New York minutes/Early March 2008
The painfully slow: Community Food and Juice, where the hostess ushered me to the bar without offering a table when I showed up alone at lunch and where I could barely stand after teetering on the bone-contorting stool while waiting just short of forever for food in a half-empty room. Forget my glass of wine — I was worried I was going to finish my book before a simple fluke sandwich arrived. It wasn’t bad, although it was about four universes away from the Pearl rendition. The fish was very fresh but all out of balance with the bread and lettuce, and the sauce on it literally dripped. It came with a little bit of good coleslaw and a few tasteless zucchini pickles for $13, no extra charge for bloat; I would have been better off dropping $4 on my Metrocard to spend $3 more on Cornelia Street. On the plus side, the bartender was excellent, even explaining when she saw my look of horror as she handed me menus that she was wearing her gross rubber gloves because she was about to cut lemons. WIGB? Maybe, but not when I’m in a hurry or hungry. The ingredients and organic wines are well sourced. 2893 Broadway at Columbia, 212 665 2800.
The painfully raucous: Les Halles, where two friends and I headed in desperation after being shunted to the bar at Resto and where we realized too late that we should have stayed shunted. Everyone at Resto was eating the burger, which looked good even to me, and I’m off beef for the foreseeable future. But the heat was blasting on us, and we were at the bar, so we headed around the corner after one friend went ahead to be sure a table was available. Of course it was one between two groups of what the place attracts after dark: testosterone-overloaded jackasses, so we could barely hear each other and the waiters couldn’t hear for shit — first they brought one steak frites cooked not to order, then they brought a muscat after saying a muscadet was available. Our new Sicilian almond-growing friend seemed underwhelmed by his food; I couldn’t see my duck confit with one tea light on the four-top, so I kept hacking off hunks of fatty skin rather than meat. It seemed more roasted than confit, so I was very glad I was not up-sold into taking the special choucroute for $5.50 more. WIGB? Maybe for lunch, but not for a good long while.
The relatively comfortable: Regional, where three of us took a birthday girl who lives around the corner and where we at least could talk and not get gouged. My baked pasta with leeks and mushrooms was shy on the vegetables and pretty dry, but it did soak up the vermentino. WIGB? Location, location. 2607 Broadway near 98th Street, 212 666 1915.