My road to hell is apparently being paved with receipts from dozens and dozens of restaurants signifying my good intentions of writing about the good, the bad and the just okay (and, also, too, the surprisingly not bad). So I\u2019m forcing myself to type about our latest meal out, the one where my consort noted we had had all appetizers the night before and I had to ask: Where did we eat last night?<\/p>\n
(Mermaid Inn on Amsterdam<\/a>, FTR, which was, yet again for like the eighth time since it expanded, close to perfect \u2014 points off for no \u201cbread\u201d offered, but we didn\u2019t need it given that we were eating light with oysters on the half-shell [for Bob], fried calamari, wedge salad and grilled octopus with frisee, gigante beans and paprika aioli [again for Bob; I ain\u2019t eatin\u2019 no near-human]).<\/p>\n I actually had done a little research before we headed down to IFC for the amazing \u201cCameraperson,\u201d<\/a> so we were able to resist the fine-and-affordable siren song of Baker & Co.<\/a> in order to stroll a couple of blocks north to the new Seabird<\/a>, downtown relative of Mountain Bird<\/a>, that awesome East Harlem destination that unfortunately represents a paving stone on my cluttered-desk highway (thanx again, Cheese Jenkins). It was only 7:30 or so and there were actually sidewalk tables available, but we headed into the din for our dinner.<\/p>\n I could complain about the table being too small, but the servers were too friendly; our main one jokingly offered to eat what she recommended if we didn\u2019t like it although we would still pay. We took the cheaper of her recommendations, passing on the $32 bouillabaisse after she translated it as if we were rubes. Salmon poke with avocado and seaweed was about 10,000 times better than I expected, with the perfect balance among fatty, fatty and tangy. Crab and artichoke cheese dip was like a flashback to the TGIFriday\u2019s 35 years ago where we agreed to move to NYC, but with real artichokes and real crab and good chips for dipping. \u201cFried oyster taco\u201d proved to be three, each with a huge fried mollusk set over coleslaw (marred by celery). Ms. Charming apparently forgot to put in our last order, for the \u201ccrab lasagna mac-and-cheese,\u201d because it took forever, but it was worth the wait, with an insane amount of lump crab in and atop the creamy shells with a touch of tomato sauce. Our $44 bottle of albari\u00f1o was poured a little too fast, but maybe that\u2019s because we were thirsty from the #bestintownpopcorn. WIGB? Absolutely, but only in a party of two able to lip-read.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" My road to hell is apparently being paved with receipts from dozens and dozens of restaurants signifying my good intentions of writing about the good, the bad and the just okay (and, also, too, the surprisingly not bad). So I\u2019m forcing myself to type about our latest meal out, the one where my consort noted… Continue reading