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Scarpetta
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"Very few people ever turn down the second bread basket," said the waiter as he brought another. One reason is the caponata, a meltingly tender mix of eggplant and tomato that trades out the typical sweet touches for a subtle note of anchovies. Then there's the butter, which is whipped with marscarpone and sprinkled with crunchy flakes of salt. Both are indicative of Scott Conant's cooking: seemingly simple but brilliantly tweaked. Sommelier Jeffrey Tascarella's wine list is similar: Among the usual suspects for an upscale Italian restaurant (many vintages of Aldo Conterno Barolo) hide unusual gems, like a rosé Prosecco from Collabrigo or an '03 Trebbiano d'Abruzzo from Emidio Pepe. A perfect meal here could consist of a glass of wine and the fresh burrata with pickled eggplant eaten at the bar in the front room, or the full-on Italian treatment with a pasta course in the sleek dining room with the retractable roof. Either way, accept the bread: you'll want it to fare la scarpetta, sop up the sauce left on the plate.
—Tara Q. Thomas
Scarpetta, 355 W. 14th St., (btw 8th & 9th Ave.) NYC; 212-691-0555; scarpettanyc.com
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How to Cook a Wolf
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How to Cook a Wolf Over the past year, Seattle has seen an explosion of microrestaurants —intimate spaces with casually exquisite food.
One of the best of this new breed is How to Cook a Wolf, the third venture from Union chef Ethan Stowell. Paneled in blond wooden slats
and sheets of hammered copper, the 23-seat restaurant features a menu of small plates and pastas. Sommelier Angela Stowell has a fondness
for small-production wineries from France and Italy (pinot grigio from Alto Adige's Peter Zemmer, Les Granges from Chinon's Baudry),
mirroring her husband's love for slightly arcane ingredients like hedgehog mushrooms, beef tongue, and crab apples, which he seeds
into simple, seasonal fare.
- Jonathan Kauffman
2208 Queen Anne Ave. N., Seattle;
206-838-8090; howtocookawolf.com
(reviewed W&S 6/08)
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Local
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Local Kitchen & Wine Merchant, located down the block from the new Rincon Hill residential tower, is a neighborhood spot that's arrived
before construction of the new neighborhood has finished. Partners Oola Fendert and Mark Bright have filled a high-ceilinged warehouse
space with a casual Mediterranean–California restaurant (think wood oven pizza, rotisserie chicken or smoked duck salad), sleek wine bar
and a wine retail shop with food to go. Bright's eclectic wine list–which ranges from Lebanon's Château Musar to grand cru Burgundy from
Ramonet–is a draw for locals and non-locals alike.
- Wolfgang M. Weber
Local Kitchen & Wine Merchant, 330 First St., San Francisco; 415-777-4200; sf-local.com (reviewed W&S 6/08)
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Terroir
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Paul Greico has never been one to make "easy" wine lists. Ever since his days at Gramercy Tavern, he's delighted in turning people
on to the obscure (say, Canadian gamay) and underappreciated (German riesling). At Insieme, his newest full-scale restaurant with chef
Marc Canora, the hotel setting means he can't go too wild. Not so at Terroir, the shoebox-sized wine bar he and Canora have opened up
a few doors down from Hearth, their East Village restaurant. At first glance, the scene looks like a bunch of high schoolers had a party
and left their three-ring notebooks behind. The notebooks–covers scrawled with graffiti such as "Riesling rules" or "Amo, Amas, Amaro"–turn
out to be the wine lists. If you show up before 6 pm, you can order off the special $5-a-glass menu, or dive right in to explore lovely,
high-acid gems like a sparking Vértice Bruto from the Douro, a golden asprinio from Giu-seppe Cicala in Campania, or a Long Island cabernet
franc from Schneider. Acid sparks the appetite, so order food, particularly anything under "fried stuff," which includes lamb sausage-stuffed
sage leaves, a dish Canora made famous at Craftbar.
- Tara Q. Thomas
Terroir, 413 E. 12th St., NYC;
646-602-1300, wineisterroir.com (reviewed W&S 6/08)
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