Untitled - Wine & Spirits Magazine

Untitled


photo by Alice Gao

Grilled monkfish, black garlic and lobster glaze

Sandwiched between the Hudson River and the southern terminus of the High Line, the Whitney Museum’s new home is the latest transformation of NYC’s Meatpacking District. Renzo Piano designed the cantilevered building, creating a sheltered public space below and a glassed-in restaurant that looks stark and minimalist from the outside. Inside, wooden tables form a line under fi ve enormous peach-colored domes; their warm light over the blond wood of the bar at the open kitchen makes the space seems comfortable and welcoming, especially as Michael Anthony’s food starts arriving. Try the fluke with lime, fish roe and pickled jalapeño. Eduardo Porto Carreiro, formerly of Boulud Sud and DBGB, would suggest the Stein Mosel Blue Slate Dry Riesling, and it’s a perfect fit. His list includes a number of Loire reds to play against the vegetable section of the menu: A postmodern take on roast carrots and a cauliflower curry works particularly well with Clos de Maulévrier’s Franc de Pied Ante Phylloxera, Marc Plouzeau’s cabernet franc from own-rooted vines. By the time the chicken arrives, roasted and fried, with tatsoi and dill sauce, the wine is hitting its stride and Untitled feels like a modern art atelier with the city on consignment behind the glass.


April 2016 Update: Danny Meyer’s team at Union Square Hospitality Group is busy reinventing the museum restaurant, having conquered MoMA and now wrestling with the Meatpacking District at Renzo Piano’s new Whitney Museum of American Art. Tucked under the massive building, in what looks to be a stark, glass-enclosed cafeteria, you’ll find the warmth of Michael Anthony’s cooking and the brilliance of Eduardo Porto-Carreiro’s wine selections. The list is everywhere you want to be, whether that’s Champagne, Loire, Mosel, Chablis or the Rhône, with enough depth in all the right places, and enough interest in tiny esoteric spaces to keep you coming back.


April 2017: Whether you come for the art and stay for dinner, or come for the wine and just soak in Renzo Piano’s dramatic, sun-drenched space, there are plenty of reasons to return, thanks to Eduardo Porto Carreiro’s wine list. It’s everywhere you want to be, if that happens to be Champagne, Loire, Mosel, Chablis or the Rhône, with enough interest in esoteric places to keep you coming back.


Update 2020: Untitled has turned into a casual café and both Porto Carreiro and his successor in managing the list, Michael Engelmann, have moved on.

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Joshua Greene is the editor and publisher of Wine & Spirits magazine.


This story appears in the print issue of August 2015.
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