$30 for Two Meatballs is Criminal
Restaurant second chances and the most exciting hospitality news of the year (for me, at least)
Remember my tear about overhyped restaurants? If you’ve been here long enough to recall that, you’re a loyal reader. If not, you can catch up here:
Where Does The "Hype" End?
I wish the hide keyword function could be applied to real life. If I could go a week without having to hear, or say, the word “hype,” I would feel a lot better. The word itself, transmuting from a noun to a verb, has dominated our digital vernacular. It is the caption of every reel, it is mentioned in articles, it is written about in cultural criticisms…
This week’s letter, though, is a softer take—a reconsideration. This is a category of restaurants I was underwhelmed by, that weren’t quite the rave-worthy experiences I was expecting. Sometimes there was one great dish, sometimes a well-executed ambience, but the through line here is that the whole experience didn’t add up. However…I feel like I have to go back and try again. I’m not too proud for second chances!
A few disclaimers for this week’s letter, and for reading restaurant reviews in general.
The table sitting next to you could be having the best meal of your life while yours is mediocre. Maybe you ordered wrong, maybe their service is better, maybe you got a rogue overcooked piece of meat. Our single meals at any given business is just one tiny a blink in the lifespan of a restaurant. None of us are the arbiter of something being Good or Bad or Great or Awful.
Restaurants deserve a grace period after opening. It is usually a good idea to wait a spot out rather than rushing in during week one. There are exceptions, of course, and sometimes I love an opening night reservation for a new spot I am extra excited about. The point is, let the pros work out their kinks and flesh out their menus. No one has it all figured out right out the gate.
Anyways, please tell me that I am wrong in the comments and stay tuned for an exciting Table Talk at the end of the letter.
Theodora
I was under the impression this was the Best Restaurant to open in 2024. I’d seen it splashed across Instagram a thousand times, but people were making genuinely compelling cases. A new Mediterranean destination with homemade breads and a wood-fired oven so close to home! So easily sold. This visit was in September— hey had people lining up at opening for bar seats, and reservations were impossible to come by. I was one of the walk-ins vying for a bar stool, and would have been particularly bummed had we missed that first turn.
Overall, I thought yeah, this is good. The stretchy Kubaneh with a trio of sauces for ripping and dipping was delicious and salty, and ultimately a good bread app. I’ve never been mad about any sort of freshly baked carb, but I also wasn’t blown away. We had a mackerel salad that was tangy and fishy, with a nice assortment of textures between the diced vegetables and the soft fish, but felt overrun by large chunks of tomato with not enough salt. This was classified as a salad but felt more like the crudo for a person who is afraid of raw fish.
The whole butterflied trout was also good, half covered in a spicy harissa sauce and the other coated in an herby chermoula. For a $45, hefty entree that seemed to be a promising order, I was underwhelmed. Having had the whole fish with parsley and adobo at Contramar that Theodora seems to be mirroring here, this was nothing to write home about. The special tuna collar, though, was perfect. Coated in a savory honey glaze with an herby green sauce, it was rich and fatty with a sweetness that perfectly balanced the fish’s char. I wish it had been 3x bigger. We finished with a baklava sundae that was a bit too sweet, but all flavors I know and love. It all just fell a bit flat, especially against rave reviews coming from all sides.
I want to go back and do it all differently. I would load up on bay leaf mezcal, go heavy on the fish cooked on the Mangal grill, and get the chocolate cake I was eyeing all night but was too full for by the end of the meal. I also definitely wouldn’t go to great lengths for a table, so if the stars align, I will be thrilled to give it another go.
Una Pizza Napoletana
One of the best pizzerias in the world!!!! I was so excited to go to Una in May of 2022, now three whole years ago, as they landed in the Lower East Side. They were already well on their way to receiving every admirable press hit.
Anthony Mangieri is an expert, there is no doubt about it. The self-taught pizzaiolo (incredible word) has been crafting Neapolitan pizzas for decades and has gotten his well-deserved flowers. Sitting in Una, though, the level of the occasion was…confusing. Unadorned wood tables line a relatively bare-bones space. The details of the interior itself don’t matter though—seats are full, and everyone’s eyes are at the back of the space. A large glass window peers into a seamless operation, dough is stretched, topped, and thrown into a wood-fired oven. Each stage has been boiled down to a science by the cook trusted with the job, and they take their task seriously as they reach for the dough over and over again. It was magical to watch, and we were anxiously awaiting our pies after seeing how methodically they had been constructed.
When your very small, $30 pizza arrived, it hit the table in one piece. You are delivered scissors which, next to your Peroni, makes the whole shindig feel like a very serious DIY pizza night at home. The difference, of course, is that the pie on the table has been crafted by a mastermind, and there is a queue of a trillion people eyeing your seat.
Though this meal was three years ago, I remember it quite well. The dough was flavorful and squishy, the level of sauce on my pizza was perfect, but as I cut misshapen triangles out of the pie, I couldn’t help but feel like I had been tricked. Was this actually that good, or had it been inflated by its celebrity as a Best Of? Wouldn’t I rather eat the corner slice of the potato pie at Leo? I think this was a perfect storm of me not being obsessed with Neopolitan-style pizza (sorry I like a crunchy crust) and an imbalanced effort-to-reward ratio.
I heard they have a bouncer now. Even so, I’m willing to try again.
Eel Bar
This one hurt, and I hate to even say it out loud. Cervo’s was the NYC restaurant that made it so abundantly clear to me that the food scene in New York was different, and valuable, and worth paying attention to. Their sister spots, Hart’s, one of my most-frequented restaurants and the namesake of the newsletter, and The Fly, a perfect restaurant unflinching in its simplicity, are equally magical places. When I heard the team that had crafted my favorite neighborhood spots was opening a new joint, I was beside myself. Another place to eat fries and seafood and drink delicious wine! How lucky are we!! I stopped in last June, just as they had opened.
Here’s the thing! I went too soon. I had a great drink, I admired the beautiful space and the perfect neon lighting behind Flemish glass windows. But I had an unremarkable meal. We had smoked cheese croquettes and marinated piquillo peppers stuffed with crab. We had a plate of more marinated peppers layered with anchovies. We opted out of the potato salad with trout roe that had inundated our Instagram feeds. Our snacks were good, but they tasted like various versions of the same things—small Basque bites with little to report other than distinct flavors of oil on various veggies. The best thing we had was a butterhead lettuce salad with tetilla cheese, oregano, and sharp white onion. A really fabulous salad is important, but it wasn’t enough to save the rest of the meal. The nail in the coffin was what we thought was an entree.
The $30 meatball and fries sounded exciting because it seemed too simple. Surely for meatballs with french fries to be on the menu, it meant that the Eel Bar chef had concocted a masterful combination from an unexpected pairing. The bowl arrived and I swear it was the bowl Cervo’s serves their marinated olives in. It was maybe the size of my fist. The bowl had four meatballs which, really, I only count as two because they were the size of a generous pimiento stuffed olive. I think we got 10 french fries. Tops. The fries were not that salty and the meatballs tasted like…meatballs. All that, for $30, and was less food than our $17 green salad!!! You guys!!!
It has been nearly a year since my visit and, since then, I have gone back to all sister restaurants a handful of times. I thought this was going to be my new hangout, and instead it was a one-and-done….for now. I look forward to going back now that they have a full year of service figured out, and I know now to order differently. It is sexy in there, I will give them that.
Drumroll please for the best neighborhood news I have received this year…
Just Opened
Disco Birdies just opened in Bed-Stuy and the vibe is chicken sandwiches, fries, and champagne. Obsessed. That falafel smash patty is calling my name.
The Daphne’s team opened Arrigo’s in Ridgewood, an Italian deli sandwich set up I am really excited about.
Panca is back and now on Vanderbilt. A new Peruvian spot for a ceviche-filled summer.
The Mark spent a lot of money rebranding for summer as a clam bar. It’s cute. I still can’t afford a $50 lobster roll.
Something New
I AM GOING TO BE SO BROKE!