Food and Drink Review

On a recent Tuesday night, the bar at Abe & Arthur’s was manic with cougars on the prowl and graying lotharios. We fought our way to the hostess stand, where a lithe trio would decide our seating fate. Would we be relegated upstairs to Siberia—far from the action on the second-floor balcony? Or escorted downstairs to the most deafening dining room in New York?

While plenty of New York restaurants have lately made the environment a priority—sourcing their ingredients locally and crafting dining rooms from salvaged materials—none have done so with quite as much visual and gastronomic panache as chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s new ABC Kitchen.

A juice and smoothie extension to Jean-Georges Vongerichten's market-driven restaurant ABC Kitchen has opened, with a similar focus on organic, seasonal produce, much of it purchased from the nearby Union Square Greenmarket. 

Since making his stateside debut in 1985, Jean-Georges Vongerichten has conquered Gotham's dining scene with cuisines as diverse as the city itself: upscale French at his flagship Jean Georges; New American at downtown charmer Perry St; and clubby Southeast Asian at Spice Market in the Meatpacking District. Now the toque gives Latin America a bump with this highly anticipated sibling to ABC Kitchen, his lauded temple to haute green cuisine, in ABC Carpet & Home. 

When he sends out authentic Greek food at Molyvos, executive chef Jim Botsacos is only telling half the story: his father’s. Now, as chef-partner at Abboccato (“touch of sweetness”), he pays tribute to his Italian mother. Each dish is associated with a region of Italy, such as Umbrian-style quail and octopus with Sicilian oregano. To make his carbonara taste like the real thing, Botsacos uses richer, more flavorful duck eggs. His vaniglia e cioccolato, meanwhile, combines two classic dishes: vanilla-scented veal cheeks and wild boar stewed in red wine, spices and chocolate. It’s dinner and dessert rolled into one.

Smørrebrød—the open-faced Danish sandwiches—arrive on the New York sub scene with this modernist cafe. House-made rye is topped with ingredients like beef tartare or chicken salad and baked root vegetables. Drinkers can throw back a shot of homemade aquavit to go with the Northern European fare. The minimalist 45-seat spot channels Scandinavian cool with white oak floors and chairs by Danish designer Arne Jacobsen. 

Spice is at the heart of Indian cuisine, at Aabhar we strive to overlay one carefully-selected spice over another, to create a rich, delicious texture in our food. At Aahbar we serve mainly North Indian food, which is not necessarily hot but is well spiced.

When an ambitious restaurant opens on fringe territory in New York, critics and buzz prospectors have a collective conniption. We trip over ourselves to declare a neighborhood an up-and-comer—Bed-Stuy, Harlem, Long Island City—fanning down our excitement like a pack of overheated Scarlett O’Haras. That’s the tragic thing about a great chef planting a flag on virgin turf: The neighborhood story tends to overshadow the culinary one.