Saturday, February 09, 2013

Lincoln Center's ATLANTIC GRILL makes NYC's Restaurant Week random (2-8-13)

I made it to NYC yesterday for a weekend of opera just before the NEMO Blizzard hit and the airports closed. I heaved myself through the wind and snow about 7 blocks from my hotel to try the highly-rated ATLANTIC GRILL just a block from Lincoln Center (http://www.atlanticgrill.com).
It's quite a large place and quite pricey, but I expected better as I have always enjoyed dining at the BR Guest localities and always loved it's sister Blue Fin, down at Times Square.
Maybe the Restaurant Week menu was too limited or lacked love...I guess I have to try the much more expensive ala carte menu at another time to find out.
The parkerhouse rolls and tasty nutty bread roll were good, but not warm, and the butter was whipped nicely for spreading. The wines are all about $12-19 by the glass and I enjoyed my Framingham Sauvignon Blanc 2009 from New Zealand, but kept it to one glass (it is a good pour from a tiny carafe) as I had a long opera.
A young woman brought over a small shot glass of tasty Cauliflower Soup "from the chef," as an amuse. I noticed this was her only job around the entire restaurant all evening.
I chose the SKUNA BAY SALMON & SHRIMP MAKI ROLL with Shiso, Cucumber and Miso-Yuzu Sauce which was a nice 6 -piece sushi portion.
The restaurant is seafood centric and specializes in sushi and raw bar specialties as well, and while this was nice, I have been more impressed recently (like at Natsumi in Times Square a couple of weeks ago).
I wanted fish and the 3 main courses were steak, pasta with seafood or the SCOTTISH SALMON a la Plancha, which I chose and came with Chive Spaetzle, Braised Red Cabbage, Almonds and a Cider Beurre Blanc Sauce.
The dish was indeed tasty and the salmon, with its crispy skin atop, superb.
Only the cabbage was too intense and indeed overpowered the sauce and the entire dish. I adored the tasty small spaetzle and more of these would have been welcome as they were quite small and spread out. The portion was a good size, but it was just not well thought out.


I chose the Lemon Meringue Tart for dessert which came with Strawberry Sorbet on a bed of chocolate crunch and a dash of Vanilla Anglaise. It was a good lemon flavor, but the pastry was a dud. I could only remember my Passion Fruit Meringue from Empellon Taqueria in the West Village last month (the one drizzled with Mescal and that soft mezcal infused meringue). The pastry chef at Atlantic Grill had little love for this basic and unexciting tart.


Tonight--TELEPAN for a tasting.(NYC does not offer Restaurant Week on Saturdays at most locations)