chicanery

Be prepared to wait at least 30 minutes (usually closer to an hour) if you choose to eat here during peak hours. But unless it’s blizzarding out, it’s well worth the wait.

It’s not the best sushi in the city, nor is it the cheapest, but it has the best price-to-quality ratio in town. The slices of fish regularly span about three inches, and the hamachi here is pure buttery goodness.

We ordered two of everything on the menu, and couldn’t get enough. Man, Chef Terje has something AWESOME going on in this kitchen.

The space is awesome. It looks like a decent sized hallway from the entranceway, but a staircase opens up into several spacious upstairs rooms, one of which is a private room that can be booked for private parties. This isn’t one of those restaurants that crams as many tables as possible into a tiny location; the space feels comfortable.

We all converged on three pasta dishes that we all wanted to eat, but we also wanted to try as many other dishes as possible, so we ordered multiples of everything to share. Be warned that these are generous portions, so you really don’t need to order that much. We were just being dumb Americans.

Some highlights that are not to be missed: agnolotti, tajarin, and papardelle. They were simply fabulous. Skip the Carne Crudo as well as the Coppa di Testa — both had great consistency and texture, but lacked in seasoning.

Wine list is amazing. Waiter was also very accommodating and picked a wonderful barrolo for us.

I love a good oyster. Although you can go around the corner on Saturdays and pick up a dozen Kumamotos from the farm’s stall at the farmer’s market for super cheap (4 dozen for $50), you could also plop yourself down at the bar in the Ferry Building and have a nice sparkling wine or sauvignon blanc with your oysters. Nothing beats it. Oh, and if you have a dog, you can sit outside and enjoy your oysters in the sun with your pup. Much added bonus.

The views of the park are simply breathtaking, but you can accomplish something similar by going to any number of bars or restaurants at the nearby Time Warner building — and your palate will be much more satisfied.

True, I went a few months after opening, so maybe the menu just didn’t have time to congeal, but there were so many issues. Portions too large. Waitstaff too in-your-face. I got a guilt trip for not finishing my food. Are you kidding me?! Maybe if it tasted better….I ordered a duck confit with some sort of white bean ragout, and while everything was cooked properly, the flavors were just… nothing stood out. Completely forgettable.

I’m sure Nobu was cutting edge back in 1994 when it first opened, but miso black cod and yellowtail with jalapeno appears on every other menu across the nation now. It’s still good, don’t get me wrong, but for all the hype, it’s not pushing any envelopes these days.

I’m as eager as the next person to try a familiar flavor in a different texture, like the foams and gelees and granites, but I don’t think they need to be on every dish. I suppose it must be fun for the chef to make the new and exciting things, instead of turning out the same perfectly braised pork or broiled steak day in and day out. I understand the desire to spread one’s creative wings. But sometimes, the result is not always a magnificent success.

Our waiter was curiously eager to share information with us about the dishes we ordered, and disappeared at other times for much too long.

The desserts were definitely the most cutting-edge in terms of the flavors that they were marrying; however, that’s not to say that everything that can be married should be. Each dessert that we ordered had between 3-5 different parts. These were evidence that the whole is not greater than the sum of its parts.

it’s clear that those in the kitchen at Trevese know what they’re doing, but sometimes it seems as though they’re trying to do too much. Blame it on the ghost that’s said to haunt the old house in which Trevese is now located.

If you feel like having awesome appetizers and skipping straight to some fabulous dessert, all the while hanging out in a country-club atmosphere, this may be the place for you.

However, if you actually want to eat an edible entree, you would be advised to skip this restaurant all together.

I had my reservations about dining at Chez TJ. Mountain View is better known for a fabulous burrito and eclectic Asian food than as the home of any fine dining establishment. But after our meal there this week, I cannot understand why our reservations were so easy to make — with the atmospheric highs at which Christopher Kostow is operating in the kitchen, Chez TJ should be booked solid for weeks. I maintain that the restaurant is just in the wrong neighborhood.

At the restaurant, you have your choice of the 12 course Chef’s Tasting Menu, for $110, or selecting 4 courses from the “Menu Gastronomique” for $80 (fois is a $12 supplement). Since there are only 14 items on the Menu Gastronomique, it makes little sense NOT to order the Tasting Menu, although going that route unfortunately made us miss out on the trio of suckling pig. It looked amazing. In its place, though, we had a butter poached lobster (which was not on the menu gastronomique) that more than made up for it.

My favorite dish of the night was the fois gras prepared two ways. The first was a standard seared fois with some sort of strawberry compote. The fois had a perfect outside crisp to balance out the fatty goodness. The second was a fois gras creme brulee with a caramelized strawberry top. I loved the way the flavors of the creme brulee progressed in your mouth. The fois flavor settles in just as the initial creaminess is fading, followed by the sweetness of the strawberry. It was the perfect Ratatouille fireworks combination.

The aforementioned butter poached lobster had (what else) a truffle foam delicately layered over the dish. This was a GREAT use of foam! It was a good, well prepared dish.

There were only two downers to the meal: First, the “chocolate covered banana.” The turron ice cream that accompanied the banana was great. The banana center was tasty as well. But the chocolate itself – it was basically a chocolate ravioli with pureed banana inside. We were expecting a harder chocolate shell, and instead were underwhelmed with a limp, overcooked pasta sort of texture. Serious texture violation. Second, as Michael Bauer noted, the service was not nearly as precise as service at a restaurant of this caliber should be. One male waiter clearly knew what he was doing – friendly, confident with the menu, and attentive. The remainder of the wait staff, however, regularly served the men before the women, and placed the plates down at the wrong angle (which the male server promptly corrected). It’s not that the rest of the staff was incompetent or rude, but just not trained.

All in all, though, I will be returning to Chez TJ regularly.

The creative genius of Sam Mason is as apparent in his savory and sweet courses at Tailor as they were when his dessert courses outshone (in my opinion) the entrees at WD-50.

[to come]

But in this case, nothing would be lost either. Although the window view, the service, and the decor of the restaurant were stunningly appropriate, the appetizers were underseasoned, and the desserts were wrong. The good side: my bronzino was grilled to perfection. The sherbets accompanying the wrong desserts were amazing. But these things alone do not a great restaurant make.