Gray and Grizzled Food Fan

The motto of Yorkville, we’re boring, but we’re nice, not we’re boring, boorish and snotty.

1) Elaine’s: Maybe once a haven for starving artists. Now a crusty club for B-listers with Disco attitude. It’s Le Cirque-lite. Mediocre food, brushoff at the door and elastic pricing are holy trinity of kissoffs. Rarely felt worse walking in or out of a restaurant.

2) Elio’s: A WASPy Elaine’s with better food and almost as much attitude. Greenwich on 2nd Avenue. Dismay at the door if you’re unknown. Prices too high, service from another century, but there’s some pleasure on the plate.

3) Café Boulud: Tweedy, but really nice tweed. Experiences vary; mine was horrendous. Had absolute worst high-end meal of my life here. Not rich nor masochistic enough to put up with long wait in lobby, cramped table next to host station and incredibly erratic pacing provided by impossibly arrogant servers. Only time I’ve ever written a restaurant without receiving a response, twice. Manager wouldn’t even give mailing address over the phone: Now that’s attitude.

4) Sfoglia: Spigolo’s without the love. Why go when consistent food and kinder cooks are so close by? Try Uva if Spigolo and Etats-Unis are too crowded.

5) La Tour: Wine poured to the rim with speed and dedication of a fraternity hell week challenge. Reds served inexcusably warm (all wine is virtually mulled). Occasional success on the plate (tarte tatin was good every fourth visit) marred by upselling, beverage service lapses and stew-meat steaks.

This entry was posted on December 7, 2006 at 11:11 pm and is filed under Overrated Foodie Finds, Yorkville. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.