Filed under American, Chelsea + Meatpacking District
200 Ninth Avenue between 22nd and 23rd Streets
212/633.8033
$104 each for a group of 11, with several bottles of wine
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From Klee’s Web site, I imagined a Meatpacking District type of place where we would be screaming at each other so that we can have a conversation. It’s probably the first restaurant Web site I’ve seen where the creator is in touch with what New Yorkers are looking for these days: a blog from the chef, updated food photographs and, oh my god, a Facebook group. I expected the restaurant to be as loud as the site. I was pleasantly surprised when I walked in: Klee is a lot smaller than what I originally thought and it’s actually cozy even with eleven girls sharing a long table.
My friends had arranged for a group dinner to celebrate another’s last days of singledom. A pre-fixe dinner for $55 per person was arranged which included a choice of appetizer and a main course; mignardises were served as desserts selection. We ordered several bottles of wine to share and still, our bill only came out to $100 each.
There was chilled pea soup poured into a bowl of squid tentacles. They didn’t seem to go together, but it worked and the presentation was pretty. I opted for the beets with blue cheese. Three of them came on a rectangular plate: one gold, one red and another pink. I thought the romaine lettuce worked well with the sharp blue cheese even though the pumpernickle “soil” didn’t make a difference except to make the plate look like a mini-garden. My mahi-mahi was a bit on the bland side–such is the nature of the fish–but it came with an interesting broccoli rabe purée and a crispy potato. The grilled chicken won me over with a crumble of chicken-peanut sausage and a faint taste of corn and lemon together. It’s from Murray’s and it would have been naturally sweet anyway without all the accoutrements.
Klee was very generous with the dessert selection, a good move on their part knowing that eleven girls were eating during a bachelorette party. The sommelier was very helpful with the wine: I ended up selecting a Hungarian rosé to start and continued on with two bottles of Burgundy. The service was swift since our party took half of the restaurant space; they just wanted us to keep moving. We still closed the restaurant but I think they couldn’t complain after our hefty group bill in the end. I was equally content.
Filed under Chelsea + Meatpacking District, Spanish
240 Ninth Avenue between 24th and 25th Streets
212/242.4730
$230 for four, with a bottle of wine, with tip
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I will always be impressed when someone can make something out of almost nothing. When that something is different than usual, I’m even more in awe of the skill that comes with that thought in the first place. At Txikito, there are some skillful people in the kitchen. Take my silverfish salad. Silverfish is easy to find in Chinatown; and cheap, too. At Txikito, they toss them in a light batter, fry to make them crunchy and serve them atop a bowl of wild arugula leaves. Then there are the leeks; poached and then drizzled in vinaigrette and sprinkled with chopped boiled egg. The dish is similar to one of Blue Ribbon’s signature dishes and it worked just fine on our table full of pork. My ultimate favorite “cheap” dish was the beef tongue, made crispy and served with mustard and cornichons. I relished the fact that the other two people at our table ate them–and liked them–because they had no idea what they were eating.
And then there are the dishes that take a lot of preparation and warrant the price on the menu. I’ve eaten octopus carpaccio a few times before, but the Txikito version is one of the best ones. Perhaps tenderized by slapping each piece against a chopping board (a la Jewel Bako) and then drizzled with oil, lemon juice, marjoram and some chili, it was tender and crunchy at the same time: a texture that might be weird to some, but really good to me. The suckling pig special was the most expensive on our bill at $30, but it was succulent and tasty; the meat melting off the bones and all the fat dripping down the crispy skin–pure heaven.
The blistered serrano peppers were hotter in the end than I would have liked; the Catalan version I savored in Barcelona was much sweeter. The crab meat gratin was tasty but unexciting. The blood sausage was wrapped in crispy egg-roll skin; it killed me to pay $8 for them. The small sandwiches of unsmoked bacon seemed out of place with the dinner items, but I liked the finger-food presentation.
Our waitress was very patient and brought out everything in perfect timing and order. One of us never experienced Spanish pintxos before, so I watched the waitress patiently explain the food choices to him. We selected a lot of meat, but she made sure the seafood and vegetables came in between. On a busy Saturday night, they let us stay until 11:30pm even though we were one of the last tables around. As we exited the restaurant, our inexperienced friend said, That has got to be one of the best dinners I’ve had in a long time. Txikito is good for that, but also excellent for someone like me.
Related post/s:
El Quinto Pino has smaller bites
Compare Basque food to the Catalan version
