Restaurant Week Part One: “This has a strange flavor…”
January 24, 2007 by karen
“…I think it might be anus.” said Alex as he took a bite of his dessert last night at Butter. What I believe (or hope) he meant was anise, which is probably more delicious.
Last night Alex and I headed to Butter to kick off one of our three restaurant week outings (we’re gluttons). I have been wanting to try Butter for some time now and since it ended up on the restaurant week list, it seemed like a good time to go.
We started off the evening at the bar with a blackberry margarita and a butter martini (pineapple, something and something). Delicious! The main floor of Butter was quite beautiful, but as we enjoyed our drinks at the bar, we guessed, as restuarant week guests, we would probably be escorted to the basement for dinner. A few minutes later the snooty hostess did just that. The downstairs dining room was also nice, but could best be described as a fancy restaurant version of Camp—the little lodge bar on Smith street.
Once seated, our overtly friendly waiter greeted us with menus and a smile. Alex ordered the shrimp with corriander and kale, short ribs, and upside down apple cake. I ordered the clam chowder, Florida (fancy!) grouper and mocha chocloate mousse cake. We topped off our early cocktails with a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc. Needless to say, we needed a good walk after dinner.
Each dish was quite delicious, particulary Alex’s shrimp and my grouper, which was served with artichoke purree and grilled baby onions. The waiter was consistently friendly throughout the night—providing more information than was necessary about the ingredients in our dishes, or leaning over quite closely to comment on how good our dinners looked. Dude, you work here, you know how good our dinners look. It was sort of like having Chuck Palahnuik wait on your table.
The desserts were good, and offered us the best laugh of the night when Alex tried to determine the “special” spice in his ice cream, but they were no match for the first two dishes.
Alex gave Butter a B/B+, and I would say they deserve a solid B+. Had we sat upstairs and not had to deal with the host staff, I probably could have offered up an A-.
Tags: alex, karen
Posted in Food & Drink, New York
January 31st, 2007 at 3:52 pm
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