Batali

I just received my January issue of Food & Wine, and part of it is devoted to "trends" in the food world for next year. Statistically speaking, it's a bit counterintuitive to talk about trends in the future. However, it's funny to read about these supposed coming attractions, knowing that most will probably be short-lived. 'Trends' have been responsible for culinary abominations like Asian fusion and the iceberg wedge salad. I think things have to stand the test of a few years to really be called a trend. Besides, the only 'trend' in food should be that it tastes good, right?

If we can point to real (and positive) trends in the food world of late, they have to be: the branding of farms on menus, the casualization of fine dining, 'small plates' dining, and the opening of countless Italian restaurants (meaning, of course, 'real' Italian, and not red-sauce houses). The latter trend has been, in part, due to pioneers like Mario Batali, who went to Italy, discovered the joys of true Italian food, and came back to bless us with its effortless deliciousness. Add to that the fact that Italian restaurants are infinitely more profitable (less labor, cheaper ingredients) than French restaurants while maintaining a comparable level of refinement, and you have the makings of a trend. While reading 'Heat', I learned that although Batali was cooking this way for his own personal pleasure, he was lucky enough to be at the right place at the right time, which is probably the primary factor in a restaurant's success (aside from good food, of course).

Since Batali opened Po, in competition with the more Italian-American Village restaurants, there has been a veritable wave of real Italian restaurants opening up in US cities. Oftentimes, the story behind those chefs is the same: classically trained (i.e. French-trained) chefs goes to Italy, falls in love with the food, comes back wanting to share their discovery with their home country. In the Bay Area, we have Delfina, A16, SPQR, Farina, and my favorites, Dopo and Pizzaiolo. Many of these restaurants have focused on fresh pasta and Neapolitan-style pizza. Some, like Quince, have gone for more of a fine-dining route. But no one has come close to achieving what Batali has done. He now has some ownership in some fifteen or so restaurants, most in New York City, and most Italian in some way. From his flagship Babbo, one of the hardest reservations in New York, to the extremely affordable Otto, he's managed to keep the quality high while developing a true culinary empire, which defies traditional restaurant economics. Think what you will about the culture of celebrity chefs, but Batali can only be seen as good for the culinary world (except for his little mishap on PBS). Batali keeps his street cred with moves like his controversial Food Network departure, showing that while he may like enriching himself, he's not a corporate whore.

This summer, I had the opportunity to eat at several Batali restaurants, and they were all positive experiences. I'll review each one in the order I dined there:

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Otto:

I accidentally stumbled into Otto with my friend Dave when visiting New York for stages last April. It was close to midnight on a weeknight, and though they were soon closing, the place was pretty packed and felt very alive. Though it's on a quiet block near Washington Square Park, the place had a uniquely New York energy. We were sat quickly, and the service was fast and professional, if a little curt. Still, better that than friendly but incompetent service. We ate a margherita pizza, spaghetti alla carbonara, and a couple of appetizers, and walked out spending less than $20 each.

I went back to Otto several times this summer, mostly because it was near my restaurant and was open late. It is more of a testament to Batali's skill as a restaurateur than as a chef, though the food excellent, especially considering the prices. The formula is quite brilliant: a large space, with a wine bar in the front and restaurant in the back. You wait for your table with the name of a train station in Italy as your place marker, and the table appears on a "departure" board behind the host, complete with spinning blackboard letters. Very cute. The wine bar has no seats, just counter-like tables, which really packs in the revelers. The wine list is huge, and very affordable. There is nothing pretentious about Otto. In the wine bar, you can order from the antipasti menu, serving typical cold vegetable dishes like olives, peas with prosciutto, spicy Sicilian cauliflower, and Tuscan-style lentils, at $4 a pop. Not only is this extremely affordable for the diner, as these are skillfully made and with the finest ingredients, but they are great for business, as they require no preparation during service, since they are served at room temperature. Much like the treats on the counter at bars in Spain, these are what best represents a truly developed food culture. Spaghetti with sausage and escarole

The rest of the menu has some excellent salumi selections (the coppa is oustanding) for $9 a plate, fish for $8, and salads for $8. The menu changes with the seasons, and there are some daily specials, but the prices never change, and always stay this low. Otto must be doing very well in this economy. The main courses are pasta and pizza. The pasta dishes are very traditional, like carbonara or puttanesca, with some more americanized variations. Again, just a few excellent ingredients, and at price ($9) that can't be beat. This streamlining of prices must make menu-planning easy for the restaurant. The pizze are more varied in price, but still moderately-priced. They are not traditional Neapolitan pizze, but are cooked on a griddle. The crust is a little crispier and denser than a Neapolitan, but the toppings and sauce are again of the highest quality. The pizza menu is divided into two sections: one more traditional, and one with simple fresh ingredient combinations like potato, anchovy and ricotta. Again, with prices that range from $9 to $14 (for pizze that have things like prosciutto or bottarga on them), we're talking about a very good deal. Since I lived on the Upper West Side, my cheap friends and I often went to a place called Celeste that was theoretically cheap Italian food. However, the prices were a couple of bucks higher than at Otto, and the food was significantly worse. Otto was perfect for going to with friends who weren't that into food. You can get out of there with a full belly for less than $20, which is amazing for the quality of the food. Put it this way: a plate of linguini with marinara sauce at my local Olive Garden (I checked the menu online) costs $11.95, compared to Otto's $9 a plate. Yes, they have that neverending pasta bowl, but that's just gross.
Pizza con arugula e prosciutto

When Lauren came to visit, we went to Otto one night without the intention to pig out. However, a look at the menu and wine list, and we were ordering from every section of the menu: four antipasti, pasta, pizza, an excellent bottle of Sauvignon Blanc from the Bastianich label (Joe Bastianich is the wine director and partner in Otto), and the bill came to less than $100 after tax and tip. We even finished with one of their amazing gelato concoctions, which are a must-try.

I love Otto because the food, while not memorable by any means, is still excellent, and priced more affordably than most restaurants of this caliber. I highly recommend it if you're looking for a fun place to go with friends who aren't too into food. You may even spot a semi-celebrity, like Dave from Season 1 of Top Chef (who ate about five plates of food by himself at the table next to us).

Otto
One Fifth Avenue (West Village)
NYC

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Lupa

I went to Lupa one night after work, and found one of the warmest, most festive restaurant spaces I had been to in a while. Though the food at Lupa is a little more detailed than at Otto, the restaurant has a quieter version of the atmosphere in the wine bar at its sister restaurant. With its typically West Village location, it's a great place for a weeknight meal.

Lupa is the brainchild of Mark Ladner, one of Batali's proteges and the nerdy guy who is his sous-chef on Iron Chef America. I once had the pleasure to read the Art Culinaire issue on his work, and he is one of the rare intellectuals of the food world. His respect for Italian tradition is inspiring, and comes through in his food at Lupa.

The menu at Lupa follows the traditional osteria format: antipasti, primi, secondi, desserts. What Otto does in large volumes at a low low cost, Lupa does with more care and slightly higher prices. For example, the antipasti cost $6, for a slightly larger portion and a finer touch. My favorite dishes came from the 'fish' antipasti section, including a splendid whipped baccala with potatoes ($10).

The pasta is first-rate; my tagliatelle with wild boar ragu was one of the best things I've ever eaten, and I know my ragus. The secondi are very simple, but executed perfectly. Again, I loved all the fish dishes I tried from that section. At prices around $20, these provide a great deal to diners.

However, my favorite part of dining at Lupa was the wine. I was lucky to be eating with someone who knew the bartender, so we were served a litany of wine tastes. Lupa was built with the wine list in mind, and my meal there contributed to my new interest in Italian wines, which I had previous shunned in favor of French and Spanish. The wine has a lot of unique selections, and the waiters know their wines.

Again, Lupa is does the casual Italian osteria right. With the West Village location, you may even thing you're in Europe somewhere. It reminds me a lot of my favorite osteria in the Bay Area, Dopo, though a little better.

Lupa
170 Thompson St (West Village)
NYC

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Casa Mono/Bar Jamon

Casa Mono is Batali's foray into Spanish cuisine. After reading Heat, you find out that it was a reward for Andy Nusser, a chef de cuisine at Babbo for years, whose passion for Catalan cuisine prompted the creation of Mono. Though it is Batali-financed and managed, Nusser is the executive chef. That is another one of Batali's skills as a restaurateur: he finds incredible culinary talents like Ladner and Nusser, nurtures them, funds their restaurants, but doesn't act like an overbearing owner, leaving them the freedom run their restaurants as they would like. Normally, those protégé-mentor relationships only last until the protégé opens his/her own place independently. However, in Batali’s case, his protégés seem to have no problem staying under his wing.

The food at Casa Mono is litany of Spanish-style dishes, mainly with influences from Catalunya. They have a varying degree of authenticity, but stay very true to their roots. Though I hate to use the word tapas when it’s not really anything but small plates, this is a fancified tapas restaurant. The traditional bar snacks are done up with fancier ingredients, and it’s easy to get addicted to the many small plates on Nusser’s menu. In a tiny kitchen and a tiny restaurant space, the flavors really remind the diner of being in one of the many small and exquisite restaurants in Barcelona.

My favorites included bacalao croquettes with a unique and delicious orange aioli, and a piece of seared foie gras with a sweet onion relish. What Nusser does best, though is the less-used cuts. The pigs’ trotters were wonderful, not too greasy and beautifully seasoned, as was the lamb’s tongue.
Bacalao croquetas with orange aioli

Again, this restaurant offers a great combination of festive atmosphere with quality, reasonably priced food. I spent around $25 and got to try many different dishes, including wine. Since it’s a little removed from the buzz of the East Village, it’s a great place to come before a night out. I also highly recommend trying the charcuterie from the adjacent Bar Jamon.

Casa Mono/Bar Jamon
52 Irving Place (Union Square/Murray Hill)
NYC

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Babbo:

My ‘last supper’ in New York was at Babbo. Babbo is Batali’s flagship restaurant, the one that started his culinary empire. Ten years later, it’s still almost impossible to get a weekend reservation there, and it’s tough on weeknights too. I got myself a seat at the bar on a Tuesday night, and at 5.30pm, the restaurant was packed. It’s on a lovely block off Washington Square Park, and has a more stately feel than Otto, Lupa, and Mono. That night, the pre-theater crowd really was a pre-theater crowd. Neil Diamond was in town to play Madison Square Garden, and many of the tables were packed with characters straight out of the Sopranos, ready for the big concert. Jersey was representing, and the bartender and bar clientele had a good laugh about it. (Sorry if I offended anyone with that, but it was really amusing).

The menu at Babbo isn’t too differently structured from Lupa’s, but the food is less traditional, or at least less rustic. There’s also a much greater selection. The menu digs around Italy’s deep culinary heritage to go beyond the classics and find new and interesting dishes. They started me off with a crostini of marinated ceci beans, which seemed almost large enough to be an appetizer. My appetizer of grilled octopus with fennel, lentils and limoncello vinaigrette was simply outstanding. It’s not hard to cook octopus, but you have to pay attention to it. If grilled, it has to be done on a very hot grill so that the outside chars nicely but the inside doesn’t cook for too long. This octopus was expertly grilled, had crispy skin and the desired consistency of moist chicken, and the refreshing salad of lentils that accompanied it was subtle and well-seasoned. The limoncello vinaigrette was an unusual way to bring acid to the dish, and added a subtle hint of licorice to the plate.

My primi of black spaghetti, salami, rock shrimp and green chile was also phenomenal. Though the shrimp themselves were a little bland, the pasta has a wonderful essence of the sea, and the little pieces of fried spicy salami were an incredible foil for the oceanic flavor. With the delicate spice of the chile, the dish was a tour de force in balance on the plate.

I finished with the excellent olive oil gelato. With a glass of wine, the three course meal came in at under $50, which makes Babbo quite affordable for the quality of the food. The service is extremely professional, and their wine director is one of the foremost authorities on Italian wines in New York. I’ve heard people say Babbo has slipped in recent years, but it seemed to be on top form when I went there. Now if I could just go to Esca and Del Posto, I would be a very happy Batali fan.

Babbo
110 Waverly Place (West Village)
NYC

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I love Mario Batali. That's all I have to say.