At first glance, Poetessa could be just another of those convivial, pub-like East Village restaurants that serve cheap but run-of-the-mill food. It has a large bar, candlelit wooden tables, a pressed-tin ceiling, red leather chairs and a murky oil painting of Venice on the wall, along with framed old family photographs and old mirrors. The Read More
Who Knew? Another Tuscan
Was Just What We NeededSometimes you leave a restaurant with the memory of one dish that impressed you so much, you keep thinking about it days later. Such is the bucatini with cavolo nero served at 50 Carmine, a new Tuscan restaurant in the West Village. Cavolo nero is a black Read More
After all the dark, dreary and depressing movies I slogged my way through at the Toronto International Film Festival, I doubt if you can fully appreciate the sheer joy I felt upon returning home to Under the Tuscan Sun . The epitome of what a feel-good movie is supposed to be but rarely is, this Read More
If you’ve ever wondered how the doormen at those Fifth Avenue and Park Avenue apartment houses manage to muster such enthusiasm for their job-rushing to help building residents out of their cabs and limos, and bustling to relieve them of their shopping bags-the answer may be the underlying threat of corporal punishment that can result Read More
Does New York really need another Tuscan restaurant? Judging by the packed tables at Beppe, there are plenty of people who think so. Sitting here, it’s not hard to imagine you’re in the hills of Tuscany instead of a brand-new restaurant in the Flatiron district. The wood-beamed dining room looks like a farmhouse trattoria, with Read More
There are not many places to eat outdoors comfortably in Manhattan. And this summer there haven’t been many nights when you felt like dining anywhere without an air-conditioner. But Va Tutto (Italian for “anything goes!”), a trattoria which opened at the end of June on Cleveland Place, has a delightful garden. In this setting of Read More
“I’m sorry there are no mussels,” said our waiter as he handed us the menu. “They’re spawning now.”
Of course. So instead, we began with a selection of antipasto–but it wasn’t your usual salami, prosciutto and slab of Parmesan cheese. At Colina, a new Tuscan restaurant that opened last month near Union Square, the platter Read More
The evening got off to a bad start. We had been to a play downtown, and I had picked a restaurant I thought was near the theater. But when we emerged–late and hungry–into a driving rainstorm, this proved not to be the case and I had, of course, forgotten the exact address. After trying four Read More
You’d expect a place called Chianti to have, if not red-checked tablecloths and candles in straw-covered bottles, then at least (given its location) the sort of contemporary look–washed yellow walls and bare wood floors–favored by chic Tuscan places in New York City. But Chianti, on the corner of Second Avenue and 55th Street, feels less Read More
