Today's review roundup includes: Azalea, La Palapa Rockola, La Marmite, Chestnut, Asiate
NYTimes Restaurants William Grimes gives Azalea one star (224 West 51st Street; (212) 262-0105):
. . .The kitchen really hits its stride with pastas, which are convincing across the board. Wild boar braised in Barolo wine may be the richest, most deeply flavored meat sauce I've come across at an Italian restaurant. It's served with broad, flat pappardelle, and cherry tomatoes have been deployed strategically to give off intense bursts of fruity acidity. Stubby rigatoni stuffed with seasoned ground veal, topped with crushed roasted walnuts and covered with an oozy white-truffle cream are downright dangerous. Each sublime bite gives rise to uneasy thoughts about the entree to follow. Most appetites will stop dead in their tracks with this one. A somewhat lighter alternative, equally appealing, is ravioli stuffed with veal and red cabbage in a concentrated veal sauce, but even the fish pastas tend to be rich, especially the ravioli stuffed with lobster and buffalo ricotta in a Prosecco and lobster broth.
The pastas can make the main courses seem anticlimactic, satisfying for the most part but not nearly as impassioned, or as complex. Jumbo shrimp sautéed with fresh herbs is what it says it is, and no more. A sizable tuna fillet, rolled in sesame seeds, is plain, served in a light tomato sauce with cannellini beans and fried onions. It was ordered medium-rare and came out on the far side of medium, but under no circumstances was it ever going to be an exciting dish. Pork fillet sautéed with apple purée sounds dull but isn't, thanks in part to tender, flavorful pork, and a nice-sized potato cake on the side. Baby lamb chops get the royal treatment. They're cooked in a potent reduction sauce of Amarone wine, then served with a heap of spinach sprinkled with pine nuts and raisins.
. . . The waiters are a colorful bunch. They seem to be working from a playbook not yet available in English-speaking countries, in which diners are regarded as hopeful applicants rather than customers with the power of the dollar behind them.
RECOMMENDED DISHES Duck sausage with barlotti beans; fennel and shrimp in Parmesan crust; pappardelle with boar; veal-stuffed rigatoni; lamb chops with Amarone sauce; veal in white wine and truffle cream; chocolate-banana cake; fruit tart.
NYTimes $25 and Under Eric Asimov reviews La Palapa Rockola (359 Avenue of the Americas (West Fourth Street); (212) 243-6870):
I usually try to avoid generalizations about Mexican food or anything else, but I am confident saying this: tortillas make almost everything taste better.
A simple test will prove my point. At La Palapa Rockola, a new sibling of La Palapa, the excellent Mexican restaurant in the East Village, you can order barbacoa de cordero ($17.95), lamb shank cooked slowly until the meat is soft as jam and flavored with anise-scented avocado leaves and mild ancho chilies. Eating the meat with a fork is fine, but if you take a soft corn tortilla and roll it around a few bites of the lamb, maybe with some black beans and a little hot sauce, and then eat the dish as a taco, well, then you have something truly delicious.
Perhaps it's the slight corn flavor of the tortilla, or the deceiving richness of its texture, or maybe the addition of beans and hot sauce, but the transformation of the individual components into a taco unit is a vast improvement. It works with other dishes as well. A special of roasted pork pipián ($17.95), tangy with tomatillos and lightly spicy, was full of flavor on its own yet still seemed to come alive wrapped in a tortilla. Even dry chicken in a red salsa of toasted pumpkin seeds and guajillo chilies ($17.95) evolved in the tortilla, which seemed to mellow the otherwise bitter sauce.
BEST DISHES Braised lamb; roasted pork pipián; chalupas; ceviche; tacos; guacamole; chicken enchiladas with tomatillo sauce; roasted pork with peanut and árbol salsa; cod with green pumpkin seed sauce; crepes with cajeta; tres leches cake.
Village Voice Robert Sietsema reviews La Marmite (2264 Eighth Ave.; (212)666-0653):
The national dish of Senegal was inspired by paella, which was brought to the west coast of Africa by Iberian traders in the 16th century. Made under ideal conditions around Dakar, where a cornucopia of vegetables is readily available, Senegalese thiebou djenne (pronounced "cheb-boo-jenn") rivals bouillabaisse in its perfection and complexity. Here's the recipe: Pieces of fish—usually small tuna that can be caught from pirogues—are stuffed with a paste of cilantro, garlic, and green onion, fried in palm oil, and removed. Water is added and vegetables, one by one, are boiled and pulled out. Rice is then cooked in this oily broth with bits of sun-dried stockfish and tamarind. When the rice is done it's bright red from the palm oil and highly flavored by all the ingredients that have gone before. The fish and vegetables are arranged on top of the rice, and the dish is served by the matriarch of the family, who carefully distributes each morsel.
. . . The current best is available at La Marmite, a comfortable Harlem café that was previously an Ivory Coast place called Le Grenier ("the granary"). La Marmite is named after a lidded French casserole, which is also the restaurant's logo. Like other versions around town, the cheb served there is regrettably devoid of palm oil—a concession to American health food consciousness. As a result, the signature orange color has changed to a dull brown. Marmite's cheb ($8), however, does feature four vegetables—cabbage, carrot, yuca, and eggplant. While the firm bluefish fillet that so ably stands in for tuna is not actually stuffed, it comes with a salty fish relish, and tart tamarind segments are found among the rice grains.
Citysearch reviews Chestnut (271 Smith St., Brooklyn; (718) 243-0049):
Former Savoy Chef David Wurth's small menu leans heavily on seasonal ingredients: An autumn appetizer of duck salad bursts with ripe pomegranate seeds; tender grilled octopus with peppers and turnips is a starter must for every table. Entrees continue the theme, employing earthy ingredients, often in unconventional ways. Spaghetti tossed with gorgonzola, cabbage and celery root packs an uncharacteristic bite, and the ample ribeye gets nicely spiced with the subtly sweet onion jam. Desserts, such as apple quince pie and chocolate cake, are good enough, but don't merit the loosening of a belt buckle. Instead finish with the fragrant peppermint tea, which arrives in an individual French press.
Citysearch reviews Asiate (80 Columbus Cir.; (212) 805-8881):
Begin with seared scallops served atop smooth, buttery celeriac puree and surrounded by truffle consomme, or the layered foie gras and venison terrine--a clever pairing that tames the richness of the foie. The shining star among entrees is the kobe-style filet of beef in a silken, oxtail sauce, but the suckling pig with pig cheek confit is also good. End the meal with the excellent chocolate fondant served with a fascinating fromage blanc sorbet; the deconstructed parfait is unsatisfying.