I got the chance to visit Resto on Park Avenue the other week. This was before the New York Magazine four star bonanza; presumably I’ll never be able to get a table ever again, if Resto inspires the same kind of devotion as Momofuku does. You know, it used to be that the people milling outside a restaurant at noon on a Tuesday here in the East Village were homeless or drug addicts, but now all they want are pork buns and ramen. I suppose they all want spoons one way or the other.
Nonetheless, Resto is an excellent Belgian restaurant, a dying breed here in New York. Markt was downsized after being pushed out by the Apple store, of all things; Bruxelles is hardly a cozy place to eat, and Petit Abeille is good for what it is, namely a Belgian version of Ruby Tuesdays. And who remembers the days of Belgo? Maybe Burp Castle bought their surplus robes on the cheap.
It’s surprising that the Belgian restaurants didn’t remain popular; as a restaurateur, there’s so much potential for markup, from nine and ten dollar plus beers to plenty of stews (cough cheap meats cough) and “stoemp”, called mashed potatoes anywhere else.
I guess this makes me a Belgian food snob, and while Resto isn’t “authentic” Belgian, that’s probably a good thing. It’s what I’d call rock n’ roll Belgian instead. Just look at the amazing deviled egg: Served atop “pork baguette”, the chef actually takes guanciale, minces it with bread crumbs and sticks it in the fryer, turning it into a “baguette” on which the egg is served. It’s pork sex on toast. I was also impressed with the carbonnade, which was refashioned with beef cheeks and stewed with all sorts of delicious things (in fact, it read like a tale of Saturday night and Sunday morning, as it’s made with coffee, beer, and whisky) and is far superior to any of the sad strips of beef that typically comprise carbonnade.
The niggles come when they stray from Belgian strengths: the fries are wimpy and the chocolates, while creatively served like a cheese plate, are not from the Low Countries. But best of all: there wasn’t a single picture of Tin Tin to be found inside the whole joint.
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