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Registered User
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Metro NYC
Posts: 2,718
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Next Time Dennis Plays Tonic...
Just read this review in the Times and it made me hungry... (I just finished breakfast, fer chrissakes!) and thought I should post it here for your "edification......" Location is convenient, too...
Italian, From the Region Near Whimsy
By FRANK BRUNI
When I walked into Petrosino about a month ago, I was suspicious. A friend had described it as a straightforward restaurant with hearty Italian fare, and I had made assumptions and extrapolations, filling in and rounding out that vague picture. I foresaw lighting that was too bright or too dark, generic décor and an unabashed emphasis on the frumpy over the faddish.
But to my surprise what I encountered was a stylish room with orange-tinted lights and, along two walls, vertical rows of barren birch branches that formed dense, enticingly spooky petrified forests. Petrosino, which opened with little fanfare more than two years ago, has the good fortune of a corner lot and the good sense to make the most of it, maximizing its northern and western exposures with a series of French doors onto the sidewalks. On this warm night, those doors were open, and the sheer white curtains that flanked them fluttered in a summer breeze.
All of this was commendably attractive, even hip. But did it presage a version of Italian food that veered toward self-consciousness or ethnically indistinct trendiness and away from its innately earthy charms? I was afraid.
Then I plunged a hunk of spongy no-nonsense bread into a bowl of thick tomato sauce, and fear gave way to relief and gratitude.
In these crazy, carbohydrate-phobic times, many restaurants do not know what to do with bread service, which has come to approximate an apology: a few pathetic rolls on a distant corner of the table; a tentative server with outstretched tongs and a poignantly timid smile. Petrosino throws caution to the wind. It provides a brimming paper bag of ciabatta and focaccia and a bowl of tomato sauce for each diner, encouraging everyone to dip away.
In the process Petrosino sends the signal that is has no airs (or at least very few of them) and indeed cares first and foremost about sating you: perhaps with a plate of tissue-thin prosciutto or with a bowl of mussels or with a moist mound of braised beef over creamy polenta. Its decorative flourishes reflect not pretentiousness but a desire for prettiness. Why not tickle the eye as well as the stomach?
Petrosino is sensible that way: eager to please, intent on making special, thoughtful gestures within the context of moderate prices and a modest Lower East Side location. (The hot zone of Schiller's Liquor Bar and WD-50 is a few crucial blocks away.)
I love its concise wine list, which focuses on southern Italy (Apulia, Campania, Sicily) and showcases less widely known varietals and grapes (falanghina, nero d'avola). More than half of the roughly 30 reds and whites can be ordered by the glass. I like the way Petrosino has tiny hooks for shoulder bags under the lip of the bar, which is distinguished by a long, slender moat with votive candles and flower blossoms floating in it.
And I really like the food here, especially in relation to its price. Most of the half-dozen pasta dishes cost $13, which buys a generous portion, and two-thirds of those dishes are terrific.
The garganelli with prosciutto, peas and cream leans just hard enough on the prosciutto and just easy enough on the cream to be pleasantly salty but not unpleasantly soupy. The rigatoni with Italian sausage and peas was another standout — also robust, also restrained. The trofiette with shiitake mushrooms, truffle butter and Parmesan is recommended primarily for diners who have just completed triathlons or a long grub-noshing stint on the latest "Survivor."
Petrosino's chef, Patrick Nuti, who grew up and learned to cook in Tuscany, does not really favor any region of Italy over another. He occasionally borrows ideas from elsewhere around the Mediterranean. He pairs a Greek yogurt and cucumber sauce with a fillet of wild salmon for an entree. He puts couscous in a colorful and delightful appetizer salad of octopus and grapefruit.
My favorite appetizer — walnut-encrusted scallops mixed with sautéed porcini mushrooms and dusted with caviar — owes more to Mr. Nuti's whims than to Italian tradition. The caviar actually adds nothing to the dish, and represents a rare example of Petrosino puffing out its chest. It is usually happier to be lusty than luxurious, and so one of the other appetizers is a mash of chicken livers over a pool of polenta.
The kitchen could be more consistent. While I rarely get monkfish as moist as the medallions that Petrosino served me one night, I have Ferragamos less leathery than the outer edges of the pork chop that came my way on another. On a third night, the salmon fillet was overcooked, but a server noticed that as he placed it on the table and, before we could say a word, insisted on replacing it with a new one.
Extremely affable service is one of Petrosino's virtues. A friend was too stuffed to try any of the desserts, which include a Nutella-flavored ricotta cheesecake that is about 10 times better than it sounds, and asked if the kitchen happened to have any fresh fruit. Our server said she would check. Minutes later, she produced a gorgeous plate of sliced bananas, strawberries and apples.
Although Petrosino was seldom full when I went, it has done well enough over its short life span that, in July, Mr. Nuti and his business partner, Antonio Bellomo, opened a less expensive sister restaurant, Canapa, next door. Canapa has an entirely different menu, including about seven kinds of individual pizzas, and it offers brunch.
But it has the same creative, adventurous wine list as Petrosino's and the same orange glow, the one I initially saw as a warning. I was wrong, of course, and the friend who steered me to Petrosino was right: its charms are mostly straightforward; its cuisine, hearty. Sure, it gussies up itself and its plates a bit. That is not a function of vanity but of pride, and it is no reason for prejudice.
Petrosino
**
190 Norfolk Street (East Houston Street), Lower East Side; (212) 673-3773.
ATMOSPHERE A softly, warmly lighted room with French doors onto the sidewalk, orange accents and, against two walls, forests of birch branches.
SOUND LEVEL Fairly loud when crowded; the music volume is excessive.
RECOMMENDED DISHES Octopus salad with grapefruit; walnut-encrusted scallops; prosciutto plate; cavatelli with veal ragout; rigatoni with sausage and peas; garganelli with prosciutto and peas; ricotta cheesecake with Nutella.
WINE LIST Concise, reasonable and very interesting, with a concentration on whites and reds from southern Italy.
PRICE RANGE Appetizers, $7 to $13; pasta dishes, $12 to $13; entrees, $16 to $20; desserts, $7.
HOURS Sunday through Thursday, 6 to 11:30 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 6 p.m. to midnight.
RESERVATIONS Weekdays a day in advance; three days for a weekend night.
CREDIT CARDS All major cards.
WHEELCHAIR ACCESS Accessible.
WHAT THE STARS MEAN:
(None)|Poor to satisfactory
*|Good
**|Very good
***|Excellent
****|Extraordinary
Ratings reflect the reviewer's reaction to food, ambience and service, with price taken into consideration. Menu listings and prices are subject to change
__________________
hp
"Life's short, drink well."
www.feastivals.com
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