Achilles Heel (c/o Village Voice)

180 West Street
Brooklyn, NY 11222
view map
347.987.3666

Cuisine: Bar snacks
Our Rating: ★★★★ Great
Hours: 8am – 2am • Every Day
Brunch: None
Booze: Full Bar
Subway: G to Greenpoint Ave.
Delivery: None
Website: achillesheelnyc.com

Village Voice says:

Look out the window from your seat at Achilles Heel, the new Greenpoint bar from Andrew Tarlow — whose expanding empire includes Marlow & Sons, Diner and Reynards, among others — and you’ll look straight into the shipyards, where a dock worker might be casually leaning against a brick wall and smoking a cigarette.
Historically, this address served that crowd, but after it went dark forty years ago, it remained vacant until Tarlow inked the deal for it and decided to open a cafe and bar inspired by — and meant to cater to — his neighbors across the way. “When Andrew saw this space a year ago, he fell in love with it,” explains Mike Fadem, a Marlow alum who now manages this spot. “It looked a lot like it does now. He saw it, saw the neighborhood, thought about what this was last time it was an operation, and decided to recreate that from his taste.”

That meant preserving a lot of the original details, like time-worn wood floors and the bar mantle. And it also means the spot will be serving early morning beers if it can lure in workers coming off the night shift. “People are on a different schedule on the docks,” says Fadem. “There are people out early, and it’s unique to have this kind of a place now. Back in the day, bars were open early, and in other places, they sometimes still are. But it’s not that way here anymore. But at our bar, we will serve drinks.”

The crew would also like the spot to serve as a local gathering place for the other folks who’ve moved into this nook of Greenpoint, many of which are used to trekking down to Marlow for their morning coffee fix. “There are a lot of daily customers at Marlow that live on these two blocks that don’t have to go there for their scones now,” notes the manager. That’s because thanks to a delivery service that connects all of the restaurants in Tarlow’s group, the Marlow scones are available behind the counter, as are croissants from Reynards. Those bites pair with the same ambitious coffee program that connects all of the sibling restaurants, too, with George Howell beans serving as the base for cappuccinos, espresso shots and pour-over cups brewed to order. “We have a lot of people who treat Marlow as their neighborhood coffeeshop,” explains Fadem. “So Andrew was definitely interested in opening a cafe.”

While coffee drinks will be available until 11 p.m., the place definitely turns bar-focused sometime in the mid-afternoon, when locals start wandering in for a beer (the well-edited list features drafts from Evil Twin and Pietra and bottles from ‘T Gaverhopke and Firestone) or a cocktail chosen from a classically slanted but perpetually changing short list of seasonally appropriate tipples. Bartender Craig Weinrib explains that many of those, like the Hemingway daiquiri, as well as the back bar are currently a bit rum-centric — “it’s a shipyard bar so it seems appropriate,” he says — but notes the spirits program will continue to develop, and that all bartenders can stir up classics not called out on the list.

And the wine, he says, is a big argument for drinking here, too. “The woman [Lee Campbell] who buys wine for this bar buys wine for the whole company, and she’s one of the most looked-to spokespeople for natural wine in New York. So there’s a heavy focus on her wine program, and it seems like there’s going to be a lot of people here to drink wine.” The list explores crisp white Muscadet, Grand Cru Champagne, Provencal rose, and Burgundy designation Chambolle-Musigny along with a number of more obscure varietals and geographies, which firmly plants the program in serious oenophile territory.

Eventually, says Fadem, the spot will ramp up its food program, offering oysters, meat and cheese plates and other snacks. But there will never be a kitchen, he notes, and the focus is always going to be on the bar.

Alameda

195 Franklin Street at Green Street
Greenpoint, Brooklyn
Brooklyn, New York 11222
view map
347.227.7296

Cuisine: American Bistro, Pub Fare, Small Bites
Our Rating: ★★★★
Cards: All major
Price: Entrees $10-$17, Cocktails $10
Hours: Mon – Fri: 4:00 pm – 2:00 am
Sat – Sun: 11:00 am – 2:00 am
Brunch: Weekends
Booze: Full Bar with fancy cocktails
Subway: G Train to Greenpoint Ave.
Delivery: No
Menu: Click Here
Website: www.alamedabk.com
says:

Eater says:

Evan and Oliver Haslegrave, the brothers behind the Home design company, are opening a new bar and restaurant in Greenpoint called Alameda. Brooklyn Star veterans Nick Padilla and Waine Longwell are also partners in this project. Nick will be the chef and Waine will be in charge of the bar. Alameda will inhabit the corner space that formerly housed The Greenpoint Coffee Shop and The Garden Spot Cafe.

Padilla describes this as “an American Bistro.” The chef tells Eater: “The idea is to provide a set list of raw bar itmes, salads and sandwiches and supplement it with chalkboard specials that are seasonal and frequently changing.” The restaurant will serve Blue Bottle Coffee, and the team hopes to offer dollar oysters during happy hour. Expect a full list of beer, wine, and cocktails.

The Haslegrave brothers designed Paulie Gee’s, The Manhattan Inn, Donna, Goat Town, and Torst, but this is their first time building and running a place of their own.

115 Berry Street
(@ North 8th Street)
Brooklyn, New York 11211
view map
347.763.2635

Cuisine: Italian
Our Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★
Cards: All major
Price: Entrees $15-$30
Hours: Sunday–Thursday; 6pm–11pm
Friday & Saturday; 6pm–12am
Brunch: 11:30 to 3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday
Booze: Full bar
Subway: L train to Bedford
Delivery: No
Reservations: Yes
Menu: Click here
Website: www.anticapesa.com
Gotham says:

The big, crackling fireplace across from the bar at Antica Pesa has a special history—it’s an homage to the fireplace that sits in the restaurant’s original since-1922 sister spot in Rome. Bottle-lined walls and dim lighting via modern circular ceiling lamps add to the cozy-romantic atmosphere, as does the fresh-from-Rome fare. Whatever you order—we love the family-recipe chitarra alla carbonara, guanciale pasta with Parmigiano, black pepper, egg, and Italian bacon; or the sumptuously juicy guancetta, braised beef cheek with whipped carrot and thyme puree—we suggest starting off with the gita fuoriporta. A luxe rendition of an appetizer sampler, it arrives in a wooden box, which opens to reveal a picnic-like assortment of everything from Roman pecorino and mozzarella cheeses to focaccia bread with spek to porchetta with pear sauce. End your evening with a dessert like house-made gelato, and curl up around the fire with an aperitif of Italian wine or a signature cocktail. We recommend a reservation, as New York big-names like Ivanka Trump and Mayor Bloomberg are already fans.

NY Observer says:

Restaurants where Italian food is served in charmingly ramshackle conditions are manifold. Between Fiore, Aurora, Osteria Il Paiolo and other vowel-heavy trattorie too legion to mention, wandering around the neighborhood can feel like stumbling about Cinecitta’s Palermo back lot. But that’s not Antica Pesa.

Whereas those restaurants, whether by design or default, offer a homogenized view of humble Italy, a nation of casalinghe and clotheslines, Antica Pesa—Italian for “the old scale”—presents the Italy of Loro Piana, Fiat, Brioni, Trussardi and Ferragamo. This is the Italy of oligarchs.

On a recent Saturday night, the scales were fully loaded with richesse. Every table in the high-ceilinged room was occupied by patrons who smelled nice and looked nicer. Men wore thick gray sweaters with shawl collars. Women wore Carven frocks and Isabel Marant shoes. Scarves for all, Moscots for many, New Balances for none.

The bar was crowded, but its patrons civilly spaced. Out of a silver cup, a woman sipped a Piazza di Ricci, a cocktail made of vodka, fresh raspberries, mint, lime juice, homemade ginger syrup and ginger beer. Next to her, a man nursed a negroni and checked in on Foursquare.

Even the leather settee in front of the fireplace was occupied by a warm if silent couple. The man had made the mistake of wearing a hoodie. Man that I am, I could tell that he felt insecure in the company of so stylish a crowd. The woman, sensing trouble, drank a cocktail called Goodbye Lovers (Tequila 8, agave sec, yuzu juice, lime juice; $14) to steel her nerves.

That fire, set in a fireplace with an immense burnished-wood frontispiece, imbued the restaurant with a golden light. The fixtures at Antica Pesa are custom-made brass tubes in which bulbs are recessed. They consequently cast a soft brassy glow that seems beamed in from mid-century.

This is not the first Antica Pesa. To find its progenitor, one must travel to Via Garibaldi, 18, in Rome’s Trastevere, the neighborhood of that ancient city that lies west of the River Tiber, and climb up the family vine four generations to 1922, when the Panella family opened the restaurant in a former Vatican tollhouse.

Today, Antica Pesa is to Rome what Cipriani is to New York, a tollhouse for the cavalcade of big-name stars whose brilliance is only burnished by plates of high-priced pasta. The walls are lined with photographs of Hollywood celebrities like ScarJo, Matt Damon and Jessica Alba arm-in-arm with the owner, Francesco Panella, taken in front of a wall full of photographs of celebrities arm-in-arm with the owner, Francesco Panella. It’s a mise-en-abyme of celebrity and cuisine. And that star has not diminished. In early January, the Roman mothership hosted a premiere party for Django. Quentin Tarantino, it turns out, loves the spaghetti cacio e pepe.

The Brooklyn outpost of Antica Pesa is primarily the work of two of the four Panella brothers, Francesco and Simone. But when I arrived, both were in Rome, where they live, and I was met by Lorenzo, the only one of the brothers who lives in New York full time—who, like a Roman colonist of yore, had set off from the shores of Latium to seek his fortune in distant climes.

Suave and handsome, Mr. Panella looks like Johnny Depp impersonating Robert Downey Jr. He is given to cashmere sweaters and high-quality blazers. His goatee is unparalleled in lushness. The menu is expensive—pastas start at $16 and main courses range up to $30—and the presentation of its content is fittingly elegant, the result of its owners having run a very successful restaurant for 90 years. I don’t think it would even occur to them not to serve their fresh baked grissini, foccacia and pane casareccia in a wooden box with a brass clasp or to decant the olive oil—from the family orchard, no less—without a flourish of the hand. They don’t, for lack of a more graceful term, peasant-up their cuisine.

Starters like crudo e bufala croccante ($17), a treacherously addictive ball of imported mozzarella baked in a jacket of filo dough, or arzilla confit ($15), silky confit skate sautéed with escarole, pine nuts and spelt bread, aren’t presented on heavy, chipped porcelain with a floral border. They are, rather, accompanied on broad white plates by an entourage of fussy dots of balsamic vinegar, in one case, or draped, painstakingly, over a hillock of escarole in the other. The rack of lamb ($30) is perfectly frenched, very well cooked and served, not with mashed potatoes, but with a dainty potato gâteau.

Even the pasta, which is hard to present in a way that gives proper credit to the effort needed to produce it, comes across well. The cacio e pepe, in which pecorino and Parmesan bind themselves to thick al dente strands of homemade spaghetti, is phenomenal. Disagree as you will with Mr. Tarantino’s taste for violence, his taste in pasta is top-notch. The schiaffoni all’Amatriciana, little fat rigatoni with guanciale and pecorino, is equally addictive.

In short, the food is presented with pride. It’s a pride that, unlike in many other prideful restaurants, is presented in an entirely unforced and unself-conscious way. The Panella brothers are stars in their own world; their food is lionized in its own town, their charm is unimpeachable and it does not occur to them that it might not fare as well in a foreign land.

Their confidence, I hope, is justified. But, it must be said, confidence has an overweening side and can well swoop perilously into silliness. When I asked Lorenzo why his family opened in Williamsburg, as opposed to, say, the West Village, he told me that the neighborhood reminded him of the scruffy charms of Trastevere. “We wanted to open here,” he said, “before the neighborhood blossomed. Before,” he said, looking at me earnestly, “it was too late.”

So deep and puppylike were his brown eyes and so soothing the little massage he gave my delts that I couldn’t bring myself to say, “What the fuck are you talking about?” Instead, I sipped a Manhattan that a man in a turtleneck had made for me and nodded. In fact, Williamsburg might be the apotheosis of a neighborhood whose scruff had been shorn by capital and condominiums—the very condominiums, I wager, from which these patrons had issued.

And yet the more I thought about it—aided and abetted by a terrific bottle of teroldego ($35), one of the many stars on an all-Italian wine list, and by the ministrations of a waitress born in Osaka and raised in Sydney, who had moved to Greenpoint only five months earlier and who, she told us, had a passive-aggressive boyfriend—perhaps Mr. Panella was correct. It was just a matter of scale.

Ten years ago, Antica Pesa would have been the restaurant to which Williamsburgians brought their parents in order to prove they didn’t live in a dangerous hinterland. Now, those erstwhile children have grown up, grown richer and grown unashamed to eat well. They can, in fact, eat Lucullan feasts, not in faux grubby diners with egalitarian waiters who nestle next to you, but like mini-captains of industry. And now the burden of parental soothing has fallen farther out on the L, to places like Roberta’s, Northeast Kingdom and Dear Bushwick. Only a fool would call Williamsburg hinter anything.

Aska (c/o Gothamist)

90 Wythe Avenue (Kinfolk Studios)
Brooklyn, New York 11211
view map
718.388.2969

Cuisine: Scandinavian
Our Rating: ★ ★ ★
Cards: All major
Price: Expensive ($115 for the six-course tasting menu; à la carte items, $6 to $12)
Hours: Dinner Monday through Friday and Sunday 6 p.m. to 2 a.m., Saturday to 4 a.m.
Reservations: Yes
Booze: Full bar
Subway: L to Bedford Ave.
Menu: Click Here
Delivery: No
New York says:

Aska, which opened earlier this winter in Williamsburg, looks at first like a caricature of the new Brooklyn-style restaurant that my wife is so tired of hearing about. There are only seven tables in the spare, slightly gloomy main dining area, which occupies the same space as Kinfolk Studios on Wythe Avenue. The (mostly male) wait staff sport checked shirts and carefully trimmed lumberjack beards and have a voluminous knowledge of trending Brooklyn topics, like cheese-making, obscure pickling techniques, and handcrafted beers. There’s a noted cocktail master on the premises, and because Scandinavian food is of the moment in Brooklyn (and around the world), the chef is, of course, Scandinavian. The featured dining option, if you don’t sit in the barroom, is a seasonal tasting menu ($65 for six courses), and because we’re in the depths of winter, it contains ascetic ingredients like rose hips, curls of lichen, and knobs of root vegetables, which the chefs proudly cultivate in the kitchen in a little brass pot.

But like many restaurants popping up all around this food-mad borough, Aska is a more sophisticated, worldly operation than it seems. The cocktail guru (and also a part owner) is Eamon Rockey, who comes to Brooklyn from Manhattan, where he ran the beverage program at Atera and helped develop the drinks for Eleven Madison Park. The chef, Fredrik Berselius, did time in several grand New York City kitchens (Aquavit, Per Se) before opening a short-lived but well-reviewed restaurant in the same location as this one called Frej. He’s a peer of the Swedish chef Magnus Nilsson, who conjures up strange delicacies from all sorts of primal ingredients (pig’s blood, cow’s bones, wet forest leaves, etc.), and his cooking is as close as you’re likely to get, in this cosmopolitan town, to the kind of unreconstructed locavore cuisine that Nilsson serves at Fäviken, his famous hunting lodge in the northern wilds of Sweden.

Or so I thought to myself as I pondered a pair of crimson-colored cracker­like objects, which, our lumberjack waiter gently informed us, were made mostly with dehydrated pig’s blood. They tasted a little like rust, the way fresh blood does, with a back taste of barnyard pork, and we washed them down as quickly as possible with an aquavit creation called Next of Kin, which tasted like a Scandinavian version of a mint julep, flavored with kombucha and caraway instead of mint. The other pre-dinner “tastes” included crisps of fried pike skin, and thin shortbread wafers flavored with molasses and dabbed with little pools of smoky housemade cheese. Freshly baked caraway rolls came out of the kitchen after that (served with a shmear of the excellent, house-churned butter), followed by the first course, which was a pair of warm Long Island oysters mingled Fäviken style at the bottom of a clay bowl with cucumbers, a sniff of dill, and a scoop of beef tallow.

Unlike Magnus Nilsson, the cooks at this little Brooklyn restaurant don’t gather your dinner from a sprawling, 20,000-acre estate. But they do an admirable job with what they have of making you feel connected, in a tenuous, mannered, priestly sort of way, to the edifying culinary variety that’s available in the great outdoors. The aforementioned Long Island oysters are “hand foraged” (as opposed to farmed), our server took pains to say, and were followed by a single herring, which the chefs deconstruct, cook separately, and rearrange on the plate in a kind of nose-to-tail sculpture, complete with new potatoes, sprigs of greenery, and the crunchy fried tail and head. The next course is a mulch-y concoction of root vegetables (salsify, lichen curls) served with the yolk of a single egg, which tasted bracing in a faintly medicinal way, despite looking, in the words of one of my city-slicker guests, like “something you’d find in the puddles of a tree stump after a rainstorm.”

Inevitably, a few of the ascetic concoctions at Aska aren’t quite so palatable.
I wasn’t crazy about the shreds of turnip and salty squid I was served one evening, or the tough, faintly rubbery hunk of monkfish the kitchen plates with a pasty, peanut-butter-colored cabbage purée. Berselius’s protein of choice this winter seems to be pork, and although he serves several appealing cuts (trotter, rib and cheek, belly), the admirably seasonal garnishes (shaving of rutabaga fermented in whey, sunchokes, the faint essence of toasted hay) tended to muffle the innate porky taste of the meat. The exceptions are a richly fatty, deboned trotter, which is sweetened with apples, and an excellent rendition of a classic Swedish potatis dumpling, which the chefs make with mashed potatoes and pork belly and serve à la carte only, with a pool of wet, smoky farmer’s cheese flavored with fennel fronds and lingonberries.

It’s possible to have an excellent meal at the bar at Aska, where the menu on the evenings I dropped by included helpings of braised beef cheeks, platters of local oysters on the half-shell (hand-foraged, of course), and two different kinds of Scandinavian-style hot dogs. You can complement this hearty winter grub with one of Rockey’s antic cocktails or a variety of carefully curated ciders, porters, and stouts (ask for a bottle of the coffee-thick Swedish porter called Dugges 1/2 Idjit! to go with your dumpling). For a mere $40, Rockey will pair wines and spirits with each course of your dinner; we enjoyed a nice Languedoc-Roussillon white with our oysters, and frosty shots of aquavit flavored with onions with the herring. Dessert was a single scoop of cardamom ice cream wreathed in a mousse made with crushed hazelnuts and brown butter, and it went down very well, I dimly recall, with a glass of Bodegas Dios Baco cream sherry.

Note
The tasting menu is available Sunday through Thursday in the main dining room; an à la carte menu is available there on Fridays and Saturdays, and at the bar at all times.

Recommended Dishes
Oyster, herring, pork trotter with sunchokes and apples, potatis dumpling, cardamom ice cream.

Briskettown (c/o Eater)

359 Bedford Ave
Williamsburg, Brooklyn 11211
view map
718.701.8909

Cuisine: Brisket
Our Rating: ★★★★
Cards: All Major
Price: Moderate
Hours: Tuesday through Sunday, Closed Monday, 6 to 6:30pm – Pre-Orders Only, 6:30PM to Sold Out – Open to Public
Booze: BYOB
Reservations: Yes
Subway: L: Bedford Ave, J to Marcy
Menu: delaneybbq.com
Website: delaneybbq.com
Delivery: No
Eater says:

Pitmaster Daniel Delaney learned how to smoke meat from barbecue big shots Aaron Franklin and Wayne Mueller. Delaney’s acclaimed brisket retails for $25 a pound, and the menu also includes traditional barbecue sides. In its first week of business, BrisketTown sold out of meat, several times, so show up early.

Brooklyn Wok Shop

182 N 10th Street
Brooklyn, NY 11211
view map
347.889.7992

Cuisine: Chinese
Our Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★
Cards: All major
Price: $$
Hours: CLOSED TUESDAY
Sun, Mon, Wed, Thurs: 12:00pm – 10:00pm
Fri, Sat: 12:000pm – 11pm
Booze: Beer and wine
Subway: L to Bedford
Menu: Click Here
Delivery: Yes
Grub Street says:

Edric Har, chef and owner at the new Brooklyn Wok Shop in Williamsburg, says the aftermath of the dot-com bubble led him to trade his day job suit and tie for chef’s whites and clogs ten years ago. After stints at Cru, Veritas, Le Bernardin, and as a private chef, Har and his wife Melissa decided to “create something more personal” and went back to the drawing board. Hence, Brooklyn Wok Shop, a concept that grew out of a late-night Chinese-food hankering in the couple’s North Williamsburg neighborhood.

Because healthy food and takeout are, for the most part, mutually exclusive, the Hars began to work on a menu of standards incorporating hormone- and antibiotic-free meats, as well as stocks and sauces made from real bones and scratch, not powders and bases. The result is a pared-down menu of snacks (buns and wings), soups (wonton, short ribs), and Cantonese staples like General Tso’s and orange beef, all made with better ingredients.

It is a mix of traditions and tweaks: Melissa’s family owns Chinese restaurants in Orlando; her father even traveled north to help out on the line during Brooklyn Wok Shop’s first week. Edric, who grew up downtown, braises chicken for the noodle soup in soy sauce like his mother once taught him, and the egg noodles are made fresh at the restaurant. Har prefers to use Escoffier-era black steel saute pans instead of actual woks, and other French touches abound — notably the flaky, fluted crust used for Har’s take on Chinese egg custard.

The counter-service restaurant is currently open only for dinner, but will open for lunch (and delivery) next month. The Hars say they plan to also start dim sum weekend brunch service in early 2012.

Gothamist says:

There are plenty of crappy Chinese takeout joints in Williamsburg, and a small handful of slightly higher-end Asian joints (M Shanghai and Samurai Mama come to mind), but overall, the area is seriously lacking in quality Chinese food. That’s where the newly-opened Brooklyn Wok Shop steps in.

Run by a husband-and-wife team who live in the neighborhood, BWS serves noodle soups with house-made noodles and broth; small dishes including fried chicken wings with a cinnamon-soy glaze, and entrees like orange-spiced hangar steak and chicken with broccoli topped with a fried egg. Owner Melissa Har told us that she and husband Edric source all of their hormone and antibiotic-free meat from Pino’s Prime Meats in Soho, and their goal is to “upgrade Chinese food a little. It’s not your typical takeout.”

Edric is a ten-year veteran of some of the city’s finest dining establishments, including working the lines at Veritas, Cru and Le Bernadin, and Melissa’s family owns several Chinese restaurants in Florida. The couple calls their Cantonese-influenced fare “Chinese food 2.0.” Right now, the restaurant is in soft-open mode, so they’re only open for dinner (6 to 10 p.m. daily), complete with a wine and beer license, though Melissa told us they hope to launch a dim sum brunch in January.

Dear Bushwick

41 Wilson Avenue
Bushwick, Brooklyn 11237
view map
718.486.9222

Cuisine: Gastropub, Irish/English
Our Rating: ★★★★
Price: Moderately Priced
Cards: Discover, MasterCard, Visa
Hours: Mon-Sun, 5pm-11pm
Subway: L at Morgan Ave.; M at Central Ave.
Menu: dearbushwick.com
Website: dearbushwick.com
Delivery: No
Village Voice says:

Inside the long, narrow dining room, couples talk quietly and a cyclist massages a cramp from his bare, tattooed calf. A small kitchen relays smells of meat and vegetables sizzling in duck fat, of hot oil meeting battered shrimp. Jessica Wilson is the chef. She used to run the kitchen at Goat Town, in the East Village. Here, she cooks English-inspired dishes with American ingredients: A grand pork chop ($20), the centerpiece of the menu, sits on shaved brussels sprouts in a bacon-y vinaigrette. The sprouts pack flavor without adding weight to the dish. This is the sort of simple, seasonal food that might change your mind about contemporary English cooking. Tiny appetizers are ideal with the cocktails (all priced at $10) that make use of many gins and exciting tinctures. Fried potato peels ($4) are a tangle of see-through fairy wings, dusted with salt and vinegar. There’s a fine duck-sausage roll ($6) with ginger-cranberry chutney, but it has a sad, soggy bottom of undercooked pastry (no, this does not make it more traditional). Halved, smoked eggs ($6) with creamy yolks and horseradish butter are squeaky and wonderfully messy. As prices go up, so do portions. A slab of crisp-skinned pork belly on wilted beet leaves ($12) could make a light meal paired with dressed roasted carrots ($5) or a shaved vegetable salad ($9) studded with cheddar. Big, juicy oysters ($11) are hot under a blanket of bread crumbs, spooning with fennel stuffing. A blob of goose terrine ($12) tastes precisely of Christmas: racy game, pickled plums, and enough clove to numb the tongue—Wilson is not shy with spices. A mutton shoulder ($21), though cooked inconsistently, was terrific when it was served tender and pink in the middle. Service is scatterbrained but caring. Twice, something my party ordered simply never arrived (on both occasions, apologies were genuine). Despite this, and the long waits that can draw out between dishes, it’s easy to see why locals like to gather at Dear Bushwick: They can eat and drink well without much fuss.

Time Out Says:

Vintage curios, muted milk-bottle lights, locally sourced oyster ’shrooms. As the name portends, this is twee Brooklyn by way of shoot-’em-up Bushwick. Despite its backwater locale on Wilson Avenue, the quaint charmer brandishes some prime talent behind the stove and the bar: respectively, chef Jessica Wilson (A Voce) and consulting cocktailian Natasha David (Maison Premiere)—another testament to the creep of low-key culinary ambition into the borough’s once-precarious corners.
ORDER THIS: The chef describes the lusty, sometimes whimsical fare as “England meets Vermont.” To that end, a hulking pork chop ($20)—thicker than an ax handle—seems more fit for a barrel-chested lumberjack than the skinny-jeans set (gathered here neath an oversize boho painting of a leggy brunet on a horse). The juicy skillet-seared slab is embellished with contrasting accoutrements: bitter braised brussels sprouts and a sweet and tangy bacon-fig vinaigrette. Other earthy, elegant dishes, like a pitch-perfect creamy celeriac soup ($6) or a buttery, beer-steamed mussels special ($7) on one night, are equally comforting.
GOOD FOR: A soul-warming walk-in meal. While nearby Roberta’s—on a buzzing corner of Bogart Street that seems like Times Square compared with this quiet drag—draws destination diners willing to brave two-hour waits, this narrow slip of a restaurant pulls off a strictly local vibe to warm effect. The two-month-old spot’s lean, slick-haired barkeep, whose disarming friendliness belies his cool greaser threads, sets a Cheers-like tone, making newcomers and second-timers feel like regulars. On a recent fall night, strangers struck up an impromptu reminiscence of early-’90s R&B—SWV! Boyz II Men! En Vogue!—at the sturdy black-steel bar while the wind howled outside.
THE CLINCHER: Most small restaurants have trouble achieving both serious food and drinks, but this flyweight depot punches above its weight. The cocktails (boozy classics, enlightened riffs) rank with the best in the borough. Our favorite was the Iron Lady ($10): Bittersweet aperol gets a double dose of flowers with rose-infused gin and Lillet Rose. Lemon juice cleans up the finish on the structured but feminine sipper. Dear Bushwick, we can forgive the name

221 South 1st Street
(between Driggs Ave & Roebling St)
Brooklyn, New York 11211
view map
718.387.0563

Cuisine: Cerviche, Seafood, Peruvian, Cocktail Bars
Our Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★
Cards: All Major
Price: Entrees are $16-$22
Hours: Mon, Sun 6 pm – 12 am
Tue-Thu 6 pm – 1 am
Fri-Sat 6 pm – 2 am
Brunch: None
Booze: Full bar
Subway: L train to Bedford
Delivery: No
Menu: www.desnudany.com
Website: www.desnudany.com
NY Mag says:

It’s been more than a year in the making, but the Williamsburg outpost of Desnuda is now open for business. Dominic Martinez’s menu includes a handful of ceviches, like lobster and coconut milk with citrus, and salmon with Thai chili oil, almonds, tamarind, and sweet potatoes. There are raw shucked and tea-smoked oysters at the bar, and Chaim Dauermann’s cocktail menu includes the Prufrock and a Hard Place, made with pisco, moscatel, lemon, hot chiles, and, of course, peach liqueur. Dare you drink it? The ceviche list will ultimately grow to about twenty daily offerings. Check out the full menu, including wines and the lineup of South American and Mexican spirits, straight ahead.

Gothamist says:

East Village ceviche bar Desnuda just opened their second outpost in Williamsburg with an expanded menu of fish offerings and a dedicated list of inventive cocktails from Chaim Dauermann. Unlike the smaller restaurant in Manhattan, the new Brooklyn location offers a dining space outfitted with cozy booth nooks and another separate bar area focused on the cocktails. Both spaces evoke a maritime vibe, with beautiful green and copper wall adornments, old seafarers maps of Patagonia and hand-carved mermaid statues on the bar front. There are also some stools at the food bar, where you can watch the ceviches come together and observe the creative cooking techniques employed by Executive Chef Dominic Martinez.
Desnuda’s signature gravity bong-smoked oysters made the voyage across the East River, as well as a selection of raw and baked oysters, which are available for an extra reasonable $1 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. daily and all day on Sundays and Mondays. The expanded ceviche menu includes a refreshing and spicy Ceviche de Mango ($18), which marinates tender chunks of mango and salmon in a piquant mixture of aji amarillo puree, peppers and red onion. The extra decadent Ceviche de Langosta ($27) sees Maine lobster marinated in coconut milk with lime and oranges juices and some heat from ginger and jalapeno.
Since the team behind The Bourgeois Pig and Death & Co. are behind Desnuda, it comes as no surprise that an artistic approach to cocktails and beverages is also employed here. Less common spirits like piscos, mescals and cachaças are found throughout the menu, as are the house-made cordials and liqueurs and a selection of dried peppers from Nobska Farms. Try the Prufrock & A Hard Place ($11), which combines Alto del Carmen Reserva Pisco, Rothman & Winter Peach Liqueur and Cesar Florido Moscatel Especial with lemon juice and incendiary Devil’s Tongue chiles.

El Amacen

Cuisine: Argentinean, Mexican, South American
Our Rating: ★★★★
Hours: Mon-Thu, 5pm-11pm; Fri, 5pm-midnight; Sat-Sun, noon-midnight
Happy Hour: 5-7pm daily
Cards: All Major
Booze: Beer and wine
Reservations: Yes
Delivery: Yes
Menu: http://www.elalmacennyc.com/menu.php
Website: www.elalmacennyc.com
Subway: L to Bedford Ave.
NY Mag says:

The name of this quaint Argentine restaurant is Spanish for general store, a detail referenced most in the old-time-shop décor like the front counter, chalkboard menus, and a glass ingredient cabinet. Wooden tables, mismatched chairs, hanging relics, and bread loaves in wire baskets add to the antique feel, but candles and flowers on every table ensure an ambiance that’s more cozy than museum quality. There’s an emphasis on sharing here, with meat-and-cheese platters and a range of small plates, from an extensive seviche bar to cotija-covered grilled corn or the popular avocado fries. A pepper stuffed with spinach, cheese, and corn that’s served over rice and black beans makes a more filling option. The highlight of the anticipated steak section is the costilla de res, braised for nine hours in maté (a South American substitute for coffee). For dessert, flan comes with a trio of chopped fresh fruits, and churros arrive hot and ready to dunk in chocolate and caramel dipping sauces. Recommended Dishes: Choclo (grilled corn), $5; ceviche de bife, $9; flan, $6

Village Voice says:

Nevertheless, one of the best dishes on the menu is Mexican—chile relleno ($14), renamed aji relleno. A huge poblano pepper, still crunchy, pours out cheese, corn, onions, spinach, and rice, and the entire mess sits atop a bed of tomatoes and beans. It’s ugly, but tasty. Other entrées strike an Italian note. Argentineans—half of whom boast some Italian blood—are notorious for preferring gnocchi to other pastas, and bathing them in a cream-laced tomato sauce. Inundated with a brown oxtail ragu, El Almacén’s papardelle ($15) flies in the opposite direction: The ragged chunks of beef have been braised in coffee by a chef who’s chosen to get creative with a traditional Italian recipe. The only real bomb among main courses is the suckling pig: Lechon asado ($16) has been rendered as a sweet-and-sour salad of baby-pig frags mixed with black beans; in the dim light of the restaurant, you can’t quite tell what you’re eating. The menu has evolved since the place first opened six months ago, decreasing the number of taco options but adding ceviches. Originally, El Almacén was the only Argentine restaurant in town that wasn’t a parrillada, or grilled meat specialist, even though the menu contained a small assortment. But recently, a much larger selection was introduced, with the characteristic meats offered as separate items. Served on a tree stump with chimichurri and an angry-looking knife, the ones I’ve tried have been on the money, especially the hulking beef spare rib ($15 each). An assortment of ribs, steak, and chorizo is also available for $38. It’s plenty of meat for two to share, though you might prefer the lamb chops, pork chops, or squishy blood sausage instead. Really, you can’t go wrong in making a meal of appetizers and side dishes at El Almacén. Among the latter ($5 each), find wonderful avocado fries (crisp-on-the-outside green boomerangs served with a dubious “yerba mate ketchup”) and papas provenzal (steak fries seductively sprinkled with paprika and vinegar). While the place is perpetually expecting its liquor license, you’re not allowed to bring in alcohol, though it was permitted in the early months. This is sad, since the best things at El Almacén scream for a glass of red wine. With the welter of Argentinean, Italian, and Mexican dishes, putting a meal together can be a headache. Accordingly, you might just stick with the stenciled words you saw on the windows when you came in. The cold cuts, in particular, are unimpeachable, swerving in Spanish and Italian directions. The $15 charcuterie assortment is a thing of beauty, including hand-cut Serrano ham with a splendid rim of fat, cured and cooked salamis, mortadella, dill pickles, a few stray olives, a pot of creamy mustard, and, best of all, a couple of slices of matambre.

Extra Fancy (c/o Grub Street)

302 Metropolitan Ave.,
(between Driggs Ave & Roebling St)
Brooklyn, NY 11222
view map
347.422.0939

Cuisine: Clam Bar/Seafood & Fancy Cocktails
Cards: All Major
Hours: 5pm-4am Daily
Our Rating: ★★★★
Price: $$$
Subway: L to Bedford Ave. or Lorimer St..
Booze: Full bar
Delivery: No
Grub Street says:

Extra Fancy is set to open on Monday in Williamsburg, aiming to establish itself as an “upscale clam shack.” Partners Mark Rancourt (Macao Trading Co.) and Robert Krueger (Employees Only) chose the highbrow-lowbrow name from the side of a seafood-condiment bottle. Chef Ross Florance worked with Eric Ripert at Le Bernardin and was a recent stagier at Noma. Along with a casual seafood menu, expect Extra Fancy to feature entrées priced between $17 and $25. The drinks menu will offer a large of selection craft beers, ciders, wines by the glass, and original cocktails by Krueger and Rancourt. Extra Fancy’s bar will be open from 5 p.m. to 4 a.m. each night, serving dinner from 6 p.m. to 11:30 p.m., with brunch and late-night menus to follow in the coming weeks.

Paper says:

Despite the name, the handsome boys behind new Williamsburg seafood and cocktails spot Extra Fancy aren’t wearing bow ties or suspenders or shiny shoes. They’re just kicking ass making good drinks, pouring rad beers and endearing themselves to the neighborhood. It’s a quiet spot now, but once people figure out it’s there, it’s sure to be overrun with pretty hipsters, cocktail fiends, and late night degenerates looking for something fried (fancily, of course).

1. Oysters and Champagne. A lovely little list of pours, including a Cremant de Jura Rose and a stellar Domaine Tissot, goes well with the super fresh selection of mollusks. And the oysters come over ice inside another GIANT oyster.

2. Summer cider. It’s really not just for fall, especially when paired with beach grub like fried clams and a plate of fish funnel cake. That’s right, fancy-ass fair food. Go for the Newtown Pippin from Original Sin if you want a fresh, crisp bite of beach breeze, and the Dooryard Cider from Farnum Hill if you’re looking for funky lumberjacky flannel.

3. A barrage of beers. A list of ten cans, fifteen bottles, and nine drafts round out the yeast and malt section quite nicely. From cheap-ass to fancy pants, Narragansett to Allagash Black, the beers will satisfy grumpy punk and Manhattanite palates alike,.

4. The new drink of summer, the Ray Ray. A twist on the Pimm’s Cup, this tall glass of Plymouth Gin, Pimm’s #1, Cei-ray Soda, lemon and herbs is like a one-two punch of summertime smelling salts.

5. Late-night food. Show up before 11:30 right now and find an array of rolls (including crabs, clams, shrimp), salt cod pickled pepper poppers, and a whole Cape Cod clam bake on their late-night menu. Soon the menu will be extended until 3 AM, and Extra Fancy will be like a midnight clam shack for housed Williamsburgers