Dovetail, Chef John Fraser's Modern American near the Museum of Natural History in Upper West Side

[Pool Boy]

Wanted to try someplace new on a recent trip to NYC, so this was one of the places we picked. Dovetail.

There are so many places to consider trying in NYC. I am often overwhelmed with choosing so my wife usually narrows it down to 5-10 places and together we winnow it down to the place we finally choose - their menu spoke to me.  We had a fun day at Die Neue Gallerie (and had had a fine, fine lunch at the restaurant there on the premises), and we were glad we had a later reservation to ease in to. I'd like to punch the taxi drive we used in the head, but that is another story.

Great space. It felt very refined and elegant, without feeling too stuffy. I'm a nice jeans and nice Hawaiian shirt guy at heart, and I did not feel (completely) out of place. Nice hum to the room without being noisy. Easy to carry on a conversation. They have some prix fix options (3-4 courses), a tasting menu, and things like pre-theater and a la carte dining at the bar. We went for the 4-course option where we could pick and choose.

After a small flurry of amuses (oysters, then some fried things (tine risotto balls? and I think tiny...what, almost like micro egg rolls but so much better), we dipped in to their fluke crudo (fluke crudo, morels, dill cream, fava beans) and white asparagus (white asparagus, prosciutto di parma, sage, orange oil), both wonderful but the fluke was the standout.

Then we had primarily vegetable/salad courses next. Warmed avocado, summer truffles, rye, rocket arugula, was stunning. And the Spring green ravioli, asparagus, black trumpet mushrooms, nutmeg was wonderful. Very hard to choose a winner between these two. You'd be right to order both.

Entrees were quite good as well. Beef tenderloin, green garbanzos, chanterelle mushrooms, pickled ramps is what they have listed on their menu now, but the preparation I had involved no ramps, but wilted/seared greens and I think morels.  My wife had the Halibut confit, english peas, shishito peppers, clam nage though I also think it was slightly varied as I do not remember the peppers in her dish (and I forgot to take a photo of it!). Both were great, but a minor step down from the prior course.

For dessert, we had these two - Macerated strawberries, vanilla panna cotta, lemon sorbet, crystallized violet and Rhubarb pavlova, hibiscus cream, pink peppercorns - the first being particularly inventive in its preparation and plating. The crystalized violet was essentially the thinnest meringue you could ever make shaped in to a cup/dome that was then dropped on top of the strawberries and other gooieds - hiding everything inside until you cracked in to it. So good, and not too sweet at all. Perfection.  The Rhubarb pavlova was quite fine as I recall (missed the phot again!), but was a notch down from the other dessert.  We ultimately also got more petit fours to take back to the hotel with us.

Good wine list, good service, great space, great pacing and a good time. I'd absolutely go back. I'll append photos when I have time to upload them and link to them here from there.

Now, what is really funny is this - despite it being an excellent meal and being largely sated, there was a Shake Shack literally right around the corner from Dovetail. We were just going to hail a cab back to the hotel, but we'd talked over dinner about how much my wife raved about the chicken sandwich she'd had at the DC outpost of Shake Shack. We popped in to split one of those so I could wee what the fuss was about. SO GOOD! Get one!

And yes, that kind of put me over the top. OOOOOOFA.

Pictures

 

[DonRocks]

On 7/9/2017 at 11:28 AM, Pool Boy said:

Good wine list, good service, great space, great pacing and a good time. I'd absolutely go back. I'll append photos when I have time to upload them and link to them here from there.

Now, what is really funny is this - despite it being an excellent meal and being largely sated, there was a Shake Shack literally right around the corner from Dovetail. We were just going to hail a cab back to the hotel, but we'd talked over dinner about how much my wife raved about the chicken sandwich she'd had at the DC outpost of Shake Shack. We popped in to split one of those so I could wee what the fuss was about. SO GOOD! Get one!

And yes, that kind of put me over the top. OOOOOOFA.

The prix fixe menu looks really nice:

Dovetail has had one Michelin Star since 2011.

I love that you're such an open-minded diner.

In the Manhattan Dining Guide, note Café Luxembourg on the map - it's a nice place (something like Le Diplomate) to go for lunch or weekend brunch.