This spring I found myself heading into downtown's Da Silvano, a New York institution, for a late weekday dinner. I was with one of my best pals, and another - always late - was making her way to meet us at an unknown time we hoped wouldn't be too late, as we had been instructed to order on her behalf. As I ducked through the door and into a room popping with lively diners, my friend asked if I'd been there before. No I had not, I said, but reminded her we'd enjoyed way too much wine on the patio of Bar Pitti, next door, a couple of years before.

Almost as soon as we'd crossed the threshold, the words "I know you! I know you!" were shouted over the din, unmistakably directed at me by an Italian waiter walking briskly my way. Flummoxed, I was sure this stranger was going to embrace me, which he did, after which I found myself being kissed on both cheeks by the spot's affable owner. My pal looked at me, incredulous. Somehow - though I had never been there before - I was the recipient of one of the warmest restaurant welcomes in history, whereas she was ignored, though she had been to the spot dozens of times over half a decade. Having recovered from the onslaught of attention, I shrugged weakly and simply said, "Italian men. They ALL think they know me."

Alas, not so Alec Baldwin, who we discovered was holding court at the table next to ours once we'd been ushered - with much fanfare and more air kisses - to our seats. The spot was full of stylish downtown types of all ages, mostly wearing black or variations thereon. Psyched to be there with one of my besties amidst all this fabulosity and no longer bewildered by my welcome, I settled in for some vino.

The First Glass
First I ordered a glass of Veuve, which arrived less cool than it ought to be (tepid?) and with a single, sad trail of bubbles making its way up the glass. At a spot so atmospheric, I reasoned, you don't come for the wine. Still, when I was ready to move into my second glass I allowed my expectations to bubble up a bit. Consulting the menu, I spied an Aglianico by the glass, vintage 1998. Given the wine's advanced age and the shady Veuve I'd just quaffed, I was both intrigued and wary. I beckoned a waiter, the same one who had greeted me so effusively. "How is the Aglianico?" To which he replied, "What kind of wine do you like, darling?" Then, without waiting for me to answer, "I bring you something you like, trust me."

The Second
At this moment so much is running through my head, but mostly: I am a sommelier, I know exactly what I want when I taste it, I know that I mostly love Aglicanicos and I will probably like yours, bu-uuut...yours hardly seems like the kind of establishment to cellar wines, and, given the spotty reputation of many older, imported Italian reds outside of those of the very top tier, I am wary. And are you even going to serve me the Aglianico, or some random pour you're promoting this week that I'll find infuriatingly banal? Instead, knowingly, I simply say, "okay."

Why? Experience. Experience with Italian men.

The Buzz
The waiter rushes (sashays, really) off to bring me some vaunted pour, presumably. And never comes back. Twenty minutes later, I get up from the table to ask him again to PLEASE bring me some wine (damnit). It finally arrives, and is - rather than some surprise - the same Aglianico I'd initially inquired about. Of course, it's sour, so I send it back. A different waiter materializes and replaces it with a Barolo. To my great relief, it's okay and all is well until I order my third and final glass of the evening; it, too, doesn't arrive until I wrangle yet another waiter and demand that my wine be delivered. When this final glass arrives, I nearly get down on my knees to thank the wine gods on high, who colluded at last to get me at least a little bit buzzed.

The Backlash
But let's talk about this irksomely foppish Italian waiter. He was doing his thing - preening, condescending, claiming to know what I didn't even know for myself - and then under delivering. Of course, he most definitely didn't 'know' me, because if he did he would be keen to some stuff like the following:

I am capable of making my own decisions. I don't want to be charmed within an inch of my life. When I stop batting my eyelashes I am no less me, though certainly less agreeable. And mostly: I WANT TO SEE THE WINE LIST AND CHOOSE FOR MYSELF. He'd literally spirited it away after claiming he'd bring me something amazing to drink, as though to say: you (women?) don't really need to look at this.

Last Words
Then: At the very end of the night, this guy - who hadn't let me see the wine list and who'd patently forgotten to serve up not one but TWO glasses I'd ordered from him - "saved" us from a broken martini glass my late-arriving pal had knocked onto the floor while putting on her Burberry Prorsum coat (hey, at least she was fashionably late). "Da Silavano pays!" he'd shrieked while running over to scoop up the broken glass. After theatrically sweeping the biggest chunks into his hand, he shoved the dangerous pile under my nose and said to me, from beneath smoldering brow, "I play with this stuff." Riiiiight. Now could you just move that quickly when there's wine to serve?

quid pro quo
The food was very good. That goes for all three of our entrees. And when I suspend my frustration about the wine orders and choose to view the condescension as something amusing (to, say, write about in my blog), I can sincerely say that I enjoyed my evening at Da Silvano. In fact, I might - almost - call the experience charming. Almost.

Posted by Courtney at 10:07 AM • Comments (0)

My latest edition of The Swill for Eater SF, wherein I sample awesome scoops from Three Twins, sip mostly awkward pairings, discover Guinness' real purpose in life is to float caramel ice cream, and bump into a zombie flash mob on the way home. All in a day's work.

Head to Eater for the The Swill in full.
And check the Flikr album from the day.

Posted by Courtney at 02:26 PM • Comments (0)

My April visit to NYC was made so much more superb thanks to Buvette. Wine vixen Alice Feiring sent me there, so I've her to thank (her note praising Buvette can be found near the bottom of this post speckled with bottle reviews - but beware some conclusions drawn, Cali Pinot lovers!!). Billed as a modern "gastroteque," Buvette is tucked into a quiet corner of the West Village but has already - no doubt thanks to mucho good press here and here, for example - started drawing major crowds. And while I love love love the simple and delicious plates at Buvette, I love the spot's ethos even more: chef-founder Jody Williams captures just this when she says "we think of our kitchen as a workshop; we think of ourselves as craftsmen more than cooks." With workaday tools and luxe embellishments alike right at home in the spot's luminous interior, it's easy to anticipate the honesty, quality, character and - dare I say it? - craftsmanship coming out of the kitchen. Kibbitzing with Jody about her new boite over a bottle of Bugey-Cerdon (her personal fav at the moment) was just icing on the visit.

Read on for more on Buvette, and don't forget to check out my Flirk album from the visit here.

Unannounced Visit
I strolled into Buvette unannounced one day in the early afternoon and found Jody in the midst of business as usual: staff training, ordering wine, managing prep for the day's service. I told her that Alice sent me, that I'm a wine writer from SF, and that I was excited to be there. She promptly brought up a bottle of Patrix Bottex "La Cueille" Bugey-Cerdon from her cellar (a Kermit Lynch selection, and one I just reviewed for Nomad's Uncorked iPad wine mag), saying it was her favorite at the moment and would I have a glass with her? SCORE, I thought. Well aware of the charms of this southeastern French charmer - bubble gum pink, bubbly and moderately sweet (wine crack, in other words) - I knew I was in for a vinous treat as well as some rare face time with Buvette's food-wine maven herself.

"It's so good," Jody raved about the Bugey, "I probably shouldn't tell people!" I don't have stats on the numbers imported, but it's quite possible they're low given the relatively small size of this appellation nestled into the Alpine foothills. A shortage of Bugey stateside would be a sad thing, indeed, especially at the peak of summer!

Background Buzz
In the background, Buvette was buzzing. Flowering branches - some of the first of spring - arrived and were arranged in the front window by a florist type, customers ambled in and chatted in twos and threes at the bar or in a cozy window seat in the back, staffers - known as "gastronomes" in keeping with Buvette's novel gastroteque ID - moved fluidly about serving guests or preparing for what was to come as the day wore on. Which is a lot, considering that Buvette is open most days at 8am and closes at 2am, with guests invited to come in at any time for something as basic as one of the spot's divine lattes or a glass of wine, or a full meal. With delicious small plates emphasizing fresh ingredients and delicious flavors - a chicken liver mousse spread on crisp toast transported me to France, a plate of tangy octopus took me to Italy's Adriatic coast, and a stunning proscuitto+steam eggs+parm breakfast combo just made me want to return to Buvette daily - meals bring variety and quality, at truly fair prices.

Visual Highs
Which brings me to more of what I love about Buvette. Apart from its everything-delicious aura, it's a totally unique, fully conceptualized destination. Visual charm oozes from every corner and it seems no detail has gone unscripted, though the spot isn't overly contrived: a Warren Muller-designed chandelier (NY Times: "looks like a kitchen drawer that's been hit by a tornado") modishly illuminates a communal table, antique-ish bottles of Blanton Kentucky Bourbon rest in a basket in the cellar, a chalk rendering of French and Italian wine regions lends whimsy and context to the wine program, patinaed chairs give texture to a banquette and an old-school bicycle out front is a final reminder to departing guests that details are top of mind at this gastroteque.

Vintage Cool
So many watering holes and eateries come across as recycled, whether in entirety or in parts that recall others' imagination originally brought to life elsewhere. Not so Buvette. Max Poglia, Jody's partner in the venture, also runs the site I Love Old NY, a sort of muse board where this visual wunderkind and friends pay hommage and ostensibly gather inspiration from vintage New York places and people (from "Who are we?": "friends with a shared love of old, rusty things and dusty forgotten places."). It's a delightful tour of nostalgia at its best that any fan of Gotham will appreciate. It also echoes the novelty and craftsmanship that inform details at Buvette right down to the menus, one of which features a novel pop-out of a champagne bucket and bottle. To me, it will always be Bugey in that bucket. ;)

Go to Buvette
For more on Buvette, check out the spot online, where you'll hear a cool voice-over from Jody describing her gastroteque (a word they coined themselves!), the role of the spot's gastronomes (servers), and more. Charming, charming. A fabulous video overview of Buvette. And last but not least, my Flikr album from the visit.

Jody says that "the only rule [at Buvette] is to do what we truly love." It shows.

Posted by Courtney at 02:12 PM • Comments (0)

My April visit to New York was superb for many reasons, some of them gustatory and wine-inclined (more later, there), others more extracurricular. Among the best of the extra's was the exhibition Color Moves: Art and Fashion by Sonia Delaunay at the Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt design museum way uptown. The museum itself is a feast for the eyes: a stunning, four-story park-adjacent mansion famously built by Andrew Carnegie, it's worth a visit to see the interiors alone. But the Delaunay exhibit was captivating, in part because it was so visually amazing but also because her story was so nuanced (it helped, too, that there was a diamond exhibit downstairs ;)). In a way, it was the perfect sensorial feast (appetizer?) to prime my senses for a trip to new West Village "gastroteque" Buvette - equally enchanting - the same weekend.

Entrepreneur, Artist, Fashion Designer, Provacateur, Textiles Designer, Wife
Sonia Delaunay's story moved me for numerous reasons, best of which include her tenacity, dedication to her craft, longevity, successful application of her vision across multiple mediums, and - easily best of all - a sort of electric verve that courses through everything she touched. With a style called Orphism that emphasized movement and incorporated cubist cues, Delaunay's best-known work in abstract painting is as exciting as her work in fashion, interior design, costumes and textiles. Surely, 1920s Paris was a better place for having this dynamic woman in its midst, who sweetly said of her husband and lifelong collaborator: "In Robert Delaunay I found a poet. A poet who wrote not with words but with colours." (If you're interested in more, do an image search for Orphism and prepare to be delighted.)

Up next: Buvette (sooo delicious)

Posted by Courtney at 10:49 PM • Comments (0)