At Chez Ma Tante in Brooklyn, the very first restaurant Aidan O'Neal and Jake Leiber fused, very early press reports represented Mr. O'Neal as the exec chef and also Mr. Leiber as his 2nd in command. But in interviews they offered-- constantly in tandem-- it was clear that they were equivalent partners which they agreed concerning every little thing from their favored food preparation surface area (Teflon) to the optimal art to await the dining-room (none).
They share the job of exec chef at their 2nd restaurant, Le Crocodile, likewise in Brooklyn. This is possibly lucky for them, offered how prominent the place has come to be considering that it opened in December. It is definitely fortunate for us, because another thing Mr. O'Neal and also Mr. Leiber apparently concur around is just how the food at a modern New York brasserie should look as well as taste.
The menu's long, solitary page cascades from one category of appetizer to the following, from shellfish to snails, prior to arriving, concerning midway down, at Entrées. That's a head counterfeit: the word is made use of in the French feeling, and also denotes much more appetisers. 10 main dishes adhere to, under Plats Principaux, and after that come a dozen treats that even more or much less describe themselves: profiteroles, chocolate pot de crème, a happily sour lemon tart. There are a lot of dishes you're not fairly sure initially whether two guys whose best-known development is a pancake will certainly have the ability to keep up. They do that and afterwards some. Almost everything I've contended Le Crocodile has actually made me intend to return for more.
This is not the simplest task in a style as extensively pawed-over and cliché-ridden as brasserie food, although to be accurate we are dealing below with New York City's peculiar idea of brasserie food. In a New York brasserie you almost never ever see choucroute, but you may well see Jonah crab salad, which at Le Crocodile, is stirred with yuzukosho mayo and remains on a padding of avocado purée. It's scrumptious. So are various other chilly points from the raw bar: sea scallops in a hot green swimming pool of parsley juice, herbs and lemon; Wellfleet oysters, their deep pearly mugs holding a dash or 2 of bay water.
In spite of this clearly broad-minded understanding of brasserie food preparation, however, Mr. O'Neal and also Mr. Leiber do enter a great deal of dishes that either come from France or make you consider it. Onion soup is compulsory in a place like this, however Le Crocodile makes it draw its own weight. The broth is almost creamy, fortified by lardons, and there are excellent crispy mouthfuls of toasted sourdough croutons as opposed to the common limp blobs of perished bread.
Pickled mussels, orange as well as plump, nod distantly to the plate of herring at every various other brasserie in France, to the marinaded onions and carrots that ride along. Cold leeks in vinaigrette make an appearance, also, though they've undergone a little improvement: trimmed right into bite-size sectors that are stood on end in a foundation of ravigote sauce and also then covered with toasted hazelnuts.
Since the lardons you 'd discover in Lyon have actually been replaced by smoked eel, there's a type of salade lyonnaise-- I claim type of. The idea is great; the salad is smokier than the initial, and also with the remarkable added oily gentleness of the eel. In its framework, it is not also different from the smoked-herring Caesar located at M. Wells Steakhouse, and before that at the initial, too-pure-to-last M. Wells in a stainless-steel diner.
Mr. O'Neal cooked in the restaurant, and was later on put in fee of M. best chef inside MoMA PS1. His cooking still has that half-crazy shimmer in its eye, yet the characteristic M. Wells urge to drive every dish to the edge of a cliff and after that tip on the gas is not much in evidence at Le Crocodile. He and also Mr. Leiber, whose formative years as a cook were spent at Barbuto under Jonathan Waxman, are at home making food that seems flawlessly normal and also average right up till you taste it.
Le Crocodile wriggled into the empty covering in the Wythe Hotel in Williamsburg that was left in 2015 when Reynard closed. The commercial bones are the very same: the double-height ceilings, well-worn flooring planks, large arched windows punched via fortress-thick block wall surfaces. However the interior was changed, concealing the open kitchen that used to control the room behind light wood paneling, replacing the bentwood coffee shop chairs with even more comfy versions and also including some rounded leather booths.
The outcomes are significant; the room has a bit much more style and feeling of purpose, and also a great deal extra power. It's an area where individuals, or a minimum of Brooklynites, intend to sit and remain. Also after 10 on a college night, there are salted heaps of pommes frites on every table. These are piled beside either the steak au poivre or the roasted poultry, in which situation the fowl as well as the french fries will certainly be slowly absorbing a warm aiding of poultry jus as well as fresh natural herbs.
Bench is still in area, with a new marble top. Additionally left over from Reynard is an excellent chest of all-natural glass of wines compiled by Lee Campbell, who was more than a couple of steps in advance of the pack. Rafa García Febles now has the keys to the cellar, and also has constructed sensibly on the tradition of Ms. Campbell as well as her follower, Basile Al Mileik.
There's no chance to discuss all-natural white wines, a modern-day New York brasserie and a pair of coequal cooks without mobilizing ideas of Frenchette. Incredibly, there is very little overlap between them. Le Crocodile looks less McNallyish, and also the kitchen is much less mesmerized by body organ meats, although somebody back there recognizes exactly how to prepare sweetbreads, which are luscious as well as puffy on a tiny hill of potato purée, triggered by charred onions and also a fistful of lardons.
Both dining establishments market a great deal of frites. The ones at Frenchette are better, yet it's close.
Both take the scientific research of charcuterie seriously, yet Le Crocodile, with nearly six terrines as well as pâtés to try out any kind of provided night, gets the side. Also the mushroom pâté, smooth as foie gras as well as held with each other by what should be a little hill of butter, is exceptional.
