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“Devin Tavern”

Occasion:	Cuisine:	Area:	Cost:	Rating:
Night Out	New American	Tribeca	Moderate	Good

urrently juggling a cast of about four men including a male ballerina. I kid you not. It was rare, and it was time to order some more wine at this point as the first one disappeared too quickly. But the wine list made my blood boil. There was not one bottle under $40. Most were in the $75-$100 range. This is not very tavern like. Come on. That is inexcusable for a restaurant of this price point and this nature especially at a time when there are such great wine values out there. I was very perturbed. We settled for an overpriced Pinot Noir from Sonoma ($45) and I tried to let it go. The wine was poured (it was nice) and our entrees arrived in moments.

Unlike his menu at Dylan, tackles fish and meat with equal attention. Artic char ($29), which is grilled over chit wood and served with broccoli rabe in a rich puddle of veal jus, looked gorgeous but it was amazingly flavor-free. Honestly, not a lick of flavor. It barely tasted like fish. It didn’t taste like anything. It was blank. How odd. Not so for the grilled organic pork loin ($26) though. It was juicy and savory and fabulous, served with wild rice and a sour cherry and veal jus. The Brek Ridge Farms baby back ribs ($25) were also an enigma. They were piled up on a plate with some cast-iron potatoes and looked like they could have been a beauty shot for an issue of Pork Smoker’s Pride magazine, but they were dried out. The odd thing is that they were quite impressively tender and rubbed with flavor, but they were completely barren of moisture. It was as if someone forgot about them and left them in a hot oven for a day. How disappointing.

Desserts at Devin have been getting some fun attention because of the chocolate covered potato chip, nuts and raisins. A riff on the chocolate covered pretzel, this salty-meets-sweet situation is just so silly and so good, you’ve gotta get it. Otherwise, I could have skipped the blueberry pie, which was far too cloyingly sweet and didn’t taste much like blueberries to me.

The service at Devin was terrific, and the place has a great easy-going vibe and is a very comfortable room to dine in. And the food is good. This isn’t a menu that’ll have you putting Devin on speed dial, telling all your foodie friends to come on down, but there are enough places for that. But it will have you marking it in your mind as a solid standby place for drinks; to watch a game; to gather a few friends for a civilized ... [more, click below]

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Posted: October 16, 2006

Other restaurants in Tribeca :
+ Lunchbox Food Company--Closed   + 66: THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED   + Ola-- Closed   + Bouley   + Dominic   + Landmarc   + Pace-- Closed   + EN Japanese Brasserie   + Centrico   + Cercle Rouge   + The Harrison   + Turks & Frogs Tribeca   + Devin Tavern   + Dani-- Closed Now   + Bacaro/Smith & Mills   + The Harrison   + Matsugen, By Guest Reviewer Kathleen Squires   + Forge   + Macao Trading Company   + Harbour   + Review text tbd...   + Mehtaphor   + Brushstroke   + Jung Sik   

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