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“Gramercy Tavern (Lunch)”

Occasion:	Cuisine:	Area:	Cost:	Rating:
Lunch/Takeout	New American	Gramercy	Moderate	Off the Charts

the beef is whole sides which weigh in at about 800 pounds each, and it takes about 4 guys to carry them into the restaurant, where they break them down in house.

Anyway, the shredded ribs get tucked into a soft rustic Balthazar potato roll, and the sandwich comes with a bowl of hearty white bean soup with bacon and croutons. I almost cried when I took that first bite of the sandwich, it was so good. The total cost of said sandwich and soup combo? Not $25, not $20, not $15. Are you sitting down? Twelve bucks! Yes, for less than you spend at the corner deli, you can dig into a massive short rib sandwich and a bowl of soup at Gramercy Tavern. I almost fell off my bar chair. I may even bring my laptop and work at the bar once a week for that combo. It’s nuts. It’s so cheap and so good.

While I’m at it, I guess I might also mention the pulled pork sandwich ($16) topped with Savoy cabbage salad with walnuts and apples that’s made by slow roasting shoulders from Ossabaw pigs (also from Eco Friendly Farms) for eight hours. The pork sauce is finished with jalapeno, pickled carrots and cipollini onions that, taken together, just do unspeakably great things to your taste buds. I learned that a guest who recently had the sandwich filled out a comment card promising he would “walk through hell in a gasoline suit to get another bite of that sandwich.” Okay, he might need some help, but honestly, I might follow him.

But there’s more. Trout is packaged in a full body bacon wrapper and sent off to the wood-fired grill to roast, then served with lentils and Tuscan kale ($17). And how ‘bout this spinach salad ($12)—tender baby greens, shaved Pecorino, wedges of roasted sweet acorn squash and coins of meaty house-made Merguez that’s got a soft spicy heat that grows deeper with every bite. Oh, and I should also let you know about the marinated calamari ($12), so delicate you’d think it was spun from silk, tossed with lemon zest, and pine nuts; it’s the womanly yin to that meatball’s masculine yang.

For the most part, Michael has pulled the Tavern menu more to the rustic, hearty, almost muscular side of eating. But his a la carte and tasting menus in the main dining room show off his more refined, delicate, almost feminine approach to food. I’ll get there too, but for now I’m hanging in the front room, where the wood smoke gives the air t ... [more, click below]

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Posted: March 18, 2007

Other restaurants in Gramercy :
+ Casa Mono/Bar Jamon   + Pure Food & Wine   + Parea   + Gramercy Tavern (Lunch)   + 15 East   + Tocqueville   + Irving Mill   + Bar Milano   + Irving Mill   + Maialino   + Asellina   + Corkbuzz Wine Studio   + Breads, by guest reviewer Tracy Weiss   

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