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“P*ONG”

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

oil, and pure Madagascar vanilla), and the Chocolate mojito (rum, mint, cocoa soda, and passion fruit ice). While these drinks are certainly inventive, they are too heavy for the food, not to mention the fact that they are extremely labor-intensive, which strikes me as a problem with a restaurant this small and with so few staff. I’d scale back the number of cocktails and the number of ingredients in them.

Drinks aside, the food at PONG is quite artful and inventive and is some of the most interesting and unique food out there. Pichet is really taking the time to create beautiful dishes that marry different textures, temperatures, and flavors profiles, which makes P*ONG quite a thrilling place to eat.

For instance, a thinly sliced scallop is seasoned and lightly “toasted” (the restaurant doesn’t have gas so all cooking is on hot plates), and rested on top of a squiggly tangle of angel hair soba noodles. It gets topped with a little icy crush of chamomile, thinly diced asparagus and a dollop of salmon roe ($14). While I could have done without the ice, the combination of all those flavors (salty, briny, sweet), textures (creamy, crisp), and temperatures (icy and warm) was magical. I felt every last spot on my palate getting its own high five. And the same thing happened with the burrata, a super creamy almost pudding-like cow’s milk cheese that’s soaked in lemon olive oil and served with a roasted tomato that’s been cooked down to almost candy sweetness and then frozen. To give it some pop and cut the fat, there’s a little mound of caviar, and as a textural crunch, there’s a foccacia chip ($12). This is the world’s best-deconstructed mozzarella and tomato sandwich.

While Pichet can hit the nail on the head, he can also get his thumb. The American Waygu carpaccio ($19) suffered, like those cocktails, from one too many ingredients. The beautiful flavors of the beef were virtually erased by a shiso pesto made with smoked Japanese volcanic salt, pine nuts, and sour cream. This meat deserved to be a little more naked, and instead, it was suffocated. I also felt that way about the tuna tartare ($14) with black olive and Meyer lemon sabayon. While the tuna was diced to fine pristine cubes, the Meyer lemon mousse just about choked the flavor out of that fis ... [more, click below]

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Posted: June 11, 2007

Other restaurants in West Village :
+ Jefferson-- Closed   + La Palapa Rockola   + Sumile   + Babbo   + Tasca   + AOC Bedford   + Home   + The Spotted Pig   + Barbuto   + Numero 26   + Mas   + August   + Alta   + Cru   + Blue Mill Tavern-- Closed   + Employees Only   + Lassi   + Metropol--Closed   + Turks and Frogs   + Bellavitae   + Yumcha-- CLOSED   + Gusto: SEE EARLIER REVIEW; THIS CHEF HAS LEFT GUSTO   + Perry Street   + Home   + Ditch Plains   + The Little Owl   + Cafe Condesa   + Cafe Cluny   + Gusto   + The Waverly Inn   + Morandi   + P*ONG   + Perilla   + Soto   + Market Table   + Centro Vinoteca   + Barfry   + Dell'Anima   + Bar Blanc   + Smith's   + Commerce   + Elettaria   + Bar Q   + Cabrito   + 10 Downing   + Minetta Tavern   + Braeburn   + Scuderia, by guest reviewer Kathleen Squires   + Bar Blanc Bistro by Guest Reviewer Kathleen Squires   + Joseph Leonard   + Bar Henry, by Guest Reviewer Kathleen Squires   + Kin Shop   + Monument Lane   + Wong   + Bin on Bleecker, by Dara Pollak   + Ristorante Rafele   + Cole's Greenwich Village by Guest Reviewer Claire Jaffe   

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