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“Bar Breton”

Occasion:	Cuisine:	Area:	Cost:	Rating:
Night Out	French	Flatiron	Moderate	Good

of wonderfully salty and crisp rosemary dusted frites. Scottish Salmon ($24) was also lovely, a supple and succulent filet of pink fish, bedded on coins of fingerling potatoes tossed with fennel in a deeply flavored red wine jus. And the grilled pork chop was as juicy as it was massive, but it was served relatively naked, with a salad of roasted baby beets that seemed rather a haphazard accompaniment that didn’t really bring out the sweetness of the pork. But it did taste great with my cider.

Consulting Pastry Chef Yvan Lemoine (who helped launch Fleur de Sel eight years ago) continues the restaurant’s inconsistencies. Her nutella crepe is delicate and as decadent as it sounds ($6), but Chef Renaud's grandmother's recipe for Foutimassons, a type of beignet, are billed as profiteroles ($7) and are filled with banana crème. If these were called beignets I might have been ready for a cream filled donut, but as it was, I was expecting profiteroles and thought these soft pastry shells would have benefited more from cold creamy scoops of ice cream and chocolate sauce. Chocolate mousse was rich and dark but the texture was chalky rather than smooth, which seems like a mistake one might find on a Top Chef elimination challenge but not at a Manhattan restaurant.

At this point, Bar Breton is a work in progress and a promising one at that, with an appealing room and menu. Renaud is no amateur and the bumps in the road are sure to smooth out with a little more time and attention. Even with its ups and downs, it’s a restaurant that makes sense for these times, a sort of Brittany gastro-pub open all day with a friendly casual setting and gently priced fare and one that I look forward to returning to for galette and a cup of cider, a burger and a beer. It’s not Fleur de Sel, but in some ways, that’s the point.

Bar Breton is open for breakfast, lunch and dinner and is located at 254 Fifth Avenue, between 28th and 29th Streets, 212-213-4999.

 

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Posted: January 14, 2009

Other restaurants in Flatiron :
+ Suenos   + Amuse-- Closed   + Dos Caminos   + Lucy-- Closed   + Gramercy Taver   + Veritas   + Fleur De Sel   + Bolo -- CLosed   + City Bakery   + Shake Shack   + Kalustyan's Cafe   + Devi   + BLT Fish   + Sugarcane   + BLT Prime   + Barca 18-- CLOSED   + Beppe   + Barbounia   + Boqueria   + Eleven Madison   + Lonesome Dove-- CLOSED   + Hill Country   + Olana   + Wildwood   + Primehouse   + Allegretti   + Bar Breton   + Aldea   + SD26 by Bao Ong   + ABC Kitchen   + Ciano   + The NoMad   

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