I am now one of the others. One who lives in Brooklyn. My 10003 has been replaced by a 11201. The F Train is now my sweet orange train ride. But I’ve been here before. I used to be a Brooklynite. Many moons ago before it was en vogue, way before it was The Culinary Wonder Borough. The year was 1991, and I was a first year at Brooklyn Law School. I remember the August before school started, and I had just come home from a trip across Europe with Melissa, my best friend from high school. I was nervous and excited at the same time. I was starting Law School after all, beginning the journey toward what I hoped would be a long career as a champion of justice. But first, I needed a place to live.

My Dad and I started our search in Brooklyn Heights where most of the students lived, but Dad shook his head. No way. Too expensive. We walked down Court Street and crossed Atlantic Avenue and entered Cobble Hill, but he kept shaking his head. Too expensive, let’s keep looking. We walked over to Boerum Hill, and I got the same response. He was footing the housing bill, after all, so I was in his hands. And so we kept walking down Smith Street. It was a steamy August day, and I remember clusters of pot-bellied men, their shiny scalps browned from the sun, smiling in shirtsleeves in their lawn chairs on the sidewalks, with hot cement underfoot. Smith Street was their Hamptons.

We kept walking farther and farther toward Red Hook until we reached Carroll Gardens, a neighborhood marked by Italian social clubs, little old widows walking around in black and young wives with big hair and lacquered nails kibitzing on the corner. There were no yuppies in this neighborhood. In 1991, it was still 99% old school Italian. And it was there in Carroll Gardens that my father finally stopped shaking his head and started nodding it—yes. We found a huge walk-through apartment on the top floor of a brownstone on Carroll Street for practically nothing in rent a couple of miles from law school. I was impressed with the place. It was sunny and big with a separate study and two huge closets, but I was not happy with its location. I saw an apartment in the boonies, far from my friends on Remsen Street. I felt isolated, in the middle of nowhere. “It’s too far from school, I said. “It’s not. You’ll live here,” he said. I frowned. “You’ll be happy,” he said, not giving into my pouting. And he was right. I loved it.

In the intervening years, after I graduated from law school, moved to Manhattan and pursued my short-lived career as a lawyer, things began to change on Smith Street. Indie coffee houses began to replace run-down bodegas, high-end cocktail bars sprang up in former social clubs, yoga reached Brooklyn, and New York City chefs discovered the world across the river. Two couples were at the forefront of the early Smith Street restaurant movement—Saul and Lisa Bolton, who opened Saul, a gutsy neighborhood spot for contemporary seasonal American in 1999 (and who would be rewarded with a Michelin star in 2008), and Charlie Kiely and Sharon Pachter, ex-pats from Savoy who opened The Grocery, a sweet mom-and-pop Greenmarket showcase later that year.
Despite the uniform praise these restaurants have both received, I’d never visited either in my years as a New Yorker. With my move, I decided it was time. (This week’s review covers The Grocery; next week’s will cover Saul.)

Diana joined me at The Grocery, coming over from the Upper East Side on a surprisingly nice Spring evening. She was thrilled for the visit, as she’d been wanting to return to the Grocery for some time. Her enthusiasm really made me happy. I haven’t gotten over my Brooklyn guilt yet. That would be the guilt caused by having people from Manhattan travel to see me here. I hope to get over it soon. In any case, The Grocery is lovely, but you might miss it if you don’t pay close attention. It’s a signless, rather weathered storefront, with just a small blackboard outside announcing its presence with THE GROCERY etched in dusty chalk lettering. Inside, you’ll find a peaceful, quietly elegant room with walls washed in soft sage, worn hardwood floors underfoot and ceiling fans whirring overhead. There’s no music; your voices are the soundtrack. Beyond the petite dining room, with tables cloaked in white linen, is the kitchen where Sharon and Charlie cook. You’ll pass by on your way to the restroom or through to the garden out back. Diana and I sat inside. While Springtime was in full bloom that day, the night was not yet warm enough for an al fresco dinner.

We started with a rosé champagne and looked over the menu that showed off the first signs of Spring—peas, asparagus, ramps, favas, lamb—but at New York prices, unfortunately. Around the dining room Charlie and Sharon were greeting guests, explaining specials and serving dinner on small fluted Tiffany-blue plates. It’s a sweet touch that makes you feel as though you’re dining in their home.
Indeed, they served our first courses. We’d decided on fried artichokes with the help of a table next to us who were raving about them. They were right to rave. A plate of beautiful fried artichokes ($14), quartered and gently breaded forming a light crust, are spritzed with lemon and served on top of a salad of shredded greens dressed in a bright vinaigrette.

With the artichokes we had that night’s special—a white wine risotto ($11) stocked with generous hunks of duck confit and plump sweet spring peas. This risotto was perfectly cooked—loose, soupy and almost running off the plate, yet creamy enough from the starch of the rice, no cheating with cream. While three appetizers were a lot, we couldn’t resist a grilled calamari, so we didn’t. We shared it as a mid-course. Thin, wonderfully chewy and charred ringlets are tossed with sweet and hot long peppers, roasted and pickled cauliflower, and giant cannellini beans (so lustrous they almost looked like little poached eggs) from Rancho Gordo in a dill and tarragon dressing. Dill is one of my favorite herbs, and here it was unexpected. But it was a welcome surprise, somehow softening the edges of all the flavors, helping the dish reach harmony.

The room was now filled, and Diana was looking around, smiling. “Brooklyn people are so cute,” she said, sweeping a piece of soft crusty bread through the last of the dill dressing. I laughed. “I guess we are,” I said, taking in the room. A sweet young couple was seated next to us—he, bookish in glasses and a polo shirt, she, petite and thin, with pale freckles and a mop of curly amber hair. Another couple sat on our other side, he speaking loudly on a cell phone, she smiling apologetically at all those eyes on him. A group of women, seemingly mother and daughters were catching up at a large table along the far wall. Two men in tight t-shirts showing off their great pecs, shared a salad (what Charlie and Sharon call “Teenage Greens.”) More and more tables of two came into the small grass-colored room, inquiring about tables for dinner. There were none free. The woman next to us commented to her husband who was now off the phone: “Looks like the sidewalk will be crowded again tonight.”

Two glasses of Sancerre and lots of conversation about the neighborhood and real estate prices later, we were finally onto our main courses. We ordered the lamb ($27), sliced into tender pink medallions served with a cool, creamy tzatsiki-like yogurt sauce in a dollop over the top. The lamb was fanned out over a bed of nutty barley tabouleh and given a clever Moroccan nod with raisins cinnamon and cumin. It was excellent. The trout ($26), on the other hand, was quite lackluster. It’s a nicely cooked moist fish, head and tail on but deboned, and served with a crispy spaetzle, asparagus and hen of the woods mushrooms. Surprisingly, it lacked bright notes of lemon or any sort of acidity that might balance the earthiness of the fish and the mushrooms. It was rather bland, and so we cleaned our plate of the lamb, but the trout was mostly left over.

No matter, it was a small blip in a beautiful meal conducted with smart and lovely service. And it did leave us room for desserts, which include a terrific steamed pudding and an exceptional selection of homemade sorbets (sour cream lemongrass) and ice creams (caramel cognac). With summer around the corner, I vote for a sidewalk ice cream stand (perhaps called The Grocer’s Freezer). I think it would fit in quite nicely with the artisan cheese shops, funky wine shops, haute boutiques peddling handbags the price of plane tickets to Rome, and restaurants with Michelin stars. Yes, I think that would work quite well.

It’s hard for me to believe how much this neighborhood has changed since that hot summer in 1991. It’s even harder for me to believe it was 17 years ago that I first moved here. (You have no idea how scary that is to me.) But, yes, it was 17 years ago. I can remember when all Smith Street could rave about was The Red Rose. And I can still remember my father telling me I’d be happy in Carroll Gardens. Who knew he’d be right, and that I’d be back.

The Grocery is located at 288 Smith Street in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, 718-596-3335.

Andrea Strong