Dining here with my niece, Nora, the last time I was in New York, I immediately saw the tastes and idiosyncrasies of New York. Briefly, New Yorkers are mad for Asian food, including sushi and raw seafood, whether ceviche or Italian crudo style preparations. They also still expect to see foie gras on a French menu, and they love classic French sauces, like the beautifully made Albuféra sauce which glossed my poularde or the Périgourdine (foie gras) sauce that accompanied my nieces’s perfectly cooked, rare venison.
Other dishes we loved included octopus with a carrot-harissa sabayon, grilled red mullet with squid and a Malabar pepper sauce, a fluffy Comté cheese soufflé and poached Maine lobster with grilled baby leeks and a suave and very elegant tarragon-galangal broth. The orange marmalade soufflé with green cardamon ice cream was a cracking dessert, and service here is alert and friendly. Located in a convenient and well-heeled residential neighbourhood, Essential by Christophe is a great place to dine amongst New Yorkers instead of tourists and also experience Christophe Bellanca’s deliciously cosmopolitan French cooking.
Essential, 103 West 77th Street, New York, NY,
Tel. (1) 646-478-7928
Prix-fixe menus $140, $180, $240.
From France Today Magazine