When a beautiful, pregnant woman
says we're going out to dinner for her birthday. The only
appropriate response is “Yes ma'am. Where do I need to be and when
do I need to be there?” The when was 8:30pm and the where was the
new joint on 3rd Avenue, Nouveau.
The first thing I noticed about
Nouveau is that it's unlike any other place in Bay Ridge. This
restaurant could've been plucked out of upper midtown Manhattan and
dropped onto 3rd Avenue. The decor is very white and
modern. Sleek might be the right word. White, shiny and clean. It
really is a beautiful room. When we sat down Gina and I were
wondering just how awful it would be if people spilled stuff on the
tables or chairs. Then we spent the next 5 minutes feeling
everything around us. Everything seems very wipeable (I'm not sure
that's really a word, but you get my drift.)...very smart. John said
it reminded of him of something out of Dexter. I'm not sure if I can
pinpoint what exactly it is, but he's right.
The people working there are all
very nice and as helpful as they can be. The hostess and waiters
were all very young and seemed a little nervous. I must be getting
old because I kept thinking that the young ladies working should have
an inch or two added to their dresses. But it seems to me that the
difference of two inches is sometimes the difference between elegant
and a $3000-a-night Governor Spitzer prostitute. These girls
straddled that line. I wasn't sure if I was being a bit stodgy in my
thinking, so I got a lesson on proper female dress from Gina. She
says you either show your ass or your boobs...not both. They were
certainly showing both. I feel better about my thinking knowing it
was validated by her. Our waiter was very personable though and sort
of made his nervousness work for him. In a lot of places it takes
forever for your waiter to notice you need a drink and forever and a
day for them to bring you a new one once they do notice. That was
certainly not the case here. Our guy was very attentive and kept
John and I well refreshed with excellent lychee martinis. Being that
we were dining with a pregnant lady, the $150 drink tab was all us.
Another nice touch was that around 10pm the house music started up
and got pretty loud. We clearly weren't thrilled with it. It kind
of shatters your ability to converse with the people you're sharing a
meal with. Not long after it got started though the DJ came over and
asked us if it was too loud. He quickly lowered the volume. That
was very considerate. John says they noticed me jotting something in
the little notebook I keep when checking out a new restaurant and
that's why he came over. I don't know if it's true...but I
appreciate the effort regardless.
All that being said, the real
reason you go to a restaurant is the food, so let's get to it. For
the most part everything was at least good. Some things were
excellent and a couple of things I had minor problems with. If the
menu lists a soup of the day, you should have one...they did not
tonight. For appetizers we had the plantain sampler which was very
tasty. But one of the fried plantains had shrimp in it and that
should be on the menu. A lot of people are allergic to seafood, so
that's dangerous. We also had the excellent shrimp ceviche, which
had some really nice heat to it. And the octopus salad, which was
better than OK but less than great. The flavors were a little
muddled and not as clean as those in the ceviche. We really liked
that the ceviche and the octopus came in martini glasses...it's just
a cute, little touch.
For entrees John got Nouveau
Noodles with Pineapple Chicken (Big surprise that John gets a chicken
dish). This was very tasty but the chicken was a bit on the dry
side. At least the piece of it that I tasted was. The balance
between chicken and noodles was somewhat lopsided towards noodles
too. But, in traditional Asian food, that's generally how it goes
unlike our Americanized versions where we go protein heavy. I had
the Barcelona NY Strip with roasted fingerling potatoes and chorizo
gazpacho. The gazpacho was more like a chorizo succotash, not that
that's a bad thing. Almost anything with chorizo is a good thing.
The potatoes were kind of bland though. The needed to be seasoned.
The strip steak was just a touch overcooked but was obviously a good
piece of meat. I ordered it medium and it was likely just about
medium well. It was still a decent steak, just not a great one.
Gina got the Bone-In Rib Eye and that was excellent. It was
perfectly cooked. Buttery and wonderful. The mushroom rum cream
sauce that came with it was splendid. She was upset that there was
no more room in her to finish it. When she offered it to me to
finish I was upset that I had no more room in me to do so. We did
get a couple of sides too. We got Broccoli in Coconut Butter, I had
reservations about this. It just doesn't sound right to my ear. It
turned out to be pretty good though. We had sautéed corn which was
good. And Parmesan Truffle Fries which were very good but they were
more fancy potato chips then they were fries.
We even managed to do dessert. We
had an Oreo cake that was good but entirely too rich for me. I
couldn't eat much more than the bite I had of that. A snickers pie
that was kind of pedestrian. And tartufo...I love tartufo, it's old
reliable. There wasn't anything special about it, but it was good.
All in all it was a very good
experience. I'll more than likely be going back to try some other
things I saw on the menu like the duck spring rolls and the lobster
tacos. You can expect to spend somewhere between $85 - $120 apiece
if you're drinking and it's more or less a shoes and a button down
shirt kind of joint so don't show up in cargo shorts and sneakers. I
say give the place a shot, you won't be disappointed.
Nouveau
8214 3rd Avenue
Brooklyn, NY, 11209
347-497-5121
www.nouveaubk.com/
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