Scarpetta

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When dinner begins, it’s clear that this is Scott Conant’s restaurant. His high-minded, almost priestly brand of Italian cooking hasn’t changed very much, but in this more casual downtown setting, the food seems more enjoyable and less precious. There are several cool, summery appetizers to choose from, including a chaste arrangement of sashimi-quality yellowtail flecked with sea salt, a mint-green pea soup with fresh crab, and delicious cubes of scallop “carpaccio” tossed with bits of citrus and soft chunks of avocado. Conant’s trademark “creamy” polenta (folded with industrial amounts of Parmesan, milk, and heavy cream) is as opulent as ever, and you can complement it with an appetizer portion of nicely braised short ribs. My favorite of these early dishes, however, was the simple, expertly cooked seafood fritto misto, which the chef mixes with frizzled bits of artichoke, eggplant, and lemon and serves the way they do on the Amalfi Coast, on a folded white napkin.

Conant devotees will be familiar with many of the pasta recipes on the menu at Scarpetta, which doesn’t make them any less exceptional. The agnolotti dal plin he introduced at Alto (little pasta pouches stuffed with ground pork and melted fontina cheese) is reproduced here, and so is the house-made tagliatelle, which is sprinkled with a rich, creamy ragù made with ground braised lamb shank and spring peas. I have dim memories of enjoying the chef’s ravioli stuffed with duck and foie gras at one of his uptown restaurants, but the dish seems a little baroque (it’s flavored with an overly sweet Marsala reduction) for the meatpacking district. This isn’t the case with Conant’s famously restrained spaghetti pomodoro (with basil and delicately simmered Roma tomatoes), or the fat rings of “calamarata” pasta dusted with mint-infused panko bread crumbs, or the delicious stamp-size raviolini, which are stuffed which a creamy, esoteric form of ricotta and finished with sliced squash blossoms and anchovy butter.

Bulky, farm-style cooking is the rage today, which may be why Conant’s entrées seem to have grown to supersize portions. At L’Impero, the chef’s much-hyped baby- goat dish (“capretto”) was served in delicate spoon-size portions. At Scarpetta, the goat is as tender as ever but lands on the table with a thud, accompanied with summer peas and a platoon of chopped fingerling potatoes. My too-dry, oven-roasted “baby chicken” wasn’t baby-size at all, and was carpet-bombed with a thick ragù made with crumblings of chicken liver. The formidable braised veal shank is fashioned in the shape of an artillery shell and topped with a delicious lemony gremolata mixed with chunks of oily, sinfully rich bone marrow. If you want something lighter, I suggest the orata (in a refined stew of mussels and giant Sardinian couscous) or the turbot, which is served with sweet caramelized endives and a nice sharp salsa verde made with anchovies and fresh parsley.

During his uptown period, Conant kept trying, in an increasingly obsessive way, to shoehorn his talents into a certain prim, Michelin-approved sensibility. At Scarpetta, the opposite is true. Restaurants in meatpacking land are always in danger of being overrun by mobs of fine-dining Visigoths from the hinterlands, but right now the space feels fresh and forward-thinking, and the cooking feels that way, too. It’s supported by a deep, Italianate wine list and a roster of competent if not mind-blowing desserts. There’s a cooling snifter of “chocolate and vanilla” parfait (flavored with hazelnuts) and a professionally constructed molten chocolate cake touched with burnt orange and made with high-grade Amadei chocolate from Italy. The most innovative dessert is the coconut panna cotta. It’s topped with caramelized pineapple and served with a spoonful of coconut sorbet, and it all melts together in a happy progression on the tongue. It’s the perfect dessert for a hot summer evening, and also the perfect antidote for a bellyful of braised goat. — Adam Platt

Fritto misto, spaghetti with tomato and basil, capretto or veal shank, coconut panna cotta

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New York Magazine Reviews

• Adam Platt's Full Review (7/21/08)

Best of New York Awards

• Best Spaghetti Al Pomodoro (2009)

Featured In

• The Best Places to Live in NYC: Our Critics’ Favorite Comestibles in Selected Neighborhoods (4/19/10)
• Adam Platt's Where to Eat 2009 (1/5/09)
• Restaurant Openings: Hundred Acres, Scarpetta, and Curry-Ya (5/19/08)