Barbuto

It's hard not to fall in love with Barbuto, which has a rustic sophistication to it.  The restaurant is basically a converted garage located on the ground floor of Industria Superstudios.  In the warm months, the garage doors are opened, creating an incredible airy and open restaurant, and the 24-seat patio seating starts to engulf the sidewalk of Washington Street and 12th Ave.

The decor is very simple.  Patio chairs and cheap tables, a wobbly iron divider partitioning the patio from the sidewalk, not a single piece of artwork, but yet...it all works together.  As cheap as it all is, the restaurant is warm and inviting, and once you taste the food, nothing else matters anyway.

The chef here is Jonathan Waxman, who arguably is one of the best chefs in America today.  He can sometimes be seen sweating over the stoves in Barbuto's open kitchen, or skillfully cooking in the wood-burning oven.

Born in 1950, Chef Waxman was one of the first pioneer's of California cuisine, and is credited with being the first chef to bring its style, fusing French technique with the freshest of ingredients, to New York City.  Heard of the "farm-to-table" craze that has been going on for decades?  Jonathan Waxman was the one who started it all here.



This marked my second visit to the restaurant.  Before I get into the food, I have to mention one thing.  I have to mention how badly the hostess staff annoyed the hell out of me when I first got there.

Barbuto is scheduled to open for dinner at 5:30pm, and that is the same time I arrived.  They never really close, serving a smaller menu between lunch and dinner, from 2pm to 5:30pm.  There were patrons seated at the bar, as well as three other diners enjoying their midday meal at a corner table.  I walked in, asked for a table for one, and received the response "We are still in the middle of our meeting, but if you give us 5 minutes we will happily seat you".

As polite as she was about it, I know exactly what the "meeting" is.  It means the kitchen and front of the house staff are taking their breaks to eat family meal.  As important as family meal is, and working in the industry, I also know guests come first, and family meal should never run over opening time.  If you're scheduled to open at 5:30, you open at 5:30.

Being an open restaurant, I then witnessed as the entire staff sat in the back area enjoying their dinner, while I waited outside the wide-open restaurant.  Five minutes turned into twenty, and my blood was rising.  Restauranteurs:  If you have a situation like this, seat your diner.  Be truthful with them, seat them at a table, and allow them to look over the menu.  Do NOT make them wait outside, especially when others are easily seen sitting inside the restaurant.  It does not look good for you at all.  In fact, it shows you could care less about your patrons.

If this was my first time dining here, I would have just walked away, flipping them off and cursing them out as I walked down the street.  But I knew the food would make up for the wait, and thankfully, I was right.

"Meeting" aside, the service staff here is actually very friendly.  When the hostess finally did approach me ready to seat me, she was very apologetic.  My server also did an amazing job navigating me through the menu, was very knowledgeable, and watched over my table carefully.  At first bite of the beet salad, all my anger left me, and Jonathan Waxman's simplistic yet technically crafted food had me in awe.

Shaved Beets, Roasted Peaches, Fontina, Frisee, and Pistachios

I started with the "Barbabietola".  Shaved beets, summer peaches, frisee, beet greens, fontina, and pistachios.  I can't describe how good this salad was.  Every type of flavor you can imagine, every type of texture came through.  The sweetness of peaches, the bitterness of the frisee, the sharpness and bitterness of the beet tops, the crunch and sweetness of pistachios, the rubber texture and full flavor of the diced fontina, all brought together with candy cane, red, and golden shaved beet slices.  Two older woman that sat down across from me couldn't help but ask me what I was eating, because I was enjoying it so much.  After describing the dish to them, they ordered the same thing to share, and the look on their faces matched the one I had just a few minutes earlier.  Food really does bring people together.

Gnocchi with Sweet Corn and Heirloom Tomatoes

Now, onto the gnocchi.  I will let each and every one of you know, this is probably the most orgasmic dish I have ever had.  I would be surprised if anyone has had this gnocchi and did not enjoy it.  Sauteed pillow-like potato gnocchi, tossed in a parmesan-cream sauce, with sweet corn, scallions, and baby heirloom grape tomatoes.  This dish is PERFECT.  It was filling, it was creamy, the gnocchi had texture, and the corn brought it to another level.  I ate every single morsel of food on my plate, and then I even thought about licking the plate afterwords.  Although a little expensive at $19, after having it you realize it is worth every penny, and probably even more.

James Oseland (one of the judges of Top Chef Masters and editor in-chief of Saveur magazine) called Jonathan Waxman "One of the country's greatest chefs", during his departure of the 2010 season of Top Chef Masters.  After eating at Barbuto, you realize every word in that statement is true.  I would have loved to have eaten Chef Waxman's cuisine when he was still in his prime at Chef Panisse many, many years ago.  However, at age 61, you can tell he's still going to be making headlines with his cooking for a long time.

Barbuto

775 Washington Street

New York, NY 10014