Gabriel T.
Yelp
One of the rare meals you have where you have to profusely apologize to your dining companion for picking this place. It was awful.
The staff were very nice (if inexperienced) and they re-did the space from the (equally bad) Du's Donuts in a lovely way, but there are a few red flags I ignored. 1. we were the only people dining here at 8 pm on a Thursday. 2. they didn't have one of their very few specialty cocktails, just didn't even have the base liquor, sitting behind the bar. 3. they were blaring expletive-laden rap music at thunderous volumes as if in warning. 4. most of the staff was just gathered at the bar drinking shots as if on a sinking ship. 5. the martinis were green-hued (but palatable).
Here's where it went wrong. The food was bad. Literally every single thing was bad. I don't even know where to start except we ordered 2 appetizers and 2 entrees. After a *very* long pause here's what arrived:
1 appetizer, 1 entree
(pause)
2nd appetizer, 2nd entree.
All at once, simultaneously...
so the table became overcrowded and food splattered all over my clothes. We spent two silent whole minutes just staring at the table, baffled.
The mediocre soulless half chicken was just cruel because Le Crocodile is literally right across the street, it's LC's signature dish, and it immediately made me depressed I wasn't there. The pork sausage rolls tasted like someone ran out and stole toppings from a nearby pizzeria and then rolled them in so much flaky dough anyone would automatically get nauseous after a single bite.
The fish and chips were perhaps the most confusing. The fish is in this sort of...hardened shell?...and...I don't even know what else to say. The only edible thing really was the whipped feta, which came with lazily toasted slices of sourdough that tasted like supermarket bread. It was probably only good by comparison to everything else. I didn't understand why there was *so much* asparagus everywhere, on everything...
The service (again, very nice, so I feel bad) is inexperienced only because they didn't know when to clear plates or empty glasses, didn't know when to bring the check, and when we asked for recommendations, only knew to recommend the most expensive dishes. There was so much repetition (and yet more under-cooked asparagus! breadiness!) that any server who has worked in a restaurant longer than 45 minutes would immediately note to a diner. The sauces that came with the f&c and the rolls were all creamy, no variation, no acidity. Holy moly. The absolute nerve of charging $26 for entrees, I've encountered less grease at my old summer camp cafeterias.
There is actually, comically, a BIOGRAPHY of the chef behind this enterprise on the back of the menu, like a Playbill or the back flap of a novel. He went to the CIA (not the intelligence agency, as you might guess after paying the bill), he worked for DIG (red flag #6), but I cannot fathom a human being would want to attach his face to this establishment. It's not a real restaurant. It's a scam, and it's a shame.