Joseph Leonard recently opened in the West Village to some acclaim. The menu is seasonal American, with a fancy twist on comfort food, in a rustic/nostalgic setting - lots of rough hewn wood, vintage photographs, and one of those analog clocks found in practically every elementary school in the 50s from here to Sausalito. It's a tiny restaurant, with at most 3 four tops and 3 or 4 two tops, and a number seats around the bar and the open kitchen.
I wanted to like this place so badly, but I feel that there are a number of kinks that the restaurant needs to iron out before I would even label it "good". We arrived about 20 minutes before the restaurant opened because it was Cochon night, when a whole pig is brought in and broken down into a number of specials that are only available that night. There were already a number of people waiting, but there didn't seem to be anyone managing the line and it started turning into one of those "creeping as close to the door as possible so as not to get screwed" kind of scene. And it didn't help that there was a photographer and a reporter on the scene asking all sorts of questions and snapping flash photos of the ridiculous crowd. I just wasn't in the mood for jostling other patrons and didn't want to start my night off annoyed.
Mercifully, when the manager let the crowd in, we were somehow all accommodated. We sat down and read over the menu, and asked the waitress a couple of questions, most of which she was unable to answer, answered incorrectly, or was just generally unhelpful ("That dish is great!" "Well why is it great?" "Um, because it's great!"). The food itself was lacking attention to detail. For instance, the lettuce in the caesar salad had been chopped too small - as a result, the warm pork shoulder made the whole thing soggy. It also needed more salt and acid to contrast with the fattiness, the pork shoulder texture was unappealing combined with the lettuce, and the crouton wasn't crunchy enough. It just didn't hit the mark for what I expect a caesar salad to be.
For my entreé I had the Blanquette de Cochon, a pork stew with white gravy stuffed inside a squash. This dish would have been great but for two reasons: the food came out lukewarm and the pork could have been cooked longer. The first is totally unacceptable, especially for a stew. I expect a stew to come out piping hot, with a meaty smelling steam rising up into my face. I was sorely disappointed. Lastly I had a piece of carrot cake, nothing overly memorable but at least it was a satisfying piece of cake.
I think the biggest problem with Joseph Leonard is that its team has lofty ambitions and is trying really hard to produce interesting food, which I give them props for. However, it's missing attention to detail that unfortunately make it miss even the baseline for good food. There really IS a Platonic ideal for a Caesar salad and you can't mess with that. You can play with expectations but you can't miss every element, then it's just not a Caesar salad.
All in all, Joseph Leonard definitely deserves another try, especially on another night (or day) that isn't quite so hectic.
I wanted to like this place so badly, but I feel that there are a number of kinks that the restaurant needs to iron out before I would even label it "good". We arrived about 20 minutes before the restaurant opened because it was Cochon night, when a whole pig is brought in and broken down into a number of specials that are only available that night. There were already a number of people waiting, but there didn't seem to be anyone managing the line and it started turning into one of those "creeping as close to the door as possible so as not to get screwed" kind of scene. And it didn't help that there was a photographer and a reporter on the scene asking all sorts of questions and snapping flash photos of the ridiculous crowd. I just wasn't in the mood for jostling other patrons and didn't want to start my night off annoyed.
Mercifully, when the manager let the crowd in, we were somehow all accommodated. We sat down and read over the menu, and asked the waitress a couple of questions, most of which she was unable to answer, answered incorrectly, or was just generally unhelpful ("That dish is great!" "Well why is it great?" "Um, because it's great!"). The food itself was lacking attention to detail. For instance, the lettuce in the caesar salad had been chopped too small - as a result, the warm pork shoulder made the whole thing soggy. It also needed more salt and acid to contrast with the fattiness, the pork shoulder texture was unappealing combined with the lettuce, and the crouton wasn't crunchy enough. It just didn't hit the mark for what I expect a caesar salad to be.
For my entreé I had the Blanquette de Cochon, a pork stew with white gravy stuffed inside a squash. This dish would have been great but for two reasons: the food came out lukewarm and the pork could have been cooked longer. The first is totally unacceptable, especially for a stew. I expect a stew to come out piping hot, with a meaty smelling steam rising up into my face. I was sorely disappointed. Lastly I had a piece of carrot cake, nothing overly memorable but at least it was a satisfying piece of cake.
I think the biggest problem with Joseph Leonard is that its team has lofty ambitions and is trying really hard to produce interesting food, which I give them props for. However, it's missing attention to detail that unfortunately make it miss even the baseline for good food. There really IS a Platonic ideal for a Caesar salad and you can't mess with that. You can play with expectations but you can't miss every element, then it's just not a Caesar salad.
All in all, Joseph Leonard definitely deserves another try, especially on another night (or day) that isn't quite so hectic.
