Mercat

i went to Mercat on Bond St. last thursday night at 7:30pm without a reservation, expecting to have to wait a long time for a table. unbelievably, i was seated immediately (but maybe it was because i went on rosh hashanah). the staff was really nice and the space is great looking but i think the food needs work. every once in a while, i really enjoy tapas. i admit that i don't know enough about basque cuisine to know whether or not the tapas at Mercat are authentically basque or not.

my friend and i started with the assorted meat platter because i can never say no to cured pork and was really shocked at how generous the portions were. then we moved onto the fried artichoke with aioli. this dish doesn't work. i thought we'd get fried artichoke hearts but instead we got quartered, whole artichokes that were deep fried and really dry. too dry for traditional artichoke eating. next came the mushrooms, fried shoestring potatoes and fried egg (sunny side up). this dish was too salty to enjoy on its own and probably too salty to enjoy period. i also think that the potatoes, which reminded me of julienned potato chips, were overwhelming the mushrooms. finally we got razor clams with bacon vinaigrette and braised pork belly with watermelon, pumpkin seeds and sunflower sprouts. these last two were good, really good. both achieved a great balance of sweet, salty, fatty and fresh.

i think i'd go back to Mercat to find out if there is anything else on the menu that is really good but i'm going to wait a while and hope that they figure out that certain dishes don't work.