Mini Review: PO

This past week one of my former college roommates and I decided to get together for dinner. Since both of us consider ourselves pretty serious foodies, we wanted to pick a place that we thought would have really tasty food and that would be relatively inexpensive. The other criteria was that it had to be a place that we could get into relatively easy without a reservation, meaning places with waits like Momofuku or tough reservations like Little Owl were out of the question.

After some back and forth e-mails we finally decided on Po in the west village on Cornelia Street between Bleecker and West 4th. I think we both liked the facts that it has been around for almost 15 years and is pretty well known and that it used to be the home of Mario Batali. The six course tasting menu prepared by chef Lee McGrath was a mere $50 dollars, something relatively small compared to most others in the city and we thought the restaurant would be a nice pick and a good value.

My friend and I both ordered the tasting menu, and while we both finished the meal feeling full, I don’t think either of us was particularly ecstatic about the food. Even though the tasting menu came at a reasonable price I disliked was the fact that it was impossible to find out what’s on it. When we asked our server, he told us it was a compilation of what the chef feels like serving that day. When pressed for more details he asked us if there was anything we didn’t like and noted that those dishes would not be on the tasting menu. Thanks.

Nonetheless we pressed on. The meal consisted of a frisee and endive salad with goat cheese, a kale filled raviolo finished in a light cream sauce, homemade gnocchi Bolognese, lamb top sirloin over chickpeas and eggplant, cheeses and desserts. I thought the portion size, timing and selection were all a little off.

We received our salad literally seconds after placing our order and even before we were brought any wine. When a restaurant so urgently rushes a salad to the plate you’d hope it was for a good reason, but this salad was pretty forgettable. Very shortly after, our server brought us the raviolo. Nice texture, but the kale didn’t really feel like a spring flavor to me (maybe I’m wrong) perhaps the chef was ridding himself of winter surplus. The gnocchi was soft and pillowy as gnocchi should be, and the Bolognese was good if slightly unoriginal. It’s not very difficult to find a good Bolognese in New York. The lamb top loin was perfectly cooked and eggplant and chickpeas with cumin yogurt and mint pesto was satisfying but perhaps a little overwhelming, with flavors that didn’t really let the lamb shine as much as it should.

We then had a really long break before our cheeses and desserts. The cheese plate was a nice composition of flavors and textures but probably pushed us over the brim of fullness. I thought the desserts really stood out. The apple tart being appley, sweet, crispy and buttery all at the same time and the chocolate terrine brightened up by subtle hints of marzipan and amaretto.

In the end food wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t that great either. The pacing of the meal was a little awkward with the first several courses coming in quick succession, not leaving enough time for our bellies to recover to a state of un-fullness. Even though the meal was perfectly decent, there are a slew of other restaurants in New York City within the same price range that serve better food. I wouldn’t mind going back to Po, but for my money it seems a little dated and is a place I can’t recommend.