Dining Brief: Spotted Pig

The weather has been getting colder and colder and I have been getting busier and busier. This confluence of trends has led me to become more and more lazy when it comes to doing fun things that 24 year olds do. I don’t relive my college days anymore and I get angry when I feel obligated to go out partying on weekends. My general fatigue and lack of desire to go outside has me seeking comfort via food more often than normal. I suppose that’s what the winter months are really about though.

This past Saturday, after teaching 5 hours of chess I decided that I wanted to get a good nights sleep so I met up with a friend tog et a good dinner at one of the restaurants on my ‘to go’ list. We chose the Spotted Pig. Since we had nothing better to do on Saturday night, the wait wasn’t too much of an obstacle and I had heard very god things about the food. In fact, the pricing and the layout of the menu (mostly bar food intended for sharing) seemed to be right up my alley.

All I have to say is that I was very disappointed. There was nothing wrong with out meal, but from a place that gets so much hype from Beard Nominations to Michelin Stars, to the general notion that the food is awesome, I just wasn’t feeling it.

The bar has a warm atmosphere and a cool, laid back vibe that seems to draw yuppie chic late 20’s to mid 30’s types, something I decidedly am not. That being said, the spotted Pig still feels like a very comfortable place, there was a palatable warmth on what was a very cold night that made the hour wait for our tale feel very comfortable.

After we were seated, we were probably in and out of the restaurant in about an hour. Our several bar snacks, appetizer and two smaller mains seemed to come out in fairly rapid succession, discouraging lingerers, but hardly leaving enough time to truly savor the food. Out of the bar snacks, the pickles herring (roll mops)were ok but a little too vinegary and not better than those you might find at a Jewish deli. The Devils on Horseback (bacon wrapped prunes), an proven recipe that is actually really difficult to screw up, were fairly tasty but not extraordinary, and our chicken liver toasts were creamy, savory and all around delicious. The ricotta gnudi that I had read so much about were light and airy as advertised, but otherwise weren’t that memorable. They were ok, but I don’t understand what all the fuss is about.

The same needs to be said about the cheeseburger. I have heard numerous rave reviews about the Spotted Pig cheeseburger with some even claiming that it was the best in the city. These reviews are flat out wrong. I really enjoy cheeseburgers but I felt that this one was completely overwhelmed by bleu cheese. The burger was perfectly cooked but with the strong cheese flavors swarming all over my taste buds I couldn’t taste a thing. Why go through the effort of cooking a burger so perfectly if you’re not going to let anyone taste it? The burger and the chewy somewhat unappealing calf’s liver entrée seemed to complement each other in that they both had their good points but didn’t really have enough going on to make them enjoyable dishes.

I rarely dislike a restaurant that I have researched and chose to go to, but the Spotted Pig wasn’t for me. Is it a nice place to grab a drink? Yes. Is it a fun place to go if you want to be seen and feel ‘in’? Sure. Would I ever go and wait an hour to eat the food there? Never again.