I will put it out there that Del Posto is not a terrible restaurant, my personal experience just wasn't all that. I should preface that unlike my usual self I didn't do any research on Del Posto before I went to dinner. I had been in all day training for 2 days at work and I just didn't have the time or energy to preview it online or read the reviews. I figured that it was so well-known that I didn't need to. I guess if I had read up on it, I would have known that it was way more elegant than I expected. I've been to many of Mario Batali's other restaurants in NYC and LA and while they are all nice none of them were stuffy or old school. Well, the minute I walked into Del Posto I immediately felt out of place. I came straight from work training where I was wearing jeans (at least they were my nice jeans) and a casual sweater. When I walked in, I immediately noticed how beautiful, ornate, and formal the decor was. Lots of beautiful wood and there was piano in the back with an actual piano player. There were also lots of grey haired people in suits and dresses. The average age of the clientele must have been 60, which in itself is not an issue for me, but it just totally wasn't what I was expecting. I was expecting something a bit more casual but still high-brow...I guess like a Lupa or Mozza (Mario's restaurant in LA).
Lav and I were seated at 8:30pm and before we could even put our butts in the seat the waitstaff brings over a tiny stool for us to put our purses on. What?! The only other place that I've known to do this, as Lav had mentioned, was Blue Hill at Stone Barns. So now everything was starting to fall into place in terms of expectations. As our waitress handed over the drink list she mentioned that the chef would like to send over an amuse bouche. Fabulous! She graciously asked if any of us had any food allergies or issues, which I always appreciate since you never know these days. This was then where things started to go downhill. We waited, then waited and waited for someone to at least give us a menu. We had gotten our drinks and I had practically finished mine (I highly recommend the Whiskey Smash - amazing drink) and we still hadn't even gotten our menu. After 25 minutes, I finally waved down our waitress to give us our menu. Another downfall of not researching before hand was that I didn't know that the main focus of the menu was the tasting menu. I had naively assumed we'd just order a couple of pastas and appetizers (which there was but I'll explain that in a bit). The waitress explained that on the left hand side was the 7 course $145 tasting menu, on the right hand side was the 5 course $115 tasting menu and that we could order most items a la carte but none of the prices were listed on the menu. It gave me the feeling that it was gauche or not encouraged to not order the tasting menu. Lav and I figured that as long as we were here, we might as well just got with the 5 course tasting menu. I started with the Lobster Fra Diavolo with Garlic Bread Panna Cotta & Seaweeds, then you are required to pick 2 pastas that you and your table mate share, so we got the Tortello Puzzone with Taleggio Dolce & Black Truffle Butter at the absolute insistence of our waiter (yes, somehow the woman who told us about our amuse bouche order stopped showing up and we now had this super nice and adorable Tim Gunn look alike waiter) and the Oreccheitte with Lamb Neck Ragu, Orange Carrots, Rye Crumbs & Toasted Sage (one version made without lamb for Lav), and the for the secondi I ordered the swordfish with nvoltini, Smoky Cabbage, Arborio Salad & Fondo of Barolo. Note that our amuse bouches had still not arrived at this point and it was around 9:20pm at this point.
Finally they bring out the amuse bouche and the bread basket almost an hour after we had been seated. I'm not sure why they couldn't have brought out the bread basket before hand so that we weren't starving? My amuse bouche was a small fried risotto ball, a small slide of toasted bread with butter and lardo and a soup. They were all good but not mind blowing. As a vegetarian, Lav got a piece of broccoli tempura with 25 year aged balsamic vinegar (our waiter kept emphasizing the age of the balsamic) and 2 other veggie items that are escaping my mind right now. She also wasn't blown away by her dishes and we were both left wondering how that took 45 minutes to make. Luckily our antipasti didn't take another hour to come out. I do want to emphasize that all the busboys, servers, and waiters there (and there were many of them. I couldn't even keep track of them) were all incredibly polite and well-mannered. You could tell that they were trained well and took their jobs very seriously. At first Lav's antipasti came out with octopus on it and our waiter immediately started yelling at the busboys to remove the dish. It was a bit alarming but it was nice of him to notice and remove it without us having to say anything. But it was then that we realized that many of the vegetarian dishes that Lav got were just the same dishes that came with a meat or seafood but with that the meat or seafood was removed....almost like she was eating the garnish. Not a great feeling. It would have been better if they created an actual vegetarian dish where the veggies were the focus and not just an after thought. But I will say that my lobster dish was pretty good. It was chilled lobster tail and knuckle and they were very substantial pieces and delicious. The panna cotta did taste exactly like garlic bead but I would have preferred actual garlic bread instead.
Our pasta dish came out next and this was where I was prepared to be blown away. Afterall, it was supposed to be an Italian restaurant and pasta should be there they shine. The waiter had talked up the tortello because of the black truffle butter so I was very excited by it. We each got 3 pieces of an almost hat shaped like pasta. I should have let it cool but of course I was so excited that I bit into it and almost burned myself in the process. My first impression was that it tasted like I was eating a big hunk of brie. The filling was so incredibly rich that I could barely get through the 3 pieces that I had on my plate. You could tell that everything was of the highest quality but it was just too rich for me to real enjoy. We also later realized that there was an extra $20 charge for this dish. I totally did not think it warranted the extra charge at all. The orecchiette came out and again it felt like Lav's dish just kind of got the shaft because instead of lamb they just put a lot more carrots on her dish. They could have made her dish more inventive or added something else in place of the lamb to really make it its own dish. The lamb neck had almost a ground beef consistency and it was a nice combination with the toasted sage. Again it was a good dish but not amazing. I was actually starting to get pretty full at this point but I still had my swordfish and dessert. Also it was about 10pm at this point and I was about to fall asleep in my food. I definitely did not anticipate this being a 3+ hour meal and was not mentally prepared for it. Luckily the swordfish came out not too long after the 2nd pasta dish. To be honest I had just run out of steam by the time this dish got to me. I just wanted to finish it quickly and get home so I probably didn't really savor or enjoy it as much as I should have. As the server was explaining my dish to me I had no idea what she was saying. What is involtini or an arborio salad?! I will say that swordfish was cooked perfectly, nice and tender but not dry or overcooked. The best part of the dish was the 3 pieces of swordfish belly wrapped in cabbage. The cabbage kept a lot of moisture in the belly and it was delicious. The other parts of the dish weren't super memorable and I couldn't even really figure out what I was eating by then. At this point I couldn't wait for dessert to roll around. I ordered the butterscotch semifreddo and Lav got the Chocolate Ricotta tortino with toasted pistachios and extra virgin olive oil gelato. Luckily both our desserts were great and it helped us to get out of our cranky mood. The semifreddo was almost like ice cream but more like a frozen mousse. It actually tasted more like coffee instead of butterscotch but luckily I like coffee so that was fine with me. I had a bite of the chocolate ricotta dish and it was surprisingly light tasting despite looking super rich and filling. While both desserts were great, the best part was actually these 2 sugar donut hole type pastries they brought out filled with rich fluffy cream. I could have had 10 of them, they were that good. They also brought out a jar of Italian cookies but given that it was almost 11:30pm at that time and I was pretty full, I just couldn't go there. Sadly, it took another 15-20 minutes to get our check and pay it, despite the fact that there were only 10 tables left in the entire restaurant. In total our meal took 3 1/2 hours which I don't have a problem with in general, it just wasn't something I was expecting on a random Thursday night outing.
The total bill ended up being close to $200/pp with tax and tip. Ouch. Looking back we shouldn't have felt shamed/guilt-ed into getting the tasting menu. We probably could have had a much more satisfying and affordable meal had we each just ordered a few dishes a la carte. Don't get me wrong, Del Posto is a beautiful restaurant and I can definitely see why it's so highly regarded, I just didn't have that great of a personal experience. I was also surprised at the lack of innovation on the vegetarian dishes. I always feel like vegetarians kind of get screwed in general in situations like this but it was super evident this night. I would go back but only if someone else pays for me. :)
Photo Credit: Yelp
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