Tag Archives: italian food

Osteria del Principe

Tabelog hosted another great food event, this time at Osteria del Principe, an Italian cured meat-centric spot down by the Flatiron building.

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The restaurant/store is the flagship location, and is run by Principe di San Daniele, a world class prosciutto manufacturer in Italy. So you know you’re getting top notch meats here when you eat.

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Tabelog invited a bunch of us ass-kicking NYC food bloggers and reviewers to mix and mingle while tasting some really nice meats and wines. Here’s a menu of things we tasted:

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As you can see from this sheet, we were asked to rate and judge the various sliced meats and wines:

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First I created a nice cushioned base with a bite or two of freshly baked focaccia bread:

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Here’s my second (or was it third?) plate of meat. I needed to try everything a few times to figure out my rankings.

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I ultimately put the truffle ham in first place, followed by the 20-month prosciutto and mortadella right behind. Then the 16-month prosciutto, with the speck being at the bottom. Surprising! That truffle ham really had an amazing flavor that wasn’t overpowering. It was a cured meat.

Here are some shots of the two ham slicings. The ones with the brownish edge is the rosemary ham, and the other is the truffle ham:

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This board has the speck on the left, and the mortadella on the right:

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As you can see, there was a fancy old fashioned hand crank meat slicer set up with the 20-month prosciutto.

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The slices were served in little paper cones:

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I really couldn’t get enough of those. So good: soft, not too salty, and really nicely flavored. One of the gents from the Gotham Burger Social Club fashioned one meat cone into a lapel flower for his suit jacket. Brilliant!

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So that was just the sliced meats that were laying around for our consumption. There was also a huge wheel of cheese that was being sliced/scraped and shoved into little brown paper bags for snacking. “Raspadura” Bella Lodi:

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The tomato and burrata caprese salad was refreshing and light, with a great herb kick:

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The prosciutto and melon was a perfect balance of sweet, savory and juicy all in one bite. These were amazing, not to mention gorgeously plated/presented:

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This polenta was wrapped with speck and then baked until crispy. Absolutely delicious! I need to try making this at home now:

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The grilled octopus skewers were a nice break from the pork overload. Wait.. is there even such a thing as pork overload? Anyway, they were warm and charred to a nice half-crisp texture, and accompanied by slices of grape tomato:

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The slices of Piadina (bread portion) with porchetta inside were really awesome too. Especially when topped with some of the freshly scraped cheese. This meat item may have been the best of the day. I almost wish it was showcased differently, because I feel like it got missed by some of the other bloggers.

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Lastly, the house-made tagliolino pasta was set in a light cream sauce and cooked with the 16-month prosciutto, then topped with a nice slice of it. Fucking amazing. The prosciutto was allowed to season the whole dish without any extras needed, other than some finely minced herbs and a little fresh pepper. So simple, yet so good.

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All around awesome meal, and I was happy because it was extremely meat-centric. The wines were pretty good too, specifically the Ribolla Nera, which was a red wine that had robust flavor but was still lighter on the palette.

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There were even some Italian cosmetic samples and creams handed out as parting gifts. I let my wife go for that. I was’t really interested.

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OSTERIA DEL PRINCIPE
27 E. 23rd St.
New York, NY 10010

Torrisi

UPDATE! NEW TORRISI IS OPEN!!!

The new address is: 275 Mulberry St, New York, NY 10012

Here are some delicious bites my wife and I tried:

I came here with my wife and her cousin for the ten course $100 price fix meal.

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It’s tough to get a rez here because it is such a tiny spot; very few tables:

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The ladies had a sparkling rose, and I tried three different beers, which seemed to pair nicely with the meal as I went through the courses. My favorite was the white rascal belgian style white ale.

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So here’s how shit went down in terms of food:

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Amuse:
Beggar’s purse with housemade buffalo mozzarella, tied up with chive string and filled with trout roe and crispy bread crumbs. This was a great, briny bite. I could pop these in my mouth like snacks all night.

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One:
Squash macchiato with brown butter and bay leaf apple cider and mulled spices. This was a great little shot of liquid, like a tea, or consommé soup.

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Two:
Japanese abalone sous vide with pickled and charred celery, hazelnut purée and chopped hazelnuts. This was really refreshing and delicate. I was wishing I had a huge bowl of it instead of a little salsa or french onion dip sized dish.

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Three:
East coast Blue crab in gelee minestrone with squash, preserved tomatoes, green beans, bread crumbs, black beans and basil pistou. I hardly had any crab in my serving, but otherwise it was pretty good. It was more like a salad than a soup for sure, due to the gelee technique used.

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Four:
The “mixed grill” course had a few components. First was a Rhode Island oyster with dill, smokey grilled cherry mignonette and fresh ground horseradish. This was an excellent bite. By far one of the better dishes served.

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Then came a trumpet royal/king mushroom “mille feuille in terrine” (lots of thin slices) that was seared in foie gras butter and topped with sea salt flakes. My favorite of the night. It was meaty, fatty, and packed with flavor. Wonderful texture too – nice crunch and bite to it on the edges, yet it was still soft like a mushroom at the same time.

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The last part of the mixed grill was a veal terrine made with tongue, tail, sweetbreads and carrot sausage with pickled fennel salad and smoked brioche pretzels. There were three mustards too: Bavarian, fig, and nectar. My favorite was the nectar. Since there were three of us dining, I was sort of hoping we would each get a slice of terrine. Not the case. I think it is usually one slice per two guests, so we did get a little more than what is typically served. Still not quite enough in my opinion.

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Five:
East coast diver scallop with super thinly sliced white and matsutaki mushrooms in a marsala bouillon with sliced chives. It sat on a nice display of bay leaf and crushed scallop shells. This was really pretty, and also tasty. The scallop was perfectly cooked and then sliced sashimi style.

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Six:
Scottish salmon tartare filled cannelloni with salmon roe, basil, crispy shallots and Meyer lemon zest. This was a great little log of pasta. I’ve never had salmon with pasta before, so it was a great surprise for me.

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Seven:
Sheep’s milk gnocchi with chestnut, chives and brown butter ragu with shallots and pecorino. This was a sweet pillow of pasta. Dessert pasta, almost. Very well done though.

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Eight:
Squab cacciatore skin-on breast with mulberry and walnut dumpling and juniper berry and walnut sauce. This was reminiscent of a duck dish. Perfectly executed breast and a great sweet yet savory sauce.

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Palate Cleanser:
Lemon ginger Italian ice. The ginger really gave it a great spicy kick. Loved it.

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Coffee:
Espresso for me, cappuccino for the ladies.

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Nine:
Whipped ricotta cheesecake with finger lime graham cracker dusting and olive oil, served in eggshells that sat on a porcelain rabbit’s ass area. Nice presentation. Great bite of cheesecake here. Very soft and creamy.

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Ten:
Italian rainbow/tricolor almond/orange sponge cake with chocolate ganache, almond slivers and custard. This was quintessential Italian. The back of the slice was the tricolor cookie/cake. It was beautiful, but not my type of dessert per se. Again I was expecting a third slice here since we were three diners. But again I think the regular portion is one slice for two diners. In this case it was enough for the three of us since none of us particularly loved this dish.

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So that’s about it. I liked the meal very much, but I felt it was a bit expensive for the small portion sizes (despite it being a ten course tasting menu I was still hungry afterwards). That said, I doubt I’d come back unless it was for some sort of special event. Here’s the bill for three people:

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We were sent home with a little box of desserts as well. Nice touch. Out of the items listed on the paper, my favorite was the spicy mango gumdrop thing.

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TORRISI IS CLOSED