My wife found out about a special dairy cow beef dinner at ACRU, in which cuts from all over the animal are featured on the tasting menu. We gave it a shot! But check out my Ride & Review video for this meal HERE first:
Okay so here’s the menu we had:
The first round of bites came with some raw sliced beef in a tart shell. Admittedly, I forgot what the waiter said about that item. I assume it was the “tetaki” (misspelled on the menu I think). Tataki is a Japanese preparation that basically means seared outside and raw inside, and that seems to match what we had on the tart. It was good!
This next plate had bresaola and a skewer of yakitori style tongue. Both of these were great, but my wife had some chewy bits on her skewer. I definitely wanted more of that bresaola!
Next up was a duo of raw applications: neck tartare and shabu shabu style top round.
The top round could have been sliced a bit thinner, or perhaps swapped out for tenderloin, but otherwise it was good and flavorful. I think the beef broth that came with it could have been hotter too, that way the meat would cook a little bit, like it does in shabu shabu or Vietnamese pho.
Both my and my wife’s tartare dishes were a bit chewy in parts. Otherwise it was tasty though. I really liked the horseradish and crispy salsify.
Next up was brisket. It was intensely flavorful and peppery, but I definitely needed to eat it with the slaw because it was a bit too dry. This was served with some beef fat brushed flatbread as well.
For the main course, we had 60-day dry aged strip and rib eye.
The strip was from the back end of the loin, where there’s some connective tissue that separates the strip loin muscle from the sirloin muscle. This was easy enough to identify and cut around for someone who knows their meat anatomy, but I could see someone complaining if they chewed on that seam. I liked the fact that we essentially got to try two different muscles here, and the sauce on this, with the allium, was delicious.
The rib eye was beautifully plated, and simply treated/cooked, but I think we preferred the flavor of the strip/sirloin. Both had a mild aged flavor and were perfectly cooked to medium rare. The rib eye came with some greens and a scallion pancake as well.
The chuck meat pie was fun, but I think It could have been made bigger and better by incorporating some potato, peas and carrots inside. Perhaps they were going for a purist’s approach here, to focus on the flavor of the chuck. The sauce was delicious on this, and the pastry was perfect.
Dessert was our favorite part of the meal, I think.
This first dish was sort of like a deconstructed tres leches cake. It was excellent.
To finish off the meal, we had some beef fat caramels. These were nice. A rare treat around these parts. I think this is an Aussie or British thing. The flake sea salt really made them pop.
All in this was a fun meal. I probably wouldn’t do it again, since I felt like, while there were some hits, there were some misses as well, and, over all, the portions were a bit small. I get that this is a tasting menu, but I went home hungry after we spent nearly $400 (the same thing happens to me with omakase). I do, however, definitely want to try some of the larger items from their regular menu, namely the duck crown and the Denver steak.
ACRU
79 MacDougal St.
New York, NY 10012
