Overrated

This is a story about two precious NYC restaurants that have received tremendous word-of-mouth, but elicited from me a reaction more along the lines of head-scratching mild confusion. (I'm not talking about Momofuku here, although that would certainly fall into this category. On second thought, it would merit its own category of ubër-overrated. Seriously, what is it with food critics and David Chang?)

A couple weeks ago, I checked out the Belgian newcomer Resto with three friends, eager to get a taste of the much-lauded hamburgers (house-ground with fatback -- which is exactly what you think it is). The evening got off to a shaky start when the server informed us that they were all out of the hamburgers, thanks to a bachelor party that had taken up residence in the back of the restaurant. Strike one, Resto, I thought to myself.

We decided to start with an order of the deviled eggs. But this being New York City, the year 2008, and one of Frank Bruni's ten best new restaurants of 2007, the deviled eggs came atop salty toast points made of fried pork jowl. It was not bad, but it was also not fantastic in that the "toast" didn't add much to the deviled eggs. My ersatz entree was one of the specials that night, a pulled pork sandwich on grilled bread that tasted a bit too buttery and the pulled pork a bit too sauced. J ordered the moules frites (someone had to, we were in a Belgian resto), and prompted by my usual Pavolovian response to food, I ate about half of the mussels. That is, in addition to my sandwich, my fries (I recommend the sweet chili sauce over the lime pickle sauce), and my Westmalle dubbel crafted by Trappist monks.

So while I ate copious amounts of food and even drank pretentious beer (and enjoyed it!), I didn't love Resto. The food was fine, but nothing spectacular, and certainly wouldn't be one of the ten best restaurants I've been to in any year. The mussels were no better than those at BXL, where I'm told the "U.N.-types" hang out. I doubt I'll even go back to check out the hamburgers.

My other tepid review is of The Little Owl, home of the gravy meatball sliders, but that will have to wait for another night.