Aldo’s birthday dinner at Corton in Tribeca was probably the finest culinary experience we’ve had in a year—the best, perhaps, since we ate at Beast, and that was in Portland, Oregon, and that was last summer. Absolutely nothing comparable in New York comes to mind, unfortunately. The restaurant scene here just hasn’t been as much fun since the economy collapsed. Aldo tried to rearrange his finances so that part of his portfolio could be redefined as a philanthropic nonprofit, the funds to be dispersed in the form of meals for two at top-flight establishments. But his accountant balked, and then oddly enough the accountant up and died, leaving Aldo unable to proceed.
Corton, though, is doing well enough that I had trouble getting a reservation. It certainly deserves its success and critical accolades. The meal we had there last week was much more memorable than one we had at the address’ previous tenant, the famous Montrachet. But we went to Montrachet late in its run, on a bring-your-own-wine night, and we uncorked a Sauternes so off it smelled and tasted like a banana wrapped in damp socks.
The restaurant’s name reflects one of the Grand Cru wine appellations of Burgundy’s northern Côte de Beaune, and so does its eminent wine list, from Chablis to the Jura. The room is boxy and pale and elegant: Most noticeable are the vines with gold leaves designed in bas-relief along the walls. The effect is something like a vineyard in the hush of a heavy snowfall.
The chef, Paul Liebrandt, gained a certain notoriety with his previous high-profile restaurant, Atlas, where some critics claimed he pushed the envelope so far the envelope eventually was perforated and the contents fell out onto the floor. Incidentally, I think I pushed that metaphor too far, and now it’s all over my lap. At Corton, at any rate, the cuisine was impeccably artful, playful and harmoniously delicious.
I started with something called, with a certain Martha Stewart poeticism, “Violet Hill Farm Egg.” It turned out to be a beautiful, omeletty puff—the egg floating on a base of salt cod and baby squid, the whole thing buoyed by pheasant consomme. Aldo, who once described himself in his diary as a “mad hog for foie gras,” was very happy with Corton’s presentation of it. The menu describes it as accompanied with “hibiscus-beet gelee and blood orange”—it was a small landscape of deep, burnished color. Aldo said it was the cleanest foie gras he has ever had. He couldn’t explain it further, he said, but meant it as a compliment.
The entrees, which so often are a slight letdown at high-end restaurants—as if the chef were an architect who took greater pleasure in crafting models than actual houses—were in fact a perfect continuation of the meal: Pheasant was served with a small but luscious cassoulet of coca beans, red-cabbage gelee and albufera sauce. And for Aldo, the unaging birthday boy, there was a happy little fish duet of John Dory and diver scallop.
My only complaint about the evening was that food was slow coming out of the kitchen. Then again, it was so good, neither of us cared. Besides, we were kept entertained with a veritable conga line of amuse bouches.
