Demian Repucci content

Last Saturday we were to meet some friends from Queens and some friends from Carrol Gardens for dinner.  So after having read an article in the New York Times that piqued my interest, I decided to pick the hardest location for all of us to reach and suggested we go to Roberta’s Pizza in Bushwick, Brooklyn.  To top it all off the ‘L’ train was terminating at Lorimer with only a packed shuttle bus to continue.  But we braved it all and went anyway. 

Roberta’s has a nice art/slacker vibe with a casual dining room and ‘college bar’ beer garden out back.  The slight difference is that the beer garden is adjacent, or under, and actual garden.  The restaurant has planted herbs and leafy things on the roof of a shipping container that dominates the lot.  Having fresh herbs on hand at all times is a big plus in my book.  A good sign.  The Times article focused on the food other than pizza that Roberta’s chef Carlo Mirarchi was offering.  Specifically it mentioned pig’s tongue, mackerel, house cured bresaola and pork chops.  Mirarchi had me at the pig’s tongue.  While living in London in 2007 I had the insane pleasure of working at St. John Restaurant.  St. John, overseen by chef Fergus Henderson, is known mainly by it’s reverence for the whole animal.  The whole animal.  It could be described as an offal think tank.  There I learned how to work with such bits as pork kidneys and livers, venison hearts, lamb’s tongue, pigeon hearts and ox hearts to name a few.  I even deboned a big pig’s head and made the classic ‘Bath Chaps’.  That was an experience.  I loved every minute of my time at St. John.  So anytime I see an American chef working with less obvious parts of the animal I am intrigued.

And overall, Roberta’s was very rewarding.  We, of course, had to have the braised pig’s tongue which had a very good, delicate flavor.  The duck prosciutto was cured with a very light touch.  Also very good.  The house made mozzarella was a very nice, light base for the strawberry, balsamic and basil salad.  And the pizzas our table had were all good.  For a young restaurant Roberta’s is way ahead of the pack and has tons of potential.  The only critique of it would be that it is very rough around the edges.  I am sure ‘rough’ is sort of the point when it comes to the restaurant’s environment.  But if the chef is producing mature, thoughtful food, the restaurant’s concept and execution should reinforce that instead of distract from it.  The biggest issue for me regarding this is the concept of the menu and it’s organization.  A sharp eye needs to hone the structure of the menu to better assist the diner in building a successful diner order.  As an example, the pig’s tongue is in the same column as the pork chop.  Unfortunately the tongue portion is tiny.  No bigger than the slivers of charcuterie listed elsewhere on the menu.  Though I understand that the tongue was braised and not cured, to my thinking this dish should have been listed with the other ’specialty’ meat.  Or else increased in portion size to stand among the other larger offerings.  “It’s small” I was told when I ordered it.  But at that point it was too late to go back and reconsider.  Everyone else had ordered and I feared that if I asked for a minute to think my order through again we might not see our server again for a while.  Which brings up the other little issue.  That of the service.  The service at Roberta’s is also rough around the edges.  Again I am sure this casualness is by design but it is casual to the point of the server’s distraction.  And it tended to distract us from the food. 

I will spare you the play-by-play but a restaurant seeking to do really great food needs to take all of these little details into account as well.  The menu concept, the service, the noise level, the lighting, how long it takes to get a drink, etc.  All these things add up to the entire dining experience.  It is this total experience that will either enhance and reinforce the food coming out of the kitchen.  Or it will distract.  For a first experience the food at Roberta’s is pretty great.  It is obvious that Mirarchi is a thoughtful chef that is growing in leaps and bounds.  I am excited to see how his cooking develops and I will definitely make the trek out to Bushwick again to eat at Roberta’s.  And I look forward to that time when the entire experience of eating there highlights Mirarchi’s food and bring’s it into greater focus.  That will be delicious.