83 1/2
“Lamb ragu – yummy
They could cut down a little on the salt, but other than that this place is a great neighborhood spot!”
“Pasta:
All the pasta was homemade and cooked to al dente.”
“I have been living on the Upper East Side for 15 years and have found few restaurants that give me a cozy Village feel with iron chef quality.”
83 1/2
Takes Reservations: Yes
Delivery: Yes
Take-out: Yes
Accepts Credit Cards: Yes
Bike Parking: Yes
Wheelchair Accessible: Yes
Good for Groups: Yes
Waiter Service: Yes
Caters: Yes
Price range.
$$$ Price range $31-60
7 reviews
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Food is spot on. Excellent octopus, mushroom flan, and burrata appetizers. The four cheese pasta with pear, sage and brown butter is really special. Really just solidly excellent food. And, shockingly, for a high end spot, I hear they're on seamless!
Portions are large. We started with the cheese and meat plate. They gave us at least a half pound of cheese. The cheeses were good – manchego and Brie, which were good, but it was odd that we didn't get any Italian cheese. It is an Italian restaurant after all. They serve every table toasted bread with olive oil and a red pepper pesto, which is good.
We had the pappardelle with lamb ragu and red snapper special. The red snapper was really good. The pappardelle was a bit overcooked and the lamb was shredded/pulled as opposed to ground. It would have been better if the pasta was cooked al dente.
We had a super Tuscan wine with our meal. For $42 it was a decent wine.
Overall, I'd recommend trying it. We'll probably give it another shot as it just seems like it's a new restaurant working out some kinks.
This is a solid neighborhood Italian restaurant with a pleasant atmosphere and nice service. We had the chicken meatballs dish along with the Tagliatelle. The pasta was homemade and very good, but both dishes lacked flavor. We also split a salad to start with was very good.
This is a reasonable priced Italian restaurant that I would recommend if you are in the area and want something convenient and comfortable. There are better Italian places relatively close by, though.
Cute little place, so I was disappointed that the food didn't match the atmosphere. The burrata salad was good, the wine (cabernet sauvignon) was excellent, the chocolate lava cake was good, but my main dish (short rib pasta) was not good. The pasta was too al dente and the dish lacked flavor.
My main complaint was with our server, he brought my friend's dessert but completely forgot mine! After we reminded him, he insisted I hadn't ordered dessert, we both insisted that I had and he finally put in the order and brought it. I found this place to be overpriced. Unless you live in the neighborhood, I wouldn't go out of your way to visit, there are better Italian restaurants.
This review is for dinner. Came here on a Sunday evening with bf, around 6pm. I'd recommend getting here on the earlier side or make a reservation because the dining room is smaller than you might think. They have a really nice and modern decor. They also have a nice list of Italian wines, which I won't comment on only because I am not super knowledgable about wines specifically but I do know they have some Italian options that are really different and unique. Hence, this review is for the food. 3.5 star, rounding up because the service was really nice- on point, helpful with recommendations, knowledgable, but not overbearing
83 1/2 have been around for a year plus but recently closed and reopened with a revamped menu. Bf and I had the:
-burrata. I love burrata and this had a really nice texture… the balsamic was less potent than others I've had, and I wish the tomatoes were a bit… more fruity? But overall a good dish.
-the polipo – grilled octopus. Lovely! And perfectly cooked in a nice, flavorful tomato ragu with asparagus. Octopus is easy to overcook and this was really nicely charred and not one bit chewy. Do get this.
– the duck papparadelle. All their pastas are made in house, which is a must to compete in NY's Italian scene… but this was our least favorite dish. It really, really lacked flavor. The pasta was thinly shaved but tasted bland because the ragu didn't taste like much.. barely there tomato sauce, and the duck could have been way more braised and beaten in an actual ragu. It was just sort of shredded in clumps. I would have thought they would have done a creamy ragu here… in fairness, our server recommended the gnocchi so maybe you should get that.
-the branzino. People know 83 1/2 is known for this dish – it's really unique and takes a good deal of culinary creativity. It's a zucchini crusted seared branzino, on a bed of really nice spinach and super thinly grilled asparagus (yum). You need to be creative with branzino because it's otherwise bland.
– for dessert, we had the tiramisu. This was another disappointment of the evening- really nice mascarpone but overall it was really dry (it was a huge portion though)- they should have soaked it with more coffee liquor
A nice neighborhood spot.
I'm not sure how I haven't heard of this place, as it took a year on the UES to find it.
The pasta was legit. I had the paccheri with vodka sauce and it was glorious. The rest of our group of six seemed extremely happy with their pasta choices as well.
Really the only miss was the decision to add vanilla to the kale salad…it tasted like they had tossed the salad in vanilla coke to me. That said, I would say the taste was 50/50 liked-disliked at the table.
I plan on going back a bunch of times.
I came here for brunch with 3 other people and we were very happy with the food. The place is small but they somehow manage to fit in enough seating for probably 30 people. The service was *painfully* slow, but everyone was nice and we weren't in a hurry on a Saturday afternoon so I can't really complain.
I got the pancetta alla benedict and it was really scrump-didly-dumptious! The hollandaise sauce was so buttery and delicious. I'm normally not a huge fan of polenta but the polenta hash was awesome!
The only downside of this place was the drinks. We all ordered bellinis which turned out to be really sour and gross so that was definitely a disappointment. In retrospect, I'm now wondering if the bottle of prosecco they used had gone bad.
Overall though, the food was great and I wouldn't mind coming back.