Rouge Tomate

Tucked on 60th street just east of the park, this lovely, large space wowed me at first sight and didn’t stop throughout the whole meal. Rouge Tomate has a sizable bar area with the dining area in the back. There are two distinct sections to the dining room. The front portion has closer tables and seems intended for smaller groups while the rear, which is across glass bridges, has larger tables and booths.

Executive chef, Jeremy Bearman, serves Modern American cuisine using seasonally inspired and locally sourced ingredients with an eye towards capturing the natural flavor of the ingredients. The wine list claims to be designed with a similar goal in mind, and I found that it offered a wide range of nice bottles at good price points. The cocktail and beer list is also quite impressive in a way that makes me want to go back to Rouge Tomate and sit at the bar for a light bite and cocktail. My friend Dawn and I opted to have a wonderful Austrian Gruner Veltliner that went incredibly well with our meal and was just a really nice, crisp white wine at a very nice price.

The menu offers a seasonal tasting menu and an a la carte menu. Dawn and I decided to order a la carte. The a la carte menu is divided a bit differently than a typical menu. There are a series of seasonal toasts, a fish & shellfish section of small appetizer sized seafood dishes, a “for the table” selection of dishes, vegetable plates that are mostly salads, a pasta & grains section, and a seafood, poultry, & meat entrée section. We decided to order something from each section of the menu except the vegetable section and split them all. It turned out to be the perfect plan!

The amuse bouche of the evening was an absolutely divine mini cup of beet soup. It was a truly fabulous little taste of velvety-rich soup. The bread basket offered three choices and appeared with a bowl of olive oil and cauliflower spread. The bread itself was okay and the cauliflower spread was a bit weird in that I didn’t love the flavor of cauliflower in a pureed texture.

We began our meal with a plate of three seasonal toasts: Celery Root Remoulade with cornichon, Quail Egg, & Tarragon; Wild mushroom with ricotta, leek, thyme, and lemon zest; & Spaghetti Squash with crab, apple, and jalapeno. We both found the celery root to be the standout in this group. It tasted like the best egg salad ever and the tarragon really added a nice flavor note. The wild mushroom was also quite nice, but there was a bit too much lemon zest for us. Our least favorite was the spaghetti squash, because the crab flavor overpowered all the other ingredients and just left the toast rather flat (pardon the pun).

These toasts were a very good start to a meal, but the next course had me almost completely forgetting the lovely little toasts. The Hawaiin Walu Crudo with Avocado, Jicama, Radish, and Yuzu was astonishingly delicious. The Walu was melt in your mouth tender and the yuzu sauce with the textures of avocado, radish, and jicama was perfect. This is one of those dishes that make you want to return to a restaurant.

From the “for the table” section of the menu we choose the sautéed Montauk calamari with savoy cabbage, butternut squash, cashews, coconut, and lime. Just when I thought we wouldn’t have a dish better than the Walu Crudo, this dish proved me wrong. Dawn and I agreed that neither of us could remember ever having calamari that was as texturely perfect as this was. The coconut lime sauce was just heaven on the already perfect calamari. Yet another reason to return to Rouge Tomate.

For our entrees, we decided we would do one pasta and one meat dish. This turned out to be ideal. The pasta dish we choose was the cow’s milk ricotta gnuddi with celery root, black truffle, salsify, fines herbs and parmesan. The gnudi were excellent little pillows of dough and the dish as a whole was a really simple feeling, well-executed pasta plate. Our other main dish was the rabbit two ways with rabbit bacon and rabbit fleischnacke (minced rabbit meat wrapped in a fresh noodle) served with toyko turnips, savoy cabbage, maple, and mustard jus. I loved the rabbit bacon on this and the rest of the plate was very good. If the competition the rest of the night hadn’t been so tough, the dish would have been far higher on my list of favorites!

For dessert, we each had an after dinner drink and then we split the Bittersweet Chocolate Sphere with banana, frangipane, and candied almonds. A large cube was brought to our table and then warm chocolate was poured over it and the sphere melted away to reveal the banana and frangipane. This dessert was prettier than it was tasty. I found the almond flavor a bit too strong and felt the dessert was only okay.

Rouge Tomate is definitely worthy of a Michelin Star. The food is incredibly delicious and thoughtful and an evening there feels special. I can’t wait to go back.