Photo by Zandy Mangold
Whatever the fallout from Allen & Delancey chef Ryan Skeen’s infamous tweet this week—could this be anything other than a fire-me-now plea—I hope the restaurant decides to press on, and to bring in yet another chef. The dining room is just too cozy, sexy, and twinkling to die so young. On a Lower East Side increasingly bereft of places worth spending a couple of hours in, sudden death would be a serious loss for the neighborhood. Yeah, it’s been a rocky ride at Allen & Delancey—a bankruptcy declaration, and three chefs so far in the past year—but maybe fourth time’s the charm.
A couple of nights ago, I had one of my favorite autumn-in-NYC dishes of the past few weeks: tagliolini with cockles, sea urchin, mussels, and bacon—gorgeous ingredients, impeccably done; ditto an appetizer of thinly sliced hamachi crudo topped with still more sea urchin (can’t get enough of the stuff). If this is cooking done by a chef who has lost all interest in his job, and in NYC for that matter, then it’s doubly impressive. Stay tuned.
UPDATE: News that will come as a surprise to no one.