jologolf: Esca was excellent! We moved our reservation up to 5:15 just to be safe, and had plenty of time to eat and walk over to Eugene O'Neill theater for the 7:00 show.
http://www.esca-nyc.com/
We started with the Crudo tasting, which I highly recommend. 6 different selections chosen by the chef, and all were very good (well, mackerel was not to our taste). They had gotten fresh John Dory that day ('very rare to see' according to the waiter) and they brought us each a tasting of this as well. It was probably our favorite. Very fresh, excellent flavor.
This was followed by the selections below. (I don't list what the kids ordered off menu: buttered pasta... They ate the salads first, and the chicken to go with the pasta and were perfectly happy.)
The only dish that was not to our liking was the squid ink spaghetti. Cooked very nicely, but overly salty.
The monkfish was fantastic.
Service was excellent as well, our waiter going out of his way to make sure we were happy. (brought tastings of multiple wines for both of us until we arrived at one we liked. Took our order initially, then came back and suggested we cancel one item and change the timing so make sure we got out on time.)
Excellent whole wheat focaccia.
Verdura Mista
Organic salad of fall vegetables, sheep's milk ricotta and herb garden vinaigrette
Insalata Di Amara
Salad of Italian and local fall greens, butternut squash and apple cider vinaigrette
Spaghetti Neri
Squid ink spaghetti with seppia, green chilis and scallions
Bucatini
House made fat spaghetti with Rita’s spicy octopus sauce
Pescatrice
Whole pan roasted local monkfish with Nueske’s smoked bacon, red cippoline and sage
Pollo
Four story hills farm chicken with primo olives, fregula and lemon
Yes, this is completely off topic. Sorry.