Saju Just Sneaked Into Midtown
While no one was looking, New York just got another high-end Vietnamese restaurant in Saju, at the Hotel Mela. The place is in what could loosely be called soft-opening mode, largely because they are still ten days away from a liquor license and are still BYOB. But the food, mostly classical versions of Vietnamese dishes, shows the kind of French influence that comes from colonial occupation, rather than “fusion cooking” per se. (The fact that a Frenchman, Osteria al Doge’s Phillipe Bernard, is a co-owner underscores its Gallic pedigree.)