In the Magazine

Adam Platt on Tertulia; Robin Raisfeld and Rob Patronite Bite Into Sticky Buns

Tertulia.
Tertulia. Photo: Danny Kim

In this week’s New York, Adam Platt turns his palate to Tertulia, “Seamus Mullen’s snug, beautifully realized new Spanish taverna in the West Village.” There’s an impressive wood-fired grill, “set in front of the kitchen, like a peasant’s hearth,” and with its help, the “rich, deceptively sophisticated menu … does for tapas-style Spanish cuisine what Batali did for Italian pastas and April Bloomfield did for English pub food.” Must-order dishes include “slivery black and white anchovies, layered on little squares of crispy toast with sweet, fresh-roasted tomatoes,” gooseneck barnacles, (if they’re offered), and “creamy, crunchy-topped arroz a la plancha (folded with snails and wild mushrooms)”; the restaurant earns three stars.

Meanwhile, pastry hounds have some sweet options at their disposal, particularly the booming crop of sticky buns. As Robin Raisfeld and Rob Patronite note, the squish of sugared dough can be experienced everywhere from Print to Peels to brand-new Zoe these days. One of the bakeries in question, Zucker Bakery, is newly opened and profiled this week. The Robs also weigh in with a recipe for radishlike kohlrabi, in season now, which swaps it in for cucumber in Charles Brassard’s (Cafe Collete) tsatsiki.

Mario Batali spends 29 minutes with Jada Yuan, who speaks to the chef about waking at 5:30 a.m. each weekday for The Chew and the spate of recent lawsuits against the chef. And speaking of famous foodies, sort of, one reporter takes Scott Wiener of Scott’s Pizza Tours to Godfather’s for an assessment of possible presidential candidate Herman Cain’s pizza.

Adam Platt on Tertulia; Robin Raisfeld and Rob Patronite Bite Into Sticky Buns