Very good food. Service simply odd. Some prices way out of whack. (But gratuity is included in price, so that accounts for some of it ) Portions range from minuscule to regular. Maybe we are gauche but absurd absurdly small portions are just not a good thing Went here 3/5. Its bright and minimalist but with interesting design. It's not a particularly warm place. The menu is broken into "snacks" small plates and entrees. We got one $9 wine with a tiny pour. It was the cheapest wine on the menu. The waitress gave us water and left us alone for a few minutes. She did mention cheese. Here's the deal: they have a frommagier or some such term. Like a sommelier of cheese. The waitress told us that each cheese was 6$ for 2 oz and the cheese person. Would choose accompaniments and help us choose the cheese. We thought we'd get to talk to her before she chose/recommended cheese but no. The waitress said we had better get moving on ordering cheese because the frommagier was backed up. A while After we told waitress that we wanted 3: one blue, one mild and one they could choose the cheese woman brought them to us. The blue was paired with brown Sugar fudge and the combination was lovely. The mild one was kind of a bore and paired with I think carmelized onion and the Third was a Swiss.
We got 4 small plates: eggplant meatballs in a sauce involving harissa The sauce was also
Slightly sour. Three large eggplant meatballs with the texture and appearance of real
Meat. They were the best vegetarian meatballs I ever had. 3 large codballs in a garlic aioli. Piping hot. One member thought that they did not taste like fish. The other disagreed but they agreed they were delicious. Sun chokes in a very good cheese crust were nice and flavorful but the potatoes were undercooked! We were quite surprised given the aims of the restaurant. Grilled artichokes with s nice smoky flavor and a pimento tasting sauce were tiny and delicious.
We ordered 2 entrees: beef cheeks with creamy polenta were perfectly cooked and delicious. The waitress warned us that the $17 Mac and cheese was small. Boy was it ever. And rich. Ditto. It came with carmelized onions and we requested no lardons. The Mac desperately needed some acidity-a bit of greens perhaps? Sometimes the server was there. Sometimes not (The thing with the weird cheese delay was just weird). A couple of male servers just stood around. I'd say it's not the most friendly place. So go here and check it out.