Balthazar
80 Spring Street at Crosby Street
New York, NY 10012
212-965-1414
Mike and I accidentally stumbled onto Fashion’s Night Out in SoHo, so we were pleased to rack up free items from retailers, mostly bottled beverages. The plan was to eat at Balthazar after. Unarmed with no reservation, a scary prospect. Amazingly we were squeezed in despite a 45 minute wait but had to sit at a miniscule round table in the flow of traffic by the bar. Oh well.
Balthazar is a sister restaurant to Lucky Strike and Pastis, both other French bistros which I have patronized. It has some other siblings, but those were of note to me. This place is also known as a celebrity hotbed though I didn’t see any movie stars.
Mike and I nibbled on the free bread as we perused the menu. We eventually settled on drinking a bottle of a red blend and sharing two appetizers. He selected the lobster risotto, and I elected for the chicken liver and foie gras mousse which came with “red onion confit and grilled country bread” ($14). The onion was nothing super special, but the mousse was all kinds of awesome. Rich and delightful and melting in the mouth. Yeah!
Mike’s risotto was strongly lobster-tasting. The corn was a nice touch for a firmer texture since risotto can get too mushy for me.
We went with the cheeseburgers ($16). At this point, I was stuffed and could have called it quits right there. Man, those appetizers were practically entrees in themselves. But Mike and I persisted. The fries? Laura said they were supposed to be the best. I can’t say I agree with that, and while they were at my desired thickness and crunchiness, they needed more sodium chloride. But noble effort! Iceberg lettuce? Um, okay. I feel like I can’t fairly judge the burger since I was too full and couldn’t enjoy it as much. No desserts for us. I felt like I needed to be rolled out of Balthazar.
Our waitress was a sweetie. I wasn’t fond of being in the line of fire and was fearing that my wine would be knocked over. Thankfully no dining malfunctions. The bathroom has an attendant. What??? Those tourists are the money shedders I guess. Who brings a bag from Dylan’s Candy Bar to Balthazar? Tourist alert! Next time, Mike and I are ordering the plateaux de fruits de mer. Two tiers of raw seafood? I’m there! And we’ll make a reservation as well. Too bad we aren’t famous…yet.
The burger was good but from the land of salt. You were offered a choice of fries or salad with the burger, and we logically agreed on salad seeing as the tartare came with fries/frites. The frites were top notch! Hot, crispy, and salty (not overly so). The steak tartare was fine, but both Mike and I reminisced about our favorite tartare at other restaurants. We wanted more capers, and it’d be nice to have it freshly prepared at our table.
6. Sauteed frogs legs–this had to be the most talked about platter during the meal. The bone was pulled out in such a way that the meat turned into a lollipop. Plus you had a special dish of water with which to wash your fingers. What fun! Mini-chicken drumsticks with green dipping sauce.
Barbary duck breast–while I did praise this, I was become stuffed at this point and couldn’t enjoy it as much. Bummer. Nectarines (whoops, I said peach) and figs were delightfully warm and sweet. 
10. Chocolate mille-feuille–again, I was too stuffed. They sure do like putting gold flakes in the food.
As I later joked, it was like Paula Deen had prepared it as the sandwich was slathered in a generous heaping of butter before being grilled. And inconsistencies too, since Laura’s sandwich was significantly darker than mine. The croque was a little salty but cheesy and hammy. I was already full on that and left the salad largely intact, to be nibble on by Laura. Must’ve filled up on the free bread and happy hour drinks earlier. I sampled Mike’s moules which were yummers.
I ordered the basket of gougeres as my appetizer. I didn’t know what this was, and we had to inquire. Hate that. Basically, they’re hot bite-sized cheese bread balls. Hey, can’t go wrong with that, and they didn’t go wrong with that.
I decided to order the sauteed skate wing because I had skate at another French bistro, Marseille, and I thought highly of that fishy dish. According to the menu, the skate came with “blood orange grenobloise & cauliflower.” There was a cauliflower puree on the side. Grenobloise, I had to look up, is a browned butter sauce with lemon, parsley, and capers. Capers all over the plate/place, in your face. The sour punch of the capers was a striking contrast to the sweeter blood orange. Also, the intense flavor of the grenobloise overwhelmed and overcompensated for the skate wing which was not particularly remarkable. This pains me to say, but the wing reminded me of cafeteria fish sticks from elementary school. Just add tartar sauce.
Usually I select the sorbets/ice creams, but I decided that was boring this time, and I should get something different. That something different was creme brulee since I wasn’t in a rum cake frame of mind. The creme brulee came with two pounded thin homemade graham crackers. Yum, creme brulee. It had those black dots just like Breyers vanilla ice cream. After dessert, the service became practically non-existent. It seemed to take months for the check to arrive. I passed time by spying on the tables nearby, not difficult because the tables are so close together that it’s practically one big communal table. It wasn’t as much fun since one couple was speaking in a foreign language, and the other couple was just dull.