• Cuisine: American
• Vibe: Swanky supper club
• Occasion: Stargazing; see and be seen. Impress your date.
• Don't Miss: Monkey bread, Nora's meatloaf, sticky toffee pudding
• Price: Appetizers, $13; entrees, $25; dessert, $9
• Reservations: Highly recommended
• Phone: (212) 308-2950
• Location: 60 E. 54th St., near Park Ave.

• Cuisine: Contemporary American
• Vibe: Clubby chic
• Occasion: Group dinner, casual date, scene-y supper
• Don't Miss: Rabbit sausage, scallops on wilted spinach, baby chicken
• Price: Appetizers, $9; entrees, $24; dessert, $9
• Reservations: Highly recommended
• Phone: (212) 475-3400
• Location: 25 Cooper Square, between Fifth and Sixth Sts.

On a busy night at Table 8, it’s easier to get a drink in the rest room than the dining room. Instead of handing out hand towels, the restroom attendant pours Prosecco.

It’s not the best of times for diners or restaurants, but considering how hard it was to get a reservation, Table 8 seems to be doing just fine. The first time I ­tasted Govind Armstrong’s cooking was at a Mediterranean restaurant called Chadwick's in Beverly Hills over five years ago. That’s where he first came up with the concept for Table 8 and its casual California cuisine.

He opened the first outpost in Los Angeles, followed by a second branch in ­Miami and now New York.  New York’s ­Table 8 is tucked inside the newly minted Cooper Square Hotel — a slick, futuristic glass structure in the Bowery district just on the edge of St. Marks Place.

To get to the restaurant, guests have to walk through a dark, dark hotel bar with a vaulted black-tile ceiling, marble bar and midnight black couches.

The dining room looks and feels warmer than both the bar and exterior suggest: a brown ­leather wall with matching chairs, glass walls with frosted landscapes, bookshelves and an outside dining area. There’s a long, communal “salt bar” with a meat slicer and elevated bar stools that runs through the center of it all.

The first part of the menu is devoted to the salt bar selection — small plates of house-cured meats and fish crudo.

All of the homemade charcuterie offerings are excellent — the duck ­prosciutto, venison bresaola with blue cheese, a creamy country pork terrine and especially the rabbit sausage. I could’ve eaten an entrée-sized portion of this warm, sweet rabbit sausage served with intense black truffle salt.

However, I’d skip the fish crudo altogether. All three miss. Both the scallops with kumquats and the striped bass cara cara orange were flavor-free. As for the fluke, it’s amazing how much havoc a dab of Thai chili can wreak on raw fluke.

Unfortunately, the portions are really small at Table 8 and, too often, so are the flavors. The homemade linguine needed something more than a sparse scattering of parsley, lemon, ricotta and breadcrumbs to taste anything more than average.

The pan-­roasted duck was upstaged by the sunchokes, hazelnut purée and kumquats that accompanied it. And an entree of halibut with ­marinated tomatoes, fava beans and smoked halibut toast fell flat.

When I go out to dinner, I want to forget what I’m talking about when I take a bite of something wonderful. The only dishes that came close to distracting me were an appetizer of sautéed scallops over wilted spinach and the grilled baby chicken served alongside a red wine-braised short rib hash and cipollini jus.

The best dessert on the menu was a coffee parfait layered with hazelnut streusel, malt ice cream and candied kumquats.

The cocktails are summery and perfect for sipping on the outdoor dining patio. There’s a mellow, gin-based “Southside” with muddled mint and lime, and a great cocktail called “the Basil” — a mix of vodka, muddled green grapes, basil, bitters and ginger soda. It’s a shame it’s so hard to track down a server to order one.

• Cuisine: American comfort food
• Vibe: Country chic diner
• Occasion: Late night munchies; neighborhood bites; after-work hangout
• Don't Miss: Jalapeño Bloody Mary, mac and cheese, blueberry sour cream pancakes; Michigan sour cherry pie
• Price: Appetizers, $8; entrees, $16; dessert; $5.
• Reservations: Accepted
• Phone: (212) 219-0666
• Location: N Moore St & Hudson St, New York, NY 10013, USA

East Village fish shack Butcher Bay's no keeper

Tuesday, March 10th 2009, 4:00 AM

Not quite everything you hope for in a fish shack.
511 E. Fifth St., near Avenue A. (212) 260-1333
Dinner: Mon.-Sun., 6 p.m. until late.
CUISINE: Fish shack
VIBE: Down and dirty East Village
OCCASION: Neighborhood dinner, bar bites
DON'T-MISS DISH: Scallop pan roast, steamed mussels with bread
AVERAGE PRICE: Appetizers, $6; entrees, $17. No desserts.
RESERVATIONS: Not accepted.

A hell of a lot has changed at 511 E. Fifth St., near Avenue A. It used to be called Seymour Burton. It wasn't the prettiest place to look at, but the food was wonderfully hearty. And they had a great burger. Now Seymour Burton is Butcher Bay, a wanna-be Pearl Oyster Bar. Adam Cohn, one of the original owners, remains. The burger doesn't. Big mistake.

The sign on the front door says, "Cash Only." It should also say, "No Beer on Tap." Butcher Bay is the kind of place that should have beer on tap. It should also have a full bar. It doesn't. No dessert either.

At the rear of the dining room, there's a raw bar with five kinds of oysters, one kind of clam and 1%BD -pound lobsters. Aside from a steak and fried chicken, it's a fish menu. There's fish and chips, chowder, boiled Maine lobster and a lobster potpie. There aren't a whole lot of seafood spots in New York anymore, but there used to be not so long ago.

Did you know that oysters used to thrive in New York Harbor until the 1900s? So did clams, eel, shrimp, lobsters and conch. Did you know that in the 1820s there used to be oyster bars along Canal St. with "all you could eat oysters" for 6 cents? Or, that by 1880, New York Harbor produced over 700 million oysters a year?

Those days are long gone. You wouldn't eat oysters out of the harbor right now.

You should eat the oysters at Butcher Bay.  Sometimes, there are Beau Soleil or Witch Duck oysters, but most are fresh from the Chesapeake Bay. And the best thing on the menu is the scallop pan roast. It's rich and buttery - studded with small, sweet scallops, bacon, corn and potato. The menu also has a generous bowl of steamed mussels served with grilled bread, and tasty shrimp hush puppies.

Seymour Burton served fried clams, and so does Butcher Bay. But Butcher Bay's are overbattered and underfried. The fried oyster and bacon po' boy isn't so much a po' boy as it is fried batter, lettuce, tomato, bacon and a muck of mayonnaise on a stale French baguette.

I remember having a good oyster chowder at Seymour Burton. But the oyster chowder at Butcher Bay is thin and flavorless. The Green Goddess salad is woefully overdressed, not exactly how you like to see your goddess.

There are a few cheap wines by the glass and one really awful sparkling white wine - a Veuve Ambal Blanc de Blancs NV - which my friend called the Mountain Dew of sparkling wine. The menu and the decor at Butcher Bay suggest fish shack, but this is one halfhearted fish shack.

The most imaginative thing about Butcher Bay is its name. Adam Cohn says that co-owner Bob Giraldi made the name up. But the only Butcher Bay I've heard of is a fictional place - a maximum-security prison in the video game Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay. Riddick is voiced by Vin Diesel - and like any good hero, he manages to escape.

Perhaps we should take a cue.

524 Court St., at Huntington St., Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn,
(718) 852-6872

CUISINE: American comfort food
VIBE: Country B&B
OCCASION: Casual date, bar bites, kid-friendly family dinner
DON'T-MISS DISHES :Maple- and bacon-roasted almonds, delicata squash tart, duck meatloaf
AVERAGE PRICE: Appetizers, $8; entrées, $16; dessert, $7.
RESERVATIONS: Accepted for parties of four or more

Owner Doug Crowell named his new restaurant in Carroll Gardens after a shallow strait that runs between Governors Island and Brooklyn.

Once upon a time, farmers used to walk their cattle across this strait during low tides. That was more than a hundred years ago, but I imagine that back then a corner restaurant might have looked like Buttermilk Channel.

A single candle flickers in every window, and a clunky wood dresser stands along the edge of the room. Wooden pews from a church down the street serve as benches against one wall, and a long, reclaimed communal table is in the center of it all. At Buttermilk Channel, you feel like you're eating at a small-town bed-and-breakfast.

Crowell is thinking seriously about what neighborhood really means, which is smart these days.

Buttermilk Channel's all about Brooklyn: 15 Brooklyn beers, breads, bratwurst, ice cream, cider, mozzarella, and even a 2005 Merlot called Brooklyn Oenology. And Buttermilk Channel caters to everyone in the neighborhood - vegetarians, locavores, hipsters and hipsters with children.

The food is straightforward American bistro cooking. Not what you'd expect from a chef, Ryan Angulo, who came from the Stanton Social and David Burke & Donatella, two trendy Manhattan restaurants.

The kinds of places that think straightforward means Kobe-beef pigs in a blanket and truffle fries. Who comforts themselves with caviar in times like these?

At Buttermilk Channel, comfort food means grilled bacon, a big burger, a Niman Ranch flap steak and meatloaf. It also means duck meatloaf on a lily pad of creamed spinach, topped with onion rings.

This is a great example of the new world of meatloaf, where the most basic and often dreaded home cooking turns into something splendid. A lot of people think you can make a really good meatloaf by jazzing up the extras, but Angulo knows it's about the quality of the meat.

This is where you see the subtlety of making familiar foods with superior ingredients and a little imagination. You end up with foods that taste close to home, only better, like buttermilk fried chicken - punctuated by pepper - accompanied by a cheddar waffle and winter-vegetable slaw.

There's cauliflower and apple soup garnished with bacon and croutons, baby back ribs scented with anise and cinnamon, and roasted leg of lamb on Tuesdays.

Not many restaurants list nuts on the menu, but these aren't just any almonds. These come roasted with chunks of bacon, bacon fat and maple syrup. The chef's squash tart looks like a savory Slinky - rings of skin-on delicata squash topped with a sweet, homemade ricotta. This is the best dish on the menu.

Just don't order fish. The herb-crusted hake was practically raw, and the bacon-wrapped trout tasted like, guess what, bacon. You might want to skip the kale and endive salad seized by way too much anchovy dressing.

After all that comfort food, how about a comfort-food dessert - Doug's pecan-pie sundae or the clown sundae? The clown sundae's made with organic Blue Marble ice cream from Boerum Hill, a homemade cone and M&Ms. It's on the kids' menu, but you can have one too.

A little like Le Bernardin in blue jeans.

Address: 85 10th Ave., near 15th St.
Phone: (212) 929-4948 Seven days, 5 p.m.-2 a.m.
Cuisine: Seafood
Vibe: Kitschy fish shack
Occasion: Posh counter dining, date, group dinner
Don’t Miss Dishes: Razor-clam ceviche, chorizo-stuffed squid, oyster pan roast, sautéed cod milt:
Average Price: Appetizers, $16; entrées, $28; desserts, $10
Reservations: Highly recommendedThe John Dory

If you could draft a fantasy restaurant team, who would you pick? It depends on what's on the menu, of course.

Italian? I'd take Mario Batali and Joe Bastianich. British pub? I'd take Ken Friedman and April Bloomfield. (Have you eaten the deviled eggs, devils on horseback or Roquefort burger at the Spotted Pig?)

These people are first-round draft picks, in my opinion. Together, they could open a restaurant called Dumpster, serve trash, and people would probably line up.

So I'm not surprised that there's a month-long wait for a table at the John Dory, which Friedman and Bloomfield opened in the Meatpacking District six weeks ago.

Picture a hybrid of every fish shack you've ever been to - a little Laguna, a little Key West, a little Jersey Shore, even a little Lancashire.  There's a giant saltwater fish tank, a long bar with fishing lures embedded in its resin, shell-studded mirrors, trophy fish on the walls, swimming-salmon tiles, and stools upholstered in lobsters and palm leaves.

It looks like a scene from a Jimmy Buffett hangover. At the heart of the room, there's a diner-ish open kitchen packed with line cooks feverishly at work. It's tight quarters - for them, for the servers, and for customers trying to edge their way into the bathroom.

Really, the John Dory is the complete antithesis of Le Bernardin, the consummate and highly formal fish restaurant in midtown.

The complete antithesis, that is, except for the quality of the cooking. But this isn't a fish-shack menu. And the superiority of the fish here is surprising, considering the fact that April Bloomfield is best known for her way with pub food. She has completely changed genres. It's like giving up the novel for lyric poetry.

Too many chefs think of fish as a faceless protein. She understands that texture and flavor are equally important. I didn't know that a swath of green-onion purée is just what razor-clam ceviche needs.

Or that yellowtail sashimi deserves a dab of ginger purée. Or that scallops crudo want fennel franz, a grassy olive oil and a few pomegranate seeds.

To grasp the inventiveness of Bloomfield's cooking, order the pan-seared squid. She stuffs the body with a wonderful mix of cured chorizo, chili, paella rice, onions, cannellini and saffron. Then she sears the squid on the plancha and serves it over a cannellini stew of sorts.

But what makes it live in your memory is the intense smokiness of the tomato - part of the cannellini stew. The smokiness is almost contagious. Everything catches flavor from it.

The oyster pan roast is a mind-blowing cup of soup. It tastes naughty. And I haven't even mentioned the sea urchin-buttered crostini that comes with it.

There are a couple of other things on the menu that I really like - the whole mullet with clementines and puntarella, the sautéed cod milt and the beer-steamed shellfish. Oddly enough, I wasn't crazy about the whole-roasted John Dory. And the Dungeness crab had been peppered to death.

Those two dishes aside, the John Dory is a little like Le Bernardin in blue jeans. The Spotted Pig is April Bloomfield's take on the British pub. But at the John Dory, she takes to the sea, triumphantly.

This might explain the hurly-burly at this fish shack. I know one of the owners, and I still had to wait an hour and a half to get that cup of soup. Would I wait again? Oh, yeah.

10 Downing St., at Sixth Ave.
(212) 255-0300
Tue.-Wed. 6 p.m.- 12 a.m.;
Thu.-Sat. 6 p.m.-1 a.m.;
Sun. 6 p.m.- 12 a.m.; closed Mon.
CUISINE
French-inflected American
VIBE
Bustling downtown eatery
OCCASION
Casual date, neighborhood bites, family or group dinner
DON'T MISS DISH
Trout tartare, squid ink agnolotti, coffee-scented semi freddo
AVERAGE PRICE
Appetizers $10; entrees $24; desserts $8
RESERVATIONS
Recommended

Here's the first thing you need to know you about 10 Downing. Order the charcuterie, especially the duck liver mousse and the duck prosciutto.

There's a lot of charcuterie in this town, even housemade charcuterie, a lot of it obligatory, a lot of it ordinary. I overlooked the 10 Downing charcuterie on my first two visits. When it comes to the table, pay attention because the chef is paying attention.

Here's the second thing you need to know. Wear earplugs. And the third thing? This is one tough restaurant to get into. I mean literally — shouldering your way through the crowd, past the waiters carrying hot plates, around the coat check mob, and beyond the hostess stand. Good luck with that.

And this is one of the few restaurants that quotes Miss Piggy on the menu. "Never eat more than you can lift." Not that the girls at 10 Downing — a sea of young girls — is ever likely to over-order.

For some reason, there are two chefs — a consulting chef and a regular chef. But it's much more Jason Neroni in the kitchen, much less Katy Sparks.

The foundation of the menu is traditional French cuisine. But Neroni adds dishes from other neighboring cuisines. His approach is to simplify a classic, take it apart, isolate it. By doing so, he gives it a new clarity. His duck meatball cassoulet isn't an epic cassoulet — the kind that's made with seven meats or cooks for three days. It's all about the flageolet beans and meatballs instead. I was surprised to find aligot puree. You may not even know what aligot means. It's French for really cheesy mashed potatoes.

One of the best dishes on the menu is the squid ink agnolotti. A lot of times "squid ink" pasta tastes like white pasta dyed black. This tastes as though the squid inked the agnolotti. It tastes like the sea. And so the does the peekytoe crab on top. I also loved the ocean trout tartar, a dish with no specific nationality.

Neroni gives trout the kind of treatment you would give steak tartar. He glosses it with chorizo oil. He mixes the trout with pickled mustard, chives, pine nuts, and then tops the whole thing with a quail egg.

But there's an over-and-under problem at 10 Downing. For example, the Arctic char. The char was killed before it came to market, so why poach it to a second death? I've never seen a man recoil from a steak. But when the hanger steak arrived — black and blue and bleeding — my friend sent it hastening back to the kitchen.

This was, no fooling, raw. As for the gnocchi, the server said they would melt in my mouth, which implies that they were actually cooked.

Neroni also makes the desserts at 10 Downing and he does a great job of it. I'd order the chocolate cake souffle just for the malted milk ice cream. Just when I thought I couldn't stomach another cheeky riff on peanut butter & jelly, Neroni convinced me otherwise. Who could turn their nose up at peanut butter gelato, concord grape jam and challah?

One last thing about 10 Downing, they also take their wines very seriously. Seven whites by the glass, seven reds, four sparkling, and one rose

Bistrong overdirects his menu at Braeburn.

117 Perry St. between Hudson and Greenwich,                 
(212) 255-0696 Open seven days; lunch, noon- 4 p.m.; dinner, 5:30-10:30 p.m.
CUISINE: American
VIBE: Cozy corner spot
OCCASION: First date, group dinner
DON'T-MISS DISH: Smoked brook trout, breast of duck, pumpkin cheescake
PRICE: Appetizers, $12; entrées, $26; desserts, $6
RESERVATIONS: Accepted

The other day, I called Braeburn. The general manager answered, "Thank you for calling The Harrison."

Then he hung up, embarrassed.

It was a natural mistake. Almost half the staff comes from The Harrison, a Tribeca restaurant that embodies the idea of American bistro cooking. In fact, some dishes make you feel like you're at The Harrison and some dishes make you wish you were at The Harrison.

What The Harrison does in a relaxed way, Braeburn does in a way that's both fussy and tiny.

After an appetizer, you feel like Oliver Twist, or maybe Steve Martin in "L.A. Story." Perhaps the thing to do is order two of everything. For some dishes, that's a good idea. Like the smoked trout, which is wonderful and would be really, really wonderful if it was twice as big. The chef gets his brook trout from the Catskills, then gently smokes it in house over cherry and applewood.

Underneath the trout is a horseradish cream purée and a combination of crushed pecans, apples, Asian pear and chives. I'd order the horseradish cream purée itself. It makes you wonder why we name every dish after a protein. Everyone wants a bite, but there's only three bites in the whole thing. Sometimes, you can forget about size.

When I think of sausage, I don't think of quail. When I think of quail, I don't think of sausage. But Brian Bistrong disassembles an entire quail and packs it into a single sausage, which he serves over quinoa, yogurt, warm figs and quail jus. What you end up with is quail gravy on your yogurt, which tastes much better than you would expect.

Too often, Braeburn gives the impression that Bistrong's trying too hard, as if he doesn't trust his ingredients or the ­discrimination of the diner, who knows that simple combinations work the best.

There are times when Bistrong doesn't let the ingredients do the work. Which of these items don't belong in the same dish? (Think of this as a culinary SAT question.) Peekytoe crab, mayonnaise, avocado, grapefruit segments, grapefruit juice, pickled mustard seeds, ketchup, Cognac or canola oil? Bistrong uses all of these.

That poor, poor peekytoe crab. That was one of several dishes killed by complexity, including the scallops — which are perfectly seared — soiled by a gritty, watery walnut purée and braised endive with butter, vanilla bean, orange juice, beer and powdered sugar.

Braeburn has a lot going for it — a great corner location in the West Village, a rustic feel, an experienced chef, and yet somehow it ends up feeling like high-end middle-of-the-road. Maybe it's an occupational hazard. Every cook wants to direct. The trouble is, sometimes they overdirect. Braeburn's new, but with luck it will last.

And what would help it last are a few basic thoughts: Keep it simple, put more on the plate, think about the customers, and don't worry so much about affirming whether you're a good chef. Just feed us, and we'll get the picture. And take a cue from the pumpkin cheesecake. Simple and satisfying — just the way every dinner should end.

By the way, Braeburn's an apple.

10 E. 60th St., between Fifth and Madison;
(646) 237-8977;
Open seven days, noon-4:30 p.m., 5:30-10:30 p.m.;
CUISINE: Modern American;
VIBE: Glossy culinary spa;
OCCASION Midtown lunch, business dinner, detox dining;
DON'T MISS DISH: Arctic char, yellowjack crudo, rabbit with chestnut pasta;
PRICE: Appetizers $10, entrees $20, desserts $10;
RESERVATIONS Accepted in downstairs dining room. Different menu in upstairs cafe; both equally good.

There are 393 calories in the rabbit Fleischnacke at Rouge Tomate. The nutritionist counted. How many restaurants do you know that have a nutritionist?

Fleischnacke is German for minced meat rolled in pasta and cooked in a stock. At Rouge Tomate, this means farm-raised, braised rabbit rolled up in chestnut pasta and sautéed in rabbit jus. None of the ingredients requires quotation marks.

There's not a mock anything anywhere in this dish. Those 393 calories also include a celery root purée, roasted celery root, roasted chestnuts, chestnut foam and a salad of apples, celery leaves and tarragon.

And that's one of the more caloric dishes on the menu.

My favorite appetizer - the celery root and almond panna cotta - is only 155 calories. The panna cotta is made with unhomogenized whole milk and topped with lots of peekytoe crab, grapefruit segments and fresh tarragon. The calories matter, but only because the food is so exceptional.

Usually the thought of self-consciously healthy food makes me depressed - so depressed I get the urge to curl up with a jar of peanut butter and a spoon.

But I don't feel that way at Rouge Tomate, even though they've replaced most of the fats we associate with haute cuisine. Take butter, cheese and cream away from most chefs and they would throw their hands up in despair. But Jeremy Bearman, chef at Rouge Tomate, has had a few good mentors, including Joel Robuchon and Daniel Boulud.

Here's how it works: Take the lobster à la plancha with green fennel risotto. Usually, what binds a risotto together is butter and cheese. Instead, Bearman uses fennel stock, fennel purée, fennel juice and fennel-fronds purée - the quintessence of fennel. He finishes the dish with sauce Americaine, a brandy-spiked lobster stock with a splash of Pernod. These are robust flavors and you never pine for the absent fats.

Rouge Tomate adheres to an 85-page S.P.E. charter - Latin for Sanitas Per Escam. That means health through food, a phrase that comes from Emmanuel Verstraeten, the founder of the original Rouge Tomate in Brussels. What this really means is sourcing, preparation and enhancement. It's the cult of culinary balance - the balance of taste and nutrition - not a bad cult to be in. But it's bigger than that.

Rouge Tomate may be a prototype for a restaurant of the future - a new way of thinking, a new way of eating, a new way of dining out.

Let me just point out some of the highlights of this wonderful menu: squab and slow-roasted faro salad; Arctic char with smoked sea salt and Asian pear sorbet; and yellowtail amberjack crudo with vanilla salt, a mung bean salad, crispy ginger, kaffir lime and fresh tropical fruit.

There's also dessert, which is where you would really mourn the missing calories. Except you don't here. The chocolate and banana tasting is 272 calories - a chocolate and caramelized banana napoleon, roasted baby banana split and a teacup of rich hot cocoa. James Distefano, the pastry chef, makes a terrific parfait with yogurt, fresh huckleberries, candied lemon and a chamomile crisp. In fact, the only dessert that doesn't work is the Hudson Valley apple soup.

I hope Rouge Tomate is going to be here for a long, long time. Especially if Jeremy Bearman stays in the kitchen.

Starting a chowder trend in Park Slope

833 Union St., near Seventh Ave., (718) 857-8828. Mon.-Thur., 5 p.m.-10 p.m.; Fri & Sat., 5 p.m.-10:30 p.m.

CUISINE: Contemporary American
VIBE: Domesticated firehouse
OCCASION: Casual date, group dinner
DON'T-MISS DISH: Crab chowder, sweet potato tortellini, Greek yogurt cheesecake
AVERAGE PRICE: Appetizers, $10; entrees, $21; dessert, $7
RESERVATIONS: Accepted

Eating the crab chowder at Bussaco makes me wonder why chowder isn't more popular. Was there a chowder trend? Did I miss it? Why don't we have one now? After all, it's a good time for one. The economy sucks and the weather is starting to suck, too.

Just imagine - a cold evening, a warm restaurant and a hot bowl of chowder, the white not the red. And what makes it even cozier is that you're seated in a roomy banquette at Bussaco, a converted firehouse in Park Slope. Bussaco's chowder is not your average bowl of chowder. It's fancy.

That's what you get when a chef who trained at Le Bernardin makes chowder. It's got tons of sweet, fresh blue crab meat. Most chefs use flour to thicken the broth. Not Matthew Schaefer. His chowder is more of a creamy consommé made with celery, chives, shallots, bacon and potatoes.

Instead of oyster crackers, he serves tapioca chips dusted in Old Bay seasoning. The crab chowder is all you need to order. Not that it's the only thing worth ordering at Bussaco.

What makes this menu interesting is that Schaefer serves only food that he really likes to eat - Mom's sauerkraut, homemade gravlax, Yorkshire pudding and fried chicken. If you can't make it to Roscoe's Chicken n' Waffles in Los Angeles, try the fried chicken and waffles at Bussaco, also one of Schaefer's favorite dishes. His version is poussin - baby chicken - and vanilla-scented waffles topped with caramelized apple-onion butter.

It's likely to be one of your favorite dishes, too. So is "the freshest mozzarella." It isn't really mozzarella until you ask for it. After you order, Schaefer drops curds into hot, salted water and out comes "the freshest mozzarella." And then, he turns it into an autumn cheese plate by adding diced delicata squash, candied pecans and sweet dumpling squash puree.

There are a few dishes on the menu that I'd stay away from. The pastrami duck breast came out practically uncooked and unpastrami-ed. The slow roast pork and crispy pork cracklings tasted like unbarbecued barbecue - no sauce, no flavor, really.

I really hope Bussaco can grow into this wonderful room, which manages to be elegant without being fussy. The tables are generously spaced - you have room to eat, room to think, room to talk.

One thing's for sure: This is a Brooklyn-centric restaurant. The long, communal table in the bar is made from an oak that once grew in Prospect Park, the coffee comes from Beford-Stuyvesant, the ale comes from Red Hook, and the chef and the pastry chef come from the borough, too.

The pastry chef's name is Deborah Snyder, who learned her trade at Judson Grill. There's a wonderful maple crème caramel that tastes just like crème brulée without the burnt sugar top.

Refreshing and light aren't words you associate with cheesecake. Except here. Snyder makes a Greek yogurt cheesecake, flecked with vanilla and a perfect finish to a bowl of chowder.