Locanda Verde

What a disaster Ago was. It seemed to have everything going for it – Robert De Niro, the Greenwich Hotel, a distinguished designer, and it was an Ago, an offshoot of the original Hollywood
eatery famous for its celebrity clientele. The one in Tribeca was like
a cafeteria that served miserable, overpriced Italian food. It opened
and closed in less than six months. Ago was dreadful, but the new
incarnation, an Italian trattoria called Locanda Verde, is excellent.

This was quite an exorcism. It’s got two high-powered chefs, Andrew Carmellini and Karen DeMasco, a hip designer named Ken Friedman, seasoned partner Josh Pickard and a rising star sommelier named Josh Nadel.

The dining room’s outfitted with terra-cotta floors, open glass
doors, exposed brick walls, shelves lined with wines and books,
low-slung lights and dark wood tables. There’s a bustling, open kitchen
toward the back, where the nightly porchetta sits on display. This is a
very different kitchen for Carmellini, who earned praise for his haute
cooking at Café Boulud and A Voce. You won’t find that formal kind of
cooking here.

Locanda Verde is the actualization of “Urban Italian,” a cookbook he
co-wrote with his wife. The menu is casual – crispy artichokes with
yogurt and mint, a dish called “my grandmother’s ravioli,” an
excellent, fire-roasted garlic chicken and orechiette with rabbit
sausage. Casual doesn’t mean simple. Fresh-from-the-garden sugar snap
peas and radish are served over a tangy Sicilian pesto made from
Calabrian sundried peppers, sundried tomatoes and almonds. Blue crab is
unexpectedly flavored with cream, garlic and a kick of jalapeño, then
spread on a traditional, tomato-rubbed crostino.

Carmellini’s cooking is thoughtful and imaginative. He’s got a knack
for making hearty foods somehow taste light and summery. I mean, the
last thing I wanted on a hot summer night was pasta in a heavy
Bolognese sauce. But it was like nothing I’d ever tasted before -
fettuccine verde in a rousing white Bolognese made with veal, pork,
celery root, white mushrooms, onion and milk.

The rabbit terrine was another hearty-sounding dish that turned out
to be light and summery – rabbit studded with sweet baby carrots and
paired with a sour cherry mostarda. The maltagliati (poorly cut pasta)
in a garlicky pesto was just as vibrant.

When Carmellini’s good, he’s fabulous, which is what makes his
blunders so frustrating. I wish the “porchetta the way I like it” was
the way I liked it. The pork was dry and overcooked, and so was the
lamb pancetta in the spaghetti with lamb amatriciana.

My tripe alla parmigiana arrived at the table cold, not really the
way you want to eat anything cooked parmigiana. And the whole roasted
trout came in a musty giallo sauce made with roasted yellow peppers,
onions and yellow tomatoes.

There are too many great wines by the glass at Locanda Verde to
waste the evening on the same bottle.  Nadel steered me to a fresh,
full-bodied 2008 Terredora Falanghina and a great Italian rose, a 2008 Castello di Ama Rosato.

Karen DeMasco is easily one of the best pastry chefs in the country. She was outstanding at Craft, and she’s
outstanding at Locanda Verde.

There’s a wonderful, toasted almond semifreddo with macerated
cherries and a pistachio raspberry cake with a supersilky pistachio
gelato. As for Karen’s homemade biscotti misti, it’s the best cookie
plate in the city.