360255 Sun Jan 14 19:04:54 -0800 2007 0 18 Manhattan 0 2188184 Salt We made a late (10:30pm) reservation and, getting out of the NYC Ballet (Sleeping Beauty...it was excellent) around 10:35, I immediately called to let them know we were running late. Because of traffic and Murphy's Law, we arrive at the restaurant at about 11:05. An inconvenience for both us and the restaurant. The hostess/manager/waitress let us know right away that there might be a problem because the kitchen was getting ready to close down for the night (despite their OpenTable page stating that they are serving until 12). I can understand, nobody wants to work later than they are supposed to, but the attitude continued with "You better order quick" and forcefully putting glasses, water and later, plates of food, on our table. Looking past the attitude, we ordered the following, knowing full well that we were on our way to Room 4 Dessert afterwards... Jude, Danna's cousin visiting from Brown, ordered a vegetarian appetizer as her main course, it was an eggplant dish of some kind which was colorful and by her account, tasty. ($12) I ordered the venison which was served with beets, pencil-thin carrots and a parsnip puree ($28.50) - all of which was, quite frankly, delicious. A solid dish through and through though overpriced by about $2. Danna's dish, on the other hand - a whole wheat papparadelle with shredded duck confit ($18) with pecans and I think maybe chestnuts, was completely unseasoned. For a restaurant with the name Salt, you'd think they'd know to include it in some of their dishes (though to their credit, my venison was perfectly seasoned). Bland couldn't begin to describe the taste of this dish. Blech. And why no salt on the table. What exactly is the concept for this place. No multiple salt offerings. No packaged salt, from what I could tell, to purchase for home use. No salt. And certainly none in the water used to make this pasta or in the dish itself. Danna and I each had an overpriced glass of Ridge Zinfandel ($15/glass) from a wine list that leaves much to be desired. In the end, we ended up getting out of the restaurant sooner than any of the other patrons who were there when we arrived. Despite mediocre service, one awful dish and a lousy wine by the glass list, I think Salt can, if the planets are aligned right, offer a decent dining experience, though I highly doubt I'll try my luck with a third visit. Room 4 Dessert Though we won't make it three times to Salt, our third visit to Will Goldfarb's Room 4 Dessert was good enough to warrant fourth and likely fifth and sixth visits. And most of that has to do with the service of Will himself. It's amazing how two dining experiences, back-to-back within minutes of each other can be so different. We walked in and the two front seats were empty. The corner spot on the bar was where Will was sitting trying to get some paperwork done when not serving customers and helping out behind the dessert bar. He immediately cleared the area for us and made us feel welcomed. He greeted us like old friends and later at the end of our desserts, kind of hung out with us chatting about this and that. We asked him what time he usually closes and his response was to the tune of "whenever people stop coming in for dessert". He said this truthfully, knowing full well that because of this dogma, he probably won't see his (beautiful, I should add) daughter until 4-5am. Perhaps that's the difference of what Michael Lomonaco (Porter House) calls a chef-driven restaurant. When the chef/owner are actually on site, you can expect a very different experience. Our options this time were similar, in name only, to the dishes we had little more than a year ago, during our first visit. Back again were "Infance" - a group of "fun" desserts including house-made marshmallows, something called "lucky charm" which tasted like a brick of the breakfast cereal, a swirl of cotton candy with rice krispie praline (tasted like a combo of rice krispies and grape nuts) and some other fun items. Also back was "Voyage to India" - a chocolate-based 4-some that stretched into some interesting directions (the almond one simply wasn't very good but most else was very tasty). I ordered the apple desserts - which I think, again, were the best options. He knows how to make apples taste even more apple-y. Overall a fun time...great music, and excellent service from all those involved. A great way to cap off the night. Room 4 Dessert will be celebrating its 1 year anniversary next week...check it out. Sun Jan 14 19:04:54 -0800 2007 20586 dkstar1