wd~50
50 Clinton Street (between Stanton and Rivington)

I had been looking forward to trying wd~50 for many months. The reviews of this place have been glowing. Although I generally don't rely on reviews, I have heard good things about this restaurant in the East Village from those I generally trust about fine dining. The menu looked adventurous too in its use of ingredients. The aesthetics of the food worried me a little (often food that looked too good has had taste sacrificed on the altar of presentation), but nevertheless I was in great anticipation as I walked into this eatery.

Sadly, I was disappointed, to say the least...

The starter of the meal was pickled beef tongue with a mesh of other "decorative" foods like a fried mayonnaise cube. This was a bad start. There was about 50 cents worth of sliced tongue on the well-worn plate, and the mayonnaise was a near disaster. It looked nice, but it was just a ridiculous dish. There was way, way too much strong mayonnaise for the lack of meat on this plate -- totally off-balanced. Again, aesthetics in place of food balance. Not a good start.

The main course was the pork belly, which again suffered greatly from a lack of balance. This time it was the other way around. Five large slices of pork belly was excellent, but its complementary items were shockingly lacking. For a dish as rich as pork belly (especially these rather fatty cuts), there was nearly no support from greens or starch. There was a few small pieces of token vegetables and fried yucca (in a cube that hinted to the same technique as the mayonnaise cubes earlier). It was simply excessive. I would have expected this in a meat-centric restaurant that offered you the option of ordering vegetable sides -- but not in a top-class place that focused on a dish. The food was very rich and good, but the lack of balance for the pork belly ruined this dish completely.

For some reason I opted for dessert, and that was a mistake. Again, way too much visual creativity and it did nothing for the food. The "Irish coffee tube" was a nice gimmick but the mixture on the plate made little sense and were not complementary. If anything, it was created for aesthetics once more -- not for taste.

I had heard great things about the head chef, Wylie Dufresne. However, this was one of the most disappointing meals I've ever had in New York. The cuisine was designed very poorly with absolutely no balance. Too much time and attention is spent on presentation at the total sacrifice of the taste. This is always my fear going into a much-cheered restaurant in New York -- the image over the substance. And sadly, this place fell down flat on the food level.

The decor was pretty low-key and rather boring. The seating is very uncomfortable, and my back actually seized up during the meal for the ridiculous cushions on the seats. It was just a plain, bad experience. Please do avoid this place until they get some common sense back and not rest on just unjustified reviews.

People, food is for eating!

Food: C
Atmosphere: B
For Lone Diners: B+