Puttanesca is one of the many Italian restaurants along 9th Avenue in our neighborhood. It looks very nice and charming from the outside, with floor to ceiling windows, exposed brick walls, gleaming white tablecloths, and romantic candlelight, plus it always seems to be packed whenever we walk by on any evening. So on one Monday night we met up with Josh’s parents for a late dinner at the restaurant.
The restaurant was still crowded despite the hour and the day but fortunately we were able to get a table right away. They brought us a big basket of bread while we perused the menu. The bread was just ok, though not terribly flavorful, with soft pieces of focaccia and a crustier Italian bread.
Basket of so-so bread
Since it was our first time at this restaurant, Josh and I both ordered our Italian standbys to test the waters. I started with beef carpaccio. The thin slices of raw beef served with arugula and parmesan cheese. It was a pretty ample portion and perfectly fine, though the beef was a tad on the chilly side. There was nothing special or outstanding about the dish but it was a classic version that satisfied my beef carpaccio craving.
Beef carpaccio with arugula and parmesan
Josh had the Caesar salad with strips of anchovy on top but it was also pretty unremarkable. Aside from the saltiness of the anchovies, which I liked, the dressing was a bit bland. It was also a paltry portion I thought.
Standard caesar salad
For his main course, he selected the linguini with white clam sauce. The sauce was a bit too heavy on the white wine but had a nice garlicky background, and there were tons of little clams on top.
Linguini with white clam sauce (Josh got tired of me taking and re-taking pictures because they were too blurry so he broke his no-flash rule just for this shot!)
For my main course, I had to have the chicken parmesan, per usual. I was actually a bit thrown off when I received my dish though, as there didn’t seem to be any cheese on top of the chicken, and the sauce had a weird pinkish tinge to it. Turns out that there was cheese, but it was kind of translucent and slightly browned so that it blended in with the breading on the chicken. I’m not so sure what kind of cheese it was but I don’t think it was mozzarella. The sauce was super light, which I liked with the al dente side of spaghetti, but I don’t know if it really went with the breaded chicken. It was an unusual version of the dish and while it didn’t taste bad, I didn’t really think of it as chicken parm.
Unusual chicken parmesan with spaghetti
Overall I was a bit disappointed with the food we had at Puttanesca, especially because it’s always so crowded every time we pass by. I thought a place that popular would have really good food, and while none of the food was awful, it was pretty average. Service, however, was pretty bad. Although we didn’t have to wait for a table, we waited a long time just to get menus. After that, someone asked if we wanted any drinks so we ordered a bottle of sparkling water. Then someone else came by and asked if we wanted anything, and we said that we had already ordered a bottle of sparkling water. Then a THIRD person came by and asked if we wanted anything, and we were STILL waiting on the sparkling water. It was so ridiculous that it was comical, but not in a good way. Maybe my expectations were set too high but there are so many other better restaurants on 9th Ave. that I don’t think we will be coming back here any time soon.
Puttanesca
859 9th Ave. at 56th St.
New York, NY
Tags: Italian, Midtown West