[EVG photo from August 2013]
News made the rounds yesterday that chef Wylie Dufresne will close Alder at the end of this month.
Dufresne, who noted the closure on Twitter this past Friday evening, hasn't said why he's shutting down his well-regarded bistro at 157 Second Ave. near East 10th Street.
Eater, who first reported the news yesterday, theorized that "it sounds like a rent hike might have something to do with it."
Here are some thoughts from the Times on all this:
Like WD-50, Alder was a showcase for the chef’s inventiveness. He reconfigured ingredients with the help of a toolbox that included meat glue, and devised surprises like rye pasta with pastrami that tasted like a sandwich from Katz’s delicatessen nearby.
Mr. Dufresne is one of the few truly experimental chefs in New York, a city that has not been particularly generous in embracing molecular gastronomy and other avant-garde trends in food. He worked for Jean-Georges Vongerichten before opening 71 Clinton Fresh Food in a tiny space in 1999; in 2003 he opened WD-50 in somewhat grander premises across the street.
In his tweet, Dufresne did write that "The search for a new home begins…"
No. 157 was previously the address for several restaurants before Alder opened in the spring of 2013, including Plum … and Cafe Brama.
Wonder if a two-year lease was what is shutting this place down?
ReplyDeleteBrama was such a nice option but it didn't last long.
Maybe they can sandwich a CVS in here with plastic coated food...
I ate there once but would not have gone back -- tiny portions for a lot of money. If money was no object you could keep ordering more dishes but making the calculus between wallet and stomach during a meal isn't relaxing or fun.
ReplyDeleteA restaurant with a $65 prix fixe menu on a block with fratty bars (and a fro-yo place) does not compute. The closure does not surprise me; further, this never seemed like a particularly welcoming place. Just one with expensive weird food.
ReplyDeleteSounds like conversation piece food for dullards. "ZOMG Megan they have this pasta that tastes EXACTLY like a pastrami sandwich!!!"
ReplyDeleteThe backer of the restaurant has moved out of their uptown east side residence and have left the city. Perhaps the interest in sustaining it when they weren't going to be nearby has waned.
ReplyDeleteNot vegetarian friendly at all, so I never went.
ReplyDeleteBut to echo the poster above, they are on one of the worst blocks in the city for fratty screaming and stupid behavior. If I were the kind of person wanting to drop big dollars on a nice dinner or cocktails there I would have turned around and left when I saw the shitshow that is 13th Step / Kingston Hall etc.
It's too bad because Wylie is a local guy doing interesting stuff (and I wish he would at least accommodate non meat eaters), but the nuisance that is the frat scene on that block and many others is actually driving businesses and adult customers away. We now go out of our way to avoid having to walk along that block after 7pm. But I don't see the NYPD doing shit about it.
This place was delicious and affordable for what it was serving and "classed up" a pretty downmarket block (ex. 13th Step, 16 Handles). But I was there last week and it was nearly empty. I was told they split the menus in April to a limited pub menu and a tasting menu. Granted, we were one of the last diners that night, but, even the old standards were lacking. Clearly not the "hot new" restaurant anymore. Some stars are meant to burn bright and then disappear. I wonder who will be brave enough to occupy this space next?
ReplyDelete"...New York, a city that has not been particularly generous in embracing molecular gastronomy and other avant-garde trends in food."
ReplyDeleteBecause trends are just that: trends. Trends are a flash in the pan. Trends are not stable. They are fleeting. Like this restaurant and their obnoxious gutter seating.
The food is delicious. The portions are small. The staff is aloof. The patrons are annoying (young women with their sugar daddies and Instagrammers the last time I was there).
ReplyDelete2nd Avenue is too pedestrian for Alder. I agree with the other commenters about the 13th Step, which can poison anything. Alder would be better served on a side street like Prune
I go to that block all the time, to 16 Handles.
ReplyDelete13th Step, Kingston Hall, and the other one have turned the block into Bro Way. It's nothing but trashy bros and bro-hos vomiting and smoking on the sidewalks. Even 16 Handles is losing customers because of them.
ReplyDeleteI hope someday some normal, intelligent person goes into 13th Step, undercover, to do an expose and show the rest of us what really goes on in there. I am curious. From the outside it looks like quite hellish. From what I understand they actually serve food and stuff. Would like to find out the profile of the people who go in there and dine.
ReplyDeleteThis place was pricey for even the new East Village. Plus, that strip isn't conducive to fine dining. Whoever was in charge of picking the location messed up.
ReplyDeleteI think that type of restaurant was best served in the west village, noho, or soho. The underlying issue is the location. Frat boys have destroyed those few blocks along 2nd avenue. I dread having to pass it, especially past 7pm. The simple truth also was perhaps the cost of the cuisine. As someone who has worked in the NYC restaurant industry for longer than I care to admit, it is the cost of rent and maintenance of the space that drives the prices of items, thus demanding a certain grade of customers, which clearly don't seem to fit aside a lame bar and a tacky yogurt shop. It was a beautiful space, but I feel that corner is becoming a university. Change is upon us kidos.
ReplyDeleteThe giant vomit stain outside the front door is SO appetizing!
ReplyDeleteAnd gum blobs! Never occurred to them to pressure wash the sidewalk?
ReplyDeleteOr, you have a restaurant with a niche idea, that people will go to once to try, but won't come back. That is why NY is not that kind to avant-garde trends -- the cost of opening a restaurant here makes experimenting too expensive. And, I won't go to a restaurant that is price fixed only. I sometimes don't get an appetizer, other times just get multiple appetizers, and I never eat dessert. I don't go out to eat so someone can tell me what to eat and in what order and quantity. I went to each of his restaurants exactly once.
ReplyDeleteAgreed 6:43. Often times my friends and I order all apps and drinks. When the proprietor wants absolute control over the experience it makes it difficult. The dirt bag strip of bars doesn't help. I cross the street to avoid them.
ReplyDeleteSuch a shame that Telephone Bar closed. So many years of great food and no obnoxious bros out front.
ReplyDeleteSecond Avenue between 14th and 12th is no picnic either -- got hassled walking through on a recent Saturday evening (early!) and won't be back that way again.
Thus is what happens when you only cater to those with self-illusion of selectivity.
ReplyDelete#SIoS