When entering a bar, one expects that someone—an owner, an architect, a quick-witted bar back— has thought through how the space should work; considering things like, “It’s a bar, people will be drinking. Hell, they may even get drunk.”The folks running White Slab Palace, a Scandinavian-themed bar on Delancey Street, did not.
While the bar’s décor features thick, sturdy-looking wooden tables, the long granite bar proves less stable.You practically have to climb onto the four-foot-tall bar stools, a feat that gets more dangerous the more cocktails you have.This furniture choice also makes the bar an awkward place to chat, unless you’re lucky enough to score one of the 15 or so seats. If your date is standing on the ground, he tends to look more like a midget than the hunky hero you hoped him to be.
Bar seating aside, the four-month-old spot has other problems that turned me off. For one, the bartender didn’t know what he was serving. “Oh I don’t drink,” he told us with a smile after I inquired which of the house aquavits ($6) he preferred. That became even more apparent when the Slab Old Fashioned ($11), listed as including Maker’s Mark, blood orange and cherry liqueur, just tasted like straight bourbon. I took another stab with the White Slab Blood Mary ($9) but was told they didn’t have the ingredients to make it. The bar was also out of Belhaven Creamy Stout, which my companion ordered. Instead, I ended up getting the Bloody Beet ($11), a light cocktail made with Stoli, beet juice and a dry spice mix. Following that, I tried the Lavender Lemonade ($12), a sweet take on the summer mainstay with Stoli, lavender syrup and orange Curacao.
Aside
from drinks,White Slab Palace’s co-owner and chef, former Good World
Bar proprietor Annika Sundvik, serves up a full menu of
Scandinavian-inspired food. Of course, in congruence with the evening,
after the bartender recommended the Swedish Meatballs it turned out
Sundvik had decided that very day to nix them from the menu. Instead,
we ordered House Smoked Norwegian Shrimp Aioli ($10), a dish that would
have been better if we were warned the tiny shrimp come out unpeeled,
heads and all.We also tried a Grated Potato Pancake ($8), which was so
dull even creme fraiche and salmon roe didn’t help, and the Lapin au
Vin ($14), a dry rabbit dish that resembled “day after Thanksgiving
stew” more than a gamey delicacy.
It was after we had a few
plates that I realized nobody else was eating. For the rest of the
night I stuck to the best thing the bar has to offer—the aquavits, a
Scandinavian spirits similar to vodka.The aquavits at White Slab Palace
are found in a floor-to-ceiling freezer and have been infused with
things like star anise, cloves, rosemary, sage and coriander. I sipped
from one that burned with pepper vodka, black kokum and telly. Another
that stood out was flavored with potato vodka, borage and lavender.
As I climbed down my bar stool, clutching the surface of the bar, I was grateful I hadn’t had more, but disappointed that the best thing White Slab Palace had to offer came so late in the evening. Chances are I won’t go back to this ill-equipped and dull bar unless someone else is buying.
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White Slab Palace
77 Delancey St. (at Allen St.), 212-334-0913
