A tale of two panini joints.
It seems unfair to compare Bread Tribeca and 'inoteca. Though the new restaurants are both expanded second incarnations of original, smaller panini bars?Bread in Soho and 'ino in the West Village?one of them is quite good, and the other one?isn't.
As neighborhood snacking destinations, both original sandwich bars excel for different reasons: 'ino for its casual Italian decadence, filling modest sandwiches with ingredients like truffle oil and whole roasted pig into, and Bread for utilizing fine-quality ingredients in appetizing combinations.
But rather than building upon the strengths of both cafes, these spin-off establishments have only precipitated the moment of truth: One exhibits great promise as a full-service restaurant, while the other shows little.
Bread Tribeca is the clear winner here, retaining the unmitigated cool of the original Bread's aloof glory. Though the dinner menu shows traces of the first Bread, deep-fried, grilled and wood-oven-baked additions heighten the sophistication and showcase the fine ingredients and skills of an ambitious new restaurant.
The custom-built wood-burning oven is the new kitchen's most touted feature, but the real star of the evening was the fritto misto ($14), a deep-fried sampler plate. In the evening's most charming presentation, this dish?a bounty of lightly battered fresh sardines, baby zucchini, cod, shrimp, calamari, onions and fennel?was served cradled in a sheet of brown paper carefully laid out on the tabletop. The yeasty batter was refined, and each item that it coated was surprisingly distinct in flavor?the zucchini, often a watery, seedy vegetable, was tender and sweet, and the meaty chunks of cod were moist with their own hot juices.
Not as impressive was an appetizer of grilled octopus with fingerling potatoes ($11). The vinegary potatoes provided a decent counterpoint to the octopus (which tasted uncannily of roasted chicken), though the dish appeared to be a work in progress.
Though the individual elements of a pasta dish, trenette with fresh clams and basil ($16), were skillfully executed, it left an overall impression of blandness. A generous quantity of supple baby clams came atop a meager bundle of al dente pasta, though what appeared to be a pleasantly salty broth could have been excess liquid from the pasta. It wasn't distinctive enough to be clear.
As for the requisite panini, which are still well represented on the menu, the prosciutto and fresh mozzarella served on Bread's own ciabatta ($9.50) suitably explained the success of the first venture. The bread was exquisitely crisp and chewy, the prosciutto subtle and mild. The only recommendation would be to eat this sandwich open-faced, as the bread tends to overpower the meat and cheese.
For dessert, a strawberry soup with the superb house vanilla gelato and muscato aqua dolce ($7) could have exhibited more qualities that distinguished it as a fruit soup rather than a very tasty coulis. But its freshness emerged more as an accompaniment to the Valhrona chocolate mousse with semolina biscotti and coffee caramel sauce ($8), which played out as a battle of intensities between the dark Valhrona pudding and the sauce, a concentrated mixture of espresso, caramel and sugar. This noteworthy dessert could have been even better if the semolina biscotti, which was distributed throughout the mousse, had been on the side. The cocktails?particularly the watermelon martini ($9), which brims with the taste of its namesake fruit?are also worth trying.
Perhaps most impressive, though, was the service at Bread Tribeca, which was unparalleled by any I've experienced in a restaurant of this price range. Like tennis-tournament ball boys, at least six servers plus our very accessible waitress seamlessly tag-teamed their duties throughout the dinner.
While service at 'inoteca was friendly, the polish wasn't there (a dessert mix-up brought us a salty nutella panini ($5) with a disappointingly thin layer of chocolate hazelnut spread, though it was rectified by the arrival of our original order of a tart and flavorful plum granita ($5)), and the same goes for the cuisine.
Apart from its elegant dark-wood interior, the aforementioned granita and the delicious and affordable wines?a Vermentino from Sardinia ($6), a fresh and delicate white, and a smooth, ripe-tasting Alberello rosso del Salento Feline ($8)?nothing that I tried here impressed.
The swordfish, fennel and arugula salad ($9) lacked balance. The swordfish, which, according to the waitress, was braised, tasted overcooked and came off dry and fishy. The fennel in the salad was almost flavorless, and the dressing was overpowering, alternately too peppery and acidic.
Truffled egg toast with bottarga ($9), silver mullet roe, is a favorite from 'ino, but what I tasted was a coarse snack that lacked finesse: a tough Pullman slice was hollowed out to accommodate an egg, doused indiscriminately with truffle oil and showered with pressed mullet roe, but with no unifying effect. I love truffle oil, eggs and caviar, so what went wrong?
Same question for the panini of culatello with gnocchi and mozzarella ($8). As it goes, culatello is supposed to be the finest cut of prosciutto, but what I tasted had the funk of a Chinese sausage. Not good. The mozzarella, homemade at 'inoteca, was hardly a presence, a barely discernible layer smooshed to the bread, an insubstantial Pullman that could afford to take its cues from Bread's ciabatta. The nocci, a bland walnut spread, overpowered the entire sandwich, which brings us back to that recurring problem: no balance.
The greatest disappointments were the lasagnetta di melanzane ($8), an utterly lackluster pasta-free eggplant lasagna, and the suppli ($7), deep-fried risotto balls with pesto, attractive little semolina-dusted spheres that were pretty to look at but too salty to be palatable.
In addition to a desperate need for fine-tuning, I sensed a scrimping on the quality of ingredients throughout this meal. With dishes being as basic as the ones that both Bread Tribeca and 'inoteca specialize in, there is no room for second-rate ingredients or flimsy preparation. Though both restaurants deserve the benefit of the doubt, as they were reviewed within their first weeks of operation, at this stage, only one proved itself worthy of a second look.