at the sign of The Pink Pig

Up The Creek: Ten Years Ago

[Pink Pig Time Machine by Wilfrid: October 7, 2013]

I'm lucky to have visited Australia three times, and as you'd expect this leads me to take a lively interest in their cuisine. Australian restaurants as such--and not counting Outback--are surprisingly rare, in London as well as New York.

I was excited, then, when a pub serving Aussie food opened in SoHo.

Mostly Stellar Estela

[Pigging by Wilfrid: October 2, 2013]

The south side of East Houston between Broadway and Lafayette is home to a few battered old bars and restaurants. The long, dark, dive Milano's. The veal-parm veteran Emilio's Ballato.

But just upstairs at number 47, in the premises which once housed Nolita House, a name chef is bringing the cutting edge to this dowdy micro-neighborhood. Ignacios Mattos--once of Il Buco, but more recently and relevantly of the terrific early incarnation of Isa is running a rather good, modern tapas bar.