After a game of golf in the New York area, finish your day at Columbus Circle. You'll find upscale hotels and shopping, as well as the Time Warner Center, headquarters of the famous media corporation. While you're there, eat at one of the restaurants that feature innovative Italian, Japanese and California cuisine.
Per Se
Chef Thomas Keller touts Per Se as the urban version of The French Laundry, his iconic restaurant in the Napa Valley. Per Se offers beautiful views of New York, as well as delicious edible fare. Depending on your appetite, you can enjoy a prix-fixe menu or a la carte choices for lunch or dinner.
Savory options range from risotto with shaved white truffles to agnolotti, a ravioli made of yams and mascarpone and filled with chestnut confit and apples. Seafood lovers will enjoy herb-roasted Pacific sablefish with smoked-bacon emulsion, and butter-poached Novia Scotia lobster with red-pepper syrup. Carnivores will go for dishes such as lamb with salsify braised in red wine. If you don't eat fish or meat, one of the prix-fixe menus is made up of extraordinary preparations of seasonal vegetables.
Per Se
10 Columbus Circle
New York, NY 10019
(212) 823-9335
perseny.com
A Voce
Head to A Voce for luscious Italian cuisine using fresh, seasonal ingredients. You may be tempted to make a meal of the inviting antipasti, such as cured sardines with eggplant caponata; beef carpaccio with walnuts, lemon and pecorino; or salad with escarole and warm pancetta vinaigrette. But you'll also want to leave room for pasta dishes, including ricotta gnocchi with mint and squash blossoms; ravioli with taleggio cheese and chanterelles; and handmade spaghetti with crab, leeks and sea-urchin butter.
Entrees include Mediterranean sea bass with marinated heirloom tomatoes, and grilled lamb chops with lamb sausage and fruit mustard. The desserts are hard to pass up, too---think vanilla bean panna cotta with raspberries; espresso-chocolate custard tart with toasted almonds; and semifreddo, a semi-frozen chocolate-chip mousse complemented by bitter orange.
A Voce
10 Columbus Circle
New York, NY 10019
(212) 823-2523
avocerestaurant.com
Masa
The prix-fixe meal at Masa restaurant is one of the most expensive in the United States, but patrons say it's well worth the $400-plus cost. Chef Masa Takayama chooses what you eat at the three-hour dinner, with delicacies including sea-urchin risotto with white truffles; tuna-belly tartare and caviar on toast made of sweet bread; and liver of blowfish, which is a delicacy if it's prepared well---and poisonous if it's not.
You also can head to Masa's bar to taste some of this Japanese cuisine at a lesser price. Start with scallop, shrimp and jalapeno ceviche; a cold salad such as tofu with soy ginger; or a warm salad of root vegetables. Proceed to sizzling spicy octopus; sautéed sardines with salt and lemon; or quail meatball skewers. Also, try the sushi rolls, such as yellowtail with scallion; tuna belly with caviar; and creamy tofu with avocado.
Masa
10 Columbus Circle
New York, NY 10019
(212) 823-9800
masanyc.com
About The Author
Barbara Dunlap is a freelance writer in Oregon. She was a garden editor at "The San Francisco Chronicle," and she currently specializes in travel and active lifestyle topics like golf and fitness. She received a master's degree from the University of Missouri-Columbia and has been a Knight Foundation Fellow.
