The Lion

Girls’ night out was last week and someone made reservations at The Standard and The Lion.  I do not like the food at The Standard and have stated so on my review of the place. It’s a place to be “seen” but the food sucks.  I have heard about The Lion. I categorize it with other scenester places and have never had any interest. To me, places like that the food usually sucks but people pile in because it’s hot and you might catch a glimpse of celebrity. I don’t care how hot the place is if the food sucks. Well anyways everyone wanted to go to The Lion and I figured I have never been and maybe it will surprise me…so we went there.

First huge negative. We had reservations for 8:30 pm and we got seated at 9:45 pm. WTF?  No apologies, no offer of a free drink, nothing.  I guess since the restaurant is so hot, it doesn’t matter if the patrons with reservations wait.  It’s worth it to be part of the scene to wait over an hour for your reservations right? NOT. Strike one.

Finally we sit down and there is an F list celebrity in the house. A new member of the Real Housewives of New York (the one that hawks Yummie Tummy) and another cast member of the show MisAdvised are having dinner together behind us. Guess Andy Cohen introduced them and now they are friends lol.  Anyways who cares.

The table bread was good. It was warm rosemary bread – soft on the inside and crunchy on the outside.

 

I asked for the foie gras as my appetizer and two other girls decided to share the foie gras but our waiter messed up and only delivered one. When I asked about it, no apology.  I just let it go.  Sigh. Strike two.

 

And boy am I glad I let it go and didn’t order a second!!! t don’t know if the plate was hot when they put that slab of duck liver on the plate or what but when I cut into it, it was very very soft. It was gross and kinda runny. Unless my foie gras was seared quickly and meant to be served hot, I do not want my COLD foie gras to be served melting.  It was served with some candied cherries and hazelnuts but they did nothing to save the foie gras melting on the plate. FAIL.

One of my friends got the wild king salmon dish:

 

It was served with chanterelle mushrooms and sweet corn. The fish was fresh but it was bland.

Another friend got the pork chop which was impressively served with a glass lid filled with smoke. They remove the lid table side and voila! smoked pork chop.

 

It’s served with a side of collared greens and bacon and no joke this thing was like 3 inches thick and on the bone. At least you get what you pay for – it’s $34.  It was moist, well cooked and tasty but again needed salt.  It’s huge too so I gotta give the restaurant props for dishing out a huge serving.  My friend portioned out some for the table and still couldn’t finish this monster.

I got the branzino with a medley of beans, baby fennel and herb pesto:

Again the fish was tasty and fresh but I had to add salt to it.

So we were done with the meal and we requested that the waiter please put the leftover pork chop in a doggy bag for my friend that has a great dane at home. We paid the bill and still no doggy bag.  They forgot and when I mentioned it to the waiter, he didn’t apologize but rather stated matter of factly “I had no control over that.”  Um…ok.  So you mess up our appetizer order and then you forget to bring us the doggy bag with no apology? Strike 3.

The main courses were fine (albeit bland) but the entire evening from start to finish just sucked. They made sure the drinks were free flowing but aside from that – the very late seating, the errors throughout the meal with no apology, the melting foie gras, the blandness of everything – I’m just not into this type of restaurant and truthfully have zero interest in ever going back.  By the way, there is nothing “sceney” about this place anymore in my honest opinion.

The Lion, 62 West 9th Street, New York, NY