Don’t Shop Where You Eat
If you find yourself fine-dining in the midst of your favorite high-end retailer, don’t act like it’s a novelty. After all, if you came from most any form of suburb, you spent enough of your youth in a mall food court to know that eating well is part of any shopper’s good day. The Urban Outfitters in Williamsburg has a restaurant inside of it, neatly packed into an elevated box on the third floor, from which the distressed wood tables full of distressed t-shirts are visible only through cracks. No obvious sign points to The Gorbals, other than a listing on the elevator and the stairwell, so if it gets any walk-ins from the street, they must be the kind of person who expects to encounter a celebrity chef’s farm-to-table Jewish-Hispanic restaurant at any time.
Alex and I came bearing a reservation, which we made as soon as we saw the place had banh mi poutine, though that would turn out to be the least interesting dish we tried. Our waitress looked like a chic medical marijuana bud picker, with dreads and a geometry of t-shirt holes I could not quite wrap my head around. She was geniuinely nice, even after Alex and I announced that we were fine with sparkling water, no alcohol, it’s Sober October for these two wild and crazy (and anxious) kids. The paradox of Sober October is that you have more funds available to go out and eat, but then dinner can seem lacking without that craft beer.
On the other hand, for once the memory of each dish I ate is clear even without the aid of notes and iPhone photos. Our five savory dishes came in rapid succession, as they were ready. At first we had some time alone with the grilled octopus, seasoned with the middle eastern herb (and probably 80's TV-villian) Za’atar, giving the single chewy tentacle a prickly coating of licorice and salt. I could have devoured a whole octopus prepared this way.
As we waited for what came next, Alex made an ominous gesture. On the table behind us stood an animal’s skull, mouth open to the sky, a few bits of flesh still dangling from it. If you would like a one sentence culmination of our zeitgeist, try this: In Brooklyn, there is an Urban Outfitters where you can eat a whole roasted pig’s head.
The chewy carrots lived up to their name, and paired well with fun little almond cakes. Then: Raspberries and corn flakes? On lamb ribs? And for some reason this made me so happy? The aforementioned banh mi poutine came smothered — I mean the overwhelming way things at Outback are smothered — in cilantro, jalapeno, and pork, and ended up tasting like french fry nachos. Which wasn’t too bad. Also on the good but not great list were the pickled mussels, which tasted exactly how I expected them to taste, which is always disappointing.
As we plow through the pitch-perfect sticky toffee pudding topped with a head-nodding scoop of peppercorn ice cream — as in uh huh, uh huh, ooh that’s so peppery, I like it, uh huh — it seems time to finally mention Ilan Hall, Top Chef Winner, the Slayer of Marcel, the brains behind this floating food court. Hanging out in the restaurant, sitting with another table of patrons in-between cooking, the small space and excellent food spoke to how he won such a competition, by making sure each piece of his food had a little story that stood out. It’s as though he took the time to flesh out the people in his tale, instead of relying on stock characters in the supporting roles.
On the way out through the store, Alex pointed out winter ponchos and scarves she liked, and I made a corresponding entry on my list of potential gifts for her. Then we continued to walk in the footsteps of our parents and grandparents, happily over full, one of them pointing through a window or display case, the other saying, you should get it.
Rating: On a scale of 1 to $75 distressed t-shirts, I give it eight and a half flowery turntables.
The Gorbals
98 North Sixth Street, Brooklyn, New York
Reviewed October 2014
