My review of Two Michelin Star Restaurant Al Coro
During a long weekend trip to New York City, we just had to try out the highly rated two Michelin star Italian restaurant called Al Coro. Located on the corner of 16th Street and 10th avenue in Manhattan’s West Chelsea.
My Al Coro NYC Review
When you first enter the restaurant, you’re greeted by a snazzy, high end cocktail like lounge with high ceilings and arched walkways. At the other ends there is a bar and immediately above it is where a band usually plays. The night that we went there was a jazz band playing along with a singer. In the video, it is a little difficult to make out the venue as the lighting inside is pretty dark.
I really loved the vibe of this place as I do prefer darker lit settings for fine dining. I guess you could call me a vampire or night owl haha. I would have preferred a booth but they had seated us at a table instead. We were seated on the right side of the restaurants towards the back, but we still had access to watch the upstairs band as they played (Well, sort of. You can be the judge of that in the video below).
The menu they have is pretty limited, which is to be expected for a place like this. They essentially had two options you could choose from: a three course selection or a seven course. We opted to go with the three course each which was plenty of food for the two of us. We also wanted to try each other’s dishes so this worked out perfectly.
They started us off with some bread and butter for the table. Very typical for an Italian style restaurant. The butter was very flavorful! and the bread looked like it was cooked with some seasoning and seeds of some kind. For our appetizers (or antipasti), we ordered the Langoustine Crudo, which had caviar and Pomelo. And we also ordered the Vitello Tonnato which was thinly sliced yellowfin tuna and veal dabbed with meyer lemon. So yummy! My favorite of the two was the vitello dish.
Of course if any restaurant offers gnocchi, I am going to order it! It is one of my favorite dishes along with a good sea bass. I ordered their Gnocchi Alla Bava while Michael ordered the Agnolotti In Brodo which had Pork, Capon and Parmigiano in a broth. Both were very good dishes, but my heart was set on the gnocchi that night!
What I really liked about the gnocchi dish (besides the gnocchi pasta itself) was the added flavor of the cooked chestnuts. It gave you an added slight crunch texture along with the creamy sauce and the perfectly textured gnocchi.
The pork brodo was also a good dish and had a variety of chopped vegetables and plenty of pork. I felt that both dishes were appropriately portioned and definitely enough to satisfy our appetite. Also, the presentations of both dishes were great and the waiter served our initially portions for us. I was given a spoonful of the gnocchi while Michael had a sauced poured over his pork dish portion. Overall both dishes tasted great and were were almost full, but thankfully we had enough room left over for our desserts – the third and final course of our meals.
To top the evening off, we selected two of their desserts (well, there were only two to select from haha): The Hazelnut Yuzu Panna Cotta and their Torta 900. The hazelnut cotta consisted of citrus crumbs and Meringue in a blue dish display, and the Torta 900 (not really sure what the 900 means here) had caramel, chocolate, buckwheat cake and topped with Coffee gelato. Both dessert were very delicious! They even gave us three smaller dishes of varying bite sized desserts consisting of small cookies and chocolates.
This was such a pleasant evening and a great dinner night out in the bustling New York City.
Would I give this a 2 Michelin Star? It is hard to tell. while the food did not really wow me, nor any particular dish really stand out, I did really like the ambiance and the music played in the background. The waiter and staff were all very polite and accommodating and knowledgeable about the dishes served to us. I think with all of this combined it could make for a 2 Michelin star for someone professionally critiquing restaurants. However, I personally think this was not worth accolades given. There are many fine dining restaurants out there with just as nice an ambiance and just a good of food served with no special rating. But you can be the judge of this! Definitely worth checking out though, if you are in the vicinity and looking for some quality Italian food in a nice, dimly lit setting.
Thank you for taking the time to read my Al Coro NYC review! Hopefully this gives you some insight on the restaurant if you’re interested in dining there anytime soon!
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