A Voce was pretty sexy. You've gotta appreciate the thousand little details that coalesce to make this restaurant such a hot spot: the impressive floor-to-ceiling glass display of leveled wine bottles, the sexy red-hued ambience elevated by the sky-high stilettoes very dressed-up women were sashaying on, the plush and jarringly white swivel chairs around almost-black tables, and - of course - the flair with which familiar Italian dishes are brought to luxuriance.
Let's take a look at our pre-entrées table.
Flutes of perfectly-chilled prosecco, on the house (see disclaimer), and three antipasti of - starting from the left - cassoncini, funghi al forno, and burratina. The cassoncini arrived as piping hot, slightly flakey half moons of fried dough bursting open with buttery crescenza cheese and slivers of Swiss chard. The subtle lingering taste of delicately-sliced prosciutto from a cut farther away from the bone pairs well with the cassoncini. The only complaint that I have is that there should've been more prosciutto to balance the substantial flavor of the cassoncini, but a restaurant's gotta make money.
Let's move onto the funghi al forno. This may be a very bizarre reference but, thinking back, the first clear thought that I had tasting this dish was that this must be what the creatures of Brian Jacques' Redwall books bite into after foraging in the woodland territory for nutty, leafy tidbits of earthy, wholesome goodness.
And oh, burratina. There are very few ways to get burrata from Puglia wrong as long as you let the flavorfully unique and texturally interesting cheese shine through, which is what they did with the additions of young spring onions, fava bean pesto, and almonds for accentuation. I always prefer extremely fresh and slightly tart cherry tomatoes with burrata, but personal preference.
Sorry, correction. You see 3.5 antipasti on this table as opposed to just 3. And here I will let you in on a little-known secret. The A Voce on Madison Avenue serves the below as an order while the A Voce at Columbus Circle serves the below as part of the table service.
You're looking at lightly herbed focaccia bread with cow's milk ricotta drizzled with olive oil and sprigs of mint and thyme. The light, chewy bread comes fresh out of the oven already fragrant with olive oil and rosemary. Served alongside the ambrosial ricotta ("ambrosia" and "ambrosial" came out of our mouths at least 6 -7 times during the course of this course), it was was a recipe for hearty indulgence. Choose A Voce Columbus, or A Voce Columbus?
Throughout our entire time at A Voce Columbus, the service was impeccable (again, see disclaimer). Neither stuffy nor negligent, but warm, welcoming, and very much like eating at a friend's table. Yeah, yeah, we were eating at a friend's table.
However, I noticed that everyone was very professional. Even though none of the servers could resist coming up to our table to crack jokes and catch up a little with my restauranting friend extraordinaire, they still kept an eye out for other tables' needs and would float away as naturally as they came.
Then our entrées came.
I gotta say, at this point we were all quite satisfied on the appetizers and were moving a bit more slowly through the entrées. The one above was definitely the star of the show. Chicken-liver-stuffed ravioli with porcini mushrooms. This dish was every bit as bold and distinctive as it sounds, with the pungent porcini mushrooms perfectly on par with the chicken liver. The pasta itself is thick and characteristically al dente, putting up a nice resistance to the teeth.
May I note that all the pastas were definitely fresh and very well-executed? Chef Robbins sticks to the fundamentals of treating pasta as a hearty, wholesome dish that can stand as a meal on its own. Not like Michael White's pasta appetizer at Ai Fiori, which really pissed me off. Sorry, but 6 stands of pasta? Really?
This one was one of those "SUMMER IS COMING!" dishes, light and citrusy wih big, fat peas. To be honest, the physical texture and heft of the pasta totally outweighed the taste. They were so much fun to eat (each one was an actual mouthful of delightful al dente pasta) but I can't really remember the flavor...
In the way back, you can see our - free! - bread again and our third plate of pasta, the spaghetti alla chittarra with clams, meyer lemon, fennel seed, sea beans, and young garlic. You definitely couldn't doubt the freshness and execution of the pasta itself, but I do have to say - as someone who comes from a culture that loves and prepares excellent seafood - that the clams were overwhelmed by the powerful Mediterranean seasoning. Part of the reason is that the clams were not in their shells and had been chopped into small pieces.
The gripe about shucked clams is that 1) they are probably not as fresh cause the idea is that you shuck 'em and forget about 'em and 2) you are foregoing the valuable - yes, VALUABLE - taste of the sea that comes with the moisture found inside a clam shell.
Anyway, second that with generous additions of fennel seeds and lemons (and not enough garlic!), and you have a plate of pasta that could probably do with some other form of protein that would stand up better to the forces at work, and would not be as expensive as clams.
Dessert! And here, our server shared with us that when he first started working here, each day would be a hunt for as many of these as he could get his hands on. But like licking the peanut butter jar clean as a kid, you get sick of it and kinda ruin it for yourself. Or some of us, anyway.
You just really can't go wrong. Come on, hot "Tuscan doughnuts," large and dense, sprinkled with sugar and served alongside bittersweet chocolate? O, bomboloni!
The walk to the 4,5,6 train on Central Park South was long and slow, as we dragged out our conversation. I couldn't help crying out "O, bomboloni!" at least 4 more times as my brain began to register how completely full I was.
Yeah, I would go back again.
Experience...4.5 outta 5.
Impress and be impressed here at this luxury-without-snobbery hot spot. And come hungry.
10 Columbus Circle, 3rd floor
New York, NY 10019
(212)823-2523
Chef Missy Robbins
