The Era of $60 Lobster Rolls Is Here...
Plus: Reviews of Estela's new shrimp sandwich, and the lobster rolls at Smithereens and Golden HOF. Also: The New Lobster Roll Price Index!
Every season is lobster roll season. Just as every month is hot soup month.
It’s important to remember the rules.
But I do have a preference: the classic New England sandwich makes me especially happy in the fall.
Hot claws, tucked into split top buns, bring me back to warmer beach days. And soft knuckle meat, as red as the sun, serves as a fine birdie flip to the coming frost.
I keep telling myself that the people in charge won’t turn the clocks back this year.
We’ll see about that.
Anyway. It appears I’m back on my BS, eating lobster rolls for my newsletter again. But there’s a news angle! The casual snack is currently spreading like the seasonal flu across posh restaurant menus, with predictable mutations that include truffles and caviar. Lots and lots of caviar!
The most famous and controversial of the pricey rolls is, at the moment, the one at Smithereens. It has some serious fine dining DNA. And I got it to try it just last week…
That divisive lobster roll at Smithereens, reviewed by me!!!
Want a bowl of clam chowder?
The kitchen at Smithereens aerates the soup and pours it over rice.
In the mood for raw oysters or shrimp cocktail? None of that here. Instead, chef Nick Tamburo (Momofuku Ko) offers a very different shellfish starter: abalone skewers grilled over the binchotan.
Is there candied seaweed for dessert? You bet there is. But there’s also an apple cider doughnut.
Smithereens — like other East Village restaurants — is a quirky antidote to the more predictable strands of luxury coursing through New York at the moment. Or more precisely: It’s a loose and modern riff on a New England seafood shack, with nods to Japan, France, and elsewhere.
Lucky diners get to enjoy everything while overlooking the kitchen. Others sit in a bar room so dark it’s more chic submarine than fancy schooner.
Globe lamps make for a dim and sexy counter; I love how a little frosty air spills out of seaweed martinis and into the darkness. I don’t love how the lighting obscures how beautiful the food is.
Most reviewers enjoy what’s coming out of the kitchen these days — and I’ve dined well here myself — but the gussied up lobster roll is proving to be more divisive.
Here’s what the New York critics have to say about Tamburo’s $38 sandwich: