Recently, Spicy Ninja came back from who-knows-where to visit NYC, and before he knew it, his month was up and he was heading back to wherever… but not without eating a meal with his favorite food blogger! (That’s me, in case you were confused.) On a super chilly, windy day (way before the snowstorm), we met up at Lupa, where I’d dined over 2.5 years ago, but had deemed “must come back to see what’s really up”.
Like last time, we started off with a rosemary foccacia. I found this way too oily – completely not in need of the olive oil served alongside – and a bit cake-like. Meh. I let Spicy Ninja polish this off.
I’d asked if we could get a starter platter of the veggies, but Spicy Ninja noted here that he’s more a “meat kind of guy” so I switched over to their board of cured meats.
Testa (I think) – the one made from the pig’s head fat. Awesome, slightly fatty – maybe too fatty for Spicy Ninja, but delicious, delicious fat.
Lingua – or tongue. Pickled slightly perhaps, as it was slightly vinegary and I loved this one. I would love to eat this with some spicy mustard, a crust of good bread, and some cheese… mmm
The rest of the meats were OK. I didn’t like the spicy one that much, but that’s expected; the others were just standard.
We followed up by splitting a pasta, which the kitchen was kind enough to split into two portions with no prompting on our part aside from telling the waiter we’d be splitting it.
Bucatini all’amatriciana – hollow spaghetti with a lovely rich tomato sauce that clung to the strands. Spicy Ninja was not impressed with the pasta, but I enjoyed my portion very much. Al dente pasta with a perfect and rich sauce. Yum!
Yvo says: At $23/person for lunch, it isn’t exactly inexpensive. However, the quality of the cured meats platter alone was worth it- I certainly enjoyed eating it, though I wish it’d been served with some bread besides the oily focaccia. Overall… an enjoyable meal, but I’m in no rush to go back. Service was fine, food was good but mostly not that outstanding. I’ll stick with Otto…
middle of the road
T.C. says
Boo, meats and no cheeses. Too bad about the foccacia.
That’s nice of them to split the pasta in half for youse.
Chris H says
I’ve always thought that Lupa was one of the best of the Batali empire, and Otto was near the bottom. I guess our food rivalry continues…
BlindBakerNYC says
This looks like a wonderful meal aside from the foccacia. That meat platter needed some cheese to go with it!