"In my opinion," he confided, leaning in with a burst of fetid breath, "the flatiron sucks!"
Even in this year of steak-house insanity, with more than its share of tableside bull, this was a rare performance. And it got even more memorable once the food came. My $42 N.Y. strip, sliced open to reassure me that it was medium-rare, appeared to be way overcooked.
"Well, take a taste of it quick!" he demanded, hoping a bite would change my mind, but sensing the imminent delay of a redo.
It's easy to excuse rough service as the symptom of a suburban strip-mall setting, where seasoned fine-dining staff is harder to come by. And I have more sympathy for earnest inexperience, like the second-meal server who struggled red-faced to open our wine (with an even younger trainee looking on) before he realized it wasn't a screw top after all.
But there's nothing small-time about the entree prices here, which range from the mid-$20s into the $40s. And I expected more all around from a restaurant by Win and Sutida Somboonsong. This couple has built an impressive restaurant empire in the Pennsylvania burbs that's suddenly growing at warp speed, from their original mom-and-pop, Mikado Thai Pepper, to handsome Teikoku, Media's sleek Azie, and beyond, including two other new spots in Villanova's former Maia - the sushi-centric Azie on Main upstairs, and a comfort-food sports bar called MIXX soon to open downstairs.
So why not a steak house, too, while the recession rents on vacant fine-dining spaces are cheap? Everyone else seemed to open one in 2009.
