'Seems Like It Needs Flavor': 3 Jezebel Queer Eye Experts Review Antoni's Dry New Restaurant
EntertainmentMovies
Antoni Porowski, the food expert from Netflix’s Queer Eye reboot, is a polarizing figure. While his fellow host Bobby whips up massive renovations, and while Jonathan charmingly “yaasss queens” everyone to death, Antoni has earned the reputation for cooking… well, very little. His Season 1 recipes—guacamole, grilled cheese—left a lot to be desired, and he often straight-up made people cook for him, like when he made one subject’s mother teach him how to make banana bread pudding.
Which is to say, people are still not sure if the man can cook. So when Antoni announced he was opening his first restaurant—a “fast-casual” spot inspired by his Polish heritage that would take over a shuttered West Village diner in New York City, with restaurateurs Eric Marx and Lisle Richards—we knew we had to go review it.
When the three of us—all active Queer Eye fans— arrived, we found a small, minimalist space filled with pothos plants and a soundtrack of the Cars and R.E.M, that was essentially a glorified Dig Inn catering to sweaty Equinox attendees from across the street with breakfast, lunch, and dinner options. We decided to order four dishes: the Thai Chicken Bowl; the TV Dinner with fish sticks (as our sides we chose cauliflower rice and smashed avocado); a collection of vegetables and smears known as the Den Mother; a salad (?) called Vegan Crunchy Creamy; and a nightmarish smoothie called the Big Porowski. (The bill was $79.)
All we can say is: we hope you like cauliflower.
Food
Megan: Healthy fast-casual places—your Dig Inn, your Sweetgreen, etc.—have spread like particularly pernicious kudzu, which is nice for me because I like my food in one bowl and a chopped salad is not an existential nightmare, but a nice way to eat what is essentially coleslaw but still feel somewhat virtuous. With this in mind, I thought Antoni’s food would feel healthy-ish but also taste good. I was very wrong.
Every single thing I ate, from the cauliflower rice to the roasted cauliflower to the dry, wrinkled lentils to the strangely sweet spaghetti squash, was devoid of salt. The Baba Ghanoush in the Vegan Crunchy Creamy sustenance bowl was spicy, and had I my druthers, I would’ve licked it off the compostable bowl in which it was served. A pretty but overly sweet beet hummus accompanied the Den Mother, which was also sprinkled with pomegranate seeds for no discernible reason that made any sort of sense. Though I did not really care for either of these items, they deserve mention because they had flavor. Everything surrounding them did not.
The TV Dinner featured the two most popular items of the evening: a tartar sauce that tasted like it was made from veganaise (but not gross) and chunked avocado, plain, dressed with maybe a lemon squeeze. At one point, I dipped salad greens into the tartar sauce because I wanted to taste something. The fish sticks were dry and coated in a Macadamia nut breading that distracted from the fish (that was fine), and added an unsettling creaminess that does not belong with fish. And while I didn’t mind the softness of the chicken in the Thai Chicken bowl (she was poached), I really struggled with how overwhelmingly and unnecessarily sweet that was. Sweet chicken. Sweet cabbage. Weird rice. “NEEDS ACID,” I scribbled in my notes, shortly after delivering what I think was a very obnoxious lecture about why. I did love the sweet potato because it’s hard to fuck up a sweet potato. Would’ve eaten the whole thing if left alone with our sad assemblage.
I wasn’t aware the cuisine would be predominantly “healthy.” Imagine my disgust!
Clover: My immediate thought, after the first mouthful, was: Wow this is bland! And then it was one bland dish after another. And then: I need to think of another word for “bland.” I went into this experience blind—having only read bits and pieces of articles about the restaurant’s opening—so I wasn’t aware the cuisine would be predominantly “healthy.” Imagine my disgust! The fish, which was part of the TV dinner special, was tasty. “A slight zest” is what I wrote in my notes. I liked that it was light—perfect for a quick lunch. Megan informed us the fish was coated with Macadamia, so that explained the… nuttiness. But the texture was a tad too chewy. The fish came with a side of avocado, which I kept sticking a fork into because it was the most flavorful option on the platter. I loved the tartar sauce.
My favorite was the Thai chicken dish, which at least had some flavor to it compared to the other meals and was pleasantly moist, plus saturated with slabs of cabbage. The least appetizing was the spaghetti squash salad (the Den Mother) because 1) it’s not spaghetti. 2) It’s squash??? (I made zucchini spaghetti before that tasted way better and I’m no chef.) Again, I wrote an astute observation in my notes: “Seems like it needs flavor.” It also came with rice and I recall Hazel wondering, “Is this real rice?” (Megan confirmed it was.)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
