karacg
Babygirl is 4!
Member since 5/05 17076 total posts
Name:
Kara®
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Finally -- a Key West-style restaurant near by!!
For those who may be interested, from today's Newsday --- since I want to be in Key West RIGHT NOW, I may just have to settle for dinner here:
Spirited Key West fare to the rescue
BY JOAN REMINICK
STAFF WRITER
February 10, 2006
THE WRECK CHOWDER HOUSE
37 Shore Rd.
Port Washington
516-767-7878
CUISINE: Key West-style seafood and more
CHECK: Appetizers, soups and salads, $5 to $11; sandwiches, $9 to $11; entrees, $14 to $21; desserts, $5 to $7.
HOURS: Dinner only, Monday to Thursday, 5 to 10 p.m., Friday and Saturday, 5 to 11 p.m., Sunday, 3 to 9 p.m. WHEELCHAIR ACCESS: Two steps at entryway; rest room equipped.
Why name a restaurant The Wreck? Blame the roguish humor of co-owner and consultant Tom Schaudel, who came up with the nomenclature in arch reference to the site's previous incarnations - Tease, Louis & Marxx and 360, not exactly rip-roaring successes.
Schaudel is hoping that a rebirth as a moderately priced chowder and seafood house with a laid-back Key West vibe will put an end to a bad streak at an out-of-the-way location. What should draw people to Port Washington is the lively cooking of Michael Ross, chef and co-owner at Fiddleheads in Oyster Bay. Ross shows he means serious business right off, with a bread basket of warm, flaky scallion and Cheddar biscuits. It was hard to limit myself to only one while sipping wine and watching the sun set over Manhasset Bay.
Then it was time for an appetizer of tuna tartare, cubes of spice-revved cool raw fish. A bowl of tomato-y conch chowder was slightly sweet, replete with minced shellfish. Another evening, a heaping platter of fried calamari was tender, if somewhat greasy. I liked the beef satay, burnished strips of well-marinated meat on wood skewers, served with chimichurri and a ramekin of tamarind peanut sauce.
At The Wreck, if you feel like nothing more - or less - than a sandwich or burger, you can have exactly that. Ross' Cuban sandwich with ham, roast pork, Swiss cheese, lettuce, tomato, pickles, mayonnaise and mustard was a piquant one, thanks to zippy, liberally applied mustard. Although an overcooked "Wreck burger" had to be sent back, its replacement proved nice and juicy, paired with very good hand-cut fries.
A fish-phobic friend contented himself with a spicy marinated flat iron steak, sliced and topped with a perky mango salsa, accompanied by crisp-fluffy hush puppies. I liked everything on his plate.
I also enjoyed a special of pecan-crusted mahi-mahi, a felicitous union of fish and nuts that, unlike some nut-encrusted piscine dishes, wasn't the least bit oily. A simply grilled slab of swordfish with vegetables took a tropical spin with the addition of banana salsa, the bananas sliced in at the last moment. I was only able to finish some of my flavorful but huge grilled salmon fillet with sweet potatoes, black-eyed peas and leeks in a Vidalia onion broth; it reheated nicely the next evening.
Finales were all house-made. The intriguing-sounding orange risotto pudding turned out to be too starchy, but the warm bread pudding with bourbon sauce worked well. Best was the irresistible Mississippi mud cake, a bittersweet chocolate-crusted chocolate tart. Served with a cloud of freshly whipped cream, it was an instrument to wreck any diet.
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