As a cool wind licked our faces last weekend at Harvest on Hudson, we were practically licking our plates. In WAG’s August issue, I foretold of the just-released update to the riverfront restaurant’s menu that Chef Vincent Barcelona called the Harvest Renaissance, and my husband and I recently headed there to check out the new arrivals. The consensus: Our favorite restaurant just got a little more favorite.
We were thrilled to see some old favorites on the menu, like bacon-wrapped dates stuffed with almonds and Valdeon cheese and what Chef Vincent calls the “the best bacon and eggs you’ll ever have” – organic Hudson Valley sunny-side-up eggs with house-cured guanciale, brown butter and black truffles.
Once those small plates were thoroughly relished, we ventured into new territory – me with half portions of the Hudson Valley rabbit pansotti and gnocchi with braised oxtail (How could I choose just one?) and he with the Hudson Valley milk-fed veal scaloppini. His came with spinach, braised artichokes, fingerling potatoes and a dry vermouth sauce that earned rave reviews from my veal devotee hubby.
My gnocchi with truffle butter and marscapone arrived generously dressed with Chef’s shredded oxtail braised to perfection in red wine and sage. And I love what Chef does with the rabbit-packed pansotti – complementing the lighter rabbit flavor with olive, artichoke, rosemary and tomato. As with any other Harvest on Hudson pasta dish, the quality of the pasta itself always impresses.
Recently, we also had a chance to try Chef Vincent’s Montauk Skate Wing and lobster coral butter with charred Belgian endive, garden chives and aged sherry vinaigrette. For neophytes to the skate world, that dish made us believers.
By the end of our introduction to the new Harvest menu (there’s lots more culinary territory to cover, and we can hardly wait) we were so stuffed to the brim that surely we couldn’t manage more. Then, alas, we heard the dessert special – a heavenly dome of raspberry mousse atop a shortbread cookie. Somehow, we found room.
Harvest-on-Hudson is at 1 River St., Hastings-on-Hudson. For more, call (914) 478-2800 or visit harvesthudson.com.
