(Crispy Cauliflower Buffalo ‘Wings’ tossed in Sriracha butter, a ‘Wilde Burger,’ and cured smoked salmon are among the offerings.) Of course, there will be plenty of bar snacks and larger dishes to soak up the absinthe, too. With this in mind, the cocktail menu embodies the spirit of both the Victorian and Prohibition eras: Choose from drinks like the "50 Shades of Dorian Gray," which blends Plymouth gin and cherry liqueur with Chinese five-spice and citrus, or "Oscar Wilde’s Potent Elixir," made with cognac, gin, Guinness, cassis, lavender, Champagne, and orange zest alternatively, stick to a more familiar gin sling or the bee’s knees. Incidentally, while the owners set about renovating the space-a process which has clocked in at around $4 million-they stumbled across a little piece of New York history: The building had once been home to the city’s Prohibition Enforcement Headquarters during the 1920s. One of the two bronze statues depicting him can be found propped up-pint of Guinness in hand-against the 118.5 foot marble and mahogany bar, and even the grandfather clock is set to 1:50 pm, the time of Wilde’s passing in 1900. According to the New York Times, the pair thought it “only natural” to dedicate their new bar to the Picture of Dorian Gray author. It’s the latest venture from Frank McCole and Tommy Burke, the Irish duo behind the almost equally ostentatious Lillie’s Victorian Establishment, dedicated to Lillie Langtry, a Victorian actress and onetime friend of Wilde’s. Those with a sharp eye will spot quotes from Wilde decorating the space, too. There are roaring fireplaces, over-the-top marble statues, a piano dating back to the 1890s, pieces of imported Murano glass, gilt framed mirrors, and eccentric antiques scattered in various corners. It is its own reward.The interior of the bar, which has simply been dubbed Oscar Wilde, is as opulent as you might expect for a place dedicated to a man whose preferred alcohols were Champagne and absinthe.
What an amazing tribute to the brief, wondrous life of Oscar Wilde. How far has the cultural vanguard come since Wilde’s heyday? A straight bar can be openly devoted to a queer icon. We happily lapped up the Gutter & Stars: jaunty, floral and velvety with a playful tumble of gin, sparkling wine and lavender bitters. Rose wine, elderflower liqueur and grapefruit botch their ménage à trois the rose literally settles to the bottom. But dodge the Potent Elixir (cognac, Guinness syrup, lavender bitters and champagne? It’s a slush pile of half-thought ideas). The botanical lift of the cucumber vodka and grape liqueur in the Writer’s Block cocktail is bubbly and bright. The 50 Shades of Dorian Gray, driven by five-spice cherry gin, is the kind of cocktail that uses its passport as ID: alluring, showy, deliciously straddling the faraway and the familiar. The fare descriptions are rife with tongue-in-cheek Freudian slurps that suggest the tongue has ventured elsewhere. Naturally, the menu is packed with odes and double entendres (any true Wilde fan loves a double).
#Oscar wilde nyc menu windows#
Either it goes or I do.” The venue is awash in deliriously decadent bric-a-brac like painted-glass windows and crushed-velvet chairs, without the impotence of being earnest-and almost everything is dolled up with gaudy marble or heavily lacquered wood. (The menu quotes Wilde: “Pleasure without champagne is purely artificial.”)ĭecor is a challenge at this homage to a man whose dying words were reportedly “This wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. Equal parts salon, pub and bordello, it serves a broad mix, including tipples in the Victorian style and Prohibition-inspired cocktails (the building previously housed the Prohibition Enforcement Headquarters) despite the fact that Wilde died 19 years before the Volstead Act, in a country that never tried the “noble experiment.” And there’s champagne, of course. “If you never know what you want to be, if you live what some might call the dynamic life but what I will call the artistic life, if each day you are unsure of who you are and what you know, you will never become anything, and that is your reward.”Įpitomized by brine-curious pickles and “broccomole” (which tastes like mushy peas and comes with taro chips), the British writer’s namesake guise-gone-Wilde bar, fittingly, has no idea what it is. “If you want to be a grocer or a general or a politician or a judge, you will invariably become it that is your punishment,” wrote Oscar Wilde.
0 kommentar(er)
