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There’s a strong argument to be
made for going to an ubercool restaurant on a Monday night.
Blissfully, there’s no storm surge at the door and instead of being
catty, the hostess is charming, and the coat attendant accommodating
– and before you’ve even taken a pre-dinner seat at the bar, you’re
feeling cared for – and yes, even cool for having the smarts to be
at Bette on a night when it’s filled with Europeans on vacation and
tables of well-dressed men and the requisite Sex in the City-like
girls, as well as the few single diners on the mezzanine,
comfortable with their Blackberries and the inevitable coddling
which occurs when a restaurant staff is relaxed enough to be both
professional and solicitous.
From the street, you might miss
Bette, with its single bronze plaque announcing its name. You might
walk right on by as we had for several months. You might be looking
for the hubbub which has always lurked around Amy Sacco’s other
ubercool ventures, the nightclub/lounges Lot 61 and Bungalow 8.
Blissfully, Bette on a calm night is the antithesis of those
stress-inducing clubs where everyone’s jostling for position, drink
tickets and further notoriety. Instead, Bette (named for Ms.
Sacco’s mother and pronounced like Ms. Davis, and not Ms. Midler)
resembles a speakeasy – that is, if one recalls the speakeasy
origins of the Stork and the 21 Club. To walk into Bette is to be
enveloped in a space warmed by smoked glass, low lighting and a buzz
of contentment. There’s a kind of supper club glamour about the
room, as if you might well encounter Margo Channing and Addison
DeWitt tossing back martinis while aiming jibes at Eve Harrington.
The cocktails are defiantly retro, as is the food, comprising hits
from the past such as iceberg wedges and Baked Alaska, and much of
it works well on the palate. Take, for example, the much-discussed
truffled french fries. At $14 a serving, that’s some audacity in
charging what is, for much of the planet, a month’s salary for a
wooden salad bowl filled with fried potatoes. But then again, those
frites are delicious and addictive: salty, crispy, and yes, truffled:
the sort of food which makes you feel good while eating (provided
you don’t think of the politics therein).
Which, in the end, is what Bette
does best: make you feel good. Even the bathrooms are chic and
stylish – and the whole place reminds you of that one very good
reason why you came to New York in the first place: to hang with
kids as cool and smart as you are.
Best always,
Mark and Robert
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