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There’s a new patty melt in town, too, and it’s very good. Photo: Buddy & Son

What the Faux? That’s the question I’ve been asking myself lately, because I don’t remember a time when my own experience at a new restaurant differed so greatly from everything else I’ve seen and heard. Yet this is the case at George McNally’s Faux, where I had a very nice dinner several weeks ago — a top-shelf burger, spot-on steak tartare, grade A profiteroles, attentive-but-not-overbearing service — and where, ever since, everyone else has apparently been disappointed. Helen Rosner called it “a total mess” in her review. A colleague reported a “dead” room on a Monday and “such bad” food. And a chef friend thought it was simply “not great.” I don’t know what to say: I found it charming. I even liked the tone set by the bouncer outside. Have I gone soft in my old age? Is Faux the restaurant equivalent of Digger? (No.) Or is it the rare restaurant that instead of off nights has sporadic “on” nights where everything goes right? It’s early days for both the restaurant and its owner (currently in his early 20s), so I’m content in saying we need to give this place some time to settle into itself. 

Meanwhile, while we’re on the topic of places that want to be known for martinis and burgers, we’ve got some news from new–to–Grub Street contributor Bella Sayegh about the next project from Cecchi’s owner, Michael Cecchi-Azzolina, and a look at the patty melt pictured above (which is not a burger but is also not-not a burger). And we’re getting on line to vote early with Grub Street intern Mia Baccei. Let’s get to it.

Earlier this year, Michael Cecchi-Azzolina — the owner of Cecchi’s; author of the memoir Your Table Is Ready; and a veteran of hospitality destinations like Raoul’s, Minetta Tavern, and Le Coucou — told the Zephyr Letter Substack that he was “doing a New York brasserie” with “two floors, two bars, two private dining rooms.” He said at the time only that it would be in Soho, but now we have an address: 12 Vandam Street, a former brewery just off Sixth Avenue in that nebulous zone between Soho and Hudson Square. He says he doesn’t have a name or a chef yet, but reiterates that it’s his “homage to a bistro.”
—Bella Sayegh

When Jake Epstein and Shelley Armistead were putting together the menu for Buddy & Son inside Ian Schrager’s Public Hotel, they came up with a burger designed to stand out from the pack with pickled green tomatoes, aged cheddar, and aïoli bound by, Epstein says, “handfuls of garlic.” Creating comfort food with high-grade ingredients was no problem, since the duo came from Gjelina (Epstein was the chef; Armistead the group’s CEO), and the new item was, Epstein adds, great, but still: Another burger? “It just read as sameness to me, even though the flavors were there,” he says, “so we started racking our brains about how to make it more fun and exciting.” Nostalgia saved the day when Epstein swapped the bun for toasted sourdough, recalling his time as a kid eating patty melts at Jewish-style delis across Los Angeles. He hopes Buddy & Son’s menu reads as “an elevated Balthazar”: It includes duck cassoulet with cranberry beans, honeynut squash tortellini, and — another throwback — warm beet salad.
—Oset Babür-Winter

Early voting across the city closes this Sunday. If you still have not found the motivation necessary to make it to your local polling site — or you just keep figuring you’ll get to it later — I am here to tell you that it’s a perfect excuse to play hooky on one of these perfect fall days we’ve been having and to find somewhere good to eat. Yes, vote because democracy is important, but also since you’re going to be at your polling site anyway, take five minutes to find something awesome to eat afterward. Maybe it’s a place that’s new — or just doing something new — like Osakana, a Japanese fish market that has just started doing sushi, sashimi, onigiri, and more for takeout in the East Village starting at 11:30 a.m. Or maybe it’s a cheap lunch staple that you’ve just never gotten around to trying because it’s nowhere near your office, like Trinidad Golden Place in Crown Heights with its $2 doubles — fried flatbread filled with spiced chickpea chana. Maybe it’s even a sit-down restaurant that you’ve never found an occasion for, like Beco, the Brazilian restaurant with the fluffiest pão de queijo in Williamsburg.
—Mia Baccei

Questions? Feedback? Recommendations? Drop us a line at eatingnewyork@nymag.com.

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