On Friday night, my family and I took advantage of Restaurant Week 2012 by going to SHO Shaun Hergatt for dinner. The restaurant is in the middle of the Financial District, which means my brother and I could just walk there from our offices. And it’s fancy.
By fancy, I mean that its two four and five course dinner menus are priced at $85 and $100. It also got two Michelin stars in 2012 and I’ve never been to a Michelin-rated restaurant. Thanks to Restaurant Week, we could take advantage of three courses for $35. What a deal.
At the restaurant, the French-Asian cuisine crafted by Chef Sho Shaun Hergatt is prepared with ingredients from upstate New York subsistence farms. (I’m currently obsessed with farm-to-table cuisine.)
The restaurant itself is beautiful. Everything is clean and crisp – from the white tablecloths to the pretty glass wine-holding walls that diners pass by to get to the main dining room.
I started off with a $12 glass of red wine that was a part of the Restaurant Week menu.
That’s my brother in the back. I can’t tell you much about the wine…I’m not a connoisseur. My preference for red wine is “not dry.” 
I am not above $4 TJs wines.
A server brought over whole wheat bread and butter once we ordered:
This bread was delicious. And the butter? Creamy and sweet. Can’t go wrong with some good bread and butter.
For the appetizer, I ordered the Potato and Leek Espuma: hot panna cotta, truffle oil:
Served with truffle powder:
First, the good: The texture was fantastic – spoonfuls of frothy and creamy with tastes of both leeks and potatoes. The truffle powder was very interesting. It immediately melted in your mouth and had only a faint truffle taste.
The bad: this could’ve used a hint of salt. And I truly expected “hot panna cotta” but this was just warm. It would’ve been more pleasant if it were in fact hot.
For my entree, I chose the Spice Dusted East Coast Flounder with a carrot- cardamom-citrus emulsion.
The fish was cooked perfectly, very tender. The emulsion was delicious, I coated every bite with it! Again, I felt like this was a bit under-seasoned. Especially since the fish was supposed to be “spice dusted.” Where the spices at?
For dessert, I ordered the Warm Sticky Toffee Sponge: caramel sauce, chantilly and pomegranate.
This was warm and sticky. It was very sweet, so I see the point of the pom seeds – they cut the sweetness and add a much needed textural element. I really liked this dessert.
Our bill came out to $200 and change. (4 people + one martini for $15 + two glasses of wine at $12 + 18% gratuity included by the restaurant)
Overall, dining as SHO Shaun Hergatt was a good experience. It’s worth noting that the items we ate are not on the regular dinner menus, they’re specific to Restaurant Week…which may be good or bad.
Still, I’m glad to have finally dined at a Michelin-rated restaurant. I wasn’t blown away but I also would go back. Who knows, maybe I’ll spend $100 on five courses someday.
I have two more Restaurant Week outings planned!
