Oddly, when the server approached our table at Orso, an Upper East Side French restaurant, to ask about our wine preferences, we had never seen a list. My dining partner chose the cabernet ($18), learning it was Californian, and I chose the Sancerre from the Loire Valley ($22).

As usual, fries ($13) were a must and were delicious.

I savored every bite of the fresh salad Nicoise with house-confited yellowfin tuna, haricots verts, fingerling potatoes, tomatoes, Niçoise olives, hard-cooked egg and white anchovies, all in a Meyer lemon vinaigrette ($32). My friend requested that dressing in lieu of the curry offered on her Salade de Poulet Grillé. Although the menu described her dish as a grilled chicken breast, instead the chicken was pounded thin into a round the size of the plate, then topped with little gem lettuce, endives, honey crisp apples, dried cranberries and spiced pepitas ($34).

I ran off to meet another friend at the Aquavella Galleries to see “Matisse—The Pursuit of Harmony,” a wonderful exhibit featuring 50 paintings, works on paper, and sculpture, which closed on May 22.

 

Orsay Restaurant
Upper East Side
1057 Lexington Avenue
New York, NY 10021