VINOCITY

He says:
When a swanky restaurant like Vinocity is practically empty on a Saturday evening, the red flags usually go up. And when your waitress voluntarily tells you the owners are moving the restaurant to Kirkwood in April and changing the mood from “hi-end Midtown” to “suburban casual,” that’s a pretty good sign to head for the exits. But sometimes looks can be deceiving.

I’m not surprised that Vinocity hasn’t found its niche in Atlanta. It is a stone’s throw from several other prominent high-brow eateries at 12th and Crescent, and yet Vinocity is unhappily situated between two municipal parking lots and a row of abandoned townhouses. The restaurant itself occupies a former two-story residence. The first floor is an “upscale” lounge playing NCAA basketball behind the bar. The dining room is on the second floor, a modest space with dark blue walls, dim lighting, and Frou Frou on the stereo.

She says:
Things seemed a little off that night. Maybe it was the emptiness, maybe the fact that we had three different servers over the course of the meal, none of whom seemed to be aware of the others. Anyway, I think the move to Kirkwood is just what the doctor ordered; losing some of the pretension and concentrating on good wine and food is a smart idea.

Vinocity’s wine list is both manageable and appealing. I tried the “Magnificent Wine Co.” red house blend, which was a decent sipping wine, but nothing spectacular.

For dinner I decided to go with the soup of the day and a few small plates. I wasn’t impressed with the cream of asparagus soup—it didn’t taste particularly asparagus-y. The small plates were pretty good, though. My favorite was a fried egg roll packed with duck confit and served with a sweet “Thai” chili sauce. The sauce overwhelmed the dish a bit, or maybe the duck confit was underwhelming? (Although it’s hard to believe that meat cooked and preserved in fat could be bland.) The second small plate was the Ahi tuna tartar, raw cubes of tuna tinged with a light teriyaki sauce served with crisped wontons and drizzled with wasabi crème fraiche. The dish was creative, but what stood out is the fact that I have never seen so much raw tuna on one plate in my entire life. I’m not sure that the $14 they charged was even sufficient to cover the cost of the tuna piled on my plate. I love tuna, but as Downtown Boy and I obligingly ate the last few raw cubes, I was wishing for a $7 version of this plate.

He says:
I was more than pleasantly surprised by my main entrée. I’ve been burnt by so many bad entrées in Atlanta that I’ve begun to treat appetizers as the apex of the meal. But the pork shank that arrived on a bed of risotto must be seen to be believed. It was the size of a football with the bone sticking out of both ends, like the Platonic ideal of Meat itself. Taking my first bite, I suddenly felt like Fred Flintstone, gnawing on the femur of a mastodon. And yet there was nothing silly about this dish – this was a serious hunk of pig prepared by a serious cook. The pork had been slow braised to perfection, and it fell right off the bone with a touch of the fork. It was rare and gamy and perfect. The accompanying broth added a nice zing and offset the risotto, which was a tad creamy for my taste. Still, neither distracted too much from that pork shank, a truly remarkable beast that just may have set the standard for all pork shanks to follow.

We say:
On the whole, Vinocity is average among upscale restaurants. The prices are rather high, the setting is less than optimal, and the service is, well, weird. Hopefully this will all change once it moves to Kirkwood. However, one thing that should not change is the pork shank. It is exactly where it should be.

He says:



She says:

VINOCITY
36 13th Street, Atlanta, GA 30309
http://www.vinocitywinebar.com/