New York's Most Exciting New Restaurant is Just a Warm-Up Act
Somewhere between the tamarind-butter snails and the bruléed coconut bread pudding at Ha's Snack Bar, I had the sudden urge to shake the hands of the two chefs — the way Paul Hollywood does as a judge on 'The Great British Bake-Off' when a confection tastes too wonderful for words.
The cliché has it that escargots are just a vehicle for butter. Yet in this version, a dab of tamarind zapped that richness with some tang, summoning the mollusks' natural earthiness. Escoffier could never! And that bread pudding: the top scorched to the razor's edge of burnt, the crumb bouncy and coconut ice cream dribbling generously down the sides. Sweet, but barely.
The rotating menu at Ha's, on the Lower East Side, modulates between Vietnam and France but mostly reflects whatever the chefs, Sadie Mae Burns-Ha and Anthony Ha, decide they want to eat that day or week. And what they want to eat is both freewheeling in concept and precise in execution. Theirs is singular, game-changing talent.
You may already know this. Since 2019 the couple have drawn a loyal following for their roving pop-up, Ha's Đặc Biệt. ('Đặc Biệt' loosely translates as 'house special' in Vietnamese.) Ha's Snack Bar has been packed since its debut in December, with little self-promotion beyond a January post on Instagram announcing that it had already been open for a few weeks. The tiny room, as quaint and charming as a Paris bistro, doesn't even have a complete kitchen — just a few portable cooktops, a rice cooker, a small fridge and a combination oven originally from a Wawa store in Philadelphia.
Ms. Burns-Ha and Mr. Ha, who are married, declined at first to be interviewed for this review, saying the Snack Bar is just a dress rehearsal. In a few months, they said, it will become a more casual spot with 'wine bar fare' like oysters and pâté, as they open a bigger, more ambitious restaurant around the corner.
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