Cafe d’Alsace — Restaurant in New York

I'll admit that our experience is an outlier and could have been influenced by the fact that we dined on Labor Day. This could have been the "B Team." The food was fine. It was the service that was disappointing. We were greeted by one waiter, then service somehow switched to another waiter. Shift change? Cocktails ordered and arrived, dinner ordered and we waited. When we realize we hadn't ordered wine I called the waiter over and asked for the wine list. It came, slowly. It's massive by the way. Then food came. All was well prepared and presented. About 3/4 through eating our mains, I mentioned to our party that we hadn't gotten our wine. A minute later, it arrived and we almost said, "too late, we're almost finished" but opted not to cause friction. Since this was a celebration, we went the whole 9 yards for dessert. I asked whether they had Calvados. The waiter was puzzled and wasn't sure. They said they had, Amaretto. I asked if they could give us a list of digestifs to choose from. When few minutes later they arrived with a glass of Amaretto, I explained that no, we'd asked for a list of digestif's. They disagreed with me and said I'd ordered an Amaretto. So again, not to cause friction, we accepted the Amaretto. Sitting there, waiting for dessert, looking at the bar, I couldn't make myself believe that a French/German bar only had Amaretto. I went to the bar and asked for a list. The bartender handed me the wine list that had probably 8 or 10 listed. I brought that over to the table and we chose the Calvados that I'd originally asked for. The manager came to the table (maybe tipped-off by the bartender) and asked if they could help. After explaining the situation, they kindly brought us 2 glasses of Calvados, compliments of the house.

The waiter wasn't well trained. Blame management for that. The only thing I'd fault them for was the attitude when I suggested they made a mistake and we had asked for a list not a glass of Amaretto. In a situation like that, it should be second nature to admit the error (whether you believe it or not) and bring the list. That's not training, that's common sense an courtesy.

We'll give it another go -- but the celebration was dampened...

This place was such a pleasant surprise!

The location is super nice and simple, but with Alsatian vibes throughout, as well as a really attentive and nice staff.

Not only do they have daily specials and a really nice menu - they even have a fixed price menu every day at 50$, that will get you an appetizer, an entree, and a dessert! Can’t beat that, especially if you wanna try a few different things (which is exactly what we did).

We started with steak tartare, a tarte, and one of their homemade sausages with sauerkraut. Every single dish was oh so delicious. The steak tartare was really well seasoned and served with toasted slices of baguette and a small salad. Perfect. The tarte flambé - which was basically a flatbread, was topped with fresh veggies and cheese. And my oh my was it scrumptious. The sausage was definitely homemade and super flavorful.

We then went onto the entrees, our choices were the risotto with morels and asparagus (which is seasonal), the steak frites - that btw comes with bone marrow, and the chicken with mashed potatoes and veggies.

Once again, none of the items disappointed us. The steak was very nicely cooked and flavorful, the fries weren’t the best ever but were pretty good nevertheless. The chicken was nice and juicy, very nicely cooked indeed.

We were already pretty full, but you can’t leave without dessert, right? The Creme brûlée was simple but nicely prepared, and served with a small Madeleine. The red berries crumble was fresh and cleansed our palates with the right amount of tartness and sweetness. The piece de resistance was without a doubt the profiteroles - perfect choux pastry filled with ice cream as well as homemade whipped cream, and topped with a delicious dark chocolate sauce. Absolutely heavenly.

I will go back without a doubt and I recommend you to make your way to the UES for this...

This was an extremely disappointing experience and I wanted to leave a review to warn anyone who has food restrictions or allergies. I ordered the crepe soufflé and specifically asked my waitress, Laura, if it contained anything with raw eggs because I am pregnant and cannot eat undercooked eggs. She seemed annoyed and assured me it was just a pancake with passionfruit sauce. When the dish arrived, it was stuffed with pastry cream, which I know has egg in it. She was nowhere to be found, but luckily a different waiter, Luis, went and asked the chef about the ingredients and came back to inform me that it did contain raw egg. Luis was extremely kind and got me a new dish, some pancakes that the chef said would be safest for pregnancy. When my waitress finally returned, she did not apologize or even acknowledge that she messed up. She was scarcely seen the rest of our meal but when she brought the check, I found that not only was there no compensation for this dangerous mistake, the pancakes that I was given instead of the crepe was $5 more. I am just extremely frustrated with the lack of attention to safety and no apology or acknowledgment of how serious this was. That being said, the food was pretty good and I highly recommend you get something with the passion fruit sauce, but maybe avoid this restaurant if you have food allergies or...