Loring Place — Restaurant in New York

We were recommended this restaurant from the staff of a nearby business we enjoy. They spoke well of the chef and food. They mentioned other restaurants (just as options), but that they would likely be packed with longer wait-times as it was a Sunday during brunch. We were hungry and Loring Place was close. Once we arrived the menu looked great, they had a lot of open tables and there was not a wait. The restaurant is a larger space and did have diners present. We were seated directly.

One of the wait staff greeted us and asked for the usual still or sparkling preference. He arrived with that not long after, but did not return. 10 minutes pass before another attendant arrives and takes our drink order. It is noteworthy that his body language indicated there might be a problem. He gave out an exacerbated sigh and slumped his shoulders forward as if to indicate he drew the short straw and had to deal with us. No hello, just “ do you want something else to drink?”. The beverages were delivered by a different attendant shortly after. 23 minutes go by and we start discussing possibly needing find food elsewhere. Within that 23 minutes we noticed a few things. The dining area we were in had two 6 top groups and two or three two tops. Not a number that should weed a staff of at least 5 servers. The two men that took our drink orders were not busy and spent most of their time chatting and enjoyed beverages in the hallway when not tending to the two 6 tops. They did not look our way again until we were leaving. The two female attendants present did notice us, one of whom brought our beverages. They both seemed to recognize the negligence, but we were not their table. Realizing we were not going to be seen again, we took the hint and decided to leave. The two men stood and faced us directly, side by side with their arms crossed as one said with a clearly approving tone, ” leaving so soon?” They did seem pleased. Note to the chef: Im certain you are talented else your fellow businesses would not make note of it to their patrons. We would have liked to try your food. That was indeed what we were there for. All places have off days but we left feeling like your establishment has a bigot problem. Good food does not make up for terrible service unfortunately. Im certain we were not offensive enough that this was an isolated incident. Best of luck, Loring Place. We will not be back or recommend it to our people...

This was one of the worst dining experiences of my life. I’ll start with the worst thing, which is that my husband has a food allergy, which I noted when I made my reservation and we alerted the server to as well. Fast forward to our entree coming out, and my husband bites into the pizza and the ingredient that he is allergic to (which was not even listed as an ingredient on the item’s description) was part of the dish. He immediately ran out of the restaurant and to CVS to grab Benadryl. He is not anaphylactic thank goodness and Benadryl helped once he got it. But obviously this is completely inexcusable.

If you’re not worried about food allergies, I still would not recommend this place. We’ve actually dined here twice before and the food was out of this world. That’s why we chose this restaurant for my birthday dinner. However, from the moment we arrived, it was a poor experience. The restaurant is very clear about giving guests 15 min to arrive and no more, so we were very careful to arrive right on time for our reservation. We ended up waiting more than 20 min past our reservation time to be seated.

Once we were seated, we decided to order a nice bottle of wine for my birthday. After 15 min of waiting, the server finally told us the sommelier would need to come and speak with us. After another 15 min he finally came to our table (at this point we had 3/4 of our food) and he told us they were out of that wine. If we would have known this 5 after ordering, we would have ordered something else, but at this point our meal was mostly over so we didn’t order anything to drink.

When it comes to the food, we ordered the grilled strawberry salad, which was okay but cloyingly sweet. We also ordered the baked ricotta which was more like a pizza dip from a bar with bread that was hard and flavorless. We also got the zucchini fries, and those were quite good.

I also wanted to mention that we had our food for 20 min and our server never came to check in and see how everything came out etc. once she took our order and returned to tell us the sommelier needed to speak to us, we never saw her again.

Perhaps we just had bad luck after bad luck, because the restaurant was packed and again we’ve had a positive experience in the past. I just don’t want anyone else dining here for a special occasion and being completely disappointed. Hopefully this was just a...

Wow, what a treat. Loring Place is the perfect balance between modernism, comfort, progressiveness, and homely, all at the same time. This seemingly impossible yet perfect balance can only be felt, starting from the interior and the decor, to the server interaction, all the way down to the focused yet sophisticated menu. Loring Place oozes of modern-day charm. Not snooty. But classy. Not awkward. But familiar.

The food is an Californian / American cuisine where you have a mixture of great appetizer concoctions, fabulous salads, creative pizzas, and a solid variety of main course. There is no theme other than probably what came to the chef's mind. The Fall Seasonal menu had a generous mix of butternut squash and chili infused into many of its dishes. Again, no dish was simply mainstream but also not overly complicated. And each one of them definitely had a perspective. The chef doesn't just play it safe, but rather chooses to test you if you dare. And you are handsomely rewarded for it. The list of ingredients may raise your eyebrows but soon all is understood as you spread the flavors in your mouth.

Pretty much everything was phenomenal. The ricotta cheese with butternut squash was wonderful and paired amazingly with the sour dough bread. The salad was rock solid and this slice of chili really added a welcome twist. The Date pizza was such a joy while the short ribs was soft and succulent. All the dishes were absolutely made with care, just like the decor, just like the service.

Loring Place is a joyful place. It's not boring, yet it wants to be subdued for all the right reasons. This is a place where you can come over and over again, knowing you'll have a good time, but not worry about the superficiality of trying to be fancy.

Everything is right...