Petite Crevette — Restaurant in New York

Good ambiance, mediocre food, verbally abusive owner. Researched this place in advance, and, after being spoiled by the excellent seafood at "Kevin's" in Red Hook, came all the way from southern Brooklyn, expecting a similar high quality food and service. Found the food to be ok, the owner - verbally abusive (read to the end for the crazy lol).

Cioppino. It was so so, scallops and shrimp in the soup were good, muscles - ok, the lobster tail in the soup was mushy and smelly. The soup base / broth was fine, slightly saltier and heavier, compared to what we had at "Kevin's".

Seafood chowder - it was ok, not as thick and chunky as I like. It had a little too much broth and not enough of seafood / vegetables for my taste.

Organic Greens with heirloom tomatoes - fine, a little heavy on the balsamic vinegar, which overpowered the taste of heirloom tomatoes.

Grilled Swordfish special - ok, kind of small for $25+, somewhat hard (over-grilled) and not juicy.

Now for the crazy part. The half lobster tail in the cioppino was marginally spoiled - the tail meat was mushy and had a strong taste. Look, this happens, so we discreetly gave that feedback to the waitress (didn't want another customer to get the other half of that lobster tail). So she calls what I assume is the owner (an older man), who comes and loudly proclaims - "so, I hear that you want more lobster?". We said, no thanks. He declares, "I am going to give you more lobster anyway". I go "no, the lobster is not fresh, and I don't want it" lol, so the guy disappears, then comes back and drops a live lobster on our table, yelling "is that fresh enough for you"? Then he yells again, so everyone can hear - there will be no charge for the dinner. We said - that's ok, we are not looking for a discount, he yells back "no charge anyway, that's not the kind of restaurant we run!".

So I ran across the street to get cash, and meanwhile, the owner tells my wife, who is still sitting at the table - "yeah, sure, keep checking your phone all you want, you are getting a free meal here". We paid in full and left.

A simple lesson for the owner- when a guest cares enough to discreetly give you honest feedback, don't be a d**k, keep your ego in check and don't cause a scene. We could have had a nice evening, even with the ok food, and you caused a loud confrontation and a negative review on Yelp. Next time for us, back to "Kevin's" on Van Brundt, for a nice service, far better chioppino and a really sophisticated seared tuna sandwich. (All this happened in the...

My wife and I had an early dinner here and very much enjoyed our experience. The place is unique to say the least, and has a very old school vibe. There is limited seating, and it does seem to fill up quickly. The service was very friendly and very attentive. Also, it is BYOB which is very nice and keeps the cost of a dinner down.

That being said there were a few downsides. First, even though they do not sell alcohol and the only option is byob, there is still a $5 corkage fee. This seems like a somewhat gratuitous charge. Second, and this is a pretty big deal for me, the place is cash only. I might accept a cash only policy at a coffee shop, or even a dive bar, but Petite Crevette is a not inexpensive restaurant. It is quite easy for two people to spend upwards of $100 on dinner. What year are we in that a restaurant does not accept a credit card? When you are spending this much at a place, that is kind of a deal breaker for me. Finally, while the food was good, it was not great. Everything we had was solid and well cooked, but not particularly impressive.

Ultimately I think the byob and old school feel are the most attractive parts of Petite Crevette, but for the price I feel like we've had much better meals at other places, and the cash only policy is a...

This old time seafood restaurant was excellent. The food was well prepared and tasty, and the ambiance, staff and customers had a legitimate local feel. It's in a strange location where you wouldn't expect a business there - over and by a highway - but had clients the whole time we were there (regulars or returning customers I believe). The menu was tight with a moderate amount of very good options. We had a sea bass with curry which was perfectly thick and tasty and a skate filet with vegetables, following an Italian-style appetizer of tomatoes, salad and mozzarella. The only reason I'm marking it down as a 4/5 instead of 5/5 is that the space could use some improvement in lighting, it was a bit dark inside, almost like a pub. But the food and service were great and we will definitely return. The staff was very friendly and caring and accommodated us bringing a baby along despite the small amount of...