SHMONÉ — Restaurant in New York

I chose Shmone for a catch-up dinner with my friend — we both enjoy discovering new places and tasting something special. It turned out that many of our acquaintances know the owner and love coming here, which made us even more curious. We were recommended several dishes, one of which was on the current seasonal menu.

Before our visit, we read up on the place and were inspired by the Michelin Guide review and the fact that the restaurant has one star. The Google rating was just 4.2, but we didn’t pay much attention to that. Spoiler: we probably should have — many of the comments turned out to be true.

I arrived about 15 minutes early. Since the restaurant is quite small and they were having an internal meeting, I was asked to wait next door at a wine bar. As I don’t drink wine, I decided to take a short walk instead. While I understand the logistical reasons behind it, I believe a guest could have been seated already — or at the very least, offered a glass of water.

The Service: There seemed to be a lot of them — constantly buzzing around like fruit flies, which created a sense of chaos. Unfortunately, this didn’t translate into attentive or thoughtful service. Dishes weren’t introduced, plates were only changed upon request, and staff tried to take away half-eaten food simply because the next course was ready. They either missed empty glasses entirely or hovered too obviously. At one point, the chef told to the guests at the next table, that she drinks wine almost daily at work. Some earlier reviewers mentioned that the team seems to be drinking on the job — and frankly, it does show. That’s rarely a good sign.

The Food: Ideally, this section should have come first — but there’s not much to say. When we asked for recommendations, almost 90% of the menu was suggested, which felt a bit excessive. We picked a few dishes, but when we left the restaurant, we realized we couldn’t remember a single one. Nothing stood out as particularly flavorful or interesting. Most items were overly salted — like the tuna, for example. One salad, described on the menu as containing “whatever the chef found at the market,” turned out to be cherries, a mountain of garlic, and tarragon. The garlic was overpowering, making it hard to taste anything afterward. We ordered wine just to reset our palates.

The shrimp were okay, and the sauce came with some bread — which, frankly, was the tastiest part of the meal. That’s always telling. The kebab? You could get a much better version at Miznon for a third of the price. Over-seasoned, overly garlicky —and this is coming from a die-hard garlic fan.

As for dessert: not bad, but nothing memorable. The tres leches was certainly better than everything that came before it, but that’s not saying much.

There were no complex techniques or intriguing ingredients in any of the dishes—nothing that would typically justify a Michelin star. The prices felt steep for the quality of the ingredients and execution.

In conclusion, perhaps things have changed with the arrival of a new chef. We’ll see what happens to the star at the next review cycle. For now, I wouldn’t recommend this place to any of my friends—and I honestly don’t see a...

We were beyond excited to celebrate our anniversary dinner at Shmone and that quickly changed after a roach crawled up to us on the wall in the middle of our dinner. Thankfully we were speaking to our server so she quickly got someone and they moved us to another table jammed behind a larger party. We asked to be moved to the back of the restaurant and they obliged. I do want to share that our food that we were eating as this all happened was not replaced but brought over to us at a different table. This felt like a big missed opportunity to share they could offer us fresh leeks. They did replace our sparkling water though......

From this point on our server never said she would no longer be our server but the two people who maybe were management helped us out. They were kind & tried to comfort us but as someone who has a phobia of bugs I cannot overlook a roach walking around the dining room. I would have liked to leave right then and there but we had food ordered.

One thing that did feel completely unnecessary was one of the woman chalking this roach incident up to just being NYC. I've dined in NYC for ages & have never had this happen. It also felt pretty invalidating of how disgusting this is in the middle of a dinner.

The food was good for the most part & the server was very helpful in answering questions. They comped a cheesecake & replaced our water. They also brought a shot over to my boyfriend. Seems pretty bare minimum given the nature of the situation. We will likely not return due to this unfortunate happening.

Atmosphere was good in the restaurant aside from the obvious. Chairs are comfy & tables are small. The bathrooms smell amazing & are quite clean. The bar seemed to be the place to be. They do jam pack chairs in between tables which is not really fun, but this is a small busy place. The hostess was very sweet & greeted us kindly. She also seated us immediately despite us being a couple mins early. Food comes out pretty quickly one behind another so there isn't much time in between bites but thankfully the plates are small enough to get through.

For $150 this is one, if not, the cheapest meals at a Michelin star restaurant so that aspect can be appealing. I think we also had some higher expectations of what the experience...

We dined at shmone on a Saturday night. So I have really been looking forward to dining at Shmoné. My husband is from Israel and much of our family is still there so even though I am not Israeli, we tend to eat at many of the Israeli restaurants in the city. We especially want to support Israeli businesses right now, so it pains me to say that this experience was disappointing. I do a lot of research before we go to a restaurant. I read the reviews, check out peoples pics on socials etc so what I was expecting is not exactly what we got.

We had a lot of food, well at least a lot of dishes. We had the hamachi, octopus, eggplant steak, artichoke heart, veal cheek, lamb roll, mashed potatoes and short rib. If I ever go back I would just get the meat and mashed potatoes as those were exceptional. I mean that short rib! Wow!

I was most disappointed in the hamachi and octopus which were entirely too small. They looked nothing like in the pics. The hamachi in total was barely one normal size of sashimi. I mean if you blinked you missed it. The octopus did not come with chick peas but was rather covered in lettuce and potatoes and was very well done.

But it wasn’t just the food. We were going for the atmosphere. The fun Israeli atmosphere where it feels like a party and shots are drank throughout the night. We read that the servers would bring shots but the only ones we saw drinking shots was one of the female servers (not ours) and the only drinks we had were the ones we paid for. Don’t waste money on the cocktails. We had the Beirut and even my husband who never complains said it wasn’t good. We were two people and spent over $400. The servers even told us we were ordering a lot and still offered nothing. And it’s not like the restaurant was full. In fact when we left it was half empty. Maybe they got their Michelin star and got lazy? I hope they step back up their game because dishes were delicious. Just everything...