If you’re at the bar or in the main dining room just beyond, you might miss the kitchen’s wood-fired oven. It’s used to cook, among other things, “Borgo focaccia,” which is not the tall, bubbly slab you might imagine but an unassuming disc of bronze-blistered flatbread that, like an Italian quesadilla, hides a layer of nutty and melting. robiola and Fontina cheeses. Smoke from the oven permeates the flaming orange flesh of tiny sweet beets piled in a quasi-salad atop a drizzle of garlicky mashed potatoes. Its warmth caresses a skewer of melting marshmallow sweetbreads that shine under a sticky demi-glace. It crisps the skin of a whole branzino, served without the bones but with the head still on, next to a pile of Sicilian greens with sweet onions and pine nuts scented with the ferric kiss of saffron.

None of this is exactly revolutionary, but I don’t think that’s the intention. Tarlow and his chef Jordan Frosolone seem to focus instead on precision: food is exciting not for its novelty but for its proximity to perfection. Chicken liver mousse, another Tarlow classic (his restaurants were instrumental in the dish’s return from gourmet Siberia), is here slathered vigorously on flame-blackened toast and adorned with slivers of candied fig . Order it with the wood-fired browned-skinned half-chicken and, were it not for the serene sophistication of the room around you, you might as well be in the twilight back room of Marlow & Sons around two thousand oh. -something, hotly debate with your date whether it’s really Narciso Rodriguez at the next table. A starter of radishes and turnips bagna caudapresented not in the familiar way, like crudités with a dip, but – surprisingly, deliciously – with the little root vegetables halved and carved into finger-sized clumps, in which the warm, rich anchovies bagna cauda was paid. I haven’t had this much fun with a raw root vegetable entrée since NoMad Restaurant (RIP) blew up the appetizer game with a plate of radishes coated, like chocolate-covered strawberries, in tempered butter .

There are a few pastas on the menu – fettuccine in an extremely rich guinea fowl ragù, baked cannelloni with braised beef cheeks – but, unlike other fine Italian-inspired restaurants, these are more like technical obligations than technical obligations. culinary masterpieces. And, unusually for pasta, Borgo’s portions seem a little large, especially given their powerful flavors. A pile of precisely stamped ravioli, filled with Jerusalem artichoke and mushrooms, is, at first bite, a thrilling explosion of mycological umami, but by the time I get to the bottom of the plate, I’ve had the impression that the message had been somewhat exaggerated. The desserts, overseen by pastry chef Adam Marca, are gracefully simple: a nutty riff on affogato, with the espresso poured into a soft cushion of pistachio gelato; a bittersweet burst of melting Sachertorte (Tarlow’s grandfather is Viennese), dressed with jewels of candied apricots.

The room, like the food, is sophisticated without trying too hard. It’s decorated in shades of wood and white, with gently curved ceilings (a little cave, a little nautical) and walls dotted with interesting, mismatched artwork. When I asked a waiter about a painting I particularly liked – a Cézanne-style still life of fruit – Tarlow, who was making the rounds, appeared at the table to proudly inform us that it had been painted by his daughter and he was hooked. directly across the wall, back to back, based on an abstract work by Tarlow himself. A double-sided fireplace connects the two dining rooms, a remnant of the Italian restaurant that previously occupied the space. (A waiter told me they hadn’t yet figured out how to light it without overheating the space or tinging the air with a smoky haze.) The ambiance and menu not only evoke Tarlow, but a certain kind of cozy atmosphere. , a sophisticated Italian restaurant, chic but not complicated, from a slightly earlier era in Manhattan: the crackling fire of Beppe, perhaps, or the homey idiosyncrasy of Cesca of the Upper West Side. Tablecloths, a nice selection of cheeses, a little grandeur, never snobbish. Is it too early to be nostalgic for twenty years ago? Maybe I’m getting old too. Maybe Manhattan is worth the detour.