The Taqueria Goes Upscale

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The New York Sun

At Sueños, in Chelsea, chef Sue Torres brought a creative, upscale excitement to Mexican cooking that was scarce in the city. It still is, although the restaurant’s opening in 2003 helped turn local attention to the wonderful potential of the cuisine. So you’d think the last thing the city needs is a high-priced taqueria offering little of that sort of creativity. But that’s exactly what Ms. Torres’s latest project is.

Los Dados, deep in the meatpacking district, feels like a botched attempt at slumming it. The restaurant evokes a casual taqueria feel with loud Latin music, plain white china, and squeeze bottles of salsa on the tables. But other factors deny the illusion: elaborate art on the walls, a cool once-over from the sheath-dressed hostess, an $18 order of tacos. This is a pseudo-taqueria, with posh trappings and food that’s simpler than Sueños’s but more elaborate than the drippy, foil-wrapped delights that staffers at my local hole-in-the-wall hand over the counter for $2 apiece. It would be a fine thing if the food benefited from that complexity, but that isn’t always the case here. A starter of tiny tuna tostadas ($11) sees thin, rare slices of the fish crusted in coriander — a classic Torres touch — and laid with avocado on tortilla crisps, for a delicate, somewhat Asian treat. And a stuffed gordita, a rich loaf made from sweet plantains, stuffed with white, mozzarella-like Oaxaca cheese, and served in a pool of chipotle sauce, is completely delicious ($7). But panuchos ($9) — a word not included in the Mexican glossary on the back of the menu — are unimpressive, shreds of mildly seasoned pork laid on bland corn cakes. The pink pickled onions on top are a high point; but they showed up on the gordita and a salad as well.

Ms. Torres does know her way around a taco. Each one is simply composed of a couple of good ingredients, with no pretension of elegance. Strips of marinated and roasted pork al pastor ($14 for a pair of tacos) are a more-than-serviceable version of the taqueria stalwart, served with juicy pineapple salsa in sizable tortillas. The lamb barbacoa ($16 for two) is better, deeply flavored and accented with radish and chilies. It’s tempting to just order these substantial tacos and call it a day. That’s a better move than continuing on to the cod tacos ($18), a trio of smaller ones on chili-flavored tortillas, containing pale fish, which the menu calls “coconut-infused” but which just tastes bland.

The staff has clearly been trained to wipe down the table after every course, which is a boon after messy, hand-held tacos. The training skimps on details of the cuisine, though — when I had questions that the menu’s glossary couldn’t answer, the waiter certainly couldn’t either.

Main courses also have a stripped-down aesthetic. At Sueños, shrimps are flambéed with tequila and piled high with avocado, beans, and pineapple; at Los Dados, they’re grilled and lie flat on an ungarnished plate, surrounding a plain pork-stuffed tamale in a pool of mild chili sauce ($18). A hanger steak ($19) is even less interesting. The one I ordered showed up considerably rarer than requested, absent of the promised tamarind glaze (unless that was lost in the charring) and with an insipid salad of cactus leaves that had evidently lost their crispness in a marinade of some sort. A salty, earthy lentil cake ($14), heaped with a slaw-like concoction of shredded vegetables and strips of tortilla, is a deviation from the menu’s meaty mainstream, and it may be the most flavorful of the main courses.

The appearance of baked Brie ($8) among the desserts is a surprise; it’s rich and runny, and topped with a citrus-tinged mortar of sugar and slivered almonds. Other desserts are more traditional: hot fried churros ($7) with chocolate and caramel dipping sauces; crepes ($8) filled with cajeta, the goat-milk version of dulce de leche; and profiteroles ($10) ludicrously overstuffed with pistachio ice cream and drizzled with a very effective spicy, sticky chocolate sauce.

Half a dozen specialty margaritas — cucumber, hibiscus-blueberry, orange blossom —differ from each other just enough to inspire curiosity, but not enough to provide any real thrills.

Los Dados never missteps severely, but it’s a disappointment after Sueños. When I want casual, hearty Mexican standards, I know a few spots I like, and none of them have cloth napkins. I expect a $100 dinner to be in a fundamentally different tier than a $10 one. Los Dados combines elements of low- and high-end dining, but inconsistently, without the best of either.

Los Dados (73 Gansevoort St. at Washington Street, 646-810-7290).


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