Last week I went for dinner with my friend Alex at Lamia’s Fish Market in East Village. It is NYC Restaurant Week right now, so you get a 3-course dinner for $42 at the participating restaurants. Some deals are better than others, so you need to check the menu offer carefully before you make a reservation, to make sure there is something that you like.
Alex and I quickly agreed that the menu at Lamia’s looked good, and a quick glance through the regular menu revealed that Lamia’s also has very reasonable prices when it isn’t Restaurant Week.
The interior is all maritime, and the restaurant is one of the most beautiful places I have dined at in NYC. You feel like you’re in an enchanted underwater world, floating around with mermaids and octopuses. And talking about octopus, I just had to order the grilled octopus, even though it wasn’t part of the Restaurant Week menu. I love grilled octopus, and the one at Lamia’s was perfectly cooked, with no trace of that rubbery texture that overcooked octopus gets.
The Restaurant Week menu started with House Crudo and oysters, and it was all fresh and delicious. We both had fish & chips as a main course, and it was also tasty, but it’s a rather heavy dish, so I couldn’t finish all of it, as I wanted to make sure I had some space left for dessert.
The Restaurant Week dessert was a hot apple tart with ice cream, which sounded good to me, but Alex had spotted a chocolate crème brûlée on the regular menu, that he just couldn’t get his eyes off, and luckily, after checking with the kitchen, he was allowed to substitute the apple tart for the crème brûlée.
It was a really nice dinner, and it was great to see Alex again. We had lots of stuff to talk about, so I completely forgot that I was going to ask him about his favorite happy hour places in Lower East Side. Alex is an expert, when it comes to happy hour in that area, and I thought it would be nice to share his tips with you, but it will have to wait until next time.
Restaurant Week at Beauty & Essex