THE $29 second coming of the city’s best $38 crab cake. Fabled scallop ravioli that’s just like the same dish at Paris’ Lucas Carton — only for $12. In what alternative culinary universe can this be true?
At the odd but compelling collaboration that is Ed’s Chowder House.
This is one of those new restaurants that certain pompous critics won’t get. Its menu breaks no new ground. There’s no “concept” other than that it “brings East Coast-style seafood to the Big Apple,” as the publicity material states.
But it makes the work of seafood wizard Ed Brown available at prices more reasonable than ever before. It brings all-American flair to Lincoln Square’s ethnic gumbo of Bar Boulud, Cafe Fiorello and Shun Lee West.
It fills what was for most of eight years a dark hole in the Empire Hotel — and it gives owner Jeffrey Chodorow, who’d become something of a punch line, a new lease on life.
In recent years, China Grill creator Chodorow has had more flops than Steve Phillips had floozies. There were doomed collaborations with Alain Ducasse and Rocco DiSpirito, laugh-riot duds like Kobe Club — and CenterCut, the short-lived steakhouse that preceded Ed’s Chowder House at the Empire.
Ed’s breaks the losing streak. It has more customers some nights than CenterCut saw in a week. Whether it has legs depends on whether Chodorow and Brown — who runs the pricier, Michelin-starred Eighty-One on West 81st Street — continue to click.
The menu describes Brown not as “executive” or “consulting” chef but as “collaborator,” a role somewhere in between. He devised the menu, set executive chef Jamie Knott’s kitchen on its way and helps keep the ship on course despite his limited management role.
Chodorow smartly lightened up the L-shaped dining room. A long wall mirror reflects street lamps outside. Pale green banquettes replaced dark red ones, and fishing boat photos cast out steakhouse ghosts.
For Brown’s most creative work, head to Eighty-One. But Ed’s Chowder House delivers on its promise of “serious local seafood in a casual setting” — a commodity long missing in the neighborhood. Its unpretentious pleasures go far beyond grilled Maine lobster for a remarkably modest $18 a pound.
Brown ran Rock Center’s Sea Grill for 12 years. That place’s best dish was (and still is) the crab cake he created — nearly 100 percent, lump crab meat bound under a sprinkle of corn- flake crumbs by smoke, mirrors and a touch of egg yolk. Ed’s uses a tartar-like sauce in place of mustard sauce, but the recipe is otherwise the same and the result every bit as winning.
On the other hand, potato chip-crusted Chatham cod ($24) is new. Broken Cape Cod Kettle chips cracklingly complement the delicate fish. Other fine entrees are “simple mains” ($18-$25) grilled a la plancha in olive oil, especially “tuna frittes,” a filet mignon-proportioned cut miraculously moist throughout with seasoned fries; buttery-textured blackfish without butter; and sea scallops rich with mineral flavor.
Not to miss is a generous sample of three chowders for just $12. One, sweet corn chowder, is so rich, it’s hard to believe it’s made entirely from blender-puréed corn. A number called “Ed’s loaded shellfish” is a meal in a cast-iron cauldron for $15 — New England chowder crammed with shrimp, crabmeat, scallops and lobster.
I didn’t have a single clinker. But some dishes were in the “are what they are” class — including ordinary smoked cod cakes, cured/smoked salmon and disappointingly dull striped bass. Desserts are unspectacular.
Many fish joints are expensive (Oceana and Le Bernardin), too esoteric for some (Esca and Milos), or cramped and noisy (Pearl Oyster Bar). Ed’s Chowder House avoids their liabilities without sacrificing enough imagination to be interesting. Keep it up, Jeffrey and Ed — and pay no attention to the whiners.
scuozzo@nypost.com