4-10 pm or so nightly. $$$ Expensive.
[NEW AMERICAN] If Metrovino is brought up in conversation, more than likely the focus of the discussion will be about the restaurant’s Enomatic wine-dispensing system—which offers single pours from fantastically expensive bottles—and tasting flights rather than its food. This is a shame, since the kitchen here punches well above what would be considered the weight class of a wine bar. The food is taken just as seriously as the wine, and it shows. Anybody should be able to put together an arugula salad, but getting the balance of bitter, peppery greens, tart lemon vinaigrette and blue cheese right takes skill, well evidenced here. A special of a salmon tartare is butter in fish form, accompanied by wax beans in a crispy tempura batter. If someone is talking up Metrovino’s food lately, it’s usually about the cheeseburger, which is admittedly awesome. (And messy—as charming as the board that it’s served on is, some concave vessel to catch the torrent of juice would be greatly appreciated.) The rest of the menu, however, should not be overlooked. BRIAN PANGANIBAN.
Ideal meal: Anything with seasonal seafood; arugula salad; a flight of wine.
Best deal: A single-patty happy-hour version of the cheeseburger (available 4-6 pm Monday-Friday) is $8.
Chef’s choice: “My favorite thing to eat on the menu at Metrovino right now is a combo of two appetizers. The first item is the Roman-style beef tripe stew with tomato, mint and pecorino. The second is our grilled broccolini with crispy poached egg and anchovy-brown butter vinaigrette. When I eat this I end up scooping the tripe on top of the broccolini and then breaking the egg on top of the tripe and letting the egg yolk mingle into the stew.” (Greg Denton)