Aldea

Though we're generally fans of Restaurant Week (recently extended through Labor Day), sometimes it bites us in the pocketbook. Case in point: a recent lunch at Aldea, in Union Square, where not a single item on the prix fixe appealed to us. (Note to selves: do research before making the reservation.)

The regular menu, on the other hand, had charm to spare, putting polish and refinement on seasonal Portuguese and Spanish flavors. So did the small dining area, a cool bastion of silvers, blues, and grays, with an open stainless steel kitchen and lovely glass sculpture affixed to the ceiling. It's a place that invites lingering.

First up, jamon serrano. Like Frank Bruni, we felt OK not going for the really pricey jamon Iberico, as we've had it at the source. Our second appetizer was a cheese plate. A nervous food runner meant we didn't catch any names. They ranged from a very soft to a moderately soft, all quite delicate, especially when spread with a little quince paste atop a morsel of walnut raisin bread. Alternating bites of the melt-in-our-mouths meat with the cool buttery cheese made us feel as if we were on a picnic.

The entrees were extraordinary. We watched, rapt, as the chefs, including George Mendes, fastidiously dolled out squirts of olive oil and pinches of salt. The scallops, with a tight sear, were very nicely cooked on the inside, which isn't often the case. Each had a sliver of orange, and all three rested on a warm farro-and-cucumber salad. The dish required precision, certainly to make but also to eat. This was a good thing, since more time getting a sliver of every component on the fork meant more time savoring the result.

But the star, by far, was the arroz de pato, a melange of textures --- crispy duck skin, chewy duck meat, spicy chorizo, plump rice. A swipe of apricot puree felt a bit out of place, both in terms of presentation (it was too thick to be swiped) and taste (there simply wasn't enough of it to compliment or contrast with the rest of the dish). Oh, we quibble. Frankly, this dish has us checking on flights to Lisbon.

Dessert consisted of extremely sugary bits of barely cooked dough, with an array of dipping sauces. They're called "sonhos," or little dreams. Our subconscious could do worse than to revisit these, or the rest of this lunch, every night.
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