Agree with cwdonald on this one. With a 2 year old in tow and the provision that it not be upscale, Dilly's is a natural choice. You'll find both New Hope and Lambertville crowded (although the weather promises to be iffy), so I might avoid them. On the outskirts of New Hope is Jamie Hollander's, a gourmet food shop that has table seating, makes great sandwiches and pizzas and has plenty of parking. I'd go with Dilly's, if you're going to Stockton Market.

Here's the new menu:

http://www.atthepass.com/menu.html

I'm liking what I see: a new menu every week and a variety of offerings to appeal to meat eaters, pescaterians and even a veggie choice or two.

Think about a fine unfiltered sake, as well.

No corkage fee for Nossa Messa dinners. Get crazy at your local wine merchant!

Bring some good wine and don't be afraid to be seated at a table with total strangers. By the second course, you'll have new friends. Besides David's great meal, the interaction with fellow diners is what makes these dinners so enjoyable.

Certainly worth a visit. I'm always reluctant to pass judgement on restaurants that are newly-opened, but The Pass did not suffer from any of the post-opening jitters some restaurants experience. Although the fluke didn't excite us, the remainder of the meal did and I'm still having memories of those shrimp chips, the mackerel and the polenta.

Hope your spring and summer will also permit you visits to D'floret in Lambertville and, if you're willing to drive a bit farther afield, Maize, in Perkasie (Bucks Co.).

We paid our first visit to The Pass this past weekend. It certainly shows promise as being a valuable addition to the Hunterdon-Bucks dining scene, a scene that has shown great strength with the addition of several new venues in the past year.

Located in Rosemont at the site of the (legendary) Cafe at Rosemont, The Pass retains much of the appearance of the Cafe, including the bookshelves lining the walls, the vintage lighting fixtures and the basic design of the cafe (enter through front or rear, kitchen and rest room in their same, familiar, locations, tables in basically the same distribution in the dining room as those of the Cafe.

The Pass features a three-course prix-fixe menu, priced at $38.50. The menu appears to be one that will change with the market. Since its May 1 opening, the menu features choices of one seafood starter or four meat starters. Similarly, the main courses include choices of one fish or two meats.

The service is attentive and friendly. At any given time, there are three servers on the floor. In addition, one sous-chef was seen delivering plates to several tables. So, a server is never more than a nod of a head or a wave away. The servers take a team approach: any one of the three will attend to your needs or deliver plates.

The meal started with a real treat, a feature I bet will become a signature for the Pass: a bowl of puffed rice-shrimp chips with an herb mixture sprinkled on top. These are delicious and a pleasing start to the meal.

We both started with the marinated mackerel served with scallion pancakes. This was the highlight of our meal, as the mackerel filets were tender and tasty. The scallion pancakes were not your neighborhood Chinese restaurant variety, but a rice-flour (The Pass makes an extra effort to please gluten-sensitive guests, as well as others with food preference issues) based crepe.

We continued with the Atlantic fluke in a brown butter sauce served alongside a seaweed salad. This was, in our opinion, the only weak link in our meal. Fluke is a very mild fish, demanding a distinctive treatment. Our fluke were just a bit bland for our tastes.

Along with the mains, we received two small dishes "compliments of the kitchen": a warm Romaine salad and a delightful bowl of Castle Valley Mills (Doylestown, PA) polenta. Would like to see the polenta worked into becoming a main course, perhaps topped with shrimp (I'm thinking of a New Orleans-style shrimp and grits).

For dessert, I chose the whiskey tart with honey ice cream. I recently had whiskey bread at a popular Brooklyn restaurant and became a fan. The tart similarly appealed to me. My wife had the rice pudding, which was well-executed.

Tables are close enough together to allow the predictable interaction among guests. Our neighboring diners were enthusiastic about the sweetbreads and the carbonara.
An acquaintance who dined at The Pass the same night as we did told me she was able to request a vegan meal for one of her dining companions.

Several neighboring tables were occupied by wine-savvy diners. A Chateuanueuf-du-Pape and a Chablis Premier Cru accompanied one table's meal, while a Cru Burgundy accompanied another's. (Our meal was paired with a Washington State Viognier and a Sonoma Pinot). It looks as if The Pass is attracting a wine-loving crowd (like so many other Hunterdon and Bucks restaurants, it is BYO).

We were generally pleased with our meal at The Pass and recommend it highly. As the menu changes, we look forward to Chef Matt Ridgway's take on other fish and seafood, but we hope the mackerel becomes a regular part of the menu.

We have a reservation this weekend. Will report back, but will keep in mind they've been open only a few days. Chowhounders should be forgiving about minor glitches at new restaurants.

Had two dozen Naked Cowboys with friends at Ken+Cook, 19 Kenmare St. last evening. They're priced at $1.50, not $1, but they were meaty, briney and substantial. Recommended.

This question has been asked on this board a few times before, so a search should lead you to dozens of answers from others. My preferences: Stone Home Wine Bar, La Caye and Scopella, all located within a three minute walk of BAM. You need to reserve a day or more in advance on evenings of popular performances at BAM. Also, look carefully at curtain time on your tickets, as some events start at 7 or 7:30, necessitating an early seating or a quick supper.

If your visit extends over a Monday evening, attend an installment of Louro's supper club. For those of us who have followed Dave Santos' progress, it's unique and enjoyable.

Thanks for the update. Although I chimed in to this thread a few years back, it had fallen off my radar, as Kaz An Nou had become our go-to place for French(-Caribbean) food. After reading your comments, a return visit is in order.

Always find your input thoughtful. Thanks Bob M.

Here's one more for your list, this one in the FiDi:

http://www.deadrabbitnyc.com/calendar/

looks as if they have $1 oysters M-F, 5-7 PM

If you love seafood prepared elegantly, if you love attentive, yet not intrusive service, if you love an adult dining room where you can actually hear your dining companion, you will love Le Bernardin. I just looked at the menu. It changes often, so many of the dishes are "new" since my last visit in January, yet many are variations on themes established by Ripert years ago. You can close your eyes and point to any dish and be thrilled with what you get. If any uncertainties remain, you can ask your server for his suggestions. I also hope you like wine. Don't hesitate to ask Aldo or any of his somms for a recommendation to fit your budget. On my last visit, I had a Condrieu (a viognier from a very small region of the Rhone) that delightfully complemented my meal.

It's a four-star restaurant, so if you want to fiddle around with the menu, they'll oblige. But why do so? The menu works perfectly as laid out. Just go with it.

With amuses, wine and bread, the prix-fixe will leave you plenty satisfied. I've had the tasting menu twice and left happy, but stuffed.

If this is your first time at Le Bernardin, enjoy. It has survived and retained its stars for two decades for a very good reason. If you over-Chowhound the menu in advance, you're doing yourself a disservice.

After two visits to the Keyport Fishery, I'm crossing the place off my list. Believe me, I very much wanted to love the place: it has risen from the ashes at least once and rebuilt after Sandy destroyed it (if you do go, check out the Sandy high-water line on the column in the center of the place).

The service here is cheerful and quick. However, the food is decidedly mediocre. Is it the tasteless breading mix used on the clam strips, the crab cakes and the fish? Is it the oil used in frying? Is it the fish itself? I'm not going to do any further research. Fish sandwiches and platters are served on soggy white bread (avoid), instead of the much more often used seeded roll. Aside from the texture, there wasn't much in the way of taste to distinguish the various fishes from one another (grouper from tilapia, for example).

Sorry, as I said, I wanted to love the place, but I think I'll search out another Monmouth County fishery to fill my shore-style seafood dinner mojo.

Tell me you don't have a smart phone. Google maps or any other map app will get you there.

@cwdonald: Yikes. Moving to Princeton? That would be a big loss. Given that the New Hope location is pretty close to full on weekends, perhaps they're thinking about opening a second location. Keep us informed if you hear anything more about this news.

Let's just say that I'll continue to buy my crab cakes from Buckingham Valley Seafood in Buckingham. Not sure what I'm reading justifies a trip to Yardley (20-25 minutes).

Of relevance to this thread:

http://africasacountry.com/2013/04/11...

So, this is not a restaurant, but a retail outlet for crab cakes. Before I travel to Yardley, tell me they're fresh and not frozen.

Thinking about a spontaneous visit to the lounge at Le Bernardin.
Items on the lounge menu are in the $16-18 range. I imagine these are "small plates" and wonder how many plates a couple might need to order to feel relatively sated for a pre-theater meal.

The seafood dinner on Monday evening was incredible. And, every seat was taken. Wells' review, highlighting the Monday evening supper club, was the impetus for at least four couples we talked with. If even half the diners who attend the supper club as a result of that review return to dine other nights, David will do quite well.

Agree. David will get over his one-star review, will get strong reviews from other food writers and will continue to do great things at Louro. As others have said, the blogosphere is nearly as powerful as Wells and Louro has an excellent reputation among people who blog about food. I'll continue to go to Louro, to both supper club suppers and regular nights. So will all his other customers.

I'm not sure how this relates to Le Bernardin. It has earned four stars each time it has been reviewed, since Gilbert Le Coze and his sister, Maguy, first opened it in 1986. Although it has changed its decor, its rating has remained at 4 stars.

Great point. You should communicate this to him at some point.

Suffice it to say, he's very discouraged.

I'm truly disappointed. Like so many others, I've followed David's progress from Um Segredo to Louro for nearly two years. There are few, if any, flaws in his cooking. That review, from the headline down to the next-to-last paragraph, read like a two-star. I know David is extremely disappointed, as well.
This is not the first time Pete Wells has withheld a second star, despite finding the cooking two-star worthy.

Kapock? That's a new one by me. Like it, though. It's like a mash-up of kaput and schlock.

After years of being loyal to Pacificana for dim sum, we started to go to East Harbor about a year or so ago. On a Sunday, there can be up to an hour wait at either place, but we just found the quality of offerings and the range of offerings to be a bit better at East Harbor.

We returned yesterday and had what we thought was our finest lunch at East Harbor. For whatever reason, the wait was just five minutes.
In addition to the usual selections of gao (including delicious har gow), bao, congee, lotus-leaf wrapped rice, cakes, buns and sweets, we really enjoyed their salt-baked octopus and their clams in a glutinous soy-based sauce. A sweet roll filled with still-warm black sesame paste was the best sweet item we've ever had at a dim sum lunch.

We were lucky enough to have a server who was learning English, asked us for the English name of several food items, complimented my wife and son and generally made the time spent more pleasant (anglicized, his name is Leo, although I thing his name is more like Li Hua).

East Harbor is a lively place to enjoy dim sum, with large tables filled with both Chinese and American guests. Service is excellent, as is the food.
Dim sum for 6, with more than enough plates for everyone, was $71.