Review: 732 Social

Creme de Caramel. (Credit: Kylene Lloyd)

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Every puzzle addict recognizes that surging of emotion when despair yields to elation. It comes when you scribble a letter in the corner grid and solve an entire crossword in one fell swoop, when you slip a piece into a jigsaw puzzle and instantly visualize the rest of the picture, when you suddenly comprehend the import of that pawn on the sixth rank and visualize a 5 move combination leading to checkmate.

I felt that same surge the first time (and the second time, come to think of it) I stepped into 732 Social. It's been a bleak year for the gallery district east of downtown, what with last winter's demise of four fine restaurants - Primo, Park Place, Browning's, Melillo's. But 732, founded by Steven and Michael Ton (Basa Modern Vietnamese) and talented chef Jayson Lewellyn (Jeff Ruby's) pulses with a distinctive, transformative energy that feels like the beginning of a new era

Everything about the place is perfectly attuned to an artsy neighborhood populated by loft-dwelling urban pioneers: the environmentally sustainable ethos that guides The Green Building's design features, the recycled barn siding that cloaks the dining room in modern rusticity; the noisy, communal atmosphere that has you sharing food with your tablemates and rubbing elbows and ideas with the folks at the next table over; the smart, enthusiastic servers who seem ever-present but never obtrusive.

And then there's the food. The menu is a concise list of small and large plates that lean heavily on French techniques and, to the greatest practical extent, local ingredients. Smoked and cured meats, mostly house-made, are brilliant – smoky slices of Saucisse de Morteau; salt-cured Kentucky ham with a depth of flavor that matches the best artisanal meats this state can produce; intense slices of bresaola made from Angus beef; and Tasso, Cajun-inflected cayenne-rubbed pork with a sharp flavor and exquisite texture (a charcuterie platter for 2 diners, $10; for 4, $15; for 6, $25).

. There are fewer than 20 items on the menu – plenty enough to keep the chefs in the open kitchen hopping on a busy night. But never mind the length of the menu: on the quality spectrum, these dishes range from sublime to… well, to sublimer.

Brussels sprouts, as tender, crisp, and green as spring itself, are simmered in wine and vegetable stock, seared to a golden, caramelized finish, and served with apple confit and candied black walnuts, all bound together in an exquisite translucent brown pan sauce ($11). Another small plate is a masterful dissertation on chicken liver: a deftly fried chicken liver is straight from the Southern kitchen, but it rests on a cylinder of chicken liver flan so airy and subtle that it could be the very disembodiment of organ meat, and a spicy tomato sauce flecked with tender brown lentils is the perfect liquid complement to the whole affair ($11). Mussels, served in a cast iron pot filled with a simmering bath of garlic, fennel, and white wine, were the finest I've ever tasted – the flavor of the sauce penetrating every plump, sensuous morsel ($11).

Beverage connoisseurs will find plenty to celebrate at 732 Social: the beer list is rich in artisanal options; the wine list reflects organic and sustainable vinicultural practices (a server-suggested bottle of Mas de Gourgonnier, a blended red from Provence, $32, was perfect with our dinner). And the cocktail list hearkens back to America's pre-Prohibition past. It's ideal to sit at the bar, where you can watch the bartenders employ medicine droppers and exotic bottles of rare vermouths and bitters as they assemble vintage drinks like the Hanky Panky (circa 1920, Tanqueray, sweet vermouth, Fernet Branca, and a strip of orange peel) or the Corpse Reviver (circa 1925, both $9). But even if you don't sit at the bar, it won't take long to detect that these are special cocktails indeed, carefully made by a crew of cocktail nerds who'll happily chat with you for hours about the evolution of gin.

Sharing dishes is encouraged by the staff – and a great way to indulge in lots of playful flavors and textures. It requires a true generosity to share classic steak frites sprinkled with blue cheese ($20) or a slab of roasted halibut covered in a charred, crusty surface that breaks apart to reveal flesh as white and juicy as the inside of a snowball – but it can be done.

And though I've eaten an entire slice of pastry chef Prescott Sullivan's Red Velvet cake, it did cross my mind once or twice that I really ought to share it. I've never before seen one that looked like actual red velvet, but the flesh of this four-layer cake looked as if it could have been tailored to create a smoking jacket for a Victorian gent, and the layers of chocolate icing tasted like memories of a happy childhood ($7).

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