Restaurant Review: Crema

Last week my best friend from high school came to NYC for the weekend. She works at ESPN (yeah boys, jealous?) and was working a game at Madison Square Garden in the morning, so me, her and her friend from college all met up to have dinner. Since she was staying near MSG and I work in the flatiron, we made reservations at Crema, a Mexican restaurant on W 17th.


K and J got to the restaurant about an early and sat at the bar and had some margaritas. I arrived about 20 minutes later and had a glass of wine. We had 9 p.m. reservations and we were sat at literally 9:00 on the dot. Now we all know how much I adore restaurants that seat you on time, but when we're there an hour early, I'd think they could have sat us a little before 9:00. BUT I was very happy that we were sat on time.


Obviously the first thing we got was guacamole. We were at a mexican cucina. It's pretty much law that you get guac. And it was a very good rendition, although being the snob that I am, I much prefer when they make the guacamole tableside. But the kitchen is open so that offset the lack of tableside creations. And the place was pretty packed. If someone was making guac tableside, I feel like they would have gotten bumped ALOT. But I still like it better when they do that.

Since it was a Friday during Lent, none of us could eat meat. K got the massive creation that is shown above, called the Plato Vegetarian, or basically the chef's choice of vegetarian items. It came with rice, beans, a salad and two vegetarian enchiladas.

J and I both ordered the "Callo de Hacha con Chile Morita y Mango". I don't speak Spanish though, so translation being dry scallops pan seared in chile morita, sweet corn cake, avocado mousse, mango pico de gallo and chipotle aioli. The scallops were bay scallops when I expected sea, and were a little overcooked and rubbery but the corn cakes were amazing. And the chipotle aioli was also delicious. If I went again would I order it? No. But I didn't hate that it was in front of me and I did some damage to the corn cakes and mango salsa.


All in all, it was a fabulous dinner, but much of that was the company I was in. Sometimes you leave dinners thinking OMG that was a great dinner, the food was so good. This time I left thinking that was a great dinner, I had so much fun...what did I eat again?


With that in mind...Crema is a great option since I work about 8 blocks away. I'd go back again. If I suddenly switched jobs and didnt work so close would I ever go to it again? Absolutely not. In fact, I probably wouldnt even remember it was there...


If you want to try your hand at some crema, which is a Mexican fresh cream, head over to 111 W 17th St, between sixth and seventh aves, and find it online at cremarestaurante.com.