Press
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A modern take on old Jewish standbys in a plush, modern setting.
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For anybody who grew up Jewish in the tristate area or, perhaps, went to summer camp up in the Catskills, the name Kutsher’s holds a lot of resonance.
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Its goal is to make Jewish cooking graceful; there’s a “borscht salad” of beets and goat cheese accompanied by fingerling potatoes and artichokes, and airy knishes laced with house-cured pastrami.
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Zach Kutsher, with partners including Jeffrey Chodorow, has opened a restaurant paying homage to the famous Catskill resort his family owned. Angular blond-wood panels reflect the décor of the 1950s and ’60s. The chef, Mark Spangenthal, is adapting authentic Kutsher dishes, including gefilte fish made with halibut and served with a beet and horseradish tartare, and a lightened version of kasha varnishkes (with bow-tie noodles) made with quinoa.
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Kutsher’s has to appeal to both those who crave nostalgia and those who don’t.
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A little farther uptown you’ll find a newcomer restaurant with nostalgic ties to New York’s Jewish past. Kutsher’s Tribeca, which opened in November at 186 Franklin St., is the brainchild of Zach Kutsher, whose grandparents ran Kutsher’s Country Club, a popular Catskills resort in its mid-20th century heyday. The menu reinvents and updates favorite Jewish comfort foods, offering savory brisket meatballs, chopped liver made from duck, and yummy matzo ball soup with dill.