Má Pêche, 15 West 56th Street, New York (00 1 212 757 5878). Meal for two, including wine and service £140
New Yorkers like to think their restaurants are better than those in London. Actually they like to think everything in New York is better than in London. Except for the taxis. They might just give us those. But in the matter of dinner they are certain: they have more and better of everything. This is profoundly irritating, not least because it just might be true. What's more, millions of us flock there every year to find out. More of you are likely to make a special trip to Manhattan to eat than you are to, say, Birmingham where I was reviewing last week.
One of the chefs whose food you might want to try is David Chang, a Korean-American, who is hot in a very New York, Ow!-My-fingers-are-burning, sort of way. Chang made his name on the back of soft buns filled with roast pork belly. My kind of guy. His informal Asiatic restaurants – Momofuku, and its siblings the Ssäm Bar and Ko – are held up as a very particular kind of hip. There are lots of communal tables and counter-eating opportunities; steamy bowls of ramen full of big deep stocks and great bits of seafood. I have eaten his food and it's great. Whether it really does declare war on thick-linened, high-end dining, as some have claimed, is a moot point. Last year one of his establishments popped up in the world's 50 best restaurants. I've no idea what it was doing there.
Now he has a place in Midtown Manhattan called Má Pêche, and it represents all the vices and virtues of New York Dining. There is no doubt that, were this in London, at this price point, the whole experience would be ramrod stiff and formal. The design of the room is spectacular in an understated way that we don't do well. On the upper floor is a bar. The back of this area is a big curve, a kind of lip jutting out over a vault at the bottom of which is the restaurant. The walls look like a stage set hung with huge flat golden drapes. It's dramatic without being contrived.
And so to the vices, which become obvious once you get below. It is horribly self-aware of its coolness. The waiters do the tiresomely chummy "and may I introduce to you the specials" thing. Where it sticks to the Asian agenda the food can be great, as in a salad of king crab with apple and puffed rice, or better still another of baby squid, splashed with fish sauce and peanuts and lots of green herbs, Vietnamese style. A side dish of crunchy, shredded Brussels sprouts with spring onions and chilli vinaigrette is a revelation. I now really like Brussels sprouts. We also enjoyed a tranche of cod with leeks and coconut in a shellfish ginger broth. There is a bottle of terrific chilli sauce on every table which gave everything a nudge, including me.
But there are also European dishes on this menu and they are duds. A plate of snails meant to be taking its cue from Burgundy, turns up with a length of pork sausage that's a waste of dead pig. There's a sticky jus which would be better used to varnish tables and a tarragon mustard with no power or kick. Worse still is their steak frites – every New York menu has to have one – flabby beef with chunky, squared-off lifeless chips.
And then to dessert. Oh hang on. They don't do dessert. As their waiter says "we prefer to spotlight artisan cheeses". Really? Do you? Why? Courtesy of a rule banning all unpasteurised cheeses unless over 90 days old, America is where cheese goes to die. What's weirder is that, as you enter Má Pêche, there is a huge dessert bar, bulging with cakes and cookies. But it's only for take away. You're not allowed to order from it in the restaurant. I have to beg our waitress to slip us some cookies and she agrees, though with little enthusiasm. This is very silly. It's very irritating. And utterly New York.
Email Jay at jay.rayner@observer.co.uk or visit theguardian.com/profile/jayrayner for all his reviews in one place
