Juliette's Kingdom of Girls

Guacamole appears in brasserie across the street from Williamsburg girdle factory

Comments (0) By Robert Sietsema Tuesday, May 15 2007

It's easy to fall in love with Juliette. A pinched front gives way to a serpentine layout: first an antique bar with tables strewn here and there, then a dimly lit room with walls colored a carnal shade of red, sprouting the usual acid-etched mirrors. Up a few steps lurks a plant-filled solarium, and on the roof discover an open-air bar that offers excellent views of The Girdle Factory across the street—a place that once made foundation garments, but now houses a shopping mall. Oh, Williamsburg! I don't like Juliette's throbbing electro soundtrack much, but I figure that puts me in the minority among patrons swilling colorful cocktails and daintily nibbling appetizers. Maybe because of the name there are lots of well-turned-out girls here, and the earnest boys they bring with them seem like accessories, hanging on their every word.

photo: Willie Davis/Veras

Juliette's star-cross'd lovers

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Juliette

135 N. Fifth St.
Brooklyn, NY 11211

Category: Restaurant > French

Region: Brooklyn

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Details

Juliette
135 North 5th Street
Williamsburg, Brooklyn
718-388-9222

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If a bistro is a small French restaurant offering a short quirky menu with plenty of attitude, and a brasserie is a sprawling establishment with a menu that tries to please everyone, then Juliette is a brasserie. Luckily for us, the food is a notch or two better than it needs to be, on a menu that spits out every French standard you ever heard of. Among the appetizers are saucisson lyonnais ($7.50), oblongs of moist pink sausage fragrant with garlic served on a bed of $2-a-pound creamer potatoes. It comes slicked with a mustard vinaigrette that climbs up your nose, then demurs and crawls back down before you get annoyed. Equally irresistible is brandade de morue ($8), a whip of potatoes and salt cod deposited in a crock radiating the toasts— inadequate in number—needed to scoop it up. The snails in anise butter are fab, and so is the whole steamed artichoke flaunting a festive champagne vinaigrette. The only thing I hated was a Franco-Mexican soup that tasted mainly of chicken breast and celery. Throw in some chiles, dudes!

While it isn't unusual for a brasserie to toss a Basque or Italian dish onto its menu in pursuit of ecumenicism, the Mexican influence is unusual. Here's the explanation: Juliette was spawned by Tartine, a quirky West Village café founded by Bretons that has always depended on Mexican immigrants for its waitstaff and cooks. Tartine's dish called spicy chicken was something of a tribute to them—a pile of chicken tidbits sided with fries and the best guacamole you've ever tasted. Transplanted across the East River, the dish ($16) doesn't fare quite as well, with the boneless chicken aping a lackluster Chinese stir fry. The oniony guacamole still kicks ass, though, and a crisp french fry dipped in it is one of the summer's culinary triumphs.

You'll find plenty to choose from among entrées, including a lamb shank braised to near-dissolution, then planted in a garden plot of al dente seasonal veggies ($18); a doctrinaire duck magret; and a moules frites swimming in coconut-laced curry. But maybe Juliette is a tad too ambitious, because the food—especially the entrées—can be disconcertingly uneven. One evening a hamburger ($12) arrived big, pink, and oozing fluids; a week later it was way overcooked and sided with fries that did a convincing imitation of tinder. Oh, for some guac to dip them in!