To add a touch of gastronomic glam to the last week of 2022 and its December holidays, Il Gradino (reviewed here) will host a dinner the centerpiece of which is Italy’s precious white truffles. The fragrant fungi will make an appearance in each of five courses, including dessert and a pre-prandial cocktail. Available nightly from Christmas Eve through New Year’s Eve (the restaurant is closed on Christmas day), the feast will carry a mind-numbing price tag of $3,000(!) per person.
The dinner, accompanied by two of Italy’s most iconic wines, including a bottle of Dal Forno Romano Amarone Della Valpolicella 2015, will commence with either a white truffle martini, combining vodka, vermouth, white truffle oil, and white truffle shavings, or a truffle sour, made with vodka, amaro, white truffle oil, and a white truffle garnish.
Franciacorta, the sparkling wine from Lombardy, will be poured with the first course — a white truffle-laden version of stracciatella, the Italian egg drop soup. Carpaccio will follow, the paper-thin slices of fillet augmented by artichokes, arugula, shaved Parmesan, and white truffles, for which the bottle of Amarone will have been decanted.
For the pasta course, guests will choose between veal-stuffed ravioli or pappardelle in a light cream sauce dappled with slivers of white truffle. The main event, which follows, requires another decision. Will it be a pounded rack of veal in a truffle sauce with white truffle shavings or sea salt-roasted branzino perfumed with white truffle oil and graced by slices of truffle?
A truffled sundae — vanilla gelato with a house-made Italian chocolate sauce under more white truffle shavings — closes out the meal. Il Gradino, 808 Lexington Avenue (bet. 62nd and 63rd Sts.), 646-649-3289, is open Monday through Saturday, noon to 11 p.m., Sunday 5 p.m. to 11 p.m.
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