Whenever my wife Jun and I visit New York City, I habitually look up reservation websites like Resy to check for available tables on some of the hottest restaurants in the city. I am as upset as anyone that Resy has an inferior system that allows opportunistic vultures to use bots that snap all the reservations right around the time the reservation window opens and to sell them at unconscionable mark-ups in the secondary markets, preventing us from checking out places like Tatiana (at least chef Kwame Onwuachi decided to open a new restaurant in DC), Torrisi (I’ve only been to the first iteration of the restaurant back in 2013) and Don Angie (an impossible restaurant to book even before the recent Resy shenanigans). Speaking to Don Angie, the wife-husband duo Angie Rito and Scott Tacinelli decided to open a second restaurant focusing on Italian seafood. My worry that San Sabino would be just as difficult to get a reservation turned out to be true, and the restaurant was booked solid during the time we were visiting NYC in September. My experience with the Notify waitlist function with Resy has been more unsuccessful than not but I figured I would at least give it a shot for a Sunday brunch with another couple before we head down to our home; the evening before, while we were walking around West Village, I got a notification that a table for four at San Sabino had opened up! I was beyond excited and promptly booked the reservation. I’m glad I was looking at my phone on that very fortuitous moment because our meal at San Sabino was quite good.

As soon as our party sat down, our server recommend that we start the meal with cheesy frittelle; don’t skip these tasty bites of puffy doughs with orange blossom honey and Sicilian saffron. Another starter not to miss is the crab and mortadella dip you can put on top of Ritz crackers, a playful dish that could fit in a trendy beach party somewhere in Italy. I also thought the octopus carpaccio displayed very good texture. One dish that our couple friends couldn’t stop raving about was the lobster triangoli pasta, and I couldn’t agree more. Yes, it is quite pricey at $38 for only four pieces, but the white vodka sauce was pure decadence on top of all the delicious fillings inside the pasta. Another dish that is very hyped at San Sabino is the shrimp parm which gets a point for novelty factor alone (I honestly haven’t seen shrimps used in parmesan dishes before); it was not surprisingly very addictive in flavor, but Jun wasn’t sure using the shrimps maximized the effect. Two desserts that we shared were very solid. I was giddy that no one was aggressively going after the caramelized crespelle (a type of crepe) with rum crema, while Jun happily savored the gelato Viennese with dark chocolate torta caprese and hazelnut caramel.

I instantly realized after walking into the dining room why getting a reservation (aside from the Resy issue mentioned above) is even harder at San Sabino. Its dining room was quite modest in size and diners were squeezed in tight space. Nevertheless, the overall bright and summery vibe of the space was certainly a positive for a pleasant meal in West Village. There is full bar with some creative cocktails that would not be out of place on the seaside resorts and Italian-focused wine list. While the service was generally friendly, there were times when we thought the staff seemed overwhelmed with the crowd and we had some awkward gaps between dishes. I am not sure if the reservation craze for buzzy restaurants like San Sabino will die down soon, but am glad we were finally able to check it out. I’m now eager to go back to Don Angie which Jun and I had last visited in 2018.    

KenScale: 8.0/10 (Jun’s Score: 8.0/10)

Address: 113 Greenwich Avenue, New York, NY 10014

Website: https://www.sansabinonyc.com/

Reservation via Resy