The magazine said:
LORENA’S
Maplewood
Until May 10, Lorena’s was Lorena and Humberto Campos Jr.’s only baby. Now there is Liam Thomas Campos, too. Anticipating the arrival, Humberto hired a talented chef de cuisine, Martin Rangel, who had worked at Bouley. This freed the boss to do more with local farms and work the bounty into the menu. Humberto’s sensuous, even sexy, French-influenced food, continues to dazzle: consider Barnegat scallops over parsnip purée with capers, pine nuts and raisins and a green-apple glaze. Meanwhile, the Camposes hired a noted Hamptons designer, Greg McKenzie, to redo the dining room, which now has a burnished bronze look graced by original paintings by Dora Maar, Picasso’s famous muse.
168 Maplewood Ave, 973-763-4460, restaurantlorena.com
VERJUS
Maplewood
With his French training (under the great Jean Jacques Rachou of Le Côte Basque), chef/co-owner Charles Tutino cooks a lot of dishes you think you know, not all of them French—roasted chicken with tarragon, mulligatawny soup, bouillabaisse, steak frites. He may tweak them a bit (like gazpacho with lemon-Sriracha sorbet, or a bluefish niçoise), but one way or another this modest, self-effacing chef makes you sit up in your chair and think, I never knew this could taste so good. Most appetizers are $8-$13, most entrées under $30. Add Verjus’s small, discerning, reasonably priced wine list; the quiet, comfortable room; and the warmth of host Jane Witkin, Tutino’s wife, and you have a lunch, brunch or dinner to treasure.
1790 Springfield Ave, 973-378-8990, verjusrestaurant.com
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