Tribeca Grill to Serve Its Last Butternut Squash Ravioli on March 1
A Lower Manhattan neighborhood has outgrown the eatery that brought it to the world’s attention. Tribeca Grill, at 375 Greenwich Street, will sound “last call” for the last time on March 1. Corporate owner Myriad Restaurant group says the decision was prompted by a combination of rising costs and other (potentially more valuable) uses for the space.
Debuting in the spring of 1990, Tribeca Grill was housed in a century-old former warehouse for Martinson Coffee, which had been bought by actor Robert DeNiro (who lived nearby) and converted into the headquarters of his newly formed production company. The vague idea of using the first floor as “a sort of bistro-type thing,” was borne of Mr. DeNiro’s longstanding desire to own a restaurant. Celebrity-owned dining destinations were commonplace in the late 1980s, but uniformly undistinguished. Tribeca Grill was different, in that from the first day it was all about the food.
This was accomplished by Mr. DeNiro’s partner, acclaimed chef Drew Nieporent, who also owned the nearby and highly regarded Montrachet, which closed in 2006. Both Tribeca Grill and Montrachet were blazing a trail that would be replicated decades later, when Williamsburg became a restaurant destination. In the closing years of the last century, space in Tribeca was still available at a cost that would allow the kitchen to be boldly innovative, and still offer guests a reasonably priced meal. A measure of Mr. Nieporent’s (and Mr. DeNiro’s) success is that dishes now regarded as upscale restaurant cliches, such butternut squash ravioli, first came to public awareness at Tribeca Grill.
The restaurant was also inviting in a way that most fine dining establishments uptown were not. Flaunting its industrial pedigree, the space was festooned with exposed brick and pipes. The centerpiece of the dining room was a mahogany bar, bought at auction from the archetypal 1960s and 70s New York singles spot, Maxwell’s Plum, where Mr. Nieporent had once worked and which had recently closed.
The appeal of Tribeca Grill was not hurt, however, by the fact that Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, and Brian De Palma all had offices upstairs in Mr. DeNiro’s building, or that investors in the restaurant included Bill Murray, Christopher Walken, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Lou Diamond Phillips, Ed Harris, and Sean Penn.
When the restaurant opened 35 years ago, the New York Times review said, “Tribeca Grill is one celebrity restaurant that needs very little editing. It should enjoy a long run.” And so it did.