Long Island Restaurants

The Grill Room

Hal Goldman ignites The Grill Room.

The chef has improved the kitchen and polished the image of this Hauppauge mainstay, which manages to brighten a colorless office-park corridor.

At lunch, the restaurant is a little oasis from the workday, light, calm and assured; at dinner, it's a more dimly lit destination for lively food and sometimes live music. The place bills itself as "a perfect place for an office affair."

The 80-seat spot also is ideal for puck-size crab cakes with tomato aioli and corn-and-potato salad; a snappy duck .tostada with Monterey Jack cheese, mango salsa, black beans and chipotle-spiked mayo and hoisin-glazed, braised baby back ribs.

Goldman's chicken quesadilla is a casual pleasure, also with mango salsa and chipotle aioli. But his mushy lettuce wrap with sauteed chicken and bland shrimp spring roll are less successful. Likewise, the nowhere-bound portobello mushroom-and-mozzarella en carrozza.

Your meal immediately gets better with a lush, savory tuna tartare, with mango and pickled ginger; the goat-cheese salad, with candied pecans, orange and mesclun; and, midday, with tasty grilled pizzas. But his Cuban panino may remind you more of Guantánamo than Havana.

Goldman sends out a very good version of what's fast becoming a signature dish on Long Island, sesame-crusted tuna: rare, velvety, with coconut rice, citrusy ponzu, spinach and a drizzle of wasabi sauce. The horseradish-crusted salmon takes a safety-first entree and adds some sparks before finishing it with a lemon beurre blanc.

But the chef's Thai fish pot, which veterans will remember from his stint at Jackson Landing in Bellmore, never delivers the expected heat, despite "Thai curry." It's an uneven shellfish-finfish stew with soba noodles. The watery pasta primavera, with pine nuts and pesto cream, also sinks.

You're backing winners with the mellow, braised short ribs, in the welcome company of mashed potatoes; and the grilled New Zealand lamb chops, flanked by a goat cheese-and-potato cake and kale. The house's flatiron steak is on the chewy side, so consider the grilled sirloin.

Desserts are headed by creamy cheesecake and a rich, chocolate tart with chocolate gelato. The warm apple tart and crème brûlée have more modest results. Of course, there's tiramisu, a good one.

The Grill Room seems more refreshing and easygoing at lunch, more studied and excitable at dinner. It will depend on your mood. But you should have an enjoyable meal anytime with Goldman at the controls.

Reviewed by Peter M. Gianotti, 2/14/08.

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