photo: B.A. Nilsson

All of the Above

By B.A. Nilsson

PINTO & HOBBS TAVERN

32 Dove St., Albany, 426-4900. Serving lunch Mon-Sat 11:30-10, dinner Mon-Sat 5-10. Sunday brunch 11:30-3:30. AE, D, MC, V.

Cuisine: pub fare and eclectic entrées

Entrée price range: $16 (sesame salmon) to $22 (osso bucco)

Ambiance: patio-enhanced tavern

Here are Italian bruschetta, Indonesian lumpia, Thai chicken saté, Carribean jerk pork chili—jerk pork chili? Has culinary fusion come to this?

And where is it leading? To an imaginative creative plane, or to something diminished by diffusion?

Only one way to tell: “I’ll have an order of the chili please.” The appetizers, which also include nachos, shrimp cocktail and, of course, wings, range in price from $7 to $9. A bowl of chili is $4, and that’s a breadbowl in which it arrives.

And having, as its meat source, jerk-spiced pork means that this chili has the fire and complexity that the so-named dish deserves. We’re so used to the wimpy beef-and-kidney-bean stew that passes for chili in the northeast that we forget how lively a dish it should be. Here, it’s lively.

Which bodes well for the fortune of Pinto & Hobbs, a six-week-old eatery that stands in place of the former Bleecker Café. In fact, I’ll confess that I rounded the corner the other night thinking it was the Bleecker Café I’d see, and so I immediately dragged my family within this new place to see what new culinary direction it may have charted.

“From the start, we wanted it to be a neighborhood tavern,” says co-owner Dave Hobbs. “We started with a pub menu of sandwiches and things, but right away people were asking for entrées. We have a lot of regular customers already, and a nice dining room, so we added the entrée menu. And it’s been a big success.”

Hobbs was one of the partners in Franklin’s Tower, the downtown Albany eatery; he has joined forces with Jessica Pinto, herself a longtime veteran of area restaurants, to stake out this new outpost in a location where such a place is needed.

And they have chef Eric Schade helming the kitchen, a talented fellow whose previous gigs include the kitchens of Carmine’s and Quintessence.

The three of them crafted a multipurpose menu featuring the aforementioned appetizers, as well as salads and sandwiches. Nothing terribly surprising, but much that’s impressive. A classic club, for instance, called The Classic Club ($8), which stacks smoked turkey, roast beef, ham or grilled chicken with the expected accessories. There’s a reuben ($8), perhaps the finest of all deli sandwiches; there’s a French dip ($8), possibly the silliest.

But you’ll also find a grilled veggie sandwich ($7) should your tastes run to meatless fare, and a Caralina (sic) pulled pork ($9), for the ultimate meat-eating experience (nothing is more fundamental as a meat enhancer than smoke). All of these are served on your choice of bread with chips and a pasta salad; add fries for two bucks more.

A hearty selection of burgers and wraps completes the standard menu, which is available throughout the dinner hours as well. Hobbs is looking forward to soon adding a late-night menu that will offer food until midnight.

This restaurant always has thrived in warm weather thanks to its outdoor and quasi-outdoor dining. There’s a patio that’s fairly open, and a closed-in porch that’s not, so you’re covered.

And while the bar may be the epicenter of the place, the adjacent dining room gives it its class. Big picture windows overlook the street; the room itself looks warm and comfortable. Service was efficient, although we weren’t sitting amid any kind of a crowd. According to Hobbs, the night after I visited, the place was packed, which is one of those maddeningly unpredictable aspects of the business.

One of the regularly featured soups is a smoked chicken and red pepper bisque ($3.25/$4.50); this is always a test of the kitchen’s mettle, and sported a delicious flavor well filled by its stock and ingredients.

Reinforcing the international cast of the menu, dinner appetizers included Indonesian crab fritters ($10) and Japanese chicken ($9), and it was the latter my daughter selected as an entrée after starting herself off with the abovementioned soup.

It was a perfect size for her, even allowing her to bring some of the panko-crusted chicken strips home. Served with a ginger-soy dipping sauce, it echoed a sushi setup with accompanying pickled ginger and a spicy wasabi extrusion.

Chicken also featured in one of the entrée specials, which put large strips of it (not unlike those Japanese chicken strips) amidst fettuccine and olives in a good marinara, seasoned with the appropriate Mediterranean feeling.

Listed on the dinner menu are such entrées as lobster ravioli ($17), seafood jambalaya ($18), Dove Street pork chops served with an brandy apple butter demi-glaze ($17), and a New York strip with onions, mushrooms and blue cheese ($20) or au poivre ($20).

Although osso bucco ($22) is always tempting, I veered in another direction and ordered the sesame salmon ($16), an excellent chunk of the fish steak coated with colorful sesame seeds, sautéed to the right point of doneness, served with rice and a medley of vegetables.

Although portions aren’t huge, we ate sparingly enough to walk out with containers of just about everything, and reluctantly refused dessert, although the items are prepared for the restaurant by one of the servers.

An urban neighborhood needs a good restaurant to support its identity; it’s pleasing to see that Pinto & Hobbs is not only aware of this fact, but also satisfies the need with a good menu, reasonably priced, cheerfully presented.

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