Two Wine Bars With Something New to Say

Did you know it’s hot? Did I mention it’s hot? Have you heard — hot.

I’ve been mumbling some version of this to myself on the subway about the wet blanket of humidity that swaddles us all in these waning days of July, awful August ascendant. On days like these, I still trek out to the steakhouses and the pasta-factory carbfests. But really, what I want most are the places that make magic in miniature. Places to sample a few dishes, artfully composed, a glass or two of something — what you might want, and not more, on a to-be-determined first date, before a long movie at an off hour or when the temperature ticks up to 95 in the shade. If I were more shameless, I’d call them snackstaurants. More often, I call them godsends.

Snacks (not “small plates,” which are taxonomically distinct) have always been a safe bet at the city’s wine bars, which continue to proliferate at an astounding rate. (Astounding, since this is exactly the moment so many hands are being wrung about the declining interest in wine — how do we square that?) In days of old, “wine bar snack” usually meant a finger bowl of unpitted olives or a couple boulders of whitening Parm. In these post-Wildair days, most do better than that, and the best of the latest new bunch do better still. They’re not just wine bars with food; they’re wine bars with interesting food. They’ve got a point of view.

The reigning alpha of these dog days is Lei, from King partner Annie Shi, on the curving, pedestrian-only slip of Doyers Street in Chinatown. Shi’s stated aim is to bring the Chinese and Chinese American flavors of her upbringing into the old wine-bar idiom; she developed the menu with Patty Lee, formerly of Mission Chinese Food. Sometimes the substitutions are more or less direct — her take on charcuterie pairs Chinese-style ham from Lady Edison in North Carolina with Asian pears. But it’s even more exciting to see her push out further: slippery, snappy slices of cold pickled celtuce interleaved with translucent dominoes of mung-bean jelly, or a fried portion of Montauk whiting gone chlorophyll green with seaweed, fabulous with a chilled glass of Eva Fricke Riesling from Germany’s Rhinegau, which — I promise — tastes like like salted pineapple kissed by diesel fuel. (I also promise you want it to.)

The full bottle list is comprehensive and inventive — including a few bottles from Chinese producers — and if you stick around long enough, Shi and her somms will inevitably come over to blind-taste you on whatever they’ve got open. The menu features a few larger dishes that are quite good in themselves, most especially a Flinstonian hunk of short rib on the bone, sweetened with strawberry jam. But for now, I’d just as soon graze as gorge.

There are entrée-size items on offer at Cactus Wren, too, a quirky, snacky offshoot of the Lower East Side tasting-menu spot 63 Clinton, which occupies a bright, airy corner space at Rivington and Ludlow. Pizzas are turned out of a domed, ceramic oven mosaic-tiled in the center of the room, and I liked the grilled pork with shishitos and ajo blanco well enough. But the snacks, the snacks! Cactus Wren — named for the state bird of Arizona, where co-owners Samuel Clonts Raymond Trinh met — has the mad-science vision of a Bennigan’s run by Alinea. Seven-layer dip crowned with caviar. Wings with jalapeño green-goddess ranch. Miniature shrimp toasts, the size of skinny matchboxes, to be wrapped in lettuce with mango salad. My favorite of all, two little discs of smoked eel tart: bronzy, buttery, sweetly glazed, with minced eel and Gold Rush apple. (They appeared on the bill, if not on the menu, as “eel tarte tatin.”)

Here, too, the wine list is impressive, ferreting out unusual bottles from smaller producers. We settled on a Cerasuolo d’Abruzzo, a thinking man’s rosé, which, unweighted down by multiple entrées, I had the clarity to reflect drinks like melted cherries and smells like smoked meat. This, too, is a compliment.