By Julie Shapiro
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
TRIBECA — Jewish bistro food and cutting-edge Korean cuisine are on the way to TriBeCa, thanks to two new restaurants opening a block apart later this year.
Both eateries revealed a first glimpse of their menus when they applied for liquor licenses last week.
Kutsher's Tribeca, opening at 186 Franklin St., near Hudson Street, in September, will serve up Jewish versions of American classics, including fried chicken breaded with matzo meal and a "Yiddish Shepherd's Pie" with a potato and spinach kugel crust.
The menu, which is so extensive that it recalls a diner, also features cross-cultural items like brisket meatballs with horseradish gravy, knish dumplings with soy ginger dipping sauce and corned beef banh mi.
The team behind the 155-seat eatery includes restaurateur Jeffrey Chodorow and Zach Kutsher, owner of Kutsher's Hotel and Country Club in the Catskills.
The TriBeCa version of Kutsher's Eastern European fare makes several nods to Jewish dietary restrictions — the bacon comes from a cow, not a pig — but it will still be possible to get cheese on your burger.
One block south at 6 Harrison St., innovative Korean restaurant Jung Sik Dang is planning its first American outpost.
The Seoul-based restaurant made a name for itself with unusual combinations of flavors and high-end ingredients, and it looks like the 55-seat TriBeCa location's menu will be similarly inventive.
A seafood salad comes with shrimp, scallops, lime jelly, quail egg yolk, kobacha squash and feta, while an anchovy paella features seaweed puree, rice, barley and baby octopus.
Pork belly, smoked salmon, gorgonzola sauce, apricot jelly and truffle oil also make appearances on the preliminary menu.
Owner and chef Jung Sik Yim trained at the Culinary Institute of America and worked in some of New York's top restaurants, including Bouley, before starting Jung Sik Dang in Seoul in 2009.
CB1's Tribeca Committee voted not to object to either establishment's liquor license at a meting Wednesday night.
