The Spotted Pig has gone downhill.
There was a time when we hit up the Pig three times in as many weeks. The cask-conditioned Sixpoint and the faggots were well worth the long wait for a table. It even got to the point where the front of house staff started to recognize us. So I don't break allegiance with the Pig lightly.
Maybe it's just that the weekend brunch/lunch kitchen staff isn't up to par with their nighttime counterparts. Maybe April Bloomfield has shifted focus to The John Dory. Whatever the cause of the decline in quality, it hit us hard.
Four friends joined us for a late brunch at the Spotted Pig. The meal was inspired by Roquefort's impending price increase, as importation tarrifs on this A.O.C. bleu will skyrocket on April 1st. What better way to kiss Roquefort goodbye than with one of the Spotted Pig's hefty, delicious, Roquefort-slathered hamburgers?

Half of us ordered the burger. I think the other three of us would have been well advised to have done the same; instead we went for the French toast, the Dutch Baby, and the corned beef hash with two poached eggs. The French toast looked good, if a little dry. My corned beef hash and eggs was merely alright. It lacked salt, and although the corned beef was tasty, I couldn't discern it from the potato in the uniformly brown-gray hash. The eggs were slightly over-poached and under-seasoned, overwhelmed by the parsley heaped on top. And that Dutch Baby? I wouldn't have served that. A Dutch Baby should be served in a Dutch oven, and look like the awesome offspring of a popover and a pancake. Instead, what came out was a dry, shrivelled approximation of a county fair elephant ear, maple syrup pooling in its crevices, some Jimmy Dean-looking sausage links resting on top, the whole thing doused in powdered sugar. The unfortunate owner of this ill-conceived dish regarded it with morose. You would have, too.
And what about those burgers, the entire reason we'd headed to the Spotted Pig in the first place? They were good, but nothing remarkable. The shoestring fries, though crispy and not greasy, were too thin for the rosemary to stick to them. Without the rosemary, they were flavorless. The thick burger patties were juicy and cooked perfectly to order, but the meat was bland and couldn't hold up to the Roquefort.
Our service, as usual, was friendly and professional, but it took over an hour for our food to come out - and when it did, it trickled in inconsistent batches, like a short-order diner. There's no reason a seasoned gastropub used to much larger crowds should need an hour to get three burgers and some rather standard breakfast items to the table. Hunched on backless stools, we felt every minute of the wait.
It's not like we didn't know there are better brunch spots or tastier burgers in the city. Next time, we'll head to Back Forty, where the grass-fed burger is so flavorful and rich it doesn't need cheese and the rosemary fries are substantial and salty enough to live up to the rich beef. Or, for a more well-rounded meal, we'll wait until the Redhead starts its much-rumored brunch service. Both restaurants offer a burger that's 40-50% cheaper than the Spotted Pig's and immeasurably tastier.
Afterwards, we'll head to Murray's to spend the money we saved on a nice hunk of cheese. Roquefort's not the only sheep's milk bleu in the game, after all.


















