THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED Onera

THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED Onera Restaurant Review:

Until Michael Psilakis relocates his pioneering haute Greek restaurant to spacious new Midtown digs (already in the planning stages) you’ll have to make do with a cramped windowless dining room in a townhouse on the Upper West Side. Onera, the self-taught chef’s Manhattan debut, announced the arrival of a bold new talent (and spawned a second spot, Dona, across town). At the upper echelons Greek food has long suffered in the shadows of its Mediterranean neighbors. Psilakis, who seems to be endowed with the cooking equivalent of perfect pitch (he learned to cook by leafing through books), does his part to put Hellenic cuisine on the international map. In one revelation he turns savory baklava into the crumbled base for cinnamon-scented skate fish---he first created the dish during an Iron Chef showdown. In another, a Greek salad’s traditional components are deconstructed into accompaniments for seared tuna (a spicy shot of tomato gazpacho, streaks of feta and black olive sauces). On any given night there are nearly a dozen painterly raw mezes to choose from, Greek-style crudo like scallops with tzatziki or sea urchin with olives and beets. The rose-essence quartet is a dessert to remember featuring rose-syrup-infused milkshake, loukum, custard and ice cream.