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the raw, not the cooked
by Myra Chanin
http://manhattanlivingmag.com/viewcolumn.cfm?colid=4694

Pure Food and Wine celebrates an organically-grown, plant-based, vegan lifestyle that shouts 'hurrah!' for fruits, vegetables and herbs but spits 'feh!' at eggs, dairy products, sugar, and grains. How raw is raw? Foodstuffs may not be heated above 118F, the temperature at which nutrients and beneficial enzymes that aid digestion take their leave of leaves.

Pure Food and Wine?s menu also proves that skilled chefs aided only by dehydrators, food processors, and imagination can produce memorable dishes. In the garden-fresh pineapple-cucumber gazpacho, the sweetness of the fruit juice is balanced by a zingy Tex-Mex blend of just-enough jalapeno, cilantro, green onions, and avocado-lime oil. In another crowd pleaser-the shiitake, avocado, and pickled ginger sushi rolls-rice is replaced by chopped jicama.

Kenney and Melngailis feature high-quality organic wines and champagnes from vineyards that are returning to sustainable practices. Some come from Old World vintners who plant seeds and harvest grapes according to lunar and solar cycles. They feel that these organically- and biodynamically-raised fruits result in wines that are better for the earth, as well as our bodies. Sake (not technically raw) roams rampant on the wine list and happens to go particularly well with the spicy, Asian-influenced, nut-flavored dishes.

(While you expect to read about a restaurant in the food pages of the Post, it?s always shocking when chefs make the Page Six headlines. Even though Kenney and Melngailis are divesting themselves of each other personally, the chefs who toil in the kitchen are too busy sending out beautifully-presented platters to have much time to concern themselves about what?s going on upstairs.)

Pure Food and Wine
54 Irving Place btw. 17th & 18th Sts., 212-477-1010; www.purefoodandwine.com