Monkey Bar: Graydon Carter's circus comes to midtown.

Monkey Bar sets the bar low

Tuesday, June 23rd 2009, 9:47 AM

Monkey Bar isn't really a restaurant. It's Graydon Carter's uptown dinner party.

The editor of Vanity Fair ­began dabbling in restaurants a few years back when he revived the aging Waverly Inn.

Some people like buying vintage cars. Carter likes buying vintage restaurants and restoring them. Monkey Bar still looks like the original, 1930s supper club - rich red-leather banquettes, brass trimmings, monkey lamps and a 65-foot mural of New Yorkers along the walls. Most of the servers wear white steward jackets with long tails and striped patches on the shoulders. The dining room has balcony and orchestra-level seating.

Me, I got stuck at table 39 on every single visit. Have you ever been to a wedding and found your place card puts you at the kids' table ... with your back to the dance floor? That's 39 - on the edge of ­Siberia, smack in the middle of the server freeway. When we asked about moving, the manager explained, "The tables are all pre­assigned by the owners." Really, like an airline? Ah, Graydon.

Comfort me with meatloaf and monkey bread. The monkey bread is the crack of carbohydrates - an intoxicatingly sweet puff of dough made with sugar, flour, eggs and heavy cream. If the oversized loaf isn't seductive enough, it has a closer of paprika-spiked pecan butter that's almost as good.

Nora Ephron wrote "When Harry Met Sally," but more importantly, she makes a mean meatloaf, and she gave Carter the recipe. It's a mix of ground veal, pork and beef, seasoned with ketchup and Worcestershire sauce, then blanketed with a wonderful mushroom sauce. I didn't see Meg Ryan or Billy Crystal there, but I did see Jon Bon Jovi, Betsey Johnson, Jerry Seinfeld and Katie Couric all dining in the balcony on the same night.

"My grandfather would love this menu," my friend said as she surveyed the offerings - oysters Rockefeller, clams casino, steak tartare, Chasen's chili and lobster Newburg. On my first visit, I had an oily, oily skate with sun-dried tomatoes, capers and onions.

The chef who made the skate was fired a month after opening. Larry Forgione, who owned An American Place, has ­
taken over as consulting chef, and the skate's gone, but most of the menu remains the same. There's a tasty dish called kedgeree, a traditional Indian dish made with smoked haddock, curried rice, scallions and coriander, all topped with a poached egg. And there's a well-executed entree of seared scallops with creamed corn and smoky bits of bacon.

Considering Carter's reputation and Forgione's pedigree, the food should be a lot better. The lobster Newburg tasted like the crustaceans died years ago, the roast halibut was horribly overcooked, and the Chasen's chili desert-dry.

Someone at my table called the cavatelli pasta with chewy short ribs "a dank train wreck."

So save room for dessert, because most are excellent - a sticky toffee pudding, Elysian Muscat Jell-O and malted milk chocolate mousse with peanut brittle. Pastry chef Caryn Stabinsky, who worked at WD-50, also makes the monkey bread.

Graydon Carter's social circus has come to midtown. All his Monkey Bar needs now is better food.