Scratch ‘n sniff: New Nick & Sam’s Grill Park Cities

Great team: Richard Blankenship and Samir Dhurandhar, the brains behind N&S

loved this spicy tuna and crisp rice with sriracha sauce and serrano peppers

crispy calamari with grapes, coconut, cashews, chili oil, chayote and radicchio

Richard Blankenship, a Charlie Palmer veteran, runs the kitchen. Guy is super talented, too.

there's a fresh catch every day. This was sea bream stuffed with rosemary

crazy good roasted chicken with grits and Brussels sprouts leaves

the beef in this burger is pedigreed: it's from Pat Lafrieda meats

Wow. The new Nick & Sam’s Grill Park Cities is so much better than it’s Uptown sibling, you might not know the two are related.

Richard Blankenship is the chef, and corporate brain trust Samir Dhurandhar, the chef behind all the Nick & Sam’s concepts, says Blankenship is responsible for 90 percent of the menu.

Good call, because Richard, a Charlie Palmer steakhouse veteran, can flat-out cook.

The menu only lists three steaks, so if you’re expecting Nick and Sam’s, you’re in the wrong place. Instead, it’s chicken croquettes, bento boxes of sushi, sauteed flounder and grilled catch o’ the day, an amazing black kale salad that I could eat every day, beet salad, Coal Vines pizzas, plus a cheeseburger whose burger meat is sourced from famed NYC butcher Pat Lafreida (I topped mine with a duck egg and good bacon). Lots of veggies, salads and sandwiches round out the one-page menu. Only a few items cost more than $15.

Of course, if you gotta have a steak, there’s a filet, a prime ribeye and a bone-in strip on the menu, too.

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