Profile

Adä ("AH-duh"), which means "style" or "flair" in Hindi and Urdu, presents a refined, high-end version of traditional Indian cuisine. Standard North Indian food is enlivened with regional dishes from Goa and Kerala along the Malabar Coast, and revivified with a delicate use of ingredients. The white pea cake, Aloo Tikki, includes bananas and a bit of crème fraîche, and the Seekh Kebab, usually made with lamb, here features goat. There's the garam masala, mint chutney, tamarind and coriander one expects, too, of course, and the flavors are melded expertly, if relatively innocuously. (The heat is adjusted to American palates.) The design of the dining room is similarly geared to a mellow experience: The deep-red color of the chairs and banquettes pops against the neutral canvas of creams and whites throughout—from the carpeting to the sweeping staircase that punctuates the center of the dining room and ascends to a private dining space above. As with the dinner menu, the desserts mix the conventional with the innovative, the Eastern with the Western. The most traditional of the sweets—and one of the most successful—is the Kheer, a sort of semi-liquid rice pudding, here dotted with minced fruit and served in a martini glass. — Andrew Sessa

Three-courses, vegetarian, $12; non-vegetarian, $15; seafood, $20

Prix-Fixe Menu
Five-course dinner, $55

Seehk kebab, $12; white pea cake, $10; Kerala fish curry, $25; caramelized banana praline, $9