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This venue is closed.

Governor, which opened not long ago at the bottom of the Clocktower building in Dumbo, feels like the kind of strained, slightly off-key restaurant that used to pass for haute cuisine in Brooklyn, before the rabble of picklers, mixologists, and lumberjack kitchen slaves forever changed the dining landscape. The bar serves cocktails with overworked names such as the Lost Bees and Cool Hunt Club. The walls of the polished, but strangely featureless, room are covered, similar to the cafeteria of a giant Restoration Hardware outlet, with potted ferns and rows of imitation ye-olde-antique milk crates. The menu is studded with the kind of mannered buzzwords that were popular in haute-barnyard circles several years ago (apple must, caper beans, clothbound Cheddar), and as our dinner was being served, the dulcet, decidedly non-hipster sounds of Linda Ronstadt’s “Blue Bayou” kept looping over the stereo. A trip to Governor is not without its dated pleasures, however. You could make a meal out of the bread alone (it’s served with radishes and whipped butter), and my order of the classic poached oysters on toast was so good I ordered it twice. My denatured portion of rib eye did not benefit from its garnish of grilled watermelon and apple must, however, and that trendy celebrity butchers’ favorite, pork neck (plated with grilled peaches and nasturtium here), seemed to have been poached for several hours too long in that now untrendy gourmet cooking implement, the sous vide bag. If you’re in the mood for a stout dinner after trolling the boutiques of Dumbo, get the plump, well-cooked quail with chanterelles instead, and follow it with the honey soufflé, which is folded, in this unintentionally retro Brooklyn establishment, with crème anglaise flavored with a stiff shot of Earl Grey tea. — Adam Platt

The warm offers a well-chosen selection of handcrafted beers.

Poached oysters on toast, quail with chanterelles, honey soufflé.