Caravaggio

The wine is as thick as a phone book at this fat-cat hangout just off Madison Avenue, and as is the tradition at such places, the pastas are stiffened with extravagant amounts of butter and cream, and you will wait patiently for long minutes as your waitperson recites the endless list of daily specials with solemn ceremony, like an actor on a stage. If you have the resources and enjoy this kind of show (as on Broadway, the prices are extreme), it’s one of the better ones in the neighborhood (the proprietors are the Bruno brothers, who also operate the high-end midtown restaurant San Pietro), and the menu includes high-minded renditions of the kind of peasant delicacies (risotto with chicken livers and bacon, polenta with venison ragù, roasted wild boar) you don’t often find up in this part of town.