Modern Love

Isa Chandra Moskowitz — the grande dame of vegan cuisine — brought her Omaha, Nebraska, restaurant to Williamsburg to serve locals “swanky vegan comfort food.” The result is a menu of innovative, plant-based renderings of various hearty classics. Moskowitz draws inspiration from her Brooklyn upbringing, pulling, she says, from Italian, Jewish, and Jamaican cuisines, with a healthy dose of southern cooking to boot. The truffled poutine is not to be missed and involves thick-cut fries presented in a Jenga-tower configuration, slathered in gravy, and topped with dollops of fresh almond ricotta. The Mac & Shews, made with a roasted-red-pepper-and-cashew-cheese sauce, is delightfully tangy, while the Buffalo-cauliflower “wings” achieve ideal smokiness. The comfort-food theme carries into dessert, where there are several different kinds of pie available. Along with wine, beer, and cocktails, there’s a healthy rotation of nonalcoholic beverages that veer somewhat crunchy, like housemade sodas and kombucha on tap. The space itself is plush and intimate without being fussy, though the acoustics make it somewhat difficult to hear a companion when the restaurant’s full.