James Beard Semi-finalist Ravi DeRossi’s Restaurants Are Now Kosher
The East Village restaurants—all part of DeRossi’s Overthrow Hospitality group—are now certified by Lighthouse Kosher.
Overthrow Hospitality’s Journey
A few years ago, Ravi DeRossi went on a mission. His goal: “convert all of the meat and cheese-heavy menus in his establishments to be plant-based.” As a 2016 Forbes article noted: “He could no longer justify the toll his practices were having on the environment and on animal welfare.” Eight years later, he’s delivered: all of Overthrow Hospitality’s award-winning restaurants are now vegan.
I reached out to Ravi last month to see if he was interested in going kosher, and his answer was an emphatic yes: “getting kosher certification is definitely something I want to do,” he wrote.
Lighthouse Kosher Returns to NYC
I first encountered Rhode Island-based Lighthouse Kosher when they were listed as the certification agency for Marty’s V Burger, a vegan burger spot on the corner of Lexington and East 27th. I recall looking up Lighthouse Kosher and being intrigued by their approach, both to kashrut and sustainability.
The Boston Globe describes Lighthouse Kosher as “… a new model of kosher supervision… only certifying high-quality vegetarian and vegan establishments, while encouraging … partners to source locally, choose organic, limit food waste, prefer compostable waste, and use toxin-free cleansers and materials.” The article goes on to quote founder and CEO Rabbi Barry Dolinger — the Yeshiva University-ordained rabbi of Congregation Beth Sholom in Providence — who describes their approach:
As a nonprofit, we’ve also flipped the classic business model. Rather than charging a fixed fee for our kosher supervision, we’re building a model that relies on the goodwill and voluntary donations of partner food businesses, while seeking funding from public supporters. In this way, kosher supervision no longer serves as a sort of tax on food—one that might be passed on to consumers in the form of higher costs, lower quality, or a combination of the two.
Marty’s may have closed last year, but I’m excited to see Lighthouse re-enter the NYC restaurant scene with Overthrow Hospitality, a group that shares their approach to sustainability.
Now let’s get to the good stuff:
The Restaurants
The Michelin Guide referred to Avant Garden as a “little jewel box of a restaurant,” that channels “all the coziness of a treehouse.” Menu items include:
- Roasted beets with hummus, dates, sumac, chickpeas, and cucumber tzatziki
- Scorched cauliflower with toasted garlic, fried capers, and cauliflower puree
- Risotto with lobster mushrooms, watercress, balsamic pearls, and basil oil
Led by two-time James Beard semi-finalist Chef Shenarri Freeman, Cadence is a soul food haven. Menu items include:
- Maple buttermilk cornbread with sage maple syrup and seasonal jam
- Fried oyster mushroom & waffles with lavender maple syrup and buffalo Sauce
- Southern fried lasagna: bolognese with pine nut ricotta and spinach, a dish that Pete Wells recommends in his glowing review, “Through some trick of engineering, the lasagna is rolled inside individual squares of pasta, then breaded and fried like a drumstick. In the process, Ms. Freeman convinces you that lasagna, a dish she grew up on, is just as Southern as she is.”
A tapas and wine bar, Ladybird is “double-take gorgeous.” New York Magazine’s mini-profile continues: “Lush green-velvet seating and ornate gold detailing serve as complements to hanging brass planters filled with various ferns and their tender tendrils.” Their menu includes:
- Hot udon: miso sesame broth with baby bok choy, tempura-fried burdock root, oyster mushroom, and chili oil
- Banh mi toast with pickled carrot and daikon slaw, cucumber, smoked sriracha aioli, marinated tofu, cilantro, and jalapeño on sourdough bread
- Kimchi mac & cheese with housemade spicy kimchi, breadcrumbs, and microgreens
There are not one but two vegan Italian restaurants in Manhattan (the other being Coletta), and now both are certified kosher. The menu at Soda Club — a Michelin Bib Gourmand recipient — includes:
- Castelvetrano olives with nduja, feta, and orange
- Watercress salad (with roasted grapes, feta, pine nuts, and a cipollini vinaigrette
- Tagliatelle with lemon nori butter, broccoli rabe, capers, and celery root (this dish comes highly recommended)
- They also have a 6 course pasta tasting option (“Try all our pasta with a bottle of wine”) for $75/person, minimum two people.
Third Kingdom started out as a pop-up space called &Beer, but it was so popular that it became a restaurant in its own right. The menu at Third Kingdom is, appropriately, “comprised entirely of mushroom-centric dishes,” such as:
- Lion’s mane dumplings with daikon sauce and micro cilantro
- Pioppino curry grits with saffron butter, red watercress, and balsamic pearls
- Black pearl oyster with mole, enchilada, epazote sour cream, and broccolini
- Blue oyster with celery root, fennel, button mushroom puree, charred cipollini, and peppercorn sauce
As a fan of sustainability and kashrut, I’m quite thrilled, to say the least.
