New restaurant mogul brings back the glamour

Fry has shown the same diverse tastes and wandering eye, opening No. 246, an Italian trattoria in Decatur, followed by the Optimist, a Westside seafood sensation, and then King + Duke, the grill to end all grills in Buckhead.

Now, Fry has debuted his latest, St. Cecilia, in a monumental glitter box with nearly 30-foot ceilings on the ground floor of Buckhead’s Pinnacle Building. If you’ve been in Atlanta longer than a minute, you might remember this space used to be Bluepointe, an Asian fusion restaurant owned by Pano Karatassos. Plus ça change …

But it (almost) goes without saying that Fry’s restaurants appeal to a different dining cohort — the folks today who like to dress up and get spendy, but who want their glamour more down to earth. Bluepointe’s oscillating colored lights, raised dining platforms and fine napery have ceded to heavy wooden tables, natural colors and a wood-burning hearth in the kitchen sending out its olfactory enticement.

The loose theme is “coastal European,” i.e., raw fish (crudo), roast fish and pastas — foods that a resident of the Amalfi Coast would more or less recognize. And, for good measure, there’s an American-style raw bar fashioned from the former restaurant’s sushi bar. Hot restaurants in Atlanta these days serve oysters. Lotta oysters.

St. Cecilia isn’t just a hot restaurant but the hottest thing in the city. Want a weekend reservation? They’ve got 5:15 or nothing.

As soon I descended the few steps into the madness of a busy Thursday night, I could sense something right away: It feels unmistakably like a Ford Fry restaurant.

Just as one might recognize the toe-tapping bounce in a music track produced by Pharrell Williams, there is a trademark upbeat rhythm to a Fry production. The unmanaged noise, the easy lighting, the curiously old-fashioned fonts on the menus, the chill service style, the ingredient-driven approach of the kitchen, which feels more Atlantan than anything. As chef Brian Horn said, “The concept is coastal European, but at the end of the day we’re Americans in Georgia. That’s how we cook.”

Working within this framework, Horn has created a menu that may have neither the focus of the Optimist nor the sheer brawn of King + Duke, but nonetheless features plenty of appealing options.

Both crudi we tried were subtle, sparkling and terrific. Cobia (a meaty white fish) arrives in a fine dice, tossed with pop-pops of smoked trout roe and sided by house-made salt and vinegar chips to add another layer of flavor and texture. The “iced crab of the moment” (that’s what they call it) was Jonah. Lumpy, sweet and clean in a toss of celeriac, black truffle and teeny cubes of toasted brioche. I love the subtle oomph.

Horn’s octopus may vie for the coveted title of best cephalopod in the Southeast, so crunchy are its tentacles and tender-chewy its meat, so perfect its salad of cured tomatoes and mixed Italian beans.You know that feeling when you think about a dish and immediately want it again? Yep, that.

Horn and Fry also have done good for the pasta paradigm in Atlanta. They price them as appetizers, portion them as appetizers and push them as appetizers. A small, scrumptiously buttery bowl of spaghetti with crab, chili and garlicky crumbs is slurpworthy, and it disappears before putting you in a food coma. Ravioli with apple, mascarpone cheese and lobster has the same rich presence, if also a distinctive sweetness that didn’t win over our table.

Main courses wisely dial down the butter and cheese. A whole, expertly grilled loup de mer with marcona almonds and citrus won best of show at the table. In a fish restaurant, simplicity always wins. But a meaty, crisp-skinned striped bass fillet served with an unlikely but convincing pumpkin agrodolce (sweet-and-sour relish) and concentrated chicken jus stayed delicious to the last bite, never tipping into weird or boring. Only black grouper set atop potatoes, fennel and chewy rings of calamari seemed to be trying too hard.

Side dishes here read more like vegetarian entrees than garnishes. Get some Tuscan kale for the table and it comes with a soft-baked egg. Kabocha squash arrives outfitted with gorgonzola dolce, spiced honey and hazelnuts. “Crispy punched potatoes” made me think there was a furious Lilliputian in the kitchen taking his fist to each fingerling. Indeed, these spuds were steamed, smashed, fried and sent out with sheep’s-milk aïoli and pecorino cheese. I kind of wanted to take the plate to the bar, get a martini and call it dinner.

In fact, it’s tempting to pass on heavy-duty desserts (Nutella torta, chocolate budino) altogether and finish the evening in that lively bar, which sends a turbo-charged energy through the room. There you will find good cocktails, excellent Old World wines by the glass, a dutiful selection of bottled beers, and a fine snapshot of Atlanta in the winter of 2014, flush with the feeling that the good times are back.