![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/94e0e32d758b463f638d9b62961257f628-Zoli-opening-07.rvertical.w570.jpg\")
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Zoli<\/a><\/p>\n \n 312 Maujer St., nr. Waterbury St., Bushwick\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cSatellite,\u201d an installation by Pierre Huyghe, anchors the space. More than a decade ago, long before Google and Disney moved to the neighborhood<\/a>, Ned Baldwin opened Houseman<\/a> and drew a devout following to a small residential block of Greenwich Street in Hudson Square. From the start, the room felt well lived-in, and Baldwin\u2019s regularly changing menu in those early days pulled inspiration from Prune, where Baldwin had worked as chef de cuisine for Gabrielle Hamilton. \u201cShe does something that I find really compelling, that I try to match, or at least do my own version of at Houseman,\u201d he says. \u201cHer menus were intelligent and informed and thoughtful and unpretentious, and a little funny. I was really moved by that.\u201d<\/p>\n Over the years, Houseman has become the site of many family dinners and attracted a devoted group of regulars. Baldwin, the kind of ingredient-loving chef who lights up when he gets a particularly excellent delivery of mushrooms or spring onions, has also been known to set up a grill for impromptu sidewalk parties whenever he gets fish \u2014 he\u2019s a keen fisherman \u2014 that excites him. Barbara Gladstone, of Gladstone Gallery<\/a>, is an investor. Marina Abramovic and Laurie Anderson each live nearby, as do Lonti Ebers and her husband, Bruce Flatt. In 2021, Ebers established Amant<\/a> in Bushwick to support working artists through gallery shows, residencies, and commissions. \u201cWe\u2019re taking risks and showing stuff that other museums or institutions in the city aren\u2019t ready to show yet,\u201d says Nick Pilato, its executive director. (A show from Kim Gordon and Bill Nace is currently on display.) Amant now encompasses five buildings, one of which \u2014\u00a0around the corner from an ice-cream-truck garage, in a former takeout-container warehouse \u2014 is the home of Baldwin\u2019s second restaurant, Zoli<\/a>, which opened this week.<\/p>\n As a genre, \u201cmuseum restaurants\u201d can take many different forms. With Zoli, Baldwin has a space to explore his sense of what \u201cmuseum food\u201d should be. \u201cCooking for artists isn\u2019t making artistic plates,\u201d he says. \u201cArtists understand what confident execution is, and a sense for makers who have a confident sense of themselves.\u201d Baldwin, who holds an MFA in sculpture from Yale and worked as an artist for years before becoming a chef, adds, \u201cWhen I consume art, which I do all the time, the last thing I want to do is sit down to a meal that\u2019s screaming itself.\u201d His goal is simple, honest food \u2014 a protein with a little sauce, for example.<\/p>\n \n A plate of monkfish demonstrates the pared-down style Baldwin employs at Zoli. Working with two other chefs, Danny Roberts (formerly of Altro Paradiso) and Amy Lee, the menu will change all the time, one day to the next. \u201cWhat kind of food do I want to cook? New York food,\u201d says Baldwin. With people moving here from so many different places, it\u2019s inevitable that this city\u2019s food is a global mashup, and constantly evolving: \u201cWe have a very chaotic food tradition \u2014 this is an extension of that, to be honest about who we are, we\u2019re in New York.\u201d<\/p>\n A plate of spicy marinated dandelion greens, quickly blanched and combined with what\u2019s essentially a quick kimchee \u2014 chile, garlic and soy \u2014 is one of the many small dishes on the menu, reminiscent of banchan. \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019ve made it the same way twice,\u201d Baldwin says. He\u2019s tinkering with a wood-fired oven and a plancha for crisp-skinned butterflied fish and chicken that Baldwin says will rival the famous roast chicken at Houseman. Fish will always play a big role on the menu, in dishes in the vein of\u00a0 roasted monkfish with ras al hanout beurre blanc and little neck clams with douchi (fermented black beans) butter and Thai basil. Fermented ingredients appear throughout, and instead of serving non-alcoholic cocktails \u201cwe\u2019re pushing to make kombuchas that have the complexity of maybe a simple wine,\u201d Baldwin says.<\/p>\n An entire second kitchen on the top floor was initially designed for prep but will be able to host chef residencies, \u201chopefully in perpetuity,\u201d per Baldwin, in an area that will also serve as a private dining room. Amant and Baldwin worked with GRT Architects, who gave the space enormous windows that open to the street, and immense skylights that fill the large room with natural light.\u00a0 A wide, wooden staircase zigzags up through the center of the restaurant to the private dining room and open-air bar, with a mezzanine along the way that\u2019s home to six seats with a bird nest view into the kitchen. Everything is anchored by an apocalyptic aquarium installation by Pierre Huyghe that was commissioned<\/a> for the space; it\u2019s the only artwork on display. The interior walls were built using three types of cinder blocks (rough hewn, smooth, and what Pilato calls \u201ca sort of corduroy\u201d) from floor to ceiling, made that have an almost honeyed color, giving the room a sundrenched warmth contrary to the industrial materials. \u201cWe wanted everything to be honest and sort of perpendicular to itself,\u201d Pilato says. \u201cThe material is the material, and it\u2019s not trying to be anything else.\u201d<\/p>\n \n Lobster pasta. EAT LIKE THE EXPERTS.<\/p>\n Sign up for the Grub Street newsletter.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n
\n Photo: Michael Vadino\n <\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/f9ecfcb8fe8751e942e5de3994c9111ce4-monkfish-horizontal.rhorizontal.w900.jpg\")
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\n Photo: Canal House\n <\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/131da7e0b6fafcfe78b2ae37ff91486675-pasta-with-lobster-horizontal.rhorizontal.w700.jpg\")
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\n Photo: Canal House\n <\/p>\n