Agava Restaurant

This restaurant is one of my Ithaca Favorites. The setting is funky and modern, with a large variety of art (for sale!) on the walls. Additionally, they have a nice covered outdoor patio in the summer. The menu is inspired, modestly priced and evolving, with changes made fairly frequently. The daily specials list typically has four/five dishes. The drink menu has many unique cocktails.

Additionally, they are open fairly late. The kitchen of many places in Ithaca close at 9pm, so its refreshing to find a place where it closes at 11 on some nights. Friday and Saturday are also great if you like live music. The foods all have generous portions, with the sandwiches coming with a mountain of hand-cut fries and house-made ketchup. Entrees are just as good, with lots of variety but a consistent level of quality. Its the perfect destination for a casual dinner, or a festive celebration.

So me and my ten hungry bad Asian driver friends (see previous review on ringwood raceway) decided to come here for some late night eatin at 10:30pm. Well yea we're not college kids anymore. That's pretty late.

The kitchen supposedly closes at 11 so we were fairly warned on the phone to put in our orders as early as possible when we arrive. When we sat down, the overall attitude of the staff was welcoming and we didn't feel hurried at all.

We started with some chips and guac. The guac was extremely creamy and had too much lemon, making it unbearingly sour. We then moved onto their "soon to be famous" flatbread, baked up in their brick oven. To me it pretty much tastes like pizza without the layer of cheese and tomato sauce. The portion is large and enough to be an entree by itself. Topping was fresh.

I asked for the cut of the day for my main. Later the lady came back and told me "the good news is, the cut of the day is extremely good. Bad news is, we ran out." Gee. I felt a slap in the face there. So I went with the hanger steak medium rare served with fries.

The steak tasted dry, bland, and a bit overcooked. Its sliced into strips and made it cook and cool a lot faster so perhaps I missed out on the umame* (whys everyone using that word nowadays?).

There were amateur paintings hanging all around the walls with serial numbers like an art gallery. This was accompanied by live keyboard music (only on Sat nights I believe?). The atmosphere, the friendly staff, and the general feel of the restaurant should be securing easy 4 stars. However, the quality of its food will drop it to a 3.

*Ju L: UMAMI

LOVED!  This place!  A really unique menu.  I had the Jerry salad with tofu and the pickled veggies (they had a kick)!  My mom had the Casa salad with shrimp and the roasted cauliflower.  The cauliflower was amazing!  Loved the interior of this place too, a great vibe.  We will be back!