Tom Colicchio Opens His First New Restaurant in 2 Years on Long Island

Celebrity chef Tom Colicchio is set to open his first new restaurant in more than two years, this time on Long Island. Small Batch, opening tomorrow, will serve American fare made from locally sourced ingredients in a rustic, 180-seat space at Roosevelt Field in Garden City.

The space, modeled after a farmhouse, will feature an open kitchen and wood-fire grill churning out an American menu with an emphasis on Long Island regional products. Starters include honeycrisp apple and delicata squash with honey, smoked chile, and country ham. There will be a raw bar and seafood mains, like grilled swordfish, roasted cod, and braised tuna.

The Top Chef judge also has four kinds of pasta on the menu, along with meaty mains like braised pork belly, Long Island duck, smoked short rib, and grilled lamb sausage. A portion of the menu is dedicated to the wood-fire grill, with offerings like a half chicken, bone-in lamb loin, and a dry-aged New York strip.

The beverage program will also center New York products, with a wine list of over 100 bottles all under $100. Locally made vodka from Long Island Spirits, a craft distillery in Baiting Hollow, NY, will also be on hand. Signature cocktails are $13 and include the “bull moose,” made with rye, coffee, vermouth, and Campari. All of the draft beer options hail from New York, from breweries like Grimm, Evil Twin, the Bronx’s Gun Hill, Oceanside’s Barrier, and Staten Island’s Flagship.

In the past couple years, Colicchio’s restaurant group Crafted Hospitality has lost two NYC restaurants, including Craftbar, which resided in Flatiron for 15 years before shuttering due to a rent hike in 2017. The year before, Colicchio shuttered his West Chelsea restaurant Colicchio & Sons, which was previously the steakhouse Craftsteak before a rebrand in 2010. But some of chef’s NYC mainstays remain, like the original Craft and the Kips Bay restaurant-with-a-view, Riverpark.

The last entry into the Colicchio NYC empire before Small Batch was Temple Court, the FiDi restaurant previously known as Fowler & Wells before it changed its name due to racist connotations.

Small Batch will serve lunch, dinner, and brunch. There will also be a happy hour during the week from 3:30 to 6:30 p.m. It opens at 630 Old Country Rd. in Garden City, NY tomorrow.