My first visit to Tribeca Grill was sometime during my first year in New York, in 1992 or 1993.

I was overly impressed that Robert DeNiro owned the restaurant that I WAS EATING IN. I really  thought DeNiro might be standing quietly at the end of the bar, notice me and my friends and raise his glass to us in a subtle Robert-DeNiro-kind-of-way.

Tribeca Grill’s longevity is not unheard of in New York restaurants, but against the odds. Many restaurants that were once white-hot dissolve into the ether of the forgotten. Good restaurants too—not just the trendy ones. A New Yorker’s memory is short.

Each annual update of Zagat’s contains a tribute page of once-loved restaurants that bit the dust in the last year. Oh yeah, I remember that one . . . too bad, but where are we going to eat tonight?

Celebrity-owned restaurants have an especially high mortality rate. Remember Planet Hollywood? Remember Britney Spears had a restaurant for five minutes? Five points if you can think of the name.

Gene and I ate at Tribeca Grill for the billionth time recently. The place has become a standard for us. Not trendy anymore, like its sister restaurant next door, Locanda Verde, but comfortable. The brick walls emit a homey warmth and the upside-down sombero chandeliers, well, what can you say about the audacity of lit-up, upside-down sombreros?

I ordered an red-wine braised octopus salad and herb-roasted monkfish with lobster ravolini. Gene had the charcuterie plate as an appetizer and the alaskan halibut as a main course. A booth and a bottle of wine made our late, romantic Sunday night dinner perfect.

Will Tribeca Grill still be there next year? The year after? I hope so.

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