Casa Pública

Truitt — whose experience includes working under the Adria brothers at El Bulli and Stephen Starr at Morimoto — is focusing on regional Mexican home cooking with an opening menu of small plates like esquites, ceviche, tacos, and dishes like stuffed squash blossoms. Large plates include pozole verde and roast chicken with chile adobo. Montagano — formerly at Extra Fancy and La Sirena — is heading up front of the house and overseeing a cocktail selection that’s heavy on micheladas, frozen drinks, and cocktails for two or more.

The restaurant’s design is influenced by Mexico City’s rich history of Art Deco architecture… with a menu that blends Mexican home cooking and market dishes…There’s a trompo Truitt will use to make proper al pastor tacos, also offered with fillings like steak with melted cheese, and stuffed squash blossoms with huitlacoche mayo. Tostadas will be topped with crab, uni, and peanut salsa, while more substantial dishes will include chilaquiles with mole, and crispy soft-shell crab with hominy polenta. The desserts will be simple sweets, including a flan made with goat’s-milk caramel, strawberry sorbet, and an ice-cream version of tascalate, the toasted maize-and-chocolate drink from Chiapas.

The decor and the dishes are both meant to evoke the past and present of Mexico City. In this interpretation, that means heirloom corn tortillas for carnitas ($8) and squash blossom ($13) tacos; tostadas topped with crab, sea urchin and avocado in a spicy peanut sauce ($20); and Pollo Abobada ($24), roasted chicken in guajillo adobo with fingerling potatoes and a pico de gallo made with nopales (cactus).