For more than 32 years, Don Luisi has lived in Sussex County, where he ran a construction company based in Sparta. When his business permitted him “semiretirement,” he resolved to “give back to Sparta by opening a New York-style steak and seafood grill.” Now hungry Spartans fill the dining room and lively bar for first-rate steaks, fresh seafood, and $13.95 to $16.95 Blue Plate specials like prime rib or pound-and-a-quarter Maine lobster, complete with sides.
Dubbed “Doc” by friends for his hands-on nature, Luisi supervised his own crew in renovating the Sparta building that formerly housed Francesca’s. He opened Doc’s in June 2007. With its vaulted beams, upholstered leather chairs, cream-colored walls, and burgundy carpeting, Doc’s 120-seat main room recalls a pre-war gentleman’s club or elegant hotel. The lighting is soft and flattering, and the noise level is muted. In warm weather, a 50-seat Tuscan brick patio with a 15-foot-high stone waterfall delivers intimate atmosphere.
The shift from construction executive to restaurateur was not that difficult. Luisi, 54, grew up in a West Orange family that owned places like the Derby nightclub, the Horse and Buggy, and the Mulberry Street Deli, all in Orange, and the Magic Carpet in Cedar Grove.
“From the time I could hold a spoon, I got that food should make you happy,” he says. “I’ve always cooked for people.” For decades, he volunteered at benefit dinners as a sous-chef under fine chefs. Luisi developed the menu for Doc’s, then last year hired chef Craig Shelton as a consultant for a few months. “Craig helped me translate my home recipes to restaurant scale,” Luisi says. “I found my key staffers, my [former] general manager, and my chef through Craig. His involvement lent culinary credibility to Doc’s.”
Shelton also contributed two winning dishes: Grandpa Shelton’s New England-style clam chowder, and the addictive Cuban spiced dates, which are wrapped in applewood-smoked bacon, dusted with brown sugar, cumin, and chili powder, and roasted. (The dates appear only on the bar menu but are served in the dining room by request.)
In truth, it’s been a bumpy ride. In the spacious kitchen Luisi built, five different executive chefs have come and gone. So has the GM Shelton recruited. Luisi attributes the revolving door to “luck of the draw, health, and attitude issues. Doc’s concept is not a look-at-me celebrity chef with an experimental kitchen. The food’s the show, not the cook. Some chefs can’t get behind that.”
Current executive chef Wade New, 33, who arrived last May, says he’s here to stay. He has ability, and the situation could work out for him. He was brought in by Shelton, whom he had assisted in 2008 when Shelton was consulting at Om, an upscale caterer in Whippany. Previously, New ran the kitchen at Pazzo Pazzo in Morristown for six years, then reported to David Burke as sous-chef at restaurant.mc in Millburn. “Wade is talented and easygoing,” Luisi says. “He’s solid, dependable but has flair. That’s what I want Doc’s food to be.”
New conjures eclectic daily specials such as house-made gnocchi in sage-flecked brown butter and maple-sassafras-glazed pork belly, a flavor combo from his North Carolina boyhood. “I love stopping at roadside markets on my commute from Morristown,” New says. “Whatever looks good I buy and work it into a special or side dish.”
Doc’s menu has some strong starters. The raw bar is excellent. A pan-seared Maryland lump-meat crab cake big as a baked potato is a purist’s delight. (It’s served with a non-purist’s delight, delicious tempura-battered sweet pickle disks.) Fried calamari are merely a foil for their sensational dip, a chunky San Marzano tomato sauce Luisi calls “my home marinara recipe.” Jersey clams are steamed in chardonnay, Portuguese style, with onions and crumbled chorizo (the sausage, alas, too salty for my taste). Crispy personal-size pizzas are ordinary, save for the lightly spiced, fennel-seeded Italian sausage slices, which also spark a side dish of white cannellini beans.
On to the main event. A half-dozen different Black Angus steaks come from DeBragga and Spitler in Manhattan, meat purveyor to New York celebrity chefs like Daniel Boulud, Tom Colicchio, Charlie Palmer, Eric Ripert, and Laurent Tourondel. New’s crew grills these richly flavorful cuts precisely to order on a gas-fired grill stoked with white oak chips beneath the flames, lending a faintly smoky flavor to the meat.
Doc’s priciest cuts—a 20-ounce bone-in Kansas City strip ($40) and a 48-ounce porterhouse ($75)—are the only ones dry aged, gaining the slight gaminess dry aging imparts, for an atavistically pleasurable eating experience. But Doc’s 14-ounce sliced skirt steak, tender as filet mignon and served Argentinean-style with a Buenos Aires-worthy chimichurri garlic sauce, delivers plenty of beef for the buck (22 of them). Veal porterhouse, prime rib, and Niman Ranch pork chop round out the meat offerings.
Lobster, salmon, tuna, swordfish, and a catch of the day can all be ordered grilled, blackened, or pan-seared. I chose the last for an entrée of yellowtail tuna, a half-pound fillet presented in four brownie-sized squares. As finessed by New, this was truly a trophy fish: ocean sweet, silky smooth, and utterly perfect even without its ramekin of tasty sesame dressing.
In true steakhouse fashion, sides are à la carte. Definitely treat yourself to a cone of Doc’s crisp, perfectly cut, sweet potato fries. Creamed spinach (Luisi’s recipe) is thick, rich, and lush with fresh spinach flavor; but I found the beer-battered Vidalia onion rings and the thickly sliced and fried Doc’s potatoes bland and superfluous.
After experimenting with commercial-tasting outsourced desserts of the chocolate-decadence variety, Luisi has upgraded quality while remaining steakhouse-conservative in concept. New’s kitchen now produces a classic vanilla crème brûlée, a New York-style cheesecake, and a crumb-topped farmhouse apple crisp intended for two but sufficient for four. A house-baked chocolate layer cake and a Kahlua-lavished banana split have recently been added.
The waitstaff are young but professional. The wine list is strong in New World varieties. Its “20 bottles for $20” proffers pleasant quaffs like Snoqualmie riesling from Washington State and Avalon cabernet from Napa.
Feeding folks is a tough business today. If Luisi can keep his staff together, he has an excellent chance to make Sparta a destination for fine seafood and steaks.