Black Crescent

Amazing! Reynold the host was a true gem. great music and I highly recommend the ‘El Burro’ and the buffalo octopus was out of this world!

I had never had oysters before, this was a great place to try them. The food was really delicious, especially if you like seafood. I loved the clams, and the drinks are so so good. The atmosphere is really cozy and relaxing which I loved as well.

The first time the bartender screamed at me across the restaurant, from behind the bar, I thought he was joking, so I kind of laughed in a «this is a really awkward joke» laugh. But when he ran around and slammed the check on the table and rudely yelled (loud enough for other tables to turn and look) «DON’T EVER COME BACK», I sort of just sat there in shock.
This was his response to me holding up an «old fashioned» into the light above me to confirm the fact that there were in fact, no bitters, or any other typical ingredients in my cocktail. But rather it consisted of only whisky and ice.
So we left after paying for our whiskey on the rocks that we did not order, and will never return.

We stumbled upon this place, looking for a late night drink and snack while in the lower east side. What a find! I sampled 3 different beers, all excellent and had the calamari, lightly fried with peppers and a tasty light sauce. Delicious!
My wife had their special, pork sliders which were prepared fresh, and again, with a great sauce. She wants to return to sample their specialty cocktails when she is not my DD!
Do yourself a favor and try this cozy, tastefully decorated place!

Solid cocktail bar on the LES. I came on a Sunday night and it was uncrowded and peaceful.

Great Manhattan!, Oysters were awesome! Bartender was soooo cool I could hit a resort with him and kill some clients! And the jukebox was playing everything I ever bought! Do it!

Best drinks, best beers and out of this world seafood!!! The staff and atmosphere are amazing as well. Do yourself a favor and come here!!!

Me and my wife had a horrible flight from Orlando with a lot of delays. We were very tired and negative! But this place helped us relax and finally enjoy our Nyc trip! Staff is outstanding, oysters fresh, cocktails amazing!!!

Worst service I ever had. Very very rude bartenders. Food and cocktails are okay but just OK. Service ruins everything. They should be ashamed their attitude. Won’t never come back here.

I’ve never thought about writing any reviews on Unilocal but decided to do this because me and my friend experienced the worst service last night.
One star is for the oysters and mussels. No doubt that was really really great.
We came here on Friday night during happy hour, the bar was busy yet wasn’t crazy packed, two bartenders (one long hair, one short hair) working at the bar and we were served by a short hair bearded guy, and HE WAS REALLY RUDE. Maybe he had a bad day, but seriously? Be professional! Not only one time he gave us the attitude like «you’re not the only one sitting here there’re other people need me too» or «just wait, this is how the system works here», me and my friend always asking for things very nicely, and never pushed when he’s busy. We were really regretted that we didn’t ask for the bar manager since we don’t deserve be treated like this after a long week at work. If he’s always grumpy when the bar gets busy, maybe he shouldn’t work at a bar in New York.
We are not needy customers but just wanted to be treated fairly because we were nice to the bartender.
Please educate your staff better!

We visited the bar after dinner on a Saturday night as a big group (approx 10 people). The cocktails were delicious.
Unfortunately, there was one member of the bar staff (who we later found out was the owner) was quite rude. Because of the layout of the tables, the bar staff who moved through the crowd did not have a direct route to walk to and from the bar. In order to maneuver through the crowd, this server would walk right behind someone and yell «MOVE».
When we ordered drinks he also indicated that our group, the majority of the patrons at that time, should «go somewhere where they would play Mariah Carey „Honey“ because we don’t play Mariah Carey here».
Sadly I will not be returning due to the way we were treated.

We are so excited that Black Crescent is back and better than ever! The drinks are creative and delicious and they’ve got a great selection of interesting wine («cool stuff» as Carlos would say). I dream about the Jambalaya. A little bowl of heaven! These guys know good food, cocktails and fun with the perfect amount of cool and elegance!

Very cool neighborhood bar with friendly, welcoming staff. Look forward to coming back

BC is BACK! After a fire and rebuilding, they are reclaiming their place in NYC making the best food and cocktails. Can’t wait to get my hands on the smoked negroni and some bang bang shrimp! The dudes of Black Crescent represent the best of NYC.

Black Crescent is back… And it’s better than ever. The legendary trifecta of Reynolds, Dustin and Carlos have risen from the ashes:) to warm your hearts with the best drinks, bites and laughs this city has to offer. Party time!!!

You have to do something really bad to make me give you a 1-​star review. Until now, only 3 of my reviews have been 1 star, and one of them was for USPS. Is your food mediocre or even a little bit gross? I probably still will give you two stars. Lazy, uninspired service does not faze me. Essentially, you have to be trying to do a really crappy job to get such a low rating. So I’d like to congratulate the staff of the Black Crescent for being so obnoxiously rude that it caused me to give this place, which actually makes decent cocktails, one friggin star.
Several weeks ago my friend, who was visiting New York, and I came in for drinks and bar bites. Upon entering, there was no one to seat us, and all of the seats were taken. No one approached us or anything, so we just stood around looking for a table or seats at the bar. We were the only people in the bar that weren’t sitting down; nobody else looked to be waiting for anything. I took the opportunity to go to the bathroom, and when I came out, my friend had located two seats at the bar and we started to walk over. That space was really cramped, though, so once we saw a table open up we grabbed it.
Here’s what happened next:
Employee: So, do you guys want to bus the table or should I?
My friend and I: [confused; I thought maybe it was a bad joke] Um… I guess you?
Employee: Well, THIS person (pointing at a person sitting at the table next to us) has been waiting for this table. You guys have a spot at the bar. Or do you have six people coming here to fill up this table?
My friend and I are kind of stunned, but we slowly get up.
Me: I’m sorry… we saw a table open and sat down.
Employee: [Sounding super annoyed] It’s okay.
It’s really not okay, dude. There were zero reasons for you to be a jerk to us. There were no instructions given to us for how to get a table. Even if we did (unbeknownst to us) take someone’s table, why not just tell us nicely? Why would you purposefully alienate your customers like that? There are a bunch of other reviews from people about how mean this guy is… eventually people are going to start taking notice and maybe choose one of the other 1,000 other cocktail bars that you can go to in the city.
Anyway, back at our outcast seats at the bar, we did stick around long enough to have one drink. I didn’t really want to as I felt uncomfortable and embarrassed but we came here on purpose and didn’t have any other bars in mind. I had a mescal drink off of the menu; I forget what it was called, but it was good– tasted like a pretty typical mescal cocktail. My friend had the «Five Dollar Shake», made with chocolate-​infused Green Chartreuse, Bourbon, egg and sea salt. It was good as well; tasted like a boozy milkshake. Obviously more than five dollars. I fully expected to be berated some more if we stuck around longer, so after downing our drinks we decided to leave and check out Attaboy (where we ended up having a great experience, btw). As we left, we noticed that the «THIS guy» who was waiting for the table was no longer there. Instead, there were two girls sitting there. I’m not sure why they didn’t receive the same treatment that we did; maybe the guy just decided to target us – or maybe everyone who comes in gets it and we just missed the verbal abuse directed at them. Regardless, I would be seriously wary of coming here.

Went Friday Dec 12. Bartender was a d*ck. Don’t come here. First 1 star review in years. Normally I just post my 5 stars.
Already got several compliments from Unilocalers. Bad sign. This despite lack of other bad reviews.
Hoping it was just the bartender in a sh*t mood that night. Wow, he alone managed to piss of ⁴⁄₆ people in our party. Other serving staff were nice.
STRIKE 1) Person went to bar looking for menu, bartender snipped at her ‘yeah, just don’t try stealing the menu’. WTF?! Bad day? Lame joke? Just say hi or nothing at all if you can’t muster a smile. Otherwise skip the smart ass comments.
STRIKE 2) Same guy appeared pacing a lot around the tables. Stressed? Noticed a stool out of place and shoved it at another woman in our party hitting her in the legs. 2 minutes later he quickly slammed a drink on the table spilling it partially on a third woman of our party.
STRIKE 3) We asked for the check. Didn’t get it after 10 mins. One of the guys in our party went to the bar to ask bartender and was rudely pushed off. This friend tips 20−30% even in bad service. You just f*cked up your last chance at a tip! Same bartender shows up finally with said check and a big smile. Too late. We left a zero tip. Same bartender yells at us as we leave ‘and don’t ever come back!’. Good one, unprofessional, you never asked why we were unhappy.
To the only bartender that night. You royally screwed it up. Keep your personal issues to yourself, or don’t come into work. You’d be more at home working at the DMV. You just lost tips on a $ 150 tab. And everyone in Unilocal knows now. Too bad your other nice staff lost their tips too. Your goodbye almost made me regret I even paid for my drink.

Super cute spot! So hesitant to write a review, but I figured they deserve their props.
Black Crescent is THE place to kick back in a non-​pretentious bar to slurp some $ 1 HH oysters and $ 9 Old Fashions. I’m not sure about you, but that sounds about the definition of Perfection to me ;)
The owner promptly opened up at 6pm and put in our order of 3 doz oysters with no restrictions (some places make you order 1 dz at a time, ick). The oysters were not your run of the mill measly HH oysters; instead they were plump and flavorful. And the Old Fashions hit the spotttttt. Absolutely recommend!

I know many people loved Alias, but despite many times thinking I had to go to a seemingly neighborhood institution, I had frequently stopped in to look at the menu before concluding I couldn’t see the reason why to go. I was intrigued when Black Crescent revamped the space and have been looking for the right opportunity to swing in for some oysters.
What Black Crescent has done is illustrative of the best aspects of the Lower East Side’s current transition. In some respects, many will lament the demise of the more affordable hippie-​esque spots like Alias; on the other hand, the neighborhood is gaining increasing access to well-​curated delicacies delivered by wonderful and knowledgeable staff in more upscale environments.
Our server was well-​versed in oysters and described all of the items we asked about in eloquent fashion. During happy hour, North Shore (Long Island) oysters are available for $.99 each, and they are delicious. Our favorite oysters are from the west coast so we sampled the Kumomoto ($ 3.50/ea.) and the Steamboat ($ 3/​ea.), as well. they were all extremely fresh and delicious. There is a happy hour drink list as well, and prosecco is available for $ 9/​glass.
This was a perfect spot to grab a drink and oysters before dinner, and I hope to be back soon.

Black Crescent opened earlier this year to surprisingly little fanfare. Not that it wasn’t well-​deserved; when the dishes are concocted by Dustin Everett (who spent extensive time working in the kitchens with John Besh) and the cocktails are dreamt up by Michael Reynolds (formerly of The Beagle, The McKittrick Hotel, and Booker & Dax) it was almost guaranteed to be a success.
A few friends and I wandered in on a Saturday evening, looking for a spot to get a drink or two before a later dinner. I don’t know what exactly what I was expecting prior to entering, but it bore no resemblance to the cocktail bar I had concocted in my mind. Black Crescent sports a dark, wood-​based interior that forgoes any pretenses. The décor is practical and pared down, with several tables meant for groups, a few stools against the bar counter, and plenty of standing room. We managed to snag seats at the bar, where we were greeted by the mixologist and handed menus.
To say that the drinks available here are tempting would be an understatement. Why not try the Rosemary Pimms, highlighted by lemon, cucumber, and honey, and served on the rocks? Or a simpler Delta Bravo, with gin, lemon, honey, and yuzu, served tall? While there were less than ten options printed, it didn’t make the decision any easier. At the end, I asked if I could have the Confederate Officer, with the bourbon swapped out for gin, a request that the bartender was willing to fulfill, if not before telling me (with a wink) that it wouldn’t be quite as good. And the drink? An expertly crafted concoction that highlighted the sweetness and freshness of peaches, mint, and lemon, all served on the rocks. The gin was subtly layered in so that I barely even noticed it, and yes, this was one of the few cocktails that I had no difficulty finishing.
Black Crescent also offers a solid happy hour that runs until 8PM, which features dollar oysters and discounts on a few drinks. While they do call themselves an «Oyster Bar», don’t skip out on the cocktails offered as well; the former may get you through the door, but the latter will encourage you to return.