Molto Trendy Two new Italian joints hew to a familiar contemporary formula. And both are pretty good. 
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Centro Vinoteca (Photo: David Leventi)
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Restaurateurs, like TV producers, stand-up comics, and gold prospectors, operate in a landscape fraught with extreme hazard and duress. So once they hit on a formula that works, they tend to repeat it, often with a kind of slavish devotion. Sasha Muniak’s formula for success appears to be this: Find a smallish, offbeat space in the West Village, pattern the floors with lots of terrazzo tiles to ensure the noise levels will be deafening, contrive a menu comprising the latest Italian dining trends, then hire the most promising female chef you can find to execute it. The formula worked almost too well at Muniak’s Gusto Ristorante e Bar Americano, a clamorous establishment whose chef, Jody Williams, soon departed to run Keith McNally’s equally frantic Italian brasserie, Morandi. Now comes Centro Vinoteca, a lively little noise box of a place that opened this summer in a formerly cursed location (most recently, it was a carryout Thai restaurant) in the scruffy lower regions of Seventh Avenue.
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