My gf and I had dinner with her brother and his gf last night at a fairly new place in Lower Manhattan called Il Brigante. It’s just a block from the old Fulton Fish market building. Many new shops and restaurants have opened up since the fish market left and some of them are pretty good. Il Brigante is an Italian trattoria at 214 Front St (at Peck Slip), ph# 212-285-0222, serving some simply prepared food.
They brought out a basket of chewy, crusty bread and a small bowl of olive oil with balsamic vinegar in the middle for dipping. A nice alternative to butter and pretty standard in a lot of Italian restaurants in NYC.

I had the bruschetta appetizer ($7.00) of grilled bread topped with chopped tomatoes, garlic, red onion and parsley. You can see the grill marks on the bread in the photo and the tomatoes were very fresh and it had a wonderful, strong (not too strong) garlic punch.

My gf had the Insalata Mista ($7.00) which is a mixed green salad in a balsamic vinaigrette.

This is the special salad of shrimp and avocado (with onions and cherry tomatoes). I like the presentation with the avocado shell.

I had the Linguine Allo Scoglio ($18.00) which is imported scampi, calamari, mussels, clams, extra virgin olive oil, garlic, in a cherry tomato sauce. It was delicious! Somewhat spicy, the pasta was cooked just al dente and the seafood was very fresh.

My gf and her brother both had the grilled seafood special which was amazing! I almost wished I had gotten it as well. It was grilled shrimp, calamari, branzino ( a mild white fleshed fish) and swordfish. It with paired with grilled zuchini and roasted potatoes. The seafood was moist and luxurious and the char added a fantastic layer of flavor as well an incredible texture. As much as I liked it, it was $35 and a bit steep, I thought.

Adam’s gf had the Linguine Gamberetti E Zucchine ($15.00) which is sauteed shrimp, zucchini, extra virgin olive oil, garlic, white wine, and parsley. It looked good to me, but she said she was somewhat underwhelmed by it.

I wouldn’t call it "roadfood", but I just wanted to share. I thought it was a pretty good meal and would definitely return as there were some other items on the menu that looked pretty good and they have a wood-fired oven for making pizzas and other baked dishes. Their menu can be found on-line at http://www.menupages.com.