Hea

I came to Hea a couple years ago for a Columbia Alumni HH event. The venue seemed alright, but due to the number of people it felt cramped.
I never had a chance to try the food, but wasn’t ever tempted to since I’m not a huge Asian fusion fan. This all doesn’t matter since Hea is now closed.

Had the sushi and it was great. The service was very decent and the sake was very good. I specifically liked the view of 3^rd while I ate.

Brand new place. The décor is nice and the outdoor seating is comfortable. Prices aren’t bad and the drinks are good.
The sushi is great, my fiancée loves it and she dislikes sushi in principal. So you know it’s good. We’ve eaten there four or five times and it’s consistently great.

Great décor and I love the top floor’s big open windows to overlook the streets. I didn’t have the food here, but the drinks were good, esp. the lychee bellini. Our bartender was really nice and attentive, great customer service… would definitely come back here again to try out the food!

Been here twice, once before the menu changed and once after.
I liked it the 1^st time time, but a lot better the 2^nd time.
Small plates were all easily shareable and the pork belly here was nicely done. They also had this corn tempura fritter that came with a dish which was really good.
I like how its spacious and not too pretentious so that you can just walk in and have dinner.

A split level bar indeed. The top level is a private room, which our entire group utilized for a birthday party for one of my party promoters targeting Asians. I cannot comment on the quality, taste of the food or drinks since I arrive late when the bill came due to my work schedule. Since I’ve arrived very late I didn’t order any food or drink as the group was ready to leave, thus no comment on food or drink. The menu obviously screams Asian Fusion cuisine as it not remotely close to authentic Chinese, a far cry indeed.
The price for our gargantuan party of approx. twenty five people was a whopping $ 660.00. I do not recommend this restaurant as patrons will need to dig very deep into their wallet for a meal. The décor is traditional Chinese wooden Ming furniture. I rate it four stars as it’s not authentic Chinese. This restaurant completely caters to American palate as when traveling to China or Hong Kong you would never find duck sauce or any of these entrees.

Its a decent split level bar, with the 1^st floor level being better decorated and inviting than the upstairs. Have never eaten here so can’t comment on the food, but had drinks a couple times. Prices are pretty expensive for the area and the ambiance doesn’t quite make up for the cost of drinks. Everytime I have been it has been half-​empty so it doesn’t seem to have attracted their target audience yet, which seems to be the late 20’s and 30’s professional looking for a quiet lounge spot in the E. Village. The asian themed lounge is nicely decorated but the bar area itself is fairly small. Decent place to grab a quiet drink with a friend or date, but definitely not a nightime destination spot.

The food is decent, overpriced. We had a the steak and some sushi, the steak was good but not $ 24 good. The sushi was mediocre. The service was atrocious. Décor is pretty classy but uncomfortable.

Hea is, I suppose, a pan-​Asian concept occupying upstairs and downstairs of a very square building with windows opening onto the corner of 13^th and 3^rd, and its name announced in large letters, high on the redbrick façade. Large windows offer great views at both levels. Everything about the look of Hea says «big» and «bold», except that it has always seemed a little quiet inside.
I think it sets itself a tough challenge, trying to sell a medium-​elaborate pan-​Asian menu at these prices on a strip of the Avenue which has, for the most part, nightlife geared to the very young. Apiary nearby is an adult exception, but this is the zone of the Village Pourhouse, Nevada Smith’s soccer bar, the NYU-​packed The Smith, and so on.
Hea ambitiously offers an austerely modern lounge atmosphere, with cocktails, wine, and a short selection of well-​chosen beers. The menu is roughly Chinese-​Malaysian-​Indonesian (chef Meng Kong is Malaysian), with sushi too.
Salmon sashimi looked pretty, topped with a thin slice of sweet– pickled onion and some salmon eggs. An eel and cucumber roll was precisely to standard. Entrées arrived in that awkwardly sized portion increasingly common in Manhattan restaurants: a bit too large for one person — although a glutton can certainly cope — not quite large enough to be a dish for two. Ideally, a party of four here should order three main dishes, and some sticky rice.
The pork belly, apparently marinated, then braised in a soy-​sauce, sugar, Chinese wine mix, is served over a tasty scattering of fingerling potatoes and mushrooms. It’s enjoyable, although it lacks the wobbly grandeur of the towering belly at Shang, and my diminutive dining companion rated it below Momofuku’s.
There was plenty of it, and fried chicken came in a mammoth serving too. The kitchen shows skill in keeping the crust very crunchy, while cooking the flesh to that sort of trembling tenderness I associate with poached chicken in Chinese restaurants. Generous food, then, pleasantly served — but two appetizers, the two large meat dishes, and a couple of beers pushed the check up toward ninety dollars with tip, primarily because entrée prices are in the twenties. With desserts, with a cocktail or two, this starts to become an expensive proposition, and I’m not sure what the target market is.
Apiary, where Scott Bryan (famously once of Veritas) is now cooking is priced in the same bracket a short step away. The Smith, which — if horribly noisy — is pretty good, is also significantly cheaper. Serious fans of Asian food will do better in Chinatown, leaving Hea awkwardly suspended between Mott Street and the much more expensive Nobus and Shangs of this world.

One the place i always wanted to go. finally made there one day. I would say the first floor is definitely better/​trendier than the second floor.
It looks very trendy from outside, which explained why I always wanted to go. but the place is a typical lounge. bar/​couches.
I don’t really get the special vibe of this place. been there done that.

Surprisingly good for a little fusion place.
The waitstaff here is patient, and knows a fair amount about wines and drinks. The space itself is a dark, rich set of colors in a bright modern package.
Fun to be with a large group of friends and with a few bottles of wine, spend the night chatting upstairs in the large group room (separate bar upstairs, too).

this place is pretty good. I liked the atmosphere — sitting upstairs near the window gives you a nice view of 3^rd avenue. It’s a japanese restaurant but they were playing reggae and hip-​hop in the background which was amusing.
I got 2 sushi rolls with brown rice and miso soup — my dinner mate got the red curry with chicken. Sushi was good but pretty pricey! my 2 veggie rolls totaled 13 bucks. hm. I guess that’s pretty average — but I think I generally pay less when the rolls are fish-​less.
Decent food, nothing WOW — but for a cute trendy place to get some japanese/​thai food — it’s solid.

I’ve walked by this place a few times, intrigued by the interiors I decided to check it out with a catch-​up dinner with a friend.
It isn’t chinese or japanese — its a fusion blend of both. They offer rolls & sushi, appys and wok dishes. The place was empty on a Tues night @ 8:30pm and there was a live DJ downstairs (God knows why)
The vibe seemed nice for a pre-​drinking/​clubbing spot. I came in with no expectations but the menu proved to be quite good.
We ordered, a dragon roll, crispy duck, miso cod and pork belly. All were very good. Pork belly & Miso cod were my faves!
No drinks but our total came to abt $ 40 for 2. Not bad. I’d come back when its a little more crowded and feels a little more hip & cool. :D

Friend wanted saki-​bombs (why? oh why?) and on our trek we were finding most saki bars crowded. On a Saturday night… this place was empty. Empty on a Saturday night at 11pm. I definitely didn’t want it to be crowded, but it was DEAD.
That being said it was serviceable. Didn’t try the food so I can only attest to the drinks. If you’re not drinking saki, and they don’t have a wide array of it, try the gin/​lemon/​mint mojito-​type drink. Otherwise, move along.

After Xing closed, I’ve been looking for a new upscale and fun chinese restaurant to fit into me repetoire. Hea is right around the corner from where my brother and sister live and we all went to check it out last night.
Overall, I was very impressed. I had the Hea vegetable tempura roll and a miso soup, both of which were very tasty. However the winner here is the Duck with Mango. Its amazing, and at $ 16, I think I’ll be hitting it up quite often (spicy, sweet and tender).
The house cocktails were quite good and the atmosphere was nice as well. Very impressed and am officially addicted to that duck dish.

i went here for a friend’s birthday dinner. i had previously been before for drinks. the bar downstairs is spacious and the drink selection melds beer, wine and your typical asian inspired cocktails.
as for dinner our group of 10 started with small plates which were, in my opinion, better than the entrees. ribs and soft shell crab tied for our favs. i had ordered the hea skate, but the waitress came by later to announce that there was only one left. two of us were relegated to order other dish and i was one of them. i ended up getting the mango chicken. it came out very saucy and sweet-​a little too much. two of my other friends said the duck was also very saucy. they need rice to tame the overpowering flavors.
lastly, if you plan to bring your cake to hea, it’s $ 2/​person for plating. not bad, but we decided to eat that at home.

My freaking God. This place is good.
I discovered this place by going on the M103 bus from Chinatown to my regular stop. This was about eight o’clock at night so Hea was actually open. I saw a pretty building out the window with the chinese symbol in the corner of the building (which means Happiness fyi) and I went «OOH! Look at that place!» to my parents and my aunt. They all looked out the window and made some comments about it.
So that weekend, I went to Hea with my best friend before we hit a club. We didn’t eat downstairs but it looked really loungy. We went upstairs, where the restaurant area was. When you go up the lit up steps, there’s a sushi bar in the corner and tables around the floor. I mean it was kind of small compared to looking at the building from the outside but who’s complaining? It was certainly has nice décor. I must say, our waitress was realllllllly sweet and extremely informative. Since we didn’t really know Japanese, she told us what certain sashimi were actually in english. Their sushi is f-​r-​e-​s-​h. I actually never tasted anything like it. Haha. I had the Salmon (I forgot the japanese name for it), Squid (Ika, it tastes a lot better than you think), and Uni (Sea Urchin, I think, and no, it doesn’t taste so good but eh, its an acquired taste). It was… yum. Hahahaha.
I would definitely come back again. :D

After wandering through 3 neighborhoods trying to find a place that fit everybody’s taste we stumbled upon Hea (pronounced «He» rather than a Boston «Here».) The simple, modern façade and beautiful interior two floors of the restaurant sold us before we took our seats.
Primarily made up of Thai small plates and Japanese sushi options, the menu is an interesting fusion. Since we were a group we went with shared appetizers of edamame, rock shrimp, and short ribs. Everything was tasty, though the edamame stood out with a light basil flavor.
For entrees, our group decided to get a mish mash of sushi options. The rolls that stood out: Lobster Tempura roll, Chilean Sea bass roll and the Taro nigiri. Definitely wouldn’t recommend the Tempura Shrimp roll… pickled carrots = yuck.
The prices are definitely acceptable for dinner, with the 2 most expensive rolls running $ 11 and $ 12.
Overall, we had a good time. They accommodated our table that grew from 4 to 5 people mid-​meal and our picky drink order (I don’t like coconut in my lychee martinis, sorry!)

I was pretty excited to hear Hea finally opened. I enjoyed watching the place some together piece by piece.
I had my first meal there this past week and I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the food… or more specifically, the sushi. I had my server obtain recommendations from the chef as to which fish looked the best that night and I ended up with several fantastic pieces of fresh and varied sushi. The prices were fairly normal, except for the sake. My server recommended one of the more expensive sakes and I can’t say I thought it was worth the extra price.
The décor is hip and the vibe is somewhat lounge-​like. I ate downstairs, so I haven’t seen the upstairs seating area yet… but it looks cool from the street.
I am quite pleased this place moved in… and that it’s actually good. Hopefully the NYU crowd won’t figure out that this place exists.

Hea is good but not great.
I feel for it – I do. (Probably because the first thing the waitress said was, «It’s been a hard few months»).
The décor feels a bit catalog. (Though the view onto 3^rd ave is pretty sweet). They didn’t have half of the items we tried to order. (Running the gamut from drinks to entrees). The food was good. It was good! And the prices? A bit high for the block.
I don’t love Hea. But I want it to stick around. It is a nice option, and a good place to take my mom when she’s in town.