Story

This building was a ferry freight shed in the 1920s. The trusses are still overhead and we left them where they were.

Inside there are a hundred and sixty seats. One long dining room, with the raw bar running down the side of it.

The old ticket office is the Ferry Room now. Thirty at the table, forty standing, and a bar of its own.

Outside there are sixty more seats on the water, looking across at lower Manhattan. The terrace is open May through October, and only when the weather agrees. At brunch those tables are first come, first served. At dinner you can book one.

Hoboken Terminal is ten minutes south on foot. The boat from Midtown lands two blocks away.

It is bright, and it gets loud. Families come at brunch. At night the same tables are two people on a date.

Mediterranean in the wide sense. Greek, southern Italian, Levantine.

Most of it meets fire. There is a wood-fired oven and there is charcoal, and between them come the branzino, the lamb shoulder for two, the wood-fired chicken and the octopus.

From three o'clock the raw bar runs without a reservation: oysters from Long Island and Cape Cod, tuna crudo, shrimp in harissa butter. Tuesday through Friday, until six, the oysters are $1.75.

Fish comes out whole. Lamb comes out for the table.

Brunch is a real service and not an afterthought. Shakshuka, ricotta pancakes with fig compote, lamb hash, the burger. Olive-oil cake after it.

Elena Marchetti grew up in Hoboken, above her family's deli.

She cooked in Athens, then Palermo, then at Marea in New York.

She walked past this shed as a child. In 2022 she opened it as Fig & Ferry.

She is the chef and the owner. Tomas Reyes runs the floor, Sofia Adler runs pastry, Marcus Bell runs the bar, and Ines Duarte keeps the wine.