Ariel Levy: Gaonnuri in Midtown Review: The New Yorker It's not every night that you find yourself dining on the thirty-ninth floor of an office building near Penn Station, nor would you want to. But for the occasional escapist dinner experience there is no beating Gaonnuri, a vast lounge-style restaurant floating high over Thirty-second Street that serves quite tasty Korean fare and offers impressive views of Manhattan - though it doesn't actually feel like it's in Manhattan. Gaonnuri means "center of the world" in Korean, and indeed it seems to be located in a kind of alternate universe: not quite Tokyo, not quite Chicago, and certainly not quite Koreatown. The décor is modern and slick; the entryway has the ambience of a nice-enough boutique-hotel lobby. Inside the dining area itself, the skyline views are too distracting for the interior to matter much. The service is crisp and no-nonsense and features the prominent use of iPads. The food is, for the most part, traditional - as in traditional Americanized Korean cuisine - but, in its way, it is as transportive as the surroundings. Table grills always provide a certain amount of excitement, and, in keeping with the spirit of adventure, you may be tempted to order sliced duck breast or pork belly instead of the usual short rib for your barbecue. But the most predictable meats are still the best: rib eye and brisket, served with pickled radishes and carrots and bracing kimchi, do not disappoint. It's fun, though, to watch your waiter snip squash and giant mushrooms with scissors directly onto the flame, even if they do get a bit dried out in the cooking. Beautiful bowls of bibimbap arrive topped not with the traditional egg but with "micro greens" and "mountain vegetables." The effect is refreshing and spa-like. The sublimely slithery japchae was rich and chewy, yet clean-feeling. Not so the delicious selection of delicately flavored but deeply fried pancakes. Dessert is a fussy and baroque affair: the selections, like pineapple cremeux and deconstructed soo jeong kwa (poached Korean pear with cinnamon chantilly, yakgwa, and ginger ice cream), have a certain Cirque du Soleil quality. Alcohol flows freely at Gaonnuri - there's a full bar, and the cocktails aren't bad, but soju is really the way to go. On a recent visit, a raucous table let fly a booming cheer after downing an army of shots, and a waiter reacted with a fleeting frown: "They should know it's not that kind of restaurant." (Open Mondays through Saturdays for lunch and dinner. Entrées $18-$34.) ♦