tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-192140022024-03-18T19:56:16.456-07:00Food Writer’s DiaryBret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.comBlogger799125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-11831533386442520272012-07-20T14:15:00.002-07:002012-07-20T14:44:09.184-07:00Cathy’s gaffe reminds us that, when you make a comment, everyone’s listening<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
July 20<br />
<br />
This blog has a new home, read my latest post h<a href="http://nrn.com/article/when-you-make-comment-everyones-listening?ad=nrn-blogs">ere</a>.</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-81163661321782285272012-05-29T10:32:00.000-07:002012-05-29T10:32:30.505-07:00Drinks as medicine<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial;"><i>Dear blog reader, sorry I've been out of touch. I've been doing a lot of reporting on </i>Nation's Restaurant News<i>' <a href="http://nrn.com/">web site</a>, which is my main job. In fact, this blog is hosted there, too, as part of our <a href="http://nrn.com/food-and-beverage">Food & Beverage page</a>. Check it out there, or here; whichever you prefer.</i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">May 23,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">When it comes to eating, it’s a well-established rule that good taste
trumps good nutrition, almost all the time. It’s true that a growing number of
Americans will lean toward eating something that seems to be better for them as
long as it’s delicious, but it has to be delicious first.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">That’s not necessarily true with drinks. We Americans might be loath to
eat our medicine, but we seem O.K. about drinking it, whether it’s vaguely
life-sustaining antioxidants, restorative electrolytes, oddly named probiotics,
or fast-acting energy boosters. I think that’s why salty, weird-tasting sports
drinks remain popular even as carbonated beverage sales continue to decline,
and why sales of energy drinks are booming despite the fact that many of them
taste like sweetened battery acid.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">The last time I checked statistics for sales of ready-to-drink tea in
the United States, 40 percent of it was green tea.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">You can’t tell me that most Americans actually like the subtly bitter,
grassy taste of green tea. Besides, most bottled green tea is sweetened (these
days often with cane sugar or agave nectar) and mixed with enough fruit
flavoring that you’d have no way of knowing there might also be some tea in
there somewhere.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">But if we don’t necessarily embrace the flavor of green tea, we
certainly seem to like the idea of it and all its antioxidants — and, I
suspect, the fact that it comes from the exotic Far East, where, for some
reason, we think everything they eat is good for you.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">With the exception of the explosion of smoothies everywhere, from hotel
brunch menus to McDonald’s, restaurants are really just in the early stages of
capitalizing on the drink-as-health-tonic trend.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Some furtive experiments have been made to sell branded energy drinks,
but from what I’ve heard they’ve generally been drunk more by staff than
customers.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Starbucks has finally introduced its own line of <span style="color: #004fc3; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;"><a href="http://nrn.com/article/starbucks-refreshers-energy-drink-debut">energy drinks called Refreshers</a></span>. They’re sparkling beverages boosted with
caffeine-charged green coffee extract that the chain’s web site promises “looks
and tastes nothing like coffee,” as well as ginseng and B and C vitamins.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Aaron Jourden, an editor with foodservice research firm Technomic’s
information services, whom I interviewed for a story I wrote earlier this month
on cold drinks, pointed out that both Honey Dew Donuts and Sheetz were spiking
some of their beverages with branded energy drinks, and that 7-Eleven now has
Big Energy Coffee, which has no sugar, but does have ginseng, gingko and
vitamins.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">I also interviewed Regan Jasper, the director of hospitality and
beverage for Fox Restaurant Group in Scottsdale, Ariz. For Fox’s True Food
Kitchen, a four-unit concept with food based on the anti-inflammatory diet of
Andrew Weil, he developed an energy drink called the Medicine Man.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">To make the drink he steeps 10 black teabags in a teapot for about an
hour to make a dark, bitter caffeine extract.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">He mixes two ounces of that with pomegranate juice and cranberry juice,
both of which are supposed to be anti-inflammatory; muddled blueberries that
are reported to have anti-aging qualities as well as being awesome for your
prostate; and extract of sea buckthorn, a favorite ingredient of Dr. Weill’s
despite its medicinal taste and extreme sourness. Jasper tells me that if you
sweeten sea buckthorn extract with agave nectar, it takes on a flavor
reminiscent of peach or apricot.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">That concoction is topped with soda water and sold for $6 for a 16-ounce
glass. It’s the restaurant’s most popular beverage, a clear indication that
drinks-as-medicine is a trend with legs.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<!--EndFragment--></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-85940579038508492182012-05-08T12:31:00.000-07:002012-05-09T10:00:04.315-07:00Beard 2012<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
May 8<br />
<br />
Well, I did slightly better in <a href="http://nrnfoodwriter.blogspot.com/2012/03/beard-handicapping-2012.html">predicting the winners of the Beard Awards</a> this year than last year. I got five out of 20 right instead of four out of 19, which is still terrible.<br />
<br />
I correctly guessed that Next would win for best new restaurant, PDT for outstanding bar program, Boulevard for outstanding restaurant, Michael Anthony for best chef in New York City and Chris Hastings for best chef in the South.<br />
<br />
I got everything else wrong.<br />
<br />
But no matter. It’s not whether you win or lose a Beard Award, it’s how you work it. Getting nominated year after year means you get free press year after year. Once you win, you get a medal and a burst of free press, but then you have to find new ways to draw attention to yourself.<br />
<br />
I chose a different strategy in covering the awards this year. Rather than spend the night in the press room, which is always a <a href="http://nrnfoodwriter.blogspot.com/2011/05/beard-awards-press-room-or-audience.html">fun party</a>, but completely unrelated to the actual awards, I decided to go ahead and sit in Avery Fisher Hall and take notes.<br />
<br />
I was worried that I’d fall asleep. I'd awakened in Chicago at 6 a.m. to write <a href="http://nrn.com/article/10-trends-2012-nra-show">this trend piece</a> on what was on display at the National Restaurant Association show in Chicago, then I took a 15-minute nap, packed, headed to the airport, landed in New York, took a taxi to NRN's office, changed into my tuxedo and took the 1 train to Avery Fisher Hall for the Beard Awards.<br />
<br />
But I guess the double-espresso I had before the awards started did the trick, and I sat through the three-and-a-half-hour ceremony wide awake, only getting antsy after two hours because I'd been sitting for two hours.<br />
<br />
It had been years since I'd sat in that hall, and I realized that the best part of the awards was missed in the press room. It was the stuff that seemed like filler — the America's Classics awards given to old-time diners and similar places, the humanitarian and lifetime achievement awards, given to Charlie Trotter and Wolfgang Puck, respectively, this year — that was really entertaining.<br />
<br />
Even the odd and maybe kind of out-of-place 20-minute performance by actor Robert Neal of part of the play “I Love to Eat,” was entertaining.<br />
<br />
The play by James Still is being performed in Indianapolis and seemed to be added to the beginning of the award ceremonies expressly to make people sit longer. It was as if the James Beard Foundation had rented out Avery Fisher Hall and was determined to get its money’s worth.<br />
<br />
But it was good.<br />
<br />
The awards themselves, well, the winners' names are read, they come on stage, thank their spouses, staff and business partners, occasionally make an amusing quip — Tory Miller, chef of l'Etoile in Madison, Wis., and winner of the award for best chef in the Midwest, thanked James Beard for being “such a crazy old weird dude” — and sit down.<br />
<br />
There are 22 of them, including the graphics and design awards, so it takes awhile, but the Beard Foundation seems to be working on streamlining them even further. They don't let the announcers — usually past winners and a representative from that particular award's sponsor — read the nominees' names anymore (except, for some reason, B. Smith, who gave out the graphics and design awards). Instead, a recorded voice reads them, keeping the presenters from butchering the names, which had been a constant problem in past years. And master of ceremonies Alton Brown seemed intent on moving things along.<br />
<br />
Even Wolfgang Puck told the audience, who were giving him a standing ovation: “Sit down. you'll get a drink sooner.”<br />
<br />
The awards are followed by a reception that seems to become more of a zoo each year as throngs of foodies in formalwear crowd each other out to try to get something to eat.<br />
<br />
I'd had a big lunch — a torta from the Frontera Grill at O'Hare — because I don't like to stand in line for food, so I mostly sipped wine and chatted with people. I caught up with inimitable chef-restaurateur Michael McCarty, who was visiting with Ruth Reichl, and with Nic Jammet, partner in the SweetGreen fast-casual salad and frozen yogurt chain based in DC.<br />
<br />
Food writer and drink maven Francine Cohen chastised me for not being in the press room but was good enough to bring me a delicious little white wine, made mostly of Colombard, of all grapes, from Southwestern France.<br />
<br />
After snacking on Paul Kahan’s blood sausage, I realized the party was over for me and headed for the logical first after-party, at Boulud-Sud, across the street from Lincoln Center. But before I went in I ran into Chris Cosentino, of Incanto in San Francisco, and Ken Oringer, of many cool places in Boston, who were intent on going to Otto.<br />
<br />
You see Matt Molina, the chef of Mozza in Los Angeles, had been named best chef in the Pacific, so Mario Batali, one of Mozza’s co-owners, was fêting him downtown, as is the custom when you win a Beard Award.<br />
<br />
My philosophy when it comes to after-parties is not to go where everyone’s going, but where the people I like are going.<br />
<br />
So to Otto we went, where I commiserated with Chris Cosentino about the coming end to foie gras in California. It becomes illegal in that state as of July 1, a fact many people at the awards were protesting against by wearing "Save the Foie” pins — too little, too late, I'm afraid. The law was passed in 2004, after all, to give foie gras producers time to find a way to make the fattened duck liver in a way animal welfare activists deemed acceptable.<br />
<br />
The pro-foie crowd might have considered organizing back then.<br />
<br />
I also met Mario Batali, perhaps for the first time, I'm not sure. I talked to him about figuring out how to report on the Beard Awards. Reporting on who won is silly, since the Beard Foundation live-tweets the event and a list of the winners is <a href="http://www.jamesbeard.org/sites/default/files/static/additional/050712_JBF_WINNERS.pdf">readily available online</a>.<br />
<br />
He agreed that the rapportage of the awards was meaningless, but that there were plenty of interesting back stories, such as Michael Anthony’s recovery from heart surgery this year — something Anthony mentioned when accepting the award for best chef in New York City.<br />
<br />
Seattle-based chef and restaurateur Tom Douglas was there, too. I thought he was out of town, because his business partner, Eric Tanaka, accepted the award for outstanding restaurateur on his behalf. But Tom said he just didn’t like public speaking, and that Eric was a genius and should have been the one to accept the award anyway.<br />
<br />
I got kind of philosophical with Daniel Holzman of The Meatball Shop, and learned something of the life story of his business partner Michael Chernow.<br />
<br />
Chernow told me he had a bit of an acting and modeling career, which was how he ended up modeling for a recent <a href="http://www.jcrew.com/AST/Navigation/theludlowsuit.jsp#/1">J. Crew</a> catalog. The fact that J. Crew also mentioned that he owned The Meatball Shop was a nice added piece of free press.<br />
<br />
The party started winding down around 2 a.m., and I quickly swung up to the annual keg party at Eleven Madison Park to congratulate my friend Will Guidara, the place’s co-owner, for Daniel Humm’s victory as the country’s Outstanding Chef.<br />
<br />
I stepped over the broken beer bottles, gave him a hug and called it a night.<br />
<span style="color: #262626; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13pt;"></span>
</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-19447519881298379502012-03-19T16:04:00.005-07:002012-03-20T07:53:45.249-07:00Beard Handicapping 2012<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
March 19<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Once
again a coterie of food writers, chefs and restaurateurs have nominated a
talented array of professionals to win the James Beard Foundation Chef and
Restaurant Awards, and once again I shall endeavor to guess who they will
ultimately pick as the winners.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">These
predictions are based, as they are every year, on the notion that the best
nominees are not necessarily selected; the most popular ones are.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Of
course, all the nominees are deserving and I hope they all leverage their
nominations to promote their services and improve their business. But the
winners will be the ones about whom there is the most buzz, about whom the
media, nationally and, more importantly, in their own regions, feel good about.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">I
think local and regional media are most important because judges are instructed
to vote only in categories in which they feel qualified to vote, and to promise
not to vote for restaurants where they haven’t eaten.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">So
although I cover the whole country, being based in New York I would not vote
for best chef in the Southwest.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">So
that’s how the voting works, and below are my predictions of who I think will
win in categories that I care about. These predictions should in no way be seen
as my votes for the awards. They are who I think will win, not necessarily who I’d
like to win.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">If
you’d like to know who’s nominated in other categories, you can look at them
<a href="http://www.jamesbeard.org/sites/default/files/static/additional/2012-jbf-nominees.pdf">here</a>:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Rising
Star<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Thomas
McNaughton, Christina Tosi and Sue Zemanick all were nominated last year, but I
think they’re going to be disappointed by the power that is Grant Achatz and
his restaurant Next. I think Dave Beran will win.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Dave Beran</b> of Next in
Chicago <b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Daniel
Bowien of Mission Chinese Food in San Francisco<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Thomas
McNaughton of Flour + Water in San Francisco<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Christina
Tosi of Momofuku Milk Bar in New York City <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Sue
Zemanick of Gautreau’s in New Orleans <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Best
new restaurant<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">I
suppose there is a danger that since Next is so hard to get into a lot of
judges won’t ethically be able to vote for it, but I think that obstacle will
be overcome and Next will win:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">AQ
in San Francisco<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Fiola
in Washington, D.C.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Next</b> in Chicago<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Isa
NYC<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Tertulia
NYC<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Outstanding
Bar Program<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">This
is tricky. Not only is it a brand new category, meaning I don’t know how people
traditionally vote, but also because, although people do go goo-goo
ga-ga over Grant Achatz and will feel compelled to vote for his Aviary, I’ve
never met anyone whose eyes don’t moisten a little bit in admiration of James
Meehan, the owner of PDT. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">I’m
going to guess PDT.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">The
Aviary Chicago <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">The
Violet Hour Chicago, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Bar
Agricole in San Francisco, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Pegu
Club in New York City</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>PDT </b>in New York City</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Best
Restaurateur <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chefs
love the Blue Ribbon restaurants. They love them! But they also admire
Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s restaurants, whose financier is Phil Suarez. And so
do food writers. Both of those restaurateurs, and Tom Douglas, were nominated
last year. This year I think Phil Suarez is going to get it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Bruce
Bromberg and Eric Bromberg of Blue Ribbon Restaurants in New York City, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Tom
Douglas of Tom Douglas Restaurants in Seattle, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Piero
Selvaggio of the Valentino Restaurant Group in Santa Monica, Calif., <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Caroline
Styne of Lucques, A.O.C. and Tavern in Los Angeles, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Phil Suarez</b> of the Suarez
Restaurant Group in New York City<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Outstanding
Restaurant <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">This
is sort of a lifetime achievement award and goes to a restaurant that has paid
its dues. All of these restaurants except Balthazar also were nominated this
year. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">The
award could easily go to Blue Hill, whose executive chef Dan Barber is a media
darling, but there’s something about the gravitas of Boulevard that I think
will result in it getting the medallion.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Balthazar
in New York City<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Blue
Hill in New York City<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Boulevard</b> in San Francisco<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Highlands
Bar and Grill in Birmingham, Ala.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Vetri
in Philadelphia.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Outstanding
Chef<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">This
is also a sort of lifetime achievement award (José Andrés got it last year). As
such, it’s kind of surprising that only Paul Kahan and Gary Danko were
nominated last year. I think it will go to one of them, and I think there has
been more buzz lately about Paul Kahan. So I think it will go to him.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">David
Chang of the Momofuku restaurants<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Daniel
Humm of Eleven Madison Park<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Gary
Danko of Restaurant Gary Danko in San Francisco, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Paul Kahan </b>of Blackbird in
Chicago<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Donald
Link of Herbsaint in New Orleans<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Nancy
Silverton of Pizzeria Mozza in Los Angeles.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Outstanding
pastry chef<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Joanna
Chang, Dahlia Narvaez and Mindy Segal all were nominated last year, which
improves their chances, but I think Daniel Boulud’s star power will shine
through and Ghaya Oliveira will win.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Joanna
Chang of Flour Bakery + Café in Cambridge, Mass.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Melissa
Chou of Aziza in San Francisco<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Hedy
Goldsmith of Michael’s Genuine Food & Drink in Miami<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Dahlia
Narvaez of Osteria Mozza in Los Angeles<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Ghaya Oliveira </b>of Boulud
Sud in New York City<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Mindy
Segal of Mindy’s Hot Chocolate in Chicago.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Outstanding
service<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">La
Grenouille and Topolobampo are back from last year. The judges like giving
awards to both Tony Mantuano of Spiaggia and Rick Bayless of Topolobampo,
but I’ve been hearing Michael Mina’s name in the ether a lot lately. I think
his restaurant will get it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Spiaggia
in Chicago<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Topolobampo
in Chicago<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Cyrus
in Healdsberg, Calif.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Michael Mina </b>in San
Francisco<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">La
Grenouille in New York City. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Outstanding
Wine service<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">A16,
Blackberry Farm and Frasca were nominated last year. Blackberry Farm always
gets nominated for something, and they don’t win much. But their PR team has
been promoting them pretty well of late, and I think it will be enough to push
them over the top.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">A16
in San Francisco<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>The Barn at Blackberry
Farm </b>in Walland, Tenn.<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Frasca
Food & Wine in Boulder, Colo.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Emeril’s
in New Orleans<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">No.
9 Park in Boston<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Outstanding
Wine, Beer or Spirits Professional<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Sam
Calagione, Merry Edwards and Paul Grieco are all back for another year. I
predicted that Grieco would win last year and I totally blew that one. Although
New Yorkers tend to have an advantage in the James Beard Awards, I’m still
betting that Sam Calagione’s going to win this year.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Sam Calagione</b> of Dogfish
Head Craft Brewery in Milton, Del.; <b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Merry
Edwards of Merry Edwards Winery in Sebastopol, Calif.; <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Paul
Grieco of Terroir in New York City, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Garrett
Oliver of Brooklyn Brewery in New York City, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Neal
Rosenthal of Mad Rose Group in Pine Plains, N.Y.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Okay,
now the regional awards:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Great
Lakes (Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio):<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Last
year, on a roster as dominated by Chicago as this one is, Alex Young of
Zingerman’s in Ann Arbor, Mich., walked away with a win. Could Anne Kearney do
the same? Yes she could. But maybe Stephanie Izard’s star power as a former Top
Chef contestant could giver her the edge. Then Again, Sepia was in a Hollywood
film, The Dilemma. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">I’m
betting on the TV chef.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Michael
Carlson of Schwa in Chicago<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Stephanie Izard </b>of Girl
& the Goat in Chicago<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Anne
Kearney of Rue Dumaine in Dayton, Ohio<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Bruce
Sherman of North Pond in Chicago<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Andrew
Zimmerman of Sepia in Chicago<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Mid-Atlantic
(D.C., Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Virginia):<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Only
Vikram Sunderam is new to this list, so it could go any way. But I’ve heard
Cathal Armstrong’s name on a number of occasions recently. There’s buzz about
him, so he’ll probably win.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Cathal Armstrong</b> of
Restaurant Eve in Alexandria, Va.<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Johnny
Monis of Komi in Washington, D.C.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Peter
Pastan of Obelisk in Washington, D.C.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Maricel
Presilla of Cucharamama in Hoboken, N.J.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Vikram
Sunderam of Rasika in Washington, D.C.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Midwest
(Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and
Wisconsin)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Here,
too, there’s only one newcomer, Gerard Craft. I’m kind of at a loss for this
one, but the name Colby Garrelts is jumping out at me. If it jumps out at me,
it could well jump out at a Midwestern judge.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Justin
Aprahamian of Sanford in Milwaukee<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Gerard
Craft of Niche in St. Louis<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Colby Garrelts</b> of Bluestem
in Kansas City, Mo.<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Tory
Miller of L’Etoile in Madison, Wis., <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Lenny
Russo of Heartland Restaurant & Farm Direct Market in St. Paul, Minn.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">New
York City<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Congratulations
to Mark Ladner, who joins four nominees from last year. Ladner is the chef of
Mario Batali’s only four-star restaurant, which is a big deal. On the other
hand, everybody loves Danny Meyer and his restaurants, giving Michael Anthony a
good shot. But they admire Michael White. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Does
admiration trump love? No, it does not. They’ll vote for Michael Anthony.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Michael Anthony </b>of
Gramercy Tavern<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">April
Bloomfield of The Spotted Pig<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Wylie
Dufresne of WD~50<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Mark
Ladner of Del Posto<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Michael
White of Marea<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Northeast
(Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, New York State, Rhode Island
and Vermont)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Jamie
Bissonnette’s the only newcomer to this list. He was named the People’s Best
New Chef by Food & Wine magazine’s readers last year. It’s possible that
the Beard Foundation voters will instead vote for Gerry Hayden, showing their
erudition by selecting the former chef of Aureole. But often when a chef wins one
award he or she wins many of them. I think Jamie Bissonnette will take this
one, too.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Jamie Bissonnette </b>of Coppa
in Boston<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Tim
Cushman of O Ya in Boston<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Gerry
Hayden of The North Fork Table & Inn in Southold, N.Y.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Matt
and Kate Jennings of La Laiterie in Providence, R.I.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Eric
Warnstedt of Hen of the Wood in Waterbury, Conn.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Northwest
(Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington and Wyoming)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Is
it possible that Food & Wine Best New Chefs is becoming the Golden Globes
to the Beard Awards, which are often called the Oscars of the fine dining
world?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Izard
was a Best New Chef last year, and so was Jason Franey. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Canlis
is a very old and very much respected restaurant that has been given a facelift
by brothers Mark and Brian Canlis — the third generation in the family to run
the place. It’s a sentimental favorite, and we love sentiment. Congratulations
in advance to Jason Franey.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Matt
Dillon of Sitka & Spruce in Seattle<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Jason Franey</b> of Canlis in
Seattle<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Christopher
Israel of Gruner in Portland<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Naomi
Pomeroy of Beast in Portland<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Cathy
Whims of Nostrana in Portland<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Pacific
(California and Hawaii)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">I
wish I knew how old the average California judge was. Those who
remember Michael Chiarello from his Tra Vigne days will feel inclined to vote
for him again. Then again, this is California, where young, hip and cool people
like Chris Cosentino are admired. But I think Daniel Patterson is
emitting an aura of gravitas that I’m not getting from the other chefs.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Will
gravitas translate into votes? Maybe not, but I’m betting that it will.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Michael
Chiarello of Bottega in Yountville, Calif.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Chris
Cosentino of Incanto in San Francisco<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Christopher
Kostow of The Restaurant at Meadowlands in St. Helena, Calif.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Matt
Molina of Osteria Mozza in Los Angeles<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Daniel Patterson </b>of Coi in
San Francisco<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">South
(Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi):<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">John
Harris, Chris Hastings and Tory McPhail are all back from last year. Based on
nothing but my gut, I think Chris Hastings is going to win this year.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Justin
Devillier of La Petite Grocery in New Orleans<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">John
Harris of Lilette in New Orleans<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Chris Hastings </b>of Hot and
Hot Fish Club in Birmingham, Ala.<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Tory
McPhail of Commander’s Palace in New Orleans<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Alon
Shaya of Domenica in New Orleans<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Southeast
(Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and West
Virginia):<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Joseph
Lenn is the only newcomer to this list, which comes from a part of the country
that admires culinary tradition and enjoys voting for Charleston chefs. I think
they’re going to vote for Craig Deihl<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Huge
Acheson of Five and Ten in Athens, Ga.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Craig Deihl </b>of Cypress in
Charleston, S.C.<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Linton
Hopkins of Restaurant Eugene in Atlanta<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Edward
Lee of 610 Magnolia in Louisville, Ky.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Joseph
Lenn of The Barn at Blackberry Farm in Walland, Tenn.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Southwest
(Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, Oklahoma, Texas and Utah):<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">There’s
been a huge turnover of nominees in the Southwest. Bruce Auden is the only
returning nominee. What does that mean? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">It
could mean anything, but in my experience bigger cities have more judges, and
Houston is now the third biggest city in the country. That gives a Hugo Ortega
an advantage that I think will result in his victory.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Bruce
Auden of Biga on the Banks in San Antonio, Texas<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Kevin
Binkley of Binkley’s Restaurant in Cave Creek, Ariz.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Bruno
Davaillon of Mansion Restaurant at the Rosewood Mansion on Turtle Creek in
Dallas<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Jennifer
Jasinski of Rioja in Denver<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><b>Hugo Ortega</b> of Hugo’s in
Houston<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">Paul
Qui of Uchiko in Austin, Texas.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial;">And
those are my predictions. If you have some of your own, why, go ahead and share
them in the comments section.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-16886939999469918292012-01-18T08:48:00.000-08:002015-06-17T04:10:34.639-07:00I knew I'd come across Dr. Romera before...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The New York Times’ new restaurant critic, Pete Wells, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/18/dining/reviews/romera-new-york-nyc-review.html?smid=tw-nytimesdining&seid=auto">tears Romera New York a new one</a> in his review of the restaurant that, by most accounts that I’ve read, is way too pretentious and self-important for its own good<br />
<br />
I don’t usually like to read the take-down of a restaurant, because restaurateurs really put their hearts into them. But Wells did have some great lines. I wanted to tweet them, but they were more than 140 characters.<br />
<br />
Then I remembered that I have a blog.<br />
<br />
And so, please let me share two sentences that I really enjoyed:<br />
<br />
“<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">Yet as much as you might admire Dr. Romera, you can’t help feeling that you will never be able to admire him quite as much as you’re supposed to.”</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">And:</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">“</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">But to eat at Romera New York is to be told repeatedly that you are in the presence of greatness, while the evidence of your senses tells you that you are in the presence of, at best, okayness.”</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">Wells also did me the service of reminding me that I had met the chef, Dr. Miguel Sanchez Romera, before, in a surreal experience that itself reminded me that, when it comes to self-importance, Americans, even American artists, are wannabes compared to Europeans.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">The Times critic mentioned that Romera eschewed “chemicals” used by such culinary artists as Ferran Adrià (and by now many fine dining chefs in the United States) and instead used a cassava derivative called Micri.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;">Micri! </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 22px;">I remembered Micri.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;">I was introduced to it years ago, near the turn of the century, at an event in New York hosted by the French Culinary Institute.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;">It was very well attended by many of New York City's coolest chefs. I'm pretty sure Wylie Dufresne was there. I know David Burke was there because he sat next to me and began thinking about what to do with Micri — instant shake-it-up-yourself milkshakes was one idea, but I'm pretty sure nothing came of it.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;">On stage, David Bouley made fascinating dishes displaying Micri's seemingly endless capacity for soaking up liquids, and Dr. Romera gave a lecture that seemed to last for at least three hours, but that was probably about 35 mintues, about his gastronomical philosophy, his own epistemological notions of how we perceive taste, I think from some sort of gastro-historical perspective, but I don’t really remember and couldn't possibly find my notes on the subject. </span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;">It was all in Spanish and I don’t know whether it was translated badly or if it simply didn’t make sense, but the charts describing Dr. Romera’s thought process were equally obtuse and absurd. And it was without a doubt a display of the sort of colossal self-importance that Wells indicated was on display at Romera, and I don't doubt it.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;">At the time of the demonstration, I was not only awestruck by the ridiculous way that Micri was presented, but also by its seemingly magical properties. But I was young.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 22px;"><br /></span></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 21px;">Since then I've seen lots of those ingredients and was more intrigued by the scallop quenelles Josh DeChellis made with a slimy Japanese tuber called nagaimo than anything I saw the Micri do, and I didn't have to endure a lecture.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span></div>
Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-8822578149920854642011-11-15T14:05:00.001-08:002015-06-30T14:05:21.138-07:00Why they served French wine at an Italian luncheon<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">November 15,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I had a fun lunch today at the David Bouley Test
Kitchen, which is a place that Bouley set up in Tribeca as a sort of food lab
for visiting chefs to play in, but it also has become an event space. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The lunch was thrown by Legends From Europe, a
three-year marketing campaign by the Italian consortia representing three
Italian cheeses — Parmigiano Reggiano, Grana Padano, and Montasio — and
Prosciutto di Parma and Prosciutto di San Daniele. Since those </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">consorzi </span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">are
traditionally enemies, it’s something of a political breakthrough that they’re
all working together.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano people
announced their partnership a couple of years ago with press conferences and a
big party at Madison Square Garden (Magic Johnson inexplicably walked through
the party, causing macho Italian-American men to become giddy) followed by a
VIP viewing of a basketball game in the fancy boxes at the top of the Garden
(Knicks vs. Nuggets, which the Knicks inexplicably won). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Here’s what nobody ever says about those two
cheeses, which come from similar parts of Italy and are part of the same family
of cheeses known as grana (hard, aged cheeses that cleave in a particular way):
Parmigiano Reggiano is more expensive than Grana Padano, it’s generally aged
longer and is widely regarded as being more complex in flavor and, well,
better. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">That’s not bad for Grana Padano, which is suitable
for cooking or grating and serving over pasta. Parmigiano-Reggiano would be
wasted if used in that way, and it’s too expensive for non-rich people to use
as anything other than a special-occasion cheese. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I understand why saying that is politically
sensitive, but they really need to get over that. Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana
Padano are not natural competitors. They are different products at different
price points to be used differently and eaten on different occasions. I think they’ve
decided to work together to stress that they are different from generic
Parmesan cheese, and consumers should know the difference.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Bringing two kinds of prosciutto into the mix just
makes it better all around. And Montasio, well, why not? It's delicious and
melts good.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So, we had five food products, all from
Northeastern Italy. So what wines did they serve during the pre-lunch
reception? Two sparkling German wines. At lunch, the wine was French — a white
Bordeaux and a red Burgundy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We asked the Test Kitchen's manager why he did
that, and he said he was instructed that he should by no means use any
Italian wine, because members of the different </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">consorzi</span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> would never
agree on which wines were suitable to be drunk with all of their products. The
Montasio and Prosciutto di San Daniele people would likely have been happy with
a Tokai Friuliano, but the other three groups might have been irked by such a
choice. And I can't imagine the Friulians doing anything but smirk if they were
served a Lambrusco from Emilia Romagna.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">What I ate:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Slow-poached Connecticut farm egg with Prosciutto
di Parma and a Parmigiano Reggiano cloud<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fresh sardine with tomato-saffron broth, fingerling
potatoes, Prosciutto di San Daniele, Grana Padano crisp<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Melon soup with ricotta ice cream<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Hot caramelized Anjou pear with chocolate, biscuit Breton, hot truffle
sauce, lemon verbena and Tahitian vanilla bean ice cream.</span></div>
</div>
Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-48924929495044143072011-10-28T14:45:00.000-07:002011-10-31T13:11:54.471-07:00On pizza, authenticity and fire<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
“Oh, uh, hey, you're on fire there,” I said.<br />
<br />
Nonchalance probably isn’t the best approach to take when you see flames start to spread behind a person, but the guy standing next to the woman whose coat and bag had drifted too close to a candle was on top of it. He let out a sort of masculine scream, grabbed the bag and coat, threw them to the floor and beat out the flames.<br />
<br />
“Sorry,” he said.<br />
<br />
People say New Yorkers are rude and uncaring, but we’ll totally let you know if you catch fire, help you to extinguish yourself and apologize for making a commotion. What more do you want?<br />
<br />
I was at the opening of Forcella, one of a growing number of Neapolitan-style pizzerias popping up in New York City.<br />
<br />
Really, there are a lot of them: <a href="http://www.chipp-pizza.com/">Chipp</a> in Sheapshead Bay, <a href="http://www.capizzinyc.com/">Capizzi</a> in Hell's Kitchen, <a href="http://donatellanyc.com/">Donatella</a> in Chelsea, <a href="http://www.kestepizzeria.com/home.html">Keste</a> in the Village. I could go on and on. That’s kind of strange considering New York has a delicious type of pizza that the locals love and that has little in common with its Neapolitan cousins. I wonder why we’re seeking out some sort of authenticity from Naples when we have our own kind of authenticity right here.<br />
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
It's not like people in Georgia are clamoring for St. Louis barbecue.</div>
<br />
Then again, authenticity is a weird and slippery notion. Last night I had dinner at the James Beard House, because Frank McClelland from L'Espalier in Boston was cooking, and I was sitting next to journalist Charles Passy, a New York native who recently returned home after a prolonged sojourn in West Palm Beach, Fla.<br />
<br />
He said he had encountered a visitor to New York who had heard that the Big Apple was a great bagel city, and so she was disappointed and outraged that you can't find asiago cheese bagels here.<br />
<br />
Which of course you can’t because we have real bagels here.<br />
<br />
Anyway, the Forcella opening was a good party. Kind of weird — one of the owners decided an opening party also would be a good occasion for Open Keyboard Night — but good.<br />
<br />
Margherita pizza and pizza with arugula and truffle oil were passed around, along with the restaurant’s signature deep-fried pizza and little arancini. I also had a slice of a dessert pizza stuffed with a chocolate-hazelnut spread that shall remain nameless and whose charms elude me.<br />
<br />
It went well with the Lambrusco I was drinking, though.<br />
<br />
The crowd was good, too: Many well-dressed Italians with great bone structure who seemed to be talking about important things and didn’t seem to know that, at crowded restaurant openings, you’re supposed to get your drink at the bar and then move away so other people can get to it.<br />
<br />
Still, good bone structure. And editors from Travel + Leisure, Food + Wine, Every Day with Rachael Ray and so on were there, too.<br />
<br />
As I was heading out, actress Stephanie March arrived with her husband Bobby Flay in tow. And as far as I know nobody else caught fire.<br />
<br /></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-69104774509440198952011-09-30T08:48:00.001-07:002011-09-30T08:48:50.801-07:00Chain restaurant workers really can cook<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"></span><br />
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
I’ve spent the past four days or so at two conferences thrown by Nation’s Restaurant News. The first was the Multi-Unit Foodservice Operators conference, better known as MUFSO (rhymes with STUFF-so, not GOOF-so).</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
The second was Menu Trends & Directions, which I don’t think is better known as anything — possibly as “the one where Nancy Kruse drops a bunch of knowledge about food trends on your head.”</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
They’re terrific conferences where people who know a lot about what they’re talking about enlighten the audience with ways to run their businesses better.</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
The conferences have to be great to get people to show up, but, like pretty much any convention, people really go to them to network.</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
Where else can the owner of a fledgling grilled cheese sandwich chain pick the brains of the CEOs of Domino’s and Panera Bread? Where else can marketers responsible for naming new ice cream treats share ides with the head of culinary development for Baskin-Robbins?</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
And where else can I hang out with the country’s corporate chefs and figure out the next thing that’s going to transform eating in America?</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
Of course we had extended panel discussions on that topic for all to see, but one interesting fact emerged as I talked to these chefs between sessions: You know those kitchen workers at chain restaurant that no one thinks about? The ones who are occasionally mentioned as data points when calculating turnover, or the nameless mass for which restaurants must decide how much medical insurance they can afford?</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
It turns out that many of them are really good cooks.</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
Some of the corporate chefs charged with developing menu items at their chains’ headquarters told me that the cooks who have to actually prepare those items are being underutilized. Many of them cook at casual-dining chains for one shift and fine-dining restaurants for the next — and they say if you can successfully work the line during a lunch rush at Chili’s, you can jam during dinner at a white tablecloth establishment.</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
One corporate chef at a big casual-dining chain said he thought the next frontier for his segment was unleashing the skills of their cooks. Not only would they make better food, but by handing more responsibility to their cooks they would improve morale in the kitchen and possibly clean up the foodservice industry’s reputation as a place loaded with dead-end jobs.</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
Food for thought (sorry, but it is).</div>
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
</div>
<span><br /><br />Read more: <a href="http://nrn.com/article/chain-restaurant-workers-really-can-cook#ixzz1ZS2omEHP" style="color: #003399; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;">http://nrn.com/article/chain-restaurant-workers-really-can-cook#ixzz1ZS2omEHP</a></span></div>
Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-4796428067923746182011-08-25T12:55:00.000-07:002011-08-25T12:55:16.897-07:00Times Square kiosk awardees come forward<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><!--StartFragment--> <br />
<div class="MsoNormal">August 25</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">I just got off the phone with my friends at <a href="http://rickshawdumplings.com/">Rickshaw Dumpling Bar</a>, who I think were bursting with desire to share the news that they’re one of four restaurants that have been granted the right to set up a kiosk in the unbelievably high-traffic area of Times Square. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">The other three are international empanada stand <a href="http://nuchas.com/home.html">Nuchas</a>; Snack Box, a creation of Jonathan Morr of Republic and Bond St., which will be serving espresso, milk shakes and gourmet hot dogs; and panini stand <a href="http://www.salumenewyork.com/">Salumè</a>.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">They told me Salumè would open this week, and the rest will open in the coming weeks. Rickshaw's targeted opening date is late September or early October.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">All of the kiosks will be opening on Broadway Plaza, the pedestrian zone that Broadway has become.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">A press release the Rickshaw folks forwarded to me from the Times Square Alliance said construction of the Salumè stand would start tomorrow, between 46th and 47th streets, and that it would open by mid-September. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">But of course a restaurant’s not open until it’s open.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">And once these particular spots are open, I suspect they’ll be mobbed. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">So, congratulations all around.</div><!--EndFragment--> </div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-68775445469795134132011-08-19T09:09:00.000-07:002011-08-19T09:09:43.492-07:00Family & Friends night at Frankies 570 Spuntino<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cT5S3KXARuM/Tk6BLT0PvoI/AAAAAAAABPE/ks2faJLI5P4/s1600/Frankies+570+Spuntino081911.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cT5S3KXARuM/Tk6BLT0PvoI/AAAAAAAABPE/ks2faJLI5P4/s320/Frankies+570+Spuntino081911.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>August 19<br />
<br />
That picture on the left is what the outside of Frankies 570 Spuntino looked like last night. You really need to be confident that you’re in the right place to open that door.<br />
<br />
It struck me as being very much in the style of<a href="http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/12/the-insiders-frank-castronovo-and-frank-falcinelli/"> Franks Castronovo and Falcinelli</a>, who own and run the restaurant and who, if they didn’t invent the current fashion of Brooklyn grunge chic that dominates large chunks of that borough (and maybe they did), they’re certainly the poster boys for it in the food world.<br />
<br />
They have that we’re-so-cool-we-don't-need-to-shave-or-even-trim-our-beards-and-we’re-certainly-not-going-to-try-to-impress-you-because-we-don’t-care-what-you-think vibe that, damn it, is quite alluring.<br />
<br />
I was invited to family-and-friends night at their new West Village restaurant, which isn’t even slated to open for another month, hence all the construction materials and building permits and hidden entrance. Eventually it will have a perfectly nice and conventional entrance with big windows letting natural light into the restaurant.<br />
<br />
But last night, with the walls boarded up, it was dark, and I could barely see the food at my candle-lit table.<br />
<br />
But the cool insider people were there. Life and Style reporter Juliet Izon swung by my table to say hello (we periodically eat together on expeditions organized by New York Post reporter Max Gross to iconic or merely awesome restaurants in the outer boroughs, such as Pirosmani in Brookly and Hunan Kitchen of Grand Sichuan in Queens).<br />
<br />
I ran into Food & Wine editor in chief Dana Cowin on my way to the bathroom. Andrew Knowlton of Bon Appétit, who I never see anymore, sat down at my table and snacked on the cheese from my antipasti plate while we mused about changes in the food scene. His two-year-old daughter Julep snacked on my salumi, which is fine. There was plenty to eat.<br />
<br />
What I ate:<br />
<br />
three crostini: sungold tomato and basil; white anchovy, avocado and setti anni peppers; and rocotta with speck and honey<br />
<br />
saffron arancini stuffed with bolognese sauce<br />
<br />
vegetable antipasti including broccoli raab and a variety of olives<br />
<br />
farmhouse cheeses<br />
<br />
cured meats including capicola and two types of sopressata.<br />
<br />
baked clams<br />
<br />
heirloom tomatoes and pickled market beans<br />
<br />
fennel, celery root and parsley salad<br />
<br />
grilled squid with pickled peppers<br />
<br />
cavatelli with hot sausage<br />
<br />
meatballs with pine nuts and raisins<br />
<br />
egg yolk & cauliflower ravioli with brown butter, almonds and anchovy<br />
<br />
Mast Brothers chocolate ganache tart<br />
<br />
red wine prunes and mascarpone</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-23385325301766461842011-08-12T16:01:00.000-07:002011-08-12T16:01:46.636-07:00What to do with an oversized zucchini<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">August 12<br />
<br />
<div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">I've spent the week visiting family in Denver, which is always fun. I've played Guitar Hero and run around at Chuck E. Cheese's, had my breakfast burrito at Pete's Kitchen and calmed my stomach with a Colorado Smashburger after indulging in the rides at Elitch's. I've examined the local beer just to make sure it's still awesome. I'm somewhat despondent that the peaches are not yet in their prime, but I'm working through that heartache.</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121"><br />
</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">I've even done some cooking.</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121"><br />
</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">We had some family over for dinner and mostly had it catered: We drove to Tacos y Salsas and bought 30 assorted tacos. But I thought some sort of vegetable was in order. So I looked in my mother's refrigerator and was confronted with a giant zucchini from the garden.</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121"><br />
</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">My eyes narrowed. When I was growing up, the family custom was to slice zucchini into rounds and saute them with onions, peppers and tomatoes. The mushy centers of those rounds still haunt me.</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121"><br />
</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">So I started by peeling the thing, slicing it into quarters and scraping out that damn mushy middle. Looking at the seeds that came out with the gunk I was instantly reminded of making Jack o'Lanterns, and the side activity of toasting pumpkin seeds.</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121"><br />
</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">I'd never heard of toasting a zucchini seed. But I separated them out and set them on a cookie sheet to dry.</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121"><br />
</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">I decided to dice the zucchini flesh and blanch it in salted water, mostly as a delaying tactic while I thought of what else to do. But actually it blached beautifully. I dropped it into salted boiling water and then drained it and rinsed it in cold water as soon as the water started boiling again.</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">The zucchini was tender, but still had body. And it tasted fresh and green, like an August evening. </div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121"><br />
</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">I had thought of making a salad out of it, but I didn't think it needed to be buried in vinegar and olive oil, so instead I just picked some basil from the garden, tore it and added it to the zucchini, along with black pepper and some salt. Then I stuck it in the fridge because it seemed like something that should be served ice cold.</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121"><br />
</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">I had dried the seeds in a 200 degree (Fahrenheit) oven, and they already started to get crunchy and nutty. I heated the oven to 400 and promptly burned most of them. But the ones that survived were very much like smaller versions of the pumpkin seeds of my childhood and would have been a great addition to my zucchini dish, but we ate them beforehand.</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121"><br />
</div><div closure_uid_cuh2lr="121">Anyway, the zucchini was a hit. Next time I'll add some blanched, diced garlic, as well as toasted seeds, which I'll toss in a dry wok instead of trying to toast them in an oven. They cook really fast.</div></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-52363094947924763822011-08-08T17:41:00.000-07:002011-08-08T17:41:28.205-07:00Bluefin jerky<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">August 8<br />
<br />
Not everything I learned about bluefin tuna could fit into <a href="http://nrn.com/article/trophy-fish?ad=food-and-beverage.">the feature aboout that fish</a> that appear's in this week's issue of Nation's Restaurant News. Feel free to e-mail me if you'd like to talk more about the different bluefin fisheries or the different farms and ranches that are raising the fish.<br />
<br />
One thing I wanted to share was what Troy Guard, chef-owner of TAG in Denver, learned to do in Hawaii, where he trained under chef and restaurateur Roy Yamaguchi.<br />
<br />
There the chefs would save the blood line of the tuna that runs along the fish's spine.<br />
<br />
They'd sprinke it with local salt and dry it in the sun. They's serve it as a type of jerky.<br />
<br />
"We called it something coo and crazy, like 'sun-dried tuna blood,'" Guard told me.<br />
<br />
Guard orders a ranched bluefin tuna to cook at TAG most weeks, but he hasn't tried serving the bloodline there yet.</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-56777762408192101672011-07-30T08:30:00.000-07:002011-08-01T10:01:25.938-07:00Cheesecake war<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-lKC0TQ168YY/TjMg0C-_noI/AAAAAAAABOg/ur9nZgT_RPU/s1600/Cheesecake+War.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-lKC0TQ168YY/TjMg0C-_noI/AAAAAAAABOg/ur9nZgT_RPU/s400/Cheesecake+War.jpg" width="297" /></a>'</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">July 30</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Davio’s, a northern Italian steakhouse in Philadelphia, wanted to prove to the world that the City of Brotherly Love had better cheesecake than New York City. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">So its owners threw down the gauntlet in front of ’Cesca, an Italian restaurant on New York’s Upper West Side. ’Cesca picked up that gauntlet, and a cheesecake war was declared.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">It was a reasonably friendly war. Both restaurants exchanged recipes and worked with each other to replicate the desserts in each other’s restaurants, with the crew at ’Cesca learning to make Davio’s vanilla bean cheesecake with blueberry compote, and Davio’s staff whipping up ’Cesca’s mascarpone cheesecake with orange cream and orange brittle.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial; font-size: medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 15px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The two restaurants served half portions of both cheesecake’s side by side from Tuesday, July 26, through Thursday, July 28. The Cheesecake War Dessert special was offered at both restaurants for $10, and customers were asked to pick their favorite.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The loser of the war will have to post a photo of themselves eating the winner’s cheesecake in the the winning city's baseball jersey.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-opHVSLqcuFU/TjMk67I2MoI/AAAAAAAABOo/OGUeZDS5vPo/s1600/Cheesecake.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-opHVSLqcuFU/TjMk67I2MoI/AAAAAAAABOo/OGUeZDS5vPo/s400/Cheesecake.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Above is a picture of the two desserts as they were plated at Davio’s.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I was asked as a neutral party to post the results today, which I'm told is National Cheesecake Day.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">They are, well, actually they're mixed:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 13px;"><u><br />
</u></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 13px;"><u>Votes from Davio’s customers</u></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">196- Davio's<br />
42- Cesca<br />
<br />
<u>Votes from 'Cesca customers<br />
</u>65- ’Cesca<br />
11- Davio's<br />
<br />
<b>Total:<br />
</b>Davios: 207<br />
’Cesca: 107<br />
</span></span> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">That’s to say that customers in both cities preferred the hometown cheesecake by a wide margin. Although Davio’s sold more cheesecake overall and got more votes, a larger percentage of ’Cesca’s customers preferred that restaurant’s cheesecake, voting 6 to 1 in favor of the local dessert, compared to 4.7 to 1 from Davio’s customers.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Maybe Davio’s wait staff should be given an award for selling 238 orders of cheesecake in three days. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Davio’s has about 150 seats in its dining room, ’Cesca seats around 125.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">In any case, it seems like it was a pretty smart promotion, and a great way to sell more dessert in the middle of the week during a slow, hot summery month.</div></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-9042140420831762682011-07-06T16:29:00.000-07:002011-07-25T12:49:15.695-07:00How to get rid of invasive species: eat them!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-4FJdKfeBf8Q/ThThDF-o0SI/AAAAAAAABOE/AlevaeRjfs4/s1600/DSC00748.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-4FJdKfeBf8Q/ThThDF-o0SI/AAAAAAAABOE/AlevaeRjfs4/s400/DSC00748.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>July 6<br />
<br />
Don’t want invaders in your home Why not kill them and eat them?<br />
<br />
That’s the approach that consumer activist group Food & Water Watch is taking with three species of fish and a crustacean that have encroached on American waters.<br />
<br />
In the picture are, from top to bottom, Asian carp, blue tilapia and lionfish, as well as green crabs.<br />
<br />
Lionfish actually look much more sexy before their exotic and poisonous spines have been removed, but Kerry Heffernan, the executive chef of Southgate in New York, had already removed them by the time I got to the James Beard House, where Food & Water Watch was doing a presentation on ”exotic invasive species” and how to eat them.<br />
<br />
I don't think their point was actually to eradicate the invaders. Indeed local sport fishermen in the Northeast like green crab, because it's good bait for blackfish.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">I think what they really wanted to point out was that there’s lots of tasty seafood in our waters, and it would make sense if we stopped overfishing the popular ones and to rely less on imports — which Food & Water Watch said accounted form more than 80 percent of the seafood we eat — and instead chow down on the stuff we have in surplus.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">Ironically, the fish wasn't easy to procure and Heffernan had roughly 27 hours to figure out what to do with what they gave him. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">They had to charter a boat in North Carolina to catch the lionfish. A seafood supplier actually told them that wild, or blue, tilapia wasn't available in the U.S., but they managed to find it at Fulton Fish Market for $1.75 a pound. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">The green crab was provided by New England fisherman after they finished scratching their heads wondering why anyone would want them.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 1em; margin-top: 0px; text-align: left;">B<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; color: black;">ut the results were good. Heffernan used the carp to make a tasty escabeche, pictured here. It was a labor-intensive preparation, though, because, as Heffernan said, “It's almost like the fish was designed not to be able to get at the meat.”</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; color: black;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jMYHQHgZOhw/ThTrQUmVsvI/AAAAAAAABOU/TCYOjKwIeC8/s320/DSC00751.JPG" width="320" /></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">Loopy bones arched out from the spine into the flesh, and then looped off in other directions, making for a labor-intensive process. I asked Heffernan if the labor in preparing the fish would make it cost-prohibitive in restaurants, and he said that if the fish itself were inexpensive enough, it might be worth it.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">My favorite was the green crab, which Heffernan made into a light bisque. He was impressed with the flavor of the meat, which to him tasted crabbier than blue crab. There was a preparation challenge for that animal, too, as there’s not a lot of meat per crab, so picking out the meat is a time-consuming process.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">There was no problem with the lionfish, as long as you remove the poisonous parts.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">But Heffernan’s favorite was the tilapia, which was firm enough that you could slice it after cooking it, and it had great body and flavor.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">Eating under-utilized fish isn’t a new concept, but it is catching on. At the International Corporate Chefs Association summit that I went to in Seattle last week, one of the speakers was John Sackton, editor and publisher of <a href="http://seafood.com/">seafood.com</a>. In the face of rising seafood prices and less-than-stable supply, he recommended to the chefs at chain restaurants and onsite operations who attended the summit that they be flexible in the choice of seafood they put on the menu, changing those choices as supply and price demanded.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">He wasn’t talking about Asian carp or lionfish, but he was advocating for a flexibility to which chain restaurants are becoming increasingly accustomed. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">Skeptics might want to remember that monkfish used to be considered unfit for consumption, and that, decades ago, North Atlantic fisherman threw away bluefin tuna as useless until the Japanese pointed out that they actually enjoy eating them, possibly more than anything else.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: auto;">Of course, now bluefin appears to be on the verge of extinction. But that's another story.</div></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-10863708406533668042011-06-17T17:03:00.000-07:002011-06-17T17:07:51.015-07:00Aspen: Day 1<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LGs61ckFnO4/TfvrWIt1JKI/AAAAAAAABN4/C7ViVLyorYU/s1600/Justin+Warner+Belinda+Chang.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LGs61ckFnO4/TfvrWIt1JKI/AAAAAAAABN4/C7ViVLyorYU/s320/Justin+Warner+Belinda+Chang.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>June 17<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 22px;">I</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 22px;">’m in Aspen for the 29th annual Food & Wine magazine Classic. It used to be the classic AT Aspen, but they changed the name a few years ago to make it less pretentious.</span><br />
<div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
I’m not sure it worked, but despite the need to periodically run the gauntlet of celebrity chef groupies to do the networking I’m here to do, it’s a fun event — basically a three-day party, sponsored by many beer, wine and spirits companies, interspersed with cooking demonstrations and panel discussions.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">During the kickoff reception on Friday night I ran into Belinda Chang, whom I’d just met during the James Beard Foundation Awards last month. She won the award for best wine service as sommelier of The Modern in New York, and then, her mission accomplished, she quit.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">“I’m a sprinter, not a marathon runner,” she told me last night.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">I ended up hanging out with her and her friend Justin Warner, who was a captain at The Modern and left to open his own place, Do or Dine, in the decidedly ungentrified Brooklyn neighborhood of Bedford-Stuyvesant.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Justin says his new place is a dive American izakaya, which is to say a bar with great bar food (as opposed to a gastropub, which is a bar with good food that’s not necessarily intended to facilitate drinking).</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Do or Dine doesn’t have a liquor license yet, so for now it’s BYO, but Justin, whose beverage people come from PDT and Pegu Club, plans to offer delicious cocktails priced at less than $10.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">So that should be fun.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The big post-reception party in Aspen is a barbecue sponsored by Wines from Spain and hosted by José Andrés, but Belinda, Justin and I instead went to Isis, where there also was a barbecue but with fancy American wines and the added appeal — always desirable at Aspen — of not being where the masses were.</div><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It’s probably obvious, but Belinda and Justin are in the picture that accompanies this blog entry.</span></div></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-68771675224725524282011-06-13T14:45:00.000-07:002011-06-13T14:45:59.386-07:00A Matter of Taste<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-AT1Jp_rPeqQ/TfaAPb4szGI/AAAAAAAABNo/m1SfDg_4JLM/s1600/MOT2%255B2%255D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-AT1Jp_rPeqQ/TfaAPb4szGI/AAAAAAAABNo/m1SfDg_4JLM/s320/MOT2%255B2%255D.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>June 13<br />
<br />
Oh shoot! The people at HBO were nice enough to send me a copy of A Matter of Taste, a documentary on Paul Liebrandt that I wanted to watch, and I’m late.<br />
<br />
The film airs on HBO tonight (9pm EST), and I'm on the road, visiting family in Denver, while the DVD is sitting on my desk in New York.<br />
<br />
So, what can I say? Paul Liebrandt’s a hell of an interesting chef. I’ve always found his food simultaneously weird, delicious and incredibly well-balanced. Most striking: Each component of each dish seems to express itself with intriguing clarity and precision.<br />
<br />
The Bouley alumnus had a brief and critically tumultuous tenure some years ago, back in 2000, at Atlas, where then-<i>Times</i> critic William Grimes gave him a glowing three-star review, placing him squarely on the map as one of New York’s most avant-garde chefs. Then a review in <i>Gourmet</i> skewered him, uncharacteristic behavior for that magazine.<br />
<br />
At the time, some people wondered if the review had anything to do with the fact that <i>Gourmet</i>’s editor-in-chief, Ruth Reichl, was Grimes’s predecessor.<br />
<br />
Liebrandt, who was something like 24 years old, left the restaurant shortly thereafter.<br />
<br />
But that’s ancient history.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-RVUDp9SOSAY/TfaB_MemYzI/AAAAAAAABNw/Sk1etQWQEkQ/s1600/MOT4%255B1%255D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-RVUDp9SOSAY/TfaB_MemYzI/AAAAAAAABNw/Sk1etQWQEkQ/s320/MOT4%255B1%255D.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Liebrandt went on to run the kitchens at a genuine variety of New York City restaurants — Papillon, One Little West 12th (I kid you not), and Gilt — before finding a home partnering with Drew Nieporent at Corton, where he has once again received adulation from critics and customers.<br />
<br />
And also a documentary on HBO, airing tonight.<br />
<br />
That network was nice enough to provide me with the pictures in this blog entry, which were taken by Sally Rowe.</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-64043401174838254842011-06-10T22:50:00.000-07:002011-06-10T22:51:45.235-07:00In the foothills with the food scholars<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fFOFi0puHNI/TfLps8VqGmI/AAAAAAAABNY/RqcCrgjE3hI/s1600/M+is+for+Montana.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fFOFi0puHNI/TfLps8VqGmI/AAAAAAAABNY/RqcCrgjE3hI/s320/M+is+for+Montana.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>June 11<br />
<br />
Montanans apparently like to put letters on their mountains. That’s what I’m told. The M in the picture is in the city of Missoula, but it stands for Montana — not the state, the university, where I’m attending the joint annual meetings of the Agriculture Food and Human Values Society, the Association for the Study of Food and Society, and the Society for Anthropology of Food and Nutrition.<br />
<br />
There’s a big concrete L on the next mountain over, which might lead you to believe that Montana has alphabetized its mountains, but a server at the reception last night told me that the L stands for Loyola Sacred Heart High School, which also is in Missoula.<br />
<br />
There’s a concrete B on one of the Mountains near Butte, she said.<br />
<br />
I’m at the conference because I was asked to participate on a panel about possible careers for people with graduate degrees.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1t8CgVsF4ms/TfL16zKzJPI/AAAAAAAABNg/NXt2hhY0jiU/s1600/Missoula+Skyline.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1t8CgVsF4ms/TfL16zKzJPI/AAAAAAAABNg/NXt2hhY0jiU/s320/Missoula+Skyline.jpg" width="320" /></a>I don't actually have a graduate degree, but they wanted a journalist on the panel, I guess so I can tell them how to be a journalist with their graduate degrees, which I don’t really know. But I do have some thoughts on the topic which I’ll share. It should be a good panel.<br />
<br />
The first day of the conference was fun. I sat in on four sessions in which people presented papers or updates on their research or similar academic things.<br />
<br />
I spent the morning mostly listening to people talk in some way or another about animal welfare, except for one presenter who talked about using sheep to clear “noxious weeds,” which, believe it or not, is a technical term for non-indigenous vegetation that’s a threat to other plants.<br />
<br />
Sheep will eat them in some cases, to very good effect, she said.<br />
<br />
Three vegetarians, one whose first name was actually Seven, discussed their research into the “caring-killing paradox” that they experienced and researched as student volunteers on a university’s experimental organic pig farm. It was actually a very interesting presentation.<br />
<br />
Then some other sociologists discussed, through narrative, the notion of using a narrative approach to develop a greater understanding of the complexities of animal husbandry — in this case once again involving pigs.<br />
<br />
A third sociologist in their group was asked if she ate the meat of the pigs once she witnessed them being slaughtered, and she said “yes, but not without gratitude.”<br />
<br />
I don’t think anyone was accusing her of ingratitude, but maybe they were. I can’t say for sure.<br />
<br />
In the afternoon I watched people present papers mostly on studies of obesity or eating habits, although I also attended one on how the Philippine delicacy balut — unhatched baby ducklings still in their eggs — was being co-opted by the Western media as an extreme food, simplifying it and presenting it out of context.<br />
<br />
I asked him how it tasted, and he said it was sort of like a gristly hard-boiled egg, except the part that's liquid. You drink that first and it tastes kind of like egg drop soup, he said.<br />
<br />
One group of researchers found indications that if you use menu-design techniques commonly used for marketing specific items — putting the items in colored boxes, or placing them at one of several key places on the menu where the eye tends to linger, or by using appealing-sounding jargon (hand-picked, chef's special, etc.) they could get senior citizens to order more healthful items.<br />
<br />
Displaying calorie and other nutritional information had no effect, they found.<br />
<br />
Another study indicated that chefs live unhealthy lives that lead to overeating and excessive drinking. That seems obvious, but, you know, you do need to quantify these things.<br />
<br />
Actually, they’re still analyzing their data and it probably won’t be ready until next year.<br />
<br />
I haven’t decided what to attend tomorrow. "Anthropology of Wine" looks promising. So does "From Food System Assessment to Food Policy: Indicators That Make a Difference.”<br />
<br />
Ooh, and I might start a fight in this one: “Pursuing Poultry Practicalities: Adaptation and Innovation for Sustainable Eggs and Chickens.”<br />
<br />
I think I’ll keep my options open.</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com0Missoula, Mt, USA46.872146 -113.9939981999999646.7984215 -114.10231419999997 46.9458705 -113.88568219999996tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-90601349880831475682011-05-20T12:28:00.000-07:002011-05-20T13:12:05.642-07:00Food Writer’s Diary’s returning to the mother ship<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">May 20<br />
<br />
Food Writer’s Diary has a <a href="http://www.nrn.com/nrn-blogs-food-writers-diary">new home</a> at <a href="http://NRN.com/">NRN.com</a>. Please visit it, so that your page views can be added to those of Nation’s Restaurant News’ other readers, helping us to impress our bosses with our awesomeness.<br />
<br />
If you like RSS feeds, you can get Food Writer’s Diary’s <a href="http://www.nrn.com/taxonomy/term/63456/feed">here</a>.<br />
<br />
I’ll keep cross-posting here for awhile, and of course my 18 gajillion previous blog entries will stay here. But I think you’ll like this blog’s new home. And while you’re there, you might want to click around and see what else is on offer at <a href="http://NRN.com/">NRN.com</a>. I think you’ll particularly like the <a href="http://nrn.com/food-and-beverage">Food and Beverage</a> section, which has all sorts of information on the latest trends and a whole lot of stories written by yours truly.<br />
<br />
While <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">’m doing this shameless self-promotion, I might as well also point you to our <a href="http://www.nrn.com/cool-plates">Cool Plates</a> feature, which showcases menu items that catch my eye and that I hope will inspire chefs’ creativity.</span></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-76411976173845438442011-05-10T02:42:00.000-07:002012-04-24T14:22:42.202-07:00Beard Awards: press room or audience?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Well, it could be argued that I should hang up my hat as James Beard Foundation Chef and Restaurant Award predictor. Of the 19 categories that I <a href="http://nrnfoodwriter.blogspot.com/2011/03/beard-handicapping-2011.html">predicted</a> two months ago, I got four of them right: I predicted that Per Se would win for outstanding service, that Eleven Madison Park would win for outstanding restaurant, that Michael Solomonov would win for best chef in the Mid-Atlantic and that Tony Maws would win for best chef in the northeast.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://jamesbeard.org/files/2011_JBF_Award_Winners.pdf">I got everything else wrong.</a><br />
<br />
But that’s all right. The awards were interesting. Portland, Ore., picked up two awards — for Gabriel Rucker of Le Pigeon, who won Rising Star Chef of the Year, which goes to a promising chef aged 30 years or younger; and for Andy Ricker of Pok Pok, who won for best chef in the Northwest.<br />
<br />
For best chef in New York, Gabrielle Hamilton beat out Michael Anthony, April Bloomfield, Wylie Dufresne and Michael White.<br />
<br />
Cynics would say that she won because she wrote a book, an argument that would have added weight because the winner for best chef in the Southeast, Andrea Reusing of Lantern in Chapel Hill, N.C., also recently had a book published.<br />
<br />
We also saw what I think was the first tie in a chef and restaurant award, between Saipin Chutima of Lotus of Siam in Las Vegas and Tyson Cole of Uchi in Austin, Texas.<br />
<br />
I was told that Cole was less than gracious about being part of a tie, but I wouldn't know, because I decided to spend the awards in the press room.<br />
<br />
I had a ticket to be part of the audience, and I was told I’d have to choose where to go. I could either sit in the audience for more than three hours while awards were handed out and speeches were made, or I could be in the press room, eating meatballs and cheese and drinking cocktails and Champagne and coffee and talking with my fellow food writers while the awards played on monitors in the rooms.<br />
<br />
It didn’t used to be like that. These were my 13th Beard Awards, and I remember when you used to be able to move back and forth between theater and press room whenever you liked, watching the ceremony, running back to the press room to interview chefs, running back to the ceremony.<br />
<br />
Ultimately I settled for watching the proceedings from the press room, but over the years that room has taken on a life of its own.<br />
<br />
It used to be that only about a couple dozen members of the press cared about the Beard Awards — maybe fewer. The press room was a tranquil place. The video feed broke sometimes, or they'd forget to show us the videos of the humanitarian award winner or the who's who inductees, but it wasn't that big a deal.<br />
<br />
Now the press room has maybe a hundred people at its most crowded moments, some socializing, some live-tweeting, many asking me who just won as I scampered back to the press room's entryway, where the loudspeakers were located so I could actually hear the results of the awards over the din of the crowd.<br />
<br />
It’s a fun party, but the Beard Awards could be on another planet. And now that the Beard Foundation is live-tweeting the results, we don't really need to be there at all.<br />
<br />
Still, should I be hanging out with the collegial group of people in the press room, ranging from reporters from Reuters and the Wall Street Journal to representatives from web sites like <a href="http://eatocracy.cnn.com/">Eatocracy</a> and <a href="http://eater.com/">Eater</a> and blogs I’ve never heard of, or should I be sitting in the audience and reporting on the Zeitgeist of the ceremony, getting a grasp on what the leaders of the Fine Dining world are thinking about and understanding with my own eyes and ears how Tyson Cole behaved?<br />
<br />
A bunch of people don't go to the awards at all, but show up at the afterparties, of which there are many.<br />
<br />
After the awards and the reception that followed it, I started across the street from Lincoln Center, where Daniel Boulud's Bar Boulud has new neighbors, Boulud Sud and Epicerie Boulud, which hosted a raucous celebration for which Boulud opened a Balthazar — that's 12 liters — of 1998 Bordeaux.<br />
<br />
There I ran into my friend Jennifer Watson, a devoted customer of Daniel’s, but also a devoted customer of The Modern, whose wine director Belinda Chang won the award for Outstanding Wine Service. So we went there next and drank Champagne while I spoke with the writers, chefs and publicists in town for the festivities.<br />
<br />
We then took a quick swing by Eleven Madison Park and then on to ABC Kitchen before stopping in The Spotted Pig for a Pimm's Cup and commiserated with the family of Dahlia Narvaez, pastry chef of Osteria Mozza in Los Angeles, who didn’t win the award for best pastry chef. Instead, that award went to Angela Pinkerton of Eleven Madison Park, which also won the award for Outstanding Restaurant.<br />
<br />
I think conversation got philosophical, and Jennifer wanted a hamburger, but The Spotted Pig's kitchen had closed, and so we ended the evening, as food-oriented evenings often end, at Blue Ribbon, where I spoke with Christopher Hastings, chef of Hot and Hot Fish Club in Birmingham, Ala., who had lost the award for best chef in the South to Stephen Stryjiewski of Cochon in New Orleans, about the merits of setting up a foundation for the Bocuse d’Or.<br />
<br />
Chris Hastings was with Gavin Kaysen, you see, who quite apart from being chef of Cafe Boulud represented the U.S. in the Bocuse d'Or some years back.<br />
<br />
But soon Jennifer and I got a table and so instead of continuing the conversation, we had fried chicken.<br />
<br />
Then we shared a taxi, which dropped me off in the office before taking her home, and then I wrote this blog entry.<br />
<br />
And now I'm going home, too.<br />
<br />
Good night.</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-50899324504556194232011-05-09T12:48:00.000-07:002011-05-09T12:50:54.018-07:00Chefs’ Night Out, 2011<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">May 9<br />
<br />
What can I say? Chefs are in town for the Beard Awards, last night many of them went to Chelsea Market, some of whose merchants handed out free food, and we ate, drank and were merry.<br />
<br />
Well, there are a couple more things to say.<br />
<br />
This year’s Chefs Night Out was much more of a James Beard Foundation-sponsored event than in previous years. As far as I could tell, Bon Appétit has stopped any sponsorship of it, which makes sense since they were holding an event on Saturday in Las Vegas. Instead, <a href="http://Giltcity.com/">Gilt</a>, the Food Network and the Cooking Channel were listed as sponsors, and Gilt threw the afterparty, which was also in Chelsea Market, but a different part.<br />
<br />
Servers at the various food stations were wearing James Beard Foundation T-shirts with the word “Eat” printed vertically on them — clearly a move at more aggressive branding on the part of the foundation. Good for them, I say.<br />
<br />
I took some pictures, which are available for your viewing pleasure at <a href="http://www.nrn.com/article/slide-show-chefs-party-james-beard-awards">nrn.com</a>.<a href="http://www.blogger.com/"></a></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-87101691402332731222011-05-06T15:27:00.000-07:002011-05-06T15:49:17.218-07:00Incident at the CIA<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">May 6<br />
<br />
Did you know that if you cut your finger at the CIA, it’s an incident?<br />
<br />
I don't mean the Central Intelligence Agency. Obviously if you cut your finger there it would be an incident. I mean the Culinary Institute of America, where practically everyone is wielding knives, and a lot of them don’t have much experience doing it.<br />
<br />
I figured I’d just grab a band-aid, apply it to my left index finger and get back to work.<br />
<br />
But no. I had to sit there with a paper towel wrapped around my finger while a security officer named James came and applied first aid.<br />
<br />
“Apply pressure and hold the finger over your head to control the bleeding,” an administrator told me. She seemed concerned that I would bleed out.<br />
<br />
All I had done was bring the knife down hard enough on my left index’s fingernail to break it and draw a little blood. I hadn't severed anything. I’d cut myself worse when I was in culinary school. Since that was in France in the 1980s, my chef-instructor wondered why I had stopped chopping apples.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-q0mGvbI20ZY/TcR2jIjVzNI/AAAAAAAABM4/cl5nC2S9txA/s1600/pig+heads.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-q0mGvbI20ZY/TcR2jIjVzNI/AAAAAAAABM4/cl5nC2S9txA/s320/pig+heads.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>“Because I’m getting blood in them,” I said.<br />
<br />
Chef Pétrof agreed that I could wash my finger and apply a bandage to it if I wanted to. Which I did and then finished chopping my apples.<br />
<br />
I think I was making a charlotte aux pommes, but I don’t really remember. It was 1986.<br />
<br />
Last weekend I was at the CIA's Greystone campus in St. Helena, Calif., for the inaugural Pork Summit.<br />
<br />
That event replaces the <a href="http://nrnfoodwriter.blogspot.com/2008/05/top-chef-pork.html">Taste of Elegance</a>, a the finals of a national competition among chefs to make delicious pork dishes.<br />
<br />
In the past, winners of regional competitions would be flown to the semi-finals for a second round of competition, and then the top eight performers in that contest would have to get back into the kitchen to do it again.<br />
<br />
Members of the trade press like me were invited to hang out, meet the chefs and learn more about pork.<br />
<br />
I guess the National Pork Board decided that it was the hanging out, meeting and learning that was valuable, because they got rid of the national competition. Instead they flew all the regional winners to the Napa Valley for a demonstration on how to butcher half a pig, followed by cooking demonstrations by celebrity chefs.<br />
<br />
The next day we were all split into teams to butcher and cook half a pig.<br />
<br />
I’m not sure why they decided to have the journalists cook, too, but hey, I'm a team player. I’m no chef, but I do cook, and I'm good at fetching spices and whatnot. I was happy to be a helper.<br />
<br />
Our team leader was Philadelphia chef and restaurateur José Garces, who, as you probably know, is also a star of Iron Chef America. He seemed like a good choice for team captain.<br />
<br />
“Are you comfortable in a kitchen?” he asked everyone on the team, which included several chefs who won regional competitions, but also me and Plate editor Chandra Ram, both of whom had been to culinary school.<br />
<br />
Michigan-based chef Steven Grostick, who was a butcher before he became a chef, volunteered to handle breaking down the pig half.<br />
<br />
“I’m a food writer,” I said, and volunteered to fetch things and be a prep cook and slave as they saw fit.<br />
<br />
So the next day, José handed me lists of spices and ingredients to fetch. He had me put eggs in the immersion circulator and track down a terrine mold for him to put his scrapple in.<br />
<br />
Then he asked: “How are your knife skills?”<br />
<br />
Compared to what? I thought. Because, you know, they’re better than my 11-year-old nephew’s but I would presume considerably worse than an Iron Chef’s.<br />
<br />
I shrugged and tried to indicate as much trepidation as I could when I said they were okay.<br />
<br />
That was good enough for him, and he had me chop mushrooms and julienne onions.<br />
<br />
It was interesting to watch José manage everyone. He seemed aware of the need to respect the skills of the other chefs, with whom he spoke with great diplomacy but generally left alone, and he also gave me increasingly challenging tasks, as though he were automatically training me.<br />
<br />
I mean, they didn't get too challenging, but I did graduate from chopping mushrooms and onions to finely chopping parsley and chives. I think that’s a little bit harder.<br />
<br />
At any rate, it was while I was chopping chives that I managed to smash the fingernail on my right index finger and cause an incident.<br />
<br />
Seriously, I thought I just needed to wrap the thing up and keep chopping, but James the security guy rubbed it with an antiseptic ointment and applied one of those fingertip band-aids to my finger — really expertly, I might add; it covered everything perfectly. Then he gave me what he called a “finger cot,” a sort of (non-lubricated) condom for my finger, to keep me from bleeding into the chives. I give him a business card so he could spell my name right in the incident report that he’d have to file.<br />
<br />
I apologized to José for the delay in finishing my chive chopping, grabbed some parsley from the walk-in, washed it off and chopped it up.<br />
<br />
He had no interest in the fact that I'd chopped up my finger, and I appreciated that.<br />
<br />
It made me feel like a grown-up.</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-88905080372153938372011-05-04T18:41:00.000-07:002011-05-06T12:13:51.202-07:00CEOs at Soul Daddy<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">May 4</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Did you know that a cabal of restaurant CEOs get together several times a year to scheme and plot?</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Okay, maybe that’s not exactly true. They don’t really plot. They get together and talk about the restaurant businesses and visit restaurants in different cities.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And I guess I wouldn’t call them a cabal. “Some guys” is probably more accurate.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But I don’t really know. Which Wich chief executive Jeff Sinelli just told me about them. They’re in New York now, and Jeff asked me to join some of them at Soul Daddy, the winner of <a href="http://www.nrn.com/article/soul-daddy-wins-%E2%80%98america%E2%80%99s-next-great-restaurant%E2%80%99">America’s Next Great Restaurant</a>, for a quick bite.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So I went to the South Street Seaport and met Abe Ng, president, CEO and chief sushi officer (so says his business card) of Sushi Maki in Miami, and David Goronkin, who doesn’t have a business card because he’s between jobs. He used to be the boss at Bennigan’s, and on June 1 he starts as CEO of Real Mex Restaurants, which operate the Chevys, El Torito and Acapulco chains.</span></div><br />
We picked at the food, and then Jeff asked for a manager and quizzed him about the restaurant.<br />
<br />
I didn't have to do anything. I just sat there and sampled the wild rice salad while Jeff interviewed the guy.<br />
<br />
It turns out that <a href="http://www.nbc.com/americas-next-great-restaurant/">America’s Next Great Restaurant</a> was filmed last year, and the winner, Jamawn Woods, didn’t know he won until it was announced on Sunday. But in the meantime, Steve Ells and the other investors in this next great restaurant got to work hiring staff and securing real estate and generally making the restaurant happen in three places at once — Los Angeles, New York and Minneapolis.<br />
<br />
That they kept the restaurant’s identity under wraps all that time is amazing.<br />
<br />
The manager confirmed that the New York restaurant was packed on its first two days of business. But it was pretty quiet when I met the CEOs there at 5:10 on its third day of business. It was a crappy, rainy day, which might have had something to do with it.<br />
<br />
The food is supposed to be soul food that's good for you.<br />
<br />
We tried the ribs and the chicken and the pulled pork sandwich, the black-eyed pea salad and the wild rice salad and the sweet potato salad and the cabbage slaw. We had a cornbread waffle and some cheese grits.<br />
<br />
The manager told us that the menu items were developed based merely on their names, which the investment partners gave to their development team in Denver.<br />
<br />
And I don’t like to badmouth a place, so I’ll say I liked the waffles and the cheese grits. The rest of it tasted like it was good for you.<br />
<br />
It would be harsh to say it’s soul food without soul, but, well, I guess I just did.<br />
<br />
Jeff, Abe and David had dinner plans with Drew Nieporent, who was going to show them Tribeca Grill, Nobu and Centrico, so that was probably fun.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-v_DbgoD7520/TcH3LMIRbCI/AAAAAAAABMs/jkIHDChbmPM/s1600/Soul+Daddy+menu.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-v_DbgoD7520/TcH3LMIRbCI/AAAAAAAABMs/jkIHDChbmPM/s640/Soul+Daddy+menu.jpg" width="494" /></a></div><br />
</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-80500624271807152392011-05-04T15:58:00.000-07:002011-05-04T17:43:33.213-07:00A new Rickshaw’s coming to town<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3Pv3oTfUJc0/TcHVXg3hFHI/AAAAAAAABMc/lbVvWDj25-Q/s1600/interior.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3Pv3oTfUJc0/TcHVXg3hFHI/AAAAAAAABMc/lbVvWDj25-Q/s320/interior.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">May 4</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I just got off the phone with Rickshaw Dumpling Bar owner Kenny Lao, who’s opening his second location in Manhattan next week.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Or maybe it's his sixth location. It kind of depends on how you look at it. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The new restaurant is at 459 Lexington Avenue. That's the northwest corner of Lexington and 45th.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">“We're aiming to open early next week,” Kenny said. That's when the butcher paper you see in the picture will come off of the windows.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">He already has one brick-and-mortar store on 23rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth avenues, and he also has a fleet of four food trucks.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">It was what he learned from his food trucks that told him where to open his next restaurant. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">“We realized with our trucks that there was a large base of customers here in Midtown who loved us. We responded to how well the trucks do parking around here, as well as to requests from customers, and we started looking for a new location.”</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tAVEUUJshe4/TcHWAu90hII/AAAAAAAABMg/Tl8DeAFhyVs/s1600/Crooked+board.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><br />
</a></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Kenny’s optimistic about the restaurant’s prospects.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">“We think it’s going to be fantasmo,” he said.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">That would be an improvement over the last store he opened, on Eighth Street, near NYU. It failed to thrive and closed after the economy went south.</span></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tAVEUUJshe4/TcHWAu90hII/AAAAAAAABMg/Tl8DeAFhyVs/s1600/Crooked+board.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tAVEUUJshe4/TcHWAu90hII/AAAAAAAABMg/Tl8DeAFhyVs/s320/Crooked+board.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The health inspector has been by, the permits are in place, but Kenny’s still trying to figure out his new magnetic menu board, which you can see in the picture. He says keeping all of those letters in a straight line is a lot harder than it looks.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The denizens of Midtown East have gotten familiar with Rickshaw's classic pork, chicken Thai basil and edamame dumplings, but at the new shop they’ll have the whole gamut to choose from, including Peking duck, kimchi beef, Szechuan chicken, and mustard green veggie dumplings, along with steamed buns, three salads instead of the single one that's available at the trucks, a bunch of sides and four different noodle soups.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Some new items are being added with the new opening, too, including warm sesame noodles.</span></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Those are made from fresh Shanghai noodles and what Kenny calls “a really creamy sesame paste sauce with scallions and cucumbers.” </span></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">He’s also adding a cucumber wakame salad and herbaceous Vietnamese spring rolls — not the fried kind, the other kind — with a peanut dipping sauce.</span></o:p></div></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-43947417551455110652011-04-19T06:59:00.000-07:002011-04-26T12:55:06.259-07:00Poll results: fries should be replaced on kids menus<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0c0800; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 22px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 10.8333px; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px;">April 19</span></b></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 17pt; margin-bottom: 9pt; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0c0800; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="letter-spacing: 3px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 10.8333px; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px;"><br />
</span></b></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0c0800; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="letter-spacing: 3px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 10.8333px; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px;">The bulk of this blog's poll takers — 67 percent — think French fries should be replaced on kids' menus, and a solid plurality — 42 percent — would do the same thing with adults' menus.</span></b></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0c0800; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; letter-spacing: 3px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 10.8333px; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px;"><br />
</span></b></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0c0800; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="letter-spacing: 3px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 10.8333px; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px;"></span></b></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0c0800; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; letter-spacing: 3px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 10.8333px; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px;">That’s not to say fries should be banned, just that they shouldn’t be the default option. Why not live it up with some artichoke or mango from time to time?</span></b></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 24px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0c0800; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; letter-spacing: 3px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 10.8333px; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 20px;"></span></b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 24px;">Twenty-eight people voted in the poll, which really isn’t terrible, but it’s not great, either, so my next poll is a poll on what sort of polls you’d like to participate in on this blog.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 24px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 24px;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 24px;">You can view the results of the most recent poll below:</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 17.0pt; margin-bottom: 9.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><b><span style="color: #0c0800; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; letter-spacing: 2pt;"><br />
</span></b><br />
<b><span style="color: #0c0800; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; letter-spacing: 2pt;">SHOULD RESTAURANTS REPLACE FRIES WITH OTHER VEGETABLES OR FRUIT ON KIDS' MENUS?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><table border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoNormalTable" style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none; mso-padding-alt: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-table-layout-alt: fixed;"><tbody>
<tr style="mso-yfti-firstrow: yes; mso-yfti-irow: 0;"> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 160.0pt;" width="160"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #535353; font-family: Georgia;">Yes<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 58.0pt;" width="58"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #acacac; font-family: Georgia;"> 7 (25%)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br />
</div></td> </tr>
<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 1;"> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 160.0pt;" width="160"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #535353; font-family: Georgia;">Yes, and on adults' menus, too<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 58.0pt;" width="58"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #acacac; font-family: Georgia;"> 12 (42%)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br />
</div></td> </tr>
<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 2;"> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 160.0pt;" width="160"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #535353; font-family: Georgia;">No<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 58.0pt;" width="58"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #acacac; font-family: Georgia;"> 4 (14%)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br />
</div></td> </tr>
<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 3;"> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 160.0pt;" width="160"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #535353; font-family: Georgia;">I don’t care<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 58.0pt;" width="58"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #acacac; font-family: Georgia;"> 3 (10%)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br />
</div></td> </tr>
<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 4; mso-yfti-lastrow: yes;"> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 160.0pt;" width="160"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #535353; font-family: Georgia;">Maybe<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td style="border: none; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 58.0pt;" width="58"><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #acacac; font-family: Georgia;"> 2 (7%)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br />
</div></td> </tr>
</tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="color: #b3b3b3; font-family: Georgia;">Votes: 28 <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #b3b3b3; font-family: Georgia;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #535353; font-family: Georgia;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 28px;">[April 28 update: never mind — clearly you’d like to leave the poll choices up to me.]</span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #0d0600; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; font-weight: bold; letter-spacing: 2px; line-height: 17px; text-transform: uppercase;">I LIKE POLLS ON THIS BLOG THAT ARE ABOUT...</span><br />
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<span style="color: #b3b3b3; font-family: Georgia;"></span><br />
<span style="color: #b3b3b3; font-family: Georgia;"><div style="background-color: transparent; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #666666; font-family: Times; font: normal normal normal 100%/normal Georgia, serif; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 1px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div id="rootCont" style="width: 218px;"><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; width: 253px;"><tbody>
<tr><td class="answerText" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #666666; font-size: 12px; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; padding-left: 0px; padding-top: 2px; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><div style="overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; text-overflow: ellipsis;" title="My personal taste">My personal taste</div></td><td style="margin-top: 2px; padding-top: 2px;"><div style="position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="resultText" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #bababa; font-size: 12px; padding-top: 2px; white-space: nowrap;" title="My personal taste"> 1 (16%)</div><div class="resultBar" style="background-color: #5588aa; border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; font-size: 12px; left: 0px; margin-bottom: 1px; margin-top: 1px; padding-bottom: 1px; padding-top: 1px; position: absolute; top: 0px; white-space: nowrap; width: 8px; z-index: -1;" title="My personal taste"> </div></div></td></tr>
<tr><td class="answerText" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #666666; font-size: 12px; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; padding-left: 0px; padding-top: 2px; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><div style="overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; text-overflow: ellipsis;" title="Beard Award nominees">Beard Award nominees</div></td><td style="margin-top: 2px; padding-top: 2px;"><div style="position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="resultText" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #bababa; font-size: 12px; padding-top: 2px; white-space: nowrap;" title="Beard Award nominees"> 0 (0%)</div><div class="resultBar" style="background-color: #5588aa; border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; font-size: 12px; left: 0px; margin-bottom: 1px; margin-top: 1px; padding-bottom: 1px; padding-top: 1px; position: absolute; top: 0px; white-space: nowrap; width: 0px; z-index: -1;" title="Beard Award nominees"></div></div></td></tr>
<tr><td class="answerText" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #666666; font-size: 12px; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; padding-left: 0px; padding-top: 2px; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><div style="overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; text-overflow: ellipsis;" title="predicting trends">predicting trends</div></td><td style="margin-top: 2px; padding-top: 2px;"><div style="position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="resultText" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #bababa; font-size: 12px; padding-top: 2px; white-space: nowrap;" title="predicting trends"> 3 (50%)</div><div class="resultBar" style="background-color: #5588aa; border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; font-size: 12px; left: 0px; margin-bottom: 1px; margin-top: 1px; padding-bottom: 1px; padding-top: 1px; position: absolute; top: 0px; white-space: nowrap; width: 26px; z-index: -1;" title="predicting trends"> </div></div></td></tr>
<tr><td class="answerText" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #666666; font-size: 12px; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; padding-left: 0px; padding-top: 2px; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><div style="overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; text-overflow: ellipsis;" title="Social or health issues">Social or health issues</div></td><td style="margin-top: 2px; padding-top: 2px;"><div style="position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="resultText" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #bababa; font-size: 12px; padding-top: 2px; white-space: nowrap;" title="Social or health issues"> 2 (33%)</div><div class="resultBar" style="background-color: #5588aa; border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; font-size: 12px; left: 0px; margin-bottom: 1px; margin-top: 1px; padding-bottom: 1px; padding-top: 1px; position: absolute; top: 0px; white-space: nowrap; width: 17px; z-index: -1;" title="Social or health issues"> </div></div></td></tr>
<tr><td class="answerText" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #666666; font-size: 12px; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; padding-left: 0px; padding-top: 2px; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><div style="overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; text-overflow: ellipsis;" title="I want to read your blog, not take polls">I want to read your blog, not take polls</div></td><td style="margin-top: 2px; padding-top: 2px;"><div style="position: relative; z-index: 0;"><div class="resultText" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(85, 136, 170); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #bababa; font-size: 12px; padding-top: 2px; white-space: nowrap;" title="I want to read your blog, not take polls"> 0 (0%)</div><div class="resultBar" style="background-color: #5588aa; border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; font-size: 12px; left: 0px; margin-bottom: 1px; margin-top: 1px; padding-bottom: 1px; padding-top: 1px; position: absolute; top: 0px; white-space: nowrap; width: 0px; z-index: -1;" title="I want to read your blog, not take polls"></div></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
<div class="pollStats" style="color: silver; display: block; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 5px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 5px;">Votes so far: 6<br />
Poll closed </div></div></div></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div></div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19214002.post-37728945092244432102011-04-13T23:11:00.000-07:002011-04-20T12:52:01.433-07:00Biryani and mangoes in Hyderabad<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-KewyGJeNChQ/TaaHVT4u2vI/AAAAAAAABL8/IPQzlDH6Nak/s1600/Biryani.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-KewyGJeNChQ/TaaHVT4u2vI/AAAAAAAABL8/IPQzlDH6Nak/s320/Biryani.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>April 14<br />
<br />
On the left is a picture of what biryani is supposed to look like, so I'm told. I took it with my cell phone, so it's not of the best quality, but according to the menu at Paradise restaurant in Hyderabad, the grains of rice in a biryani should all be separate — no sticking together.<br />
<br />
Hyderabad, the capital of Andhra Pradesh state, claims to be the birthplace of biryani, and the best place to eat it. And Paradise, by several accounts, is as good a place as any to get it. So while the franchisors on the trade mission were having their late morning <a href="http://nrnfoodwriter.blogspot.com/2011/04/speed-dating-in-india-nrninindia.html">speed dates</a>, I hired a driver to help me find mangoes and to take me to Paradise.<br />
<br />
When I worked in Thailand, a place with very fine mangoes as far as I and the Thais are concerned, my Indian colleagues would snigger and laugh at the local fruits, declaring them to be inadequate shadows of real Indian mangoes.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PkT9RlVVuQM/TaaJiUPyggI/AAAAAAAABME/gNwJA-Pm8bw/s1600/Bangana+Palli+mangoes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PkT9RlVVuQM/TaaJiUPyggI/AAAAAAAABME/gNwJA-Pm8bw/s320/Bangana+Palli+mangoes.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>My pre-trip research indicated that mangoes were in season now in India, and although the people of Mumbai told me it was a bit early for the prized fruits yet, they agreed that I might have better luck in Hyderabad, farther south.<br />
<br />
The Hyderabadis laughed at me — about as politely as you can laugh at someone, but they laughed — and suggested I wait a couple of weeks before trying mangoes.<br />
<br />
I pointed out to them that I was in India now and would not be in a couple of weeks, and suggested that perhaps with Indian mangoes being so good, even those that were not at the peak of season might possibly be the best I’d ever tasted, and they agreed that that might be so.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eS65yZ4Ch4c/TaaL3ekGmZI/AAAAAAAABMM/qFMKkjTL7Xg/s1600/hyderabad+market+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eS65yZ4Ch4c/TaaL3ekGmZI/AAAAAAAABMM/qFMKkjTL7Xg/s320/hyderabad+market+1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>So I had my driver take me to the fruit market. To see what we could find.<br />
<br />
There weren’t a lot of mangoes, but there were some, and after wandering around for awhile the driver recommended a stand to me, and I bought a kilo of mangoes for 40 rupees — about a dollar.<br />
<br />
They had the great floral aroma of a good mango and the promise of a complex and nuanced flavor that I would expect from an excellent piece of fruit.<br />
<br />
Delighted with my purchase, I headed to Paradise for lunch and had mutton biryani.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NdEEf74f7O4/TaaPHXf-9oI/AAAAAAAABMU/RGl0Sx9X-rI/s1600/Hyderabad+market2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="242" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-NdEEf74f7O4/TaaPHXf-9oI/AAAAAAAABMU/RGl0Sx9X-rI/s320/Hyderabad+market2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>What can I say? All the Biryani I’d had in the past was basically rice pilaf with meat in it, and so was this. The distinguishing characteristics were very long-grained basmati rice that didn't stick together and a strong but not overpowering cardamom aroma. This being Andhra Pradesh, which claims to be the state with the spiciest food (although I’m told that some people in Tamil Nadu would beg to differ), there was also plenty of chile in the rice.<br />
<br />
It was tasty. I suppose it might have been the most delicious biryani I'd ever had. I don't know. It was hardly worth a trip to Hyderabad to eat, but since I was there already I was glad for the experience, and to have a benchmark for what is considered great biryani.<br />
<br />
Back at the hotel, I had the staff peel and slice my mangoes for me, which they did with alacrity.<br />
<br />
And let me tell you, they were terrible. The flesh had the right orange color, glistening sheen and slippery texture of a good mango, but it was soulless and sour, and I was sorely disappointed.</div>Bret Thornhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05421121059536730439noreply@blogger.com2