Chris Cheung, my favorite Cantonese chef from Bensonhurst, is on his own again. He had a difference of opinion with the owners of Almond Flower Bistro about where the restaurant should go culinarily. Chris wanted a menu that used Western ingredients in Chinese cooking techniques — something he already was doing to a certain extent with items such as foie gras roast char siu bao with black truffle. The owners, according to Chris, have decided instead to serve $5 plates in a kitchen without a chef.
Anyway, this was the menu that Chris wanted, and he says he hopes to implement something like it somewhere soon.
ALMOND FLOWER BISTRO
evolutionary asian american cuisine
DINNER
APPETIZERS
Noodle wrapped jumbo Maya shrimp 8
Foie gras roast pork buns 9
Roasted baby conch, black bean foam 7
Short rib lobster rice roll “cherng fun” 12
Asian green salad, mandarin oranges 6
Seared foie gras w/sautéed lychees 16
Truffled congee soup w/abalone wontons 12
Seafood chowder w/lotus chips 9
Wasabi crabcake 10
Mabu tofu wonton crisps 7
Crispy short rib wontons, truffle soy 8
Baked clams w/chili garlic gratin 9
Sliced salmon wrapped shrimp tempura 9
Sleeping oysters w/grilled scallops 16
Crispy calamari 8
COLD SEAFOOD BAR
Chilled baby conch 7
Shrimp cocktail 7
Clams on the half shell 8
Oysters on the half shell 15
Steamers (served hot) 15
The “Sea” cold platter 25
(3) clams (3) oysters (4) shrimp cocktail, chilled lobster
The “Ocean” cold platter 50
(6) clams (6) oysters (8) shrimp cocktail (3) baby conch, chilled lobster
ENTREES
MIDDLE SIZED PLATES
Sweet and spicy baby back ribs 13
Char siu roast pork w/manndarin orange marmalade 12
Broiled ½ Lobster w/blue crab chili 18
Pan seared flounder 14
Asian and American vegetable medley 10
Black cod w/char siu marinade 16
Pan seared sirloin 13
FULL SIZED PLATES
Szechuan pepper crusted salmon w/mandarin orange marmalade 19
Peking duck w/scallion hoisin pancakes, mango reduction 25
Rack of lamb, baby vegetables, minted daikon 28
Pan seared sirloin w/wasabi scallion mash 27
Grilled chicken w/yellow curry rice stew 17
5 spice braised short rib w/pappardelle noodles 17
Seared squid udon pasta 17
Vegetable medley w/spinach noodles 13
Seafood stir fry 25
Mai fun rice noodles w/Chinese sausage and clams 17
SIDES
Ginger and garlic hoi nam rice 3
Jasmine rice 2
Wasabi scallion mash potato 4
Little vegetables 4
DESSERTS
$7
Chocolate French tuile fortune cookie
Lychee custard tart
Mango cheesecake
Chocolate volcano cake
Assorted ice cream or sorbet
Thursday, July 05, 2007
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
Fifth drink buyback
June 28
The Sonoma County Winegrape Commission wants some attention, and they hired Larry Levine to get it for him. Larry in turn hired Zagat-editor-turned-publicist Ben Schmerler to get the attention of New York media.
Ben, by the way, also is a new father as of June 25 — welcome to the world Sophie Anne Schmerler.
So Ben asked me if I would please meet Larry for a drink.
I wondered if it was the Bay Area-based publicist Larry Levine that I already knew, but there are several Larry Levines out there, so I didn’t mention it.
But indeed it was that boisterous, old-school publicist I’d known for years but hadn’t seen for awhile.
Ben, being smart, arranged for us to meet at Aquavit, which is across the street from the Nation’s Restaurant News headquarters.
We bellied up to the bar and I suggested he try the house-infused spirits, and we agreed that a three-drink sampler was a good idea. Larry went for the citrus ones, and I went for horseradish, saffron and peach-anise.
We found that we weren’t done catching up when we drained our drinks, so we each had another. I ordered another peach-anise aquavit. Larry had a Carlsberg, and since we had ordered four drinks, the bartender immediately poured us a fifth one — mango-chile aquavit.
That was too spicy for Larry’s delicate baby-boomer palate (statistically, Gen-Xers such as me have the strongest penchant for spicy food — more so than the youngsters). So he gave it to me.
Now, the aquavit served at Aquavit comes in small glasses, but, I mean, the sixth one meant I was well-primed for dinner, which I was having with another publicist, Philip Ruskin, at Colors, a restaurant owned and operated by a cooperative of former Windows on the World employees. That makes it a sentimental favorite, but not enough of one to make it a huge commercial success. They’re working on it.
Chef Jean Pierre (I’m not being excessively familiar; Pierre is his last name and he comes from Haïti) sent out samosas and scallop ceviche while I munched on papadams. Then we had a hot preparation of chicken and green papaya named Pam Thai because it was invented by one of their Thai chefs, whose name is Pam, along with braised pork ribs and bowls of pozole verde.
I’m not exactly sure what Philip and I talked about.
The Sonoma County Winegrape Commission wants some attention, and they hired Larry Levine to get it for him. Larry in turn hired Zagat-editor-turned-publicist Ben Schmerler to get the attention of New York media.
Ben, by the way, also is a new father as of June 25 — welcome to the world Sophie Anne Schmerler.
So Ben asked me if I would please meet Larry for a drink.
I wondered if it was the Bay Area-based publicist Larry Levine that I already knew, but there are several Larry Levines out there, so I didn’t mention it.
But indeed it was that boisterous, old-school publicist I’d known for years but hadn’t seen for awhile.
Ben, being smart, arranged for us to meet at Aquavit, which is across the street from the Nation’s Restaurant News headquarters.
We bellied up to the bar and I suggested he try the house-infused spirits, and we agreed that a three-drink sampler was a good idea. Larry went for the citrus ones, and I went for horseradish, saffron and peach-anise.
We found that we weren’t done catching up when we drained our drinks, so we each had another. I ordered another peach-anise aquavit. Larry had a Carlsberg, and since we had ordered four drinks, the bartender immediately poured us a fifth one — mango-chile aquavit.
That was too spicy for Larry’s delicate baby-boomer palate (statistically, Gen-Xers such as me have the strongest penchant for spicy food — more so than the youngsters). So he gave it to me.
Now, the aquavit served at Aquavit comes in small glasses, but, I mean, the sixth one meant I was well-primed for dinner, which I was having with another publicist, Philip Ruskin, at Colors, a restaurant owned and operated by a cooperative of former Windows on the World employees. That makes it a sentimental favorite, but not enough of one to make it a huge commercial success. They’re working on it.
Chef Jean Pierre (I’m not being excessively familiar; Pierre is his last name and he comes from Haïti) sent out samosas and scallop ceviche while I munched on papadams. Then we had a hot preparation of chicken and green papaya named Pam Thai because it was invented by one of their Thai chefs, whose name is Pam, along with braised pork ribs and bowls of pozole verde.
I’m not exactly sure what Philip and I talked about.
Monday, July 02, 2007
Raw scallops and the WASPiest WASPs in WASPtown
June 27
I really like Rhode Island. Have I ever mentioned that?
It’s this tiny little state that one passes through on the way to Massachusetts, and most people don’t give it a second thought, but it’s great. The people are totally different culturally from their neighbors in Connecticut and Massachusetts (although the cultural divide isn’t demarcated by state borders; I’ve heard the Rhode Island term “quahog,” for a type of large clam, used as far north as Falmouth, Mass. [Since writing this, I have been informed that the term “quahog” is widespread throughout eastern and central Massachusetts; I don't know about western Mass., so I’d be delighted to hear from someone from Stockbridge or Pittsfield or Lenox or Great Barrington]).
And the accents! Oh I wish I could do their accents. They sound like they’re making fun of Bostonians.
The capital, Providence, is a multicultural hodgepodge, but for the past few days I have been in Newport, which contrary to its name is one of the oldest settlements in the Northeast, and has a lot of Old Money to go with that fact.
“Rum and slaves,” Eben Klemm said to me, looking at the mansions for which the town is famous. Eben’s the historically-informed head bartender for BR Guest restaurants in New York.
Okay, actually he’s not, he’s like, senior director of beverages or something, but you get the idea. He was in Newport to talk at the International Corporate Chefs Association’s annual summit.
He was talking about cocktails, which is reasonable enough. I was there ostensibly to talk about New England food trends and to add my august presence to the proceedings, but really I was there to hang out with chain restaurant corporate chefs — fascinating people who do things like develop Buca di Beppo’s meatballs and make new salsas for On the Border.
The corporate chefs at Dunkin’ Brands — which includes Dunkin’ Donuts and Baskin-Robbins — I learned, are working on their own brand of soft-serve. I asked one of them if they could please also have dipped soft serve, with that hard chocolate shell, and he said that was problematic at this time as it’s hard to get it to harden without using trans fats.
Anyway, Old Money — the type that I imagine still distinguishes between different types of northern Europeans and that continues to be mostly Protestant and of Anglo-Saxon stock (and of course white, I mean, come on) — was very much in evidence in Newport.
I don’t think I’ve ever been anywhere that seems so dominated by WASPs.
There were so many WASPs that some of them were doing manual labor. The groundskeepers at the International Tennis Hall of Fame (which I didn’t know was in Newport, but wasn’t surprised to find out) were blond-haired white guys.
The bell staff at the Viking Hotel, where the ICCA summit was held, looked like they’d come straight out of an Abercrombie & Fitch catalog.
Portuguese was about as “ethnic” as it seemed to get.
The summit, as conferences like these tend to be, was mostly a series of panel discussions on different topics, preceded by a keynote address, usually about leadership — given in this case by Dunkin’ Brands chief Jon Luther. But we also got to go out on the water if we wanted to (others visited an organic farm and someplace else I didn’t want to see). Some people went deep-sea fishing, others went out on a lobster boat, I spent half a day with some corporate chefs, some representatives from the meeting’s sponsors, the owner of American Mussel (which to me sounds like a gay porn site but isn’t) and his 19-year-old son Justin, an able deck-hand and nice kid.
American Mussel actually is a mollusk producer and processor. We first visited their oyster farm on the eastern passage of Narragansett Bay, where small oysters are put in crates stringed one on top of the other and hung in mid-stream, where the bulk of the plankton swim by. The oysters eat the plankton and grow, and then American Mussel harvests and sells them. They also process mussels and clams and scallops, but they don’t process them much. They just keep them alive and clean them and ship them out.
We toured the facilities and then ate steamed clams and mussels and raw clams and oysters and, for the first time in my life, a raw scallop.
Dear reader, you might have noticed that I eat pretty much whatever anyone puts in front of me and that I’ve tried many, many things just since I started writing this blog, but I cannot remember a more joyful, ethereal culinary experience than eating a raw scallop.
It was super fresh, mind you — still pulsing as it was being removed from the shell. Simultaneously firm and silky-smooth, sweet and briny, I wanted to curl up on the concrete floor of American Mussel and go to sleep, so at peace was I.
“I didn’t care for it,” said someone from the California Avocado Commission.
Great, I thought, more for me, and I proceeded to get stoned on mollusk protein.
I really like Rhode Island. Have I ever mentioned that?
It’s this tiny little state that one passes through on the way to Massachusetts, and most people don’t give it a second thought, but it’s great. The people are totally different culturally from their neighbors in Connecticut and Massachusetts (although the cultural divide isn’t demarcated by state borders; I’ve heard the Rhode Island term “quahog,” for a type of large clam, used as far north as Falmouth, Mass. [Since writing this, I have been informed that the term “quahog” is widespread throughout eastern and central Massachusetts; I don't know about western Mass., so I’d be delighted to hear from someone from Stockbridge or Pittsfield or Lenox or Great Barrington]).
And the accents! Oh I wish I could do their accents. They sound like they’re making fun of Bostonians.
The capital, Providence, is a multicultural hodgepodge, but for the past few days I have been in Newport, which contrary to its name is one of the oldest settlements in the Northeast, and has a lot of Old Money to go with that fact.
“Rum and slaves,” Eben Klemm said to me, looking at the mansions for which the town is famous. Eben’s the historically-informed head bartender for BR Guest restaurants in New York.
Okay, actually he’s not, he’s like, senior director of beverages or something, but you get the idea. He was in Newport to talk at the International Corporate Chefs Association’s annual summit.
He was talking about cocktails, which is reasonable enough. I was there ostensibly to talk about New England food trends and to add my august presence to the proceedings, but really I was there to hang out with chain restaurant corporate chefs — fascinating people who do things like develop Buca di Beppo’s meatballs and make new salsas for On the Border.
The corporate chefs at Dunkin’ Brands — which includes Dunkin’ Donuts and Baskin-Robbins — I learned, are working on their own brand of soft-serve. I asked one of them if they could please also have dipped soft serve, with that hard chocolate shell, and he said that was problematic at this time as it’s hard to get it to harden without using trans fats.
Anyway, Old Money — the type that I imagine still distinguishes between different types of northern Europeans and that continues to be mostly Protestant and of Anglo-Saxon stock (and of course white, I mean, come on) — was very much in evidence in Newport.
I don’t think I’ve ever been anywhere that seems so dominated by WASPs.
There were so many WASPs that some of them were doing manual labor. The groundskeepers at the International Tennis Hall of Fame (which I didn’t know was in Newport, but wasn’t surprised to find out) were blond-haired white guys.
The bell staff at the Viking Hotel, where the ICCA summit was held, looked like they’d come straight out of an Abercrombie & Fitch catalog.
Portuguese was about as “ethnic” as it seemed to get.
The summit, as conferences like these tend to be, was mostly a series of panel discussions on different topics, preceded by a keynote address, usually about leadership — given in this case by Dunkin’ Brands chief Jon Luther. But we also got to go out on the water if we wanted to (others visited an organic farm and someplace else I didn’t want to see). Some people went deep-sea fishing, others went out on a lobster boat, I spent half a day with some corporate chefs, some representatives from the meeting’s sponsors, the owner of American Mussel (which to me sounds like a gay porn site but isn’t) and his 19-year-old son Justin, an able deck-hand and nice kid.
American Mussel actually is a mollusk producer and processor. We first visited their oyster farm on the eastern passage of Narragansett Bay, where small oysters are put in crates stringed one on top of the other and hung in mid-stream, where the bulk of the plankton swim by. The oysters eat the plankton and grow, and then American Mussel harvests and sells them. They also process mussels and clams and scallops, but they don’t process them much. They just keep them alive and clean them and ship them out.
We toured the facilities and then ate steamed clams and mussels and raw clams and oysters and, for the first time in my life, a raw scallop.
Dear reader, you might have noticed that I eat pretty much whatever anyone puts in front of me and that I’ve tried many, many things just since I started writing this blog, but I cannot remember a more joyful, ethereal culinary experience than eating a raw scallop.
It was super fresh, mind you — still pulsing as it was being removed from the shell. Simultaneously firm and silky-smooth, sweet and briny, I wanted to curl up on the concrete floor of American Mussel and go to sleep, so at peace was I.
“I didn’t care for it,” said someone from the California Avocado Commission.
Great, I thought, more for me, and I proceeded to get stoned on mollusk protein.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
JB’s birthday
June 23
Not many people call John Bruce JB anymore. He certainly doesn’t. I’m not even sure that I do; I think I say “hi John,” when I see him. But I still think of him as JB.
He’s a nice guy. Rabelaisian, gregarious and back in college sort of the social focal point of the group of friends that was very much like my family during my first two years of college. If you read this blog regularly, you have met many of the members of that group, including Birdman aka David Kraus, Shane Curcuru and Michael Gerber. Even big Chinese lawyer Dennis Liu has made an appearance, and you might have read Shane’s and JB’s comments. They make them from time to time.
JB turned 40 in February, making June a very good time for his wife, Kim, to throw him a surprise birthday party. He would never suspect — that is until she started getting ready for the party, at which point she told him. I imagine she said something like: “Get out of the way John, I’m setting up the grill. Happy birthday. Surprise!”
June is a particularly good time to throw a party to JB’s liking, as his favorite foods are lobster and ribs.
So Michael and I drove from Gloucester to the Bruce homestead in Northborough (I drove very briefly, while Michael spoke on the phone to his wife, Shoshi, in Israel; my driving terrified him enough that he made me get off the highway at the first possible exit after he was off the phone and switch places, which was fine with me). We stopped on the way for me to buy a bottle of bourbon for the birthday boy and for Michael to buy two bettas for a homemade gift he was preparing for JB: A blue betta over clear red stones, and a red one over clear blue stones, separated by a partition that could be covered by something opaque when JB didn’t want the two fighting fish to display their aggressive tendencies.
Michael set up camp in the kitchen and started making tuna sushi rolls for everyone.
“Should I bring one or two pounds of tuna?” He’d asked me.
“Two,” I said, and I was right. Celebrating chez les Bruce has always necessitated joy and indulgence, and it still does.
So after sushi I sat down next to Michael and we each ripped into a lobster. He instructed a young tween — someone’s daughter; I don’t know whose — how best to go at the crustacean. This was her first one and it was nice to see her learn. I then polished off an ear of corn and some ribs, grabbed my wine glass and hung out in the backyard where kids ran around and grown-ups drank beer and wine.
Thank goodness Michael was driving. He’s a teetotaler.
Not many people call John Bruce JB anymore. He certainly doesn’t. I’m not even sure that I do; I think I say “hi John,” when I see him. But I still think of him as JB.
He’s a nice guy. Rabelaisian, gregarious and back in college sort of the social focal point of the group of friends that was very much like my family during my first two years of college. If you read this blog regularly, you have met many of the members of that group, including Birdman aka David Kraus, Shane Curcuru and Michael Gerber. Even big Chinese lawyer Dennis Liu has made an appearance, and you might have read Shane’s and JB’s comments. They make them from time to time.
JB turned 40 in February, making June a very good time for his wife, Kim, to throw him a surprise birthday party. He would never suspect — that is until she started getting ready for the party, at which point she told him. I imagine she said something like: “Get out of the way John, I’m setting up the grill. Happy birthday. Surprise!”
June is a particularly good time to throw a party to JB’s liking, as his favorite foods are lobster and ribs.
So Michael and I drove from Gloucester to the Bruce homestead in Northborough (I drove very briefly, while Michael spoke on the phone to his wife, Shoshi, in Israel; my driving terrified him enough that he made me get off the highway at the first possible exit after he was off the phone and switch places, which was fine with me). We stopped on the way for me to buy a bottle of bourbon for the birthday boy and for Michael to buy two bettas for a homemade gift he was preparing for JB: A blue betta over clear red stones, and a red one over clear blue stones, separated by a partition that could be covered by something opaque when JB didn’t want the two fighting fish to display their aggressive tendencies.
Michael set up camp in the kitchen and started making tuna sushi rolls for everyone.
“Should I bring one or two pounds of tuna?” He’d asked me.
“Two,” I said, and I was right. Celebrating chez les Bruce has always necessitated joy and indulgence, and it still does.
So after sushi I sat down next to Michael and we each ripped into a lobster. He instructed a young tween — someone’s daughter; I don’t know whose — how best to go at the crustacean. This was her first one and it was nice to see her learn. I then polished off an ear of corn and some ribs, grabbed my wine glass and hung out in the backyard where kids ran around and grown-ups drank beer and wine.
Thank goodness Michael was driving. He’s a teetotaler.
New England Kosher
June 22
I’m going to the International Corporate Chefs Association conference in Newport, and I have trouble going to Rhode Island without popping up to Boston to visit a friend or two.
Tonight I’m keeping my old college friend Michael Gerber company. His wife, Shoshi, is in Israel with their sons, five-year-old Nadav and three-year-old Gilad.
Michael picked me up at South Station and then we headed to Newbury Street to have dinner at Boston Public Meat. That’s Pino Maffeo’s new restaurant, in the space of his old restaurant, L.
Michael actually found parking on Newbury Street, a feat at which he marveled for some time.
He is a good and proper New Englander, from Lexington, Mass., although he lives in Gloucester now, and as such will eat pretty much anything from the sea. Slime, tentacles, six or more legs, antennae — none of it troubles him. Down his Yankee gullet it goes.
But tripe, veal cheeks, rabbit? No way.
“It’s a cultural bias,” he acknowledges with a shrug. He’s a biologist and middle school science teacher by trade, a naturalist by avocation, so he knows it’s all perfectly fine to eat. But it’s still not going to happen (or not often; I did convince him to try veal cheek when we went to Toro, Ken Oringer’s Spanish place, during its family-and-friends night; I don’t remember whether I convinced him to put tripe in his mouth).
Michael also is Jewish, and, like me, comes from a liberal tradition that does not fuss with the troubles of dietary law. Shoshi, on the other hand, is a Yemenite-Israeli who was raised keeping Kosher and still sort of does, more or less, basically.
So when they were setting up a household together, negotiations were in order, especially since Michael is the family cook.
He agreed to abstain from consuming pork in the house. He would not mix milk and meat, but as a New Englander, lobster is simply part of who he is. He wouldn’t eat it in front of Shoshi if it bothered her, but he was darn well going to eat it.
Okay, so it’s Friday night and Michael and I are preparing to have our Sabbath meal at Boston Public. We agreed to throw ourselves on the mercy of the chef, and let him send out whatever food he wanted, and appropriate wine to go with it, with the caveats that Michael would not be eating rabbit or pork this evening.
Pork wouldn’t normally be an issue for him, but he and Shoshi are pretty serious about Shabbat, and although pig flesh is really no more anathema than anything else that’s not Kosher (it either is or it isn’t), the swine is nonetheless symbolic of everything that is (spiritually) unclean, and so to him it seems like a tacky thing to eat on Friday night.
Rabbit, as we discussed, is simply cultural bias, although it’s not kosher either (indeed, in Leviticus, it’s mentioned before the pig on the list of things not to eat; so is rock badger, whatever that is).
Pino, the chef, actually was at MIT that evening talking to an audience about molecular gastronomy, but he came back in time to make us steak and dessert. I introduced him to Michael, and they discussed the work of Michael’s friend, doctor Morgan Hott, who is using alginate, a popular molecular gastronomy tool, to grow materials for human joint replacement.
Cool, huh?
What we ate and drank:
Local striped bass with truffle and yuzu
Onset and Hood Canal oysters, garnished with a little salad of wakame, lotus root and sesame
Crémant de Bourgogne
Alaskan king crab with grapefruit and avocado
Tuna summer rolls with ginger soy sauce
Potato spring rolls topped with smoked salmon and crème fraîche (for Michael)
Pork and shrimp spring rolls with mustard sauce (for me)
Pappardelle with braised rabbit, summer truffles, truffle froth and wild mushroom (for me)
Beefsteak and cherry tomato salad with mozzarella (for Michael)
2005 Umani Ronchi Casal di Serra, Puglia
Porterhouse topped with Himalayan rock salt grated at table side, served with taro purée and three sauces: Hollandaise, red wine oxtail and Béarnaise
French fries stacked like a Jenga game, served with mayonnaise
2005 Buehler Zinfandel, Napa
Red Bull, flash fried cranberries and lotus root chips
Peanut butter-chocolate gianduja with malted chocolate ice cream and raspberry sauce
De La Force Curious and Ancient 20-year-old tawny port
I’m going to the International Corporate Chefs Association conference in Newport, and I have trouble going to Rhode Island without popping up to Boston to visit a friend or two.
Tonight I’m keeping my old college friend Michael Gerber company. His wife, Shoshi, is in Israel with their sons, five-year-old Nadav and three-year-old Gilad.
Michael picked me up at South Station and then we headed to Newbury Street to have dinner at Boston Public Meat. That’s Pino Maffeo’s new restaurant, in the space of his old restaurant, L.
Michael actually found parking on Newbury Street, a feat at which he marveled for some time.
He is a good and proper New Englander, from Lexington, Mass., although he lives in Gloucester now, and as such will eat pretty much anything from the sea. Slime, tentacles, six or more legs, antennae — none of it troubles him. Down his Yankee gullet it goes.
But tripe, veal cheeks, rabbit? No way.
“It’s a cultural bias,” he acknowledges with a shrug. He’s a biologist and middle school science teacher by trade, a naturalist by avocation, so he knows it’s all perfectly fine to eat. But it’s still not going to happen (or not often; I did convince him to try veal cheek when we went to Toro, Ken Oringer’s Spanish place, during its family-and-friends night; I don’t remember whether I convinced him to put tripe in his mouth).
Michael also is Jewish, and, like me, comes from a liberal tradition that does not fuss with the troubles of dietary law. Shoshi, on the other hand, is a Yemenite-Israeli who was raised keeping Kosher and still sort of does, more or less, basically.
So when they were setting up a household together, negotiations were in order, especially since Michael is the family cook.
He agreed to abstain from consuming pork in the house. He would not mix milk and meat, but as a New Englander, lobster is simply part of who he is. He wouldn’t eat it in front of Shoshi if it bothered her, but he was darn well going to eat it.
Okay, so it’s Friday night and Michael and I are preparing to have our Sabbath meal at Boston Public. We agreed to throw ourselves on the mercy of the chef, and let him send out whatever food he wanted, and appropriate wine to go with it, with the caveats that Michael would not be eating rabbit or pork this evening.
Pork wouldn’t normally be an issue for him, but he and Shoshi are pretty serious about Shabbat, and although pig flesh is really no more anathema than anything else that’s not Kosher (it either is or it isn’t), the swine is nonetheless symbolic of everything that is (spiritually) unclean, and so to him it seems like a tacky thing to eat on Friday night.
Rabbit, as we discussed, is simply cultural bias, although it’s not kosher either (indeed, in Leviticus, it’s mentioned before the pig on the list of things not to eat; so is rock badger, whatever that is).
Pino, the chef, actually was at MIT that evening talking to an audience about molecular gastronomy, but he came back in time to make us steak and dessert. I introduced him to Michael, and they discussed the work of Michael’s friend, doctor Morgan Hott, who is using alginate, a popular molecular gastronomy tool, to grow materials for human joint replacement.
Cool, huh?
What we ate and drank:
Local striped bass with truffle and yuzu
Onset and Hood Canal oysters, garnished with a little salad of wakame, lotus root and sesame
Crémant de Bourgogne
Alaskan king crab with grapefruit and avocado
Tuna summer rolls with ginger soy sauce
Potato spring rolls topped with smoked salmon and crème fraîche (for Michael)
Pork and shrimp spring rolls with mustard sauce (for me)
Pappardelle with braised rabbit, summer truffles, truffle froth and wild mushroom (for me)
Beefsteak and cherry tomato salad with mozzarella (for Michael)
2005 Umani Ronchi Casal di Serra, Puglia
Porterhouse topped with Himalayan rock salt grated at table side, served with taro purée and three sauces: Hollandaise, red wine oxtail and Béarnaise
French fries stacked like a Jenga game, served with mayonnaise
2005 Buehler Zinfandel, Napa
Red Bull, flash fried cranberries and lotus root chips
Peanut butter-chocolate gianduja with malted chocolate ice cream and raspberry sauce
De La Force Curious and Ancient 20-year-old tawny port
Friday, June 22, 2007
rising stars
Starchefs.com has made its pick for the New York City chefs it deems to be "Rising Stars."
They'll be honored on September 18 at the end of Starchefs' International Chefs Congress.
Here they are:
Michael Anthony – Gramercy Tavern
Eric Hara – Davidburke & Donatella
Craig Hopson – Picholine
Chris Lee – Gilt
Akhtar Nawab – EU
Masato Shimizu – 15 East
Yosuke Suga – L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon
Damon Wise – Craft
Also:
Hotel Chef Award: Doug Psaltis – Country
Mixologist Award: Jim Meehan – PDT
Pastry Chef: Tim Butler – Alto
Pastry Chef: Bill Corbett – Anthos
Restaurant Concept Award: Chris Santos – The Stanton Social
Sommelier Award: Stephane Colling – The Modern
Sustainability Award: Daniel Eardley – Chestnut
They'll be honored on September 18 at the end of Starchefs' International Chefs Congress.
Here they are:
Michael Anthony – Gramercy Tavern
Eric Hara – Davidburke & Donatella
Craig Hopson – Picholine
Chris Lee – Gilt
Akhtar Nawab – EU
Masato Shimizu – 15 East
Yosuke Suga – L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon
Damon Wise – Craft
Also:
Hotel Chef Award: Doug Psaltis – Country
Mixologist Award: Jim Meehan – PDT
Pastry Chef: Tim Butler – Alto
Pastry Chef: Bill Corbett – Anthos
Restaurant Concept Award: Chris Santos – The Stanton Social
Sommelier Award: Stephane Colling – The Modern
Sustainability Award: Daniel Eardley – Chestnut
Thursday, June 21, 2007
What do I look like, Page 6?
June 21
People do like their celebrity gossip, but this is a high-class blog, so if I'm going to report on the doings of famous people I haven't met, it's going to be world leaders.
So, straight from a successful downtown restaurant company: “On Father's Day, Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert dined at Tribeca Grill. Then on Tuesday June 19th, Vietnam's President Nguyen Minh Triet had Dinner at Mai House. Just another week in the life of the Myriad Restaurant Group,” so I’m told.
People do like their celebrity gossip, but this is a high-class blog, so if I'm going to report on the doings of famous people I haven't met, it's going to be world leaders.
So, straight from a successful downtown restaurant company: “On Father's Day, Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert dined at Tribeca Grill. Then on Tuesday June 19th, Vietnam's President Nguyen Minh Triet had Dinner at Mai House. Just another week in the life of the Myriad Restaurant Group,” so I’m told.
pine shoots
June 21
I had lunch at The Modern today with Dean Max, chef of 3030 Ocean in Fort Lauderdale, the general manager of the Marriott resort where the restaurant is located, their publicists and assorted other journalists. Conversation ranged from regulations regarding catching Florida lobster (they have to be hand-caught) and counterfeiting of grouper (sometimes it's Vietnamese basa) to the next great hotel amenity (I suggested affordable minibars that might actually be used by regular people).
GM Jim Mauer explained how hotels used to be luxury experiences for most people, but now most people's homes are nicer than hotel rooms — just think about what a drag it is to be somewhere without your cable TV, DVR/TiVo etc. So hotels have to keep ramping up the amenities. The term "bed wars" was used.
And I actually tried an ingredient that I hadn't had before, which doesn't happen much these days. The amuse bouche was a tiny watermelon salad with what the server called "pine shoots." I'm not sure what they tasted like, because the tiny salad had all sorts of little elements I couldn't quite identify. Maybe I was distracted because I was so enthralled by the notion of a minibar soda that didn't cost $11.
I had lunch at The Modern today with Dean Max, chef of 3030 Ocean in Fort Lauderdale, the general manager of the Marriott resort where the restaurant is located, their publicists and assorted other journalists. Conversation ranged from regulations regarding catching Florida lobster (they have to be hand-caught) and counterfeiting of grouper (sometimes it's Vietnamese basa) to the next great hotel amenity (I suggested affordable minibars that might actually be used by regular people).
GM Jim Mauer explained how hotels used to be luxury experiences for most people, but now most people's homes are nicer than hotel rooms — just think about what a drag it is to be somewhere without your cable TV, DVR/TiVo etc. So hotels have to keep ramping up the amenities. The term "bed wars" was used.
And I actually tried an ingredient that I hadn't had before, which doesn't happen much these days. The amuse bouche was a tiny watermelon salad with what the server called "pine shoots." I'm not sure what they tasted like, because the tiny salad had all sorts of little elements I couldn't quite identify. Maybe I was distracted because I was so enthralled by the notion of a minibar soda that didn't cost $11.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Sunday in Aspen
Wow, some people attending the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen have a lot of money. One woman paid $37,000 so she and her daughter could be Bobby Flay's sous chefs for 20 minutes during the Sunday morning cookoff. The money went to charity, but still...
I thought the cookoff pretty much closed the Classic, but no, the big tasting tent opened, and there I heard of the pool party at the Sky hotel, and of another party at the Eagles club.
So I went.
But first I coincidentally ran into Greg Graber, who went to East High School in Denver with me and also happened to live in Bangkok when I did. Now he's a buyer of non-performing mortgages and spends his time mostly between Denver and Los Angeles.
Small world.
At the pool party I drank margaritas, got better acquainted with San Francisco mixologist Duggan McDonnel and caught up with chef E. Michael Reidt. I also chatted with young Justin Amick, whom I had met the night before -- or was it the night before that? -- at the 212 House. He's the son of Atlanta restaurateur Bob Amick, and plans to join him in the business.
The 212 and pool parties were similar in that they were the sort of parties held behind the second velvet rope of trendy clubs. You have to get past one rope just to get in -- that would be going to the Food & Wine Classic in the first place -- but then you have to be cool enough to get past the second rope to go to the best parties. It's elitist, but fun if you're part of the in crowd.
I didn't get to go to the much less exclusive publisher's dinner atop Ajax mountain two nights before, so I had duck confit lettuce wraps and carne asada tacos at Blue Maize with Erica Duecy, her friend Gibson, whom she met on a press trip to Italy, and his wife Heather.
Anyway, the pool party drew to a close shortly after Steve Olson and his entire crew ended up in the pool. The distributor of a high-end collection of mezcals also jumped in the pool -- he was the only one to do so bare naked.
So from there I wandered over to the Eagles club, where chef Todd Downs had invited me.
There I hung out with a very friendly group of local cooks and assorted others and munched on top-notch beef and lamb chops while drinking punch and wine.
We moved inside as stragglers from other parties showed up. I rehydrated on water, which seemed to annoy the bartender, and then wandered home.
Speaking of water, the water company that was one of the sponsors of the Classic estimates that it gave away 70,000 bottles of the stuff over the weekend.
I thought the cookoff pretty much closed the Classic, but no, the big tasting tent opened, and there I heard of the pool party at the Sky hotel, and of another party at the Eagles club.
So I went.
But first I coincidentally ran into Greg Graber, who went to East High School in Denver with me and also happened to live in Bangkok when I did. Now he's a buyer of non-performing mortgages and spends his time mostly between Denver and Los Angeles.
Small world.
At the pool party I drank margaritas, got better acquainted with San Francisco mixologist Duggan McDonnel and caught up with chef E. Michael Reidt. I also chatted with young Justin Amick, whom I had met the night before -- or was it the night before that? -- at the 212 House. He's the son of Atlanta restaurateur Bob Amick, and plans to join him in the business.
The 212 and pool parties were similar in that they were the sort of parties held behind the second velvet rope of trendy clubs. You have to get past one rope just to get in -- that would be going to the Food & Wine Classic in the first place -- but then you have to be cool enough to get past the second rope to go to the best parties. It's elitist, but fun if you're part of the in crowd.
I didn't get to go to the much less exclusive publisher's dinner atop Ajax mountain two nights before, so I had duck confit lettuce wraps and carne asada tacos at Blue Maize with Erica Duecy, her friend Gibson, whom she met on a press trip to Italy, and his wife Heather.
Anyway, the pool party drew to a close shortly after Steve Olson and his entire crew ended up in the pool. The distributor of a high-end collection of mezcals also jumped in the pool -- he was the only one to do so bare naked.
So from there I wandered over to the Eagles club, where chef Todd Downs had invited me.
There I hung out with a very friendly group of local cooks and assorted others and munched on top-notch beef and lamb chops while drinking punch and wine.
We moved inside as stragglers from other parties showed up. I rehydrated on water, which seemed to annoy the bartender, and then wandered home.
Speaking of water, the water company that was one of the sponsors of the Classic estimates that it gave away 70,000 bottles of the stuff over the weekend.
Best quotes from Aspen
The seminars organized at the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen for people in the restaurant business were pretty good, which is nice since I have to write about them for Nation's Restaurant News.
NRN, incidentally, got three plugs during the panels: once when Drew Nieporent expressed frustration that his Tribeca Grill hadn't been inducted into our Fine Dining Hall of Fame, once when USA Today's Jerry Shriver said he read NRN to spot trends, and once by Dana Cowin. She told those who attended the panel about handling national press to pay attention to the local press and the underlings in national media. She said you might have met someone when they started as "an associate editor of Nation's Restaurant News, and now they're running something."
I happened to be sitting at the same table as my former colleague, Erica Duecy, who now is running some things at Fodor's, so of course I pointed to her, as she's the only one I know off the top of my head who used to be an associate editor ("field editor," actually) at NRN and now is running something.
That stuff won't make it into my story on the Classic. I'm afraid the quotes below might not either, so I'm publishing them here:
"You have to be comfortable on the corner of Art and Commerce." -Mario Batali
"I agree with you, but I'm going to disagree because it's more fun for them [pointing to the audience]." -Jose Andres
"Wine's a grocery, not a luxury." -Richard Betts
"I have a passion for selling expensive wines to rich people." -David Lynch
"Maybe it's because I'm in New York and to me everyone's a pain in the ass." -David Lynch
"There's not a lot of you that look great in a dress and can hold a knife." -Michelle Bernstein
NRN, incidentally, got three plugs during the panels: once when Drew Nieporent expressed frustration that his Tribeca Grill hadn't been inducted into our Fine Dining Hall of Fame, once when USA Today's Jerry Shriver said he read NRN to spot trends, and once by Dana Cowin. She told those who attended the panel about handling national press to pay attention to the local press and the underlings in national media. She said you might have met someone when they started as "an associate editor of Nation's Restaurant News, and now they're running something."
I happened to be sitting at the same table as my former colleague, Erica Duecy, who now is running some things at Fodor's, so of course I pointed to her, as she's the only one I know off the top of my head who used to be an associate editor ("field editor," actually) at NRN and now is running something.
That stuff won't make it into my story on the Classic. I'm afraid the quotes below might not either, so I'm publishing them here:
"You have to be comfortable on the corner of Art and Commerce." -Mario Batali
"I agree with you, but I'm going to disagree because it's more fun for them [pointing to the audience]." -Jose Andres
"Wine's a grocery, not a luxury." -Richard Betts
"I have a passion for selling expensive wines to rich people." -David Lynch
"Maybe it's because I'm in New York and to me everyone's a pain in the ass." -David Lynch
"There's not a lot of you that look great in a dress and can hold a knife." -Michelle Bernstein
Saturday, June 16, 2007
Gossip at Aspen
June 16
I invite you to read Ben Leventhal's coverage of what's going on here in Aspen. It's by no means comprehensive, but he's doing a good job of highlighting the things that might amuse consumers about the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen. Ben's a good guy. You'd like him. If you want to be scandalized about irresponsible, scurrilous rumors in the restaurant industry, read someone else; Ben's rumors are more measured.
He was called out by Food & Wine editor Dana Cowin in this morning's panel for people in the restaurant trade. The panel was about working with national press. She asked him, basically, what's up with blogs and why don't we understand you? And he basically said, we're an open book, send me an e-mail and let's talk.
Yet Ben's presence at the 212 House last night -- the de facto Aspen Classic after-party -- caused some minor kerfuffles. As an important chef was regaling a circle of people about past acid trips (scandal! A chef over the age of 24 has done acid!), an important publicist whispered into his ear about, um, shutting up because of the presence of bloggers. Said chef actually looked at me with a bit of leariness until Ben was pointed out, even though, from what I understand, Ben had been more or less muzzled as a condition of being let in to the 212 House.
I saw nothing scandalous at 212 House. I did see Thomas Keller hanging out with what I think is his ex-business partner Laura Cunningham, but that's really sweet rather than scandalous. I saw Jean-Georges Vongerichten, which is slightly unusual, but not scandalous. I found myself spending time with some of the United States' greatest chefs and beverage specialists, and with some of the high-end food scene's coolest people -- an agglomeration so cool that I didn't want to leave at 2:30 but instead drank more water, until I finally did leave at 3. But if anything was going on that would have made it on to Page 6, I either missed it or I'm not telling you.
I invite you to read Ben Leventhal's coverage of what's going on here in Aspen. It's by no means comprehensive, but he's doing a good job of highlighting the things that might amuse consumers about the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen. Ben's a good guy. You'd like him. If you want to be scandalized about irresponsible, scurrilous rumors in the restaurant industry, read someone else; Ben's rumors are more measured.
He was called out by Food & Wine editor Dana Cowin in this morning's panel for people in the restaurant trade. The panel was about working with national press. She asked him, basically, what's up with blogs and why don't we understand you? And he basically said, we're an open book, send me an e-mail and let's talk.
Yet Ben's presence at the 212 House last night -- the de facto Aspen Classic after-party -- caused some minor kerfuffles. As an important chef was regaling a circle of people about past acid trips (scandal! A chef over the age of 24 has done acid!), an important publicist whispered into his ear about, um, shutting up because of the presence of bloggers. Said chef actually looked at me with a bit of leariness until Ben was pointed out, even though, from what I understand, Ben had been more or less muzzled as a condition of being let in to the 212 House.
I saw nothing scandalous at 212 House. I did see Thomas Keller hanging out with what I think is his ex-business partner Laura Cunningham, but that's really sweet rather than scandalous. I saw Jean-Georges Vongerichten, which is slightly unusual, but not scandalous. I found myself spending time with some of the United States' greatest chefs and beverage specialists, and with some of the high-end food scene's coolest people -- an agglomeration so cool that I didn't want to leave at 2:30 but instead drank more water, until I finally did leave at 3. But if anything was going on that would have made it on to Page 6, I either missed it or I'm not telling you.
Friday, June 15, 2007
Bobby Flay and Me
June 15
During my recent vacation in Denver, my eight-year-old nephew Harrison, who goes to sleep to the Food Network (he finds it less scary than The Weather Channel, which sometimes reports on frightening storms), wanted to get an idea of how well I knew some of the celebrity chefs. So he asked me if I knew Bobby Flay's favorite color.
I explained to him that grown-ups don't actually talk about their favorite colors much, and that at any rate I didn't know Bobby Flay very well. Although I'd interviewed him over the phone once or twice, he doesn't seem sure of who I am when he sees me. He seems aware that he should acknowledge me, but he's not sure why.
That's totally understandable. There's no reason why he should know me. I have many similar relationships with people.
For some reason I have been seeing a lot of Bobby Flay here at the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen.
I ran into him in the elevator of the St. Regis Hotel yesterday, apparently after he'd been working out.
"What's goin' on?" he asked.
"Aspen," I said.
He agreed.
But this morning I ended up at the same table as he and his cohorts during a panel discussion in which Food & Wine editor Dana Cowin asked Steve Ells, Drew Nieporent, Thomas Keller and Tom Colicchio about the future of fine dining.
Like me, Bobby Flay likes to comment to his friends in the middle of panel discussions. So when Dana introduced Steve Ells, the founder of Chipotle, Flay leaned over to his business partner, Laurence Kretchmer, and said, "It's good food."
At one point during the discussion, Drew sort of started insulting everyone, and everyone at the table seemed to get a big kick out of that.
It wasn't really intentional, but he grimaced when he said "Chipotle" and later he basically said that Thomas Keller's strategy for handling reservations was to raise prices so fewer people would want to go. He pointed out that Craft, Tom Colicchio's fine dining restaurant, was spelled with a 'C,' not a 'K.'
He even managed to take a swipe at Bobby Flay (and Nation's Restaurant News, which continues to anger him because we haven't inducted his Tribeca Grill into our Fine Dining Hall of Fame, but the magazine staff can handle it). He said he couldn't imagine Tom Colicchio's face on a bucket of chicken, but "Bobby Flay's, yes."
"Was I just insulted?" he asked Kretchmer.
"A little bit," was the response.
"He's speaking from the heart," said Jose Andres, who had seated himself between me and Flay, with a shrug.
Flay also asked Ells a great question about what food was prepared on-premise and what wasn't, and Ells' response was extremely forthright, as it usually is from him but rarely is from many other chain restaurant operators when it comes to those sorts fo details (basically if it's braised, it's made off-premise, but by Chipotle, not by suppliers or manufacturers).
Flay also asked Andres about a project the Spanish chef was working on in Los Angeles. I thought I had a little scoop, but it turns out that my colleague Milford Prewitt wrote about it awhile ago: He'll be involved in the redevelopment of Le Merdian hotel on La Cienega. The new property, SLS, is being designed by Philippe Starck.
During my recent vacation in Denver, my eight-year-old nephew Harrison, who goes to sleep to the Food Network (he finds it less scary than The Weather Channel, which sometimes reports on frightening storms), wanted to get an idea of how well I knew some of the celebrity chefs. So he asked me if I knew Bobby Flay's favorite color.
I explained to him that grown-ups don't actually talk about their favorite colors much, and that at any rate I didn't know Bobby Flay very well. Although I'd interviewed him over the phone once or twice, he doesn't seem sure of who I am when he sees me. He seems aware that he should acknowledge me, but he's not sure why.
That's totally understandable. There's no reason why he should know me. I have many similar relationships with people.
For some reason I have been seeing a lot of Bobby Flay here at the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen.
I ran into him in the elevator of the St. Regis Hotel yesterday, apparently after he'd been working out.
"What's goin' on?" he asked.
"Aspen," I said.
He agreed.
But this morning I ended up at the same table as he and his cohorts during a panel discussion in which Food & Wine editor Dana Cowin asked Steve Ells, Drew Nieporent, Thomas Keller and Tom Colicchio about the future of fine dining.
Like me, Bobby Flay likes to comment to his friends in the middle of panel discussions. So when Dana introduced Steve Ells, the founder of Chipotle, Flay leaned over to his business partner, Laurence Kretchmer, and said, "It's good food."
At one point during the discussion, Drew sort of started insulting everyone, and everyone at the table seemed to get a big kick out of that.
It wasn't really intentional, but he grimaced when he said "Chipotle" and later he basically said that Thomas Keller's strategy for handling reservations was to raise prices so fewer people would want to go. He pointed out that Craft, Tom Colicchio's fine dining restaurant, was spelled with a 'C,' not a 'K.'
He even managed to take a swipe at Bobby Flay (and Nation's Restaurant News, which continues to anger him because we haven't inducted his Tribeca Grill into our Fine Dining Hall of Fame, but the magazine staff can handle it). He said he couldn't imagine Tom Colicchio's face on a bucket of chicken, but "Bobby Flay's, yes."
"Was I just insulted?" he asked Kretchmer.
"A little bit," was the response.
"He's speaking from the heart," said Jose Andres, who had seated himself between me and Flay, with a shrug.
Flay also asked Ells a great question about what food was prepared on-premise and what wasn't, and Ells' response was extremely forthright, as it usually is from him but rarely is from many other chain restaurant operators when it comes to those sorts fo details (basically if it's braised, it's made off-premise, but by Chipotle, not by suppliers or manufacturers).
Flay also asked Andres about a project the Spanish chef was working on in Los Angeles. I thought I had a little scoop, but it turns out that my colleague Milford Prewitt wrote about it awhile ago: He'll be involved in the redevelopment of Le Merdian hotel on La Cienega. The new property, SLS, is being designed by Philippe Starck.
drinking at 8,000 feet, post script
June 15
I did pop out briefly last night, into the cool air in search of non-alcoholic beverages (Aspen tap would have been fine, but I guess I wasn't ready to throw in the towel for the evening).
I ended up being waylaid by some folks from PR company Bullfrog & Baum and we ended up at 212 House, an after hours spot being run by good old Scott Feldman. I drank several bottles of water from the sponsoring company and swapped stories with Chris Lee about fussy eaters we knew (his wife Melissa gave me a brief talking to for not going to bed).
And I saw chef Todd Downs, who's here cooking for the California Raisin Board.
Good times.
I did pop out briefly last night, into the cool air in search of non-alcoholic beverages (Aspen tap would have been fine, but I guess I wasn't ready to throw in the towel for the evening).
I ended up being waylaid by some folks from PR company Bullfrog & Baum and we ended up at 212 House, an after hours spot being run by good old Scott Feldman. I drank several bottles of water from the sponsoring company and swapped stories with Chris Lee about fussy eaters we knew (his wife Melissa gave me a brief talking to for not going to bed).
And I saw chef Todd Downs, who's here cooking for the California Raisin Board.
Good times.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
drinking at 8,000 feet
June 14
I've been told that high altitude affects a person's ability to hold alcohol. I think that makes sense scientifically, but I had never experienced it, until tonight.
Maybe it was the three ice coffees I had on my drive from Denver to Aspen -- one in Golden, one in Frisco and one in Leadville -- maybe it was part of the unjustifiable anxiety I felt in driving above the tree line to get over Independence Pass, or maybe it was just one of those things you hear about when people feel woozy at high altitude, but I didn't feel right after that first glass of Champagne in the "green room" of the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen (it used to be the Classic at Aspen, but I was told today that they changed it two years ago).
The green room was in lieu of the usual gift bags; you just went there and took whatever merchandise the sponsors had laid out for media and VIPs to take. I filled my bag with chazerai to give to my family in Denver, sipped Champagne and felt woozy.
So at the opening reception I drank water before having a glass of wine. Then I had more water and chatted with people (including Steven Holt, who used to do PR for the Jerome Hotel and took me under his wing at my first Food & Wine Classic, which was at Aspen, but now Steven is at the Ritz-Carlton Bachelor Gulch in Beaver Creek, where the fourth Spago will open sometime soon; you learn something new every day) before sampling a Manhattan made from a high-end single malt.
I was feeling better by the time I climbed into the front seat of a Lexus that had been hired to take invitees to the Wines from Spain party, where Jose Andres and his crew were cooking, and also slicing sausages and thin pieces of jamon iberico. I chatted with local Aspen press, and with wine consultant Steve Olson and a bunch of other people, while drinking wine and neglecting my water, until someone collapsed on the floor and had a brief siezure. She recovered quickly and seemed coherent, but it was a reminder of the need to stay hydrated.
An ambulance was called and I went downstairs for some of the Spanish bottled water that had been imported for the party.
Many tall people in the right clothing and with a lot of gel in their hair were at the party. I wondered who they were and where they came from. I suppose I could have asked them, although you have to choose your words carefully in such situations.
Instead I hung out with New York journalists, eating pork products, gazpacho shooters and oysters with lemon "air." One of those journalists, Amy Cortese, suggested we repair to the Little Nell, where word had it that a party featuring American caviar was afoot.
We wandered over there while Rachel Wharton of the New York Daily News and I expressed outrage at deceptive food marketing (like the fruit-pops I saw in Denver that were marketed as having only 19 calories per ounce; soda only has 13 or 14 calories per ounce).
We got to the Little Nell early and lay on the recliners around the pool until the party started.
Then I ate domestic sturgeon roe and French trout roe while drinking Tokai Friuliano and noticing more tall, fair-haired people. But these looked less like socialites and more like people I went to high school with in Denver -- stereotypical Coloradans with sandy-brown hair and an apparent readiness to go snowboarding or mountainbiking at any moment.
I got in line for more Tokai and was greeted by Ti Martin of the Brennan clan (the New Orleans Brennans, first family of American foodservice). We hadn't seen each other since the last time we were in Aspen, several years ago, and neither of us had been to Aspen since. Ti said her plans had been scuttled by "that stupid hurricane."
But she said everything was coming back together. I wanted to talk more about Katrina, but she changed the subject and we exchanged our opinions on a variety of matters, such as the Tokai we were drinking and the cooking of Grant Achatz.
Soon, however, I was aware of my parched throat and the need to rehydrate. I excused myself and began my search for water as Chris Lee, the chef of Gilt, arrived with his wife Melissa and sommelier Jason Ferris.
"Are you staying or going?" Chris asked. As I squawked about my need for water Melissa sent me to my hotel, which is where I went.
I've been told that high altitude affects a person's ability to hold alcohol. I think that makes sense scientifically, but I had never experienced it, until tonight.
Maybe it was the three ice coffees I had on my drive from Denver to Aspen -- one in Golden, one in Frisco and one in Leadville -- maybe it was part of the unjustifiable anxiety I felt in driving above the tree line to get over Independence Pass, or maybe it was just one of those things you hear about when people feel woozy at high altitude, but I didn't feel right after that first glass of Champagne in the "green room" of the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen (it used to be the Classic at Aspen, but I was told today that they changed it two years ago).
The green room was in lieu of the usual gift bags; you just went there and took whatever merchandise the sponsors had laid out for media and VIPs to take. I filled my bag with chazerai to give to my family in Denver, sipped Champagne and felt woozy.
So at the opening reception I drank water before having a glass of wine. Then I had more water and chatted with people (including Steven Holt, who used to do PR for the Jerome Hotel and took me under his wing at my first Food & Wine Classic, which was at Aspen, but now Steven is at the Ritz-Carlton Bachelor Gulch in Beaver Creek, where the fourth Spago will open sometime soon; you learn something new every day) before sampling a Manhattan made from a high-end single malt.
I was feeling better by the time I climbed into the front seat of a Lexus that had been hired to take invitees to the Wines from Spain party, where Jose Andres and his crew were cooking, and also slicing sausages and thin pieces of jamon iberico. I chatted with local Aspen press, and with wine consultant Steve Olson and a bunch of other people, while drinking wine and neglecting my water, until someone collapsed on the floor and had a brief siezure. She recovered quickly and seemed coherent, but it was a reminder of the need to stay hydrated.
An ambulance was called and I went downstairs for some of the Spanish bottled water that had been imported for the party.
Many tall people in the right clothing and with a lot of gel in their hair were at the party. I wondered who they were and where they came from. I suppose I could have asked them, although you have to choose your words carefully in such situations.
Instead I hung out with New York journalists, eating pork products, gazpacho shooters and oysters with lemon "air." One of those journalists, Amy Cortese, suggested we repair to the Little Nell, where word had it that a party featuring American caviar was afoot.
We wandered over there while Rachel Wharton of the New York Daily News and I expressed outrage at deceptive food marketing (like the fruit-pops I saw in Denver that were marketed as having only 19 calories per ounce; soda only has 13 or 14 calories per ounce).
We got to the Little Nell early and lay on the recliners around the pool until the party started.
Then I ate domestic sturgeon roe and French trout roe while drinking Tokai Friuliano and noticing more tall, fair-haired people. But these looked less like socialites and more like people I went to high school with in Denver -- stereotypical Coloradans with sandy-brown hair and an apparent readiness to go snowboarding or mountainbiking at any moment.
I got in line for more Tokai and was greeted by Ti Martin of the Brennan clan (the New Orleans Brennans, first family of American foodservice). We hadn't seen each other since the last time we were in Aspen, several years ago, and neither of us had been to Aspen since. Ti said her plans had been scuttled by "that stupid hurricane."
But she said everything was coming back together. I wanted to talk more about Katrina, but she changed the subject and we exchanged our opinions on a variety of matters, such as the Tokai we were drinking and the cooking of Grant Achatz.
Soon, however, I was aware of my parched throat and the need to rehydrate. I excused myself and began my search for water as Chris Lee, the chef of Gilt, arrived with his wife Melissa and sommelier Jason Ferris.
"Are you staying or going?" Chris asked. As I squawked about my need for water Melissa sent me to my hotel, which is where I went.
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Prelude to Aspen
June 13
I've just realilzed that I eat differently depending on who I'm trying to impress. That's kind of pathetic, I know, but it's food for thought as I prepare to head up to Aspen for the Food & Wine Classic there.
I'll be driving up there tomorrow; at the moment I'm in Denver for family time.
I arrived last Saturday and have been mostly hanging out with family -- Mom, Dad, brother, sister, sister-in-law, nieces and nephew, aunts, uncle, cousins. I also reconnected with Pam Paulien, a friend from back in fourth grade, who is moving into one of my family's apartment buildings (sort of; they're actually turning it into a co-housing development, a dream of my sometime-socialist mother). And I did my usual obligatory walk down East Colfax, where I stopped in tHERe bar & lounge and had iced coffee with a truck driver named Sonya.
And of course I've checked out some restaurants. I went with my sister-in-law Helen Thorn, her son Harrison and my niece Tahirah Thorn to Amazing Jake's -- one of those places where you can eat and play video games and ride bumper cars and play laser tag.
The price of admission included an all-you-can-eat buffet, and I stuck exclusively to the salad bar, loading up on greens and drizzling it with a little basil oil and balsamic vinegar.
Now, had I been on my own, I might very well have loaded up on Mac & Cheese and pizza, but it seemed reasonable to model for the kids.
Had I been in a restaurant where the chef might know me, I would have ordered whatever was most obscure or "cool" in the eyes of a chef -- sweetbreads or something with cockscombs. Had I been trying to assess whether the restaurant was any good, I would have ordered signature dishes or anything else the restaurant seemed to be hanging its hat on.
Later in the week I took my brother, Todd (Thorn, obviously), his wife Helen, and their kids Harrison and Alia (a tender 11 months and just the sweetest thing, unless she's tired or hungry or otherwise out of sorts) to Rioja, where I did a combination of eating what I wanted, modeling and trying to find a wine my relatively teatotaling brother and sister-in-law would enjoy. So I picked a Suttcliffe Vineyards Gewurtztraminer to drink. It's a Colorado wine, and I'd interviewed the winemaker for an article I'd written on the Four Corners region, so I wanted to try it, and I thought it would appeal to Todd and Helen's sweet teeth, but Helen found it too light and Todd didn't comment, so I guees I should raise the ante next time and get a German Riesling.
I ordered some braised pork belly (called "fresh bacon" on the menu, which was cute), to show Harrison the desirability of being adventurous (he seemed more interested in his Game Boy, which is reasonable, but you never know exactly what kids pick up), and then in the interest of moderation, to model the value of moderation, and because I wanted to try it, I ordered the vegetarian main course, which was a tasting of four different vegetable preparations.
It was a lot of thought for a simple dinner, but a good time was had by all.
And now it's time for me to go. We're dining at Texas de Brazil this evening. It's a churrascaria, so I shall be eating large quantities of meat. I might even skip the salad bar.
I've just realilzed that I eat differently depending on who I'm trying to impress. That's kind of pathetic, I know, but it's food for thought as I prepare to head up to Aspen for the Food & Wine Classic there.
I'll be driving up there tomorrow; at the moment I'm in Denver for family time.
I arrived last Saturday and have been mostly hanging out with family -- Mom, Dad, brother, sister, sister-in-law, nieces and nephew, aunts, uncle, cousins. I also reconnected with Pam Paulien, a friend from back in fourth grade, who is moving into one of my family's apartment buildings (sort of; they're actually turning it into a co-housing development, a dream of my sometime-socialist mother). And I did my usual obligatory walk down East Colfax, where I stopped in tHERe bar & lounge and had iced coffee with a truck driver named Sonya.
And of course I've checked out some restaurants. I went with my sister-in-law Helen Thorn, her son Harrison and my niece Tahirah Thorn to Amazing Jake's -- one of those places where you can eat and play video games and ride bumper cars and play laser tag.
The price of admission included an all-you-can-eat buffet, and I stuck exclusively to the salad bar, loading up on greens and drizzling it with a little basil oil and balsamic vinegar.
Now, had I been on my own, I might very well have loaded up on Mac & Cheese and pizza, but it seemed reasonable to model for the kids.
Had I been in a restaurant where the chef might know me, I would have ordered whatever was most obscure or "cool" in the eyes of a chef -- sweetbreads or something with cockscombs. Had I been trying to assess whether the restaurant was any good, I would have ordered signature dishes or anything else the restaurant seemed to be hanging its hat on.
Later in the week I took my brother, Todd (Thorn, obviously), his wife Helen, and their kids Harrison and Alia (a tender 11 months and just the sweetest thing, unless she's tired or hungry or otherwise out of sorts) to Rioja, where I did a combination of eating what I wanted, modeling and trying to find a wine my relatively teatotaling brother and sister-in-law would enjoy. So I picked a Suttcliffe Vineyards Gewurtztraminer to drink. It's a Colorado wine, and I'd interviewed the winemaker for an article I'd written on the Four Corners region, so I wanted to try it, and I thought it would appeal to Todd and Helen's sweet teeth, but Helen found it too light and Todd didn't comment, so I guees I should raise the ante next time and get a German Riesling.
I ordered some braised pork belly (called "fresh bacon" on the menu, which was cute), to show Harrison the desirability of being adventurous (he seemed more interested in his Game Boy, which is reasonable, but you never know exactly what kids pick up), and then in the interest of moderation, to model the value of moderation, and because I wanted to try it, I ordered the vegetarian main course, which was a tasting of four different vegetable preparations.
It was a lot of thought for a simple dinner, but a good time was had by all.
And now it's time for me to go. We're dining at Texas de Brazil this evening. It's a churrascaria, so I shall be eating large quantities of meat. I might even skip the salad bar.
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Kampuchea
June 7
You might remember my first encounter with Kenyon Phillips, but maybe you don’t as it was 14 blog entries ago. But whenever I meet someone who can engage in quick elevator banter about imagined criminal activity, I try to stay in touch, especially if he’s a musician who’s work I enjoy.
So I e-mailed him — nice meeting you, blah blah blah, always looking for people to check out restaurants with, yada yada.
And I asked him about dietary restrictions.
He replied: “I'm a vegetarian (lacto-ovo, not vegan) and a straight-edge (so no booze), but am an adventurous foodie nonetheless...”
Oh brother.
Not vegan. Woohoo!
What happened to the bacchanalian rockers of yore? (My other rockin’ friend, Peter Yanowitz of Morningwood, doesn’t eat meat either, although he does eat fish).
I suppose I could have written back: “Well, I’m sorry then, but we cannot be friends.” But I’ve learned that vegetarians are not necessarily bad people.
So I took him to Kampuchea, a restaurant with a strong Cambodian accent on the Lower East Side.
“Kampuchea” is kind of an odd name for a restaurant. It simply means “Cambodia” in Khmer, that country’s national language, but the outside world only referred to Cambodia thus — in modern times, at least — under the rule of the Khmer Rouge, who were a bunch of murderous bastards.
Cambodia, being a poor country albeit a Buddhist one, doesn’t have many vegetarians. People eat pretty much whatever they can there. But a Cambodian restaurant on the Lower East Side would have to be vegetarian friendly, even though chef Ratha Chau is pretty hard-core in his desire to reproduce the flavors of the country where he was born.
He doesn’t hold back with the spices, and Kenyon, a southern Californian, and I actually suffered from chile overload while eating from the pickle plate. That doesn’t happen very often in the Northeast.
Despite Kenyon’s dietary shortcomings, he proved to be an excellent dining companion — and one highly dubious of, but open-minded about, tofu. It was fun getting acquainted and swapping childhood stories and opinions on music (not surprisingly, we agree on our dislike of Emo). We even exchanged 9/ll stories — everyone who was in New York at the time has some, of course.
And we both appreciated the artwork on the walls in the bathroom — people with light bulb heads performing the bodily functions that one performs in a bathroom. It reminded me of the Japanese “Story of farts,” of which I had actually read the Thai translation (if you choose to follow this link, I have to point out that Martha Gordon seems to be a humorless prig with an anti-dairy bias).
What we ate:
Grilled sweet corn with coconut chile mayo, chili powder and coconut flakes
Plate of pickled watermelon rind, daikon, red cabbage, cucumber and soy sprouts
Tofu salad with pickled cabbage, chives, red onions, sprouts, shiitake mushrooms, lime dressing
Prince Edward Island Mussels, spicy and sour, with tomatillos, celery, okra, red onions and Thai chiles, served with toasted baguette pieces
Shiitake mushroom, soybean and butternut squash crêpes with lettuce, soy sprouts, mint, basil and tuk trey
Num Pang (sandwich) tasting of grilled tofu with ginger-scallion soy, grilled Thai and Chinese eggplant with ginger and garlic, and hoisin Berkshire pork meatballs with rice and light tomato sauce
Tamarind baby back ribs with honey and cilantro-lime dip
You might remember my first encounter with Kenyon Phillips, but maybe you don’t as it was 14 blog entries ago. But whenever I meet someone who can engage in quick elevator banter about imagined criminal activity, I try to stay in touch, especially if he’s a musician who’s work I enjoy.
So I e-mailed him — nice meeting you, blah blah blah, always looking for people to check out restaurants with, yada yada.
And I asked him about dietary restrictions.
He replied: “I'm a vegetarian (lacto-ovo, not vegan) and a straight-edge (so no booze), but am an adventurous foodie nonetheless...”
Oh brother.
Not vegan. Woohoo!
What happened to the bacchanalian rockers of yore? (My other rockin’ friend, Peter Yanowitz of Morningwood, doesn’t eat meat either, although he does eat fish).
I suppose I could have written back: “Well, I’m sorry then, but we cannot be friends.” But I’ve learned that vegetarians are not necessarily bad people.
So I took him to Kampuchea, a restaurant with a strong Cambodian accent on the Lower East Side.
“Kampuchea” is kind of an odd name for a restaurant. It simply means “Cambodia” in Khmer, that country’s national language, but the outside world only referred to Cambodia thus — in modern times, at least — under the rule of the Khmer Rouge, who were a bunch of murderous bastards.
Cambodia, being a poor country albeit a Buddhist one, doesn’t have many vegetarians. People eat pretty much whatever they can there. But a Cambodian restaurant on the Lower East Side would have to be vegetarian friendly, even though chef Ratha Chau is pretty hard-core in his desire to reproduce the flavors of the country where he was born.
He doesn’t hold back with the spices, and Kenyon, a southern Californian, and I actually suffered from chile overload while eating from the pickle plate. That doesn’t happen very often in the Northeast.
Despite Kenyon’s dietary shortcomings, he proved to be an excellent dining companion — and one highly dubious of, but open-minded about, tofu. It was fun getting acquainted and swapping childhood stories and opinions on music (not surprisingly, we agree on our dislike of Emo). We even exchanged 9/ll stories — everyone who was in New York at the time has some, of course.
And we both appreciated the artwork on the walls in the bathroom — people with light bulb heads performing the bodily functions that one performs in a bathroom. It reminded me of the Japanese “Story of farts,” of which I had actually read the Thai translation (if you choose to follow this link, I have to point out that Martha Gordon seems to be a humorless prig with an anti-dairy bias).
What we ate:
Grilled sweet corn with coconut chile mayo, chili powder and coconut flakes
Plate of pickled watermelon rind, daikon, red cabbage, cucumber and soy sprouts
Tofu salad with pickled cabbage, chives, red onions, sprouts, shiitake mushrooms, lime dressing
Prince Edward Island Mussels, spicy and sour, with tomatillos, celery, okra, red onions and Thai chiles, served with toasted baguette pieces
Shiitake mushroom, soybean and butternut squash crêpes with lettuce, soy sprouts, mint, basil and tuk trey
Num Pang (sandwich) tasting of grilled tofu with ginger-scallion soy, grilled Thai and Chinese eggplant with ginger and garlic, and hoisin Berkshire pork meatballs with rice and light tomato sauce
Tamarind baby back ribs with honey and cilantro-lime dip
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Herring Week
June 6
Aquavit has two summertime celebrations: Herring Week and the Crayfish Festival. Owner Håken Swahn and chef-owner Marcus Samuelsson always hold a little reception for the press to let us know about them. Herring Week starts next week, the reception was today, so my boss Pam Parseghian and I walked over for a snack.
The reception was in Aquavit’s private room, at the far end of the bar which was unusually packed for a Wednesday at 1pm.
To my delight, at the reception I ran into young Nick Pandolfi, the baby brother of my friend Erica Duecy’s husband Jono. Nick just finished his junior year at NYU (can you believe it?) and, having just interned at Spin magazine is now interning with my friends at Food & Wine. He looked very pleased.
I also chatted with Johan Svensson, the executive chef, who said lunches have been crazy busy for the past three weeks, and no one knows why. He wasn't complaining, of course, but he wondered what precisely was going right.
Håken, speaking to the crowd, pointed out that Aquavit is 20 this year — an unusual feat for a New York restaurant. He also said they would be opening an Aquavit in Stockholm this February, which is nice. But of far more interest was his announcement of the opening in about a month of a commissary that would provide baked goods for a chain of AQ Cafes he hopes to open in New York. Further investigation is required.
Marcus told the room that, during a recent conversation with Gourmet editor-in-chief Ruth Reichl, she told him that writers were pitching more stories on Scandinavian food than anything else.
I think maybe she was exaggerating.
Aquavit has two summertime celebrations: Herring Week and the Crayfish Festival. Owner Håken Swahn and chef-owner Marcus Samuelsson always hold a little reception for the press to let us know about them. Herring Week starts next week, the reception was today, so my boss Pam Parseghian and I walked over for a snack.
The reception was in Aquavit’s private room, at the far end of the bar which was unusually packed for a Wednesday at 1pm.
To my delight, at the reception I ran into young Nick Pandolfi, the baby brother of my friend Erica Duecy’s husband Jono. Nick just finished his junior year at NYU (can you believe it?) and, having just interned at Spin magazine is now interning with my friends at Food & Wine. He looked very pleased.
I also chatted with Johan Svensson, the executive chef, who said lunches have been crazy busy for the past three weeks, and no one knows why. He wasn't complaining, of course, but he wondered what precisely was going right.
Håken, speaking to the crowd, pointed out that Aquavit is 20 this year — an unusual feat for a New York restaurant. He also said they would be opening an Aquavit in Stockholm this February, which is nice. But of far more interest was his announcement of the opening in about a month of a commissary that would provide baked goods for a chain of AQ Cafes he hopes to open in New York. Further investigation is required.
Marcus told the room that, during a recent conversation with Gourmet editor-in-chief Ruth Reichl, she told him that writers were pitching more stories on Scandinavian food than anything else.
I think maybe she was exaggerating.
Can you please explain what this sentence means?
“Burgers proudly ruled the American menu throughout its tenure.”
Anyone?
Anyone?
Tuesday, June 05, 2007
mismatch
June 5
Have you ever met anyone who for whatever reason just doesn’t like you? There’s a producer for one of the national early morning news shows like that. At least I think she doesn’t like me. I always sense when she glances at me that she’s feeling a combination of boredom and disgust. It’s unsettling.
And I was already unsettled today. I thought I put on a suit this morning until I looked down during my subway ride and realized that my jacket didn’t match my trousers.
I have no excuse. I mean, I was at dinner last night with publicists at Pera, but it wasn’t such a late night that I shouldn’t have been able to see in the morning.
Believe it or not, business attire is required at the offices of Lebhar-Friedman, Nation’s Restaurant News’ parent company, but not between Memorial Day and Labor Day, when business casual is permitted.
At any time of year it’s okay not to wear a suit — trousers and a sportcoat are fine — and wearing a suit jacket instead of a sportcoat is really just a minor faux pas in this modern era, as long as you look like you did it on purpose.
But I was wearing two different patterns of dark pinstripe. I looked like an idiot.
And I was having lunch at Daniel, which is why I tried to wear a suit in the first place.
I don’t know if Daniel actually enforces a jackets-for-gentelmen dress code, and at any rate I’m pretty sure they’d let me slide at a press luncheon in the private dining room, which is where I was eating. But it seems wrong to walk into Daniel without wearing a jacket.
Then again, it also seems wrong — indeed it is wrong — to go to a press function looking like an idiot.
I didn’t see that I had much of a choice, though; I don’t have an off-the-rack-shaped body. So I went to Daniel in my mismatched suit, resolving to stand in the shadows or shift around confusingly to keep people from noticing that I didn’t match.
Of course no one said anything, but that producer who hates me was there. She didn’t arrive until right before we were being seated, though, so I’m just going to go ahead and assume she didn’t notice.
We were at lunch to enjoy the food of Gavin Kaysen, the young chef — just six years out of culinary school — of El Bizcocho at the Rancho Bernardo Inn in San Diego, who was visiting. Gavin's also one of Food & Wine magazine’s ten "Best New Chefs” this year, so I’ll be seeing him soon in Aspen anyway.
He represented the United States in the most recent Bocuse D’Or competition, which is what most people who follow such things consider to be the most rigorous culinary competition in the world. Gavin spent a year preparing for the competition, as one does, and came in 14th out of 24, which isn’t bad at all, especially, Gavin said, considering what happened during the competition.
Obviously I asked him what he meant, and he told the story of their French assistant, "Kevin,” (Gavin’s eyes narrowed), who inexplicably ate the chicken wings that were to garnish one of Gavin’s plates, something that Gavin didn’t notice until it was time for the plates to go out.
Gavin asked what happened to the wings and Kevin simply said he ate them, with no explanation or expression of concern:
"I ate them."
Here’s what we ate for lunch at Daniel:
From Gavin:
Grilled hamachi with mango, fennel purée and ponzu vinaigrette
From Daniel Boulud:
Slow-baked halibut peas à la Française, potato confit, herb beurre blanc
From Gavin:
Lamb loin, zucchini flower, eggplant caponata and wild arugula
From Daniel
Berry fruit soups, followed by an assortment of chocolate desserts, which of course were followed by his famous madeleines.
Have you ever met anyone who for whatever reason just doesn’t like you? There’s a producer for one of the national early morning news shows like that. At least I think she doesn’t like me. I always sense when she glances at me that she’s feeling a combination of boredom and disgust. It’s unsettling.
And I was already unsettled today. I thought I put on a suit this morning until I looked down during my subway ride and realized that my jacket didn’t match my trousers.
I have no excuse. I mean, I was at dinner last night with publicists at Pera, but it wasn’t such a late night that I shouldn’t have been able to see in the morning.
Believe it or not, business attire is required at the offices of Lebhar-Friedman, Nation’s Restaurant News’ parent company, but not between Memorial Day and Labor Day, when business casual is permitted.
At any time of year it’s okay not to wear a suit — trousers and a sportcoat are fine — and wearing a suit jacket instead of a sportcoat is really just a minor faux pas in this modern era, as long as you look like you did it on purpose.
But I was wearing two different patterns of dark pinstripe. I looked like an idiot.
And I was having lunch at Daniel, which is why I tried to wear a suit in the first place.
I don’t know if Daniel actually enforces a jackets-for-gentelmen dress code, and at any rate I’m pretty sure they’d let me slide at a press luncheon in the private dining room, which is where I was eating. But it seems wrong to walk into Daniel without wearing a jacket.
Then again, it also seems wrong — indeed it is wrong — to go to a press function looking like an idiot.
I didn’t see that I had much of a choice, though; I don’t have an off-the-rack-shaped body. So I went to Daniel in my mismatched suit, resolving to stand in the shadows or shift around confusingly to keep people from noticing that I didn’t match.
Of course no one said anything, but that producer who hates me was there. She didn’t arrive until right before we were being seated, though, so I’m just going to go ahead and assume she didn’t notice.
We were at lunch to enjoy the food of Gavin Kaysen, the young chef — just six years out of culinary school — of El Bizcocho at the Rancho Bernardo Inn in San Diego, who was visiting. Gavin's also one of Food & Wine magazine’s ten "Best New Chefs” this year, so I’ll be seeing him soon in Aspen anyway.
He represented the United States in the most recent Bocuse D’Or competition, which is what most people who follow such things consider to be the most rigorous culinary competition in the world. Gavin spent a year preparing for the competition, as one does, and came in 14th out of 24, which isn’t bad at all, especially, Gavin said, considering what happened during the competition.
Obviously I asked him what he meant, and he told the story of their French assistant, "Kevin,” (Gavin’s eyes narrowed), who inexplicably ate the chicken wings that were to garnish one of Gavin’s plates, something that Gavin didn’t notice until it was time for the plates to go out.
Gavin asked what happened to the wings and Kevin simply said he ate them, with no explanation or expression of concern:
"I ate them."
Here’s what we ate for lunch at Daniel:
From Gavin:
Grilled hamachi with mango, fennel purée and ponzu vinaigrette
From Daniel Boulud:
Slow-baked halibut peas à la Française, potato confit, herb beurre blanc
From Gavin:
Lamb loin, zucchini flower, eggplant caponata and wild arugula
From Daniel
Berry fruit soups, followed by an assortment of chocolate desserts, which of course were followed by his famous madeleines.
getting reacquainted with my neighborhood
June 1
Matt and Ted Lee have a lot of friends, or at least they can get a lot of people to show up at a party, as I found out this evening, the first truly warm night of the year.
The Lee brothers were celebrating the fact that their cookbook had taken top honors at the James Beard Awards by throwing a party at an art gallery in the Brooklyn neighborhood of DUMBO*.
The party didn't start until 9:30, so not only did I have time to go home beforehand, I actually had time to kill. I also had to find my way to the F train, which is in southern Park Slope. I live on the other end of the neighborhood, near Grand Army Plaza, and so I decided to wander down 5th Avenue (more interesting than 7th Avenue, although farther from the subway) and eat at whatever restaurant caught my eye.
The ever-popular Al Di Là had a wait of just 20 minutes, at 8pm on Friday, so I took them up on it, relaxing with a glass of Sancerre in their neighboring wine bar until I was summoned to my table, where I started with the special of grilled sardines over salad greens and then had cazunsei, a type ravioli, with beets, ricottta and poppy seeds. With dinner I drank a couple of glasses of Erbaluce, a Piedmontese white wine made from the indigenous Erbaluce grape, which I had just recently learned about (high acid with floral and herbal notes).
Feeling slightly bad that I was dining solo at a table of two, I gave up my table and had coffee at Cocoa Bar, drinking it as I walked to the F train.
I got to the party at 10:30 and it was in full swing. I congratulated the Lee brothers and chatted with Salma Abdelnour briefly before getting in line for beer. Then Julie Besonen from Paper arrived with her husband Jim Knapp, and I got back in the beer line with them and caught up.
You would think that an art gallery would have air conditioning, but I guess not. People were still psyched to be there, though, although half of them stayed outside and chatted.
I talked to a couple of publicists and then decided it was time to go. Since it was only 11:30 I stopped by Excelsior for a beer once when I was back in my neighborhood and then went for a stroll. I was stopped by jazz music coming from a storefront I'd never noticed before. Turns out it was Puppet’s Jazz Bar, which I learned was in fact a couple of years old and I just hadn’t noticed, and now it’s losing it’s lease, or so the owner tells me. He’ll be throwing some fundraisers in an attempt to relocate, so stay tuned for more information on that.
I drank Australian Shiraz and listened to the music. Victor Bailey was in the audience, too, wearing a T-shirt with a bass clef on it. He sat in on the bass for a song or two, shrugging off praise. It was a nice way to end the evening.
*Non-New Yorkers might not know that that means "down under the Manhattan Bridge overpass."
Matt and Ted Lee have a lot of friends, or at least they can get a lot of people to show up at a party, as I found out this evening, the first truly warm night of the year.
The Lee brothers were celebrating the fact that their cookbook had taken top honors at the James Beard Awards by throwing a party at an art gallery in the Brooklyn neighborhood of DUMBO*.
The party didn't start until 9:30, so not only did I have time to go home beforehand, I actually had time to kill. I also had to find my way to the F train, which is in southern Park Slope. I live on the other end of the neighborhood, near Grand Army Plaza, and so I decided to wander down 5th Avenue (more interesting than 7th Avenue, although farther from the subway) and eat at whatever restaurant caught my eye.
The ever-popular Al Di Là had a wait of just 20 minutes, at 8pm on Friday, so I took them up on it, relaxing with a glass of Sancerre in their neighboring wine bar until I was summoned to my table, where I started with the special of grilled sardines over salad greens and then had cazunsei, a type ravioli, with beets, ricottta and poppy seeds. With dinner I drank a couple of glasses of Erbaluce, a Piedmontese white wine made from the indigenous Erbaluce grape, which I had just recently learned about (high acid with floral and herbal notes).
Feeling slightly bad that I was dining solo at a table of two, I gave up my table and had coffee at Cocoa Bar, drinking it as I walked to the F train.
I got to the party at 10:30 and it was in full swing. I congratulated the Lee brothers and chatted with Salma Abdelnour briefly before getting in line for beer. Then Julie Besonen from Paper arrived with her husband Jim Knapp, and I got back in the beer line with them and caught up.
You would think that an art gallery would have air conditioning, but I guess not. People were still psyched to be there, though, although half of them stayed outside and chatted.
I talked to a couple of publicists and then decided it was time to go. Since it was only 11:30 I stopped by Excelsior for a beer once when I was back in my neighborhood and then went for a stroll. I was stopped by jazz music coming from a storefront I'd never noticed before. Turns out it was Puppet’s Jazz Bar, which I learned was in fact a couple of years old and I just hadn’t noticed, and now it’s losing it’s lease, or so the owner tells me. He’ll be throwing some fundraisers in an attempt to relocate, so stay tuned for more information on that.
I drank Australian Shiraz and listened to the music. Victor Bailey was in the audience, too, wearing a T-shirt with a bass clef on it. He sat in on the bass for a song or two, shrugging off praise. It was a nice way to end the evening.
*Non-New Yorkers might not know that that means "down under the Manhattan Bridge overpass."
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Kittichai
May 31,
Okay, let’s start with news, so those of you not interested in my social life can move on:
Lulzim Rexhepi isn’t at Xing anymore. He’s back working with his old boss and friend Ian Chalermkittichai at Kittichai, where he’s executive sous chef.
Shirley Lew, who was Lulzim’s #2 at Xing, is the chef there now.
Actually, she has been since Lulzim aka Lou left in, um, July.
Someone was not completely honest with me when he said the chef was still at Xing. Either that or he meant Shirley was still there. That’s possible.
That’s what I learned last night while dining with Sarah Chang, Ian’s girlfriend and, like so many people I meet these days, a graduate of Tufts University.
Sarah and I have more in common than that. We both studied Chinese and lived in Thailand. We also are both fond of Ian, but in different ways.
We ate at Ian’s restaurant, but he was upstairs, working at a party on the rooftop of the 60 Thompson hotel. No one seemed to know who was at the party, only that many of them were wearing suits.
Sarah gave me the low-down on the inner workings of the company that owns Kittichai, which I will not be sharing with you. We also talked about her and Ian's Jack Russell terrier, Kasper. Kasper recently was amusing himself by gnawing on the handles of Ian’s sushi knives. Vet bills are climbing.
Sarah spent time in Thailand on a grant to study overseas Chinese businesses, something she was able to do by befriending the Chearavanont family, which of course owns the Bangkok-based multinational conglomerate Charoen Pokhpand. If you don’t know how important that is, I can’t explain it to you.
So we spoke of many things, including overrated New York Asian-fusion chefs and the fact that Kittichai’s main eating utensil is a pair of chopsticks, despite the fact that Thais don’t eat with chopsticks (unless of course they’re eating Chinese food which, you know, we do too).
She said Ian would like to do away with the chopsticks, but customers keep asking for them.
Just so you know: Chinese, Japanese, Koreans and Vietnamese use chopsticks for everyday eating. No one else does. In most of Southeast Asia, especially the rural parts, the right hand is the preferred eating utensil. In most of the rest of the region, especially in urban areas, a spoon and fork are used: The fork is used to push food onto the spoon, which then conveys it to the mouth.
But Sarah and I used the chopsticks, because to ask for a spoon and fork would have been obnoxious. One can only go so local without becoming a jerk.
What we ate and drank:
Kobe beef carpaccio with sukiyaki sauce
pork "tonnato" (actually very thin roasted pork topped with Thai citrus and aromatics)
tuna "phad thai" in which the tuna was cut like the noodles and it was all dressed in a peanut sauce and garnished with bean sprouts
2004 Domaine Hering Pinot Gris (Alsace)
crispy duck and pickled watermelon salad
seared scallops on gai lan (or phak khanna, if you want to do it in Thai)
2003 Domaine Réaltière Cabernet-Syrah blend (Provence)
Chicken khao soi
Line-caught mahi-mahi with a light tom som sauce
Crios de Susana Balbo Cabernet, Mendoza Valley (Argentina)
"Sankaya" pandan white chocolate sauce with seasonal fruit (basically fondue)
Jasmine flan on sweet-and-sour fruit salad with jasmine rice ice cream
2005 Patrizi Muscato d’Asti
Okay, let’s start with news, so those of you not interested in my social life can move on:
Lulzim Rexhepi isn’t at Xing anymore. He’s back working with his old boss and friend Ian Chalermkittichai at Kittichai, where he’s executive sous chef.
Shirley Lew, who was Lulzim’s #2 at Xing, is the chef there now.
Actually, she has been since Lulzim aka Lou left in, um, July.
Someone was not completely honest with me when he said the chef was still at Xing. Either that or he meant Shirley was still there. That’s possible.
That’s what I learned last night while dining with Sarah Chang, Ian’s girlfriend and, like so many people I meet these days, a graduate of Tufts University.
Sarah and I have more in common than that. We both studied Chinese and lived in Thailand. We also are both fond of Ian, but in different ways.
We ate at Ian’s restaurant, but he was upstairs, working at a party on the rooftop of the 60 Thompson hotel. No one seemed to know who was at the party, only that many of them were wearing suits.
Sarah gave me the low-down on the inner workings of the company that owns Kittichai, which I will not be sharing with you. We also talked about her and Ian's Jack Russell terrier, Kasper. Kasper recently was amusing himself by gnawing on the handles of Ian’s sushi knives. Vet bills are climbing.
Sarah spent time in Thailand on a grant to study overseas Chinese businesses, something she was able to do by befriending the Chearavanont family, which of course owns the Bangkok-based multinational conglomerate Charoen Pokhpand. If you don’t know how important that is, I can’t explain it to you.
So we spoke of many things, including overrated New York Asian-fusion chefs and the fact that Kittichai’s main eating utensil is a pair of chopsticks, despite the fact that Thais don’t eat with chopsticks (unless of course they’re eating Chinese food which, you know, we do too).
She said Ian would like to do away with the chopsticks, but customers keep asking for them.
Just so you know: Chinese, Japanese, Koreans and Vietnamese use chopsticks for everyday eating. No one else does. In most of Southeast Asia, especially the rural parts, the right hand is the preferred eating utensil. In most of the rest of the region, especially in urban areas, a spoon and fork are used: The fork is used to push food onto the spoon, which then conveys it to the mouth.
But Sarah and I used the chopsticks, because to ask for a spoon and fork would have been obnoxious. One can only go so local without becoming a jerk.
What we ate and drank:
Kobe beef carpaccio with sukiyaki sauce
pork "tonnato" (actually very thin roasted pork topped with Thai citrus and aromatics)
tuna "phad thai" in which the tuna was cut like the noodles and it was all dressed in a peanut sauce and garnished with bean sprouts
2004 Domaine Hering Pinot Gris (Alsace)
crispy duck and pickled watermelon salad
seared scallops on gai lan (or phak khanna, if you want to do it in Thai)
2003 Domaine Réaltière Cabernet-Syrah blend (Provence)
Chicken khao soi
Line-caught mahi-mahi with a light tom som sauce
Crios de Susana Balbo Cabernet, Mendoza Valley (Argentina)
"Sankaya" pandan white chocolate sauce with seasonal fruit (basically fondue)
Jasmine flan on sweet-and-sour fruit salad with jasmine rice ice cream
2005 Patrizi Muscato d’Asti
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
What do you mean, pronounce chrysanthemum?
May 30
This is how you pronounce chrysanthemum: Chris Anne thug (but don't pronounce the 'g') mumm. At least that's as close as I can get without having a schwa key.
Someone typed the words "pronounce" and "chrysanthemum" in Google and were led here to Food Writer’s Diary. I hope he or she tries again, because now the answer is here, waiting.
Bruni? Why that’s brew knee.
Prosecco is pronounced pro seck oh, basically.
Mechoui? Hmm. Now that you mention it, I'm not sure. I'd try muh chewy.
I know what web sites lead people here. Some people come on their own. Some come from nrn.com or my fellow NRN bloggers Peter Romeo and Gregg Cebrzynski. Others are led here by my friends at Eater, Grub Street, Snack, The Daily Fresser, Allergic Girl and others. Andy Battaglia and Michaelangelo Matos are kind enough to have permanent links here, making me wonder if I should be writing more about music. My old college friend Shane Curcuru has been linking to me quite a little bit, too.
But mostly people come here from word searches. They seem to want to know if the people I write about have significant others or do their jobs well or if I have pictures of them wearing jeans. Some come here because of typos (unless people go to streep clubs to watch Meryl Streep movies).
I wish you would just e-mail me (at bthorn@nrn.com) and ask. I’d be happy to try to help you out, although I’ll tell you right now I’m not going to spread rumors about Zak Pelaccio’s marital status. I will say, however, that I think Richard Grausman is doing a very good job.
Tomatoes? Yin, I'm pretty sure.
Of course some keyword searches just leave me flummoxed. “Mother” and “seduction” in the same search window? I’m speechless.
Here are some recent searches that brought people to Food Writer’s Diary:
Richard grausman not doing a good job
chorizo dust
vetri restaurant hard to get a reservation
humane foie gras
peanut opera experiment
a duck walked a store. he asked the manager if they had any chap stick
mother seduction
kittichai name meaning
an herb called kinome
fashion week food diaries
comedy dialogs with compliments in restaura
drink called vespa james bond
motley fool mandarin oriental
how to tell when peanuts have gone rancid
how many calories in pret a mange miso soup?
infusion mint julep
allergic to seafood can i eat at benihana
oxytocin foods chile
fantastic biceps of dani
how to kill gnats in south georgia
chef conant's wife susan
american oriental bioengineering jon goldberg
picture of salma abdelnour
wine cowboys
streisand gossip
antonio's pizza lodz
creative tattoo posed for a wok shop
sumile too expensive
agar agar vegetable terriers
different types of faux hawk haircuts
how do i make wild rice and green onion brets
cool names of chinese restaurant
plagiarism the sincerest form of flattery quote
food tiffany aloe
genetic defects in tasting cucumbers
interesting places on the way to spokane
pekin duck temperament
watershed peacock designer restaurant
tomatoes yin or yang
playgirl sexiest chef
ozersky dufresne
foie gras powder
tequila and cucumber juice
foodservice rumors on lee food service
bond and martini
molecular gastronomy maltodextrin
rockstar has an ice cream flavor after him
tilapia taco
zak pelaccio divorces his wife
hawaiian food colorado
rock star menu
favorite food what does jared leto like to eat
joe piscopo im from jersey
bobby flay's health dept
ion foods
pinotage and pulled pork
chocolate for cognac
estrogen food
streep clubs Birmingham
la caravelle tomato processing
Prosecco walnut oil vinaigrette
names that sound like food
todd english and ny post 2007
bobby flay in jeans
ihop east Colfax
pronounce chrysanthemum
quotes of food aroma
todd english's girlfriend
keys to restaurant bathroom
old skool food
dan barber girlfriend
beautiful teenagers coats
dunkin donuts that use soy milk in rhode island
predictions eve the restaurant ann arbor
pronounce Bruni
This is how you pronounce chrysanthemum: Chris Anne thug (but don't pronounce the 'g') mumm. At least that's as close as I can get without having a schwa key.
Someone typed the words "pronounce" and "chrysanthemum" in Google and were led here to Food Writer’s Diary. I hope he or she tries again, because now the answer is here, waiting.
Bruni? Why that’s brew knee.
Prosecco is pronounced pro seck oh, basically.
Mechoui? Hmm. Now that you mention it, I'm not sure. I'd try muh chewy.
I know what web sites lead people here. Some people come on their own. Some come from nrn.com or my fellow NRN bloggers Peter Romeo and Gregg Cebrzynski. Others are led here by my friends at Eater, Grub Street, Snack, The Daily Fresser, Allergic Girl and others. Andy Battaglia and Michaelangelo Matos are kind enough to have permanent links here, making me wonder if I should be writing more about music. My old college friend Shane Curcuru has been linking to me quite a little bit, too.
But mostly people come here from word searches. They seem to want to know if the people I write about have significant others or do their jobs well or if I have pictures of them wearing jeans. Some come here because of typos (unless people go to streep clubs to watch Meryl Streep movies).
I wish you would just e-mail me (at bthorn@nrn.com) and ask. I’d be happy to try to help you out, although I’ll tell you right now I’m not going to spread rumors about Zak Pelaccio’s marital status. I will say, however, that I think Richard Grausman is doing a very good job.
Tomatoes? Yin, I'm pretty sure.
Of course some keyword searches just leave me flummoxed. “Mother” and “seduction” in the same search window? I’m speechless.
Here are some recent searches that brought people to Food Writer’s Diary:
Richard grausman not doing a good job
chorizo dust
vetri restaurant hard to get a reservation
humane foie gras
peanut opera experiment
a duck walked a store. he asked the manager if they had any chap stick
mother seduction
kittichai name meaning
an herb called kinome
fashion week food diaries
comedy dialogs with compliments in restaura
drink called vespa james bond
motley fool mandarin oriental
how to tell when peanuts have gone rancid
how many calories in pret a mange miso soup?
infusion mint julep
allergic to seafood can i eat at benihana
oxytocin foods chile
fantastic biceps of dani
how to kill gnats in south georgia
chef conant's wife susan
american oriental bioengineering jon goldberg
picture of salma abdelnour
wine cowboys
streisand gossip
antonio's pizza lodz
creative tattoo posed for a wok shop
sumile too expensive
agar agar vegetable terriers
different types of faux hawk haircuts
how do i make wild rice and green onion brets
cool names of chinese restaurant
plagiarism the sincerest form of flattery quote
food tiffany aloe
genetic defects in tasting cucumbers
interesting places on the way to spokane
pekin duck temperament
watershed peacock designer restaurant
tomatoes yin or yang
playgirl sexiest chef
ozersky dufresne
foie gras powder
tequila and cucumber juice
foodservice rumors on lee food service
bond and martini
molecular gastronomy maltodextrin
rockstar has an ice cream flavor after him
tilapia taco
zak pelaccio divorces his wife
hawaiian food colorado
rock star menu
favorite food what does jared leto like to eat
joe piscopo im from jersey
bobby flay's health dept
ion foods
pinotage and pulled pork
chocolate for cognac
estrogen food
streep clubs Birmingham
la caravelle tomato processing
Prosecco walnut oil vinaigrette
names that sound like food
todd english and ny post 2007
bobby flay in jeans
ihop east Colfax
pronounce chrysanthemum
quotes of food aroma
todd english's girlfriend
keys to restaurant bathroom
old skool food
dan barber girlfriend
beautiful teenagers coats
dunkin donuts that use soy milk in rhode island
predictions eve the restaurant ann arbor
pronounce Bruni
Friday, May 25, 2007
Pitcher plants in the bathroom!
May 25
One of the nice things about going to the Restaurant Show is that it’s in Chicago, which is arguably the best eating city in the United States. One of the drawbacks is that during the Show a lot of restaurateurs are in town and want to check out all the cool restaurants, making it hard to get a reservation. One of the nice things about being a food writer is that if you express an interest in eating at a restaurant, its owners will likely find a way to accommodate you. One of the drawbacks of being a food writer for Nation’s Restarant News during the Show is that you have many work-related obligations and rarely a free meal during which to explore.
However, I managed to weasel my way out of going to the annual Gold and Silver Plate banquet on Monday and instead went to Alinea.
I had actually planned to weasel out of the banquet weeks in advance and had reserved a table for one at Grant Achatz’s restaurant.
Yes, that's right, a table for one. Alinea’s a place of experimental, experiential, whimsical and arguably bizarre food and I wasn’t interested in finding someone to dine with just so I could spend the night explaining the food to them, worrying that they found it too weird or trying to keep them patient for the four hours or so it would take to work our way through the 24-course meal. Dining experiences like that aren’t for everyone, and they require the right companion. Although I have a couple of friends in New York whom I’d trust unequivocally to sit through it with me (actually, one: Andy Battaglia) finding the right person in Chicago and then trying to find a time when we were both free for dinner during the Show was a task up to which I simply wasn’t.
I made the right decision, because there were times during the meal when I had to close my eyes to focus my attention on my senses of taste and smell to properly appreciate what was going on. I couple of times I involuntarily clenched my left fist as unexpected flavor combinations rushed across my tongue, or as my mouth and sinus passages filled with molecule clusters they had never experienced. The crispy monkfish not only made me grin, but affected parts of my body that food shouldn’t.
I had my notebook with me, but I was delighted when one of the many servers who visited my table told me they’d give me a list of everything I ate and drank. I still jotted a few notes, but I was then free just to let the meal wash over me, and sometimes that’s just what you should do.
Alinea’s printed menu is terse, and doesn’t really describe the food in the way it deserves, but then again, food like this really can’t be described usefully without being able to plug into someone else’s tastebuds and olfactory receptors.
The menu for the meal I passed up, on the other hand, the one served during the Gold and Silver Plate gala, is always an extravaganza of purple prose and ornate description.
So, here’s what I didn’t eat:
Captivating Cornucopias
Tempting Asiago cheese cones form perfect pockets for smokey salmon mousse with tobiko caviar, fresher-than-fresh ahi poke and antipasti with sun-dried tomato.
These enticing cornucopias surround a mini caprese with balsamic reduction and fresh basil.
Sweets & Savories
A sweet chili-roasted lady apple cradling a bouquet of baby field greens partners with a savory blue cheese cake and balsamic vinaigrette.
Chic Chiller
Wake up your senses with the refreshingly sublime taste of blood orange sorbet elegantly showcased in a frosted martini glass and garnished with frangrant orange twists.
Divine Duo
Revel in two of nature’s most divine creations. Succulent vanilla-butter poached South African lobster tail and luscious white truffle-infused beef tenderloin blanket tender pillows of rosemary and sun-dried tomato gnocchi, accompanied by crisp haricot verts.
Sweet Surrender
Feed your inner devil. A sinfully rich crème de cacao tower topped with chocolate ganache joins a brandy tulip with citrus curd and fresh mixed berries. This tantalizing twosome is embellished with a raspberry/chocolate spear and fruit coulis.
And, what I did eat and drink (if you feel like counting, you’ll notice that I, in fact, had 26 courses as the kitchen sent out a couple of extras; welcome to my world):
CROQUETTE smoked steelhead roe, several garnishes
L.Aubry Brut Champagned with Pineau des Charentes
OCTOPUS shiso, papaya, toasted soy
CHANTERELLE carrot, curry ham
Vercezi del Castellazo Pinot Nero Bianco “Gugiarolo”, Oltrepo Pavese 2005
APPLE horseradish, celery
MONKFISH banana, onion, lime
Vincent Dancer Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Cru “Tête de Clos” 2004
KUROGE WAGYU yuzu, seaweed smoke, sea grapes
Joseph Voillot Volnay 1er Cru “Les Fremiets”, Côte de Beaune 2002
DUCK mango, yogurt, pillow of lavender air
Rudi Pichler Gruner Veltliner Smaragd “Kollmutz”, Wachau, Austria 2000
BLACK TRUFFLE explosion, romaine, parmesan
SHORT RIB Guinness, peanut, fried broccoli
Paolo Bea Montefalco Rosso Riserva “Pipparello”, Umbria 2001
CHEESE in crackerr
HONEYDEW Bliss sherry vinegar, mint
RHUBARB goat milk, beet, long pepper
Müller-Catoir Harrdter Mandelring Scheurebe Spätlese, Pfalz 2005
STRAWBERRY frozen and chewy, with wasabi
STURGEON candied and dried
SKATE caper, lemon, and brown butter powders
Ogier “Viognier de Rosine”, VdP des Colllines Rhodaniennes 2004
WHITE ASPARAGUS chorizo, egg, red pepper
Philippe Portier Quincy, Loire 2005
PINEAPPLE bacon powder, black pepper
LAMB peas, consommé, morels
Hereus Ribas “Ribas de Cabrera” Vi de Taula de Balears, Spain 2000
HOT POTATO cold potato, black truffle, butter
BISON encased in savory granola
Azelia Barolo “Bricco Fiasco”, Castiglione Falletto 1998
[YOU’LL JUST HAVE TO GUESS BECAUSE THE CHICAGO CITY COUNCIL IS STUPID AND I'M NO SNITCH] spicy cinnamon, apple pâte de fruit
GUAVA avocado, brie, key lime juice
Hans Tschida Traminer TBA, Burgenland, Austria 1998
COCONUT saffron, kiwi, corrnmeal
LICORICE CAKE muscovado sugar, orange, anise
CHOCOLATE passionfruit, lemongrass, soy
Abbazia di Novacella Moscato Rosa “Praepositus”, Alto Adige 2004
CARAMEL meyer lemon, cinnamon perfume
Ethiopian coffee
One of the nice things about going to the Restaurant Show is that it’s in Chicago, which is arguably the best eating city in the United States. One of the drawbacks is that during the Show a lot of restaurateurs are in town and want to check out all the cool restaurants, making it hard to get a reservation. One of the nice things about being a food writer is that if you express an interest in eating at a restaurant, its owners will likely find a way to accommodate you. One of the drawbacks of being a food writer for Nation’s Restarant News during the Show is that you have many work-related obligations and rarely a free meal during which to explore.
However, I managed to weasel my way out of going to the annual Gold and Silver Plate banquet on Monday and instead went to Alinea.
I had actually planned to weasel out of the banquet weeks in advance and had reserved a table for one at Grant Achatz’s restaurant.
Yes, that's right, a table for one. Alinea’s a place of experimental, experiential, whimsical and arguably bizarre food and I wasn’t interested in finding someone to dine with just so I could spend the night explaining the food to them, worrying that they found it too weird or trying to keep them patient for the four hours or so it would take to work our way through the 24-course meal. Dining experiences like that aren’t for everyone, and they require the right companion. Although I have a couple of friends in New York whom I’d trust unequivocally to sit through it with me (actually, one: Andy Battaglia) finding the right person in Chicago and then trying to find a time when we were both free for dinner during the Show was a task up to which I simply wasn’t.
I made the right decision, because there were times during the meal when I had to close my eyes to focus my attention on my senses of taste and smell to properly appreciate what was going on. I couple of times I involuntarily clenched my left fist as unexpected flavor combinations rushed across my tongue, or as my mouth and sinus passages filled with molecule clusters they had never experienced. The crispy monkfish not only made me grin, but affected parts of my body that food shouldn’t.
I had my notebook with me, but I was delighted when one of the many servers who visited my table told me they’d give me a list of everything I ate and drank. I still jotted a few notes, but I was then free just to let the meal wash over me, and sometimes that’s just what you should do.
Alinea’s printed menu is terse, and doesn’t really describe the food in the way it deserves, but then again, food like this really can’t be described usefully without being able to plug into someone else’s tastebuds and olfactory receptors.
The menu for the meal I passed up, on the other hand, the one served during the Gold and Silver Plate gala, is always an extravaganza of purple prose and ornate description.
So, here’s what I didn’t eat:
Captivating Cornucopias
Tempting Asiago cheese cones form perfect pockets for smokey salmon mousse with tobiko caviar, fresher-than-fresh ahi poke and antipasti with sun-dried tomato.
These enticing cornucopias surround a mini caprese with balsamic reduction and fresh basil.
Sweets & Savories
A sweet chili-roasted lady apple cradling a bouquet of baby field greens partners with a savory blue cheese cake and balsamic vinaigrette.
Chic Chiller
Wake up your senses with the refreshingly sublime taste of blood orange sorbet elegantly showcased in a frosted martini glass and garnished with frangrant orange twists.
Divine Duo
Revel in two of nature’s most divine creations. Succulent vanilla-butter poached South African lobster tail and luscious white truffle-infused beef tenderloin blanket tender pillows of rosemary and sun-dried tomato gnocchi, accompanied by crisp haricot verts.
Sweet Surrender
Feed your inner devil. A sinfully rich crème de cacao tower topped with chocolate ganache joins a brandy tulip with citrus curd and fresh mixed berries. This tantalizing twosome is embellished with a raspberry/chocolate spear and fruit coulis.
And, what I did eat and drink (if you feel like counting, you’ll notice that I, in fact, had 26 courses as the kitchen sent out a couple of extras; welcome to my world):
CROQUETTE smoked steelhead roe, several garnishes
L.Aubry Brut Champagned with Pineau des Charentes
OCTOPUS shiso, papaya, toasted soy
CHANTERELLE carrot, curry ham
Vercezi del Castellazo Pinot Nero Bianco “Gugiarolo”, Oltrepo Pavese 2005
APPLE horseradish, celery
MONKFISH banana, onion, lime
Vincent Dancer Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Cru “Tête de Clos” 2004
KUROGE WAGYU yuzu, seaweed smoke, sea grapes
Joseph Voillot Volnay 1er Cru “Les Fremiets”, Côte de Beaune 2002
DUCK mango, yogurt, pillow of lavender air
Rudi Pichler Gruner Veltliner Smaragd “Kollmutz”, Wachau, Austria 2000
BLACK TRUFFLE explosion, romaine, parmesan
SHORT RIB Guinness, peanut, fried broccoli
Paolo Bea Montefalco Rosso Riserva “Pipparello”, Umbria 2001
CHEESE in crackerr
HONEYDEW Bliss sherry vinegar, mint
RHUBARB goat milk, beet, long pepper
Müller-Catoir Harrdter Mandelring Scheurebe Spätlese, Pfalz 2005
STRAWBERRY frozen and chewy, with wasabi
STURGEON candied and dried
SKATE caper, lemon, and brown butter powders
Ogier “Viognier de Rosine”, VdP des Colllines Rhodaniennes 2004
WHITE ASPARAGUS chorizo, egg, red pepper
Philippe Portier Quincy, Loire 2005
PINEAPPLE bacon powder, black pepper
LAMB peas, consommé, morels
Hereus Ribas “Ribas de Cabrera” Vi de Taula de Balears, Spain 2000
HOT POTATO cold potato, black truffle, butter
BISON encased in savory granola
Azelia Barolo “Bricco Fiasco”, Castiglione Falletto 1998
[YOU’LL JUST HAVE TO GUESS BECAUSE THE CHICAGO CITY COUNCIL IS STUPID AND I'M NO SNITCH] spicy cinnamon, apple pâte de fruit
GUAVA avocado, brie, key lime juice
Hans Tschida Traminer TBA, Burgenland, Austria 1998
COCONUT saffron, kiwi, corrnmeal
LICORICE CAKE muscovado sugar, orange, anise
CHOCOLATE passionfruit, lemongrass, soy
Abbazia di Novacella Moscato Rosa “Praepositus”, Alto Adige 2004
CARAMEL meyer lemon, cinnamon perfume
Ethiopian coffee
Thursday, May 24, 2007
“Are you having a good show?”
May 24
My apologies, dear reader, for my recent silence. I just got back from Chicago, where I attended the National Restaurant Association Restaurant, Hotel-Motel Show, also known as the NRA Show, the Restaurant Show and the Show.
I’ve been known to call it simply “that,” as in: “Oh, please don’t tell me I have to go to that again.”
It’s not bad for a trade show, but everyone who attends from Nation’s Restaurant News has a lot of ground to cover, hands to shake, people to make nice with, all while still meeting deadlines from outside the office. Backlog ensues.
The schmoozing can be a bit much even for me, and I’m a good schmoozer.
“Are you having a good show?” people ask me. I have no idea what that means. I go, I do the work I need to do and see the people I need to see. I try to enjoy myself and get enough sleep so that I don’t hurt myself. I don’t know whether that’s good or bad.
It doesn’t help that I go with a bad attitude. I get so many obnoxious, nagging messages in the weeks leading up to the show that I’m sick of it by the time I get there.
“Be sure to visit booth 3041 to learn the latest trends in latex technology!”
“Stop by 5311 to try our new cheese straws, now with 0 grams trans fat!”
Shoot me now.
And then when I’m on the trade show floor, if I so much as raise an eyebrow as I walk by a booth I run the risk of being accosted by someone who insists that I taste something like their black salt.
And then they require positive feedback.
“Isn’t it great?” they ask.
“Delicious,” I say. I want to say “It tastes like salt,” but then I’ll be attacked with a sales pitch about how the subtle flavors of iron and ash really bring out the flavor of food. Tacked onto that will likely be a completely specious assertion of the health benefits of those trace minerals.
One particularly pushy publicist dragged me across the trade show floor to sample his Belgian waffle mix, something I would never, ever write about because NRN doesn’t write about mixes that likely would be sold by our advertisers, for obvious reasons.
So I ate a slice of waffle topped with smoked salmon and crème fraîche and stood there until the publicist looked satisfied that he’d done his job, and then I wandered off.
Oh whine, whine, whine. Poor me, being plied with food and drink and treated like my opinion were worth something. Boo hoo.
There are of course booths that I like to visit. It’s good to check in on the latest soft drinks from Atlanta and spicy foods from Avery Island. And I got to be on a panel this year talking about Asian food.
Besides me, the panel was quite august: Dan Coudreaut, director of culinary innovation for McDonald’s, thank you very much; Ross Kamens, executive chef of Noodles and Company; and Doug Martinides, vice president of culinary development for on-site giant Aramark.
So that was fun. And I managed to make it to a couple of good parties. The best one — and I’m not just saying that because we throw it — is the MenuMasters party.
MenuMasters mostly honors chain restaurants for innovations that are significant in both culinary and economic ways, although an independent restaurant is honored each year, too — this year it was the Inn at Little Washington.
Some celebrity fine dining chefs come to the party — Patrick O’Connell was there to pick up the Inn at Little Washington’s award, and Paul Prudhomme was holding court from his scooter — but this world is very different from the foie gras- and Champagne-laden world where I spend most of my time, and it’s every bit as interesting and, by most measures, more important.
Dan Coudreaut from McDonald’s was there, getting teased by Kathleen Kennedy of Starbucks for being named in the Chicago Sun-Times, along with Oprah, as one of seven pivotal Chicagoans. Dan was his usual aw-shucks about it, which is his nature. I guess if you introduce edamame to mainstream America you can afford to be low-key about it.
Chris Martone from Subway was there, too. So was Peter Gibbons, currently of Denny’s, which is major enough, but he’s the guy who rolled out the chicken Whopper when he was at Burger King.
Mark Miller (not the one from Coyote Café, another one) was there. He had to be because he was getting an award for Captain D’s menu revamp, but he likes to come to the MenuMasters party.
Of course it wouldn’t be a party without Oona Settembre (isn’t that the best name you’ve ever heard?). She was for years the woman behind the food at Dave & Buster’s, and now she’s at On the Border. She was marveling at how young, slim and cute newly single Luke Belsito looked. He developed the chili dishes at Red Robin, but now he’s on his way to Texas Roadhouse.
The gang from Mimi’s Café was chatting with a couple of guys from California Pizza Kitchen, one of whom, it turns out, developed their carne asada pizza, so I told him the pieces of meat were too big. He nodded, perhaps in agreement, perhaps to be polite. Hard to say, really.
I closed out the meeting hanging out with NRN’s event planning staff, who were doing a relaxed sort of post-mortem of the event.
My apologies, dear reader, for my recent silence. I just got back from Chicago, where I attended the National Restaurant Association Restaurant, Hotel-Motel Show, also known as the NRA Show, the Restaurant Show and the Show.
I’ve been known to call it simply “that,” as in: “Oh, please don’t tell me I have to go to that again.”
It’s not bad for a trade show, but everyone who attends from Nation’s Restaurant News has a lot of ground to cover, hands to shake, people to make nice with, all while still meeting deadlines from outside the office. Backlog ensues.
The schmoozing can be a bit much even for me, and I’m a good schmoozer.
“Are you having a good show?” people ask me. I have no idea what that means. I go, I do the work I need to do and see the people I need to see. I try to enjoy myself and get enough sleep so that I don’t hurt myself. I don’t know whether that’s good or bad.
It doesn’t help that I go with a bad attitude. I get so many obnoxious, nagging messages in the weeks leading up to the show that I’m sick of it by the time I get there.
“Be sure to visit booth 3041 to learn the latest trends in latex technology!”
“Stop by 5311 to try our new cheese straws, now with 0 grams trans fat!”
Shoot me now.
And then when I’m on the trade show floor, if I so much as raise an eyebrow as I walk by a booth I run the risk of being accosted by someone who insists that I taste something like their black salt.
And then they require positive feedback.
“Isn’t it great?” they ask.
“Delicious,” I say. I want to say “It tastes like salt,” but then I’ll be attacked with a sales pitch about how the subtle flavors of iron and ash really bring out the flavor of food. Tacked onto that will likely be a completely specious assertion of the health benefits of those trace minerals.
One particularly pushy publicist dragged me across the trade show floor to sample his Belgian waffle mix, something I would never, ever write about because NRN doesn’t write about mixes that likely would be sold by our advertisers, for obvious reasons.
So I ate a slice of waffle topped with smoked salmon and crème fraîche and stood there until the publicist looked satisfied that he’d done his job, and then I wandered off.
Oh whine, whine, whine. Poor me, being plied with food and drink and treated like my opinion were worth something. Boo hoo.
There are of course booths that I like to visit. It’s good to check in on the latest soft drinks from Atlanta and spicy foods from Avery Island. And I got to be on a panel this year talking about Asian food.
Besides me, the panel was quite august: Dan Coudreaut, director of culinary innovation for McDonald’s, thank you very much; Ross Kamens, executive chef of Noodles and Company; and Doug Martinides, vice president of culinary development for on-site giant Aramark.
So that was fun. And I managed to make it to a couple of good parties. The best one — and I’m not just saying that because we throw it — is the MenuMasters party.
MenuMasters mostly honors chain restaurants for innovations that are significant in both culinary and economic ways, although an independent restaurant is honored each year, too — this year it was the Inn at Little Washington.
Some celebrity fine dining chefs come to the party — Patrick O’Connell was there to pick up the Inn at Little Washington’s award, and Paul Prudhomme was holding court from his scooter — but this world is very different from the foie gras- and Champagne-laden world where I spend most of my time, and it’s every bit as interesting and, by most measures, more important.
Dan Coudreaut from McDonald’s was there, getting teased by Kathleen Kennedy of Starbucks for being named in the Chicago Sun-Times, along with Oprah, as one of seven pivotal Chicagoans. Dan was his usual aw-shucks about it, which is his nature. I guess if you introduce edamame to mainstream America you can afford to be low-key about it.
Chris Martone from Subway was there, too. So was Peter Gibbons, currently of Denny’s, which is major enough, but he’s the guy who rolled out the chicken Whopper when he was at Burger King.
Mark Miller (not the one from Coyote Café, another one) was there. He had to be because he was getting an award for Captain D’s menu revamp, but he likes to come to the MenuMasters party.
Of course it wouldn’t be a party without Oona Settembre (isn’t that the best name you’ve ever heard?). She was for years the woman behind the food at Dave & Buster’s, and now she’s at On the Border. She was marveling at how young, slim and cute newly single Luke Belsito looked. He developed the chili dishes at Red Robin, but now he’s on his way to Texas Roadhouse.
The gang from Mimi’s Café was chatting with a couple of guys from California Pizza Kitchen, one of whom, it turns out, developed their carne asada pizza, so I told him the pieces of meat were too big. He nodded, perhaps in agreement, perhaps to be polite. Hard to say, really.
I closed out the meeting hanging out with NRN’s event planning staff, who were doing a relaxed sort of post-mortem of the event.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Conversing with Clark, getting mad at marketers
May 14
My friend Clark Mitchell of Travel + Leisure (we’ve actually been friends for longer than he’s had that job) has a big soft spot in his heart for what he calls trashy food, particularly Tex-Mex queso dip, but other things, too, so I invited him to come to the opening of California Pizza Kitchen’s newest Manhattan location (it already has one Manhattan unit, on E. 60th St.)
Not that CPK’s food is trashy, far from it. But Clark judges food based on its quality, not its class.
We met at Nowhere in the East Village for a drink. I had a bourbon on the rocks and, in an unusual if slight move toward moderation, Clark had a gin & tonic instead of his usual Martini. From there we walked to the CPK on E. 30th and Park Avenue South, passing on the way a restaurant with a giant banner declaring that it had done away with trans fats because it cared about its customers’ health. That’s sweet, except New York City’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene has banned artificial trans fat in all restaurants (natural trans fats don’t seem to be bad for you, according to current science). If the management of this particular restaurant cared so deeply about its guests’ health, why hadn’t they gotten rid of trans fats before they were forced to do so?
That got me into a snit about deceptive marketing, and I’ve been getting some amazing lies sent to me lately — companies saying they have allergy-free peanuts, which is impossible; every damn fruit or vegetable representative claiming magical qualities from their stuff; disgusting organizations claiming to be doctors although everyone knows they’re animal rights activists, publishing quarter-truths about the health effects of eating dead animals. They’re just a bunch of vegetable murderers, is what they are.
Clark and I agreed that, no matter what we ate, we would, in fact, die at some point.
“A familiar face!” exclaimed Alice Elliot, who was leaving CPK as we were entering. She introduced herself. Of course I knew her (if you’re very good, someday I’ll tell you the story of the time I carried a giant cardboard check across Midtown Manhattan on a blustery winter night so I could take a picture of IHOP chief Julia Stewart handing it to Alice Elliot for the Elliot Leadership Institute). But it’s polite to introduce yourself even if the person you’re talking to is supposed to know you. It’s sort of the opposite of saying “Don’t you know who I am?”
“Didn’t you win an award?” She asked, which in fact I did, last year. So she congratulated me and headed out into the night.
She was the only person I knew in the restaurant, except for the increasingly ubiquitous Ben Leventhal, who was sitting in the booth next to ours with three other guys, a delighted grin on his face the whole night. I’m glad he’s happy.
Clark ordered the spinach-artichoke dip, which we ate with tortilla chips while drinking Margaritas and marveling at the packed open kitchen, swarmed with cooks who cranked out the food as fast as they could. We had the chicken cobb salad and the carne asada pizza, and finished up with Key lime pie.
We walked down to Union Square to digest and took the Q train to Brooklyn. During the subway ride, we discussed the definition of trashy food. I insisted it was a class thing, not a good-for-you thing, as no one would call foie gras trashy.
True, said Clark, but he pointed out that foie gras is a natural food, not processed or manipulated.
That reminded me of my dislike for foie-gras haters. If you don’t want to eat foie gras, that’s fine, don’t eat it, but don’t act like you know what the ducks are going through. From what I understand, the force-feeding doesn’t bother them, and they do fatten up their own livers naturally before migrating.
My friend Clark Mitchell of Travel + Leisure (we’ve actually been friends for longer than he’s had that job) has a big soft spot in his heart for what he calls trashy food, particularly Tex-Mex queso dip, but other things, too, so I invited him to come to the opening of California Pizza Kitchen’s newest Manhattan location (it already has one Manhattan unit, on E. 60th St.)
Not that CPK’s food is trashy, far from it. But Clark judges food based on its quality, not its class.
We met at Nowhere in the East Village for a drink. I had a bourbon on the rocks and, in an unusual if slight move toward moderation, Clark had a gin & tonic instead of his usual Martini. From there we walked to the CPK on E. 30th and Park Avenue South, passing on the way a restaurant with a giant banner declaring that it had done away with trans fats because it cared about its customers’ health. That’s sweet, except New York City’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene has banned artificial trans fat in all restaurants (natural trans fats don’t seem to be bad for you, according to current science). If the management of this particular restaurant cared so deeply about its guests’ health, why hadn’t they gotten rid of trans fats before they were forced to do so?
That got me into a snit about deceptive marketing, and I’ve been getting some amazing lies sent to me lately — companies saying they have allergy-free peanuts, which is impossible; every damn fruit or vegetable representative claiming magical qualities from their stuff; disgusting organizations claiming to be doctors although everyone knows they’re animal rights activists, publishing quarter-truths about the health effects of eating dead animals. They’re just a bunch of vegetable murderers, is what they are.
Clark and I agreed that, no matter what we ate, we would, in fact, die at some point.
“A familiar face!” exclaimed Alice Elliot, who was leaving CPK as we were entering. She introduced herself. Of course I knew her (if you’re very good, someday I’ll tell you the story of the time I carried a giant cardboard check across Midtown Manhattan on a blustery winter night so I could take a picture of IHOP chief Julia Stewart handing it to Alice Elliot for the Elliot Leadership Institute). But it’s polite to introduce yourself even if the person you’re talking to is supposed to know you. It’s sort of the opposite of saying “Don’t you know who I am?”
“Didn’t you win an award?” She asked, which in fact I did, last year. So she congratulated me and headed out into the night.
She was the only person I knew in the restaurant, except for the increasingly ubiquitous Ben Leventhal, who was sitting in the booth next to ours with three other guys, a delighted grin on his face the whole night. I’m glad he’s happy.
Clark ordered the spinach-artichoke dip, which we ate with tortilla chips while drinking Margaritas and marveling at the packed open kitchen, swarmed with cooks who cranked out the food as fast as they could. We had the chicken cobb salad and the carne asada pizza, and finished up with Key lime pie.
We walked down to Union Square to digest and took the Q train to Brooklyn. During the subway ride, we discussed the definition of trashy food. I insisted it was a class thing, not a good-for-you thing, as no one would call foie gras trashy.
True, said Clark, but he pointed out that foie gras is a natural food, not processed or manipulated.
That reminded me of my dislike for foie-gras haters. If you don’t want to eat foie gras, that’s fine, don’t eat it, but don’t act like you know what the ducks are going through. From what I understand, the force-feeding doesn’t bother them, and they do fatten up their own livers naturally before migrating.
How not to start a press release
“It’s widely believed that ‘breakfast is the most important meal of the day’ and Americans are taking heed to the old adage. A 2006 report on breakfast conducted by Mintel Research revealed that 72 percent of all respondents typically eat breakfast on both weekends and weekdays.”
From reading those two first sentences in a press release, do you have any idea what company it’s from or why it was sent to me (hint, it’s not Mintel Research, which wouldn’t send me results of a study conducted last year)?
Neither do I. So, even without the weird use of prepositions, this is a bad press release.
From reading those two first sentences in a press release, do you have any idea what company it’s from or why it was sent to me (hint, it’s not Mintel Research, which wouldn’t send me results of a study conducted last year)?
Neither do I. So, even without the weird use of prepositions, this is a bad press release.
Monday, May 14, 2007
Blue light is the new, well, whatever the latest new design feature is
May 12
I checked my neck for bite marks as I left the Venetian hotel and headed across the Strip to Caesars Palace. The sun was blinding me and I felt like my skin was melting, or maybe on fire. I thought I might have become a vampire. But no, it was just the Las Vegas sun — and not at noon, but at 5:30 pm.
It was my fault for wearing a sportcoat, really, but sportcoats have such a slimming effect. It’s so much easier than losing weight.
I was in Vegas for HDExpo 2007, a big conference and trade show for designers of hospitality venues, such as hotels and restaurants. I was there to talk on a panel with avant-garde celebrity pastry chef Will Goldfarb of Room4Dessert in New York and hip young Joseph Elevado, executive chef of Social House in Las Vegas.
Hospitality Design magazine’s Tara Mastrelli was moderating the panel. Tara and I go way back from when she worked at Restaurant Business, and we have been known to sing karaoke together. She has known Will Goldfarb for even longer, as he and her older brother were fraternity brothers at Duke.
The panel went well. I talked about foodservice trends, Will showed pictures and videos of his virtual restaurant in Second Life, and Joseph showed pictures of Social House and talked about how the décor and food went together. The audience stayed until the end, asking questions until time ran out, when Tara cut them off and some of them came up to ask more questions anyway.
After that I snacked on noodles at the Venetian’s Asian noodle restaurant (many Las Vegas casinos have them — Atlantic City ones, too — as the market for Chinese gamblers is vast), and then I wandered the trade show floor for a bit, looking at light fixtures and floor coverings and fountains and mirrors and furniture. Then after a nap (my flight left at 7:30 am), I went to the Expo’s "party by the pool" at Caesars Palace, which was where this blog entry began.
I sipped Riesling and then Chardonnay before settling on the Jekel Pinot Noir for the evening, wandering around, noticing that designers as a rule dress much more stylishly than restaurant operators or chefs and trying to find a conversation to fall into.
Finally someone from Hospitality Design whom I must have met before (she knew me), introduced me to some young designers. Among them was Michael Gentile, a young chap now based in Los Angeles but originally from The Hill, an Italian neightborhood in St. Louis known for its food. So we talked restaurants for awhile until I swerved the subject to design, because I already know about restaurants. I took issue with the clock-radio in my hotel room, which had a blue LED display and was hard to read. Michael said we were going to see a lot of blue light in the coming years — under beds, in elevators, wherever one might expect to see colored lighting.
I meandered through a few other conversation groups and ended up talking to Will Goldfarb, Larry Bogdanow — who was the only designer I knew there as we had judged a gingerbread house contest together — and Mindy Lehman Cameron, another designer and an interesting woman depite her being a vegetarian. We sat and chatted until the staff started stacking chairs. Will wandered off somewhere, but the rest of us stopped for a bite at Bradley Ogden. I ordered an appetizer involving a poached egg and greens and, for a main course, fish and chips. I was not planning to be spotted by the chef de cuisine, David Varley. Maybe it was the poached egg that tipped him off. Anyway, he came out and said “long time no see!”
“Actually it was just a few days ago,” I said, as we had just met at a Beard Award’s afterparty. I immediately regretted saying that, as it sounded snotty, but David didn’t seem to mind. Instead he sent out a sautéed shrimp appetizer and some foie gras terrine, followed by a cheese course that I had to tackle on my own as Larry and Mindy had 10pm tickets to Cirque de Soleil.
I checked my neck for bite marks as I left the Venetian hotel and headed across the Strip to Caesars Palace. The sun was blinding me and I felt like my skin was melting, or maybe on fire. I thought I might have become a vampire. But no, it was just the Las Vegas sun — and not at noon, but at 5:30 pm.
It was my fault for wearing a sportcoat, really, but sportcoats have such a slimming effect. It’s so much easier than losing weight.
I was in Vegas for HDExpo 2007, a big conference and trade show for designers of hospitality venues, such as hotels and restaurants. I was there to talk on a panel with avant-garde celebrity pastry chef Will Goldfarb of Room4Dessert in New York and hip young Joseph Elevado, executive chef of Social House in Las Vegas.
Hospitality Design magazine’s Tara Mastrelli was moderating the panel. Tara and I go way back from when she worked at Restaurant Business, and we have been known to sing karaoke together. She has known Will Goldfarb for even longer, as he and her older brother were fraternity brothers at Duke.
The panel went well. I talked about foodservice trends, Will showed pictures and videos of his virtual restaurant in Second Life, and Joseph showed pictures of Social House and talked about how the décor and food went together. The audience stayed until the end, asking questions until time ran out, when Tara cut them off and some of them came up to ask more questions anyway.
After that I snacked on noodles at the Venetian’s Asian noodle restaurant (many Las Vegas casinos have them — Atlantic City ones, too — as the market for Chinese gamblers is vast), and then I wandered the trade show floor for a bit, looking at light fixtures and floor coverings and fountains and mirrors and furniture. Then after a nap (my flight left at 7:30 am), I went to the Expo’s "party by the pool" at Caesars Palace, which was where this blog entry began.
I sipped Riesling and then Chardonnay before settling on the Jekel Pinot Noir for the evening, wandering around, noticing that designers as a rule dress much more stylishly than restaurant operators or chefs and trying to find a conversation to fall into.
Finally someone from Hospitality Design whom I must have met before (she knew me), introduced me to some young designers. Among them was Michael Gentile, a young chap now based in Los Angeles but originally from The Hill, an Italian neightborhood in St. Louis known for its food. So we talked restaurants for awhile until I swerved the subject to design, because I already know about restaurants. I took issue with the clock-radio in my hotel room, which had a blue LED display and was hard to read. Michael said we were going to see a lot of blue light in the coming years — under beds, in elevators, wherever one might expect to see colored lighting.
I meandered through a few other conversation groups and ended up talking to Will Goldfarb, Larry Bogdanow — who was the only designer I knew there as we had judged a gingerbread house contest together — and Mindy Lehman Cameron, another designer and an interesting woman depite her being a vegetarian. We sat and chatted until the staff started stacking chairs. Will wandered off somewhere, but the rest of us stopped for a bite at Bradley Ogden. I ordered an appetizer involving a poached egg and greens and, for a main course, fish and chips. I was not planning to be spotted by the chef de cuisine, David Varley. Maybe it was the poached egg that tipped him off. Anyway, he came out and said “long time no see!”
“Actually it was just a few days ago,” I said, as we had just met at a Beard Award’s afterparty. I immediately regretted saying that, as it sounded snotty, but David didn’t seem to mind. Instead he sent out a sautéed shrimp appetizer and some foie gras terrine, followed by a cheese course that I had to tackle on my own as Larry and Mindy had 10pm tickets to Cirque de Soleil.
A Voce
May 11
“This is off the record!” Jennifer Leuzzi said, pointing an angry finger at me (or rather, an insistent one, see comment #4 below) as I ate lunch with her, Mitchell Davis and MJ Loza at A Voce. We were having a little reunion of our 2001 trip to New Zealand. Back then Jennifer was a publicist for Cervena venison and MJ worked for them in New Zealand (now he works for a winery in Marlborough).
I mean, am I that scary?
Chef Andrew Carmellini sent out bread and Sardinian sheep's milk ricotta. I had the vegetable antipasti (buffalo mozzarella, eggplant agrodolce and sweet peppers with capers), and then grilled tonno bianco with rapini pesto, roasted pepper and blood orange.
Then Andrew sent out a bunch of dessert, including his bomboloni and citrus tiramisu.
And that’s all I have to say about that, because no one wants an angry Jennifer Leuzzi.
“This is off the record!” Jennifer Leuzzi said, pointing an angry finger at me (or rather, an insistent one, see comment #4 below) as I ate lunch with her, Mitchell Davis and MJ Loza at A Voce. We were having a little reunion of our 2001 trip to New Zealand. Back then Jennifer was a publicist for Cervena venison and MJ worked for them in New Zealand (now he works for a winery in Marlborough).
I mean, am I that scary?
Chef Andrew Carmellini sent out bread and Sardinian sheep's milk ricotta. I had the vegetable antipasti (buffalo mozzarella, eggplant agrodolce and sweet peppers with capers), and then grilled tonno bianco with rapini pesto, roasted pepper and blood orange.
Then Andrew sent out a bunch of dessert, including his bomboloni and citrus tiramisu.
And that’s all I have to say about that, because no one wants an angry Jennifer Leuzzi.
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Beard ’07
May 8
“When is it going to be over?”
“Another 45 minutes.”
“But you said that like 20 minutes ago.”
“I know, I’m sorry. You know what? It’s going to be a long time before it’s over. I honestly can’t say how long.”
Oh wait, that was a conversation I had with my seven-year-old nephew, Harrison Thorn, last weekend at the Bat Mitzvah of cousin Yael Kornfeld (it was long, but really quite excellent; her speech made me cry).
But I could have had it at this year’s James Beard Foundation Awards.
Both the Bat Mitzvah and the awards were just a bit longer than three hours — an hour shorter than last year’s Beard Awards, which is a good start.
This was my ninth year covering the awards and I think I’ve had about enough.
The venue was moved this year from the Marriott Marquis to Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center.
Members of the press were given actual seats instead of herded into a roped off section in the back as used to be the case. But they were all up in tier two. I went up to my seat. It was seat #13 in box #13, but I decided not to take that personally.
The ceremony started at 6:50, 20 minutes late, and I was all alone in my box, although I was soon joined by Ben Leventhal.
“May I crash your box?” he asked, which sounds dirty but it’s not. He sneaked a couple of photos and made notes with some sort of electronic device while the ceremony got underway with a speech from Beard Foundation president Susan Ungaro and a video celebrating the Beard Foundation, which is 20 years old.
Much of the video was shot during a recent dinner by Denver-based chef Troy Guard, which I attended (Beard Award attendees who paid attention might have noticed my profile in the background for about a second).
I stayed in my obstructed-view seat while David Chang was named Rising Star chef, and then when the year’s first America’s Classics award was being presented Laren Spirer from Gothamist — who was in the next box over — and I slipped down to the press room, where I spent the rest of the ceremony.
There, for the first time in my life, I felt the need to use the word “scrum.”
Honestly, it wasn’t that bad, as long as you didn’t want to hear the acceptance speeches (most of which were appropriately short and innocuous anyway) or see any of the videos, which they seemed uninterested in showing to the only people even remotely likely to write about them.
It was a very polite and congenial scrum, and the sausages and cheese provided by a high-end restaurant supplier were terrific, although I wonder if it’s really a good idea at the fine-dining world’s biggest shmoozefest to serve the biggest chatterboxes — the media — things that are going to have such a deleterious affect on their breath.
Sometimes you have to cover events just to cover them, and that’s what I do at the Beard Awards. It’s unlikely that anything will happen that you can’t read about in a press release, but you never know. And you have to gauge the mood of the crowd, listen to the chatter afterwards, reconnect with people. It might be tedious, but it’s also important.
This year the bloggers were in attendance in fuller force, so that was interesting, and I got to catch up with my friend Andrew Knowlton from Bon Appétit, whom I never see because he doesn’t go out anymore (he said as much: “I don’t go out anymore,” he said).
I also got to hang with James Oliver Cury, formerly of Time Out New York and now of Epicurious, which is always a treat (he loves loves loves his new job, by the way).
And the award ceremony does come to an end eventually. It has to.
It is followed by a reception.
I whipped out my camera for the picture page that we would likely run in Nation’s Restaurant News and mostly left the food to the paying guests, although I did gratefully accept the foie gras handed to me by former Aureole chef Dante Bocuzzi, who’s in the process of setting up his own restaurant in Cleveland. And when Thomas Keller hands you one of his salmon cornets you can’t leave him hanging. It would be rude. Besides, I wanted to take a picture of him with his chef at French Laundry, Corey Lee.
I chatted with the folks at Gilt, including sommelier Jason Ferris who gushed about how great it was working with chef Christopher Lee — how chefs and sommeliers so often say that they click and get along famously, but that it’s rarely true.
He didn’t say he was glad to see former chef Paul Liebrandt gone, perhaps because I wasn’t indelicate enough to ask.
David Carmichael, Gilt’s new pastry chef, similarly raved about the Palace Hotel’s facilities, so of course I ate his berry sorbet, and so it would have been improper not to eat Chris Lee’s Kobe beef.
I reminded Robert and Mimi Del Grande about the night we dined together some years ago at the Bon Appétit Food & Entertaining awards (it was surreal: there in Daniel’s private dining room were the Del Grande’s, Julia Child, Alice Waters, Jacques and Claudine Pépin, Charlie Trotter, David Bouley, Drew Nieporent — who actually spoke to Bouley for the first time in 16 years — Wolfgang Puck, Anna Wintour to introduce Jeffrey Steingarten, Dean Fearing, other really important food luminaries … and me).
Then it was time for the afterparties, so I stopped by the Parker Meridien, where the only person I knew was a freelance photographer for the Beard Foundation. So I rehydrated with some sparkling water, sipped a glass of wine and then wandered off to Hawaiian Tropic Zone, where I met Sam Hazen of Tao and became reacquainted with his co-executive chef, John Villa, whom you might remember from Pico, Patroon, or a photo spread in Playgirl in which he was called something like the world’s sexiest chef.
David Burke was hosting the party, and I congratulated him on the $88 fried rice at davidburke & donatella, which apparently is selling like hotcakes, or maybe like $4 fried rice.
He immediately leapt to the dish’s defense, although I hadn’t attacked it. Hey, if people want to buy an $88 fried rice, sell it to them.
Then I settled into a conversation with Lee Jones and David Varley. Lee is the marketing guy at Chef’s Garden, which supplies many of the fine dining restaurants in the eastern half of the United States (and apparently Las Vegas) with super-expensive micro greens and baby vegetables. He was in his trademark outfit (literally, he trademarked it) of white dress shirt, red bow tie and denim overalls.
David’s the chef de cuisine of restaurant Bradley Ogden in Las Vegas.
Here’s Lee with Celina Tio, who won the award for best chef in the Midwest.
Lee, David and I headed down to Olives, where the last time I went to a Beard Award afterparty it was awful — third-tier publicists and other hangers on — but it had its groove back this year, and it was a lot of fun. I introduced myself to Jean-Georges pastry chef Johnny Iuzzini, because I’d never met him and I thought it was high time I did.
I hate doing that — introducing yourself to someone at a party as if they’re going to remember you the next day.
But he was nice about it and I kept it brief and let him continue the conversation he was having with the pretty woman. I think she might have been Todd English’s girlfriend, but that’s none of my business.
But who won besides David Chang and Celina Tio, you ask?
By the way, this is David Chang, whom I introduced to Ivy Stark, the executive chef of Amalia in New York, so I could take a picture of them together.
One more thing: You might remember that I made some predictions about who would win the Beard Awards. I got seven right, 12 wrong, which, okay, is a failing grade, but it's nearly twice as good as a monkey throwing darts at random would do.
“When is it going to be over?”
“Another 45 minutes.”
“But you said that like 20 minutes ago.”
“I know, I’m sorry. You know what? It’s going to be a long time before it’s over. I honestly can’t say how long.”
Oh wait, that was a conversation I had with my seven-year-old nephew, Harrison Thorn, last weekend at the Bat Mitzvah of cousin Yael Kornfeld (it was long, but really quite excellent; her speech made me cry).
But I could have had it at this year’s James Beard Foundation Awards.
Both the Bat Mitzvah and the awards were just a bit longer than three hours — an hour shorter than last year’s Beard Awards, which is a good start.
This was my ninth year covering the awards and I think I’ve had about enough.
The venue was moved this year from the Marriott Marquis to Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center.
Members of the press were given actual seats instead of herded into a roped off section in the back as used to be the case. But they were all up in tier two. I went up to my seat. It was seat #13 in box #13, but I decided not to take that personally.
The ceremony started at 6:50, 20 minutes late, and I was all alone in my box, although I was soon joined by Ben Leventhal.
“May I crash your box?” he asked, which sounds dirty but it’s not. He sneaked a couple of photos and made notes with some sort of electronic device while the ceremony got underway with a speech from Beard Foundation president Susan Ungaro and a video celebrating the Beard Foundation, which is 20 years old.
Much of the video was shot during a recent dinner by Denver-based chef Troy Guard, which I attended (Beard Award attendees who paid attention might have noticed my profile in the background for about a second).
I stayed in my obstructed-view seat while David Chang was named Rising Star chef, and then when the year’s first America’s Classics award was being presented Laren Spirer from Gothamist — who was in the next box over — and I slipped down to the press room, where I spent the rest of the ceremony.
There, for the first time in my life, I felt the need to use the word “scrum.”
Honestly, it wasn’t that bad, as long as you didn’t want to hear the acceptance speeches (most of which were appropriately short and innocuous anyway) or see any of the videos, which they seemed uninterested in showing to the only people even remotely likely to write about them.
It was a very polite and congenial scrum, and the sausages and cheese provided by a high-end restaurant supplier were terrific, although I wonder if it’s really a good idea at the fine-dining world’s biggest shmoozefest to serve the biggest chatterboxes — the media — things that are going to have such a deleterious affect on their breath.
Sometimes you have to cover events just to cover them, and that’s what I do at the Beard Awards. It’s unlikely that anything will happen that you can’t read about in a press release, but you never know. And you have to gauge the mood of the crowd, listen to the chatter afterwards, reconnect with people. It might be tedious, but it’s also important.
This year the bloggers were in attendance in fuller force, so that was interesting, and I got to catch up with my friend Andrew Knowlton from Bon Appétit, whom I never see because he doesn’t go out anymore (he said as much: “I don’t go out anymore,” he said).
I also got to hang with James Oliver Cury, formerly of Time Out New York and now of Epicurious, which is always a treat (he loves loves loves his new job, by the way).
And the award ceremony does come to an end eventually. It has to.
It is followed by a reception.
I whipped out my camera for the picture page that we would likely run in Nation’s Restaurant News and mostly left the food to the paying guests, although I did gratefully accept the foie gras handed to me by former Aureole chef Dante Bocuzzi, who’s in the process of setting up his own restaurant in Cleveland. And when Thomas Keller hands you one of his salmon cornets you can’t leave him hanging. It would be rude. Besides, I wanted to take a picture of him with his chef at French Laundry, Corey Lee.
I chatted with the folks at Gilt, including sommelier Jason Ferris who gushed about how great it was working with chef Christopher Lee — how chefs and sommeliers so often say that they click and get along famously, but that it’s rarely true.
He didn’t say he was glad to see former chef Paul Liebrandt gone, perhaps because I wasn’t indelicate enough to ask.
David Carmichael, Gilt’s new pastry chef, similarly raved about the Palace Hotel’s facilities, so of course I ate his berry sorbet, and so it would have been improper not to eat Chris Lee’s Kobe beef.
I reminded Robert and Mimi Del Grande about the night we dined together some years ago at the Bon Appétit Food & Entertaining awards (it was surreal: there in Daniel’s private dining room were the Del Grande’s, Julia Child, Alice Waters, Jacques and Claudine Pépin, Charlie Trotter, David Bouley, Drew Nieporent — who actually spoke to Bouley for the first time in 16 years — Wolfgang Puck, Anna Wintour to introduce Jeffrey Steingarten, Dean Fearing, other really important food luminaries … and me).
Then it was time for the afterparties, so I stopped by the Parker Meridien, where the only person I knew was a freelance photographer for the Beard Foundation. So I rehydrated with some sparkling water, sipped a glass of wine and then wandered off to Hawaiian Tropic Zone, where I met Sam Hazen of Tao and became reacquainted with his co-executive chef, John Villa, whom you might remember from Pico, Patroon, or a photo spread in Playgirl in which he was called something like the world’s sexiest chef.
David Burke was hosting the party, and I congratulated him on the $88 fried rice at davidburke & donatella, which apparently is selling like hotcakes, or maybe like $4 fried rice.
He immediately leapt to the dish’s defense, although I hadn’t attacked it. Hey, if people want to buy an $88 fried rice, sell it to them.
Then I settled into a conversation with Lee Jones and David Varley. Lee is the marketing guy at Chef’s Garden, which supplies many of the fine dining restaurants in the eastern half of the United States (and apparently Las Vegas) with super-expensive micro greens and baby vegetables. He was in his trademark outfit (literally, he trademarked it) of white dress shirt, red bow tie and denim overalls.
David’s the chef de cuisine of restaurant Bradley Ogden in Las Vegas.
Here’s Lee with Celina Tio, who won the award for best chef in the Midwest.
Lee, David and I headed down to Olives, where the last time I went to a Beard Award afterparty it was awful — third-tier publicists and other hangers on — but it had its groove back this year, and it was a lot of fun. I introduced myself to Jean-Georges pastry chef Johnny Iuzzini, because I’d never met him and I thought it was high time I did.
I hate doing that — introducing yourself to someone at a party as if they’re going to remember you the next day.
But he was nice about it and I kept it brief and let him continue the conversation he was having with the pretty woman. I think she might have been Todd English’s girlfriend, but that’s none of my business.
But who won besides David Chang and Celina Tio, you ask?
By the way, this is David Chang, whom I introduced to Ivy Stark, the executive chef of Amalia in New York, so I could take a picture of them together.
One more thing: You might remember that I made some predictions about who would win the Beard Awards. I got seven right, 12 wrong, which, okay, is a failing grade, but it's nearly twice as good as a monkey throwing darts at random would do.
Thursday, May 03, 2007
Pizza with beautiful people
May 3
“I hope none of us is dangerous,” I said as three of us entered Peter Yanowitz’s apartment building after someone buzzed us in.
You’re not supposed to let strangers walk into a building with you in New York City, but, well, this isn’t the 1970s. New York’s a kinder, gentler place than it once was.
“That would be awesome if we were,” said a guy who looked like an urban, downtown Jared Leto — his head wrapped in a scarf that also swaddled his neck, shark teeth dangling from hoops in his ears — as we entered the elevator.
The young blonde woman who had entered with us kept quiet.
So I told the story (abbreviated as elevator rides don’t take long) of the time I almost mugged someone.
I was leaving a movie theater in swanky Brooklyn Heights and was asked by a guy from Portland, Oregon, if I could tell him the way back to Manhattan. I told him I was heading to the subway myself and could walk him and his girlfriend there.
He asked: “You’re not going to rob us, are you?”
I think he was 99 percent joking, but, I mean, the guy was a solid head taller than I was and I was dressed in the standard-issue wool-cashmere-blend dress overcoat worn by most men who work in Midtown.
I said: “Do I look like I’m going to rob you?”
He agreed that I didn’t, but it occurred to me later that it might have been fun to say: “As I matter of fact I am! Give me your wallet, bitch!” and then kind of shove him.
I mean, I would have mailed it back to him, probably with an extre 20 bucks thrown in for his trouble, but it would have given us both an experience to remember.
Mr. Jared Leto Lookalike (My So-Called Life Jared Leto, not strange, modern-day goth Jared Leto or Fight Club, maimed-with-a-broken-eye-socket Jared Leto) agreed that that would have been a good idea as we exited the elevator on the top floor. To our surprise, we walked to the same door. It turned out we were both visiting Peter Yanowitz and his girlfriend, Lisa Davies.
You might remember that I reconnected with Peter, who went on the same trip to Israel as I with our high school youth goup in 1984, just a few weeks ago. If you remember that, you probably remember that Peter is now the bassist for Morningwood and that Lisa’s a model and nursing student.
The guy I met in the elevator is Kenyon Phillips, the man behind an electronica band called Unisex Salon, who said he met Peter by jumping on stage and behaving lewdly at Morningwood concerts. [July 5, 2007 update: I have since become more familiar with Kenyon's music; it’s really not electronica but more ’80s-style new-wave pop with synthesizers, in a good way].
Peter ordered pizza from Joe’s, on Carmine and Bleecker, and poured 2005 Corbières "premier pas" Domaine des Deux Anes 2005, which Lisa says they buy for $9 a bottle. We sat on Peter’s balcony while Kenyon and the happy couple caught up and I peppered them with questions, as I do. Then we were joined by Lisa’s friend, designer Patrik Rzepski, who marvled that he and Lisa had known each other for four years now.
I motioned to Peter, who was inside with Kenyon playing new Morningwood tracks, and said we’d met in 1983 (we went to a Jewish camp in the Poconos together that year).
I told Peter that my favorite Morningwood song was a very dirty and inappropriate tune called Babysitter, in which a young woman in charge of looking after a kid suggests activities that, well, she shouldn’t.
Peter said the song was autobiographical and recounted tales of growing up as a young Jewish boy in Salt Lake City, left in the overenthusiastic and roaming hands of teenage Mormon girls.
I later jumped up and went inside when Kenyon started playing some music from his web site. For speakers, Peter was using an old boom box that he’d bought on the street, and I thought it sounded great, which made Kenyon smile.
Here are my dining companions (from left): Kenyon, Lisa, Patrik and Peter, in front of a newly installed door to Peter’s balcony.
“I hope none of us is dangerous,” I said as three of us entered Peter Yanowitz’s apartment building after someone buzzed us in.
You’re not supposed to let strangers walk into a building with you in New York City, but, well, this isn’t the 1970s. New York’s a kinder, gentler place than it once was.
“That would be awesome if we were,” said a guy who looked like an urban, downtown Jared Leto — his head wrapped in a scarf that also swaddled his neck, shark teeth dangling from hoops in his ears — as we entered the elevator.
The young blonde woman who had entered with us kept quiet.
So I told the story (abbreviated as elevator rides don’t take long) of the time I almost mugged someone.
I was leaving a movie theater in swanky Brooklyn Heights and was asked by a guy from Portland, Oregon, if I could tell him the way back to Manhattan. I told him I was heading to the subway myself and could walk him and his girlfriend there.
He asked: “You’re not going to rob us, are you?”
I think he was 99 percent joking, but, I mean, the guy was a solid head taller than I was and I was dressed in the standard-issue wool-cashmere-blend dress overcoat worn by most men who work in Midtown.
I said: “Do I look like I’m going to rob you?”
He agreed that I didn’t, but it occurred to me later that it might have been fun to say: “As I matter of fact I am! Give me your wallet, bitch!” and then kind of shove him.
I mean, I would have mailed it back to him, probably with an extre 20 bucks thrown in for his trouble, but it would have given us both an experience to remember.
Mr. Jared Leto Lookalike (My So-Called Life Jared Leto, not strange, modern-day goth Jared Leto or Fight Club, maimed-with-a-broken-eye-socket Jared Leto) agreed that that would have been a good idea as we exited the elevator on the top floor. To our surprise, we walked to the same door. It turned out we were both visiting Peter Yanowitz and his girlfriend, Lisa Davies.
You might remember that I reconnected with Peter, who went on the same trip to Israel as I with our high school youth goup in 1984, just a few weeks ago. If you remember that, you probably remember that Peter is now the bassist for Morningwood and that Lisa’s a model and nursing student.
The guy I met in the elevator is Kenyon Phillips, the man behind an electronica band called Unisex Salon, who said he met Peter by jumping on stage and behaving lewdly at Morningwood concerts. [July 5, 2007 update: I have since become more familiar with Kenyon's music; it’s really not electronica but more ’80s-style new-wave pop with synthesizers, in a good way].
Peter ordered pizza from Joe’s, on Carmine and Bleecker, and poured 2005 Corbières "premier pas" Domaine des Deux Anes 2005, which Lisa says they buy for $9 a bottle. We sat on Peter’s balcony while Kenyon and the happy couple caught up and I peppered them with questions, as I do. Then we were joined by Lisa’s friend, designer Patrik Rzepski, who marvled that he and Lisa had known each other for four years now.
I motioned to Peter, who was inside with Kenyon playing new Morningwood tracks, and said we’d met in 1983 (we went to a Jewish camp in the Poconos together that year).
I told Peter that my favorite Morningwood song was a very dirty and inappropriate tune called Babysitter, in which a young woman in charge of looking after a kid suggests activities that, well, she shouldn’t.
Peter said the song was autobiographical and recounted tales of growing up as a young Jewish boy in Salt Lake City, left in the overenthusiastic and roaming hands of teenage Mormon girls.
I later jumped up and went inside when Kenyon started playing some music from his web site. For speakers, Peter was using an old boom box that he’d bought on the street, and I thought it sounded great, which made Kenyon smile.
Here are my dining companions (from left): Kenyon, Lisa, Patrik and Peter, in front of a newly installed door to Peter’s balcony.
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
Dan Barber and I were dorm mates
May 2
T-U-F-T-S, T-U-F-T-S
Hurrah! Hurrah! for the dear old brown and blue!
You will probably never hear a graduate from Tufts University sing the old college fight song. It’s impossible to sing with a straight face and Tufts just isn’t one of those schools where spirit is taken seriously.
Here at Nation’s Restaurant News we have Gators and Bulldogs and an apparently endless supply of Buckeyes. I mean no disrespect to them, because senior desk editor Christi Ravneberg makes delicious chocolate-and-peanut-butter buckeyes (by contrast, on-site editor Elissa Elan has never brought in any Georgia bulldog for us to eat, although she will with very little encouragement holler “woof woof”; editor-in-chief Ellen Koteff has never given me a Florida Gatorade).
Yesterday I did sing part of Tufts’ fight song for a few of my colleagues (the lines above are preceded by — I kid you not:
Steady and true, rush along brown and blue,
Raise a mighty score today!
Fearless tear down the field and never yield
Brown and blue, brown and blue, for aye!)
Very few of my fellow Jumbos (yes, we’re Jumbos; P. T. Barnum was a major benefactor of Tufts, giving the school, among other things, the carcass of the famous elephant after which we are all named) can sing that song, and fewer would. I bet you Dan Barber can’t.
Yes, it turns out that the executive chef of Blue Hill also went to Tufts. He graduated with a B.A. in English and Political Science in 1991, a year after I graduated with a degree in history. During his freshman year he lived on the second floor of Bush Hall. At the same time, I was a sophomore on the third floor.
[June 11, 2008 update: It turns out that Dan actually was the class of 1992, meaning he lived on the second floor of Bush when I was studying in China — sorry about that]
It’s a small world, they say, although it’s not really; we just tend to move in fairly tight circles.
I was interviewing Dan Barber because NRN is inducting Blue Hill into our Fine Dining Hall of Fame, which means someone has to write an article about the place.
Andy Battaglia, my good friend, former NRN colleague, editor at The Onion and occasional freelancer for NRN, wanted to write the Fine Dining Hall of Fame article about Blue Hill, as a recent meal he had at the restaurant was one of the best he’d ever eaten. But I beat him to it — something I am able to do easily since, as food editor, I get second dibs, after execuive food editor Pam Parseghian.
“you bitch!” Andy said to me in an e-mail.
But hey, Andy heads up the city section of The Onion for New York, which includes (serious) food writing. He can interview Dan for that.
Andy’s a Georgia Bulldog, by the way. I doubt you will get a “woof woof” from him, though.
When the interview with Dan was done, he said “stay for dinner.” It would have been rude for me to refuse.
What I ate and drank:
Roger Pouillon et Fils Brut Rose
garlic tuile
lightly grilled bread with dehydtrated carrots and salt
parsnip soup
apple-celery juice
spring vegetables, all from Stone Barns, some raw, some roasted, some marinated, with mushroom gelée and pistachios
Joh. Jos. Prüm 2004 Wehlener Sonnenuhr Spätlese
Poached egg with spring vegetable broth, and New Jersey asparagus
Raffault Chinon Rosé 2006
Asparagus and leeks with asparagus-caviar sauce and dehydrated root vegetables
pork shoulder, belly and cheek with fennel, plumped raisins, pine nuts and stinging nettle purée
Viñas Del Cenit 2003
Poached rhubarb with tapioca and rhubarb sorbet
Chocolate and peanut brownie topped with Maldon salt, served with banana ice cream
T-U-F-T-S, T-U-F-T-S
Hurrah! Hurrah! for the dear old brown and blue!
You will probably never hear a graduate from Tufts University sing the old college fight song. It’s impossible to sing with a straight face and Tufts just isn’t one of those schools where spirit is taken seriously.
Here at Nation’s Restaurant News we have Gators and Bulldogs and an apparently endless supply of Buckeyes. I mean no disrespect to them, because senior desk editor Christi Ravneberg makes delicious chocolate-and-peanut-butter buckeyes (by contrast, on-site editor Elissa Elan has never brought in any Georgia bulldog for us to eat, although she will with very little encouragement holler “woof woof”; editor-in-chief Ellen Koteff has never given me a Florida Gatorade).
Yesterday I did sing part of Tufts’ fight song for a few of my colleagues (the lines above are preceded by — I kid you not:
Steady and true, rush along brown and blue,
Raise a mighty score today!
Fearless tear down the field and never yield
Brown and blue, brown and blue, for aye!)
Very few of my fellow Jumbos (yes, we’re Jumbos; P. T. Barnum was a major benefactor of Tufts, giving the school, among other things, the carcass of the famous elephant after which we are all named) can sing that song, and fewer would. I bet you Dan Barber can’t.
Yes, it turns out that the executive chef of Blue Hill also went to Tufts. He graduated with a B.A. in English and Political Science in 1991, a year after I graduated with a degree in history. During his freshman year he lived on the second floor of Bush Hall. At the same time, I was a sophomore on the third floor.
[June 11, 2008 update: It turns out that Dan actually was the class of 1992, meaning he lived on the second floor of Bush when I was studying in China — sorry about that]
It’s a small world, they say, although it’s not really; we just tend to move in fairly tight circles.
I was interviewing Dan Barber because NRN is inducting Blue Hill into our Fine Dining Hall of Fame, which means someone has to write an article about the place.
Andy Battaglia, my good friend, former NRN colleague, editor at The Onion and occasional freelancer for NRN, wanted to write the Fine Dining Hall of Fame article about Blue Hill, as a recent meal he had at the restaurant was one of the best he’d ever eaten. But I beat him to it — something I am able to do easily since, as food editor, I get second dibs, after execuive food editor Pam Parseghian.
“you bitch!” Andy said to me in an e-mail.
But hey, Andy heads up the city section of The Onion for New York, which includes (serious) food writing. He can interview Dan for that.
Andy’s a Georgia Bulldog, by the way. I doubt you will get a “woof woof” from him, though.
When the interview with Dan was done, he said “stay for dinner.” It would have been rude for me to refuse.
What I ate and drank:
Roger Pouillon et Fils Brut Rose
garlic tuile
lightly grilled bread with dehydtrated carrots and salt
parsnip soup
apple-celery juice
spring vegetables, all from Stone Barns, some raw, some roasted, some marinated, with mushroom gelée and pistachios
Joh. Jos. Prüm 2004 Wehlener Sonnenuhr Spätlese
Poached egg with spring vegetable broth, and New Jersey asparagus
Raffault Chinon Rosé 2006
Asparagus and leeks with asparagus-caviar sauce and dehydrated root vegetables
pork shoulder, belly and cheek with fennel, plumped raisins, pine nuts and stinging nettle purée
Viñas Del Cenit 2003
Poached rhubarb with tapioca and rhubarb sorbet
Chocolate and peanut brownie topped with Maldon salt, served with banana ice cream
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
Xing’s not closing yet
May 1
Boy, you turn down one person’s rehearsal dinner and everyone says you’re going out of business.
I just got off the phone with Michael Lagunas, the owner of Xing in Hell’s Kitchen, and he denies rumors that the restaurant has closed or that his chef, Lulzim Rexhepi, has left. But he admits that things aren’t going well and he’s trying to figure out what to do with the place. “I love my staff. I love my chef. I’m kind of in a confusted state of mind,” he says.
So he has put egg rolls and other less expensive items on the menu to try to bring in that critical mass of neighborhood regulars that any restaruant needs to survive.
If you happen to be near 9th Avenue and the low 50s, you might want to check it out. Otherwise, it might become a lounge.
For more about Xing, how it’s pronounced and other useless but possibly interesting esoterica, click here.
Boy, you turn down one person’s rehearsal dinner and everyone says you’re going out of business.
I just got off the phone with Michael Lagunas, the owner of Xing in Hell’s Kitchen, and he denies rumors that the restaurant has closed or that his chef, Lulzim Rexhepi, has left. But he admits that things aren’t going well and he’s trying to figure out what to do with the place. “I love my staff. I love my chef. I’m kind of in a confusted state of mind,” he says.
So he has put egg rolls and other less expensive items on the menu to try to bring in that critical mass of neighborhood regulars that any restaruant needs to survive.
If you happen to be near 9th Avenue and the low 50s, you might want to check it out. Otherwise, it might become a lounge.
For more about Xing, how it’s pronounced and other useless but possibly interesting esoterica, click here.
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