January 31, 2011
For Fans With Texas-Size Appetites By SAM SIFTON
ARLINGTON, Tex. — The faithful have started to arrive in this drab, featureless city a little closer to Fort Worth than to Dallas. They have come sweat-panted and reverent to stand along Collins Street to photograph Cowboys Stadium, to walk the sidewalk surrounding its $1.2 billion form.
The building rises up out of the immense rolling prairie as if raised by supplicants to the higher power of football, capitalism and Texas, a silver biscuit large enough that were the Statue of Liberty to be erected inside it, the torch would barely blacken the retractable roof. On Sunday it will be the stage for the Super Bowl between the Green Bay Packers and the Pittsburgh Steelers.
All over the city and region parking lots are being expanded or resurfaced in anticipation. Landscapers trim bushes and trees, plant flowers. Men repair streetlights and potholes along Interstate 30, the corridor that links Fort Worth to Dallas. The odor of fresh paint fills the hallways of local hotels. Enforcement of a new anti-panhandling law has been stepped up.
And from White Settlement in the west to Deep Ellum in the east — an area of north Texas that is 9,000 square miles in all — local restaurants and bars are getting ready for a rush of business.
I was part of the advance guard, a special-teams rookie sent out to feed. For four days I did so, up and down the economic ladder. I stood in for forthcoming Wisconsinites and Pennsylvanians with a taste for cheese or sausage, for media hounds, sex workers and all those who follow the money that comes with a Super Bowl game.
There was plenty to cheer. I found excellent tacos, ate glazed quail at the Ritz, stood in an all-male line of Fort Worth barbecue hounds. I followed in the footsteps of Roosevelt at the Original Mexican Eats Cafe in Fort Worth, and in those of George W. Bush at Sonny Bryan’s Smokehouse in the shadow of the Southwestern Medical Center of the University of Texas.
There were double-breakfast mornings followed by quadruple-lunch afternoons, followed by dinners and more dinners still.
I had a meal at Bolsa, an art house hangout in the city’s Oak Cliff neighborhood with a grand hamburger, decent pizzas and an ambitious cocktail list, and another in a grim little barroom in the Sheraton here, just down the road from Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, across from the Six Flags Over Texas amusement park. I took in the sight of Tim Love’s Lonesome Dove restaurant near the Fort Worth Stockyards (wild boar ribs!), ate a cheeseburger loaded down with onions and jalapeño at Kincaid’s and put more than 300 miles on the odometer of a truck built right here at the G.M. plant, looking for places to eat.
One of the best was Nonna, a trattoria in Dallas that is across the street from a Whole Foods market. The restaurant, with its Italian menu, excellent wine list and cosmopolitan service style, serves as a clubhouse for some of Dallas’s most influential citizens. (Jerry Jones, the owner of the Cowboys, was there the other night in black suit and well-polished black cowboy boots, walking the dining room and shaking hands. “I used to think I could only really get excited about Dallas playing a football game,” he drawled. “But this is pretty great.”)
They wave across the spare dining room while eating sweet fried oysters and baby artichokes bathed in fiery Calabrian chili butter, and devour plates of elegant pasta with sea urchin. A cut of firm Petrale sole can follow, a Pacific flounder served crisp from the wood oven and paired with Dungeness crab and a tangle of spinach. It is a balm for anyone just in from the airport with a crick in his neck and the feeling that it is slightly insane to travel great distances just to watch television commercials on the 60-yard high-definition screen Jones installed in the middle of his stadium.
Robb Walsh, a Texas food authority who recently helped found Foodways Texas, a group devoted to the preservation of the state’s food culture, suggested another remedy: Babe’s Chicken Dinner House, in Roanoke, a short drive from the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. (“Gateway to Super Bowl XLV,” read the signs there.)
Babe’s is a family business with restaurants across north Texas. But the Roanoke location is the original and, Walsh says, the best, a restaurant founded in 1993 in a barn of a room that might have served as a stage set for “Friday Night Lights.”
Only two entrees are served. You can get chicken fried steak or you can get fried chicken. (Get both, and see your doctor when you get home.) The C.F.S., as chicken fried steak is known among the local food maniacs, is a wide plank of pounded, floured and fried beef, served with an immense bowl of peppery cream gravy on the side. The cognoscenti do not pour this over their meat, but instead dip bites into it as they go along. “You don’t want anything congealing,” Walsh said.
New York has nothing to compare with the excellence of Babe’s fried chicken. It has a shatteringly crisp and salty exterior, not at all greasy, that gives way to meat of amazing juiciness in both breast and thigh.
With these come bowls of creamy corn, buttery mashed potatoes, biscuits and as much sweet tea as you can handle. (All meals begin with a regrettable green salad.) For dessert, spread some of the salted Plugrá butter that is on each table onto a biscuit, then drizzle sorghum syrup over the top. Whoa.
Discussion of where you can get the best barbecue in the Dallas-Fort Worth area can be pitched. Many will tell you that you cannot get it at all, that you need to drive south toward Austin and Lockhart if you want brisket, beef ribs, beans.
The dry, flavorless brisket at the original Sonny Bryan’s in Dallas makes a strong argument that this is true, and the meat at Angelo’s in Fort Worth does not mount much of a defense either. (Still, both restaurants are worth a visit simply to see. They were founded in 1958, and appear to have been placed in smoke-fragrant amber.)
Daniel Vaughn, a Dallas architect and self-professed prophet of smoked meat who blogs as the BBQ Snob, believes the city can hold its own. A meal at Smoke, the chef Tim Byres’s haute barbecue restaurant, would seem to back him up, at least on the brisket front.
By insistent text message, Vaughn sent me to Mac’s, a quiet Dallas lunch spot in a low-slung brick building on Main Street, not far from the interstate. Billy McDonald runs the show there, and has for more than 30 years, after taking over the business from his father, who started it in 1955. Brisket, pork ribs, ham, turkey, jalapeño-spiked sausages and kielbasa are all available, smoked over the green hickory McDonald keeps stacked out back, and which keeps his large oven running 24 hours a day.
The brisket is hugely flavorful, with a rich crust and a melting interior. The ribs — “dirty old things,” McDonald called them — are sweet. His kielbasa will be manna for some number of Pittsburgh fans used to the flavors of Eastern Europe. But it is the moist and smoky turkey that astonishes.
There are arguments here about tacos, as well. For some, the best come from the stand inside the Fuel City station on Industrial Drive in Dallas, a business perched almost on the banks of the flood plains of the Trinity River. Corn tortillas filled with picadillo or barbacoa are favorites, slathered with hot sauce and covered with onions and cilantro, and eaten in the parking lot as traffic screams by.
Better, though, is Fuel Town 2, a Texaco station on Inwood Road practically under the Stemmons Freeway, a short drive from the airport at Dallas Love Field. The barbacoa is less greasy than at the competitors, full of flavor, and the tortillas warmer, fresher, tasting more emphatically of corn. Served with lemons, cilantro, grilled onion and whole jalapeño, with a chunky red salsa, a taco here may be the perfect Dallas snack food. And at $1.50, a good value, too.
You’ll spend more at Fearing’s, the chef and restaurateur Dean Fearing’s comfortable and excellent flagship establishment in the Ritz-Carlton hotel in the Uptown region of Dallas. Maple-soaked buffalo tenderloin runs $46, with jalapeño grits, a butternut squash taquito and a tangle of greens. The glazed quail, a rich and buttery appetizer-size bird, is $18.
It is terrific eating all the same (get the deep-fried apple pies for dessert). And Fearing is a constant and ebullient presence in the dining room, the face of a prideful city. Those who have come to the Super Bowl will not mind the prices, he said.
Tickets to Super Bowl XLV have a face value of $600 to $1,200. More than 100,000 people are expected to attend, according to N.F.L. officials. The economic impact on the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan region alone, they say, is expected to be more than $600 million.
“It’s great,” Fearing said, laughing. “I can double the minimum check and get people to pay in advance. Hey, I’m in the black for February already.”
Showing posts with label Restaurants. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Restaurants. Show all posts
Monday, January 31, 2011
Sunday, January 02, 2011
Chowhound: 20 essential restaurants in Dallas
We present the 20 essential restaurants in Dallas, spanning cuisine, budget, and ambiance. We put one eye on deliciousness, another eye on variety, a third eye on mood (we like to have fun), and added a finger on the pulse of Chowhound.
• Wingfield's
• Mia's
• Ali Baba Mediterranean Grill
• Stephan Pyles
• La Duni
• Fearing's
• Tei-An
• Angry Dog
• Jimmy's Food Store
• Neighborhood Services
• Fireside Pies
• Zander's House
• Jasmine Thai
• Dairy-ette
• First Chinese BBQ
• Nam Hua
• Gonzalez
• The Porch
• El Taquito Cafe
• Wingfield's
• Mia's
• Ali Baba Mediterranean Grill
• Stephan Pyles
• La Duni
• Fearing's
• Tei-An
• Angry Dog
• Jimmy's Food Store
• Neighborhood Services
• Fireside Pies
• Zander's House
• Jasmine Thai
• Dairy-ette
• First Chinese BBQ
• Nam Hua
• Gonzalez
• The Porch
• El Taquito Cafe
Thursday, December 30, 2010
In Search of History on a Plate By SAM SIFTON
December 30, 2010
In Search of History on a Plate By SAM SIFTON
History buffs and first-time visitors had questions this week. Send me your own dining queries via dinejournal@nytimes.com or Twitter.com/samsifton.
Q. My partner and I are students of history, particularly New York City during the World War II years. I’m a native New Yorker, so I actually got to eat at the last Automat in the city on 42nd Street and Third Avenue before it closed. I would love to take my partner to eat at a place that hasn’t changed much, in both atmosphere and cuisine, since the 1940s. Any places you recommend around the city that would satisfy our curiosity?
A. Eisenberg’s Sandwich Shop, on Fifth Avenue between 22nd and 23rd Streets, ought to fit the bill nicely. It’s been in business since the late 1920s and has in its service, atmosphere and sandwiches something of what I imagine you’re looking for: history on a plate. Egg salad with bacon on rye, with a fountain Coke, and you’ll find yourself slipping back through the years.
When this question was posted on the Diner’s Journal blog of The New York Times, readers chimed in with their suggestions:
My father’s first meal in the U.S. when the war ended was at the Oyster Bar in Grand Central Terminal. I understand they had a fire sometime since, but they rebuilt it exactly as it was. I had the great fortune of eating there with him two decades ago, and he said it looked exactly the same. After my father died, my mother would visit my sister in New York at Thanksgiving, and I would come up from Philly that Friday for a lunch there in his honor. After my mother died, my sister and I continued the tradition. — JANA, Philadelphia
Sam, the must-have Eisenberg’s item is a chocolate egg cream. You are missing out if you haven’t tried it. — BodegaVendetta, New York
Why not have breakfast or lunch at Barney Greengrass? It’s been there forever (as have the Formica counters). and it is a real piece of New York history. Plus, the smoked fish is excellent. — rts, New York
Q. My 16-year-old niece and a school friend, both from London, will be staying with me in Greenwich Village over a weekend in February. Both are low key, sporty and fairly unhip. Where would you suggest that I take them for a Saturday evening meal? Thank you very much for your ideas.
A. Take them to Mary’s Fish Camp and introduce them to America. Or go to Otto for fancy pizza. (You could go to Arturo’s for old-school, not-fancy pizza, instead: deeply unhip.) Maybe Bianca on Bleecker Street? And cute little Jean Claude on Sullivan Street for Saturday night.
Q. What Italian restaurant would you recommend in the city for a family of 10 for dinner? We have eaten at Alto, Convivio, Al di Là, Il Mulino, Del Posto, Pó, Lupa and Babbo. Price is not an issue.
A. That’s a good position in which to find yourself! Make a reservation at Scarpetta and see how you do. Scott Conant’s the chef, a pasta wizard out of Waterbury, Conn., who cooked at Alto and L’Impero before he had a falling out with Chris Cannon, an owner of those restaurants, who then hired the chef Michael White for both properties, made one of them Convivio and, with Mr. White, opened Marea, which you should also totally try except that, well, it’s a long story spooling itself out right now in lawyers’ offices at around $700 an hour. Go to Scarpetta. Black tagliolini with lobster and minted bread crumbs!
Q. I’m coming to New York for the first time from Australia for a week at the end of January. While I can’t wait to try out some of the food experiences I’ve been reading about all these years, I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed by choice. Can you suggest some quintessential dining experiences for a first-timer? Despite the great state of the Aussie dollar at the moment, and because I’ll be traveling alone, I’ll probably steer clear of the high-end restaurants this time. I’m looking to spend no more than $60 a meal at the top end for dinner and will be staying in the East Village. I’m up for just about anything.
A. First time in the big town, eh? You could never leave the East Village and do well by Jack’s Luxury Oyster Bar and Momofuku Ssam Bar. You should certainly have a lunch at Katz’s. Perhaps you should spend one evening tucked into a meal (and the crowd) at the Spotted Pig. Up in Midtown I like the idea of a newcomer experiencing the scene at P. J. Clarke’s. And here is one thing you should do, for sure: walk across the Brooklyn Bridge in the afternoon wearing something decent under your coat, so that you can have an early drink at the River Café before walking back to have dinner in Chinatown, at Oriental Garden.
Old Favorites and New Discoveries
ARTURO’S 106 West Houston Street, at Thompson Street, West Village; .
BARNEY GREENGRASS 541 Amsterdam Avenue, at 86th Street; (212) 724-4707, barneygreengrass.com.
BIANCA 5 Bleecker Street, between Bowery and Elizabeth Streets, Greenwich Village; (212) 260-4666, biancanyc.com.
EISENBERG’S SANDWICH SHOP 174 Fifth Avenue, between 22nd and 23rd Streets, Flatiron district; (212) 675-5096.
JACK’S LUXURY OYSTER BAR 101 Second Avenue, at Sixth Street, East Village; (212) 979-1012.
JEAN CLAUDE 137 Sullivan Street, between Prince and West Houston Streets, SoHo; (212) 475-9232.
KATZ’S DELICATESSEN 205 East Houston Street, between Ludlow and Orchard Streets, Lower East Side; (212) 254-2246, katzdeli.com.
MAREA 240 Central Park South; (212) 582-5100, marea-nyc.com.
MARY’S FISH CAMP 64 Charles Street, at West Fourth Street, West Village; (646) 486-2185, marysfishcamp.com.
MOMOFUKU SSAM BAR 207 Second Avenue, at 13th Street, East Village; (212) 777-7773, momofuku.com/ssam-bar.
ORIENTAL GARDEN 14 Elizabeth Street, between Bayard and Canal Streets, Chinatown; (212) 619-0085, orientalgardenny.com.
OTTO One Fifth Avenue, between East Eighth Street and Washington Mews, Greenwich Village; (212) 995-9559, ottopizzeria.com.
OYSTER BAR Grand Central Terminal (lower level); (212) 490-6650, oysterbarny.com.
P. J. CLARKE’S 915 Third Avenue, at 55th Street, Manhattan; (212) 317-1616, pjclarkes.com.
RIVER CAFE 1 Water Street, at the East River, Dumbo, Brooklyn; (718) 522-5200, rivercafe.com.
SCARPETTA 355 West 14th Street, meatpacking district; (212) 691-0555, scottconant.com/restaurants/scarpetta/new-york.
SPOTTED PIG 314 West 11th Street, West Village; (212) 620-0393, thespottedpig.com.
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: December 31, 2010
An earlier version of this article misidentified Grand Central Terminal.
In Search of History on a Plate By SAM SIFTON
History buffs and first-time visitors had questions this week. Send me your own dining queries via dinejournal@nytimes.com or Twitter.com/samsifton.
Q. My partner and I are students of history, particularly New York City during the World War II years. I’m a native New Yorker, so I actually got to eat at the last Automat in the city on 42nd Street and Third Avenue before it closed. I would love to take my partner to eat at a place that hasn’t changed much, in both atmosphere and cuisine, since the 1940s. Any places you recommend around the city that would satisfy our curiosity?
A. Eisenberg’s Sandwich Shop, on Fifth Avenue between 22nd and 23rd Streets, ought to fit the bill nicely. It’s been in business since the late 1920s and has in its service, atmosphere and sandwiches something of what I imagine you’re looking for: history on a plate. Egg salad with bacon on rye, with a fountain Coke, and you’ll find yourself slipping back through the years.
When this question was posted on the Diner’s Journal blog of The New York Times, readers chimed in with their suggestions:
My father’s first meal in the U.S. when the war ended was at the Oyster Bar in Grand Central Terminal. I understand they had a fire sometime since, but they rebuilt it exactly as it was. I had the great fortune of eating there with him two decades ago, and he said it looked exactly the same. After my father died, my mother would visit my sister in New York at Thanksgiving, and I would come up from Philly that Friday for a lunch there in his honor. After my mother died, my sister and I continued the tradition. — JANA, Philadelphia
Sam, the must-have Eisenberg’s item is a chocolate egg cream. You are missing out if you haven’t tried it. — BodegaVendetta, New York
Why not have breakfast or lunch at Barney Greengrass? It’s been there forever (as have the Formica counters). and it is a real piece of New York history. Plus, the smoked fish is excellent. — rts, New York
Q. My 16-year-old niece and a school friend, both from London, will be staying with me in Greenwich Village over a weekend in February. Both are low key, sporty and fairly unhip. Where would you suggest that I take them for a Saturday evening meal? Thank you very much for your ideas.
A. Take them to Mary’s Fish Camp and introduce them to America. Or go to Otto for fancy pizza. (You could go to Arturo’s for old-school, not-fancy pizza, instead: deeply unhip.) Maybe Bianca on Bleecker Street? And cute little Jean Claude on Sullivan Street for Saturday night.
Q. What Italian restaurant would you recommend in the city for a family of 10 for dinner? We have eaten at Alto, Convivio, Al di Là, Il Mulino, Del Posto, Pó, Lupa and Babbo. Price is not an issue.
A. That’s a good position in which to find yourself! Make a reservation at Scarpetta and see how you do. Scott Conant’s the chef, a pasta wizard out of Waterbury, Conn., who cooked at Alto and L’Impero before he had a falling out with Chris Cannon, an owner of those restaurants, who then hired the chef Michael White for both properties, made one of them Convivio and, with Mr. White, opened Marea, which you should also totally try except that, well, it’s a long story spooling itself out right now in lawyers’ offices at around $700 an hour. Go to Scarpetta. Black tagliolini with lobster and minted bread crumbs!
Q. I’m coming to New York for the first time from Australia for a week at the end of January. While I can’t wait to try out some of the food experiences I’ve been reading about all these years, I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed by choice. Can you suggest some quintessential dining experiences for a first-timer? Despite the great state of the Aussie dollar at the moment, and because I’ll be traveling alone, I’ll probably steer clear of the high-end restaurants this time. I’m looking to spend no more than $60 a meal at the top end for dinner and will be staying in the East Village. I’m up for just about anything.
A. First time in the big town, eh? You could never leave the East Village and do well by Jack’s Luxury Oyster Bar and Momofuku Ssam Bar. You should certainly have a lunch at Katz’s. Perhaps you should spend one evening tucked into a meal (and the crowd) at the Spotted Pig. Up in Midtown I like the idea of a newcomer experiencing the scene at P. J. Clarke’s. And here is one thing you should do, for sure: walk across the Brooklyn Bridge in the afternoon wearing something decent under your coat, so that you can have an early drink at the River Café before walking back to have dinner in Chinatown, at Oriental Garden.
Old Favorites and New Discoveries
ARTURO’S 106 West Houston Street, at Thompson Street, West Village; .
BARNEY GREENGRASS 541 Amsterdam Avenue, at 86th Street; (212) 724-4707, barneygreengrass.com.
BIANCA 5 Bleecker Street, between Bowery and Elizabeth Streets, Greenwich Village; (212) 260-4666, biancanyc.com.
EISENBERG’S SANDWICH SHOP 174 Fifth Avenue, between 22nd and 23rd Streets, Flatiron district; (212) 675-5096.
JACK’S LUXURY OYSTER BAR 101 Second Avenue, at Sixth Street, East Village; (212) 979-1012.
JEAN CLAUDE 137 Sullivan Street, between Prince and West Houston Streets, SoHo; (212) 475-9232.
KATZ’S DELICATESSEN 205 East Houston Street, between Ludlow and Orchard Streets, Lower East Side; (212) 254-2246, katzdeli.com.
MAREA 240 Central Park South; (212) 582-5100, marea-nyc.com.
MARY’S FISH CAMP 64 Charles Street, at West Fourth Street, West Village; (646) 486-2185, marysfishcamp.com.
MOMOFUKU SSAM BAR 207 Second Avenue, at 13th Street, East Village; (212) 777-7773, momofuku.com/ssam-bar.
ORIENTAL GARDEN 14 Elizabeth Street, between Bayard and Canal Streets, Chinatown; (212) 619-0085, orientalgardenny.com.
OTTO One Fifth Avenue, between East Eighth Street and Washington Mews, Greenwich Village; (212) 995-9559, ottopizzeria.com.
OYSTER BAR Grand Central Terminal (lower level); (212) 490-6650, oysterbarny.com.
P. J. CLARKE’S 915 Third Avenue, at 55th Street, Manhattan; (212) 317-1616, pjclarkes.com.
RIVER CAFE 1 Water Street, at the East River, Dumbo, Brooklyn; (718) 522-5200, rivercafe.com.
SCARPETTA 355 West 14th Street, meatpacking district; (212) 691-0555, scottconant.com/restaurants/scarpetta/new-york.
SPOTTED PIG 314 West 11th Street, West Village; (212) 620-0393, thespottedpig.com.
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: December 31, 2010
An earlier version of this article misidentified Grand Central Terminal.
Was the Glass Half Full or Half Empty for Dallas Diners in 2010? By Hanna Raskin
Sara Kerens
Goodbye, Dali. We're so sad to see you go.
Subject(s):
York Street, Il Cane Rosso, Nick Badovinus,
Avner Samuel, Sharon Hage
Was the Glass Half Full or Half Empty for Dallas Diners in 2010? By Hanna Raskin
published: December 30, 2010
With a few
days still
remaining in
December, it's
probably too
soon to
accurately
assess how 2010 will be recalled in the annals of Dallas
food. And as someone who spent the first half of the year
living in North Carolina, I'm surely not the obvious
candidate to hold forth on what happened in Dallas
County in February. But year-end summations are far too
important in the culinary news biz to be derailed by such
niggling considerations as perspective and expertise, so
let's just press on.
It's no easy thing to classify 2010 as a good or bad year for
the local food scene. Almost every event that riveted the
food community this year could represent a stride forward
or a minor setback, depending upon how you squint at it.
Should we be heartened that so many charitable fund-raisers showcased ambitious cooking—or
fret about overstretched chefs and diner fatigue? Is the proper response to the reopened Green
Room a loud cheer for the folks who bothered to resurrect an icon or a head shake-and-hang at
the futility of dwelling on the past?
Since I'd like to have it both ways (see above), I present here two different end-of-year lists, one for
optimists and one for pessimists. If you're the sort of diner who thinks servers spit in your food
and believes flavored foams are the greatest swindle ever perpetrated against the eating
public—who pays for air, anyhow?—you'll want to cozy up with the restaurant closings and chef
departures rehashed on the list of five reasons Dallas diners should brace for a lean year in 2011.
But if you're the sort of diner who tips more when your server neglects you, since she's obviously
busy, bless her heart, and gladly tries every critter organ set before you, you'll want to skip
straightaway to this year's shining edible moments, which provide five great reasons Dallas
diners can look forward to an engaging, vibrant local food scene in 2011. I know I'm rooting for
it.
The Pessimistic Dallas Eater's Take
1. Money was tight: Money may be the root of all evil, but the lack of it is the root of all troubles
in the restaurant industry: Every other bullet point on this list can be tracked back to the flagging
economy. Continued scrimping meant chefs citywide didn't have the resources or the confidence to
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experiment and innovate. Instead, independent restaurants aped corporate cost-cutting measures
to keep their dining rooms afloat: Kitchens dispensed with local produce, while Horne & Dekker
tried opening without an executive chef. Restaurants can't thrive when customers don't spend.
2. York Street closed: Food lovers who lamented the state of the local food movement in Dallas
could always console themselves with York Street, a bastion of the highest-quality ingredients,
creativity and elegant technique. Then chef Sharon Hage decided she was done. Citing personal
reasons, she closed the restaurant this fall, denying Dallas diners their favorite example of
locavorism and food without pretense.
3. Luxury took a nose-dive: Many diners adore Nosh, the moderately priced bistro Avner and
Celeste Samuel opened this year. But nobody would mistake the clubby restaurant for its
predecessor, Aurora, which for seven years dished out the kind of opulence that made Bear Sterns
parties seem tasteful. Turned out, the Champagne cart, foie gras and truffles weren't a good
match for a recession, so the Samuels closed Aurora. The number of Dallasites who could afford a
dinner with a four-digit price tag is minuscule, of course, but the demise of glitz and glamour is a
depressing indicator that dining's migrating from fun to functional.
4. A top chef got the boot: After the lifetime supplies of Buitoni pasta and Glad storage
containers are exhausted, after the trips to Spain and New Zealand have been taken, former
contestants on Top Chef can still lean on the love and adulation of their hometowns. Except in
Dallas, where season seven fan favorite Tiffany Derry found herself out of a job when Go Fish
Ocean Club closed suddenly. Derry wasn't the only celebrated chef who had trouble translating
fame into fortune this year, but Dallas diners' apparent lack of interest in her cooking was a sad
reflection of the community's feeble support for its culinary practitioners who've made good.
5. Theatergoers lost an after-show spot: Dali may not have been the most important
restaurant in Dallas, but the 2-year-old One Arts Plaza wine bar—which served far better food
than a Chardonnay drinker who glanced at the deceptively simple menu would ever expect
—played an important part. In addition to providing the artsy set with crab cakes before and
after operas and ballets, the restaurant helped assert the role of the culinary arts in the city's
cultural life. Its position in the arts district proved eating and drinking matter as much to a city's
intellectual vitality as paintings, sculptures and brilliantly designed buildings—until it shut down
without warning.
The Optimistic Dallas Eater's Take
1. 48 Nights was an incredible success: There's nothing wrong with raising tens of thousands
of dollars for charity, but the pop-up 48 Nights project wasn't just a fund-raiser. The guerrilla
30-seat restaurant in Oak Cliff, staffed by a rotating series of the city's biggest-name chefs, infused
the Dallas dining scene with excitement, energy and a spirit of collaboration that's critical for a
growing food community. The sold-out dinners were playful and brave and wonderful.
2. Paul Quinn College planted seeds: Paul Quinn College had a football field, but since the
beleaguered school no longer had a football team, leaders this year transformed the tract of land
into an urban farm. The Food for Good Farm is designed to grow healthy food for the
surrounding neighborhood—where produce is hard to come by—and teach entrepreneurial skills
to Paul Quinn students. But diners across the city should benefit from the expansion of the local
farming community, which has long been too scattered and fragmented to develop the
distribution networks needed to put fresh ingredients on restaurant plates or flex much political
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muscle.
3. Jay Jerrier ordered a new pizza oven: The pizzaiolo behind Il Cane Rosso is settling down
with a restaurant in Deep Ellum, for which he's ordered a very fancy Italian pizza oven. And
Jerrier's not the only producer getting geeky about culinary equipment: Oddfellows, itching to
provide a world-class coffee experience in Oak Cliff, installed a La Marzocco Strada espresso
machine, while Lockhart Smokehouse—perhaps next year's most eagerly anticipated opening
—plans to smoke its meat in a Bewley wood-fired pit. Such commitment to quality and craft
means better eating for everyone.
4. Neighborhood Services opened and opened and...: Nick Badovinus spun-off Neighborhood
Services twice this year, setting up the schmoozy Tavern on Henderson Avenue and pitchperfect
Bar & Grill in north Dallas. What makes the restaurants notable—other than the highly
praised veal schnitzel—is the warm service and real neighborhood feel that's eluded so many
Dallas restaurants. The success of Neighborhood Services bodes extremely well for eateries that
connect with their guests and serve honest food.
5. The cocktail scene got all stirred up: When Jason Kosmas, the revered barkeep who this
year relocated to Dallas, offered a cocktail seminar for fellow pros last year, 10 people showed up.
This year, there were nearly 40 bartenders in attendance. Local bartenders are getting serious
about fresh ingredients, authenticity, technique, flavor and making Dallas a destination for the
nation's drinkers. And where bartenders go, chefs are sure to follow.
Dallas http://www.dallasobserver.com/content/printVersion/2039767/
3 of 3 1/7/2011 9:28 AM
Goodbye, Dali. We're so sad to see you go.
Subject(s):
York Street, Il Cane Rosso, Nick Badovinus,
Avner Samuel, Sharon Hage
Was the Glass Half Full or Half Empty for Dallas Diners in 2010? By Hanna Raskin
published: December 30, 2010
With a few
days still
remaining in
December, it's
probably too
soon to
accurately
assess how 2010 will be recalled in the annals of Dallas
food. And as someone who spent the first half of the year
living in North Carolina, I'm surely not the obvious
candidate to hold forth on what happened in Dallas
County in February. But year-end summations are far too
important in the culinary news biz to be derailed by such
niggling considerations as perspective and expertise, so
let's just press on.
It's no easy thing to classify 2010 as a good or bad year for
the local food scene. Almost every event that riveted the
food community this year could represent a stride forward
or a minor setback, depending upon how you squint at it.
Should we be heartened that so many charitable fund-raisers showcased ambitious cooking—or
fret about overstretched chefs and diner fatigue? Is the proper response to the reopened Green
Room a loud cheer for the folks who bothered to resurrect an icon or a head shake-and-hang at
the futility of dwelling on the past?
Since I'd like to have it both ways (see above), I present here two different end-of-year lists, one for
optimists and one for pessimists. If you're the sort of diner who thinks servers spit in your food
and believes flavored foams are the greatest swindle ever perpetrated against the eating
public—who pays for air, anyhow?—you'll want to cozy up with the restaurant closings and chef
departures rehashed on the list of five reasons Dallas diners should brace for a lean year in 2011.
But if you're the sort of diner who tips more when your server neglects you, since she's obviously
busy, bless her heart, and gladly tries every critter organ set before you, you'll want to skip
straightaway to this year's shining edible moments, which provide five great reasons Dallas
diners can look forward to an engaging, vibrant local food scene in 2011. I know I'm rooting for
it.
The Pessimistic Dallas Eater's Take
1. Money was tight: Money may be the root of all evil, but the lack of it is the root of all troubles
in the restaurant industry: Every other bullet point on this list can be tracked back to the flagging
economy. Continued scrimping meant chefs citywide didn't have the resources or the confidence to
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Dallas http://www.dallasobserver.com/content/printVersion/2039767/
1 of 3 1/7/2011 9:28 AM
experiment and innovate. Instead, independent restaurants aped corporate cost-cutting measures
to keep their dining rooms afloat: Kitchens dispensed with local produce, while Horne & Dekker
tried opening without an executive chef. Restaurants can't thrive when customers don't spend.
2. York Street closed: Food lovers who lamented the state of the local food movement in Dallas
could always console themselves with York Street, a bastion of the highest-quality ingredients,
creativity and elegant technique. Then chef Sharon Hage decided she was done. Citing personal
reasons, she closed the restaurant this fall, denying Dallas diners their favorite example of
locavorism and food without pretense.
3. Luxury took a nose-dive: Many diners adore Nosh, the moderately priced bistro Avner and
Celeste Samuel opened this year. But nobody would mistake the clubby restaurant for its
predecessor, Aurora, which for seven years dished out the kind of opulence that made Bear Sterns
parties seem tasteful. Turned out, the Champagne cart, foie gras and truffles weren't a good
match for a recession, so the Samuels closed Aurora. The number of Dallasites who could afford a
dinner with a four-digit price tag is minuscule, of course, but the demise of glitz and glamour is a
depressing indicator that dining's migrating from fun to functional.
4. A top chef got the boot: After the lifetime supplies of Buitoni pasta and Glad storage
containers are exhausted, after the trips to Spain and New Zealand have been taken, former
contestants on Top Chef can still lean on the love and adulation of their hometowns. Except in
Dallas, where season seven fan favorite Tiffany Derry found herself out of a job when Go Fish
Ocean Club closed suddenly. Derry wasn't the only celebrated chef who had trouble translating
fame into fortune this year, but Dallas diners' apparent lack of interest in her cooking was a sad
reflection of the community's feeble support for its culinary practitioners who've made good.
5. Theatergoers lost an after-show spot: Dali may not have been the most important
restaurant in Dallas, but the 2-year-old One Arts Plaza wine bar—which served far better food
than a Chardonnay drinker who glanced at the deceptively simple menu would ever expect
—played an important part. In addition to providing the artsy set with crab cakes before and
after operas and ballets, the restaurant helped assert the role of the culinary arts in the city's
cultural life. Its position in the arts district proved eating and drinking matter as much to a city's
intellectual vitality as paintings, sculptures and brilliantly designed buildings—until it shut down
without warning.
The Optimistic Dallas Eater's Take
1. 48 Nights was an incredible success: There's nothing wrong with raising tens of thousands
of dollars for charity, but the pop-up 48 Nights project wasn't just a fund-raiser. The guerrilla
30-seat restaurant in Oak Cliff, staffed by a rotating series of the city's biggest-name chefs, infused
the Dallas dining scene with excitement, energy and a spirit of collaboration that's critical for a
growing food community. The sold-out dinners were playful and brave and wonderful.
2. Paul Quinn College planted seeds: Paul Quinn College had a football field, but since the
beleaguered school no longer had a football team, leaders this year transformed the tract of land
into an urban farm. The Food for Good Farm is designed to grow healthy food for the
surrounding neighborhood—where produce is hard to come by—and teach entrepreneurial skills
to Paul Quinn students. But diners across the city should benefit from the expansion of the local
farming community, which has long been too scattered and fragmented to develop the
distribution networks needed to put fresh ingredients on restaurant plates or flex much political
Dallas http://www.dallasobserver.com/content/printVersion/2039767/
2 of 3 1/7/2011 9:28 AM
muscle.
3. Jay Jerrier ordered a new pizza oven: The pizzaiolo behind Il Cane Rosso is settling down
with a restaurant in Deep Ellum, for which he's ordered a very fancy Italian pizza oven. And
Jerrier's not the only producer getting geeky about culinary equipment: Oddfellows, itching to
provide a world-class coffee experience in Oak Cliff, installed a La Marzocco Strada espresso
machine, while Lockhart Smokehouse—perhaps next year's most eagerly anticipated opening
—plans to smoke its meat in a Bewley wood-fired pit. Such commitment to quality and craft
means better eating for everyone.
4. Neighborhood Services opened and opened and...: Nick Badovinus spun-off Neighborhood
Services twice this year, setting up the schmoozy Tavern on Henderson Avenue and pitchperfect
Bar & Grill in north Dallas. What makes the restaurants notable—other than the highly
praised veal schnitzel—is the warm service and real neighborhood feel that's eluded so many
Dallas restaurants. The success of Neighborhood Services bodes extremely well for eateries that
connect with their guests and serve honest food.
5. The cocktail scene got all stirred up: When Jason Kosmas, the revered barkeep who this
year relocated to Dallas, offered a cocktail seminar for fellow pros last year, 10 people showed up.
This year, there were nearly 40 bartenders in attendance. Local bartenders are getting serious
about fresh ingredients, authenticity, technique, flavor and making Dallas a destination for the
nation's drinkers. And where bartenders go, chefs are sure to follow.
Dallas http://www.dallasobserver.com/content/printVersion/2039767/
3 of 3 1/7/2011 9:28 AM
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Dishes That Earned Their Stars By SAM SIFTON and Recipe: Guacamole Roasted Grapefruite
December 28, 2010
Dishes That Earned Their Stars By SAM SIFTON
I MADE a list of the 15 best things I ate in New York City in the past year of reviewing restaurants for The New York Times. It is an accounting that comprises restaurant dishes of uncommon excellence and flavor. Together they underscore New York’s place as one of the planet’s best cities in which to dine out.
And we’ll get to them soon enough.
But these dishes make up just one part of a year’s meals taken at the professional table, one sleeve in the accordion folder marked “2010 Delicious.” Add meals I ate out of town on assignment or off the clock or on the way to the clock, and the catalog swells. There is, for example, the sandwich of deep-fried oysters and house-made bacon I had this year at Cochon in New Orleans, served on white Pullman bread with a chili-spiked mayonnaise. And the black vinegar spare ribs with pine nuts served at Shanghai River in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Hoarsely I sing to the poached egg, potato mousseline and chorizo crumble I inhaled at LudoBites 5.0, in downtown Los Angeles. Also to the rabbit parfait with rabbit rillettes and a cinnamon-scented rabbit consommé at Alinea in Chicago (whoa, now!).
Closer to home, there were the Shanghai-style dumplings from Chui Hong Yuan in Bath Beach, Brooklyn, and lunchtime salads from Yemen Café near Brooklyn Heights, and midafternoon pickled veal tongue at M. Wells in Long Island City, Queens, and, always, plates of oxtail gravy over rice and peas from the Golden Krust on Eighth Avenue in Midtown.
For breakfast, there was the grapefruit at Pulino’s in SoHo, not really a dish so much as a magic trick, the fruit covered with muscovado sugar and mint, then cooked into caramel. (A recipe for it and a few other dishes appear here.)
There is the fist of bluefin I got this summer from the fishing guide Brendan McCarthy, who killed a tuna off Cape Cod after a long slog east from Montauk in the wind. I ate part of it raw, with soy sauce, and cooked the rest for the children, who ate it as if it were cake.
And I want to remember forever the martini I drank at the Carlyle before hearing John Pizzarelli and his wife, Jessica Molaskey, sing, with Mr. Pizzarelli’s father, Bucky, in the audience. (I waved to him before the show. “Who’s playing tonight?” he asked, and laughed.)
Also: the barbecue chicken I got from a guy cooking out of a trailer in the parking lot of a Tractor Supply Company in rural Delaware. And a plate of topneck clams from Randazzo’s in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn. And the fish tacos I crushed on the sidewalk in front of Juanita’s Taco Shop in Encinitas, Calif. Them, too.
But the following list, which is presented in no particular order, reflects my professional experience over the course of 12 months dining out specifically in New York City restaurants, hoping each night to be surprised, yearning to be delighted, always hungry for the next great bite.
CODFISH FRITTERS WITH LAMB-SAUSAGE RAGÙ AT RECETTE Jesse Schenker, the extravagantly tattooed chef and owner of this estimable West Village restaurant, makes a classic salt-cod bacalao, then deep-fries small balls of it. Paired with a fiery little lamb Bolognese with hints of smoked paprika and vinegar, and served beneath a drizzle of curried mayonnaise, it is an immensely flavorful introduction to his studied, intricate and soulful cooking. 328 West 12th Street (Greenwich Street), Greenwich Village; , recettenyc.com.
‘SIMPLY COOKED’ SCALLOPS AT THE MARK RESTAURANT BY JEAN-GEORGES Four scallops the color of gold, adorned only with salt and pepper, sitting on a white plate in the manner of a gift. Jean-Georges Vongerichten, who opened this restaurant in the Mark Hotel this year with Pierre Schutz in the kitchen, pairs the shellfish with a small bowl of sauce: a pink-hued, sriracha-enhanced mixture of egg yolks, grapeseed oil, kombu seaweed water and orange and lime juice. Mayonnaise for the celestial set. 25 East 77th Street, Upper East Side; (212) 606-3030, themarkrestaurantnyc.com.
BURGUNDY SNAILS AT MÁ PÊCHE These tender little nuggets, garlicky and sweet, are as pure an example of old-school French cooking as you’re ever likely to find at a David Chang restaurant, outside of the way the cooks bathe fish in hot butter at Momofuku Ko. Tien Ho, Má Pêche’s chef, combines the snails with a fat pork sausage in a sticky, almost unctuous sauce, suitable for mopping and mopping and mopping up with a crisp piece of baguette. 15 West 56th Street, Midtown; (212) 757-5878, momofuku.com/ma-peche/.
WHOLE WHEAT TONARELLI WITH SPICY CICERCHIE, ROSEMARY AND SHAVED BONITO AT DEL POSTO It sounds like hippie spaghetti with chickpeas, I know. But Mark Ladner, whose brilliance in the kitchen helped elevate Del Posto into the thin air of four-star restaurants this year, takes a rich, toothsome pasta and combines it with the earthy flavor of chickpeas and the piney scent of rosemary to create something that evokes nothing so much as a coastal forest. As the bonito flakes wilt and shrivel in the heat of the finished dish, they release a briny pungency into the air, completing the mental image. It’s crazy: this was just supposed to be dinner. 85 10th Avenue (16th Street); (212) 497-8090, delposto.com.
SMOKED CRAB LAKSA AT FATTY ’CUE A funky smokiness runs along like a bass line in this luscious bowl of soft, thick lai fun noodles, with a melody made up of cold-smoked lump crab meat, tiny anchovies, maitake and shiitake mushrooms, grated daikon, brown-rice vinegar, unrefined palm syrup and fiery chili heat, addictive as Marlboros. 91 South Sixth Street (Bedford Avenue), Williamsburg, Brooklyn; (718) 599-3090, fattycue.com.
BLACK SEA BASS WITH CHILIES, HERBS, RED BLISS POTATOES AND SPINACH AT ABC KITCHEN Spa food doesn’t come much better than this herb- and jalapeño-scented roast fish served at the second restaurant Mr. Vongerichten opened in Manhattan this year, with Dan Kluger in the kitchen. Soft potatoes accompany the plate, with wilted spinach hit up with sweet lemon confit. Oh, man. 35 East 18th Street, ground floor of ABC Carpet & Home; (212) 475-5829, abckitchennyc.com.
GARGANELLI WITH CREAM, TRUFFLE BUTTER AND PROSCIUTTO AT OSTERIA MORINI These beautifully shaped and cooked quills of pasta swim in heavy cream and truffle-scented butter, alongside wisps of smooth, salty prosciutto. The food of Emilia-Romagna is the point of this pretty new restaurant from Michael White, and if it’s richer and silkier than the genuine article, that is all to the good: Intensity is at the center of his Italian love affair. 218 Lafayette Street (Spring Street), SoHo; (212) 965-8777, osteriamorini.com.
GUACAMOLE FRUTAS AT TOLOACHE It is one of the great treats of the theater district, up there with bumping into Laura Benanti in front of Joe Allen: the chunky guacamole with apple, pear and jalapeño that the chef Julian Medina serves at his marvelous little Mexican joint on 50th Street. Just add margaritas. 251 West 50th Street, Clinton; (212) 581-1818, toloachenyc.com.
CHILI LOBSTER AT MARC FORGIONE An upscale take on the classic Singaporean dish of chili crab, Marc Forgione’s appetizer (at his rustic and comfortable TriBeCa restaurant) offers cull lobster in a fiery sea of butter and sriracha, ginger, soy and lobster stock, with a faint note of lime acidity on top. Big hunks of Texas toast come along with, in place of steamed buns. 134 Reade Street (Hudson Street), TriBeCa; (212) 941-9401, marcforgione.com.
DEVIL’S CHICKEN AT TORRISI ITALIAN SPECIALTIES There is a new menu virtually every night at the tiny restaurant that Rich Torrisi and Mario Carbone run out of their Little Italy storefront (at which, at lunchtime, you can reliably find the city’s best turkey sandwich). Dozens of dishes have graced them. But the devil’s chicken, a smoky-hot version of the classic pollo alla diavola, with crackling skin and a swab of tangy local yogurt, remains a highlight. 250 Mulberry Street (Prince Street), Little Italy; (212) 965-0955, piginahat.com.
BUTTER-POACHED OYSTERS WITH CELERY ROOT AT COLICCHIO & SONS In a restaurant that offers both the casual ease of its tap room and the more formalized experience of a tasting menu in its main dining room, these sweet little fatties from the à la carte menu were a brilliant demilitarized zone, with celery root that had been cooked and cut into a vegetable rendition of tagliatelle pasta, and a large smack of American caviar on top for seasoning and texture. 85 10th Avenue (15th Street), Chelsea; (212) 400-6699, colicchioandsons.com.
ARROZ CON PATO AT NUELA Giant, shareable dishes are the chef Adam Schop’s great strength at this nightclubby Latinate restaurant. And nowhere is his skill more apparent than with this big duck paella, served with foie gras, duck confit, seared breast, a pile of gizzards and a massive fried duck egg on a plate the size of a manhole cover: grandiose peasant food in a nightclub restaurant in the greatest city on earth. 43 West 24th Street, Flatiron district; (212) 929-1200, nuelany.com.
HETE BLIKSEM AT VANDAAG Phillip Kirschen-Clark, the chef at this spare and elegant Netherlandish restaurant, brings a firm understanding of the intersection between sweet and savory to this side dish to lunchtime sandwiches and evening hen. “Hot lightning” is how the words translate from the Dutch: little fried fingerling potatoes combined with smoked bacon and a tiny dice of tart apples, all of it glossed in stroop, a velvety syrup made of sugar, butter, cream and molasses, then flavored with juniper, nutmeg, mace and cinnamon. 103 Second Avenue (Sixth Street), East Village; (212) 253-0470, vandaagnyc.com.
CAVATELLI CON VONGOLE AT LINCOLN Opinions abound about whether there should be a $20 million new restaurant on the Lincoln Center campus and, if so, what it should be like and whom it should serve and what they should pay. While you’re discussing that, eat the chef Jonathan Benno’s cavatelli with razor clams, a warm bowl of beautifully prepared pasta the same size as the perfectly cooked clams, with sweet peppers to match and lemon thyme and butter for flavor. The dish leaves people moving their arms as if they were Alan Gilbert at the Philharmonic, calling in the bassoons. Lincoln Center, 142 West 65th Street, Upper West Side; (212) 359-6500, lincolnristorante.com.
SFERA DI CAPRINO, CELERY AND FIG AGRODOLCE AND CELERY SORBET AT DEL POSTO Brooks Headley, the pastry chef at Del Posto, has the appearance of a rock drummer who just fell off the couch. (Until he started cooking, in fact, that was his job.) But he makes dessert like a beautiful demon, and his little goat-cheesecake spheres, rolled in salted bread crumbs made slick with olive oil, with a sweet-and-sour mixture of celery and figs, and a football of celery sorbet, were hands-down the best dessert I ate this year. Check, please! 85 10th Avenue (16th Street); (212) 497-8090; delposto.com.
December 28, 2010
Guacamole de Frutas
Adapted from Julian Medina, Toloache, Manhattan
Time: 10 minutes
1 tablespoon finely diced sweet onion, like Vidalia
1 teaspoon finely diced seeded jalapeño pepper
1 teaspoon lime juice
Kosher salt
2 tablespoons finely diced peeled Granny Smith apple
2 tablespoons finely diced peeled Asian pear
2 tablespoons dried cranberries
1 teaspoon thinly sliced basil, preferably Thai
2 ripe Haas avocados
1 tablespoon fresh pomegranate seeds.
1. In a nonreactive mixing bowl, combine onion, jalapeño, lime juice and a pinch salt. Mix well, and add the apple, pear, cranberries and basil. Mix again.
2. Cut the avocados in half, scoop out the pulp and mash it with the ingredients in the bowl. Adjust salt to taste. Transfer to a serving bowl and top with pomegranate seeds. If desired, serve with warm corn tortillas or chips.
Yield: About 1 1/2 cups (4 servings).
Roasted Grapefruit
Adapted from Nate Appleman, Pulino’s Bar & Pizzeria, Manhattan
Time: 15 minutes
1 grapefruit
1/3 cup muscovado sugar
2 teaspoons finely chopped mint.
1. Cut the grapefruit in half and thoroughly loosen all sections with a knife. Dry the cut surface with a paper towel.
2. Put the sugar in a 10-inch heavy skillet and place over medium-high heat. Stir until the sugar melts and darkens slightly, about 2 minutes; do not let it burn. Spread it across the pan (it will not coat evenly) and immediately add the grapefruit halves, cut sides down.
3. Move the grapefruit in the pan to coat the surface. Using tongs or two spoons, transfer to serving dishes, cut sides up. Sprinkle with mint and serve immediately.
Yield: 2 servings.
Dishes That Earned Their Stars By SAM SIFTON
I MADE a list of the 15 best things I ate in New York City in the past year of reviewing restaurants for The New York Times. It is an accounting that comprises restaurant dishes of uncommon excellence and flavor. Together they underscore New York’s place as one of the planet’s best cities in which to dine out.
And we’ll get to them soon enough.
But these dishes make up just one part of a year’s meals taken at the professional table, one sleeve in the accordion folder marked “2010 Delicious.” Add meals I ate out of town on assignment or off the clock or on the way to the clock, and the catalog swells. There is, for example, the sandwich of deep-fried oysters and house-made bacon I had this year at Cochon in New Orleans, served on white Pullman bread with a chili-spiked mayonnaise. And the black vinegar spare ribs with pine nuts served at Shanghai River in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Hoarsely I sing to the poached egg, potato mousseline and chorizo crumble I inhaled at LudoBites 5.0, in downtown Los Angeles. Also to the rabbit parfait with rabbit rillettes and a cinnamon-scented rabbit consommé at Alinea in Chicago (whoa, now!).
Closer to home, there were the Shanghai-style dumplings from Chui Hong Yuan in Bath Beach, Brooklyn, and lunchtime salads from Yemen Café near Brooklyn Heights, and midafternoon pickled veal tongue at M. Wells in Long Island City, Queens, and, always, plates of oxtail gravy over rice and peas from the Golden Krust on Eighth Avenue in Midtown.
For breakfast, there was the grapefruit at Pulino’s in SoHo, not really a dish so much as a magic trick, the fruit covered with muscovado sugar and mint, then cooked into caramel. (A recipe for it and a few other dishes appear here.)
There is the fist of bluefin I got this summer from the fishing guide Brendan McCarthy, who killed a tuna off Cape Cod after a long slog east from Montauk in the wind. I ate part of it raw, with soy sauce, and cooked the rest for the children, who ate it as if it were cake.
And I want to remember forever the martini I drank at the Carlyle before hearing John Pizzarelli and his wife, Jessica Molaskey, sing, with Mr. Pizzarelli’s father, Bucky, in the audience. (I waved to him before the show. “Who’s playing tonight?” he asked, and laughed.)
Also: the barbecue chicken I got from a guy cooking out of a trailer in the parking lot of a Tractor Supply Company in rural Delaware. And a plate of topneck clams from Randazzo’s in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn. And the fish tacos I crushed on the sidewalk in front of Juanita’s Taco Shop in Encinitas, Calif. Them, too.
But the following list, which is presented in no particular order, reflects my professional experience over the course of 12 months dining out specifically in New York City restaurants, hoping each night to be surprised, yearning to be delighted, always hungry for the next great bite.
CODFISH FRITTERS WITH LAMB-SAUSAGE RAGÙ AT RECETTE Jesse Schenker, the extravagantly tattooed chef and owner of this estimable West Village restaurant, makes a classic salt-cod bacalao, then deep-fries small balls of it. Paired with a fiery little lamb Bolognese with hints of smoked paprika and vinegar, and served beneath a drizzle of curried mayonnaise, it is an immensely flavorful introduction to his studied, intricate and soulful cooking. 328 West 12th Street (Greenwich Street), Greenwich Village; , recettenyc.com.
‘SIMPLY COOKED’ SCALLOPS AT THE MARK RESTAURANT BY JEAN-GEORGES Four scallops the color of gold, adorned only with salt and pepper, sitting on a white plate in the manner of a gift. Jean-Georges Vongerichten, who opened this restaurant in the Mark Hotel this year with Pierre Schutz in the kitchen, pairs the shellfish with a small bowl of sauce: a pink-hued, sriracha-enhanced mixture of egg yolks, grapeseed oil, kombu seaweed water and orange and lime juice. Mayonnaise for the celestial set. 25 East 77th Street, Upper East Side; (212) 606-3030, themarkrestaurantnyc.com.
BURGUNDY SNAILS AT MÁ PÊCHE These tender little nuggets, garlicky and sweet, are as pure an example of old-school French cooking as you’re ever likely to find at a David Chang restaurant, outside of the way the cooks bathe fish in hot butter at Momofuku Ko. Tien Ho, Má Pêche’s chef, combines the snails with a fat pork sausage in a sticky, almost unctuous sauce, suitable for mopping and mopping and mopping up with a crisp piece of baguette. 15 West 56th Street, Midtown; (212) 757-5878, momofuku.com/ma-peche/.
WHOLE WHEAT TONARELLI WITH SPICY CICERCHIE, ROSEMARY AND SHAVED BONITO AT DEL POSTO It sounds like hippie spaghetti with chickpeas, I know. But Mark Ladner, whose brilliance in the kitchen helped elevate Del Posto into the thin air of four-star restaurants this year, takes a rich, toothsome pasta and combines it with the earthy flavor of chickpeas and the piney scent of rosemary to create something that evokes nothing so much as a coastal forest. As the bonito flakes wilt and shrivel in the heat of the finished dish, they release a briny pungency into the air, completing the mental image. It’s crazy: this was just supposed to be dinner. 85 10th Avenue (16th Street); (212) 497-8090, delposto.com.
SMOKED CRAB LAKSA AT FATTY ’CUE A funky smokiness runs along like a bass line in this luscious bowl of soft, thick lai fun noodles, with a melody made up of cold-smoked lump crab meat, tiny anchovies, maitake and shiitake mushrooms, grated daikon, brown-rice vinegar, unrefined palm syrup and fiery chili heat, addictive as Marlboros. 91 South Sixth Street (Bedford Avenue), Williamsburg, Brooklyn; (718) 599-3090, fattycue.com.
BLACK SEA BASS WITH CHILIES, HERBS, RED BLISS POTATOES AND SPINACH AT ABC KITCHEN Spa food doesn’t come much better than this herb- and jalapeño-scented roast fish served at the second restaurant Mr. Vongerichten opened in Manhattan this year, with Dan Kluger in the kitchen. Soft potatoes accompany the plate, with wilted spinach hit up with sweet lemon confit. Oh, man. 35 East 18th Street, ground floor of ABC Carpet & Home; (212) 475-5829, abckitchennyc.com.
GARGANELLI WITH CREAM, TRUFFLE BUTTER AND PROSCIUTTO AT OSTERIA MORINI These beautifully shaped and cooked quills of pasta swim in heavy cream and truffle-scented butter, alongside wisps of smooth, salty prosciutto. The food of Emilia-Romagna is the point of this pretty new restaurant from Michael White, and if it’s richer and silkier than the genuine article, that is all to the good: Intensity is at the center of his Italian love affair. 218 Lafayette Street (Spring Street), SoHo; (212) 965-8777, osteriamorini.com.
GUACAMOLE FRUTAS AT TOLOACHE It is one of the great treats of the theater district, up there with bumping into Laura Benanti in front of Joe Allen: the chunky guacamole with apple, pear and jalapeño that the chef Julian Medina serves at his marvelous little Mexican joint on 50th Street. Just add margaritas. 251 West 50th Street, Clinton; (212) 581-1818, toloachenyc.com.
CHILI LOBSTER AT MARC FORGIONE An upscale take on the classic Singaporean dish of chili crab, Marc Forgione’s appetizer (at his rustic and comfortable TriBeCa restaurant) offers cull lobster in a fiery sea of butter and sriracha, ginger, soy and lobster stock, with a faint note of lime acidity on top. Big hunks of Texas toast come along with, in place of steamed buns. 134 Reade Street (Hudson Street), TriBeCa; (212) 941-9401, marcforgione.com.
DEVIL’S CHICKEN AT TORRISI ITALIAN SPECIALTIES There is a new menu virtually every night at the tiny restaurant that Rich Torrisi and Mario Carbone run out of their Little Italy storefront (at which, at lunchtime, you can reliably find the city’s best turkey sandwich). Dozens of dishes have graced them. But the devil’s chicken, a smoky-hot version of the classic pollo alla diavola, with crackling skin and a swab of tangy local yogurt, remains a highlight. 250 Mulberry Street (Prince Street), Little Italy; (212) 965-0955, piginahat.com.
BUTTER-POACHED OYSTERS WITH CELERY ROOT AT COLICCHIO & SONS In a restaurant that offers both the casual ease of its tap room and the more formalized experience of a tasting menu in its main dining room, these sweet little fatties from the à la carte menu were a brilliant demilitarized zone, with celery root that had been cooked and cut into a vegetable rendition of tagliatelle pasta, and a large smack of American caviar on top for seasoning and texture. 85 10th Avenue (15th Street), Chelsea; (212) 400-6699, colicchioandsons.com.
ARROZ CON PATO AT NUELA Giant, shareable dishes are the chef Adam Schop’s great strength at this nightclubby Latinate restaurant. And nowhere is his skill more apparent than with this big duck paella, served with foie gras, duck confit, seared breast, a pile of gizzards and a massive fried duck egg on a plate the size of a manhole cover: grandiose peasant food in a nightclub restaurant in the greatest city on earth. 43 West 24th Street, Flatiron district; (212) 929-1200, nuelany.com.
HETE BLIKSEM AT VANDAAG Phillip Kirschen-Clark, the chef at this spare and elegant Netherlandish restaurant, brings a firm understanding of the intersection between sweet and savory to this side dish to lunchtime sandwiches and evening hen. “Hot lightning” is how the words translate from the Dutch: little fried fingerling potatoes combined with smoked bacon and a tiny dice of tart apples, all of it glossed in stroop, a velvety syrup made of sugar, butter, cream and molasses, then flavored with juniper, nutmeg, mace and cinnamon. 103 Second Avenue (Sixth Street), East Village; (212) 253-0470, vandaagnyc.com.
CAVATELLI CON VONGOLE AT LINCOLN Opinions abound about whether there should be a $20 million new restaurant on the Lincoln Center campus and, if so, what it should be like and whom it should serve and what they should pay. While you’re discussing that, eat the chef Jonathan Benno’s cavatelli with razor clams, a warm bowl of beautifully prepared pasta the same size as the perfectly cooked clams, with sweet peppers to match and lemon thyme and butter for flavor. The dish leaves people moving their arms as if they were Alan Gilbert at the Philharmonic, calling in the bassoons. Lincoln Center, 142 West 65th Street, Upper West Side; (212) 359-6500, lincolnristorante.com.
SFERA DI CAPRINO, CELERY AND FIG AGRODOLCE AND CELERY SORBET AT DEL POSTO Brooks Headley, the pastry chef at Del Posto, has the appearance of a rock drummer who just fell off the couch. (Until he started cooking, in fact, that was his job.) But he makes dessert like a beautiful demon, and his little goat-cheesecake spheres, rolled in salted bread crumbs made slick with olive oil, with a sweet-and-sour mixture of celery and figs, and a football of celery sorbet, were hands-down the best dessert I ate this year. Check, please! 85 10th Avenue (16th Street); (212) 497-8090; delposto.com.
December 28, 2010
Guacamole de Frutas
Adapted from Julian Medina, Toloache, Manhattan
Time: 10 minutes
1 tablespoon finely diced sweet onion, like Vidalia
1 teaspoon finely diced seeded jalapeño pepper
1 teaspoon lime juice
Kosher salt
2 tablespoons finely diced peeled Granny Smith apple
2 tablespoons finely diced peeled Asian pear
2 tablespoons dried cranberries
1 teaspoon thinly sliced basil, preferably Thai
2 ripe Haas avocados
1 tablespoon fresh pomegranate seeds.
1. In a nonreactive mixing bowl, combine onion, jalapeño, lime juice and a pinch salt. Mix well, and add the apple, pear, cranberries and basil. Mix again.
2. Cut the avocados in half, scoop out the pulp and mash it with the ingredients in the bowl. Adjust salt to taste. Transfer to a serving bowl and top with pomegranate seeds. If desired, serve with warm corn tortillas or chips.
Yield: About 1 1/2 cups (4 servings).
Roasted Grapefruit
Adapted from Nate Appleman, Pulino’s Bar & Pizzeria, Manhattan
Time: 15 minutes
1 grapefruit
1/3 cup muscovado sugar
2 teaspoons finely chopped mint.
1. Cut the grapefruit in half and thoroughly loosen all sections with a knife. Dry the cut surface with a paper towel.
2. Put the sugar in a 10-inch heavy skillet and place over medium-high heat. Stir until the sugar melts and darkens slightly, about 2 minutes; do not let it burn. Spread it across the pan (it will not coat evenly) and immediately add the grapefruit halves, cut sides down.
3. Move the grapefruit in the pan to coat the surface. Using tongs or two spoons, transfer to serving dishes, cut sides up. Sprinkle with mint and serve immediately.
Yield: 2 servings.
A Critic’s Choice of Restaurant Newcomers By SAM SIFTON
December 28, 2010
A Critic’s Choice of Restaurant Newcomers By SAM SIFTON
FOLLOWING is a list of my favorite new restaurants among those that I reviewed in 2010. They are presented in alphabetical order. But Torrisi was awesome.
ABC KITCHEN Jean-Georges Vongerichten opened a greenish, market-driven restaurant on the ground floor of ABC Carpet & Home. And it turned out to be great! 35 East 18th Street; , abckitchennyc.com.
THE BRESLIN The evolution of the gastropub, and the chef April Bloomfield’s triumph of fat, flavor and defiant British cooking. 16 West 29th Street (Broadway); (212) 679-1939, thebreslin.com.
CASA LEVER An elegant Italian restaurant well suited to adults, set within the beauty of Lever House, beneath copious Warhols. 390 Park Avenue (53rd Street), Midtown; (212) 888-2700, casalever.com.
COLICCHIO & SONS The taproom is best for beer and sandwiches. But if you can take advantage of Tom Colicchio cooking a tasting menu in the main dining room? That’s aces. 85 10th Avenue (15th Street), Chelsea; (212) 400-6699, colicchioandsons.com.
FATTY ’CUE American barbecue technique is married to the flavors of Southeast Asia. The congregation cheers. 91 South Sixth Street (Bedford Avenue), Williamsburg, Brooklyn; (718) 599-3090, fattycue.com.
KIN SHOP A Thai-inspired restaurant from Harold Dieterle, calm and adult, the sort of place everyone wishes to have in the neighborhood. 469 Sixth Avenue (West 11th Street), Greenwich Village; (212) 675-4295, kinshopnyc.com.
MAIALINO Danny Meyer’s Romanish trattoria in the Gramercy Park Hotel, with excellent pig cooking from the chef Nick Anderer. 2 Lexington Avenue (21st Street), Gramercy Park; (212) 777-2410, maialinonyc.com.
OSTERIA MORINI A church of Emilia-Romagna, consecrated in butter and cream, worth visiting once at least. 218 Lafayette Street (Spring Street), SoHo; (212) 965-8777, osteriamorini.com.
RECETTE A casual West Village dining room belies Jesse Schenker’s immense culinary ambition. 328 West 12th Street (Greenwich Street), Greenwich Village; (212) 414-3000, recettenyc.com.
TORRISI ITALIAN SPECIALTIES Italian-American food best understood as a first album from a duo — Rich Torrisi and Mario Carbone — who should properly end up as big, big stars. 250 Mulberry Street (Prince Street), Little Italy; (212) 965-0955, piginahat.com.
A Critic’s Choice of Restaurant Newcomers By SAM SIFTON
FOLLOWING is a list of my favorite new restaurants among those that I reviewed in 2010. They are presented in alphabetical order. But Torrisi was awesome.
ABC KITCHEN Jean-Georges Vongerichten opened a greenish, market-driven restaurant on the ground floor of ABC Carpet & Home. And it turned out to be great! 35 East 18th Street; , abckitchennyc.com.
THE BRESLIN The evolution of the gastropub, and the chef April Bloomfield’s triumph of fat, flavor and defiant British cooking. 16 West 29th Street (Broadway); (212) 679-1939, thebreslin.com.
CASA LEVER An elegant Italian restaurant well suited to adults, set within the beauty of Lever House, beneath copious Warhols. 390 Park Avenue (53rd Street), Midtown; (212) 888-2700, casalever.com.
COLICCHIO & SONS The taproom is best for beer and sandwiches. But if you can take advantage of Tom Colicchio cooking a tasting menu in the main dining room? That’s aces. 85 10th Avenue (15th Street), Chelsea; (212) 400-6699, colicchioandsons.com.
FATTY ’CUE American barbecue technique is married to the flavors of Southeast Asia. The congregation cheers. 91 South Sixth Street (Bedford Avenue), Williamsburg, Brooklyn; (718) 599-3090, fattycue.com.
KIN SHOP A Thai-inspired restaurant from Harold Dieterle, calm and adult, the sort of place everyone wishes to have in the neighborhood. 469 Sixth Avenue (West 11th Street), Greenwich Village; (212) 675-4295, kinshopnyc.com.
MAIALINO Danny Meyer’s Romanish trattoria in the Gramercy Park Hotel, with excellent pig cooking from the chef Nick Anderer. 2 Lexington Avenue (21st Street), Gramercy Park; (212) 777-2410, maialinonyc.com.
OSTERIA MORINI A church of Emilia-Romagna, consecrated in butter and cream, worth visiting once at least. 218 Lafayette Street (Spring Street), SoHo; (212) 965-8777, osteriamorini.com.
RECETTE A casual West Village dining room belies Jesse Schenker’s immense culinary ambition. 328 West 12th Street (Greenwich Street), Greenwich Village; (212) 414-3000, recettenyc.com.
TORRISI ITALIAN SPECIALTIES Italian-American food best understood as a first album from a duo — Rich Torrisi and Mario Carbone — who should properly end up as big, big stars. 250 Mulberry Street (Prince Street), Little Italy; (212) 965-0955, piginahat.com.
Inexpensive Restaurants That Stood Out in 2010 By THE NEW YORK TIMES
December 28, 2010
Inexpensive Restaurants That Stood Out in 2010 By THE NEW YORK TIMES
THE best of the casual restaurants reviewed this year proved that delicious doesn’t have to mean expensive.
AYADA This is a serious Thai restaurant that makes no concessions to Western palates. The menu is encyclopedic; the waitresses are patient. Put yourself in the gentle but firm hands of the chef and owner, Duangjai Thammasat (known as Kitty), and she’ll guide you toward the best dishes, complex orchestrations of tart and sweet, salt and burn. (Reviewed by Ligaya Mishan) 77-08 Woodside Avenue (77th Avenue), Elmhurst, Queens; .
BAOHAUS For $4, you get a lily-white bun (the bao) brimming with Niman Ranch pork belly, glossy with fat and topped with the classic Taiwanese condiments: sweet pulverized peanuts, pickled mustard greens and cilantro. Dissenters will quibble that you can get it for less in Chinatown. Not with this quality can you. (Ligaya Mishan) 137 Rivington Street (Norfolk Street), Lower East Side; (646) 684-3835, baohausnyc.com.
CAFE ‘AT YOUR MOTHER-IN-LAW’ In this sunny space two blocks from the boardwalk you can order an amalgam of Eastern European, Korean and Uzbek dishes from Russian-speaking ethnic Koreans hailing from Tashkent. (Dave Cook) 3071 Brighton Fourth Street (Brighton Beach Avenue), Brighton Beach, Brooklyn; (718) 942-4088.
CAMPO DE’ FIORI The dough for the pizza is a result of 15 years of experiments by an engineer specializing in the molecular properties of flour. But you can have a beguiling meal here and never taste a pie. The food is plain-spoken and appealingly rough around the edges. Although the vibe could be cozier, it’s worth lingering awhile. (Ligaya Mishan) 187 Fifth Avenue (Berkeley Place), Park Slope, Brooklyn; (347) 763-0933, pizzacampodefiori.com.
CASTELLO PLAN Quirky and wonderful wines are paired with delicious small plates, cured meats and cheeses at this wine bar. Relax in the dark dining room, or on the side deck when warm weather returns, grazing until late at night. (Betsy Andrews) 1213 Cortelyou Road (Argyle Road), Ditmas Park, Brooklyn; (718) 856-8888, thecastelloplan.com.
THE COMMODORE A dive bar with great food that feels as if it’s been around forever. The Commodore’s kitchen turns out a vaguely Southern array of crunchy, spicy, greasy, gooey and salty dishes that push all the right buttons when you’re rolling through your third drink of the night. (Oliver Strand) 366 Metropolitan Avenue (Havemeyer Street), Williamsburg, Brooklyn; (718) 218-7632, commodorebar.com
DOS TOROS The food here is simple and succulent, stripped-down cooking served in spartan conditions. The restaurant will bring to mind the sort of fresh, quick and cheap eating found at Mexican joints in the San Francisco Bay Area. (Oliver Strand) 137 Fourth Avenue (13th Street); (212) 677-7300, dostorosnyc.com.
DOSA GARDEN The deep, smoky, vibrant curries of Chettinad, in the southern Indian state Tamil Nadu, are featured here, along with a range of dosai with a rich, deep sambar sauce. Flavors build in fragrant waves, from sweet to spiced and earthy to a subtle, integrating chili burn. It’s all delicious. (Betsy Andrews) 323 Victory Boulevard (Cebra Boulevard), Staten Island; (718) 420-0919, dosagardenny.com.
HECHO EN DUMBO Daniel Mena, the chef, is at his best when he takes the big flavors of his native Mexico City and strips a dish down to its fundamentals. He believes in his ingredients; a dish like the short-rib tacos doesn’t need anything more than a squeeze of lime. The place is serene in the day, a scene at night, but food like this is worth standing and shouting for. (Oliver Strand) 354 Bowery (East Fourth Street), East Village; (212) 937-4245, hechoendumbo.com.
HILL COUNTRY CHICKEN Hill Country proved that great Texas barbecue can exist in Manhattan. Now the owners repeat the feat (down the street) with fried chicken and other Southern dishes. (Julia Moskin) 1123 Broadway (25th Street); (212) 257-6446, hillcountrychicken.com.
KUTI’S The chef and owner, Abdhul Traore, marries West African and Middle Eastern flavors from his native Ivory Coast, and insinuates a few French techniques in dishes like shrimp piri-piri and what must be the city’s only escargot panino. (Dave Cook) 355 West 116th Street (between Manhattan and Morningside Avenues); (212) 222-1127.
MEXICUE Winning combinations and smart deployment of sauces make it worth seeking out this truck offering Mexican sliders and gorgeous artisanal tacos. (Betsy Andrews) For locations: (260) 639-4283, mexicueny.com.
THE NORTHERN SPY FOOD COMPANY The menu at this Greenmarket-driven restaurant reads like a roster of favorite snacks and midnight feasts, executed with a precision honed in high-end kitchens. (Ligaya Mishan) 511 East 12th Street (Avenue A), East Village; (212) 228-5100, northernspyfoodco.com.
NO. 7 SUB Visit this takeout shop for subs stuffed with ceviche or broccoli; roast beef layered with pickled blueberries; or lamb with peanut butter, all with extras like candied wasabi, papadums, fried lemon or fermented soybean paste. Results, for the most part, are exhilaratingly delicious. (Ligaya Mishan) 1188 Broadway (29th Street); (212) 532-1680, no7sub.com.
PIES ’N’ THIGHS This restaurant’s new home is a Brooklynite’s imaginary version of a meat-and-three in the South. The thighs are as crunchy and as golden as ever, and the pies are honest, American and sweet. They’re enough to restore the faith of anybody who’s eaten too many fancy desserts that look like Frank Gehry’s rejected sketches. (Pete Wells) 166 South Fourth Street (Driggs Avenue), Williamsburg, Brooklyn; (347) 529-6090, piesnthighs.tumblr.com.
Inexpensive Restaurants That Stood Out in 2010 By THE NEW YORK TIMES
THE best of the casual restaurants reviewed this year proved that delicious doesn’t have to mean expensive.
AYADA This is a serious Thai restaurant that makes no concessions to Western palates. The menu is encyclopedic; the waitresses are patient. Put yourself in the gentle but firm hands of the chef and owner, Duangjai Thammasat (known as Kitty), and she’ll guide you toward the best dishes, complex orchestrations of tart and sweet, salt and burn. (Reviewed by Ligaya Mishan) 77-08 Woodside Avenue (77th Avenue), Elmhurst, Queens; .
BAOHAUS For $4, you get a lily-white bun (the bao) brimming with Niman Ranch pork belly, glossy with fat and topped with the classic Taiwanese condiments: sweet pulverized peanuts, pickled mustard greens and cilantro. Dissenters will quibble that you can get it for less in Chinatown. Not with this quality can you. (Ligaya Mishan) 137 Rivington Street (Norfolk Street), Lower East Side; (646) 684-3835, baohausnyc.com.
CAFE ‘AT YOUR MOTHER-IN-LAW’ In this sunny space two blocks from the boardwalk you can order an amalgam of Eastern European, Korean and Uzbek dishes from Russian-speaking ethnic Koreans hailing from Tashkent. (Dave Cook) 3071 Brighton Fourth Street (Brighton Beach Avenue), Brighton Beach, Brooklyn; (718) 942-4088.
CAMPO DE’ FIORI The dough for the pizza is a result of 15 years of experiments by an engineer specializing in the molecular properties of flour. But you can have a beguiling meal here and never taste a pie. The food is plain-spoken and appealingly rough around the edges. Although the vibe could be cozier, it’s worth lingering awhile. (Ligaya Mishan) 187 Fifth Avenue (Berkeley Place), Park Slope, Brooklyn; (347) 763-0933, pizzacampodefiori.com.
CASTELLO PLAN Quirky and wonderful wines are paired with delicious small plates, cured meats and cheeses at this wine bar. Relax in the dark dining room, or on the side deck when warm weather returns, grazing until late at night. (Betsy Andrews) 1213 Cortelyou Road (Argyle Road), Ditmas Park, Brooklyn; (718) 856-8888, thecastelloplan.com.
THE COMMODORE A dive bar with great food that feels as if it’s been around forever. The Commodore’s kitchen turns out a vaguely Southern array of crunchy, spicy, greasy, gooey and salty dishes that push all the right buttons when you’re rolling through your third drink of the night. (Oliver Strand) 366 Metropolitan Avenue (Havemeyer Street), Williamsburg, Brooklyn; (718) 218-7632, commodorebar.com
DOS TOROS The food here is simple and succulent, stripped-down cooking served in spartan conditions. The restaurant will bring to mind the sort of fresh, quick and cheap eating found at Mexican joints in the San Francisco Bay Area. (Oliver Strand) 137 Fourth Avenue (13th Street); (212) 677-7300, dostorosnyc.com.
DOSA GARDEN The deep, smoky, vibrant curries of Chettinad, in the southern Indian state Tamil Nadu, are featured here, along with a range of dosai with a rich, deep sambar sauce. Flavors build in fragrant waves, from sweet to spiced and earthy to a subtle, integrating chili burn. It’s all delicious. (Betsy Andrews) 323 Victory Boulevard (Cebra Boulevard), Staten Island; (718) 420-0919, dosagardenny.com.
HECHO EN DUMBO Daniel Mena, the chef, is at his best when he takes the big flavors of his native Mexico City and strips a dish down to its fundamentals. He believes in his ingredients; a dish like the short-rib tacos doesn’t need anything more than a squeeze of lime. The place is serene in the day, a scene at night, but food like this is worth standing and shouting for. (Oliver Strand) 354 Bowery (East Fourth Street), East Village; (212) 937-4245, hechoendumbo.com.
HILL COUNTRY CHICKEN Hill Country proved that great Texas barbecue can exist in Manhattan. Now the owners repeat the feat (down the street) with fried chicken and other Southern dishes. (Julia Moskin) 1123 Broadway (25th Street); (212) 257-6446, hillcountrychicken.com.
KUTI’S The chef and owner, Abdhul Traore, marries West African and Middle Eastern flavors from his native Ivory Coast, and insinuates a few French techniques in dishes like shrimp piri-piri and what must be the city’s only escargot panino. (Dave Cook) 355 West 116th Street (between Manhattan and Morningside Avenues); (212) 222-1127.
MEXICUE Winning combinations and smart deployment of sauces make it worth seeking out this truck offering Mexican sliders and gorgeous artisanal tacos. (Betsy Andrews) For locations: (260) 639-4283, mexicueny.com.
THE NORTHERN SPY FOOD COMPANY The menu at this Greenmarket-driven restaurant reads like a roster of favorite snacks and midnight feasts, executed with a precision honed in high-end kitchens. (Ligaya Mishan) 511 East 12th Street (Avenue A), East Village; (212) 228-5100, northernspyfoodco.com.
NO. 7 SUB Visit this takeout shop for subs stuffed with ceviche or broccoli; roast beef layered with pickled blueberries; or lamb with peanut butter, all with extras like candied wasabi, papadums, fried lemon or fermented soybean paste. Results, for the most part, are exhilaratingly delicious. (Ligaya Mishan) 1188 Broadway (29th Street); (212) 532-1680, no7sub.com.
PIES ’N’ THIGHS This restaurant’s new home is a Brooklynite’s imaginary version of a meat-and-three in the South. The thighs are as crunchy and as golden as ever, and the pies are honest, American and sweet. They’re enough to restore the faith of anybody who’s eaten too many fancy desserts that look like Frank Gehry’s rejected sketches. (Pete Wells) 166 South Fourth Street (Driggs Avenue), Williamsburg, Brooklyn; (347) 529-6090, piesnthighs.tumblr.com.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
The Fabulous Freshmen of '09 By SAM SIFTON
December 30, 2009
The Fabulous Freshmen of '09 By SAM SIFTON
FOLLOWING is a list of my favorite restaurants among those that opened in New York this year. It is in no particular order except that Marea is first and foremost.
MAREA The latest gem in the crown of the restaurateur Chris Cannon and his talented partner-chef, Michael White, representing the marine treats of a nation that is almost Italy, almost the United States. 240 Central Park South (Broadway), Columbus Circle, (212) 582-5100.
LOCANDA VERDE Andrew Carmellini, cooking like the hippest Italian grandmother you never had, in a dining room that's drop-dead pretty, with desserts by Karen DeMasco. Reserve now. In the Greenwich Hotel, 377 Greenwich Street (North Moore Street), TriBeCa, (212) 925-3797.
PRIME MEATS Frank Castronovo and Frank Falcinelli's new venture combines steaks and cocktails under something like a German flag, to great effect. And the main dining room's not even open yet! 465 Court Street (Luquer Street), Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, (718) 254-0327.
MINETTA TAVERN Keith McNally opened a steakhouse in an old Village landmark, updating the room with great skill and making the food about six times better than he needed to. Everybody came. 113 Macdougal Street (Minetta Lane), Greenwich Village, (212) 475-3850.
DBGB KITCHEN AND BAR A Daniel Boulud restaurant this far downtown is as strange as contemplating a David Chang one in Midtown. Incredible sausages and very good beer, however, make it worth the cognitive leap. 299 Bowery (Houston Street), East Village, (212) 933-5300.
OCEANA The Oceana of old was a pleasant room with elegant food and a caring touch; the new one, in the McGraw-Hill Building, is a high-functioning luxury mill. Sometimes that's just what you need. 1221 Avenue of the Americas (entrance on 49th Street), Midtown, (212) 759-5941.
LE RELAIS DE VENISE L'ENTRECOTE There is only green salad and steak frites. You can have O.K. wine and a dessert after. Women in French maid outfits serve the stuff, turning tables as if they were stools at Schrafft's. And you know what? It's terrific. 590 Lexington Avenue (52nd Street), Midtown, (212) 758-3989.
CO. Jim Lahey, of Sullivan Street Bakery, got into the restaurant game this year with Co. (pronounced "company"), a pizzeria. It's casual, fairly elegant in its way. The pizza's excellent. 230 Ninth Avenue (24th Street), Chelsea, (212) 243-1105.
FATTY CRAB A big, loud, ugly spinoff of the smaller, downtown, stoned-glutton restaurant of the same name, Zak Pelaccio's Fatty Crab brought gastro-hipster cachet to a neighborhood not formerly known for it — and good noodles, too. 2170 Broadway (76th Street), Upper West Side, (212) 496-2722.
ROCKAWAY TACO After a trial run in summer 2008, this fantastic summers-only surfer-shack taco stall opened with intensity for beach season 2009, with perfect fish tacos from Andrew Field, the chef, that are best eaten barefoot. 95-19 Rockaway Beach Boulevard (Beach 96th Street), Rockaway, Queens, (347) 213-7466.
The Top New Restaurants of 2009 - Review - NYTimes.com (30 December 2009)
http://events.nytimes.com/2009/12/30/dining/reviews/30ylist.html?ref=dining&pagewanted=print
http://snipurl.com/twxev
The Fabulous Freshmen of '09 By SAM SIFTON
FOLLOWING is a list of my favorite restaurants among those that opened in New York this year. It is in no particular order except that Marea is first and foremost.
MAREA The latest gem in the crown of the restaurateur Chris Cannon and his talented partner-chef, Michael White, representing the marine treats of a nation that is almost Italy, almost the United States. 240 Central Park South (Broadway), Columbus Circle, (212) 582-5100.
LOCANDA VERDE Andrew Carmellini, cooking like the hippest Italian grandmother you never had, in a dining room that's drop-dead pretty, with desserts by Karen DeMasco. Reserve now. In the Greenwich Hotel, 377 Greenwich Street (North Moore Street), TriBeCa, (212) 925-3797.
PRIME MEATS Frank Castronovo and Frank Falcinelli's new venture combines steaks and cocktails under something like a German flag, to great effect. And the main dining room's not even open yet! 465 Court Street (Luquer Street), Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, (718) 254-0327.
MINETTA TAVERN Keith McNally opened a steakhouse in an old Village landmark, updating the room with great skill and making the food about six times better than he needed to. Everybody came. 113 Macdougal Street (Minetta Lane), Greenwich Village, (212) 475-3850.
DBGB KITCHEN AND BAR A Daniel Boulud restaurant this far downtown is as strange as contemplating a David Chang one in Midtown. Incredible sausages and very good beer, however, make it worth the cognitive leap. 299 Bowery (Houston Street), East Village, (212) 933-5300.
OCEANA The Oceana of old was a pleasant room with elegant food and a caring touch; the new one, in the McGraw-Hill Building, is a high-functioning luxury mill. Sometimes that's just what you need. 1221 Avenue of the Americas (entrance on 49th Street), Midtown, (212) 759-5941.
LE RELAIS DE VENISE L'ENTRECOTE There is only green salad and steak frites. You can have O.K. wine and a dessert after. Women in French maid outfits serve the stuff, turning tables as if they were stools at Schrafft's. And you know what? It's terrific. 590 Lexington Avenue (52nd Street), Midtown, (212) 758-3989.
CO. Jim Lahey, of Sullivan Street Bakery, got into the restaurant game this year with Co. (pronounced "company"), a pizzeria. It's casual, fairly elegant in its way. The pizza's excellent. 230 Ninth Avenue (24th Street), Chelsea, (212) 243-1105.
FATTY CRAB A big, loud, ugly spinoff of the smaller, downtown, stoned-glutton restaurant of the same name, Zak Pelaccio's Fatty Crab brought gastro-hipster cachet to a neighborhood not formerly known for it — and good noodles, too. 2170 Broadway (76th Street), Upper West Side, (212) 496-2722.
ROCKAWAY TACO After a trial run in summer 2008, this fantastic summers-only surfer-shack taco stall opened with intensity for beach season 2009, with perfect fish tacos from Andrew Field, the chef, that are best eaten barefoot. 95-19 Rockaway Beach Boulevard (Beach 96th Street), Rockaway, Queens, (347) 213-7466.
The Top New Restaurants of 2009 - Review - NYTimes.com (30 December 2009)
http://events.nytimes.com/2009/12/30/dining/reviews/30ylist.html?ref=dining&pagewanted=print
http://snipurl.com/twxev
Eleven Memorable Dishes, and Not Even a Full Year By SAM SIFTON
December 30, 2009
CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK
Eleven Memorable Dishes, and Not Even a Full Year By SAM SIFTON
THE best dishes of the year? We'll get to the roasted unicorn in dwarf-fairy reduction sauce soon enough. But perspective is everything. For much of 2009 I was not the restaurant critic of The New York Times. I was the newspaper's culture editor, with little access to the sort of food that ordinarily appears in articles like this one.
Many of my meals were taken at my desk, between phone calls or sometimes during them, sometimes three times a day. Others were taken on weekends, the children in tow, rushing from beach to grocery store to birthday party or back. Still more were eaten at the bars of Times Square gin mills well after the newspaper's nightly deadlines, as colleagues railed into the dark against the perfidy of whoever had stood in the way of our getting to the place earlier.
Of course, I did not go hungry before stepping into the big brogans of Frank Bruni, my brilliant and tireless predecessor, who left his post at the end of August. As a civilian with a deep interest in the city's restaurant culture, I was able to sneak in some truly memorable dishes this year: among them, a perfect agnolotti del plin at Del Posto; a tiny piece of French toast at Momofuku Ko; a crisp and juicy truffle-stuffed chicken thigh with Medjool dates, carrot mousseline and tatsoi at Per Se.
As an amateur, I would also rate the suckling-pig tacos that Jimmy Bradley served as a Monday night special at the Red Cat in Chelsea as among the best things I ate in 2009. I also loved the spicy chicken shwarma served at the new, expanded Pick-a-Pita on Eighth Avenue near the newsroom, and the Korean tacos from the Kogi truck in Los Angeles.
But the following list, presented in no particular order, reflects my recent experience as a professional eater. It is the accounting of a fellow feeding with critical intent, who has read back over some months of notes to determine what, of all the new dishes in all the new restaurants in New York City, really were his favorites. (Since The Times does not review new restaurants until a decent interval has passed, the list includes a few dishes from places that opened at the end of 2008.)
In such cases where it seemed appropriate, I reached out to the creators and asked for a recipe. Even made by an amateur with a grim kitchen in Somewheresville, they can approximate the quality experienced here in the big town, under sparkling lights.
THE SMOKED HADDOCK TART AT LE CAPRICE It is early days yet over at Le Caprice, the new American outpost of London's club-like Piccadilly snob-shop, but Michael Hartnell, the chef, has at least one good card to play: this marvelous appetizer. With smoked haddock still a relative rarity in the United States, its smoky sweetness is a small taste of British sophistication, especially against the melting gold of the two tiny poached quail eggs he places above the pastry. Eaten at the bar, after the application of a Hendrick's martini, this dish can leave even the rubiest of American rubes feeling Bondlike and well fed. In the Pierre Hotel, 795 Fifth Avenue (61st Street), Upper East Side, (212) 940-8195.
THE FUSILLI WITH RED-WINE BRAISED OCTOPUS AND BONE MARROW AT MAREA This is surf and turf from Crazytown, Italy, near the American border. Michael White, the hugely talented pasta maven behind Chris Cannon's excellent new restaurant in the space that used to be San Domenico, cooks a mirepoix in a heavy pot, then adds baby octopus, Sangiovese and tomato purée. This simmers away for an hour, until the little fellows are fork tender and the sauce gone almost thick with flavor. The result is introduced to a serious amount of seared bone marrow and some twirls of house-made fusilli. The marrow emulsifies and acts as butter does in a sauce — if butter were 10 times richer than it already is. The combination is a loving marriage between separate species. 240 Central Park South (Broadway), Columbus Circle, (212) 582-5100.
THE POMMES ALIGOT AT MINETTA TAVERN A side dish, particularly well suited to the restaurant's excellent roast chicken, the pommes aligot at Keith McNally's glittery remake of this Greenwich Village landmark are a marvel of silky excellence. (They more than make up for the restaurant's one notable misstep: a partly open kitchen that clashes with both the aesthetic of the room and the heretofore modest demeanor of the men who run it, Riad Nasr and Lee Hanson.) Yukon Gold potatoes are whipped smooth with garlic, enormous amounts of butter and cheddar curds until they begin to turn to ribbons — a potato dish that is literally elastic. It tastes of Alpine clouds. 113 Macdougal Street (Minetta Lane), Greenwich Village, (212) 475-3850.
THE DUCK MEATLOAF AT BUTTERMILK CHANNEL Buttermilk Channel roared onto the Brooklyn dining scene late last year with family-friendly service, an excellent wine list and a great deal of comforting food. Popovers and fried chicken don't make year-end roundups, though. Rich, raisin-studded, thyme-infused duck meatloaf does. Doug Crowell, the restaurant's owner, is pairing the meat with puréed parsnips zipped on orange and star anise. You could do that at home, too, or try it alongside the pommes aligot. 524 Court Street (Huntington Street), Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, (718) 852-8490.
THE BOUDIN BASQUE AT DBGB KITCHEN AND BAR This disk of spicy blood sausage with bits of head meat for textural contrast is served above a small pool of scallion-brightened, cream-thickened mashed potatoes. It is the standout sausage among many at Daniel Boulud's audacious new restaurant on the lower Bowery, just a few steps down from the birthplace of punk rock. Through a spokeswoman, Georgette Farkas, Mr. Boulud declined to offer a recipe for the home cook. It's too easy for it all to go terribly wrong, Ms. Farkas said. Not at the restaurant, though! 299 Bowery (Houston Street), East Village, (212) 933-5300.
THE MEATBALL PIZZA AT CO. Jim Lahey's much debated Chelsea pizzeria is devoted almost to a fault to the excellence of its dough, as Frank Bruni sagely pointed out in his one-star review of the restaurant in the spring. But in recent months, Mr. Lahey's been dialing in his toppings and the use of his insanely hot oven; he's now putting out pies that are good enough to do justice to his dough and to rival the city's best pizzas. The veal meatball version, with buffalo mozzarella, tomato, caramelized onions, gaeta olives, aged pecorino and oregano, is my favorite. 230 Ninth Avenue (24th Street), Chelsea, (212) 243-1105.
THE PRIME MANHATTAN AT PRIME MEATS There are a lot of people here who appear to have dressed for a Vancouver trapping expedition, attended a gallery show in Bushwick, and then had the idea to mush over to Carroll Gardens for absinthe. But this restaurant from the brilliant team behind the Frankies empire, while not even yet completely open, has wonderful food and a truly inspired drinks menu arranged by Damon Boelte. His Manhattan, built out of 100-proof Rittenhouse rye, Dolin sweet vermouth and bitters made at the restaurant out of buddha's hand, a lemony citrus fruit, is a glass of refinement afforded only artists and dreamers: a direct portal into an imaginary 19th-century New York City. 465 Court Street (Luquer Street), Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, (718) 254-0327.
THE OYSTER PAN ROAST AT THE JOHN DORY Here's a wild card. This restaurant opened in December 2008, and closed in August. But April Bloomfield, the chef and an owner, and Ken Friedman, another owner, now have The Breslin to their name, and are making noises about reopening the John Dory in another space. So there's some chance we'll see this marvelous dish — a murderously rich pan roast topped with toast slathered in uni butter — again. Here's hoping: it made my winter last year. This year, you can cook it at home.
THE FRIED CURRIED PINK SNAPPER AT OCEANA Served upright, as if it had been caught swimming through hot oil and flash-fried into statuary, this amazing dish is among the most flavorful you can get at the new and massive version of stately old Oceana, now in the McGraw-Hill Building on West 49th Street. Served with lotus coins and strips of cucumber, with cilantro strewn here and there above its fantastic Indian-inflected sauce, it is a superb meal for two, accompanied by some spicy Napa cabbage. 1221 Avenue of the Americas (entrance on 49th Street), Midtown, (212) 759-5941.
THE CLASSIC BANH MI AT BAOGUETTE You can take subways, buses and trains to taste and debate the best banh mi in town. For the best I had in a new restaurant, though, look no farther than lower Lexington Avenue, where Michael Huynh opened Baoguette last December. His classic version, with house-made pâté, terrine and pork belly on a baguette from Tom Cat Bakery, with pickled daikon, cilantro and jalapeño, dabbed with their own mayo and squirted with fish sauce and Sriracha, is delicious and, at $5, among the best quality-to-cost ratios available in the city. 61 Lexington Avenue (between 25th and 26th Streets), Murray Hill, (212) 532-1133
THE MAPLE BUDINO AT LOCANDA VERDE Karen DeMasco is the wildly gifted pastry chef at Locanda Verde, which the chef Andrew Carmellini opened in the Greenwich Hotel in TriBeCa with a team of partners in the late spring. She brought a beautiful simplicity to the dessert menu at Tom Colicchio's Craft, where her impact was big enough that, more than a year after she left, she is still prominently featured on that restaurant's Web site. At Locanda Verde, she brings deep flavor and mischievous intensity to a dessert menu that sees its heights in a dark maple budino with candied pecans and cranberry sorbetto. Make it at home and serve it to friends exactly as if you were serving overstrong cocktails or recreational drugs. Taxonomically speaking, they are all of a piece. The Greenwich Hotel, 377 Greenwich Street (North Moore Street), TriBeCa, (212) 925-3797.
Critic’s Notebook - Selecting the Year’s Top 11 New Dishes - Review - NYTimes.com (30 December 2009)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/30/dining/reviews/30year.html?pagewanted=print
http://snipurl.com/twx9l
CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK
Eleven Memorable Dishes, and Not Even a Full Year By SAM SIFTON
THE best dishes of the year? We'll get to the roasted unicorn in dwarf-fairy reduction sauce soon enough. But perspective is everything. For much of 2009 I was not the restaurant critic of The New York Times. I was the newspaper's culture editor, with little access to the sort of food that ordinarily appears in articles like this one.
Many of my meals were taken at my desk, between phone calls or sometimes during them, sometimes three times a day. Others were taken on weekends, the children in tow, rushing from beach to grocery store to birthday party or back. Still more were eaten at the bars of Times Square gin mills well after the newspaper's nightly deadlines, as colleagues railed into the dark against the perfidy of whoever had stood in the way of our getting to the place earlier.
Of course, I did not go hungry before stepping into the big brogans of Frank Bruni, my brilliant and tireless predecessor, who left his post at the end of August. As a civilian with a deep interest in the city's restaurant culture, I was able to sneak in some truly memorable dishes this year: among them, a perfect agnolotti del plin at Del Posto; a tiny piece of French toast at Momofuku Ko; a crisp and juicy truffle-stuffed chicken thigh with Medjool dates, carrot mousseline and tatsoi at Per Se.
As an amateur, I would also rate the suckling-pig tacos that Jimmy Bradley served as a Monday night special at the Red Cat in Chelsea as among the best things I ate in 2009. I also loved the spicy chicken shwarma served at the new, expanded Pick-a-Pita on Eighth Avenue near the newsroom, and the Korean tacos from the Kogi truck in Los Angeles.
But the following list, presented in no particular order, reflects my recent experience as a professional eater. It is the accounting of a fellow feeding with critical intent, who has read back over some months of notes to determine what, of all the new dishes in all the new restaurants in New York City, really were his favorites. (Since The Times does not review new restaurants until a decent interval has passed, the list includes a few dishes from places that opened at the end of 2008.)
In such cases where it seemed appropriate, I reached out to the creators and asked for a recipe. Even made by an amateur with a grim kitchen in Somewheresville, they can approximate the quality experienced here in the big town, under sparkling lights.
THE SMOKED HADDOCK TART AT LE CAPRICE It is early days yet over at Le Caprice, the new American outpost of London's club-like Piccadilly snob-shop, but Michael Hartnell, the chef, has at least one good card to play: this marvelous appetizer. With smoked haddock still a relative rarity in the United States, its smoky sweetness is a small taste of British sophistication, especially against the melting gold of the two tiny poached quail eggs he places above the pastry. Eaten at the bar, after the application of a Hendrick's martini, this dish can leave even the rubiest of American rubes feeling Bondlike and well fed. In the Pierre Hotel, 795 Fifth Avenue (61st Street), Upper East Side, (212) 940-8195.
THE FUSILLI WITH RED-WINE BRAISED OCTOPUS AND BONE MARROW AT MAREA This is surf and turf from Crazytown, Italy, near the American border. Michael White, the hugely talented pasta maven behind Chris Cannon's excellent new restaurant in the space that used to be San Domenico, cooks a mirepoix in a heavy pot, then adds baby octopus, Sangiovese and tomato purée. This simmers away for an hour, until the little fellows are fork tender and the sauce gone almost thick with flavor. The result is introduced to a serious amount of seared bone marrow and some twirls of house-made fusilli. The marrow emulsifies and acts as butter does in a sauce — if butter were 10 times richer than it already is. The combination is a loving marriage between separate species. 240 Central Park South (Broadway), Columbus Circle, (212) 582-5100.
THE POMMES ALIGOT AT MINETTA TAVERN A side dish, particularly well suited to the restaurant's excellent roast chicken, the pommes aligot at Keith McNally's glittery remake of this Greenwich Village landmark are a marvel of silky excellence. (They more than make up for the restaurant's one notable misstep: a partly open kitchen that clashes with both the aesthetic of the room and the heretofore modest demeanor of the men who run it, Riad Nasr and Lee Hanson.) Yukon Gold potatoes are whipped smooth with garlic, enormous amounts of butter and cheddar curds until they begin to turn to ribbons — a potato dish that is literally elastic. It tastes of Alpine clouds. 113 Macdougal Street (Minetta Lane), Greenwich Village, (212) 475-3850.
THE DUCK MEATLOAF AT BUTTERMILK CHANNEL Buttermilk Channel roared onto the Brooklyn dining scene late last year with family-friendly service, an excellent wine list and a great deal of comforting food. Popovers and fried chicken don't make year-end roundups, though. Rich, raisin-studded, thyme-infused duck meatloaf does. Doug Crowell, the restaurant's owner, is pairing the meat with puréed parsnips zipped on orange and star anise. You could do that at home, too, or try it alongside the pommes aligot. 524 Court Street (Huntington Street), Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, (718) 852-8490.
THE BOUDIN BASQUE AT DBGB KITCHEN AND BAR This disk of spicy blood sausage with bits of head meat for textural contrast is served above a small pool of scallion-brightened, cream-thickened mashed potatoes. It is the standout sausage among many at Daniel Boulud's audacious new restaurant on the lower Bowery, just a few steps down from the birthplace of punk rock. Through a spokeswoman, Georgette Farkas, Mr. Boulud declined to offer a recipe for the home cook. It's too easy for it all to go terribly wrong, Ms. Farkas said. Not at the restaurant, though! 299 Bowery (Houston Street), East Village, (212) 933-5300.
THE MEATBALL PIZZA AT CO. Jim Lahey's much debated Chelsea pizzeria is devoted almost to a fault to the excellence of its dough, as Frank Bruni sagely pointed out in his one-star review of the restaurant in the spring. But in recent months, Mr. Lahey's been dialing in his toppings and the use of his insanely hot oven; he's now putting out pies that are good enough to do justice to his dough and to rival the city's best pizzas. The veal meatball version, with buffalo mozzarella, tomato, caramelized onions, gaeta olives, aged pecorino and oregano, is my favorite. 230 Ninth Avenue (24th Street), Chelsea, (212) 243-1105.
THE PRIME MANHATTAN AT PRIME MEATS There are a lot of people here who appear to have dressed for a Vancouver trapping expedition, attended a gallery show in Bushwick, and then had the idea to mush over to Carroll Gardens for absinthe. But this restaurant from the brilliant team behind the Frankies empire, while not even yet completely open, has wonderful food and a truly inspired drinks menu arranged by Damon Boelte. His Manhattan, built out of 100-proof Rittenhouse rye, Dolin sweet vermouth and bitters made at the restaurant out of buddha's hand, a lemony citrus fruit, is a glass of refinement afforded only artists and dreamers: a direct portal into an imaginary 19th-century New York City. 465 Court Street (Luquer Street), Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, (718) 254-0327.
THE OYSTER PAN ROAST AT THE JOHN DORY Here's a wild card. This restaurant opened in December 2008, and closed in August. But April Bloomfield, the chef and an owner, and Ken Friedman, another owner, now have The Breslin to their name, and are making noises about reopening the John Dory in another space. So there's some chance we'll see this marvelous dish — a murderously rich pan roast topped with toast slathered in uni butter — again. Here's hoping: it made my winter last year. This year, you can cook it at home.
THE FRIED CURRIED PINK SNAPPER AT OCEANA Served upright, as if it had been caught swimming through hot oil and flash-fried into statuary, this amazing dish is among the most flavorful you can get at the new and massive version of stately old Oceana, now in the McGraw-Hill Building on West 49th Street. Served with lotus coins and strips of cucumber, with cilantro strewn here and there above its fantastic Indian-inflected sauce, it is a superb meal for two, accompanied by some spicy Napa cabbage. 1221 Avenue of the Americas (entrance on 49th Street), Midtown, (212) 759-5941.
THE CLASSIC BANH MI AT BAOGUETTE You can take subways, buses and trains to taste and debate the best banh mi in town. For the best I had in a new restaurant, though, look no farther than lower Lexington Avenue, where Michael Huynh opened Baoguette last December. His classic version, with house-made pâté, terrine and pork belly on a baguette from Tom Cat Bakery, with pickled daikon, cilantro and jalapeño, dabbed with their own mayo and squirted with fish sauce and Sriracha, is delicious and, at $5, among the best quality-to-cost ratios available in the city. 61 Lexington Avenue (between 25th and 26th Streets), Murray Hill, (212) 532-1133
THE MAPLE BUDINO AT LOCANDA VERDE Karen DeMasco is the wildly gifted pastry chef at Locanda Verde, which the chef Andrew Carmellini opened in the Greenwich Hotel in TriBeCa with a team of partners in the late spring. She brought a beautiful simplicity to the dessert menu at Tom Colicchio's Craft, where her impact was big enough that, more than a year after she left, she is still prominently featured on that restaurant's Web site. At Locanda Verde, she brings deep flavor and mischievous intensity to a dessert menu that sees its heights in a dark maple budino with candied pecans and cranberry sorbetto. Make it at home and serve it to friends exactly as if you were serving overstrong cocktails or recreational drugs. Taxonomically speaking, they are all of a piece. The Greenwich Hotel, 377 Greenwich Street (North Moore Street), TriBeCa, (212) 925-3797.
Critic’s Notebook - Selecting the Year’s Top 11 New Dishes - Review - NYTimes.com (30 December 2009)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/30/dining/reviews/30year.html?pagewanted=print
http://snipurl.com/twx9l
Bright Spots in a Year for Thrift By THE NEW YORK TIMES
December 30, 2009
Bright Spots in a Year for Thrift By THE NEW YORK TIMES
SOMETIMES the bill can help make a dining experience enjoyable. Here are some of the best affordable places from the Dining Briefs and $25 and Under columns this year, with the reviewer's name in parentheses.
AN CHOI The culinary thrill of Vietnamese streetside dining, like great pho and banh mi, combined with the camaraderie of a Lower East Side hangout. (Dave Cook) 85 Orchard Street (Broome Street), Lower East Side, (212) 226-3700.
CALEXICO CARNE ASADA The storefront sibling of the Vendy award-winning street cart makes a carne asada rolled quesadilla with a punch of flavor so intense, it's hard to justify ordering anything else. (Ligaya Mishan) 122 Union Street (Columbia Street), Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, (718) 488-8226.
CHARLES' COUNTRY PAN FRIED CHICKEN Charles Gabriel's celebrated buffet, and its superb fried chicken, is back in the game after being sidelined for nearly a year. (Dave Cook) 2839-2841 Frederick Douglass Boulevard (151st Street), (212) 281-1800.
HENRY PUBLIC A pub that honors Brooklyn's illustrious past, with classic cocktails complementing dishes like a delicious turkey leg sandwich. (Betsy Andrews) 329 Henry Street (Atlantic Avenue), Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, (718) 852-8630.
LAUT Hiding behind a pan-Asian menu is some of the best Malaysian food in Manhattan, like a roasted version of Hainanese chicken. (Julia Moskin) 15 East 17th Street, Flatiron district, (212) 206-8989, lautnyc.com.
M&T RESTAURANT The cuisine of Qingdao is prepared with elegant simplicity. Dishes balance strong flavors, like the fried ginseng and grass noodles. (Oliver Strand) 44-09 Kissena Boulevard, Flushing, Queens, (718) 539-4100.
MOMOFUKU MILK BAR At this adjunct to David Chang's Momofuku Ssam Bar, Christina Tosi prepares standouts like soft-serve ice cream, chocolate-chocolate cookie, candy-bar pie and chocolate cake with yellow-cake icing. (Ligaya Mishan) 207 Second Avenue (13th Street), East Village, (212) 254-3500.
MIMI'S HUMMUS This sunny cafe serves dishes — not just hummus — that bear traces of the chef's family history in Israel, Morocco and the Kurdish region of Iraq. (Ligaya Mishan) 1209 Cortelyou Road (Westminster Road), Ditmas Park, Brooklyn, (718) 284-4444.
NENA LA RUBIA'S STREET STAND The tiny menu has one terrific cheap thrill, a $1 cup of habichuelas con dulce: creamed red beans, coconut milk, spices and the occasional whole bean or chunk of sweet potato. (Dave Cook) 182nd Street near the southeast corner of St. Nicholas Avenue, no telephone.
RECIPE Small and friendly, sophisticated but not scary, it wraps local ingredients and refined cooking in a modern-rustic package. Try the banana tarte Tatin. (Julia Moskin) 452 Amsterdam Avenue (82nd Street), recipenyc.com, (212) 501-7755.
SALTIE A tiny sandwich shop where breads are baked in-house and the dessert case is filled with 10 or more different pastries. Sandwiches are careful compositions of bright and brawny flavors. (Oliver Strand) 378 Metropolitan Avenue (Havemeyer Street), Williamsburg, Brooklyn, (718) 387-4777, saltieny.com.
SARAGHINA This trattoria, with winning dishes like bluefish ragù, is a pretty and unexpected addition to the neighborhood. (Oliver Strand) 435 Halsey Street (Lewis Avenue), Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, no phone.
STUMPTOWN COFFEE ROASTERS Perfect cappuccino. (Oliver Strand) 20 West 29th Street (Broadway), no phone, stumptowncoffee.com.
TRINI-GUL Lines form early for the heady wraps of stew known as roti, for bake and shark (fry bread packed with seasoned fried shark bits), for jerk chicken and the whole crazy mash-up of Trinidadian cuisine: Indian, Creole, Chinese, African, Lebanese. (Sam Sifton) 543 Nostrand Avenue (Herkimer Street), Crown Heights, Brooklyn, (718) 484-4500.
UMI NOM Artful small plates of Asian comfort food — like sweet sausage, pork-belly adobo and bahay kubo fried rice — are elevated by technique but primal in appeal. (Ligaya Mishan) 433 DeKalb Avenue (Classon Avenue), Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, (718) 789-8806, uminom.com.
VINEGAR HILL HOUSE Confident, flavorful food, most of which comes out of a wood-burning oven, like the enormous heritage pork chop, is worth a wait. (Oliver Strand) 72 Hudson Avenue (Front Street), Vinegar Hill, Brooklyn, (718) 522-1018.
Highlights From the Dining Briefs and $25 and Under Columns - NYTimes.com (30 December 2009)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/30/dining/30others.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print
http://snipurl.com/twx7h
Bright Spots in a Year for Thrift By THE NEW YORK TIMES
SOMETIMES the bill can help make a dining experience enjoyable. Here are some of the best affordable places from the Dining Briefs and $25 and Under columns this year, with the reviewer's name in parentheses.
AN CHOI The culinary thrill of Vietnamese streetside dining, like great pho and banh mi, combined with the camaraderie of a Lower East Side hangout. (Dave Cook) 85 Orchard Street (Broome Street), Lower East Side, (212) 226-3700.
CALEXICO CARNE ASADA The storefront sibling of the Vendy award-winning street cart makes a carne asada rolled quesadilla with a punch of flavor so intense, it's hard to justify ordering anything else. (Ligaya Mishan) 122 Union Street (Columbia Street), Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, (718) 488-8226.
CHARLES' COUNTRY PAN FRIED CHICKEN Charles Gabriel's celebrated buffet, and its superb fried chicken, is back in the game after being sidelined for nearly a year. (Dave Cook) 2839-2841 Frederick Douglass Boulevard (151st Street), (212) 281-1800.
HENRY PUBLIC A pub that honors Brooklyn's illustrious past, with classic cocktails complementing dishes like a delicious turkey leg sandwich. (Betsy Andrews) 329 Henry Street (Atlantic Avenue), Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, (718) 852-8630.
LAUT Hiding behind a pan-Asian menu is some of the best Malaysian food in Manhattan, like a roasted version of Hainanese chicken. (Julia Moskin) 15 East 17th Street, Flatiron district, (212) 206-8989, lautnyc.com.
M&T RESTAURANT The cuisine of Qingdao is prepared with elegant simplicity. Dishes balance strong flavors, like the fried ginseng and grass noodles. (Oliver Strand) 44-09 Kissena Boulevard, Flushing, Queens, (718) 539-4100.
MOMOFUKU MILK BAR At this adjunct to David Chang's Momofuku Ssam Bar, Christina Tosi prepares standouts like soft-serve ice cream, chocolate-chocolate cookie, candy-bar pie and chocolate cake with yellow-cake icing. (Ligaya Mishan) 207 Second Avenue (13th Street), East Village, (212) 254-3500.
MIMI'S HUMMUS This sunny cafe serves dishes — not just hummus — that bear traces of the chef's family history in Israel, Morocco and the Kurdish region of Iraq. (Ligaya Mishan) 1209 Cortelyou Road (Westminster Road), Ditmas Park, Brooklyn, (718) 284-4444.
NENA LA RUBIA'S STREET STAND The tiny menu has one terrific cheap thrill, a $1 cup of habichuelas con dulce: creamed red beans, coconut milk, spices and the occasional whole bean or chunk of sweet potato. (Dave Cook) 182nd Street near the southeast corner of St. Nicholas Avenue, no telephone.
RECIPE Small and friendly, sophisticated but not scary, it wraps local ingredients and refined cooking in a modern-rustic package. Try the banana tarte Tatin. (Julia Moskin) 452 Amsterdam Avenue (82nd Street), recipenyc.com, (212) 501-7755.
SALTIE A tiny sandwich shop where breads are baked in-house and the dessert case is filled with 10 or more different pastries. Sandwiches are careful compositions of bright and brawny flavors. (Oliver Strand) 378 Metropolitan Avenue (Havemeyer Street), Williamsburg, Brooklyn, (718) 387-4777, saltieny.com.
SARAGHINA This trattoria, with winning dishes like bluefish ragù, is a pretty and unexpected addition to the neighborhood. (Oliver Strand) 435 Halsey Street (Lewis Avenue), Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, no phone.
STUMPTOWN COFFEE ROASTERS Perfect cappuccino. (Oliver Strand) 20 West 29th Street (Broadway), no phone, stumptowncoffee.com.
TRINI-GUL Lines form early for the heady wraps of stew known as roti, for bake and shark (fry bread packed with seasoned fried shark bits), for jerk chicken and the whole crazy mash-up of Trinidadian cuisine: Indian, Creole, Chinese, African, Lebanese. (Sam Sifton) 543 Nostrand Avenue (Herkimer Street), Crown Heights, Brooklyn, (718) 484-4500.
UMI NOM Artful small plates of Asian comfort food — like sweet sausage, pork-belly adobo and bahay kubo fried rice — are elevated by technique but primal in appeal. (Ligaya Mishan) 433 DeKalb Avenue (Classon Avenue), Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, (718) 789-8806, uminom.com.
VINEGAR HILL HOUSE Confident, flavorful food, most of which comes out of a wood-burning oven, like the enormous heritage pork chop, is worth a wait. (Oliver Strand) 72 Hudson Avenue (Front Street), Vinegar Hill, Brooklyn, (718) 522-1018.
Highlights From the Dining Briefs and $25 and Under Columns - NYTimes.com (30 December 2009)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/30/dining/30others.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print
http://snipurl.com/twx7h
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards
Find this article at:
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards_3.aspx
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards (29 December 2009)
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards_3.aspx?p=1
http://snipurl.com/twi2r
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards
The D Home editors found the prettiest particulars in restaurants all around town. Forget the food. This is all about the most delightful dining details.
By by the D Home editors
D Home NOV-DEC 2009
Best International Experience
(above) Dining at Tei An is like taking a trip to Japan—without the outrageous airfare and jet lag. Hatsumi Kuzuu of Kuzuu Design succeeded in bringing the best of Tokyo to One Arts Plaza. The atmosphere is decidedly chic yet natural—a sake cup installation mixes with the beautiful stonework arranged in the middle of the restaurant. The utilitarian—and somewhat sobering—uniforms come straight from the Japanese soba bars.
Best Lighting
(above) Dean Fearing knows women. Even better, he knows Dallas women. That's why it's no surprise that his namesake restaurant Fearing's boasts seven separate dining areas—each with its own distinct lighting scheme. Whether you're recovering from a little nip/tuck or feeling like a million bucks after a day at the Ritz-Carlton, Dallas spa, there's a table for you in the Johnson Studio-designed space that is sure to show you in your best light.
Best Acoustics
(above) Whether you're having the "It's not you, it's me" talk or proposing marriage, you won't risk being misheard at Salum. Not that it was planned that way. "We had no idea what it would sound like in there," owner and chef Abraham Salum says. So much for best-laid plans. In the end, though, designer Julio Quiñones created a sleek, sophisticated space that's ideal for those with a need to be heard.
Best Place to Have an Affair
(above left) Designed by local firm Plan B Group, The Stoneleigh Hotel's restaurant Bolla showcases rich colors and textures with a modern and glamorous appeal. The flattering lighting, chic chandeliers, and privacy panels make it the perfect place to sample forbidden fruit. The hotel rooms upstairs don't hurt either.
Best Tapestry
(above right) We've always coveted the tapestry on the east wall of Hattie's in Oak Cliff. No more coveting: turns out it is a digital photo printed on a
micro-fiber canvas, and anyone can use the technique to replicate the image of their choice. "The Legend of the Blue Willow" plate was created by Meisel in Dallas.
Best Wine Room
(above left) One could argue that any seat where you're sipping wine is the best seat in the house. We beg to differ. Experience the glass room in the middle of The Fish, designed by co-owner Michael Collins and built by Kevin Dinh. It holds 2,400 bottles of wine and seats 14 very comfortably. What was the inspiration? Collins wanted an exclusive private area—with separate climate and volume controls—ideal for birthday parties, bachelorette fetes, or even an executive lunch meeting.
Best Wall Coverings
(above right) Any Golden Girls fan worth his weight knows that the botanical wallpaper at Park is the very same used in Ms. Blanche Devereaux's boudoir. The Martinique "A" print by Beverly Hills Wallpaper is just part of the fun of the colorful Breck Woolsey-designed space, which is also filled with photographs by Allison V. Smith.
Best Presentation
(above left) We have a love/hate relationship with the desserts at Tillman's Roadhouse. We love the desserts, and we hate ourselves for not being able to resist them. Maybe that's why we love the "cookie paddle" so much. The R.W. Smith & Company-designed piece is perfect for meting out the appropriate punishment after we once again inhale one cookie too many.
Best Table
(above right) Admit it: the restaurant table often gets short shrift. You're so busy looking into your special someone's eyes—or into the bottom of your glass, depending on the day—to note the fine details of the dining surface. Not so at the Rosewood Mansion on Turtle Creek. The tables chosen by design firm BAMO are a marriage that crosses state lines: bases are by Alabama merchant Table Topics, and the Macasssar veneer is from Dallas' Wood Gallery.
Best Silverware
(above at bottom) Dining at Hôtel St. Germain is a lesson in elegance. Just as the men don ties and jackets, the tables are dressed in their finest. The linen tablecloths, antique Limoges china, and crystal wine glasses set the scene perfectly, but what really pulls it all together is the antique silverware. The establishment's vast collection, which was two decades in the making, includes nearly a thousand pieces in more than 30 patterns. The flatware is so beautiful, you just might be inspired to start a collection of your own.
Best Concept
(above) There's just something about Charlie Palmer at The Joule that gets us excited. It's probably because the place is full of energy—literally. Designer Adam Tihany nestled six slowly rotating wind turbines in the ceiling as an homage to Texas wind energy, and artist Bram Tihany (Adam's son) created six wind-themed photo art pieces for the restaurant, with fantastical subjects such as The Wizard of Oz. You'll be blown away, we promise.
Best Checkout
(above left) Our friends at Shinsei encourage you to focus on a different time—the days of your youth—instead of that pesky bill. So they deliver the bad news in the pages of a children's book such as Goodnight Moon. The best part: it works. Plus, you can borrow this idea. Use your favorite literary works for place settings or name cards at your next dinner party.
Best Comic Relief
(above right) There's plenty of delicious pork on the menu at Smoke, but the pigs that really put a smile on our face are the ones on these quirky dishes the restaurant uses as bread plates. Part of the Les Cochons line by Jill Butler, the appetizer plates can be purchased as a set of four. Combine them with her matching glasses and "tidbit dishes," and you'll be in hog heaven.
Best Overall
(above) In our debates to the death regarding each category, one restaurant kept showing up: Rise No. 1. Why? Everything about this charming, authentic French restaurant is meant to contribute to a five-sensory experience. Even the bathroom is darling. Owner Hedda Dowd designed the space, and, luckily, she's willing to share. Everything in the restaurant is for sale: the silver, linens, even the chair you're sitting on. And feel free to borrow one of the books in the library, as long as you replace it with one of your own.
Best Booth
(above) Our crush on Craft owner Tom Colicchio has nothing to do with this proclamation. The intimate booths here, part of the design scheme by New York-based Bentel & Bentel Architects/Planners, win on their own merits. That said, we wouldn't be opposed to canoodling with the Top Chef judge in a corner booth after inhaling some of Craft's signature chocolate chip cookies.
Best Napkin
(above left) Snagging a table at Neighborhood Services is no easy feat. The restaurant doesn't take reservations, so your wait may include making a friend—or enemy or two—at the bar. Once you finally get seated, signal your good fortune (or raise your white flag, if necessary) with this adorable linen napkin from Admiral Linen and Uniform Service. The buttonhole even ensures that your new Tommy Bahama shirt will remain unsoiled.
Best Plates
(above right) Masterpieces by Nana's Anthony Bombaci are obviously a treat on regular china. But plan a private party of 20 or so, and you can experience a Bombaci creation served on Versace—Medusa or Russian Dream patterns. It's out of this world. Purchase your own set at Neiman Marcus, Bombaci fare not included.
Best Outdoor Furniture
(above left) Until recently, we never liked to think about eating in conjunction with trying on clothes. The veranda at Cibus at NorthPark Center changed all that. Eating al fresco at the mall feels downright cosmopolitan when you're lounging in a "Thayla" chair by Kartell, in all of its "almost feminine form" glory. Purchase
your own Kartell collection at
Scott + Cooner.
Best Place to Rest your Bum
(above right) At most restaurants, you don't spend much time admiring the spot where you put your tush. Not so at Screen Door. George Cameron Nash designed the "One Arts" chair for the restaurant, and the style has become a top seller. With their generous seating proportions, the chairs provide the ideal place to settle in for a leisurely brunch, lunch, dinner, or afternoon tea. Both pretty and comfy, these seats are just as stylish and genteel as you'd expect in a "modern Southern kitchen."
Best Bar
(above left) Is there a more sophisticated place to drink than Highland Park Village's Cafe Pacific? From the black and white tiled floor to the tiny tables and the marble-topped bar, every detail is perfection. The people-watching at this haunt, open for some 29 years, is surpassed only by the dizzying array of liquors stocked behind the bar. According to a source who knows: "It's the best-stocked bar in Dallas. They have liquors other bartenders have never even heard of."
Best Fountain
(above center) Close your eyes and listen to the soothing sounds of the fountain on the patio at Dakota's and you're sure to find some peace. Close your next deal, and you might even be able to afford a fabulous fountain of your own. In the meantime, close out the bar while enjoying this Akard Street fixture, designed by the late Keith Simmons of HKS Inc. in the early 1990s.
Best Art Collection
(above right) Server Tamara White and pastry chef Rick Griggs lead double lives at Abacus. Sure, White is happy to talk specials and Griggs makes a mean dessert, but both are also accomplished artists. Check out their artwork hanging around the restaurant and purchase pieces of your own at Nest.
Best-Looking Waitstaff
(above) The employees at the Park Cities Houston's could have come directly from central casting. Clad in black uniforms, dewy-eyed, and polite, these waiters and waitresses have faces fit for head shots and portfolios. Even better: the fine fleet combines good looks with great service. Trust us, you drink your water (or wine) a little faster here just for the punctual refill.
Best Entrance
(above left) When Liz and Jim Baron opened the Blue Mesa Grill on Northwest Highway, they faced a couple of challenges: how to create a dramatic entryway in a strip mall and how to avoid the second-floor "kiss of death." Architect Rick Carrell saved the day with this gorgeous oversize door that creates a canyon effect in the restaurant's entry. Once inside, you completely forget that you passed a Container Store on your way in.
Best Private Dining Room
(above right) Todd Fiscus and Rob Dailey created something out of a fairy tale in the back room at Tillman's Roadhouse. The dreamy, tree- and feather-filled private parlor can seat up to 24, and it's ideal for an elegant lunch, dinner, or cocktail reception. Choose from three set menus. Looking to bring some of this whimsy to your own backhouse? Hire party planner extraordinaire Fiscus for your next big bash.
Best Side Service
(above) At Rathbun's Blue Plate Kitchen, the side dishes are a main attraction—and not only because of the food. The serving dishes aren't bad either. While you're munching on veggies, grits, and other sides, the lovely pots from Le Creuset add a splash of color to your table decor. Lucky for you, the cookware company just opened a new signature space in Allen (see p. 24), so getting this look at home just became a whole lot easier.
Best Lip Service
(above) Wet your whistle with these gorgeous glasses: (from top left) Impulse! Enterprises Galaxy water glass at Villa-O; silver mint julep glass from Screen Door; hand-blown polka dot water glass at Stephan Pyles; La Duni water glass; Riedel beer stein at Neighborhood Services; and Schott Zwiesel Pure fine champagne glass at Charlie Palmer.
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards (29 December 2009)
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards_3.aspx?p=1
http://snipurl.com/twi2r
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards (29 December 2009)
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards_2.aspx?p=1
http://snipurl.com/twi4b
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards (29 December 2009)
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards.aspx?p=1
http://snipurl.com/twi3p
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards_3.aspx
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards (29 December 2009)
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards_3.aspx?p=1
http://snipurl.com/twi2r
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards
The D Home editors found the prettiest particulars in restaurants all around town. Forget the food. This is all about the most delightful dining details.
By by the D Home editors
D Home NOV-DEC 2009
Best International Experience
(above) Dining at Tei An is like taking a trip to Japan—without the outrageous airfare and jet lag. Hatsumi Kuzuu of Kuzuu Design succeeded in bringing the best of Tokyo to One Arts Plaza. The atmosphere is decidedly chic yet natural—a sake cup installation mixes with the beautiful stonework arranged in the middle of the restaurant. The utilitarian—and somewhat sobering—uniforms come straight from the Japanese soba bars.
Best Lighting
(above) Dean Fearing knows women. Even better, he knows Dallas women. That's why it's no surprise that his namesake restaurant Fearing's boasts seven separate dining areas—each with its own distinct lighting scheme. Whether you're recovering from a little nip/tuck or feeling like a million bucks after a day at the Ritz-Carlton, Dallas spa, there's a table for you in the Johnson Studio-designed space that is sure to show you in your best light.
Best Acoustics
(above) Whether you're having the "It's not you, it's me" talk or proposing marriage, you won't risk being misheard at Salum. Not that it was planned that way. "We had no idea what it would sound like in there," owner and chef Abraham Salum says. So much for best-laid plans. In the end, though, designer Julio Quiñones created a sleek, sophisticated space that's ideal for those with a need to be heard.
Best Place to Have an Affair
(above left) Designed by local firm Plan B Group, The Stoneleigh Hotel's restaurant Bolla showcases rich colors and textures with a modern and glamorous appeal. The flattering lighting, chic chandeliers, and privacy panels make it the perfect place to sample forbidden fruit. The hotel rooms upstairs don't hurt either.
Best Tapestry
(above right) We've always coveted the tapestry on the east wall of Hattie's in Oak Cliff. No more coveting: turns out it is a digital photo printed on a
micro-fiber canvas, and anyone can use the technique to replicate the image of their choice. "The Legend of the Blue Willow" plate was created by Meisel in Dallas.
Best Wine Room
(above left) One could argue that any seat where you're sipping wine is the best seat in the house. We beg to differ. Experience the glass room in the middle of The Fish, designed by co-owner Michael Collins and built by Kevin Dinh. It holds 2,400 bottles of wine and seats 14 very comfortably. What was the inspiration? Collins wanted an exclusive private area—with separate climate and volume controls—ideal for birthday parties, bachelorette fetes, or even an executive lunch meeting.
Best Wall Coverings
(above right) Any Golden Girls fan worth his weight knows that the botanical wallpaper at Park is the very same used in Ms. Blanche Devereaux's boudoir. The Martinique "A" print by Beverly Hills Wallpaper is just part of the fun of the colorful Breck Woolsey-designed space, which is also filled with photographs by Allison V. Smith.
Best Presentation
(above left) We have a love/hate relationship with the desserts at Tillman's Roadhouse. We love the desserts, and we hate ourselves for not being able to resist them. Maybe that's why we love the "cookie paddle" so much. The R.W. Smith & Company-designed piece is perfect for meting out the appropriate punishment after we once again inhale one cookie too many.
Best Table
(above right) Admit it: the restaurant table often gets short shrift. You're so busy looking into your special someone's eyes—or into the bottom of your glass, depending on the day—to note the fine details of the dining surface. Not so at the Rosewood Mansion on Turtle Creek. The tables chosen by design firm BAMO are a marriage that crosses state lines: bases are by Alabama merchant Table Topics, and the Macasssar veneer is from Dallas' Wood Gallery.
Best Silverware
(above at bottom) Dining at Hôtel St. Germain is a lesson in elegance. Just as the men don ties and jackets, the tables are dressed in their finest. The linen tablecloths, antique Limoges china, and crystal wine glasses set the scene perfectly, but what really pulls it all together is the antique silverware. The establishment's vast collection, which was two decades in the making, includes nearly a thousand pieces in more than 30 patterns. The flatware is so beautiful, you just might be inspired to start a collection of your own.
Best Concept
(above) There's just something about Charlie Palmer at The Joule that gets us excited. It's probably because the place is full of energy—literally. Designer Adam Tihany nestled six slowly rotating wind turbines in the ceiling as an homage to Texas wind energy, and artist Bram Tihany (Adam's son) created six wind-themed photo art pieces for the restaurant, with fantastical subjects such as The Wizard of Oz. You'll be blown away, we promise.
Best Checkout
(above left) Our friends at Shinsei encourage you to focus on a different time—the days of your youth—instead of that pesky bill. So they deliver the bad news in the pages of a children's book such as Goodnight Moon. The best part: it works. Plus, you can borrow this idea. Use your favorite literary works for place settings or name cards at your next dinner party.
Best Comic Relief
(above right) There's plenty of delicious pork on the menu at Smoke, but the pigs that really put a smile on our face are the ones on these quirky dishes the restaurant uses as bread plates. Part of the Les Cochons line by Jill Butler, the appetizer plates can be purchased as a set of four. Combine them with her matching glasses and "tidbit dishes," and you'll be in hog heaven.
Best Overall
(above) In our debates to the death regarding each category, one restaurant kept showing up: Rise No. 1. Why? Everything about this charming, authentic French restaurant is meant to contribute to a five-sensory experience. Even the bathroom is darling. Owner Hedda Dowd designed the space, and, luckily, she's willing to share. Everything in the restaurant is for sale: the silver, linens, even the chair you're sitting on. And feel free to borrow one of the books in the library, as long as you replace it with one of your own.
Best Booth
(above) Our crush on Craft owner Tom Colicchio has nothing to do with this proclamation. The intimate booths here, part of the design scheme by New York-based Bentel & Bentel Architects/Planners, win on their own merits. That said, we wouldn't be opposed to canoodling with the Top Chef judge in a corner booth after inhaling some of Craft's signature chocolate chip cookies.
Best Napkin
(above left) Snagging a table at Neighborhood Services is no easy feat. The restaurant doesn't take reservations, so your wait may include making a friend—or enemy or two—at the bar. Once you finally get seated, signal your good fortune (or raise your white flag, if necessary) with this adorable linen napkin from Admiral Linen and Uniform Service. The buttonhole even ensures that your new Tommy Bahama shirt will remain unsoiled.
Best Plates
(above right) Masterpieces by Nana's Anthony Bombaci are obviously a treat on regular china. But plan a private party of 20 or so, and you can experience a Bombaci creation served on Versace—Medusa or Russian Dream patterns. It's out of this world. Purchase your own set at Neiman Marcus, Bombaci fare not included.
Best Outdoor Furniture
(above left) Until recently, we never liked to think about eating in conjunction with trying on clothes. The veranda at Cibus at NorthPark Center changed all that. Eating al fresco at the mall feels downright cosmopolitan when you're lounging in a "Thayla" chair by Kartell, in all of its "almost feminine form" glory. Purchase
your own Kartell collection at
Scott + Cooner.
Best Place to Rest your Bum
(above right) At most restaurants, you don't spend much time admiring the spot where you put your tush. Not so at Screen Door. George Cameron Nash designed the "One Arts" chair for the restaurant, and the style has become a top seller. With their generous seating proportions, the chairs provide the ideal place to settle in for a leisurely brunch, lunch, dinner, or afternoon tea. Both pretty and comfy, these seats are just as stylish and genteel as you'd expect in a "modern Southern kitchen."
Best Bar
(above left) Is there a more sophisticated place to drink than Highland Park Village's Cafe Pacific? From the black and white tiled floor to the tiny tables and the marble-topped bar, every detail is perfection. The people-watching at this haunt, open for some 29 years, is surpassed only by the dizzying array of liquors stocked behind the bar. According to a source who knows: "It's the best-stocked bar in Dallas. They have liquors other bartenders have never even heard of."
Best Fountain
(above center) Close your eyes and listen to the soothing sounds of the fountain on the patio at Dakota's and you're sure to find some peace. Close your next deal, and you might even be able to afford a fabulous fountain of your own. In the meantime, close out the bar while enjoying this Akard Street fixture, designed by the late Keith Simmons of HKS Inc. in the early 1990s.
Best Art Collection
(above right) Server Tamara White and pastry chef Rick Griggs lead double lives at Abacus. Sure, White is happy to talk specials and Griggs makes a mean dessert, but both are also accomplished artists. Check out their artwork hanging around the restaurant and purchase pieces of your own at Nest.
Best-Looking Waitstaff
(above) The employees at the Park Cities Houston's could have come directly from central casting. Clad in black uniforms, dewy-eyed, and polite, these waiters and waitresses have faces fit for head shots and portfolios. Even better: the fine fleet combines good looks with great service. Trust us, you drink your water (or wine) a little faster here just for the punctual refill.
Best Entrance
(above left) When Liz and Jim Baron opened the Blue Mesa Grill on Northwest Highway, they faced a couple of challenges: how to create a dramatic entryway in a strip mall and how to avoid the second-floor "kiss of death." Architect Rick Carrell saved the day with this gorgeous oversize door that creates a canyon effect in the restaurant's entry. Once inside, you completely forget that you passed a Container Store on your way in.
Best Private Dining Room
(above right) Todd Fiscus and Rob Dailey created something out of a fairy tale in the back room at Tillman's Roadhouse. The dreamy, tree- and feather-filled private parlor can seat up to 24, and it's ideal for an elegant lunch, dinner, or cocktail reception. Choose from three set menus. Looking to bring some of this whimsy to your own backhouse? Hire party planner extraordinaire Fiscus for your next big bash.
Best Side Service
(above) At Rathbun's Blue Plate Kitchen, the side dishes are a main attraction—and not only because of the food. The serving dishes aren't bad either. While you're munching on veggies, grits, and other sides, the lovely pots from Le Creuset add a splash of color to your table decor. Lucky for you, the cookware company just opened a new signature space in Allen (see p. 24), so getting this look at home just became a whole lot easier.
Best Lip Service
(above) Wet your whistle with these gorgeous glasses: (from top left) Impulse! Enterprises Galaxy water glass at Villa-O; silver mint julep glass from Screen Door; hand-blown polka dot water glass at Stephan Pyles; La Duni water glass; Riedel beer stein at Neighborhood Services; and Schott Zwiesel Pure fine champagne glass at Charlie Palmer.
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards (29 December 2009)
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards_3.aspx?p=1
http://snipurl.com/twi2r
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards (29 December 2009)
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards_2.aspx?p=1
http://snipurl.com/twi4b
The 2009 Dallas Restaurant Design Awards (29 December 2009)
http://www.dmagazine.com/Home/D_Home/2009/November_December/The_2009_Dallas_Restaurant_Design_Awards.aspx?p=1
http://snipurl.com/twi3p
Ten chefs to watch Leslie Brenner
Ten chefs to watch Leslie Brenner
Heading into the new decade, there are a number of chefs in and around Big D who seem to be bursting with fresh ideas. Here are ten I'll be keeping my eye on:
1. Christopher Short. I loved what he did at Bella, the beautiful-people spot near the Quandrangle, which he recently left. He'll be heading up the kitchen at Artin's Grill, with a planned opening later this month. Kim Pierce recently quoted him as saying it will be "an upscale, casual American grill with a huge, hickory-burning grill." His cooking is appealing and unpretentious, with solid technique and a focus on flavor; he does pastry as well as savory. Can't wait to see where he's going.
2. Jeff Harris. The East Texas-born UT graduate landed his first job four days out of culinary school, at Craft in New York, and Tom Colicchio made him top toque at Craft Dallas earlier this year. Harris has a terrific feel for produce and fish (I loved his halibut with butter beans, crave his artichoke risotto with roasted garlic). He's quite the talent, bound to make a lot of noise in this town sooner or later.
3. David Uygur. Big D's foodie community was pretty heartbroken when Lola, where Uygur was chef, closed in the fall. But Uygur has promised to return, with plans to open a small Italian restaurant, where he'll feature house-made pastas and house-cured salumi. (His cured meats at Lola were outstanding.) It'll be fascinating to see his what he does as he lights out on his own.
4. Molly McCook. The Louisiana-born, California-trained chef made a terrific debut at Ellerbe Fine Foods, which owns with her childhood friend, Richard King. Anyone who can deliver such compelling cooking right out of the gate is worth watching.
5. Randall Copeland and Nathan Tate. At Ava in Rockwall, they cook as a team, so they share an entry. My experiences at Ava were uneven, but these young chefs have some good ideas -- I still remember their wonderful wood-roasted pork chop with Canton peaches. Like McCook, they revere great produce and they're devoted to working with farmers, which benefits everyone, so as they gain experience, it'll be interesting to see how they progress.
6. Tre Wilcox. It was a relatively quiet year for the one-time "Top Chef" star, who has been practicing his craft at Loft 610 in Plano. But he's got more than that cooking -- he and Loft 610 owner Brian Twomey plan to open a more chef-driven restaurant later this year in Highland Park. Though Wilcox told me he draws a percentage at Loft 610, this, he says will be his first experience as a real chef-owner. I doubt I'm the only one who will be excited to see what he does.
7. Sara C. Johannes. Wolfgang Puck is notoriously good to work for (so my L.A. sources have long told me); therefore I'd be very surprised if this talented chef leaves the fold anytime in the foreseeable future. But clearly she's got the chops. Will her skill and ideas continue to develop at Five Sixty? If so, she could gain the kind of amazing but somewhat-under-the-radar status that Lee Hefter, the brilliant execu-chef who heads Spago Beverly Hills, enjoys. The kind of chef where you absolutely must stop by and see (and taste) what's happening on her plates.
8. Kelly Hightower. The former Hattie's chef, who has been charming diners at Kavala in Oak Cliff, reportedly plans to turn the Mediterranean Grill into a tapas bar. If the rumors are true, he also plans to be involved in a music venue with an international soul fusion menu. I still have not dined at Kavala (I'd better hurry, I guess!), but anyone who gets that much rumor-buzz merits keeping an eye on.
9. Tim Byers. True, the former Stephan Pyles chef has made a lot of noise lately at Smoke, the Oak Cliff restaurant he co-owns with Christopher Jeffers and Chris Zielke. But the kid's a creative whiz, and no doubt he'll continue to impress and surprise -- starting with the "guerrilla restaurant" the trio plans to open in mid-January.
10. Bruno Davaillon. Sure, we're watching the new chef at The Mansion. Isn't everyone?
OK, whom are you watching?
EATS | dallasnews.com (29 December 2009)
http://eatsblog.dallasnews.com/
http://snipurl.com/twhwm
Heading into the new decade, there are a number of chefs in and around Big D who seem to be bursting with fresh ideas. Here are ten I'll be keeping my eye on:
1. Christopher Short. I loved what he did at Bella, the beautiful-people spot near the Quandrangle, which he recently left. He'll be heading up the kitchen at Artin's Grill, with a planned opening later this month. Kim Pierce recently quoted him as saying it will be "an upscale, casual American grill with a huge, hickory-burning grill." His cooking is appealing and unpretentious, with solid technique and a focus on flavor; he does pastry as well as savory. Can't wait to see where he's going.
2. Jeff Harris. The East Texas-born UT graduate landed his first job four days out of culinary school, at Craft in New York, and Tom Colicchio made him top toque at Craft Dallas earlier this year. Harris has a terrific feel for produce and fish (I loved his halibut with butter beans, crave his artichoke risotto with roasted garlic). He's quite the talent, bound to make a lot of noise in this town sooner or later.
3. David Uygur. Big D's foodie community was pretty heartbroken when Lola, where Uygur was chef, closed in the fall. But Uygur has promised to return, with plans to open a small Italian restaurant, where he'll feature house-made pastas and house-cured salumi. (His cured meats at Lola were outstanding.) It'll be fascinating to see his what he does as he lights out on his own.
4. Molly McCook. The Louisiana-born, California-trained chef made a terrific debut at Ellerbe Fine Foods, which owns with her childhood friend, Richard King. Anyone who can deliver such compelling cooking right out of the gate is worth watching.
5. Randall Copeland and Nathan Tate. At Ava in Rockwall, they cook as a team, so they share an entry. My experiences at Ava were uneven, but these young chefs have some good ideas -- I still remember their wonderful wood-roasted pork chop with Canton peaches. Like McCook, they revere great produce and they're devoted to working with farmers, which benefits everyone, so as they gain experience, it'll be interesting to see how they progress.
6. Tre Wilcox. It was a relatively quiet year for the one-time "Top Chef" star, who has been practicing his craft at Loft 610 in Plano. But he's got more than that cooking -- he and Loft 610 owner Brian Twomey plan to open a more chef-driven restaurant later this year in Highland Park. Though Wilcox told me he draws a percentage at Loft 610, this, he says will be his first experience as a real chef-owner. I doubt I'm the only one who will be excited to see what he does.
7. Sara C. Johannes. Wolfgang Puck is notoriously good to work for (so my L.A. sources have long told me); therefore I'd be very surprised if this talented chef leaves the fold anytime in the foreseeable future. But clearly she's got the chops. Will her skill and ideas continue to develop at Five Sixty? If so, she could gain the kind of amazing but somewhat-under-the-radar status that Lee Hefter, the brilliant execu-chef who heads Spago Beverly Hills, enjoys. The kind of chef where you absolutely must stop by and see (and taste) what's happening on her plates.
8. Kelly Hightower. The former Hattie's chef, who has been charming diners at Kavala in Oak Cliff, reportedly plans to turn the Mediterranean Grill into a tapas bar. If the rumors are true, he also plans to be involved in a music venue with an international soul fusion menu. I still have not dined at Kavala (I'd better hurry, I guess!), but anyone who gets that much rumor-buzz merits keeping an eye on.
9. Tim Byers. True, the former Stephan Pyles chef has made a lot of noise lately at Smoke, the Oak Cliff restaurant he co-owns with Christopher Jeffers and Chris Zielke. But the kid's a creative whiz, and no doubt he'll continue to impress and surprise -- starting with the "guerrilla restaurant" the trio plans to open in mid-January.
10. Bruno Davaillon. Sure, we're watching the new chef at The Mansion. Isn't everyone?
OK, whom are you watching?
EATS | dallasnews.com (29 December 2009)
http://eatsblog.dallasnews.com/
http://snipurl.com/twhwm
Sunday, December 27, 2009
From Brussels-sprout kimchi in Illinois to beef with parsnip milk in Oakland, the best of 2009 By RAYMOND SOKOLOV
The Year in Food
From Brussels-sprout kimchi in Illinois to beef with parsnip milk in Oakland, the best of 2009 By RAYMOND SOKOLOV
In a rough year for the economy, it's been a good year for food. Here are my picks for the sweetest spots in the 2009 foodie menu.
BEST NEW RESTAURANT
This is too big and various a nation to have a best of anything. So I've picked three standout new eateries, East, West and heartland.
East: A Voce Columbus
(10 Columbus Circle, New York, 212-823-2523, avocerestaurant.com)
Missy Robbins has brought the neo-Italian gospel from her last gig, at Chicago's Spiaggia, to the third-floor restaurant ghetto at the Time Warner Center. Sicily is a primary inspiration here: Pine nuts, raisins and citrus undergird graceful revisions of classics. But all of Italy contributes something—as does Ms. Robbins's imagination—to polenta punctuated by tiny black dots of ground buckwheat.
West: Commis
(3859 Piedmont Ave., Oakland, Calif., 510-653-3902,
commisrestaurant.com)
Oakland-born James Syhabout opened his own storefront place in his native city only four months before he got a Michelin star. Commis means apprentice, and Mr. Syhabout has worked for some of the best chefs in the Bay area and abroad, at places like Spain's El Bulli, the U.K.'s Fat Duck and Manresa in Los Gatos, Calif. In the process, he has honed a palatal gift that allows him to combine exotic ingredients seldom melded in one dish. Instead of steak sauce, your beef might come with pearl barley, parsnip milk and wild anise.
Heartland: June
(4450 N Prospect Rd., Peoria Heights, Ill., 309-682-5863
www.junerestaurant.com)
June graces a mini-mall in this no-frills river town, but the wide world echoes here, in an up-to-the-minute open kitchen. With produce provided by an 80-acre organic farm, the restaurant, under Josh Adams, improves on the locavore bounty, turning Brussels sprouts into kimchi and grinding its own duck sausage.
BEST NEW DISH
I watched Joël Robuchon fine-tune the dish of the year for the spring menu at his hyper-opulent Joël Robuchon in the MGM Grand in Las Vegas (3799 Las Vegas Blvd. S., 702-891-7925, www.mgmgrand.com). It was a dish layered with a crab mixture and strips of yellow-brown sea urchin, which the chef took from a neat pile. Minced, raw white cauliflower lurked within the crabmeat mix as a stealth carrier of a starch element that makes this dish a no-grain, marine cousin of tabbouleh, the ancient Near Eastern salad based on bulghur wheat and mint. Mr. Robuchon has moved on through several seasonal menus by now, but we won't soon forget this springtime caprice.
BEST EXOTIC NEW INGREDIENT
Pagliolaia, the dewlap or flap that hangs down from the jowls of the steer. We encountered it at Spiaggia (980 North Michigan Ave., Chicago, 312-280-2750, spiaggiarestaurant.com). Chef Tony Mantuano's idea of surf 'n turf is wood-roasted diver scallops with black trumpet mushrooms and crispy pagliolaia. The hearty beef fragments and earthy fungus highlight the slippery elegance of the seafood. Having dewlaps myself, I winced for a minute but surrendered to the brilliance of the conception and the resourcefulness of Spiaggia's butcher.
MOST IMPORTANT PUBLIC FOOD ACTS
President Barack Obama invited Cuban-American New Jersey chef/restaurateur Maricel Presilla to oversee the food at a White House event celebrating Latino music. The menu included Argentinean beef empanadas with red chimichurri; Brazilian black-eyed pea arrumadinho, Honduran enchiladas with chicken hash; and Cuban roast pork and malanga (a tropical root vegetable) canapes with lulu sauce. This was a groundbreaking nod from the First Eater to the heritage food of Latino citizens.
Mr. Obama continued his foray into ethnogastropolitics by engaging New York-based, Ethiopian-Swedish chef Marcus Samuelsson to cook the administration's first state dinner, an Indian-fusion meal for the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Old Washington hands muttered about the wisdom of serving a visiting envoy the food of his own country, but I'm guessing that not a word of complaint percolated inside the Beltway after guests tasted Mr. Samuelsson's vegetarian menu, which included roasted potato dumplings with tomato chutney, chickpeas and okra or green curry prawns, caramelized salsify with smoked collard greens and coconut-aged basmati rice.
WORST LUCK FOR A TOP CHEF
First, Anita Lo had to close her Greenwich Village Asian barbecue venue Bar Q, which she had opened just in time for the bursting of the financial bubble. Then, on July 5, she came to work at her very successful and universally admired Annisa, only to find it a charred disaster. Ms. Lo and her front-of-the-house partner Jennifer Scism spent months climbing out of the mess; a Building Department permit now graces the front door. Better luck in the New Year to Anita, Jennifer and everyone else who has fed us well or written to us with savvy tips for where to eat next.
From Brussels-sprout kimchi in Illinois to beef with parsnip milk in Oakland, the best of 2009 By RAYMOND SOKOLOV
In a rough year for the economy, it's been a good year for food. Here are my picks for the sweetest spots in the 2009 foodie menu.
BEST NEW RESTAURANT
This is too big and various a nation to have a best of anything. So I've picked three standout new eateries, East, West and heartland.
East: A Voce Columbus
(10 Columbus Circle, New York, 212-823-2523, avocerestaurant.com)
Missy Robbins has brought the neo-Italian gospel from her last gig, at Chicago's Spiaggia, to the third-floor restaurant ghetto at the Time Warner Center. Sicily is a primary inspiration here: Pine nuts, raisins and citrus undergird graceful revisions of classics. But all of Italy contributes something—as does Ms. Robbins's imagination—to polenta punctuated by tiny black dots of ground buckwheat.
West: Commis
(3859 Piedmont Ave., Oakland, Calif., 510-653-3902,
commisrestaurant.com)
Oakland-born James Syhabout opened his own storefront place in his native city only four months before he got a Michelin star. Commis means apprentice, and Mr. Syhabout has worked for some of the best chefs in the Bay area and abroad, at places like Spain's El Bulli, the U.K.'s Fat Duck and Manresa in Los Gatos, Calif. In the process, he has honed a palatal gift that allows him to combine exotic ingredients seldom melded in one dish. Instead of steak sauce, your beef might come with pearl barley, parsnip milk and wild anise.
Heartland: June
(4450 N Prospect Rd., Peoria Heights, Ill., 309-682-5863
www.junerestaurant.com)
June graces a mini-mall in this no-frills river town, but the wide world echoes here, in an up-to-the-minute open kitchen. With produce provided by an 80-acre organic farm, the restaurant, under Josh Adams, improves on the locavore bounty, turning Brussels sprouts into kimchi and grinding its own duck sausage.
BEST NEW DISH
I watched Joël Robuchon fine-tune the dish of the year for the spring menu at his hyper-opulent Joël Robuchon in the MGM Grand in Las Vegas (3799 Las Vegas Blvd. S., 702-891-7925, www.mgmgrand.com). It was a dish layered with a crab mixture and strips of yellow-brown sea urchin, which the chef took from a neat pile. Minced, raw white cauliflower lurked within the crabmeat mix as a stealth carrier of a starch element that makes this dish a no-grain, marine cousin of tabbouleh, the ancient Near Eastern salad based on bulghur wheat and mint. Mr. Robuchon has moved on through several seasonal menus by now, but we won't soon forget this springtime caprice.
BEST EXOTIC NEW INGREDIENT
Pagliolaia, the dewlap or flap that hangs down from the jowls of the steer. We encountered it at Spiaggia (980 North Michigan Ave., Chicago, 312-280-2750, spiaggiarestaurant.com). Chef Tony Mantuano's idea of surf 'n turf is wood-roasted diver scallops with black trumpet mushrooms and crispy pagliolaia. The hearty beef fragments and earthy fungus highlight the slippery elegance of the seafood. Having dewlaps myself, I winced for a minute but surrendered to the brilliance of the conception and the resourcefulness of Spiaggia's butcher.
MOST IMPORTANT PUBLIC FOOD ACTS
President Barack Obama invited Cuban-American New Jersey chef/restaurateur Maricel Presilla to oversee the food at a White House event celebrating Latino music. The menu included Argentinean beef empanadas with red chimichurri; Brazilian black-eyed pea arrumadinho, Honduran enchiladas with chicken hash; and Cuban roast pork and malanga (a tropical root vegetable) canapes with lulu sauce. This was a groundbreaking nod from the First Eater to the heritage food of Latino citizens.
Mr. Obama continued his foray into ethnogastropolitics by engaging New York-based, Ethiopian-Swedish chef Marcus Samuelsson to cook the administration's first state dinner, an Indian-fusion meal for the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Old Washington hands muttered about the wisdom of serving a visiting envoy the food of his own country, but I'm guessing that not a word of complaint percolated inside the Beltway after guests tasted Mr. Samuelsson's vegetarian menu, which included roasted potato dumplings with tomato chutney, chickpeas and okra or green curry prawns, caramelized salsify with smoked collard greens and coconut-aged basmati rice.
WORST LUCK FOR A TOP CHEF
First, Anita Lo had to close her Greenwich Village Asian barbecue venue Bar Q, which she had opened just in time for the bursting of the financial bubble. Then, on July 5, she came to work at her very successful and universally admired Annisa, only to find it a charred disaster. Ms. Lo and her front-of-the-house partner Jennifer Scism spent months climbing out of the mess; a Building Department permit now graces the front door. Better luck in the New Year to Anita, Jennifer and everyone else who has fed us well or written to us with savvy tips for where to eat next.
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
La Grenouille By SAM SIFTON
December 23, 2009
La Grenouille By SAM SIFTON
LA GRENOUILLE turned 47 on Saturday, the last great French restaurant in New York. As on its birth night, there was snow outside the old stable at 3 East 52nd Street, and this made the soft, glittering light of the brocaded interior seem all the more inviting, the flowers towering out of the corners all the more welcoming, the sheer elegance of the place all the more arresting, important, rare.
The decline of great French cooking in New York has been a subject of discussion among the food-obsessed for decades, since at least the closing of Le Pavillon in 1971. In the last decade the talk has turned funereal, with the demise of Lutèce, La Caravelle, La Côte Basque, Lespinasse.
Brasserie cooking survives in New York, even flourishes under old mirrors and subway tile. We will always have steak frites.
But the quiet opulence of the traditional haute cuisine that was first brought to New York by Henri Soulé for the World’s Fair in 1939 and which flourished at his Pavillon and other restaurants in the years that followed? The whole marvelous Tom Wolfe scene of it: blanquette de veau and Beaumes-de-Venise, and ladies in finery beside gentlemen in soft cashmere jackets and rolled silk ties? C’est fini!
A series of recent meals at La Grenouille suggests that isn’t so. Not so long as Charles Masson, who has run it since 1975, greets his customers at the door, quiet and French and welcoming. Not so long as people can take a seat on a scarlet banquette at his restaurant, sit beneath a spray of flowers and eat sumptuous food out of Escoffier. It has been this way since his father, also named Charles, opened the restaurant in 1962 with his wife, Gisèle.
The crowd is amazing. There are city patricians, upscale travelers, romantics celebrating anniversaries, cads with escort-service friends, priests drinking Burgundy and spooning soup past their dog collars. There is jewelry everywhere, evidence of plastic surgery.
There are Thackeray characters come to life in a modern age. Some have spent too much time in the sun, doing nothing much more than turning the pages of a book. Others, eyes darting back and forth, examine the restaurant and chart customers as handicappers do horses at Belmont: Are the flowers less resplendent than in years past? Perhaps, ever so slightly, yes. Is the carpet threadbare? Not in the least, though those waiters may qualify! Is that a daughter or lover in the corner with that old lion? Oh, please. Have the Montrachet to start?
Back in the kitchen, the executive chef, Matthew Tropeano, spoons forcemeat pike into simmering broth. He naps the result with sauce and gives the plates to waiters who have known no other service. They present their customers a paragon of quenelles de brochet in the Lyonnaise style, a textbook example of classic French cuisine.
The dish is executed perfectly, a kind of beige-on-beige masterpiece devoid of irony or deconstructionist camp. (Only those without heart would call it gefilte fish.) It is delicious without being overwhelming, without being much more than ethereal pike, light as mist, buttery rice, a shellfish cream sauce with just a hint of nutmeg, a dab of American caviar. It is wonderful to eat at La Grenouille.
The revelations start early. A waiter brings an amuse-bouche, perhaps more perfunctorily than is currently normal in most New York restaurants. He neither issues a greeting nor attempts to make the action dramatic.
“This is a split pea soup,” he says. The offering is roughly four spoonfuls’ worth. Each is a cloud of magnificent flavor — salt that raises the vegetal from its depths, cream that makes it buoyant. It lingers on the tongue. The tiny dish expands the mind.
It also concentrates its focus. For there will be no lemon grass foam to confuse matters on the menu of La Grenouille this evening, no huckleberry confit or magret sliders.
This is a classic French restaurant (with classically high prices; a three-course prix fixe dinner starts at $95). Its strength is still, as Bryan Miller wrote in The New York Times almost 20 years ago, the excellence of its stocks, the basis of its magnificent sauces.
Begin your meal with sweetbreads, then. They are the thymus gland of a calf, two lobes separated by a soft tube of flesh. (Someone always asks!) Here they are trimmed in the manner of miniature chicken breasts, then sautéed until crisp, leaving a creamy interior.
Accompanied by a small bit of demi-glace made piney with rosemary, they provide an instant view of a world in which plenty is not nearly so important as quality — a world in which the point is to experience small, rich pleasures, one by one by one.
In that line, there is also foie gras, of course, fattened duck liver seared beautifully and served with port, melting velvet in the mouth. There is a magnificent country terrine, studded with pistachios and served blessedly at the temperature of the room, so that it spreads easily and caresses the tongue.
On a brisk winter evening, you might begin with risotto, now served with buttery wild mushrooms, each grain separate and pliant and rich.
A slightly rakish salmon tartare arrives piled on a large and perfect blini with more of that American caviar on top to heighten the experience. (Ravioli with lobster and tarragon achieves a similar effect, plus cream.)
And a simple endive salad highlights the bitter sweetness of the green, then sweetens it with slick pear, chalky walnut, the rough, salty excellence of Roquefort cheese.
For main dishes, there are those quenelles. Also frogs’ legs sautéed in butter with parsley and garlic, a nod to the restaurant’s name (in France, une grenouille is a frog). The legs are delicate, flavorful, addictive and impossible even in this luxe setting to finish with knife and fork. (The waiter will bring you a finger bowl when you are done.) There is an excellent plate of veal kidneys, sautéed in a flash of Cognac until just browned around the exterior, served with a thick, piquant mustard sauce. There is another of sirloin, crimson beef dominoes on a plate, with creamy pommes boulangère.
There are beef oxtails of uncommon excellence, braised until sticky in red wine, a dish the late Pat Buckley once said she would choose as her last on Earth.
And for those experiencing the restaurant for the first time, or returning to it for the first time in ages, there is Dover sole. Named for the English port in which it was first popularized, Dover sole is slightly less bathmat-shaped than its relative the flounder. It is prized by diners for close-grained sweet flavor, and by restaurants for ease of filleting, which is why it’s so often done tableside.
Here, grilled and then sauced with butter, and served with soft, golden mustard sauce, it achieves a kind of transfiguration: France brought to Midtown, a vacation in a bite. It’ll change the color of your mood ring.
Let us stay happy through the end of this meal. Wise diners will, as they order the sole, also ask for the preparation of a soufflé for dessert, perhaps the one scented with Grand Marnier. (The unwise will ask for tarte Tatin and receive a wan example in return.)
During the winter of 1997, when La Grenouille was just 35, Ruth Reichl wrote in the restaurant’s most recent review in these pages that it was not for nothing that a parade of soufflés crosses the dining room each evening. “I don’t think there is a better soufflé in New York,” she wrote, and awarded three stars.
That is still the case. It is a magic-trick dessert, a dreamlike concoction from the night kitchen: perfection unsullied. And it stands, in its way, for the importance of La Grenouille. This is the bastion now. It is worth the expense to put on your best and experience it. It is part of why you are here.
La Grenouille
★★★
3 East 52nd Street, Midtown; (212) 752-1495; la-grenouille.com.
ATMOSPHERE Romantic beneath golden light, with flowers everywhere.
SOUND LEVEL Civilized if New Yorkish: you’re quite close to the neighbors.
RECOMMENDED DISHES Foie gras; sweetbreads; wild-mushroom risotto; Dover sole; quenelles of pike; veal kidneys; braised oxtails; soufflés.
WINE LIST Bargains for those who have long money to spend on maturing Bordeaux, and some good offerings from neighboring communes for the rest of us.
PRICE RANGE Two-course prix fixe lunch, $38; three courses, $52. Two-course prix fixe dinner, $78; three courses, $95.
HOURS Monday, 5 to 10 p.m.; Tuesday to Thursday noon to 3 p.m.; 5 to 10 p.m.; Friday, noon to 3 p.m.; 5 to 11 p.m.; Saturday, 5 to 11 p.m.
RESERVATIONS Call a week or so in advance, unless it’s your anniversary, in which case a month before is more like it. Don’t get jammed up on that.
CREDIT CARDS All major cards.
WHEELCHAIR ACCESS Restaurant is on one level.
WHAT THE STARS MEAN Ratings range from zero to four stars and reflect the reviewer’s reaction to food, ambience and service, with price taken into consideration. Menu listings and prices are subject to change.
La Grenouille By SAM SIFTON
LA GRENOUILLE turned 47 on Saturday, the last great French restaurant in New York. As on its birth night, there was snow outside the old stable at 3 East 52nd Street, and this made the soft, glittering light of the brocaded interior seem all the more inviting, the flowers towering out of the corners all the more welcoming, the sheer elegance of the place all the more arresting, important, rare.
The decline of great French cooking in New York has been a subject of discussion among the food-obsessed for decades, since at least the closing of Le Pavillon in 1971. In the last decade the talk has turned funereal, with the demise of Lutèce, La Caravelle, La Côte Basque, Lespinasse.
Brasserie cooking survives in New York, even flourishes under old mirrors and subway tile. We will always have steak frites.
But the quiet opulence of the traditional haute cuisine that was first brought to New York by Henri Soulé for the World’s Fair in 1939 and which flourished at his Pavillon and other restaurants in the years that followed? The whole marvelous Tom Wolfe scene of it: blanquette de veau and Beaumes-de-Venise, and ladies in finery beside gentlemen in soft cashmere jackets and rolled silk ties? C’est fini!
A series of recent meals at La Grenouille suggests that isn’t so. Not so long as Charles Masson, who has run it since 1975, greets his customers at the door, quiet and French and welcoming. Not so long as people can take a seat on a scarlet banquette at his restaurant, sit beneath a spray of flowers and eat sumptuous food out of Escoffier. It has been this way since his father, also named Charles, opened the restaurant in 1962 with his wife, Gisèle.
The crowd is amazing. There are city patricians, upscale travelers, romantics celebrating anniversaries, cads with escort-service friends, priests drinking Burgundy and spooning soup past their dog collars. There is jewelry everywhere, evidence of plastic surgery.
There are Thackeray characters come to life in a modern age. Some have spent too much time in the sun, doing nothing much more than turning the pages of a book. Others, eyes darting back and forth, examine the restaurant and chart customers as handicappers do horses at Belmont: Are the flowers less resplendent than in years past? Perhaps, ever so slightly, yes. Is the carpet threadbare? Not in the least, though those waiters may qualify! Is that a daughter or lover in the corner with that old lion? Oh, please. Have the Montrachet to start?
Back in the kitchen, the executive chef, Matthew Tropeano, spoons forcemeat pike into simmering broth. He naps the result with sauce and gives the plates to waiters who have known no other service. They present their customers a paragon of quenelles de brochet in the Lyonnaise style, a textbook example of classic French cuisine.
The dish is executed perfectly, a kind of beige-on-beige masterpiece devoid of irony or deconstructionist camp. (Only those without heart would call it gefilte fish.) It is delicious without being overwhelming, without being much more than ethereal pike, light as mist, buttery rice, a shellfish cream sauce with just a hint of nutmeg, a dab of American caviar. It is wonderful to eat at La Grenouille.
The revelations start early. A waiter brings an amuse-bouche, perhaps more perfunctorily than is currently normal in most New York restaurants. He neither issues a greeting nor attempts to make the action dramatic.
“This is a split pea soup,” he says. The offering is roughly four spoonfuls’ worth. Each is a cloud of magnificent flavor — salt that raises the vegetal from its depths, cream that makes it buoyant. It lingers on the tongue. The tiny dish expands the mind.
It also concentrates its focus. For there will be no lemon grass foam to confuse matters on the menu of La Grenouille this evening, no huckleberry confit or magret sliders.
This is a classic French restaurant (with classically high prices; a three-course prix fixe dinner starts at $95). Its strength is still, as Bryan Miller wrote in The New York Times almost 20 years ago, the excellence of its stocks, the basis of its magnificent sauces.
Begin your meal with sweetbreads, then. They are the thymus gland of a calf, two lobes separated by a soft tube of flesh. (Someone always asks!) Here they are trimmed in the manner of miniature chicken breasts, then sautéed until crisp, leaving a creamy interior.
Accompanied by a small bit of demi-glace made piney with rosemary, they provide an instant view of a world in which plenty is not nearly so important as quality — a world in which the point is to experience small, rich pleasures, one by one by one.
In that line, there is also foie gras, of course, fattened duck liver seared beautifully and served with port, melting velvet in the mouth. There is a magnificent country terrine, studded with pistachios and served blessedly at the temperature of the room, so that it spreads easily and caresses the tongue.
On a brisk winter evening, you might begin with risotto, now served with buttery wild mushrooms, each grain separate and pliant and rich.
A slightly rakish salmon tartare arrives piled on a large and perfect blini with more of that American caviar on top to heighten the experience. (Ravioli with lobster and tarragon achieves a similar effect, plus cream.)
And a simple endive salad highlights the bitter sweetness of the green, then sweetens it with slick pear, chalky walnut, the rough, salty excellence of Roquefort cheese.
For main dishes, there are those quenelles. Also frogs’ legs sautéed in butter with parsley and garlic, a nod to the restaurant’s name (in France, une grenouille is a frog). The legs are delicate, flavorful, addictive and impossible even in this luxe setting to finish with knife and fork. (The waiter will bring you a finger bowl when you are done.) There is an excellent plate of veal kidneys, sautéed in a flash of Cognac until just browned around the exterior, served with a thick, piquant mustard sauce. There is another of sirloin, crimson beef dominoes on a plate, with creamy pommes boulangère.
There are beef oxtails of uncommon excellence, braised until sticky in red wine, a dish the late Pat Buckley once said she would choose as her last on Earth.
And for those experiencing the restaurant for the first time, or returning to it for the first time in ages, there is Dover sole. Named for the English port in which it was first popularized, Dover sole is slightly less bathmat-shaped than its relative the flounder. It is prized by diners for close-grained sweet flavor, and by restaurants for ease of filleting, which is why it’s so often done tableside.
Here, grilled and then sauced with butter, and served with soft, golden mustard sauce, it achieves a kind of transfiguration: France brought to Midtown, a vacation in a bite. It’ll change the color of your mood ring.
Let us stay happy through the end of this meal. Wise diners will, as they order the sole, also ask for the preparation of a soufflé for dessert, perhaps the one scented with Grand Marnier. (The unwise will ask for tarte Tatin and receive a wan example in return.)
During the winter of 1997, when La Grenouille was just 35, Ruth Reichl wrote in the restaurant’s most recent review in these pages that it was not for nothing that a parade of soufflés crosses the dining room each evening. “I don’t think there is a better soufflé in New York,” she wrote, and awarded three stars.
That is still the case. It is a magic-trick dessert, a dreamlike concoction from the night kitchen: perfection unsullied. And it stands, in its way, for the importance of La Grenouille. This is the bastion now. It is worth the expense to put on your best and experience it. It is part of why you are here.
La Grenouille
★★★
3 East 52nd Street, Midtown; (212) 752-1495; la-grenouille.com.
ATMOSPHERE Romantic beneath golden light, with flowers everywhere.
SOUND LEVEL Civilized if New Yorkish: you’re quite close to the neighbors.
RECOMMENDED DISHES Foie gras; sweetbreads; wild-mushroom risotto; Dover sole; quenelles of pike; veal kidneys; braised oxtails; soufflés.
WINE LIST Bargains for those who have long money to spend on maturing Bordeaux, and some good offerings from neighboring communes for the rest of us.
PRICE RANGE Two-course prix fixe lunch, $38; three courses, $52. Two-course prix fixe dinner, $78; three courses, $95.
HOURS Monday, 5 to 10 p.m.; Tuesday to Thursday noon to 3 p.m.; 5 to 10 p.m.; Friday, noon to 3 p.m.; 5 to 11 p.m.; Saturday, 5 to 11 p.m.
RESERVATIONS Call a week or so in advance, unless it’s your anniversary, in which case a month before is more like it. Don’t get jammed up on that.
CREDIT CARDS All major cards.
WHEELCHAIR ACCESS Restaurant is on one level.
WHAT THE STARS MEAN Ratings range from zero to four stars and reflect the reviewer’s reaction to food, ambience and service, with price taken into consideration. Menu listings and prices are subject to change.
Sunday, December 20, 2009
The Year/The Decade: Best Chefs by Dave Faries in Picking Up Crumbs (Year In Review)
The Year/The Decade: Best Chefs by Dave Faries in Picking Up Crumbs (Year In Review)
Mon., Dec. 21 2009 @ 1:43PM
Thumbnail image for Sharon Hage 2.jpg
Best is a matter of degrees, whether you're talking about the top chefs over the course of months or years.
Certainly this city's kitchens are staffed with more than competent sorts: Brian Luscher, Jean-Marie Cadot, Marc Cassel, Joel Harloff, Graham Dodds...we could go on and on. So in defining our picks, we looked for a combination of big splash and dull, plodding consistency.
Over the long run, consistency matters more. It's as the great Dizzy Dean reportedly said: "it ain't braggin' if you can back it up."
So here are some chefs who, bragging or no, really backed it up...
Best chefs of 2009:
1. Nick Badovinus, Neighborhood Services
There are few places like this, places where you are forced to wait in a crowded bar for an hour--sometimes more--for downscaled dishes and you don't mind a bit. Badovinus returned from the brash, bullying things he created for Hibiscus to almost flawless basics. Now he's planning two more Neighborhood Services. Seems he's on to something.
2. Sarah Johannes, Five-Sixty
Before its gala opening, all the attention was hurled at owner Wolfgang Puck. It was left to the young protoge to basically save Reunion Tower from becoming a mere skyline relic. Turns out she's one of the city's best.
3. Stephan Pyles, Samar/Stephan Pyles
The Dallas celebrity returned to the fray in 2006 with Stephan Pyles. Not only did he keep that going, he also used what he gleaned from travels around the Mediterranean and India to create Samar. Guess it's his way of staying on top.
Best chefs of the 00s:
1. Sharon Hage, York Street
She opened in a former garage back in the late spring of 2001. So for close to a decade now she's kept a 40-seat restaurant with almost no visible presence running strong. More importantly, she helped kick-start interest in local and seasonal ingredients here. At the end of the decade, almost every new place claims some stake with nearby farms.
2. Gilbert Garza, Suze
There is a more famous Garza, but she just flirts with the limelight. Chef Gilbert tends to hide in the kitchen, preparing some of the best foie gras, some of the best trout, some of the best everything you've ever tried in a neighborhood restaurant. And he was neighborhood long before Badovinus came around.
3. Kent Rathbun, Abacus
In the early 2000s there was Rathbun and his Knox-Henderson place. Since then, he's won television contests, opened Jasper's and other restaurants and started a number of careers. But all along, there's been Abacus--then, as now, a destination
The Year/The Decade: Best Chefs - Dallas Restaurants and Dining - City of Ate (29 December 2009)
http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/cityofate/2009/12/the_yearthe_decade_best_chefs.php
http://snipurl.com/twhrm
Mon., Dec. 21 2009 @ 1:43PM
Thumbnail image for Sharon Hage 2.jpg
Best is a matter of degrees, whether you're talking about the top chefs over the course of months or years.
Certainly this city's kitchens are staffed with more than competent sorts: Brian Luscher, Jean-Marie Cadot, Marc Cassel, Joel Harloff, Graham Dodds...we could go on and on. So in defining our picks, we looked for a combination of big splash and dull, plodding consistency.
Over the long run, consistency matters more. It's as the great Dizzy Dean reportedly said: "it ain't braggin' if you can back it up."
So here are some chefs who, bragging or no, really backed it up...
Best chefs of 2009:
1. Nick Badovinus, Neighborhood Services
There are few places like this, places where you are forced to wait in a crowded bar for an hour--sometimes more--for downscaled dishes and you don't mind a bit. Badovinus returned from the brash, bullying things he created for Hibiscus to almost flawless basics. Now he's planning two more Neighborhood Services. Seems he's on to something.
2. Sarah Johannes, Five-Sixty
Before its gala opening, all the attention was hurled at owner Wolfgang Puck. It was left to the young protoge to basically save Reunion Tower from becoming a mere skyline relic. Turns out she's one of the city's best.
3. Stephan Pyles, Samar/Stephan Pyles
The Dallas celebrity returned to the fray in 2006 with Stephan Pyles. Not only did he keep that going, he also used what he gleaned from travels around the Mediterranean and India to create Samar. Guess it's his way of staying on top.
Best chefs of the 00s:
1. Sharon Hage, York Street
She opened in a former garage back in the late spring of 2001. So for close to a decade now she's kept a 40-seat restaurant with almost no visible presence running strong. More importantly, she helped kick-start interest in local and seasonal ingredients here. At the end of the decade, almost every new place claims some stake with nearby farms.
2. Gilbert Garza, Suze
There is a more famous Garza, but she just flirts with the limelight. Chef Gilbert tends to hide in the kitchen, preparing some of the best foie gras, some of the best trout, some of the best everything you've ever tried in a neighborhood restaurant. And he was neighborhood long before Badovinus came around.
3. Kent Rathbun, Abacus
In the early 2000s there was Rathbun and his Knox-Henderson place. Since then, he's won television contests, opened Jasper's and other restaurants and started a number of careers. But all along, there's been Abacus--then, as now, a destination
The Year/The Decade: Best Chefs - Dallas Restaurants and Dining - City of Ate (29 December 2009)
http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/cityofate/2009/12/the_yearthe_decade_best_chefs.php
http://snipurl.com/twhrm
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