Supreme Fiction

Otto a No-No

Dara writes:

Last week a friend and I met at Mario Batali's pizzeria Otto, located on 8th Street in downtown Manhattan. The restaurant has been open for about five years; I dined there for the first time around when it opened and remember only the lardo--or pig fat--pizza. I had never eaten a slice of pig fat before. So the pizzeria had that going for it. From my recent experience, Otto does not have much else to recommend it.

When I walked in to the restaurant this time I felt like I was entering The Peach Pit, that diner where Brenda and Brandon Walsh hang out in the TV show Beverly Hills, 90210. Every patron was under 25 years old, including the hostess, who looked like a high school senior--and acted just as professionally.

Though we had made a reservation, when we arrived, on time, my friend and I received a "train ticket," and were told to watch the "board," where, as with an arriving train, our table number would appear. Now, I don't know about you, but I don't like watching train boards. When I am standing in the LIRR waiting room at Penn Station, I feel harried and tired--which is not how I want to be feeling on a relaxing night out with a friend.

To make matters worse, when we did sit down, our waiter thought he was too cute by half, and that a broad smile from him could mask the sharp acidity of the dolcetto I ordered to drink. The wine tasted like vinegar and only letting it breathe for an hour made it palatable. For our main courses, I admit it: we erred. We did not order pizza. This being a pizzeria, that was a foolhardy choice. Instead, we ordered a bunch of little veggies in ramekins. Beets, cauliflower, brussels sprouts. They were a tad cold and oily and did not go down easily. Chunks of grayish fish in a sweet, raisiny and oniony marmalade filled another ramekin. It tasted good but resembled cat vomit . The best item we ordered was a crisp escarole salad studded with chopped almonds and dressed with a light, lemony olive oil. Actually, the olive oil gelato for dessert was great. The restaurant is known for its gelato. I had tasted olive oil gelato before, but only this one was redolent of bright green grass.

I had a sense I didn't like Mario Batali's food. Where he favors bold, meaty, fatty, I appreciate subtle, delicate, clean. More Japanese, if you will. Having just listened to the book about Batali--Heat by New Yorker writer Bill Buford--on tape, I knew the chef had an out-sized personality. I'm beginning to think that is why he is famous. He's fun! He was red hair! He wears shorts! He drives a Vespa!

One word about that Vespa: a friend lives in Batali's building. She gets annoyed that he leaves his Vespa always parked at the awning, and that he seems to think he is the coolest cat around. So my friend gooses him by acting the country bumpkin whenever they meet.

Picture this: Batali, clogs and bermudas, enters the elevator. Perhaps he is nursing a hangover. My friend is a poised, downtown lady, but when her famous neighbor is in the elevator, she goes all Oklahoma on him. In her most chipper, "the corn is as high as an elephant's eye" voice, she coos: "My, my, isn't the weather delightful today! Well I never saw such a blue sky in all my life."

My friend tells me Batali just flips his red hair and turns away. I think I will take a cue from the chef himself and give his pizzeria Otto the silent treatment.

Top Cooking Moment of 2007

Dara and James write:

It was our proudest culinary moment of the year. For James’s birthday in December we put together the following menu for six of our friends.

Hors d'oeuvres : Grandma Shipley’s cheese dip (equal portions mayonnaise and grated sharp cheddar cheese, with a bit of chopped onion, baked in a dish for 15 minutes). Green olives from Whole Foods.

Main course: Cider braised pork shoulder with caramelized onions with 4 lb deboned pork shoulder butt from Flying Pigs Farm (Union Square Greenmarket); thinly sliced brussels sprouts with purple cippolini onions and lime juice; mustard roasted potatoes; sour dough levain bread from Our Daily Bread (USG)

Dessert: 7 inch strawberry shortcake from Veneiro's bakery. It's a light cake, perfect after a heavy meal.

Drink:

Cocktails: 2 bottles Lini lambrusco bianco (sparkling)

Wine: 1 Vigna del Noce 1997 Barbera d’Asti from Trinchero Renato;
1 Rocche 2001 Barolo

Digestives: 2 Braida Giacomo Bologna 2006 Brachetto d’Acqui (sparkling red sweet wine, first sampled in Turin at Cambio); amaro

All wine from Vino, New York.

Top Ten Restaurant Moments of 2007

Dara and James write:

Here are our favorite tastings of the year. Sorry New York: our honeymoon in Italy produced the most delicious moments.

(1) Warm pistachio cake at Guido in Pollenzo, Italy
(2) Apricot gelato at Grom Gelateria in Turin, Italy
(3) Salsa verde over ripe tomatoes and Spanish anchovies (see picture above) at the little enoteca next to Produttori del Barbaresco in Barbaresco, Italy
(4) Brussels sprouts with kimchee puree at Momofuku Noodle Bar in New York
(5) Eel at Sushi Yasuda in New York
(6) Thunder Pickles from Katchkie Farm in upstate New York
(7) Finanziera at Cambio in Turin, Italy.
(8) Vitello Tonato at La Libera in Alba, Italy
(9) Risotto al Salto at Trattoria della Pesa in Milan, Italy
(10) Chicory salad with anchovies and olive oil at Bebel's in Milan, Italy

Beer and Brats

Dara writes:

James and I spent Christmas in the snow and winds of Madison, Wisconsin with James's mother's side of the family. Every year, this family does a grab-bag of gifts, going on the premise of, if you bring one, you get one. It's a remarkably inexpensive and fun way to celebrate. This year, it was James's idea we do "consumables." We brought Greenmarket items.

The two things that made our grab-bag gifts were liverwurst from Flying Pigs farm in upstate New York, and Thunder Pickles from Katchkie Farm, also upstate. The pickles have a stunningly spicy, vinegary, and garlicky flavor. They don't crunch, but the taste lingers and beguiles. The Flying Pigs swine enjoy a good life under the care of Michael Yezzi and his wife, Jennifer Small, who are at the Union Square Market on Saturdays. We had to special order the pickles.

James's cousin from Milwaukee added Serbian cheese and meat pies to the grab bag. Another cousin from the South (Georgia) added pickled okra and lemon-artichoke spread. We were lucky enough to take home Wisconsin micro-brews and glasses from the Milwaukee brewery. Overall, the consumables idea was a good one.

Finally, it wouldn't be Wisconsin without bratwurst. James's uncle brought us to State Street Brats. State Street is the main campus drag. Of course, school was out, but we got a taste of the storied beer hall. Wanting to be virtuous, James and I ordered just brats--not in a basket with plain or spicy fries. The brat arrived swaddled in a chewy sourdough roll, wrapped in wax paper, and adorned with a pickle. We both ordered white brats, which were delish. I garnished mine with pickle relish, red onions, sauerkraut, ketchup, and mustard. I washed it all down with a Sunset Weisse beer. It was a fab, apricot-y, thick-but-not-heavy wheat garnished with an orange slice. It chased away the cold--and it was cold. More snow than I'd ever seen. And we basically flew in during a snow storm. Before we took off the pilot said, "Basically the whole flight will be bumpy." Superior!

But it was a superior Christmas!

Moms at Momofuku

Dara writes:

As readers of our blog know, James and I love David Chang's Momofuku Noodle Bar, in downtown Manhattan. We love it so much we decided to venture there, with our parents, for James's recent birthday.

We were excited to share our fave kimchee-laced brussels sprouts and sinfully rich ramen with our folks, but I guess we were in a bit of a bubble and failed to realize our parents might not want to crowd onto tiny stools for grub that doesn't quite fit in their comfort zone.

Our market research told us that on a weekend night we best arrive early. 5:20pm found us waiting outside the door, the first people there. The waitress who had told us "the line starts at 5pm" was a tad off the mark. No matter. What did matter was that my father had to arrive late, and, Momofuku being one of those "no reservations, we can't seat you until all members of your party are here" establishments, it gave us a tussle about our table. We had to insist we'd order for my father. The manager said that we could save a seat for him but that if the place filled up he'd have to give away that seat.

Now, Momofuku has grown very big in stature (and bigger in size, since it recently moved to a bigger space), which is great for it, but in the process it's gotten an entirely new staff. Not everyone is as mellow and cool (host with the wacky '80's haircut, I'm referring to you) as the old staff. And indeed, talking to this new manager was like being on the phone with Delta Airlines. There was no reasoning with him and he spit out dictates that didn't make sense in the context: to wit, our potentially having to cede my father's chair midway through the meal although we would have set the space and ordered food for him.

We made it to the table, though (as did my dad, about 30 min. later), and our mothers had to sit on their coats and wiggle into their stools. When the food came, they thought it was weird, but couldn't deny the tastiness of the kimchee and charred mackerel. The runny egg on top of the ramen frightened some at the table.

I think all in all we realized that while the dorm-room, guerilla theater elements of the restaurant thrill us, to our folks, it's a little shady. They dine out for comfort and ease, not necessarily to be challenged. And by the way, at around 6:30pm, there were still plenty of seats, although when we left at 7pm there was the proverbial "line out the door."

Wild Salmon to Close

Dara writes:

As I predicted right here in September, Jeffrey Chodorow's paean to the Pacific Northwest, Wild Salmon, will close at the end of this month.

I love salmon, but, as I said before, salmon is like chicken: in and of itself, it's boring. Therefore, the right stage for salmon is kind of a wild and crazy joint. And though Chodorow's place has "wild" in the title, it looked like a basement-level Sheraton conference room where one drinks Starbucks and nibbles on deli-sandwich quarters provided by Sodexho catering.

Good riddance, El Chod.

Lunetta

Dara writes:

Last night we picked a new restaurant for my mother's birthday: Lunetta, on Broadway near the Flatiron Building. The restaurant already has a well-regarded outpost in Boerum Hill, Brooklyn, so I suppose choosing it wasn't a total shot in the dark.

James and I are fortunate enough to live in a restaurant-rich neighborhood, but some new places, such as Bar Stuzzichini, underwhelm (though James likes it for after-work drinks). The evening at Lunetta did not start off auspiciously, as we sat right across from the kitchen doors. James thought he might vomit, looking at the line prep as he ate. I didn't care, because the kitchen seemed spotless. (If we'd been instead, let's say, at the Chinatown dive NY Noodletown, so my mother could enjoy the crispy duck, I would rather have eaten toenails than have looked into the kitchen). But the night only got better from there.

We ordered a well-priced Nebbiolo that we'd tried on our honeymoon in the Piedmont region of Northern Italy. I tucked into a "crisp greens" salads with a shaved parmesan and anchovy dressing. It was fabulous. The lettuce was fresh and buttery, absolutely the opposite of bagged lettuce--it had no gross salady aftertaste or wilted leaves slime. The dressing was just right, fishy and salty but neither overly so. James's beet salad was delish, as was my father's surprising brussels sprouts salad, which consisted of sprouts leaves and succulent red onion. My mother's fried artichokes were light and crunchy. The salad prep occurred behind a bar right next to us, in the back of the restaurant near the kitchen door. That salad guy knows his way around greens.

My snapper over stewed tomatoes, olives, and capers was really tasty. The tomatoes were pulpy and fresh, and the fish really delicate. James ordered pork chop (the pork having been purveyed, we were told on the menu, by the brother of one of James's colleagues) over black lentils. So flavorful--in contrast, of course, fish can only provide so much taste. My mother got the meatballs, a signature dish of the chef. They were so tasty, chewy and sweetish, with raisins. The only thing I didn't try was my father's octopus, an app that he ordered as a main. I have to say, it didn't look appetizing, though Dad said the taste was spot on. Our waiter was super-green (the restaurant itself has been open for less than two weeks!). But he didn't mangle putting a candle on my mother's dessert, a classic tartufo filled with hazelnut gelato.

Overall, I was very pleased with the experience. The diners were suitably hip that my mother felt like she was having fun for her birthday, but the food wasn't trendy, it was hearty and classic, kind of like what we enjoyed in the Piedmont and Lombardy regions of Italy. And that's a very high compliment.

Coconut Chicken and Lemonade Cream

Dara writes:

James and I set out last night to eat at Momofuku. But alas, the summer is over, the NYU students are back, and the wait at this loud and crowded shrine to pork was over 35 minutes long. We wandered back up First Avenue and ended up at Pistahan, a steam counter Filipino restaurant I'd read about in New York magazine's "Cheap Eats" issue.

$20 for two entrees, an app, and a drink certainly is cheap. Unfortunately, so are the ingredients. A sweet and savory crepe starter filled with "sauteed vegetables" was in fact filled with raw cabbage and bean sprouts so saturated in garlic we had to brush our teeth about eighteen times when we got home. My chicken marinated in coconut and vinegar had a nice spicy kick and tasted pretty good. But def the cheap parts of the chicken, and the sauce was gooey and cloying, kind of like sweet and sour in a Chinese restaurant. The rice was Uncle Ben's level. James's barbecue pork was fine. Since I'm not a fan of extreme garlic's masking not great ingredients, I won't be going back.

Luckily for us, City Bakery has opened an East Village outpost on the same block as Pistahan. So we washed down the extreme garlic with a cookie and what they call "Farmer's Lemonade," which is lemonade and a "touch of Ronnybrook cream." Sounds putrid but it is amazing; as the site I just linked to says, "it makes you kneel." It also clogs your sinuses like all get-out, but what a frosty, milky, tart kick.

Bar Stuzzichini

Dara writes:

Just in time for Frank Bruni's review in the Times today, we ate at Flatiron newcomer Bar Stuzzichini last night.

I agree more with the Times' one star review than with New York magazine's two stars. In fact, I may be even a bit less forgiving than Bruni.

Admittedly I dined there once, but I was not that impressed. First of all, the room leaves a lot to be desired, as many have said already. It's big and I agree with Adam Platt of New York mag, looks like a Pizzeria Uno. It's cheesy. It looks middle-aged and middle-brow--cue the odd photos on the wall of graffiti in Italy, I guess to youth-up the joint.

The meal started off promising, as our server chose an odd but mead-like white wine (honey notes) that was lovely. But then the bread basket was very Penn Station Zaro's (an outlet of which is just down Broadway from Bar Stuzzichini). James and I split the "five little plates for $22" as an appetizer. These little plates are the "stuzzichini" in Italian. We ordered zucchini, spicy soppressata, ricotta with saffron and honey, meatballs, and fried artichoke.

As readers of this column know, I tend to find zucchini in its natural form--meaty and squishy--repellent, so I asked the server how it was prepared. When he said grilled with olive oil, garlic, and mint, that sounded promising. But in fact what came to the table were castoffs from Au Bon Pain's "grilled veggie" sandwich, those horrible thick zucchini rounds with black char marks that are the stuff of food nightmares. The artichoke and meatballs were delish. The meatball is tiny, crispy on the outside, and really tender and well-seasoned on the inside.

James and I split the orecchiette with cauliflower and breadcrumbs, and a chickory salad with anchovies. We ordered the latter because it sounded exactly like a dish we had at Bebel's in Milan: tender bulbs of fresh chickory decorated with cut anchovies, lemon, sea salt, and olive oil. Fab. The Bar Stuzzichini version though was chickory leaves--lettuce, essentially--with a caesar-salad like dressing. Eh. Fishy. The orechiette tasted like gourmet mac and cheese. Not enough cauli to flower it. Our friend got the tuna; it looked a tad overcooked, but the pesto garnishing it was nutty.

A word about the service: not so hot. An odd thing happened as we were chowing on our appetizers; our server came over and said, "it would be great if you could consolidate your plates, because your entrees are coming." He literally took away my plate from which I was still eating and kind of moved my silverware out of the way to make way for the mains.

That would have been odd but OK if steaming plates then immediately were set down in front of us. But no. We waited fifteen minutes. So why on earth did he clear our apps so precipitously?

I agree the size of the place isn't right; it doesn't jibe with the little-plate feel. Moreover, while it's in my neighborhood, it doesn't feel neighborhoody. Not too expensive, but not sure I'll return.

Wild Salmon

Dara writes:

James and I ate a late-night meal at the new restaurant Wild Salmon by Jeffrey Chodorow, he of food-fight-with-Frank-Bruni fame.

In the Times recently, Bruni took the high road and reviewed the new place fairly. He didn't like it that much, and neither did I. This is a deathwatch on the joint, which I don't think is long for this world.

Nearly no patrons occupied the restaurant when we dined (admittedly late, 9pm). It is a gigantic space, and was so empty it kind of seemed like an airport hangar. Indeed, while the salmon passed through a hangar on its way from the Pacific Northwest, that doesn't mean the salmon's final resting place should evoke United.

I sat down to a dirty water glass, which I had to send back. Our waiter was out of it. The flat bread, served in lieu of a bread basket, dusted with olive oil, sea salt, and rosemary, was crunchy on the outside and really soft on the inside, and performed well the function of being my appetizer, since I wasn't hungry enough, or intrigued enough by the appetizers on the menu, to order one. The problem was this: I'd heard the cured salmon platter was a great starter, but if I ordered that, what would I order for my main, since this was, afterall, a salmon joint? And alas the hostess-recommended dish, the black cod, was finito for the evening.

I ended up ordering cedar-planked salmon, which Bruni recommended. It was good. The cedar plank smells delightful, awakening your taste buds. The pinot noir morel sauce accompanying it was buttery and super rich and slightly funky from the morels. Three asparagus spears decorated the fish.

Fine. But that was $30. And that was the cheapest of the salmon options (I ordered coho, but one could request sockeye or king). I'm not n the mood to pay thirty bucks for an average-sized piece of fish with no accoutrements. Especially when I recall the $16 I paid for the supremely incredible snapper at Momofuku that came equipped with remarkable sides, assembled with mucho care. From the assemblage of my fish at Wild Salmon, I get the sense Chodorow's target audience wouldn't know a pickled ramp from an exit ramp.

Speaking of average, isn't salmon the chicken of fish? I like it, but who ever thought to build a restaurant around it?

Won't be returning, and by the empty looks of the place when I went, other patrons feel the same.

Bacony Fish

Dara writes:

I have written about chef David Chang's Momofuku empire before. No surprise, I'm a fan. Just to add to the adulation, I had a chart-topping, show-stopping fish dish there tonight.

As usual, James ordered the house special Momofuku ramen, which is succulent, toothsome noodles in a porky broth with, indeed, two kinds of pork--belly and shredded--and soft-cooked egg, peas, green onion, nori, lotus root, and deliciousness. James always gets it. He's obsessed. But I ordered something new: crispy red snapper. Not usually my fave fish. Slightly funkier than bass or trout. The fish was delish, but it was the sides I died for. What graced the dish? Summer squash. I don't often love squash because it's squishy and meaty in an unpleasant way. Surprisingly, Chang's staff didn't slice the squash extra-thin. But because, like all things Chang, the veg floated in a salty, porky broth, it ruled.

Two things lifted the dish into the stratosphere: the best chunky, pancetta-y bacon ever, and pickled ramps. Now, I saw Chang's recipe for them in New York mag in May, but whatever, not something I'd make at home, so I didn't think more about it. Holy mackerel: I could make a meal of them. Imagine wilted, kim-chee-y onions. Yes please.

I should mention we started with an heirloom tomato salad with Asian vinaigrette and shiso leaf, with soft tofu. And, the kicker, we walked right into the place. Why? Three ideas: August; early; outside it was hot as hell.

Dining at Momofuku is hectic. It's loud and cramped and hot. But you get to see your dinner assembled in front of you by pros. It's like you're on the set of a cooking show. You get to listen to the Stones' Gimme Shelter and remember those violent scenes in Scorsese's Mean Streets and The Departed. And you get to have an ass-kicking, fresh fish dish for $16. Worth it.

Cookin for Mom in Law

Dara writes:

Here is an easy recipe to impress Mom or Mom in Law. It is for roasted salmon. We got the wild kind from Whole Foods, paired it with fresh parsley and chives, and roasted it for nary 15 minutes before it came out tender and succulent. Add fresh bread, roasted potatoes with vidalia onions, and fresh asparagus, and you have a lovely summer supper. Mom in Law even chipped in with prep, whole thing took one hour or so, including nibbling brie from TJs (Trader Joe's) and drinking rose. Perfect yuppie evening, I say.

One word about Trader Joe's. Love it. But the one near our apartment--the only one in Manhattan, alas--is always ridiculously packed. J and I are lucky enough to a) have a car and b) access to a house in Connecticut. On our way there we stop at Trader Joe's "uptown," as we like to say--that is, in Danbury, Connecticut. Whole thing takes 20 minutes in the store there, which is about how much time we'd spend on line in the TJs NYC.

Tanoreen

Dara writes:

Today it is practically Hurricane Gloria here in New York, so James and I are lucky that we did our driving yesterday. Specifically, we drove to an art opening on Staten Island, where I have not been for decades. I cannot drive over the towering Verazzano-Narrows Bridge without thinking of the suicide scene from Saturday Night Fever. Back in the day I loved John Travolta so. Now, not so much.

Anyway, after the opening, we got on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and exited at the Brooklyn neighborhood Bay Ridge. On 3rd Ave in Bay Ridge is a fantastic Middle Eastern joint named Tanoreen. From Staten Island, Bay Ridge is not hard to reach. From Manhattan, it is the third to last stop on the R train. A trek. The food was fabulous.

Our appetizers of tahini-rich and parsley-laced (I am a fiend for parsley) hummus and sauteed fava and green beens filled us so that we had essentially to cart home our entrees. The homemade lemonade with "secret" ingredients--tamarind, for one--quenched our thirst as alcohol wouldn't (the restaurant does not yet have a liquor license, but you can bring your own bottles of wine).

I ordered baby squash stuffed with ground lamb in a yogurt mint sauce with rice with vermicelli. James got kibbie balls with little doughy lamb pastries in a yogurt sauce with vermicelli rice. I read in my Claudia Roden Middle Eastern cookbook that the broken vermicelli in rice is a typical Arab dish and that the vermicelli stand for prosperity. Delicious.

Oooh, the meals were so fragrant with nutmeg, mint, and garlic. When we re-heated the dishes today there was hardly any oil. The ingredients were quite fine, and everything tasted just as good as last night.

Tanoreen doesn't take reservations for parties of two. We waited from 8:15-9pm sipping Guinness at the Irish pub down the block.

Bruni Out of Tune

Dara writes:

Just when I was feeling badly I had not yet posted on the recent development in the world of New York Times' chief restaurant critic Frank Bruni, Bruni lets loose another gust of bad wind that makes me kind of glad I waited.

To begin: the ranting letter written against him by restaurateur Jeffrey Chodorow. Chodorow has opened several successful restaurants, including China Grill and Asia de Cuba, and several disastrous ones, such as Rocco's, the demise of which television chronicled. Chodorow's $40,000 Times' ad opposite Bruni's column responded to Bruni's no-star review of Chodorow's latest venture, Kobe Club. In his rant, Chodorow recoils not from the negativity per se, but from what he considers Bruni's ad hominem attack. Chodorow complains that the "unfair" review hurts not him, as he is battle-worn and tough, but his servers and kitchen staff.

As Mimi Sheraton, former New York Times' chief restaurant critic, brilliantly asserts on Slate, Chodorow is in fact the one hurt--by his own letter. Now, all those unaware of the negative review will be aware of it. Moreover, by attesting to the critic's influence, Chodorow merely served to increase Bruni's power.

Too bad, because I have really started to dislike Bruni. While I may not agree with Chodorow's view--many other critics also panned Kobe Club--I do agree that Bruni tends toward the ad hominem, as I have already made abundantly clear on this very blog. Now, just today, we see that Bruni is also capable of agressing ad feminam.

Witness today's NYT review of the steakhouse inside the Penthouse Executive Club.

“Foxy,” I began, then stopped myself, wondering if I was being too familiar. “Are you and I on a first-name basis, or should I address you as Ms. Foxy?”

“You can call me Dr. Foxy,” she said.

“Is that an M.D. or a Ph.D.?”

“Yes,” she answered.

Now, this rudeness has already been addressed on Gastroporn, but I have to second that blogger's comment assailing Bruni for being so condescending to this Penthouse worker. On the NYT website, a "multimedia" show accompanies Bruni's article, on which you can relish such photo captions as:

Look at that meat. On the plate, I mean.

It's not so much that I think Bruni is demeaning women, as much as I think he is being awkward and dumb. Gridskipper has reported that Mr. Bruni is gay; maybe his being in a straight strip joint made him profoundly uncomfortable and he acted out. Unfortunately, his writing bore the brunt of whatever psychic burden being around nude women loaded on his shoulders. To wit:

You can find bliss in the soulless cradle of a strip mall. Why not the topless clutch of a strip club?

Get it? Get the parallels? I used to like Bruni's puns, but now I find he is precious and annoying when trying to make so many cute literary twists.

I am curious to see Bruni's next move. Many others are now also tuned in, including, my favorite post on the Strip Snafu, Feminist Law Professors.

Sublime Sushi

Dara writes:

I made a reservation for me and James for Valentine's Day only two weeks in advance, so I knew I could not hit up the usual romantic New York suspects. Instead, I chose a sushi restaurant considered sublime by those in the know, but not flashy like Nobu, Megu, Masa, Morimoto. I chose Sushi Yasuda, on a Little Tokyo block near the UN.

From the second we walked in, at an early 6pm (even two weeks ahead I could only secure an early reservation), I knew we were in for an experience. The sushi chefs, all five of them, heartily greeted us, as did the staff. We sat at the sushi bar, where a Hawaiian tea leaf garnished with ginger and wasabi was promptly placed in front of us. A server brought over warm towels so we could wash our hands because, as as I learned that night, sushi can be eaten with ones hands. (What an ideal beginning for a germaphobe like me!) We ordered dry cold sake and two kinds of fish to start: flash-fried striped bass with pickled radish on top, and sake-soaked black cod. Both were outstanding. The second we finished the plates, servers whisked them away. The second I took more than three sips from my water, it was replenished. I have read that service, for example in department stores, in Japan is phenomenal. I had my first taste of it that night.

Basically, we had our own private sushi chef. He would give us a piece of sushi, we would eat it, muse about what we wanted next, and then he would prepare it for us. What a delightful way to eat! I can't say it was the most romantic meal, since it was almost like eating in a kitchen, but it was a way to learn about fish, knife work, and Japanese traditions. We ordered Spanish mackerel, yellowtail, giant clam, sea urchin, squid, cuttlefish, and a toro scallion roll. The roll was the only thing we dipped in soy sauce. The chef prepared the fish in a bit of sauce or sea salt and told us simply to pick it up with our hands and eat it. The fish was clean and delicious, on perfectly warm sushi rice.

The standouts: toro was buttery and divinely rich. We asked the chef's recommendation to end the meal, and he gave us two heavenly chunks of Alaskan crab, decorated with squeezed lemon and sea salt. Sweet and luscious. But here were my two favorites: a sea scallop from Massachusetts and white freshwater eel. I had never had raw scallops before; these were so sweet and succulent. The chef apparently prizes domestic fish, and this was an excellent specimen. The chef's press materials say he is an eel expert, and I would corroborate that from the eel I tasted, the best I have ever tasted. Usually sushi eel is kind of hard and blocklike, apparently because chefs re-heat the eel in a toaster oven. Our chef took raw eel and cooked it in front of us on a small grill. The result was the kindest, tastiest, most tender flesh. Changed the way I think about that sea creature.

The second we told the chef we were full our tea leaf was withdrawn, our plates carried off. We received a complimentary brown tea and the bill. Expensive, but worth every penny. The cheapest trip to Tokyo I can imagine. When I went to the restroom on the way out and heard someone speaking English, I was thoroughly disoriented.

New Haven's Chez Panisse

Dara writes:

When I resided in Berkeley College at Yale University in the mid-90s, the dining hall food was so abysmal I moved off campus. The dingy, co-ed bathroom, minute cubicle with bunk beds I shared with my roommate, and the rodents didn't help either. All that has changed. Not only have most residential colleges at Yale undergone total renovations, but my college's dining hall has become a model for sustainable, local, and mostly organic food.

James and I have taken so many car trips lately to see his father, that we have taken to listening to Podcasts. Several recent ones were from a Princeton conference on food and ethics, which took place last November. Panelists repeatedly mentioned the Yale Sustainable Food Project as a model.

The daughter of Alice Waters, the chef who was instrumental in the "eat seasonal and local" movement, matriculated at Yale and inspired her mother to urge more organic dining. What has happened at the residential college Berkeley is staggering. The menu sounds amazing, it is seasonal, and some of it comes from a farm that is a fifteen minute walk from campus. The farm takes summer interns and I was kind of sad to learn the interns must be undergrads.

Unfortunately being on the road so much has meant a steady diet of McDonald's Snack Wraps: crispy chicken, jack cheese, lettuce, and ranch dressing in a tortilla. My theory is it is small enough to not make me sick, or for that matter thirsty for three days because of the amount of salt McDonald's pours on its food.

Bruni throws another hand grenade Meyer's way

Dara writes:

Bring it on, Bruni!

And bring it, he did. Oh yes, the fight continues between NYC restaurateur and NY Times chief restaurant critic Frank Bruni in this week's "Dining" section.

As I have written here and here, there is a war going on between Danny Meyer and Frank Bruni. In his book on the restaurant business, "Setting the Table," Danny Meyer laments how Frank Bruni awarded Meyer's most ambitious restaurants, Eleven Madison Park and The Modern, only two stars. Mr. Meyer felt Mr. Bruni did not give them a chance to evolve before (relatively) slamming them.

Alas, two weeks ago in The New York Times, Mr. Bruni awarded these two restaurants three stars. Hooray! Except Bruni took the opportunity to demote Meyer's most famous restaurants, Gramercy Tavern and Union Square Cafe--a back-handed compliment if ever I have seen one.

In last week's "Dining" section, Mr. Meyer's friends came to his aid by trumpeting, in an ad, the first "six star" review ever in the history of The Times: three stars each for Eleven and Modern. And now, in today's "Dining" section, Bruni lobs a grenade.

In his article today entitled "You May Kiss the Chef's Napkin Ring," Bruni excoriates the latest trend of chefs to conduct their restaurants as temples to themselves. By promoting ten-course tasting menus and blasting their iPod playlists, chefs are preoccupied with their own predilections and desires, not those of their accolytes--I mean, customers. Somehow, although Mr. Meyer is not a chef, Mr. Bruni makes him a prime target of his article, even including a picture of Tabla as Exhibit A in the hubris of restaurant people.

Mr. Bruni whines:

After the restaurateur Danny Meyer’s “Setting the Table” was published last fall, he propped up copies right inside the front doors of Gramercy Tavern, Eleven Madison Park and Tabla, where the book was also displayed above the bar, just to be safe.

Mr. Meyer isn’t a chef. He’s essentially a host, renowned for his humility and hospitality, for rounding out your meal with a prettily wrapped coffeecake for breakfast the next morning.

And yet he set things up so that when you walked into one of his restaurants, your first encounter wasn’t necessarily with a host or a hostess saying hello or taking your coat. It was with a photograph of him on a self-flattering book (“America’s most innovative restaurateur,” trumpets the cover) about how he always puts you, the customer, first.

For one thing, Mr. Meyer is an excellent, skilled writer, and I would put him to test with Bruni any day. For another, how does Meyer's promotion of his book oppose or even exclude his concern for his customers? I'm sure many of them over the years have wondered about how he has done such an amazing job in such a tough city, and many would be interested in learning his philosophy.

Bruni's direct challenge of Meyer's "humility" is ad hominem. I am interested to see where Meyer takes this mano a mano next.

Food: Meyer Strikes Back

Dara writes:

Readers of the previous post will know that I found Frank Bruni's three-star review of Danny Meyer's restaurants Eleven Madison Park and The Modern a back-handed compliment at best. Even the title, "Two Upstarts Don Their Elders' Laurels," suggests a kind of karmic balancing: Bruni can feel good about feeling good about Meyer only if Bruni is simultaneously dissing Meyer.

Well, Alan and Michael Stillman, who own the Smith & Wollensky restaurant group that controls such New York establishments as Park Avenue Cafe, Cite, and The Post House, have offered a timely reminder to New York Times' readers that Danny Meyer's restaurants deserve three stars. The Stillmans have taken out an ad in this week's "Dining" section that reads:

"Congratulations on the First Six-Star Review in the History of The New York Times."

Now finally someone can do his math.

Food: Latest Salvos in the Bruni-Meyer War

Dara writes:

Recently, I wrote here about my interest in the latest book on the food business, Setting the Table, by acclaimed New York restaurateur Danny Meyer, he of Union Square Cafe, Gramercy Tavern, and Shake Shack fame. Mr. Meyer is brilliant. I love his medium rare tuna at Union Square as much as I do the cheeseburger at the Shack, even when one hour of waiting outside in a line precedes its arrival. James and I pigged out at Blue Smoke, another of his boites, and I could not get the blue cheese dip with house-made barbecue chips out of my mind.

Enter Frank Bruni, chief restaurant critic for The New York Times. In a city on which Mr. Meyer has had such a positive impact, one would think its chief paper's chief food critic would be hospitable to the man. No such luck. As Meyer admits in his book, he was very frustrated to receive only two stars from Bruni for his most ambitious restaurants yet: Eleven Madison Park, the temple to haute cuisine on 24th Street, and The Modern, a sleek accompaniment to the Picassos in the MOMA.

Basically, Bruni thinks Meyer is more in the business of food than into food. He's no Mario Batali. Bruni feels Meyer's restaurants are formulaic; he thinks there is something weird about the fact that servers and hostesses smile and seem genuinely interested in what you are eating and how you are doing. I have never quite gotten Mr. Bruni's beef, but I was very surprised to read in last week's New York Times' "Dining" section that he was re-reviewing Eleven Madison Park and The Modern, and in fact, giving each three stars. Well this is news, I thought.

No such luck. It appears Herr Bruni still has it out for Monsieur Meyer: Brutus, I mean Bruni, awards Modern and Madison with three stars, only to strip two other of Meyer's restaurants, Union Square and Gramercy, of their lustre! The nerve of this guy! To wit:

Every time I left Eleven Madison Park, it was with at least one dish, and usually several, lingering in my thoughts and prompting me to rave to somebody the next day. That’s not the case with most restaurants, and that hasn’t been my experience in recent years at Gramercy Tavern or Union Square Cafe. They may have the more steadfast retinues of loyal suitors. But the crowns rest uneasily — and perhaps unjustly — on their heads.

That is a back-handed compliment if ever I have heard one.

Speaking of Union Square Cafe, I dined there yesterday on the occasion of a cousin's 40th birthday. It was a girls' lunch: several female relatives, my mother, and I. The servers were as kind as ever, but I dare say the food was a tad undistinguished. For instance, our appetizer of fried calamari was, horrors, mushy, when crispiness is the essential element of this dish. I ordered the yellow-fin tuna burger and it tasted fresh, gingery, and oniony, but I did not swoon--not as I had over a Greenmarket strawberry crumble I devoured at the Cafe over the summer.

Danny Meyer makes a lot in his book about the regrettable layout of USC, how it is below street level, plain, and with airplane cabin-sized restrooms. I typically find the room pleasant, but yesterday I did feel a bit as though I were dining in the cabin of a ship; I kind of kept wanting to peek out the window for air. Yet, if one of Meyer's goals is to sustain the room as a canteen for the publishing industry, he still achieves that, as I ran into an editor with whom I had worked at Talk magazine, back when it still existed.

My lack of a rave for yesterday does not trouble me too much. James and I prefer the bar at night, anyway. Although, the last time we checked it out--a Monday, 9:30pm or so--there was a 45 minute wait...for the bar! Despite Bruni's hemming and hawing, I don't think Meyer has much to fret about.

Food: Uptown

Dara writes:

Because of Dr. Martin Luther King's birthday today, I stayed for an abridged schedule at the literary agency where I work in Harlem. Many of the area's stores closed for the holiday, including the Original SoupMan, where I eat. I eat here not because this is a franchise of the shop portrayed in my favorite TV show, "Seinfeld," or because I particularly relish soup. I eat here because it is the only good-looking eatery in the immediate vicinity of 132nd Street and Lenox Avenue. If there is a reader who can correct me, I would love it.

My friend Ruth and I, spurned by our soup craving, shopped in the neighborhood Associated Supermarket for lunch goods. Lunch for two cashed in at under ten dollars, which is roughly what a "combo meal" for one--large soup, grilled panini, and a fountain drink--would have cost at SoupMan. The combo meal is pretty good. I have tried an Italian wedding soup--little pearl noodles, meat dumplings, spinach--which I usually love (especially at P&W's Sandwich Shop near Columbia University) that was grotesquely over-salted. I almost felt I could not drink for three days lest I bloat like a balloon and pop. But SoupMan flavors its butternut squash soup with freshly grated carrots and orange zest, and the grilled cheese panini is passable. Less so the fruit and bread that accompany the meal. The banana might have been sitting by the boiler in a bodega for two weeks, so soft is it, while the bread is so hard I could sign my credit card receipt on it. The woman who owns this franchise is nice but rings customers out at a rather lethargic pace.

So it is not as if I experience Le Bernardin and today had to make do with Blimpie. But Blimpie is just about what I got at the neighborhood Associated Supermarket. I did save money there--on 99 cent whole wheat pitas, flip-top cans of Bumble Bee tuna (because we couldn't ascertain if the agency had a can opener), small jar of Hellmanns, Vlasic dills, and two bananas. My friend keeps kosher, so alas we could not spring for the Oscar Mayer salami.

I have heard that development is happening in many parts of Harlem. I would say that not a ton is going on around 135th Street near Harlem Hospital, although apparently Make My Cake around 139th Street serves a wicked red velvet cake that beats canned tuna any day of the week, especially holidays.

Bi-coastal Pronvincialism

Dara writes:

I got some very good feedback on a recent post about Target from a woman in Alabama. She reminded me that New Yorkers can be very provincial; Ms. Herbitter averred that while compared to the MoMA Design Store Target might not be much, compared to Wal-Mart it is manna from heaven.

While we New Yorkers can navel-gaze, we can also forget the rest of the country and zoom right on out to California. One example of our coastal myopia is the writing of Kim Severson for the "Dining" section of The New York Times. Her role seems to be bringing dispatches from California; no wonder: until recently she was a staff writer at The San Francisco Chronicle. Don't we have enough voices from CA?

This past week, Ms. Severson wrote about a fire that destroyed a beloved Northern California inn. The caption below the photograph of the inn read as follows:

"RUSTICITY Manka’s Inverness Lodge was known for its quirky menu."

For a moment I thought I was going to read about a quaint little restaurant of which I would not have otherwise known. Instead, Ms. Severson informs her readers that

"Manka’s fed actors like Frances McDormand and Brad Pitt and writers like Isabel Allende and Robert Haas."

Indeed, the day of the fire, actors Maggie and Jake Gyllenhaal were guests at Manka's. The thing is this: if I want to encounter Jake Gyllenhaal, I can nibble chicken paillard at the over-discovered Manhattan restaurant Pastis (as I recently did and sat next to him). If I want to read about food and scenery a bit more extraordinary, I might need to look beyond food writers whose main pipeline is the next Jet Blue flight to Oakland.

Food: Pickles

Dara writes:

I mentioned below how I loved the pickles curated by David Chang of Momofuku. The ones with which I decorate a rice bowl at the Ssam Bar tickle me green. But I forgot to mention how divine the seasonal pickles at Momofuku Noodle Bar are. Chang chooses to dip carrots, brussels sprouts, turnips, mushrooms, and other unsuspecting veggies in vinegar, and his chefs plate them to create a beautiful cornucopia.

As I just praised a pickle purveyor, karma has it I must now slam one. I choose to slam Rick Fields, who created Rick's Picks, which he peddles at the Union Square Greenmarket. Rick may look like a Lower East Side hipster-cum-Catskills organic farmer, but folks, he was a TV producer and went to Yale.

I went there too, which is how I know; I first learned of Rick not in the Dining Section of The New York Times, where he has indeed been mentioned, but in the Yale Alumni Magazine, which ran a "Where They Are Now" column about him in a 2005 issue.

Since in 2005 I walked through the Union Square Greenmarket each day on my way to work, I decided to meet Mr. Fields. I introduced myself and said I read about him in the Alumni Magazine. He grunted. I think he looked away.

Oh, I see: your affiliation with the Ivy League doesn't quite go with your residence on a street corner in downtown Manhattan. Ruins your cred, does it? Ruins your customer service, more like it.

I inherited my passion for pickles. Recently my mother took my cousin and me to a swank lunch on the Lower East Side, and perhaps to balance her karma, she followed the tony lunch with a stop at the corner pickle-barker, who hawked pickles out of big barrels on the street. The lusty woman purveyor fished dills and sours from the briny broth and poured them into plastic containers. It all felt very Jewish Lower East Side circa 1918. My mother waxed nostalgic about buying all her underwear at Goldbergs, back in the day.

Underwear: yes, I need underwear, thought Mother. To my and my cousin's absolute mortification, my mother asked the large, lusty pickle purveyor about where, around here, she could buy panties.

If I could think of a living soul I would be less inclined to ask about undies, it would be the lusty pickle purveyor.

Oy.

Restaurants: Momofuku Ssam Bar

Dara writes:

I love it when most people leave New York City and I can pretend I have it all to myself. Such is the occasion on the Friday of Christmas weekend--especially when the rain pours.

James and I took the opportunity to revisit the more casual restaurant of David Chang, he of Momofuku Noodle Bar, which critics worship. You might remember that I was negative on the Ssam Bar here. In fact, I have changed my mind; the workings of the Bar have changed.

When I first went to the Bar a few months ago, I ordered a Ssam (a Korean burrito), and while I liked some of the ingredients--the pickles, cole slaw, and spicy sauce--the next day I felt a bit less happy to have ordered it. Now the process has been deconstructed, so that when you go up to the counter and place your order, you can pretend you are at Subway and really make your meal as you go.

Now I get the rice bowl instead of the Ssam. The rice bowl is just rice and you add a protein. I always go for the Berkshire pork because it is tender, high-quality, and delicious. Then, because I can order as I go, I avoid beans, edamame, and others bits that don't agree with me. I pile cole slaw, ginger-scallion sauce, and portobello pieces on the rice and am satisfied. Also: as far as I am concerned, David Chang makes the best pickles in the city. Tonight I let James eat some of my bowl but absolutely insisted he not touch the pickles.

In case you were surprised up there by the word counter: yes, this restaurant is cafeteria style. You stride in past the burnished wood bar on one wall and the roomy wood communal tables along the other wall. You pass the big picture of John McEnroe and place your order at the counter. You pay and then, since every time I have been I have shared the restaurant with only a few others, you take a whole "communal" table to yourself. I once met a fellow teacher here to plan a week of lessons and the space and quiet proved essential to the success of our meeting. Not that it's completely quiet: the Rolling Stones invariably mix with hip-hop and rock on the playlist. And by the way, the restaurant does get busy, and on weekends stays open until 2:30am--at which point table service gets the job done.

Restaurants: Yama

Dara writes:

On the way to our apartment near Gramercy Park in Manhattan after a long day of running pre-Christmas errands and fighting the midtown tourist crowds, James and I stopped in Yama, the venerable sushi restaurant on Irving Place.

Since we arrived before 6pm, we were seated immediately at a comfy corner table. Our server attended us lovingly and our sushi and sake arrived very quickly. We ordered inventive and huge rolls: salmon with chives and spicy mayonnaise; tuna and yellowtail with avocado; and the "crispy shrimpy," which is tuna with shrimp and little tempura flakes tucked inside. Each roll looked delectable and the fish broadcasted its freshness. The fish was tender, buttery, and clean tasting. Perhaps the rolls do play to Americans' focus on size. Nevermind.

While I love the sushi joint closer to our apartment, and I attest it is better than average, Yama was in a different class and reminded me of how important texture is in raw fish. It occurs to me the East 40s in Manhattan is a bit of a Little Tokyo, and I intend to try some of those places soon.

Food: Delishop

Dara writes:

Did you ever wonder what would happen if Zabar's, the storied New York purveyor of nova, bialys, gourmet cheese, and disgruntled older Upper West Side ladies, married a really sleek shoe store and they had offspring? Wonder no longer. The love child of gourmet food and hipness is the store my brother and his Spanish bride just opened in Barcelona, Spain: Delishop.

My brother has lived in Spain for years, working as a sports marketer and perfecting his cooking skills in Barcelona, which has become a culinary mecca whose imam is Ferran Adria of the famously experimental restaurant El Bulli. My brother has had two memorable meals there, by the way, after the first of which he scanned in his annotated copy of the menu, all thirty-some courses, and emailed it to us.

My brother's wife Monica has worked in advertising, but is also an excellent chef. The two pooled their entrepreneurial and culinary skills to dream up their new shop. As far as I can tell, the endeavor has two goals: to bring new cuisine to Spain, and to do it stylishly. According to them, Spain has been a bit insular, having only recently come out from under a totalitarian dictatorship. Staples we take for granted--soy sauce, ramen noodles, Bisquick--have never been readily available. Ricky and Monica will present "exotic" foods in a manner so hip you will be drawn into their shop first by the gorgeous layout (and handsome salespeople--my brother and their friend Sergio).

Foot traffic has been steady. The best-seller so far? Betty Crocker Brownie Mix.

Stay tuned in to supremefiction for more news from Espana.

Raymond's in Montclair: Mayberry's Odeon

Dara writes:

Yesterday James dragged me, sorry, brought me along on a trip to the Montclair Art Museum for an afternoon lecture on the 19th-century American landscape painter George Inness. I was sort of excited to visit Montclair, where I had never been, because I know that many NY writer-types live there and commute to the city. From our apartment near Union Square in Manhattan, the drive took about forty minutes. Not bad, yet I kind of always hold my breath through the Lincoln Tunnel, and has there ever been a more prosaic road than the NJTP? Highway 101 out of San Francisco over the Golden Gate Bridge it is not.

I very much enjoyed the Inness paintings. James appreciates the painter for his varied techniques: he painted both exact landscapes and almost abstract, emotional nature scenes. In one image, Sunset, in the museum's collection, brilliant orange sun beams peak out between two leaning trees. From a distance, there seems to be extraordinary depth behind the trees. Up close, the painter has daubed bright orange between the trees and in fact what seemed like depth now appears to be surface. I'm not an art historian, so I'm not sure of the significance of that observation, but I was intrigued by the work. Interestingly, an Inness collector and benefactor of the wing in the museum was on hand to give us a personal tour of the collection, which was delightful.

It was about 6:30pm, and James and I needed sustenance. The museum's director pointed us to Raymond's, down Bloomfield Avenue not far from the institution. Now, the museum is perched on a hill, and driving down Bloomfield toward the restaurant entailed a breathtaking view, on this clear night, of Manhattan.

Raymond's, which opened in 1989, is retrofitted to look like an old malt shop. Imagine an Odeon--albeit one estranged from the scene in downtown Manhattan in the 1980s--in Mayberry. We had to wait about ten minutes, and in that time I noticed a nice-looking--and chopped--cobb salad, and that most people were ordering burgers. While deliciously ripe avocado slices perched atop the lettuce, tomatoes, blue cheese, bacon, and chicken in the salad, and while the chicken was very moist, the salad lacked crispness and taste. The chef mistakenly thought heavily mixing the salad, so the blue cheese kind of spread its wealth, could compensate for a lack of dressing. No. A cobb salad should not just be creamy, but should taste of something. I ate more of the french fries that came with James's burger than I should have to get some salt and snap.

Could I see myself in Montclair? The main street was very well tended. The museum was estimable. But part of me feels if I will leave New York I will really leave it, not to a town on a hill where I will always feel like an outsider peeking in the window at the action.

Molyvos: Amazing salads

Dara writes:

Last night James and I were treated by his mother to a wonderful pre-Carnegie Hall meal at the Greek restaurant Molyvos on Seventh Avenue and 55th Street in Midtown Manhattan. I had always associated the establishment with the power luncheon crowd, as I would make reservations there for various bosses when I worked in various Midtown publishing ventures, including (the now defunct) Talk magazine and the publishing company Little, Brown. As we were dining last night pre-concert, I assumed I was headed for an obligatory, rather than revelatory meal.

In contrast, the romaine, dill, and scallion salad wowed me. I am a salad fanatic and this one stood up. I shared it with my mother-in-law, so the smaller portion arrived at table in a delightful white porcelain creche. The greens were chopped, which I love. To my mind, the point of a salad is getting all the fresh flavors in my mouth at once. The chopped salad facilitates this by making every morsel smaller and thus more able to fit on one forkful. In Molyvos's version, the greens--herbs and leaves--were remarkably fresh. But perhaps most importantly, the dressing was sublime. What was it? I dare say only olive oil, lemon, and sea salt. But what a bracing, briny blend. The bitter lemon balanced the sweet herbs in a tingly way.

I am going to try this simple dressing at home, armed with an oil recommended in the magazine of Christopher Kimball (an author with whom I worked at Little, Brown), Cooks Illustrated. The condiment can be purchased from Crate & Barrel (finally, this over-hyped store is good for something).

My main at Molyvos was actually just as winning. A Mediterranean sea bass atop baby lentils, parsnips, and brussels sprouts. The root vegetables were as flavorful as if the chef had just brought them from Union Square Market. The fish was sweet and lovely and the skin so crispy that actually a piece scratched my throat. In spite of that momentary abrasion, I loved the dish. I had been a little worried that it might be heavy when I saw legumes and brussels sprouts accompanying it. Brainwashed by one too many recent meals laden with Thanksgiving leftovers, I was expecting a plate bursting with the meat and then heaping side portions of veggies and starch. Instead, this fish perched on a sprightly mound of lentils just barely studded with a few caramelized root vegetables. Delightful! And not gouging on my stomach.

Perhaps next time this long-standing establishment will be the evening's main attraction.

Boqueria: I just don't like tapas

Dara writes:

There are certain restaurants in this city of ours in which it is pretty okay to hold a poetry workshop. Boqueria, the jolly new tapas joint on West 19th Street, is not one of them.

Aimee and I needed a moderately-priced place to eat that was not too far downtown and not too far east, where we could also exchange a few poems over dinner. Since I had recently read the review of Boqueria in New York magazine, I knew I would be sitting on a stool, probably at a communal table, in the midst of a lively bar atmosphere. But hey, poetry sometimes requires livening up. Plus, Aimee and I both appreciate good food, and we wanted to check the restaurant out.

Once our groping under the table finally yielded a lone hook on which we could hang our purses, we could relax into our stools (an oxymoron), and concentrate on wine and verse. We ordered two glasses of Spanish white, quail egg and chorizo on toast, squid, lamb, and, just to test the authenticity of the place, patatas bravas. A large and somewhat intrusive table of four parked themselves next to us at the communal table, and then a strange thing happened. They ordered after us and yet their first tapas plates came out before ours.

And then their last little plates came out before ours. And then their entree-sized plate appeared. Aimee and I hadn't seen each other in a bit, so we were absorbed in talk--but also, finally, hungry. Just then our waitress arrived to let us know there had been a mix-up, and the server had given all our dishes to the adjacent group!

One point of information: if I got four dishes I didn't order, I might not just eat them as though I had!

We got our dishes, and they tasted good, although the lamb was undercooked and sent back and then the server brought it back--to the adjacent group! I literally had to say, "excuse me, but isn't that the lamb we ordered?" Running interference with dishes does not enhance my dining experience.

As spicy as the aioli accompanying the potatoes was, as lemony and olive-slicked as the squid was, as meaty and sinful as the egg yolk-coated chorizo was, the pieces together did not win me over as a meal. Alas, they are not supposed to. Tapas are supposed to satisfy a light hunger before dinner, or soak up alcohol afterwards. Remind me only to use them for that purpose!

Aimee and I were able to exchange poems, by the way. But I did notice that the callow couple next to us who had annoyed me when they blatantly laughed in the waitress' face because they "had the giggles" vexed me exponentially more when they gaped at our para-literary interaction and burst out in hysterics.

Chide you will that I should have known better than to stage a mini-MFA in a tapas bar. Yet isn't the Spanish tradition the literary equivalent of poetry: compact and dense with meaning?

Great N.Y. Noodletown: Yummy, not Yucky

Dara writes:

If peering at a menu glued to the table beneath a greasy plastic tabletop, downing your bowl of soup wedged in among strangers at a communal table for eight, and blanching under flickering flourescent lights do not combine, for you, into a pleasurable dining experience, you might want to avoid Great N.Y. Noodletown, a Chinese restaurant on the Bowery in New York's Chinatown.

At least, I tried to avoid it, though James dragged me there a few times. Yes, the noodle soup was mighty tasty. The noodles a toothsome tangle, the shrimp dumplings fresh and tangy with chives, and the bits of juicy duck with crispy skin very hearty. Still, I found the establishment--there really is no other word for this--gross.

But friends, I have been converted. You see, about three weeks ago, when they were still in season, James and I ordered the soft shell crab. I admit I was intrigued to do so by a mention of the dish in Travel + Leisure. Indeed, the taste was delightful: crispy skin, touched by hot chilies, juicy, steaming meat. The dish was--there really is no other word for this--dainty. Delicate. And so my feelings about the restaurant that served it began to change. Any kitchen that could produce such lacey food couldn't be as lacking as I'd first judged.

Alas, the crabs were no more when James and I returned last night, but our waiter kindly recommended the salt-baked combo as a replacement. I like shrimp, but the consistency of scallops and squid--mushy and chewy, respectively--can get to me. Nevertheless, I capitulated. And dear reader, I cannot get the dish out of my mind. Again, so delicate! Salty, crispy, lightly fried exterieror, masking absolutely succulent fish, kissed by jalapenos. Heaven for a pittance!

Sure, the lights still flicker, and the service is nothing more than functional. But sometimes well-executed food, fast and cheap, is exactly what a city night requires.

Pain Quotidien: What is it?

Dara writes:

Le Pain Quotidien, the Belgian bakery chain with international outposts and many branches in New York City, is never as good as it should be. It *is* a go-to place, as it offers light, fresh, tasty lunch and breakfast fare. Apparently its croissants are award winning. And yet, recent experiences there have made me wonder: is the ambience that of an artisanal restaurant or Ikea cafeteria?

PQ's prices and decor say artisanal. A nice blond wood comprises the chairs and tables, the menus are appealingly in French, and the international waiters--today I counted Russians, French, Africans, and West Indians among them--register a degree of aloofness often seen in haute establishments. And yet, the communal tables and slackness of service say cafeteria.

Then there's the food. It tastes quite good. I very much like the curry chicken on pain levain with cranberry chutney and little slices of cucumber. But why is this lovely meal kind of all spread out on a charcuterie board and more importantly, why did a very quick dish so easy to plop on a platter take 25 minutes to arrive a la table?

I think I might prefer PQ if it actually were a kind of upscale mess hall. I would prefer to speed up to a counter and order the chicken salad, and then quickly pace to my countertop for my feed. OR, I would like to sit in a smaller room at a more well-appointed table built just for me and my companion(s), and place my chicken order with an accommodating and patient staff member.

With lower prices and faster service, I wouldn't mind sitting with 32 strangers. But at these prices and with this service, I expect a slightly calmer, more intimate experience.

Freemans: If Mom were a guy with hip facial hair

Dara writes:

I love the reviews by Frank Bruni, the restaurant critic for The New York Times. He's smart and a great writer. What some call overwriting, I call a gift with metaphor.

Last week, he panned Freemans, writing in the Dining section of the hip Lower East Side hideaway:

Twice I had poached chicken with celery and carrots, and twice it tasted like the remnants of a stock that was supposed to have been the promising genesis of a dish, not the sorry conclusion.

Baby back ribs longed for succulence, while grilled trout with thyme and lemon cried out for a dash of excitement and a dew drop of moisture.

As for service, well, let’s get there by way of one of Mr. Somer’s pre-Freemans commercial enterprises. He designed T-shirts with cheeky messages. One said, 'My girlfriend is out of town.' Another: 'Emotionally unavailable.' That’s the shirt that should be worn by some of the servers.

I can see why Mr. Bruni didn't like the place, a two-year old restaurant tucked down an alley off of Rivington Street and just east of the Bowery on New York's Lower East Side. He didn't like it because he's paid to review restaurant cooking, while what's presented at Freeman's is essentially costly home-cooking. My mother could have cooked the EXACT same meal, and it wouldn't have cost $100/person (price raised because we occupied a FULL room, as part of a gathering. That's prime Losaida real estate, yo). But I see the restaurant's point, in a way, because the mothers of the Oklahoma hipsters who frequent Freemans are far, far away and sorely missed by their modish offspring.

As Bruni notes, the artichoke dip is excellent, though again, my mother makes a slightly better version, because less salty, which she found in a cookbook my grade school put together in 1983 for a fundraiser. Bruni writes that "the people jamming the entrance, eager to see what the fuss is about, need to know that what awaits them isn’t a memorable feast. It’s iceberg with ranch dressing under a stuffed boar’s head." True, but, the iceberg they use isn't exactly a plastic-wrapped bulb of Foxy from Met food. It's a kind of, I'm sure, boutique iceberg and the ranch is ungloppy buttermilk ranch. Plus, fresh, thinly sliced radishes, grace the dish, thereby elevating it. The filet mignon with horseradish cream that Bruni called "fine" was indeed so, though again, it was kind of what a friend could put together for a dinner party, and again, when you're paying a lot, you anticipate more.

James pointed out that the appeal of the current craze for anti-glamour has its limits. Used to be that dining out meant luxury and gracious service, whereas now the aloofness of the staff increases with the price of an entree. I dig the taxidermy animals on the wall, and having a room for our party was private and nice. But to get there I had to walk through a room of people who are kind of my worst nightmare: younger than I and with exactly the right facial hair (men) and raised ponytails , dark eyeliner, and stovepipe jeans (ladies). Though I have to say turning onto Freeman's Alley, at the end of which the restaurant is located, is cool, if disorienting. For one thing, I try not to make a practice of walking down alleys in the city, so doing so is breaking a taboo. For another, when do stucco walls adorned by crucifixes (an art project I assume sponsored by an adjacent gallery) grace a city alley? I felt like I could be walking down a street in Italy--well, no, maybe--Poland.

Pastis: Wish I Knew How to Quit You

Dara writes:

I submit to dining at that chestnut of meatpacking milieus, Pastis, Keith McNally's French bistro on 13th and Hudson, (only) because my cousin works down the street. But actually I love McNally's creations--from the ginger iced tea at Balthazar to the toffee pudding at Schiller's--and think he does an expert job with city restaurants.

Just when my cousin and I sit down, in comes, yes, the hunk who uttered those now-famous words in Ang Lee's Brokeback Mountain, Jake Gyllenhaal. Whoa, right? As I'm telling cuz about it, he saunters over and sits right next to us.

My cousin and I were supposed to have a serious talk and 'twas a tad tough to concentrate thereafter. He ordered sardines and mentioned to his companion--who also looked familiar and seemed, in his seriousness and absence of hunkishness, to be a director or writer--that she'd stayed at his place all week. She going unnamed.

Director/writer and I each ordered the chicken palliard, which I recommend. The frisee on top is dressed just right with vinegar and salt, and the kitchen sprinkles crispy fried shallots on top.

Dara's Upper East Side Kitchen

I'm sorry for the absence, but you couldn't very well expect me to stay in town for the holidays. Yo fui en Espana, donde yo aprendi cocinar la comida de catalunya. I should probably be writing that in Catalan, but anywho. The sexy Spanish woman my brother is marrying showed me how to make a delicious tapas I now pass on to you.

Monica's Magic Mushrooms:

six big white (normal) mushrooms
bacon
tabasco sauce
paprika
pepper

Tear off the mushroom stems. Douse the insides of the caps with tabasco sauce, pepper, and paprika. Wrap the caps with bacon.

There are several ways to cook:

Cover each cap in tin foil and barbecue. OR, if you don't live in a spacious, terraced flat in Barcelona, but rather a cramped one-bedroom in NYC, you can bake the caps uncovered in a Pyrex dish at 350 for one hour (on't forget to drain the bacon fat about 40 minutes into the one hour cooking time). Next, quickly--for like ten minutes--fry them up in a pan until the bacon is crispy.

Son muy rico!