Asiate

[NY News Team]

It seemed that the latest trend among trendy New York City hotels is to have a Japanese restaurant in it. The latest to jump on the bandwagon is none other than the super luxurious Mandarin Oriental, which will open Asiate this fall with interior designed by the restaurant architect du jour-Tony Chi (who designed LOMI in Chicago). Located on the 35th floor of the AOL Time Warner Center, Asiate will feature the cuisine of chef Nori Sugie, who has worked at the L'Aubergade in France, Charlie Trotters in Chicage and Tetsuyas and Restaurant VII in Sydney. Sugie is expected to bring his harmonius approach to food, with each dish promising to delight all five senses. With Thomas Keller's French Laundry and Jean George Vongerichten's Steakhouse near by, Asiate will most certainly have some pretty tough competitions, then again, this may be the restaurant that surprise us all. Check it out at www.mandarinoriental.com

by Y. Yang

Asiate

at AOL Time Warner Center

Reservations: (212)805-8881

or call the Mandarin Oriental (212) 805-8800

source: press release from the Mandarin Oriental Hotel and Lou Hammond & Associates

[JesseNYC]

They will also have an advantage over the Keller and JG restaurants as they will be open at least four months before the other two.

Keller and JG are behind schedule and wont be open until early '04.

[dbrociner]

The latest to jump on the bandwagon is none other than the super luxurious Mandarin Oriental, which will open Asiate this fall with interior designed by the restaurant architect du jour-Tony Chi (who designed LOMI in Chicago).

Do you mean NoMi? This is also a hotel restaurant, in the Park Hyatt hotel in Chicago.

[NY News Team]

It is NoMi didn't even realize the typo. Apologies for the disinformation. I think he also designed the restaurant in the Mandarin Oriental in Miami.

[SobaAddict70]

Kobe beef, often dealt with preciously, is treated like beef at Asiate. It's doused with a rich oxtail jus and surrounded by mushroom ragout and smoked potato purée.

Diner's Journal: Asiate (William Grimes) (from this weekend's DIGEST. You may have to scroll down for the relevant link.)

Chef Noriyuki Sugie, formerly of Tetsuya and Restaurant VII -- both of which are located in Sydney, Australia -- offers an ambitious and elegant marriage of French technique and Japanese ingredients in a fashionable west Midtown location.

First impressions, anyone? The Earl Grey crème brulée with litchi sorbet is an interesting possibility.

Soba

[Fat Guy]

I missed the media preview lunches back in November, but the buzz I've been hearing has been quite positive. The $85 (I think) tasting menu with 12 (I think) courses sounds like a great deal, and the room sounds spectacular. Definitely high on my list of must-visits.

[tommy]

sounds like my kind of place. hadn't heard anything before this.

[Bond Girl]

More information on Asiate.

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showto...=0entry372501

[Fat Guy]

Thanks, Bond Girl -- NY News Team was all over it as usual. Also check Eden (coquille) Blum's roundup of the TWC restaurants in The Daily Gullet: http://egullet.com/?pg=ARTICLE-blumontimewarner

[OPJK]

I ate at Asiate last night with three others. We sat in a fairly private booth, decorated with kimonos, colorful pillows, and smack up against the windows overlooking Broadway, Trump Intl Hotel and Tower, and bits of the park. Like many new restaurants, it seems, the tables are a comfortable size, making it impossible for those serving to comfortably reach the diners on the inside. So any filling of glasses, addition or removal of plates, cutlery, etc. requires the involvement of the diners.

The basic menu is $65 prixe fixe. This includes an appetizer and an entree only. The table was served a plate of gougeres that were good. We also had glasses of champagne (Nicholas Feuillatte NV rose at a stunning $22 per glass - still cheaper than the bottle!).

While billed as an asian-french fusion restaurant, I found that there were a number of asian-french collisions. The rolls, for instance, were basic and well-made french rolls, but had been shellacked with nori and that sweet soy-based (?) coating found on Japanese rice snacks. It took away from the roll's basic pleasure.

The amuse bouce was a cold soup served in a small cup. It looked almost like a coddled egg, as it was a cream-based pumpkin and some other root vegetable soup. Very rich and tasty - not too sweet.

Appetizers were large. I had rice paper wrapped crab meat with some shredded vegetables with a pomelo sauce. There were three of these and they were generally forgettable. The sauce was nice, the crab was tasteless, the garnish was tasty.

One other appetizer was scallops that had been seared appropriately. I don't recall the sauce, but this were praised by all (largely for the simple food cooked simply aspect of it).

Oh yes, we ordered a bottle of 2002 Morey Chassagne Montrachet (around $85-90). This was nice, if initially served a bit warm. (By the way, as you walk into the restaurant, you pass dramatic wall-to-ceiling glass wine shelves holding what must be a thousand wines bottles, mostly stored horizontally, with some sections vertical. It works.)

Post appetizer, we were served "caesar salad soup." Very cool - Asiates' nod to el Bulli. Served in small, cup-like containers, there were beads, liquid, and a white foam, together creating a modified caesar salad-ish sensation. There was no anchovy (flavor or otherwise) in this, and the foam was bacon-flavored.

My entree was branzino that had been pan-seared, served over mashed potatoes along with a verjus and a seared scallop. The scallop sat next to a glob of ponzu sauce that was completely unnecessary and, when given the chance, a bit overwhelming. The fish was very nice. Other entrees included salmon and lobster. There was an additional charge for the lobster (maybe $7, maybe $15 - I don't remember).

Those eating the lobster were disappointed. I'm not sure how it had been prepared. Likewise the salmon-eater said it was fine, but not noteworthy.

Desserts ordered included chocolate three ways (the one prep I rememebr was a warm white chocolate liquid -something between a hot milk shake and melted ice cream). I had a very tasty quince tart served with a basic chestnut ice cream. There was also a chocolate fondant that was well-received.

Followed by an espresso and a cappucino, the bill was $650 (incuding tax, pre-tip). In the end, a pleasant meal, a lovely setting, decent service, with a few forced-fusions-for-fusion's-sake accents. And, in the end, just not remotely worth the price.

(By the way, there was a funny/sad near-monologue by the server concerning one menu item. The menu includes wagyu beef. When asked what that was, the server said that "It is kobe beef." Then why isn't it called kobe? "Oh, it's from Washington state, but it's kobe. Kobe is just the grain and beer that the cattle are fed. Oh, and don't worry about it being from Washington. It doesn't have mad cow. It comes from a small farm that's really, really careful..." The inaccuracy about the kobe beef aside, it was a funny slide down into mad cow defensiveness in front of a group that wasn't worrying about it.)

[Bond Girl]

My hair dresser likes this one too (she's Japanese). I am actually thinking about going sometimes this week.

[Pan]

I'll be curious to read your meal report. I consider OPJK's report a warning.

[kurl]

That ceasar salad soup sounds amazingly weird and amazing and weird. Are there any other things like that on menus around NYC?

[docsconz]

I'll be curious to read your meal report. I consider OPJK's report a warning.

I agree, Michael, after that well written report I am not in such a hurry anymore to try it out for myself. while any restaurant can have an off night, the criticism here in might be a little deeper than that. I'll keep an open mind to other reports to decide whether it is worth a trip.

[Fat Guy]

We finally made it to Asiate last night. A number of my reactions were similar to OPJK's above (therefore OPJK is a genius!) although I differ on the question of price: this place offers an amazing value and is probably hemorrhaging money hand over fist. Has anybody been to Daniel lately? $88 for the basic three-course menu, plus hefty supplements (such as $20 for the foie gras terrine). At $65 for three courses (including all the intermezzos you'd expect), Asiate is charging well below the going rate for a luxury restaurant, and right now this is one of the most luxurious dining rooms in the country, with all the other trappings of luxury. It's less expensive than Gramercy Tavern, for example, though it's certainly possible to run up the wine bill.

There were enough good dishes among the four of us to make one truly outstanding meal that I'd go back and eat tomorrow: An appetizer of freshly made fettuccine with shrimp in a multidimensional XO-based sauce came in a parchment beggar's purse, which was cut open at the table. As OPJK says, the appetizer portions are large, and this was a particularly gezunteh helping. The duck entree was dynamite: duck confit and a slice of seared foie gras over pearl onions and a ton of other vegetables swimming in a fragrant (of what, I'm not sure) jus, served in an iron crock. By far the winningest dessert was a passion-fruit souffle -- probably the best souffle I've had (from a technical standpoint), and elevated by a pervasive and emphatic passion fruit flavor.

Other items ranged from successful to pretty lame, and a couple indicated bad judgment -- for example why the heck would anybody serve a cold soup amuse in February? I know the seasons are reversed in Australia, but come on: you walk into this hotel and the whole place has a very cold feel to it. I think it's beautiful, and no sane person could say it isn't dramatic, but it's not a warm, welcoming environment. A little cup of warm soup would have sent exactly the right signal. Instead, this cold custardy pumpkin thing felt totally wrong (later, you get the Caesar salad soup -- which is warm -- between courses, which also raises the question: why two soups?). Also agree with OPJK that the bread would be better if left alone, which isn't to say it's bad. The cocktails were poorly made. The crab appetizer was neither based on particularly good crab nor interesting for its overdose of lemongrass.

There was some debate at the table about the success of the other dishes: everybody loved the "cod" (sablefish, I believe it really is, though it was just called cod on the menu) except for me -- I thought it was a pale imitation of the dish and its derivatives (oily sablefish/black-cod with a sweet glaze of miso or whatever) as I've had it at Nobu and elsewhere. There was also enthusiastic reception for the scallops (which themselves were excellent, and beautifully seared) over, among other things, duck prosciutto, but I felt the dish was out of balance: the bitter and salty components overwhelmed everything else. On the other side of the opinion scale, I thought the Wagyu beef (one of the only dishes with a supplement) was outstanding and a couple of others in the group thought it was lame -- not enough flavor was their objection, but to me it was right on: extreme marbling, very flavorful if the flavor you're looking for is fat (which I am when tasting Wagyu), and of course amazingly tender. I also thought all the desserts were interesting and forward-thinking, whereas everybody else thought they were mostly unsatisfying (I assume the consensus view will be that the desserts need to be more traditional and decadent, and less foamy and precious, but I like foamy and precious desserts -- I see myself as a foamy and precious person).

I still haven't made up my mind about the pork dish and will have to try it again. It's advertised as suckling pig, which is a mistake because there's a certain expectation of suckling pig: it's a joyous, festive, fatty, warming dish. The thing that comes out, though, is so totally deconstructed and manipulated that I couldn't get over it: it's really a "pork three ways" dish with pressed pork, deep-fried trotter, and confit. The trotter was particularly tasty.

Service was unimpressive, but I assume it will improve -- the waiters seem to be professionals, but the place is rather new and there are indeed some ergonomic challenges (not to mention the challenge of a badly worded menu). And of course there is that room, and that view. There's no denying the value added from those things. I'll certainly be back, maybe in a couple of months, to check on progress. I imagine there will be some.

[rozrapp]

At $65 for three courses (including all the intermezzos you'd expect), Asiate is charging well below the going rate for a luxury restaurant

The basic menu is $65 prixe fixe. This includes an appetizer and an entree only.

This is confusing. Is the $65 prix-fixe 3 courses or 2?

[newguy]

I know it's odd to have those 2 soups. But since they are being "playful" with the caesar salad soup, it's a play on the traditional salad as a last course or intermezzo in France and Italy. Pretty cool idea, espeicially if they change the amuse.

[Fat Guy]

Roz, it's appetizer, entree, and dessert (plus various freebies: gougeres, soup #1, soup #2, and chocolate covered petits fours things) for $65.

Newguy, the Caesar salad soup is terrific. In addition to the lettuce base, it has Israeli couscous and bacon foam and it's warm and great. It's served between the appetizer and entree, though -- not as a pre-dessert.

[LJC]

$22 per glass for Feuillatte NV Brut Rose? Isn't that really pricey for this wine? I think it is the same price as the brut n/v, wholesale $20 +/- $2.

[bunny]

is there a web site up for this place yet

[rozrapp]

is there a web site up for this place yet

No web site, but MenuPages has the menu here.

[Fat Guy]

There is an Asiate page on the Mandarin Oriental site:

http://www.mandarinoriental.com/hotelsite/...ionId=674055625

It's fairly useless, though. I'm not sure the above link will stay ripe, so you may have to navigate to it from the home page.

Speaking of useless, has anybody ever been able to dial the restaurant directly? No matter what I do, I get bounced to the front desk.

[SobaAddict70]

Flaglike sticks made of kuzukiri (a fried rice noodle), fried parsley leaves, wedges of roasted beet and miniature pattypan squash soar above dabs of potato purée. In the center a mountain potato slouches forlornly in a thick truffle sauce. There are reasons nouvelle cuisine went away, and this dish is one.

It also epitomizes the flaws in the cooking at Asiate. Mr. Sugie should not be serving pattypan squash in February. And he should not feel the need to load every dish with his entire culinary arsenal.

Asiate (Amanda Hesser) (from today's DIGEST update. You may have to scroll down for the appropriate link.)

It's not that the review is bad.

For example, you have:

Suckling pig is pressed, its cheek confited and its trotters fried into a croquette. It's salty, chewy, earthy and rich.

It's just that the restaurant showed so much promise, especially given the reviews above, that THIS review seems almost like a slap in the face, or perhaps a wake-up call to the chef.

Soba

[JosephB]

You would think that the extraordinary setting and apparently pleasant service would entitle Asiate to one star before the food was even considered.

[Fat Guy]

Hesser's review is one of the best-written reviews we've seen since Ruth Reichl left the position. Her judgment, however, lags far behind her writing ability.

It's unfortunate that a major restaurant like Asiate had to get reviewed by a first-timer who clearly has some unusual notions of what the stars mean, whose tastes are antithetical to what the restaurant is serving, and who appears to be unable to separate herself from those preferences for the purposes of critical evaluation. One star is a completely an utterly indefensible rating for Asiate. JosephB, it gets two stars if it serves steak. The only debate should be between two and three: is Asiate a three-star restaurant that happens to be underperforming and therefore gets two, with a three-star review forthcoming if things improve? Or is it already a three-star (which I think it may very well be)?