Fat Guy

I've now sampled this creation twice. I'm beginning to think Laurent Tourondel's spring-peas-with-bacon may very well be the greatest side dish for steak, ever. Or for a veal chop. Or short ribs. Or soft-shell crabs. I went ahead and asked for the recipe and this is what I got today via e-mail. I haven't tested it yet (I won't add it to RecipeGullet until I do).

Dude, I don't want to hurt your feelings, but I dress that way around you because I don't want to have sex with you.

I've never eaten the 5-course menu (as you can see from reading this thread, 9/10 foodie types order the tasting menus at Keller's restaurants), but a table near us had the 5-course and the portions did indeed look like they were roughly double the size of the tasting menu portions. They were also somewhat more elaborately plated.

In addition to the degustation (10 courses) at $150, there is a prix-fixe menu (5 courses) with choices for each course at $125.

According to LaVarenne.com:

I don't think there's anyplace one would go in black tie just to eat dinner. Unless you happen to be the waiter . . .

And as a result they get laid a lot less than they'd like to. The reality, gentlemen, is that, even if you're out with your wife, your love life will be improved by expending the time and effort to look your best.

I'm not speaking of satiety. I'm saying that often meat dishes are aesthetically unsatisfying when presented in minute quantities because so much of the enjoyment of meat comes from the development of flavor throughout the cross-section of a larger piece. I'm not saying one needs an entire steak or roast, but my French Laundry and Per Se experiences have involved dishes that were built around a couple of very thin slices of meat -- maybe an ounce or two for the entire portion -- sitting in a bowl with a sauce and a garnish. With most fish dishes like the oysters and pearls, this works fine: the only difference between the dish as served at Per Se and a larger portion would be the size of the portion. With lamb, beef, etc., however, I feel as though there's a dish beyond the dish, a flavor and texture experience beyond the one in the bowl, an unrealized crescendo of the savory part of the meal, that would be present in a more substantial presentation. A matter of personal taste or hidebound tradition, perhaps, but it's how I have experienced Keller's cuisine to date.

I'm not familiar with that terminology.

I'm only aware of two restaurants in New York City that still have policies in place requiring neckties for gentlemen: Le Cirque 2000 and Alain Ducasse at the Essex House. I'd be interested in hearing of any others where people are certain that a necktie is required -- as in, it is clearly stated as policy (for example on the restaurant's voicemail) and the restaurant truly is unlikely to admit you sans tie. There are many other restaurants where only a jacket is required, and at several of those a necktie may be suggested.

The pastry kitchen at Per Se is very accomplished. If you serve desserts at that level in Northern California, you're probably serving the best desserts for 2,000 miles in any direction. But if you serve them in the Time Warner Center they may not be the best desserts on the block (you can look out your window and see Jean Georges and ADNY looming out there) or even in the building (what with Chris Broberg gearing up downstairs at Cafe Gray). The pastry standard in New York is high and, at the haute cuisine level, the talent pool is deep. I sampled three dessert items plus an array of candies, cookies, and such at dinner, and also had the opportunity to taste through about a dozen specimens at a pre-opening event. Some of them were excellent -- on technical skills, such as macaroon-making, the pastry kitchen is first rate. Some were pretty good but tended towards the one-dimensional and cloying -- such as the doughnuts. A lemongrass sorbet was ill-conceived both in itself and as far as its placement in the meal. To the extent the pastry kitchen may be responsible for the cheese course (I wouldn't know for sure), it's sub-par. My experience of the arc of the meal at Per Se matched my French Laundry experience: I think it's downhill from an early peak. And I don't mean to say it descends into bad. I just mean that those first few tastes are dynamite and nothing matches them. I find meat dishes in the three-bite format particularly unsatisfying -- for the most part I prefer to be able to eat from a larger cut of meat, not because I'm hungry but because of the way flavors develop in meat cookery. So for me the decline begins after the fish.

I've got to assume "brisée" as in pâte brisée which, I think, derives from the ingredients being "broken" into one another. Not that I've ever seen "crème brisée" written in any cookbook ever, but my French is about as weak as can be. It's certainly something I could ask him about next time I go in there. My arm already hurts thinking about the demonstration, which will no doubt involve me whipping a lot of cream and then feeling like an idiot because I can't break it right.

My point is simply that the article fails to address any of these questions adequately.

Failed as a kitchen manager? Given that you've recently made this claim about two four-star chefs (of Gray Kunz you wrote "I don't believe that Kunz was considered to be a great kitchen leader or manager when he was at Lespinasse.") both of whom happened to be the chef at Lespinasse and both of whom I think rank at the very top of the overall hierarchy of chefs, let me suggest that Lespinasse was absolutely doomed from the start. Maybe you're letting the failure of Lespinasse -- which was beyond the control of any chef -- loom too large over your conclusion. Or maybe you know something I don't. But I can't imagine anybody who has seen Delouvrier work would call him anything but a tremendously effective, hands-on kitchen manager who personally expedites at almost every service. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the claim, but I'm reminded of the announcement that went out a couple of years ago for a Beard House dinner featuring the disciples of Delouvrier: "As a mentor to more chefs than we could possibly collect in the Beard House kitchen, Christian Delouvrier, chef of New York's Lespinasse, has nurtured a generation of cooks, bitter almonds and cabbage, if you will, and helped them grow to be great chefs in their own right." The dinner featured Delouvrier proteges Ed Brown, Mike Colameco, Luc Dimnet, and Edward Stone, and you could add to that list Neil Annis and many others. I do agree, and noted above, that Ducasse will help rein in Delouvrier's wilder side and give more focus to his menus. But I can't reason my way from there to the conclusion that he doesn't have a definitive style. I think when he's cooking at his core -- the meat, game, and shellfish dishes that earned him his stars and accolades -- his style has always been quite distinctive. As for loyal customers, there's a substantial group -- I know because, as a member of that group, I'm often receiving e-mails and phone calls from the Delouvrier loyalists, many of whom haven't been to Lespinasse in the past 2-3 years even though they love Delouvrier's cuisine. Lespinasse was a disintegrating mess in the front of the house and on the business side, and it just wasn't worth trying to see Delouvrier through that thick veil. But ADNY is already drawing out the Delouvrier faithful. In any event, I don't mean to quibble. The past is what it is. You need a lot of luck to succeed in this business, no matter how good you are. Now Delouvrier is at what will probably represent the pinnacle of his career. Let's hope the planets are in alignment and that his moment has arrived.

Amendment XXI states in relevant part: "Section 2. The transportation or importation into any state, territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited." The "dormant commerce clause" refers to a body of judicial theory (derived from the Commerce Clause but not actually in the Constitution) that, as applicable here, prevents states from passing laws that discriminate against interstate commerce as such. It seems straightforward enough to argue that 1) Amendment XXI says states can fundamentally regulate liquor sales any way they like, but 2) such regulations must be uniformly applicable, in other words they may not discriminate against interstate commerce. The counter-arguments will be a host of bugbears about how interstate shippers are involved in price fixing, threatening the welfare of our children, blah blah blah. Hopefully the Court will recognize those arguments for the hoaxes they are.

French Laundry is tremendously profitable at a similar price point, with no liquor or banquet business to support its costs. Assuming those additional income streams cover the increased cost of doing business in New York, Per Se can make money at it current prices with modest increases for inflation. But I don't think it makes sense, at this level of the industry, to collapese every discussion of value into a discussion of profitability. To me as the consumer, the test of value isn't whether a restaurant is profitable. It's what I get for what I pay. And that has to be measured on a curve of rapidly diminishing returns. The extra 25% you pay at ADNY isn't supposed to get you 25% more or 25% better food. It's supposed to get you a slight marginal improvement -- and I think it does get you that and therefore justifies its price as a luxury purchase. Whether that's worth it to you is more a question of how much money you have and how much you value the best over the already-excellent.

That's mentioned in the article, but again without context. Have rents on that block gone up more than rents on average for commercially populated neighborhoods? How much would menu prices need to change to support a rise from $7k to $10k a month in rent? Assuming even a very low number like 100 covers per day, that's 3k covers per month -- in other words you need to increase menu prices enough to generate one dollar more per cover to fill the rent gap. Over a 5-10 year period that's hardly significant enough for customers to notice. "You know, I used to be able to get a great meal down there for $12 in 1999 but now that it's $13 in 2004 I just don't think it's worth the trip."

We can safely assume that Keller is giving us his most conservative game at this point -- he's basically serving the dishes that his French Laundry-trained staff can already handle. It will take a year or two to see the full potential of Per Se -- hopefully he will take the restaurant forward in a way that will convince his fair share of discriminating diners like Robert and John that he deserves to be called the best. While his style appeals to me less than some others, I think it's fair to say that Keller's skill level certainly puts him in the top group of chefs. And his venue is without peer -- Daniel Boulud for all his talent just can't provide, in a 300+ covers situation, the kind of meal that Per Se provides to every customer.

Reporting on the loss of 11 restaurants and an unsubstantiated claim of 40% fewer diners is hardly enough to establish context or significance within that context. The one attempt to provide some context appears to be based on no research or a misunderstanding of reality: "True, Bangladeshi and Indian restaurants can now be found throughout the city and in many suburbs, making a special trip to once-novel East Sixth Street unnecessary." Really? In what year was it possible to get Indian food on East 6th but not in Midtown? The article purports to discuss a decline that has occurred over a 5 year period. That takes us back to 1999. Are we seriously expected to believe that 5 years ago Indian cuisine in New York was something exotic that you had to trek to 6th Street to get? I'd be much more interested in learning why some of the restaurants have survived while others haven't. We already know that tons of restaurants have closed since 9/11. Most curious is the quoted statement calling the neighborhood "a great part of New York City history." What exactly is the history of that strip of restaurants? It appears to be nothing more than a collection of Bangladeshi-owned restaurants. Do Indians (or Bangladeshis) live there? Are there an abundance of shops, markets, and cultural resources? It would seem all that stuff is in Queens, and to a lesser extent up on Lexington in the 20s.

Love the name, and the idea.

It's common to all chefs that have even basic competence. But Delouvrier is better at it than most anybody else on this side of the Atlantic. He simply knows more about and has a better palate for and sense of sauces, stocks, jus, thickening methods, etc., than the competition. The level on which he thinks and talks about flavor puts him in a very small group. Ducasse is most likely one of the only chefs in the world who has anything to teach Delouvrier about development of flavor in food of this style, which is part of the reason it's such an interesting collaboration. He scrapped everything and started anew, both in terms of individual dishes and overall style. At ADNY he has preserved much of the house style, though I'm pretty sure every dish is new (save for the rum baba on the dessert menu). But of course the house style at ADNY was already a lot closer to Delouvrier's style than the Kunz style, which was totally atypical and unique. Ducasse and Delouvrier came up through the same French haute-cuisine system, they're from the same area of France, they have experience with the same suppliers. It's a much different kind of transition, as is the business framework surrounding it. Delouvrier has been given custody over Ducasse's global luxury brand as it is being presented to the US market. So it's a balancing act, and one without a lot of clear precedent. It will be interesting to see how people react.

What is "broken whipped cream"? Is this cream whipped until it begins to turn into butter? Why would you use this rather than ordinary whipped cream? It's Delouvrier-speak (looking in my reference books, I see now that it's not a standard term) for his style of lightening a sauce with whipped cream at the last minute -- it has nothing to do with breaking as in a broken sauce. He lightly whips the cream (no Profi-Whip device here -- this is done by whisk to a very soft consistency) and when the sauce is just at the moment of service he takes a spoonful of the whipped cream and "breaks" it into the sauce. The closest standard term would be fold but to fold it into the sauce would mean to distribute it evenly in several turns of the spoon. It's also not quite swirled in. It's more of a single fold-swirl motion, which Delouvrier calls breaking.

That's the menu as of May 19, and is the same menu I saw on Friday night -- in other words the current menu. The rest of the Web site text still hasn't been rewritten or updated, for whatever reason. However if you go to the media area you can read the Delouvrier press release.

I don't know if it's possible to separate the two; it's more a question of knowing what will flatter each item. With a piece of beef, developing depth is going to come from the choice of product, gentle cooking on the bone, and saucing. With something like hare, it's going to be a question of a lengthy marinade (as in weeks) plus combining the cooking liquid with the blood of the hare to make the sauce.

It depends how you derive your impressions of value, I suppose. Part of the premium at ADNY derives from the restaurant doing 50% fewer covers on the same number of seats. And you'll get fewer courses, but with more substance in each course. I can virtually guarantee that you'll agree with me about the meat-cheese-dessert arc of the meal, if not my overall conclusions. My basis for comparison between ADNY and Per Se is as a friend-of-the-chef at both (I have no relationship with Keller but Benno and I go way back; indeed I believe I was the first and second journalist ever to write about him, several years before there was a Per Se), so there's a relatively even playing field there. But I wouldn't fixate on my status. You might be able to buy me with a bottle of '61 Lafite, but not with a bottle of '91. I've also dined at French Laundry as a friend of nobody, and at ADNY several times before I was known to the house there. At neither restaurant would the same dish be any different as between a regular or VIP/FOH/soignee table, with the possible exception of a bigger quenelle of caviar or whatever. There are no lesser pieces of fish in either kitchen -- everything is top notch. The differentiation comes when one starts dealing with off-menu items. In the case of both ADNY/Delouvrier and Per Se, I've eaten only the exact same items that appear on the menu -- no special dishes. Service-wise, I'm assuming the best theoretical service from both -- my comment is about the style of service, as opposed to the service I specifically received.