Fat Guy

Ms. Burros, thanks so much for doing this Q&A. Before I ask my question, I just want to say that the hot dogs in mustard and currant sauce recipe from the original Elegant But Easy cookbook is the greatest thing in the world. I believe there would be no questions about Thomas Keller's potential success in the Time Warner Center if he served those things instead of that oyster-and-tapioca concoction. My question is this: when you're not here doing a Q&A with us, do you ever get the opportunity to read eGullet? If so, do you have any opinions about the site and the community?

Did you all spot one another and exchange the secret eGullet handshake?

Interesting... I really enjoyed all the little bites (loved the oysters), but the veal "fillet mignon" dish didn't do so much for me. It does make a spectacular visual presentation because it is truly gigantic, but in the end it is mostly bone. I wasn't quite sure what it was about it that made it worth ten dollars more than a typical osso buco. I guess I have to admit that it would have appealed to me a lot more had it been priced at 26 dollars instead of 36. I'll be interested to try it again sometime. There are definitely a lot of interesting ideas coming out of the kitchen. slkinsey is such a cheap bastard that he's complaining about the price even though we got TWO OF THEM for free! Seriously, though, db&d is an expensive Upper East Side restaurant. Burke told me his ingredient cost on that dish is more than $10 just for the piece of meat, and there's other stuff on the plate too, so it's certainly not a bad value from the pure cost perspective. That clientele won't mind paying $36 for the dish, as long as it's good (and even if it isn't).

I've had a Zojirushi fuzzy logic model for almost 10 years and it's great. You wouldn't be able to get the exact same model now, but the brand is still a top pick among my rice-cooker-savvy friends. I'm pretty sure every Asian-American family's home that I've visited where I've had a chance to check out the kitchen has had a Zojirushi unit.

Foams aren't going anywhere, because used judiciously foams are great vehicles for flavor. I'm inclined to think Tommy is right: we got a bit overloaded with amateurish use of foams so now there's a bit of a backlash. A few of us were at the media cocktail party at davidburke & donatella, which isn't the sort of event where you get to size up the restaurant's cuisine -- it's mostly an opportunity for all the media people to see their media friends. Still, we got to eat a whole lot of Burke's hors d'oeuvres and as the token other heavy guy in the room I chatted with Burke for quite awhile. I've always liked the guy's food and he has really thrown himself into creative high gear at his new restaurant. Although the whimsical flourishes are the most noticeable aspect of his cooking, what I find most interesting is that he's constantly inventing new cuts of meat and fish, new ways to present food, etc. He's heavily involved with the food industry on the research side as well -- he consults for one of the big flavor companies and holds a number of patents. At the end of the evening, after a few drinks, Burke suggested I try the "Bronx style" veal filet chop (for lack of a better description) and I thought it was terrific though undersalted: it had the tenderness of a filet but the flavor of meat cooked on the bone. Also came with some excellent pistachio ravioli. Theoretically, I'm going to visit Burke's butcher with him in the Bronx as part of the research for my book, so if that happens I'll give a brief report here. Also supposed to have dinner at the restaurant next week, but I might have to cancel. One of my pickiest friends has been there 3 times and it's her new favorite place.

One lurker that I know of; no members as far as I know.

Basic Per Se facts (from the restaurant's publicist): LOCATION Ten Columbus Circle Time Warner Center Fourth Floor New York, New York 10019 (212) 823 9335 CHEF/OWNER Thomas Keller DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS Eric Lilavois DEVELOPER Ken Himmel, Related Urban Development DESIGNER Tihany Design, New York, NY KITCHEN DESIGNER Tim Harrison, Harrison/Koellner, San Francisco CHEF DE CUISINE Jonathan Benno PASTRY CHEF Sébastien Rouxel WINE DIRECTOR Paul Roberts DIRECTOR OF PRIVATE DINING AND SPECIAL EVENTS Célia Laurent CUISINE Contemporary American cuisine with French influences Lunch and dinner: $150 Chef's Tasting Menu $125 Five course Prix Fixe Menu with choices $135 Nine course Tasting of Vegetables HOURS Dinner: Sunday-Wednesday 5:30-10:00pm, Thursday-Saturday 5:30-10:30pm Lunch: Friday, Saturday and Sunday 11:30-1:30 INTERIOR Striking views of Columbus Circle and Central Park. Dining room is contemporary and elegant, with stained woods, stone and muted tones. Handcrafted detailing and materials throughout. CAPACITY 64 seats in the dining room PRIVATE DINING WEST: 40 seat private dining room; 20 seat private dining room (combined up to 60 seats) EAST: Intimate private dining room seats up to 10

I hope everybody involved in this discussion can at least see both sides of this issue, which comes up often. From the consumer perspective: - The consumer has been victimized. - The consumer has suffered extreme discomfort. - The cause of the discomfort has been determined. From the restaurant perspective: - A restaurant can take every precaution and still the occasional bad oyster or other product that has become infected earlier in the supply chain, through no fault of the restaurant, can be served to a customer. - Fraudulent claims are common and it's difficult to separate the legitimate ones from the illegitimate ones. - Causation is very difficult to establish, and most claims of food poisoning are unfounded or misdirected. - Admission of wrongdoing can lead to greater liability. There's an additional perspective worth mentioning here: that of eGullet's management. We have a number of concerns about food poisoning claims, and have addressed them somewhat in our user agreement. In addition, we are concerned that the party who is wronged is typically the only party who will actually speak on our site. As a result, the story will most often be told in a certain way. Thus, while we are willing to host discussion of general food-poisoning issues like this one, we insist that all identifying information about the restaurant in question be omitted.

Are we still on this?!?! I really think this obsession with Ms. Burros's eating habits represents a collective failure to see the forest for the trees. Restaurant reviewing is about a lot more than a reductionist examination of every dish on a menu. Again, this was not a one-off assignment where the editors of the paper asked, "Who would be the absolute best person to review this particular restaurant?" Rather, it was a restaurant review written by the restaurant's weekly critic. It was not a matter of choice: she did her job, and she did it well. Whatever extremely minor issues are presented by Ms. Burros's failure to eat a few menu items are in my opinion entirely outweighed by her experience as a diner, her professionalism as a journalist, her editorial detachment, the high quality of her writing, her long track record as an authoritative voice on the food scene, and the need to have a consistent voice from week to week in the paper's restaurant reviews. There would be very little value in having 52 different writers covering the restaurant beat -- those would no longer be reviews. Why should we pick an offal obsessed writer just to review an offal restaurant? How does that help anything? Every writer has a set of opinions, biases, and prejudices. We get to know that writer over time and we take opinions for what they're worth. The question isn't "is she the best person to write this review?" or "is she the best person to be the NYT restaurant critic?" Rather, the question is "is she the best person to bridge the gap between William Grimes and his successor?" For that job, the best choice is an established veteran, somebody who has held the reviewer's position in the past, whose knowledge and experience are above reproach. It's hard for me to think of any better choice. Mark my words: you'll all miss her terribly when the next critic starts.

It's Marian Burros. There's another major food writer named Marion Cunningham, which is probably the source of much of the confusion. It's kind of like how David Bouley and Daniel Boulud often get inverted as Daniel Bouley and David Boulud. And please, call Bourdain anything -- smart, talented, handsome, a great kisser -- but don't call him a gent.

Oh, I forgot to mention, I called on the Bat Phone.

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.

After spending most of the day thinking I wouldn't bother, I was inspired by these reports and decided I'd dial once and, if I didn't get through, I'd wait a couple of months to try again. I got through on the first try, the recorded voice referred me to a Web site that doesn't seem to exist (www.perseny.com), and a very nice lady answered. I asked for any time after March 10 and she offered March 11. So, that was easy. I fully expected them to ask for a credit card guarantee, but they didn't. They just asked for a phone number and asked that I call 2 days beforehand to confirm (they give you a special number for this). She also said they request that men wear jackets and that they don't allow jeans, tee-shirts, or tennis shoes. Looking forward to all your meal reports.

Feb 16

212.823.9335

The issue is that if you order conservatively at Craft you don't get the full Craft experience. The fewer people you have at the table, the more you have to over-order just to be able to taste a variety of items. Or, if you get up into the range of 6 people (which is ideal from a diversity standpoint), the portions aren't really large enough to eat family-style so you have to start doubling up on stuff. With 4-5 people, you can leverage your ordering to make Craft an economically viable dining choice, but it only works if everybody in the group is willing to order and eat for the benefit of the group. How often does that happen?

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.

Not every instance of coverage of a restaurant is a review. I don't believe there are restaurant reviews in any of those magazines. Typically, magazines like the ones on that list publish chef profiles, trend reports, "diner's journal"-type meal summaries, and other dining-related pieces, but not reviews.

Finally had my first-ever meal at Saigon Republic. Definitely the best Vietnamese food I've had outside of Vietnam. (That was a little joke, as I've never been to Vietnam.) Favorite items were the terrific, crisp shrimp toast made with little baguette slices; the pork chops; and of course the pho -- also the best I've had. Everything else was also quite good; not a bad dish in the bunch. The flavors coming out of this kitchen are clean and focused, the food has a handmade look and taste to it, and the quality of ingredients (the shrimp, the beef) is high. The tiny dining room is overseen by a very capable server. He told us that they can cram 30 people in there -- not something I'd like to experience! At lunchtime, though, it was thankfully uncrowded.

eGullet is going to acquire Slate. Not directly, but as a result of our planned takeover of Microsoft.

In addition to being a review of food, a restaurant review is a piece of literature -- a story. It's supposed to be enjoyable and interesting. Lengthy clinical descriptions of food just aren't enjoyable or interesting to read, especially when the food itself isn't particularly unusual or complex. So a good writer looks for ways to place the food discussion -- which is the core of the review -- in a context. I agree that restaurant reviewers serve the public best by focusing on food, and I think at a certain point all the talk of what people at other tables becomes frivolous and distracting -- I think Ruth Reichl was guilty of going too far in that direction too often. At the same time, consumers (aka the readers) want to know about more than just food. Indeed, anybody who has dealt with large numbers of restaurant customers can testify that most of them will be thrilled with unremarkable food so long as you provide them with what they consider to be great service, ambience, value etc. And plenty of customers simply won't enjoy a restaurant -- no matter how good the food is -- if the place itself isn't their style. So I do think it's quite necessary for a critic to report on the atmosphere of a restaurant. If it's a good read, all the better.

There are two ways to read that!

I don't know if you're a reviewer or if the meal reports we all post on eGullet are reviews, but I now know we can all get sued in England!

Your expectations of restaurants are unrealistic. If there's conceit in explaining that to you, then I plead guilty. The eGullet message boards are full of reports from people -- some of them not even from New York -- who have experienced poor meals at restaurants with two and three Michelin stars. It happens. No amount of not wanting it to happen is going to change reality. A restaurant is a very complex mechanism and the best of them can only reduce the margin for error to a certain level. A critic should be a knowledgeable consumer. A critic should try to capture the essence of the consumer's experience. But why on Earth would you say there shouldn't be any difference between the ways in which critics and consumers eat? The dynamic alone creates a difference: consumers rely on critics to help them steer clear of the duds; consumers rely on critics to recommend the best dishes. The critic, in order to fulfill his end of the deal, needs to visit new restaurants -- even the bad ones -- as often as possible and order as much of the range of the menu as possible. The knowledgeable consumer is in it for pleasure, and should avoid bad restaurants and bad dishes. A critic has a duty of critical distance, whereas a consumer has the freedom to get wrapped up emotionally in the experience. Call me conceited -- heck, call everyone in New York conceited -- but I don't think it takes much imagination to see that the role of critic and the role of knowledgeable consumer are and should be quite different.

As much as you don't like it, Pan, it's the way the industry works and it's not going to change -- it would be economically impossible for it to change. So the only way for 99% of food writers (those who aren't at the Times and Gourmet at one extreme or irrelevant hermits silently protesting at the other extreme) to deal with it is to try to carve out a space for themselves within certain limitations. I've written for the full range of media outlets -- from Web sites you've never even heard of to small regional newspapers to Saveur, Food & Wine, Elle, and even the New York Times -- and I've worked within the full range of reimbursement, non-reimbursement, and comp procedures. If you remain committed to writing what you believe, it makes very little difference (some, but not much) what the economic arrangment is, and if you have to write about a restaurant based on one visit it's certainly possible to do a good job and provide a useful service. Anyway, the narrower point is simply that some reviewers are limited to one meal and that's not going to change, so the only question is how should a reviewer behave within those limits. Personally, I think if you have only one meal at a place you should be somewhat conservative about generalizing.