Dryden

Deluxe food is indeed on Elizabeth. For some fish, but more for seafood, try Centre Seafood on, um, Centre.

Were Cora and Ong ever professionally involved? Seemed like stacking the deck in Cora's favor, not like that's a new thing.

I found it particularly interesting that Pichet Ong was working as one of the sous chefs for Cora... Anyone know why?

The steak tartare, the lemonade, the bread...

For the UWS, it isn't bad, but on a par with Balthazar? No way.

Well, if you're flying in from Asia, probably a lot... http://www.menupages.com/restaurantdetails...d=0&cuisineid=0

OK, so we went there this past weekend to see what Jason was talking about... ...and I still have no idea. What did you eat there that was so remarkable? We must have tried a good 20% or so of the dim sum menu, and nothing was so impressive as to make me want to eat at CB more than, say, Golden Unicorn or Dim Sum Go Go.

If you really like their ginger scallion sauce, I have the recipe... :-)

We went last night. The Cincinnati night menu is fairly short - just Skyline chili (3, 4 or 5 ways), Coneys, Montgomery Inn Ribs, LaRosa's pizza and 5 flavors of Graeters. As noted above, it's a bit pricey, but a great time overall. The regular menu is also available if someone wants to do the Cincy thing but their guests do not.

Congee Village Honmura An Pasha Craftbar Suenos Shake Shack Burger Joint Monsoon En Japanese Brasserie

In an effort to disagree with everyone as much as possible, we thought the best items this year with the rib tips from Smoki O's (the snoot was also darn good) and the brisket, particularly the deckle, from Salt Lick. I, personally, didn't feel like Mike Mills' ribs or Ed Mitchell's stuff was quite up to their own lofty standards from past years, but they were still darn good... The fastpass lanes were definitely moving about 1000% better Sunday than Saturday, but the waits weren't too bad either day. If my extremely pregnant wife can stand and wait 10 minutes for Ed Mitchell's stuff, not sure what the big fuss is. And for the clever people who ended up using cut up boxes, foil trays, plastic pallets and everything else in sight to transport 20 plates of barbecue, what's wrong with that? Another year with another great event. I'm hoping they keep doing it forever.

Little Korea is very accessible to there and provides lots of non-touristy options.

There is a Chopt on 56th between Madison & Park. This would be a different place. And chopt is actually really good.

Isn't the usage of "twee" itself, um, kind of twee? If the worst thing anyone can say of Keller is his use of quotation marks is absurd (which is obviously is), then I kind of doubt he's staying up "nights" worrying about "it".

Does the sit-down section of Bouchon take reservations at all?

I didn't get any wristbands with the pass we got this year, for whatever that's worth...

Having had both at Per Se over the years, the butter poached lobster is unbelievably tender, is the best piece of lobster I've ever had, and is amazing - the sous vide comes out just a little bit tough to cut, without quite the same degree of flavor (there's a big discussion of this somewhere upthread) and I have no idea why they decided to make the change. It's just inferior in every way.

The next theme night is Monday, 6/26 and they absolutely have skyline chili, graeter's and a whole bunch of other goodies. They currently have 6:30, 7 and 9 PM seatings available.

Are you saying they carry Graeter's here in NY? That would be worthwhile to visit.

Maybe this is just a similarly named place? Because there isn't anything Cincinnati about it.

Teenage Suicide (Don't Do it)

You can get the soup and all that jazz at Peking Duck house if you tell them and order it for enough people.

To answer my own question, I'd say Peking Duck house has the best peking duck I've had in New York, somewhat surprisingly better than Mainland (where the overall food is better, though).

With the passing of the old guard at places like Zabar's, a lot of this isn't being done as well as it used to there, either. Or maybe I'm just getting old and crotchety...

But in those cases, it's the universal lack of quality, or handling, that gives gyros that distinctly delicious flavoring...