Marian Burros

thanks everyone for your great questions and comments

thanks everyone for a fascinating week . very stimulating

thanks to all for a fascinating week talking to a lot of very smart people

a few additional places I like union square cafe, gramercy tavern, daniel, cesca, march, and thanks for the stimulating week

a great standard question i use often myself. but in this case, nothing really thanks for all the great questions and stimulation

because it's hard to get good help! thanks for an informative and stimulating week. you are an amazing group!

I do but I will more now. You are a formidable bunch and I thank you for a stimulating week. I wish I could have done more but you caught me while I was doing two jobs: regular and reviewing. That is now over and I'm off to try to flavors of New Zealand

thanks to all for a stimulating week. you are formidable!

we don't always know the name of the pastry chef or that there is a separate one. when the apstry chef is mentioned on the menu, we can say something, which reminds me trhat in a review upcoming i wonder if they have a pastry chef, and if not, why not

thanks everyone for all the stimulating conversation. you are so knowledgable

thanks everyone for all the stimulating conversation. you are so knowledgable

The policy with re-reviews is that isn't one. It's very difficult to get around to all the new places that deserve a review one time around. But when something is called to our attention by more than one person, or someone we know and trust - ie the palce you gave x stars to has improved enormously or decline precipitously, we try to get back to it. In fact I have one coming up next week, my next to last review before I go back to my regular work. Thanks for all your great questions

In all of this I think you have to remember that the people who are interested in slow food, in locally grown food, in the best of everything belong to a very small, select group. Some would say elitist. Whatever it is, in this world it will never be big business . Once big business takes it loses what makes it precious right now. They are doing that with organics and while it is certainly better for the earth and for us, it is putting small organic farmers out of business and twisting waht organic is supposed to mean. That's why I said when I have to make a choice between organic across the globe or local but not organic, I'll choose local

That's a tall order. You make some good suggestions. I will pass it on to my editor

Now that I have ascended the escalators at the Time Warner buidling and seen the views from some of the restaurants, I'm sure people will go. Thomas Keller at per Se has a breathtaking one but so do others. The retail I can't answer whether people will ride up and down or not.

For a mostly volunteer movement Slow Food is doing remarkably well. It might be different if there were a lot of money behind it, but how likely is that!

I don't have just one. It depends on my mood and my pocketbook So I am going to metnion a few and as I think of them this week I'll add them Craft, Babbo, Le Bernardin, Esca, Bouley more later and if I forget, someone please remind me

There are two occasions when I am likely to write at length about service: when it is exceptionally bad and when it is exceptionally good. Otherwise I'm just as likely to make a small comment here or there. I think most people assume if it hasn't been comment upon, it's ok.

Maybe they don't have to be so picky because they don't have industrial agriculture quite on the scale that we do. But, in fac,t our agencies are only selectively picky. It depends on what the industry tells them to do. Anyway, I think scientists should keep their cotton pickin fingers off raw ingredients, thank you. I don't need nutraceuticals. With rare exceptions if you eat meals based on unprocessed foods you don't need to have your food ""fixed" by scientists. Genetic engineering may be good for someone but iit's not good for me.

Several people have suggested that when I wrote :"And I wish we had enough time and staff so that we didn't reprint press releases" that they thought I was referring to the New York Times. I most assuredly was not. Around here that would get you fired. I meant we food writers as a generic group, but was misunderstood by some.

It's not quite fair to indict all of Europe with G.B.. When I said Europe in this instance I meant the continent.You don't see any bovine growth hormone there; no irradiation. I think our federal food agencies are falling down on the job in many, many areas, no matter what Europeans may think or say Foie gras. I love it, but in very small amounts Actually it isn't the Ag Dept but the Food and Drug Administration that has been threatening, I believe, but I haven't heard anything lately on unpast cheese

No more than you can get people to stop using Howard Dean's "scream" over and over. You do your best and hope you reach a lot of people

Sorry, I didn't finish my thought. Right now I would say that New York has gone restaurant crazy again, as it did before 9/11 and people are eager for new important places. If there was ever a time for these to succeed, I think this is it. People will get used to going up in elevators or escalators, or whatever.

If the food tastes good who cares?

Every reviewer has a different standard. It can't be helped. To me a restaurant deserves two stars, even if it isn't in the expensive category, if it fulfills its mission. Bread Tribeca has more good food than many restaurants that are far more expensive and it has an appropriate wine list. Within reason I don't think stars should be determined by price. Casa Mono is not really a $25 and under restaurant, though it could be. But then, if you just ordered a main course at many more expensive restaurants they could be $25 and under, too. I wasn't assigned these restaurants: they were my choice. Who the chef is has nothing to do with the stars. If it did it would mean that some famous chef might get more stars than he deserved even if he didn't come up to his usual standards at a second or third place. Many restaurants I have been to in this town have surprised me with the number of stars they have, and don't deserve to my way of thinking so, it really depends on the reviewer.