ewindels

I don't believe the menu utilized these heat ratings, which I remember from Bangkok (especially at Spice Market, where this chef was previously), and which I found terrifically useful. Kittichai should definitely consider them, but given the level of the cuisine they're doing, they may well consider this beneath them.

Thanks for the clarification, gents -- I have slightly amended my original post to point out the level of what Kittichai is aiming for (i.e., this ain't Lemongrass Grill). As for the question of heat, I have no doubt that, as in Bangkok, if you asked for extra punch, they'll definitely give it to you. Bear in mind also that there were only two of us and one of us is not a big eater, so we only had a limited sampling of the menu and that specifically geared towards Elvira's phobia of spice. Next time, with more adventurous companions, I would definitely a) order more and b) tell the kitchen not to be shy. Even so, the meal was still amazing.

New Yorkers are forever bemoaning... well, pretty much everything. New York food enthusiasts are forever bemoaning the impossibility of finding authentic cuisine from (insert your favorite country/region/city/neighborhood here). My own peeve has been Thai food -- in my (admittedly limited) experience, what is dished up in the metropolitan area’s Thai restaurants is a wan and listless imitation of the real deal, an impression only reinforced by a week in Bangkok last year. During seven days of almost obsessed eating, I was introduced to a cuisine that, even in it's most rustic form, is awe-inspiring in its ability to meld a panoply of exotic flavors and an uncanny way with heat and spice. From Bangkok's top hotels to simple street fare, this is a cuisine with few rivals and not easily duplicated. (This is not to denigrate other Asian cuisines which do much the same thing, but which haven't created the same level of magic for me.) We stuffed ourselves knowing that back in New York there would be no substitute. Well, despair no more, fellow Thai enthusiasts -- a damn convincing facsimile of the high-end, inventive Thai cuisine now sweeping Bangkok's luxury hotels, has arrived in Manhattan. Kittichai has opened as a showcase for Ian Chalermkittichai, brought over from Spice Market restaurant in Bangkok’s Four Seasons, where I was lucky enough to sample his cooking during my visit last year. Oy, Here's Where He Schwatzes About Everything But The Food Located in Soho's achingly hip Thompson Street hotel in what used to be Thom restaurant, Kittichai melds urban Thai sleekness with Manhattan cool. Orchids, orchids everywhere is the theme -- the walls of the up-front bar are lined with orchid filled jars in Day-Glo colored liquids, vased in profusion on the bar, hung on fish wire above the square reflecting pool that is the centerpiece of the soft, intimate dining room, and scattered sparingly amongst the dishes as they arrive at your table. The dining room walls are draped with lustrous Thai silk, delineating the sections of teak-enclosed banquettes that line the walls. Pinpoint spotlights highlight the tables (a little too harshly early in the evening for those of us who benefit from more sepulchral tints). In an otherwise carefully appointed setting, the scarred linoleum tables look like they've come from the closing sale of some defunct school cafeteria -- table cloths should be considered. Heavy pottery plates and bowls in the geometric patterns currently considered de rigueur add to the exotic atmosphere. Spoons and chopsticks (oddly enough the cheap, disposable kind generally found in Chinese takeout) are the only utensils, although a wider variety is no doubt available on request. Service is subdued and unfailingly attentive. The servers were red-lined, black pajama outfits. Is He Done Yet? You could do worse on one of this year’s beautiful summer evenings than to find a spot in one of the hotel's two flanking outdoor lounge areas and savor one of Kittichai's luscious cocktails, many using Moet champagne. Elvira, Mistress of the Dark (inveighing, as always, against the ungodly idea of dining while the sun was still up) and I skirted the various Paris-Hilton look alike contests and forced ourselves to sample two each for the delectation of our gullet comrades. The mango martini, made with fresh mango puree, grand Marnier, fresh lime juice and rum, is thick and tangy. An elderflower martini blends intriguingly dense, viscous layers of elderflower syrup, Skyy vodka and Moet and looks like a lava lamp. The watermelon cooler, while light and refreshing, needed stronger flavored watermelon to offset the Skyy, Grand Marnier and (again) Moet. But the sure-fire hit of the lot is the Ginger Lemongrass Highball: fresh ginger, lemongrass puree, cointreau, lime juice and Hendrick's -- the ultimate and perfect summer cocktail. The menu in the dining room is broken up into "tapas", soups, appetizers, fish, poultry and meat, curries, side dishes and desserts. Although not huge, the menu ranges wide across the Thai spectrum and beyond (including foie gras, which seems to be currently mandated by law on the menu of every restaurant in the city). Portions are on the modest size, and if you've got the dough I would recommend some tapas, a soup, an appetizer, and an entree (With separate side). Tapas and appetizers range from $7 - $20, and entrees from the upper $10s to the upper $20s (the lamb is $29). We opted to share three tapas, an entree each with a side of the pineapple fried rice, and a dessert each. All three of our tapas were recommended by our waitress: chocolate spare ribs, meltingly tender and coated in a thick, dark baste redolent of a mole; small, crunchy fish cakes in a pool subtly flavored, fish-sauce based sauce; and fried jasmine rice cakes -- big, feather light slabs of pounded rice dough, studded with sesame seeds or spice, to be dipped in a mild but terrifically flavored chunky, dried shrimp sauce. I could easily have eaten a couple dozen more. Elvira's Chilean sea bass was perfectly cooked, a hefty, moist slab, delicately spiced just enough to compliment the fish's own powerful flavor. My short rib green curry was a work of art -- the meat fork tender, the sauce studded with big slabs of peppers and gooseberries, which popped when you chewed them with a smoky flavor. The sauce had just the right amount of heat. The pineapple fried rice, studded with bits of chorizo, served in a pineapple and redolent of its juices, was an experience unto itself, but next time I would probably go for plain jasmine so as not to confuse the flavors of the entrees. Wine pairing is a tricky job for most Asian food, especially with fiery dishes. The Sancerre recommended for Elvira's bass, while fine on its own, didn't really stand up to the heft of the fish, and I'm not sure what could have complimented the zest of my curry, although the Zinfandel didn't obscure it in any way. The guy drinking Stellas at the table next to us probably had the better idea. Champagne mango on a bed of sticky sweet black jasmine rice is a terrific pairing both taste-wise and texturally. The kaffir lime tart with coconut ice cream is light and luscious, although the tart crust was a bit tough and under baked, and the ice cream, while fine, did nothing to erase the memory of the life-altering version at Bangkok's Celadon restaurant. $200 flat for the two of us, including tax and tip. Overall: outstanding. Kittichai's food is a bona fide example of the Thais' dazzling ability to marry panopleic flavors and uncanny knack with heat. I came away with real awe for the subtle blendings. Other than the curry, I would have preferred a little more heat, but that’s me, and the kitchen may well be bowing to the notorious timidity of New Yorkers, to most of whom spice consists of a tentative dash of supermarket cayenne. Elvira being just such a person, I denied myself the Thai beef salad, which our waitress promised packs a serious kick. Next time, though.

I tried GUMBO CAFE on Columbus and 107th Street a couple of weeks ago. Now, I've never been to Louisiana and so can't speak as anything even close to a connoisseur, but this was some of the blandest, most boring food I've ever had. Of spice there was little, of heat none. The place has only five tables all but stacked on top of each other, and the other diners tended to be girthsome, which made quarters cramped. But it sure was cheap!

Flossie, Last summer Martha Stewart Living had a recipe for making your own cassis, which I can't seem to find on their web site but I'd swear it was in their June or July 2003 issue. My friend Mark who grows both black and red currants tried it. If I'm not mistaken it was just black currants, sugar, and good brandy, but I can't remember the proportions, and then you let it ferment in the refrigerator for a month. The result jelled considerably, which made it tough to pour and distribute, but it sure was tasty. No doubt someone else on the gullet would have cassis recipes. Now all you have to do is make your own champagne and you're set!

Oakapple, you definitely should, it's very worth it. I was just disappointed that Bruni's effort appreciation came from early in the review, and that the overall impression at the end was one of failure -- at least that's how I took it. Mas is definitely at the very least a two-star, IMO. But enjoy it!

I gotta say I found Bruni's review disappointing. I'm not sure what his criteria are, and I'm not saying the food was stellar, but it was overall very good and more importantly it's a small, lovely, elegant place that is trying (which is more than you can say for most restaurants in this city, where they act like they're doing you a favor just letting you through the door). And while I know this is not incumbent on professional restaurant reviewers I'm all for giving an "A" for effort, and Mas makes a big one. So forget Bruni, folks, and try it anyway and make up your OWN mind.

My companion last Friday had the provencal mussels as well, and I have to agree with brohnik here: kinda bland, lots of vegetables tumbling around and not adding much, and the broth not nearly as kick-a-- as the other sauces, as proof of which we only went through one basket of bread between the two of us instead of one each. I also have to say that having had the frisee aux lardons twice, the dressing to my taste could use a little more punch, mostly in the way of vinegar. It sort of tasted undressed. Either that or after two pomegranate negronis my tongue had gone comatose (highly possible). This, however, is nitpicking: the place is so terrific all around that trivial issues like these don't really matter.

I had all but given up on MAS FARMHOUSE, recently opened on Downing Street in. The highly snooty young man who had been answering the phone for the last two months had always sniffed that the place was booked solid, although I find it interesting that potential tables disappeared when I corrected the impression that our party was three, not two (a trend at many restaurants that I find really irritating). But this week, a pleasant young lady answered the phone, and although the restaurant was booked, a previously denied wait list was produced, and wonder of wonders, the morning of the day in question she called with an available table. And boy did I get a deluge of friendly greeting when I walked in, the first person there – so overwhelming that I nearly walked back out, but a nice change from the previous months’ phone reception. Located next to Blue Ribbon Bakery and around the corner from the legendary Shopsin’s, Mas has transformed the former Isla into a sleek, intimate, elegant boîte focused on serious food. Like their neighbor, AOC Bedford (another restaurant I highly recommend), Mas is attempting a big effort with limited means, emphasizing service and presentation. This is a chic, adult restaurant. The space has been redecorated in dark, sleek colors featuring wood panels and stone accented with parchment lamp shades and strategically placed mirrors. The window seat at the bar makes for a good place to wait for your guests and sip ginger daiquiris ($12 a pop). The dining room features a small thin center communal table and smaller tables along the wall flanking a banquette. The presentation includes as much of the accouterments of an old-fashioned restaurant as the space and the limited staff will allow: white linen tablecloths, embossed silverware (and a lot of it), berry-patterned china, blue-patterned stoneware water pitches, mother-of-pearl napkin holders and steak knives. Beware the attractive looking Prouvé chairs, though, which required one of the banquette pillows to make it tolerable by one of my companions. The noise level, as the restaurant fills, does get a little blatant, but this was exacerbated by a table of resonantly barrel-chested people next to us. The wait staff, small in number and young in years, makes up in eagerness and attentiveness what they lack in suavity or experience. With only three waiters and two bus boys to handle the entire room, there was not surprisingly a slightly frazzled air as the place filled up, and course timings were disparate, but I expect this will dissipate over time. Said staff is also quite lissome, which is a plus given the tight spacing, but unfailingly charming. On ordering, we were asked if there were any dietary or allergic restrictions, which I thought was a nice touch. One of the owners is also the sommelier, and recommended some terrific wines by the glass (ranging from $9 – 16 a glass). The wine list is pretty extensive for so small a place, and I noticed a lot of good, familiar bottles that were not too overly priced. A choice of three breads from Amy’s is offered on a silver salver, but oddly only once. The menu offers a three-course tasting for $68 (not including booze or dessert), with two choices for each course, or three pages of à la carte offerings, $9-13 for the appetizers and $20+ for the entrees. Like AOC Bedford, the menu focuses on good quality, fresh ingredients treated simply and sparely. This is certainly a nice change from the roaringly big flavors and fusion and gimmicks found elsewhere. In some cases, this resulted in incredibly light, subtle flavors that reminded me of Geisha—one or two overly subtle. A starter of pureed zucchini soup actually verged on flavorlessness, saved by the crabmeat-filled zucchini blossoms floating in the center. Ahi tuna was a gorgeous deep magenta color, but if it had any inherent flavor I couldn’t detect it under the buerre noisette. My rabbit salad was nicely tangy with a light mustard vinaigrette. Loin of young spring lamb was a perfect rosy pink and delicately flavored, with a dollop of luscious pureed fingerlings. Squab cooked in clay is presented as a beautifully crisped-skinned leg, some slices of wonderfully gamy liver, and a slice of duck liver terrine. A few shards of the clay are included, I suppose as proof of the eclectic cooking method. My pork belly, glazed with maple syrup and served with a few spring carrots, was braised to the unctuous, silky consistency of pudding, and was all the more delicious for being mostly fat. Portions are delicate – do not go expecting to gorge. Guanduja chocolate seems to have replaced all other varieties on city menus these days. I wish I knew the difference (new thread, please). Here it appeared as a dense, rich brownie, with a quenelle of lightly flavored coffee gelato. Banana cream was layered between unbelievably delicate, whisper-thin sheets of crisp sugar tuiles. I liked my rhubarb tart best, just the right tartness and with a whisper-thin crust, accompanied by what was described on the menu as black-olive ice cream, which I confess gave me pause. But this was either a misprint or misleading, as it mercifully turned out to taste solely of very good vanilla. With five cocktails between us, and three courses and a glass of wine each, the bill came to $110 a person with tip. I thought this very reasonable for the quality we got overall. Like AOC, Mas is seriously ambitious, and if they occasionally fall a hair or two short of the level they’re aiming for, the attempt nevertheless provides a seriously satisfying experience.

Hi schaem, You make a point and I should clarify: a chef without talent (or a really good chef de cuisine) wouldn't have been able to pull off the generally terrific entrees we had. The fact that I didn't care for much of the meal is, after all, purely a subjective opinion, outside of which I was aware that things were well executed and showed an imagination willing to push boundaries. I just didn't happen to like them. For example, I've now read several raves about the peas and bacon, which I simply found strange (but really tasty bacon!), but I was still aware that it was cooked properly and an inventive thing to try, so I give him kudos for that. Those with more adventurous or wordly palates than my own will undoubtedly appreciate more. But when all is said and done, much rather go back to Landmarc

Hi Pan, sorry it took so long to reply. Gosh, it was a while ago, but I think $10 each.

Thanks for all the recos, guys -- we did Lacroix, which was lovely, especially as the front desk very kindly and generously held our 6PM reservation till after the Belmont was over (my aunt is an avid horsewoman and would not hear of missing it). The food was not bad, and I very much like their Kellnerian idea of small portions of lots of things, although we only did the three plate menu (I could have happily done the five). Had a glass of an excellent sparkling to start, Marquis de Perlade blanc de blanc, this is one worth finding. I started with the potato and sorrel soup with chicken ravioli -- the soup oddly tasted like neither potatoes nor sorrel, but rather like a rich turkey gravy, which was fine if unexpected. The chicken ravioli were, not surprisingly, flavorless. My aunt started with a roasted tomato salad (I think) with which she was very happy. We moved on to beautiful veal sweetbreads for me, and rilletes of pork for her that had been soaked in milk and cooked till they were incredibly soft, like pudding. She then had the braised lamb shank (very nice if not as strongly flavored as I expected), and I had the suckling pig, which was delicious if skimpy (but again, this being my first time, I wasn't aware how small the portions were and if I went back would go for one of the larger offerings). She had the excellent coffee ice cream for dessert, and I had the four chocolate tasting -- perfectly fine, if kind of routine. The restaurant very sweetly gave her a fondant-wrapped petit four with a candle in it and the chef sent out a hand-written card, so we were both very pleased and I highly recommend the place.

In a nutshell: run, do not walk, to Landmarc, and order anything, and accompany it with a half-bottle of the Turkey Flat 2002 Shiraz, which seemed to me to have been created solely to put a smile on your face -- or for that matter order a half-bottle of anything on Landmarc's wine list, cuz for these prices you cannot go wrong, and bask in the warm amiability of the just-attentive-enough staff, and let your cares go.

Many thanks to both Katie and mrbigjas for your comments, I have booked BOTH for Saturday and we'll see what she's in the mood for. I'm very grateful.

For my aunt's birthday on Saturday, June 5, I'd like to take her out someplace upscale and high end for an early dinner. Any recommendations, please? Not Le Bec-Fin, a little too stodgy and old world, though if you tell me the food is amazing I'll consider it. Any word on Lacroix? She is herself not a foodie and in her early 70's, so it needs to be not too loud or "sceney". I'm sort of looking for the Philly version of New York's Jean Georges, or possibly Ducasse. Any recommendations would be GREATLY appreciated.

“It’s our second day – our second day,” the very charming and comely host apprises us when we walk into IXTA. That sort of warning is usually an ominous sign of poor service and wrong orders to come, but what the hell: it’s a beautiful Friday night after a long and grueling week, the place looks fun and clever, and I don’t mind sitting through early kinks. And in the end, Ixta turns out to be very worth it. Located just west of Park Avenue on 29th street, the space is small but not overcrowded, and the décor is eye-catching and lively. Of course there’s music, probably louder than most people would like, but this seems to be requisite for Latin restaurants these days, and since it was a Friday night I didn’t mind the slightly insistent festivity. More importantly, the food is definitely worth the trip. Chef Linda Japngie comes from Jimmy Rodriguez’ operations, and so has some experience adding nouvelle luster to otherwise folksy food. At Ixta, she works this magic on Mexican cuisine. The requisite chips are lightly fried, and though flavorful the two accompanying salsas were a little on the bland side for my tastes. The inventive cocktail list is worth exploring, as it uses top quality rums or tequilas and so doesn’t leave you flattened after just one. (The two of us did manage to try all seven between us). There’s a wide range of starters. We split the ensalada noche, perfectly fried calamari atop a perfectly dressed heap of greens. The lobster taquitos, on the other hand, although certainly pretty looking, were largely devoid of flavor. The lamb is a must – perfectly charred on the outside and just rosy on the inside atop a dollop of really luscious guacamole. The duck is just as rosy and delicious. They come with a small bowl of rice and another of beans, making the extra order of paprika fritas superfluous (the menu leads you to believe you need to order extra sides, so ask first). The “margarita meringue tart” at the end had more meringue than tart, but after a fairly filling meal, this is not necessarily a bad thing. And for just the second night, the service wasn’t bad. It does take an inordinately long time to get cocktails, but I can only assume that this is due to careful preparation, cause boy are they worth it. The taquitos were supposed to be served with the ensalada noche, but wound up being delivered with the entrees, which themselves took a bit longer than usual (Chef Japngie kept popping out of the kitchen to chat with the table next to us, which may explain this). Otherwise the trip was well worth it.

Anyone interested in essaying 5 NINTH will do themselves a favor by waiting at least another month, or better two, before trying out this latest entrée into the Meatpacking District circus. Located in an old townhouse on the corner of Ninth Avenue and Gansevoort (one block south of Pastis), rabid early-bird restaurant whores like myself will have no trouble identifying it from the construction shed that surrounds the building, a state of affairs continued inside: unfinished floors, a back patio still being laid, air conditioning and ventilation not yet up to speed. The place definitely has potential, and it will be worth revisiting in a couple of months when both the physical structure and operational issues are finished. You have to sympathize with the wait staff, though, who have to be both limber and hyper to manage the two-to-three flights of stairs from the basement kitchen to the ground floor bar area to the second floor dining room to the third floor late night lounge. The sneakers are therefore self-explanatory. There’s not much point in commenting on décor or atmosphere at this point, since all this is still being worked on. There has been a fair amount of press about the restaurant devising it’s own specialty cocktail list, none of which however was available because none of the necessary exotic liquors had been stocked yet. But on a hot night a tanqueray and tonic does just fine, thank you. I had no idea what to expect from the kitchen because I’d never heard of chef Zak Pelaccio, other than the recent blurb in New York mentioning his former stint at Brooklyn’s Chickenbone Café, which didn’t bring to mind images of inventive fine dining so much as the Heimlich maneuver. But you have to admire a place in this state of infancy offering amuses, in the form of a slim cylinder of deep fried pork belly with a dish of egg white aioli. Starters were a strange affair: crisply fried soft-shell crab came with a dish of red-onion infused vinegar sauce so piquant it zonked the taste buds. Peas and bacon were literally just that, though the bacon was delicious, if on the fatty side. The lobster dish registered not at all, and barbequed ribs were tough and gluey. My own starter of jumbo shrimp three ways, one “drunken” in Armagnac, was a disappointment. One was peeled but overcooked, one was unpeeled and flavorless, and the small dish of crayfish left me baffled, because after dissecting them I couldn’t find anything to actually ingest. Entrées were a substantial improvement. My short ribs on gnocchi with fiddlehead ferns were sumptuous, and roasted and braised lamb shoulder was exactly what lamb should be – slightly gamey and deeply flavorful. Scallops were sweet and perfectly cooked, and a bowl of sea trout with a medley of crisp spring vegetables was light, bright and perfect hot weather food. A “flat iron steak rending” was a peculiar idea – thin slices of nicely cooked flank steak topped with rendang sauce that tasted like some generic Asian product from a jar. The bowl of jasmine rice however was beautifully aromatic. The wine list is small and not too expensive, but the selection is not very impressive – the Cote du Rhone that was recommended stood up to neither of the meat dishes, and the Sentall Sauvignon Blanc might have worked better with proper chilling, but for reasons that never got explained the ice bucket had to be kept on the third floor instead of by our table, necessitating even more sprinting from our waiter. Our three desserts were, to put it politely, too interesting by far. I’m always ready to applaud chefs yearning to break from the tried and true, but either I’m getting reactionary in my old age or they’re getting desperate. “Fried caramel” turned out to be a bowl of fried little pieces of dough sprinkled with caramel which could not obliterate a greasy, oil taste. “Chocolate Bruschetta” is an unhappy take on the idea of nutella on toast: thick slices of sesame topped sourdough toast spread with chocolate and accompanied by a bowl of “marmalade cream”, a dairy soup with only a vestigial hint of citrus. But the topper was the much touted and certainly intriguing sounding “durian pie with mangosteen sorbet and pineapple.” Well, I know durians aren’t the greatest smelling things in the world, but the pie tasted like used socks, and the sorbet tasted nothing like the mangosteens I remember from my trip last year to Asia. This one wrinkled noses around the whole table. All three need to be rethought, or better yet, replaced. That said, Chef Palaccio clearly has talent and a fertile imagination, and putting aside the nascent physical state of 5 Ninth, he strikes me as someone to keep an eye on from whom great things can be expected.

My guess: yes. Just a guess, tho!

The door is locked. Am I in the right place? There’s no sign outside (a trend with “fabulous” new restaurants of which I am personally getting tired), but I am only fifteen minutes early for a 6PM reservation. It sure looks like Spice Market inside, what with the pagoda-lined bar, the Tihanny lamps and the group of sleek young hosts with their perfectly calibrated down-market look, like they’ve assembled for a Benetton photo shoot. I try around the corner, but those doors don’t have any handles, so I make another stab at my initial entry. This time one of the sleek young things unlocks it just long enough to sniff “We’ll be opening shortly,” and disappears. Mazel tov. Twenty minutes later I am one of a group of about fifteen people who rise en masse from the more welcoming bar at Pastis and trot through the wet snow back up the street where we are finally granted admittance to this week’s Must Go restaurant. Spice Market is still clearly getting its act together, although the powers that be might want to rethink their scheduling considering the probably $300 - $400 worth of bar tab they lost out on from us early birds. For those of you true epicures who disdain mention of anything that doesn’t go in your mouth, please skip the next section and go to the following one. For the rest of you restaurant whores, like myself… SEEING AND BEING SEEN Spice Market, located at 403 East 13th street on Ninth Avenue, across the street from the remarkably unattractive but no doubt painfully hip Gansevoort Hotel (still under construction), is Jean Georges Von Gerichten’s latest stop in his own Epcot Center, this one focusing on Southeast Asia: India, Thailand, Vietnam, etc. The décor is on the dim, loungy side, nicely and imaginatively done. There are two dining areas, one straight past the main bar and adjoining the open kitchen, and to the right a wide wrap-around balcony to that overlooks the downstairs bar/lounge area. This is ringed with antique, distressed archways, pedestals and columns reportedly rescued from junk heaps throughout Southeast Asia. These are topped with jars, vases, baskets and sundry other gewgaw. It looks authentic and cool. Banquettes and chairs are white tufted leather. The tables are veneer in ebony. The silverware is heavy and very chic. All very sleek. Music is of course played, although not, I felt, obtrusively so. The wait staff, all of whom surely had to submit headshots with (if not instead of) their resumes, are nice and accommodating. Service was a shade slow, but again the restaurant is still getting on its feet. The uniforms are all of the flimsy, pajama variety. Those for the waiters feature dark orange tops, backless for the women. Several of them admitted that they were feeling the cold. Apropos, until the temperature picks up, avoid being seated along or near the Ninth Avenue wall of windows, in order to avoid a draft so strong that it set the potted palms swaying. The bus boys and girls all had remarkably sculpted eyebrows – clearly Suarez has worked out a deal with some nearby salon. The crowd largely consists of people who spent a lot of time (and money) trying to look like they hadn’t. There were several tables of “Sex and the City” wannabes, all angled to make sure that their footwear was displayed to the most noticeable advantage possible. Liev Schreiber was two tables down from us, and around the corner was pointed out to me some movie mogul of whom I’d never heard. (Are there actually any moguls anymore?) By the time we left at 8PM, the place was packed with people all eyeing each other suspiciously and contemplating whether they should deign to remain and grace the place with their presence. Great people watching! The Great Man himself, conspicuous in his chef whites, was a very noticeable presence, whizzing around with an anxious smile on his face and keeping an eye on details. I was impressed. But one suspects a fate for Spice Market like that of 66, which enjoyed a few months of cachet before being abandoned to the dregs of Wall Street and their surgically enhanced girlfriends. BLAH, BLAH, BLAH – WHAT’D YOU EAT? The menu is described as being family style and meant to be shared. I.e. each person is provided with small individual plates and the dishes are placed in the middle to be apportioned out. This is easier said than done. The appetizers come in portions of three, which, if you were a couple attempting intimacy and romance, might well lead to some arguments, or at least disgruntlement. And no serving utensils are provided with the entrees. The noodles that came with the short ribs inevitably made a stop in the wine glasses before they reached the plate. Chopsticks are provided as an option, but neither the food nor the plates make them a realistic utensil. Portions are not large and to really explore the inventive menu, which covers a very broad geography, four to six people would be ideal, ordering lots and lots of different things. So ANYWAY: You are given a small bowl of tiny crisp crackers with a coriander dipping sauce for nibbles, very tasty. We started with chicken samosas, which were delicious. Black pepper tiger shrimp with “sun-dried” pineapple was nice. Best was the julienned jicama salad with toasted sesame seed dressing underneath it. We chose three entrées: the aforementioned short ribs, which while not very flavorful are wonderfully tender; pork vindaloo, braised to an extraordinarily silken consistency and nicely flavored; and coconut crusted monkfish “nuggets” each with a dollop of tamarind sauce, quite nice. Brown or white rice is offered gratis. A side dish of snap peas, shiitake mushrooms and water chestnuts never materialized, but was not billed either. I never got to see the wine list (there may not be one). The cocktail menu offers four whites and four reds by the glass, including a Claiette (sp?) from India, and how many times do you get the chance to try an Indian wine? I can’t recommend it, though, (it largely disappeared in competition with the food), although it wasn’t offensive. For dessert, we eschewed the waiter’s recommendation of “Thai jewels and fruits” (the jewels being those gummy, sweet, bland confections of which Asians are so fond but for which I have yet to develop an appreciation), and opted for the “Ovaltine Kulfi.” Not having much experience with Asian food overall, and Asian desserts in particular, my only point of reference was the ethereal kulfi at Tabla. What we got at Spice Market was accurately described by my companion as a “slightly melted Heath bar” – a tough, rubbery slab of praline. Accompanying it was a sautéed slice of something, which my companion guessed might be plantain, but which a hostess confirmed was a slice of caramelized banana. Either way, from the taste it had been prepared either near or actually in the fish station. Total for two people (three glasses of wine, two appetizers, three entrées, one dessert) was $144, including tax and tip. Overall the food struck me as catering to a New York clientele notoriously wary of authentic foreign foods, particularly when it comes to heat. The menu continues von Gerichten’s exploration of mixes and matches, but only nudging the envelope rather than really expanding any horizons. While nothing was bad or offensive (although that banana could only best be described as “unusual”), nothing was particularly remarkable. Everything was pleasant and correct, but certainly nothing to go out of your way for. Except for us attention order deficients, already looking around for the next Must Go!

Dined @ Geisha Wednesday, 11 February. Great people watching -- lots and lots of people working very hard to look fabulous (far be it from me to judge whether or not they succeeded). The passion fruit martinis are a great way to start off. The food is pretty terrific -- flavors taken to an extremely subtle level, almost delicate, requiring slow and concentrated savoring to really appreciate them. The broths for both the mussels and the black tiger prawn dumplings were exquisite (the prawns a little more so). Salmon actually tasted like something for a change, and the lamb had a luscious sweet miso glaze. It's worth splurging on a really good bottle that won't overwhelm the food (there's not much on the list under $50). The dining room is on the cramped side, tables are hard on top of each other, next to no leg room (then again, I'm 6'2" so take that into account). Service friendly and efficient. A definite must-visit for fellow restaurant whores.