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If the argument is that even Luger's doesn't deserve three stars, then it goes further to reinforce the proposition that two is the practical maximum for a Steakhouse. The three-star rating for Luger's dates from the Ruth Reichl era, but we know from Bruni's controversial review of Wolfgang's that he found the Luger steaks slightly superior to Wolfgang's, and he gave Wolfgang's two stars. That said, it's a slippery slope to say, "Restaurant X got three stars; this restaurant is better than X; hence, this restaurant cannot be lower than three." The Times gives out fifty-two ratings a year, and the existing ratings are the work of numerous critics over many years. You can always find anomalies. The reviewer must, of course, be generally aware of what a star has historically meant, but that doesn't mean that the three-star category is defined by the most ill-advised three-star rating the paper has ever given out. One of the purposes of re-reviews is to correct such errors, but only a fraction of the year's fifty-two reviews can be used for that purpose, because there are a lot of new restaurants that need to be rated. As Fat Guy observed, the people who opened this restaurant aren't dummies. If the name is "V Steakhouse," there's a strong prima facie case that it's a steakhouse.

The only three-star steakhouse in New York is Peter Luger. I see no reason why other restaurants in that genre shouldn't be eligible for three stars, but perhaps it's significant that none besides Luger has reached that level to date. If two stars is the historical maximum for all but the most extraordinary steakhouses, and V's non-steak dishes have as much wrong with them as Bruni says, then one star seems to me the correct rating. Clearly V was trying to break out of the mold by offering all of these funky deconstructed dishes. I've not tried them, but I would brand the experiment a failure in the sense that I can't recall a critic so far who has said, "Wow! Isn't that great! Instead of a French Onion Soup, I get the ingredients and assemble the food myself!" If this is a brilliant idea, diners so far seem not to be getting it. I think it's just coincidence that two of the first six Bruni reviews were steakhouses. It just so happened there were two important new restaurants in the genre that hadn't been reviewed yet.

From the review: What exactly does Niman Ranch do that makes their beef superior to other sources?

Bruni seems to agree with you that Mas makes a stellar effort. He wrote: But effort can get you only so far. That said, Mas is still on my to-try list.

Hmmm, let us see about this. There's Babbo: There's Megu: Then there's Wolfgang's Steakhouse: And lastly, Mas: This is the supposedly glass-half-empty guy? I don't think so. Indeed, perhaps the most serious criticism of Bruni is that he's more of a food fan than a food writer. He loves to eat well, but he doesn't yet have the verbal arsenal to describe taste and texture sensations so that we'll feel like we were there. Although I think that ambiance and background information are important, Bruni seems to dwell on them a bit too much, perhaps because they are easier for him to write about. The Bouley review definitely had a glass-half-empty feeling to it, but this was a formerly four-star restaurant getting demoted. Four-star restaurants are supposed to be judged by the highest and pickiest standards. Nobody yet has seriously argued that Bruni got the rating wrong, but I do agree that he failed to touch on the positive attributes of a restaurant that, after all, is still rated three stars, which means (or is supposed to mean) "excellent."

Begin to see? Any paper that awards stars has this problem, which you find in review after review. From the rating itself, you just can't tell if the restaurant is a solid one-star, or a two-star that's screwing up badly enough that a star needs to be taken away. On reading the text, it becomes clear that Mas is the latter. You get the sense that Bruni wishes he could come back in six months or so, to see if these problems have been rectified. (Since I haven't been to Mas, I'm taking Bruni's word for it that the problems are what he says they are.) But he also realizes that he doesn't have enough reviewing slots to give every underperforming restaurant a second chance. Bouley might be important enough deserve that chance in a year or two. Mas probably is not. dccd: The Wolfgang's/Luger's comparison was obviously a unique situation. Given that Wolfgang's was patently designed as a Luger's knock-off, and marketed itself as such, how could the critic not make the comparison? Can you find me a review of Wolfgang's that has not compared its steaks to Luger's? It's unavoidable. Moreover, I think it's precisely the comparison Wolfgang wants. I have yet to see any evidence that the institution has enshrined "specific criteria" for each star rating. Both Amanda Hesser and Frank Bruni have recently opined on what a four-star rating means to them. That each of them expressed it in personal terms—and differently—suggests that the ratings are no more than the critic's subjective reaction. Probably any critic in that seat has some healthy respect for the ratings that are already out there, coupled with an ambition to right a few wrongs.

In today's New York Post, Steve Cuozzo puts the hurt on Mix:

Speed dial. Many people are trying.

That date works for me, as well.

And after that, it's up to Columbia Presbyterian for a coronary bypass .... oops, that's Frank Bruni's joke.

A friend and I visited davidburke & donatella last night. It is the best two-star restaurant I've been to, and I wouldn't be surprised to see it gunning for three if a re-review comes along. The restaurant is a beautiful space, decorated with the kind of wit that you find in Burke's inventive menu. There are two dining rooms, and we were seated in the larger of the two. It seems the owners were determined to use every inch of available space, as there was barely room to navigate between the closely-spaced tables. It was hard to hear over the din. When we sat down, a folded paper menu was on our plates. This was the day's tasting menu — five courses, $75. It was a typeset menu, on top of which Burke had scribbled additional daily specials and witty artwork. I was tempted, but my friend was not, so we moved onto the main menu, which our server came by and handed out. Bread arrives — cooked in its own copper casserole, and steaming hot. The butter comes as a modern art sculpture that you almost regret cutting into. There wasn't quite enough time to appreciate this before the amuse-bouch, a small confection of salmon ribbons. To start, I ordered the foie gras and lobster appetizer. It came in two hollowed-out egg shells, each with its own tiny little spoon. My friend had the gazpacho, which came with a shrimp profiterole and a mound of guacamole. I had read about the origins of Burke's "Bronx" veal chop on eGullet, and I had to give that a try. The difficulty with this dish is that the chop itself is an awkward shape, and it's a struggle to find an anchor point for your fork. It was a tasty piece of veal, but I don't like to fight fight for my food. My friend had the pork chop, which I tasted. It had a wonderful char and was perfectly tender. The wine list is a confusing jumble. Within the standard categories (red/white), the wines are grouped by degrees—that is, each of the main headings is a number with the little "degree" symbol. Was this the degrees latitude where the grape was grown? The temperature at which the wine is stored? We could not tell. It is also a pricey list, and we struggled to find a good choice in our range. Finally we asked the sommelier for a suitable choice under $60 a bottle, and he produced an off-the-menu chiraz at $55 that we were pleased with. DB&D is known for its desserts. The table next to us were friends of pastry chef James Distefano, and they got a free sample of everything on the menu. You would have to carry me home if I ate that much dessert, but it certainly gave us an idea of the range of creativity on offer here. I had the Coconut Layer Cake, my friend the Dark Chocolate & Praline Torte, which were both winners. David Burke himself seemed to have a few friends in the house last night, as he came out of the kitchen several times to greet diners. I expected a light turnout, given that it is a holiday weekend, but the restaurant was packed. However, we got an 8:00pm reservation that I called for only on Wednesday, which perhaps wouldn't be available on an ordinary weekend. There is much to appreciate at DB&D, and on one visit I thought we had barely scratched the surface. I will have to return.

A friend and I went to Landmarc for lunch today. We both ordered the Landmarc burger with gruyère cheese. Sure enough, as others have reported, the bun was too large for the patty. I also ordered a gazpacho soup with shrimp, which was just fine. My friend asked for her burger without the bun, and she also asked if the kitchen would give extra salad in lieu of french fries, which they happily did (notwithstanding the "no substitutions" policy).

If the date works, I'm in.

I have to agree with Rich. The cholesterol joke (and from the tone, it very clearly is an attempt at humor) appears six times in the review. After its first or second appearance, it was time to move onto some substance. We can debate whether restaurant reviews are the place for general health tips, but that's clearly not what's going on here. Bruni is just poking fun at restaurants that serve huge steaks. He's also poking fun at himself, for having attempted the ludicrous feat of eating two of these steaks in the same evening—something even Dr. Atkins probably would not recommend. Given what is obviously a very limited space budget, Bruni should have focused on what we really want in a restaurant review, which is information about the restaurant itself. Sure, we got some of that, but coverage of the non-steak menu items was limited to a couple of sentences.

Joe Dziemianowicz reviews V Steakhouse in today's New York Daily News, awarding 2 1/2 stars in an article titled "V approaches letter-perfection": He thought the beef was great, but he complained about the same "deconstructed" dishes Frank Bruni lampooned a couple of weeks ago.

Compare this to theater and music critics, who often publish reviews based on just one observation. Now, granted a restaurant offers a menu of choices, while a theater or concert offers the same thing to everyone that attends. But live performances are not identical every time, even if the personnel remain consistent. And in theater and opera, there are cast changes, but usually it's only the opening night cast that gets reviewed. Although restaurant critics make multiple visits, I suspect they order different items on each visit, so each dish is tested only once. If the restaurant fouls up their signature dish the night Frank Bruni tastes it, that's tough luck — just like if a Metropolitan Opera tenor cracks his top notes on opening night.

NYT critics have an extremely wide berth to cover the subjects they choose, in the manner they choose. Whether you liked the Bouley & Wolfgang reviews or not, it was well within the scope of Bruni's job to write them that way. This does not make them great criticism — an attribute we are free to debate — but editors don't ring-fence their critics the way you're suggesting.

The more I think about this comment, the more I conclude that it is totally specious. Every critic in town that has reviewed Wolfgang's has compared it to Luger. It's an unavoidable comparison, and nobody on eGullet had questioned whether those other critics had a large enough "sample size" to do this. Bruni merely did something further, which was to compare them on the same day, and furthermore, to make that excursion the focal point of his review. He could simply have done what all the other critics did, which is to include the comparison without mentioning his two-Porterhouses-in-one-day steak orgy, in which case it likely would have passed under your nose without notice, and without the accusation of a purportedly inadequate sample size.

To say they "flunked" is really to mis-read the review. Bruni wrote: Does that sound like a "flunking" review to you? It certainly doesn't to me! Now, I do have to admit that this praise is difficult to square with the "overbroiled" comment at the end of the review. And this may be Bruni's real failing to date: a failure to communicate clearly. But reading the review in its totality, you cannot possibly conclude that Wolfgang's had come anywhere close to "flunking" at the art of broiling a steak. Far be it from me to tell you what to order, but there is quite a bit more to making a first-class steak than merely getting the doneness right. The big steakhouses age their meat, which makes an enormous difference. They are also able to get higher quality beef than is found at your typical community supermarket. Even if you have the same product quality and age it yourself, it is no small feat to produce the "crunchy, tender, smoky, earthy" taste Bruni referred to. If you can do all that consistently, I congratulate you. But lastly, there is of course the pleasure of having it all done for you, which is one of the reasons we eat out.

Babbo: ** Megu: *** Bouley: * Wolfgang's: **

It's funny you should ask that. If I'm Wolfgang, I'm pretty happy with this review. Bruni praised the steaks highly ("many wonderful things at once" — "induced a kind of euophoria"). While he doled out a bit more praise for Luger's steaks, Bruni gave quite a few good reasons for diners to choose Wolfgang's: a more varied menu; a more convenient location; acceptance of credit cards; a beautiful main dining room. And lastly, Bruni gave it two stars, and there is no steakhouse in Manhattan with a higher NYT rating than that. Luger's is three stars, but not without some drawbacks. Wolfgang was clearly trying to open a Manhattan outpost that would be a credible alternative to Luger's, and this review says he succeeded.

No critic has the column space to mention all of the dining experiences he has had at the restaurant(s) under discussion. The review is a selection of those experiences, chosen to give an overall impression of what the restuarant is about. If he has visited both Luger's and Wolfgang's multiple times (which you concede is likely), then he is not comparing them based on one experience. In the review, he wrote about the day he tried them within hours of each other—something that no other critic in memory has done. This doesn't mean he has no other data to draw upon. A high-end steakhouse should hardly ever fail to get the doneness right. Therefore, if the critic has had an over-broiled steak on even one of his visits, it's relevant to the review. The overall context of the review suggested that this was not a chronic problem, but it was certainly fair to mention it.

Florence Fabricant reports that Katy Sparks has left Compass, the UWS restaurant that now needs its fourth executive chef in two years. The article cites a book deal with Knopf, which sounds like a cover story—not that she doesn't really have a deal, but that there's probably more to it than that. Amanda Hesser's demotion from two stars down to one can't have helped.

A vendor took me out to dinner at 66 on Monday night. That meant I wasn't paying. We had a fun night out, but I wouldn't rush back to spend my own money there — not because there's anything wrong with 66, but because there's plenty of other fun places I haven't tried yet. My feeling now about 66 is, "been there, done that." 66 is Jean-Georges Vongerichten's riff on Chinese cooking. Neither the menu nor the wine list is long, but this is not a complaint. Vongerichten has narrowed the stereotype Chinese menu down to the things his kitchen can execute well. Aside from a dessicated plate of overcooked spareribs, every dish was fresh, tasty, and inviting. The menu is divided into appetizers, dim sum, rice/noodles, and entrees of vegetables, fish and meat. The apps top out at about $14, although most are under $10. The entrees top out around $26, although most are around $20-22. As at Spice Market, plates are brought out when ready. Our server assured us that all of the dishes are designed for sharing (which wasn't always true), and encouraged us to do so—which we did. There's a tasting menu for $66 (get it?), which our server advised was "personally selected by Jean-Georges" (no surname required). Three of us were willing to go that route, but one of our party was skittish about trusting the famous chef's judgment, so we created a more conservative tasting menu of our own. Our server advised ordering one app, one dim sum, and one entree/vegetable course per person, which turned out to be an ample amount of food, and indeed perhaps a tad too much. I can't find a menu for 66 online, and I can't remember everything we ordered, but I'll run through a few of the highlights. The two standout appetizers were cubes of pork belly and shrimp prepared two ways. We ordered four different kinds of dumplings, of which I remember three: foie gras, mushroom, and lobster. All were excellent, and you're not going to find them on the typical Chinese menu. We ordered a fish entree, which I believe was a grilled sole. It was an undivided fillet, and it quickly crumbled into bitty pieces when we tried to divide it among the four of us. It was a wonderful dish, but hard to split among a large group. The traditional duck with scallions and pancakes was more successful in this regard. Here, Vongerichten was just replicating a Chinese standard (albeit with happy results), without putting his own stamp on it. A plate of mixed vegetables (including the inescapable snow peas) and a sweet & sour chicken dish completed the main courses. The cocktail menu included a concoction called Mother of Pearl, with rum and coconut milk, which was so wonderful I ordered a second. After dinner, I ordered a 14-year-old Oban (single malt scotch), which was very reasonably priced at around $15, and included about twice as much as you normally get in a restaurant portion. Our meal concluded with chocolate fortune cookies—once again, Jean-Georges is winking at us. The Richard Meier décor has been much written about. It is spare, sleek, and doesn't at all resemble your typical Chinese restaurant. The entrance on Church Street (between Leonard and Worth Streets) is so subtle you could easily miss it. My hosts had no trouble getting a 6:30 reservation, and when we left about two hours later 66 was not yet full.

That had me scratching my head! It is not an unreasonable distance. I reckon it would take under an hour if you walk briskly, which a man of Bruni's age should be able to do. Bruni didn't say that this was his only experience with Luger's. He just happened to mention this particular occasion when he did both on the same day. Wolfgang's is obviously trading on its Luger roots — no reviewer has failed to mention it. Bruni simply took the idea to the next logical step: performing the closest he could come to a side-by-side taste test, and reporting the results.