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In January, Uovo was prominently featured in a NYT article about how restaurants stock their liquor and wine inventories. It had another mention in August. Bruni didn't write those pieces, but I believe he reads his own paper. There were full reviews in Tables for Two and Strong Buzz, a feature in Daily Candy, and another mention in NY Magazine. That's enough press coverage that Bruni would surely have been aware of it, and I would guess that he paid at least one visit. But the Eater post mentioned that Uovo was uneven. If Bruni happens to have sampled one of its bad days, the restaurant probably didn't get a second shot.Rich hit it right: "It's always very convenient to blame a third party for failure. Why take the heat yourself when there are so many out there to blame?"

Like much that Eater does, the Deathwatch is a bit tongue-in-cheek. Eater puts restaurants on DW when there are clear signs of trouble. Some may recover. Eater has only been doing this for about six months, so it's too soon for there to be a real track record. I think there have been a couple of DW'd restaurants that closed.In Alto's case, I saw for myself that they were only about half-full on a Saturday night, and à la carte options have been added to what was formerly a $75 prix fix-only menu. The signs are pretty obvious that Alto is struggling.

Alto is the newer of a duo of Italian restaurants by chef-wunderkind Scott Conant. Eric Asimov awarded three stars to L’Impero in December 2002, while Frank Bruni gave Alto a two-star kiss-off in July 2005. For a restaurant helmed by so well regarded a chef, it was a significant slapdown. Bruni seemed almost vengeful in that review, calling Alto “haute and bothered,” but it never really made sense. A celebration for my friend’s birthday provided the excuse to see for ourselves whether Bruni was right. Alto is named for the Alto Adige a region of northern Italy. It’s a companion to L’Impero, which features the food of southern Italy. But Conant plays with flavors and ingredients, and aside from an emphasis on pasta dishes, one is not really conscious of a focus on Italy. We ordered the seven-course tasting menu ($115) with wine pairings ($75). The server said that the kitchen would substitute freely, but we took the menu as printed. After a delicious amuse-bouche of smoked trout, we had: Branzino Tartare (avocado, gremolata and preserved lemon vinaigrette) Poached Black Sea Bass (caponata panzanella and lemon thyme broth) Veal and Fontina Angolotti (organic baby carrots, baby mushrooms, and parmigiano emulsion) Risotto with Frogs Legs (summer squash and black truffles) Roast Suckling Pig (smoked corn, chanterelles and black pepper agrodolce) Braised Beef Short Ribs (vegetable and farro risotto) Warm Chocolate Ganache (milk chocolate gelato, roasted peanot froth) We found the pacing and variety of the dishes, the combination of ingredients, and the quality of the presentation, all impeccable. The first four dishes were unanimous hits. The branzino tartare was meltingly delicious. The crunchy caponata was a perfect contrast to the soft black sea bass. We noted that the risotto ran rings around the one we had at Del Posto (for which Mario Batali charges $50). I found my suckling pig a bit tough, but my friend said that her portion was wonderfully tender. Short ribs, I suppose, were a rote inclusion not quite as exciting as the other items. The staff were alerted in advance that it was my friend’s birthday, and her dessert came with “Happy Birthday” written on the plate in chocolate calligraphy. Conant has made some changes since Frank Bruni’s two-star review. Some dishes that skewed towards German-Austrian cuisine have been dropped. There is no longer a bottle of olive oil on every table. The menu, formerly prix fixe-only at dinner ($75 for four courses), is now available à la carte. It was a Saturday night, and the restaurant was not full — I suspect they are starting to get desperate. The décor, which Bruni hated, appears to be unchanged. For us, it was elegant, refined, serene—delightful. The day before our visit, the food blog Eater put Alto on deathwatch, with an over/under of January, noting that “Conant’s investors can’t be very happy with the thin dinner crowds. There’s even a rumor circulating that the venue is up for sale, which, no, does not bode well at all.” I hope it survives, but I must admit the same thought crossed my mind when I saw so many empty tables on a Saturday night. We found the service attentive and impressive. Many dishes were delivered with half-moon covers, and the food uncovered with that voila! moment that is so seldom seen these days in restaurants. I was mildly irritated when we ordered champagne, but the sommelier could not explain what it was. (“It just came in and I’m not too familiar with it, but I’ll be happy to help you with any of your other wine selections.”) At $15 per glass, she should know. There was an addictive selection of homemade breads, but oddly enough they came with no butter, and the bread server’s accent was so thick that we couldn’t quite understand all of the five choices. A couple of the other dishes were dropped off by barely-comprehensible servers. Am I asking too much when I suggest that at a restaurant of Alto’s calibre, a reasonable command of English should be required of those entrusted with describing the food? These minor complaints aside, Alto did a lovely job on a special occasion. We would gladly go back.

A couple of months ago, I put up a blog post about my dining experience at The Savoy Grill in London, which is one of Ramsay's restaurants. The house manager there is relocating to NYC to run Ramsay's new restaurant, and we chatted briefly. The link is here.

The quote, I believe was specifically in reference to people shooting photos of the food. A general "family shot" on a special occasion wouldn't get you banned.Now, aside from the fact that journalists may (but do not always) misquote their source, or paraphrase to the point that the original meaning is lost, what makes you think it happened in this case?

Rich's suggestion — Annisa, followed by drinks at One If By Land — is the best so far. Annisa is a very charming place, the food can be counted on, and it's elegant without being over-the-top romantic. Any Danny Meyer outlet would be very solid, such as Union Square Café, Eleven Madison Park, or Gramercy Tavern. Ditto Gotham Bar & Grill. Some of the suggestions are fine first-date places, but not exactly what comes to mind when the thread says "Money is no object." If that's the parameter, I wouldn't choose The Red Cat or Gigino at Wagner Park. Battery Gardens, while not being really that expensive by NYC standards, has a more upscale feel to it, and the food is certainly respectable. But if it rains that day, and there is no view, the whole reason for going will have been rendered irrelevant. I do agree with the comment that you shouldn't choose a first-date restaurant that's fancier than what you can generally afford. It sets up an expectation that you won't be able to live up to. Beyond that, even if I were as rich as Warren Buffett, I wouldn't go to Per Se or Jean Georges on the first date. It just doesn't feel right.

As far as I know, Ramsay is the first restauranteur to take such a militant stance. (The Times reports today that "any patron trying to take pictures of [the food] would be banned.") I haven't kept track, but I think photos from just about every high-end restaurant in town have appeared on eGullet or a food blog at some point or another. I don't get the impression that it's so common that it really justifies a policy statement.

It depends how you define "major city." As a guy who's lived in Detroit and Tampa, New York looks pretty adventurous.

At Per Se, parties of two are seated at the same-size tables as parties of four.

Identical menu, identical style, and I've seen Wolfgang there personally on several occasions.

This week, I head meals at two steakhouses I’ve reviewed before: Wolfgang’s TriBeCa and Craftsteak. Both appear to be midlly struggling restaurants, although for different reasons. Wolfgang’s had lengthy opening delays. I’ve been in there twice now, and while the restaurant certainly doesn’t seem to be failing in any sense, it certainly doesn’t have the heavy crowds that the original Wolfgang’s did. It appears you can walk in just about any time and get a table. Craftsteak ought to have been a sure bet, with a celebrity chef/owner (Tom Coliccio) who has been successful wherever he went and a brand name (Craft) that has always stood for quality. But the restaurant was pilloried in one review after another for the same highly peculiar reasons: Craftsteak didn’t know how to cook a steak; the menu was over-wrought and wordy. How hard could it be? Manhattan is overflowing with competent steakhouses. Surely steak is the one thing a steakhouse should know how to prepare. But apparently Craftsteak did not. In two separate interviews, Coliccio admitted they had blown it, and he even arranged an amicable split with partner Danny Meyer at Gramercy Tavern so that he could focus on his Craft properties. At Wolfgang’s this week, I ordered the New York Strip. At $36.50, it is one of the better steak prices in New York City. It came sizzling hot, perfectly charred on the outside, achingly tender on the inside. The steak was sliced in the traditional Peter Luger style. My server not only served the first several slices, but kept returning to my table to serve more. For quality and attention, it could not be beat. Wolfgang’s is a traditional steakhouse, populated mostly by businessmen. It is not for everybody. But in its genre, Wolfgang’s is doing a superb job. At Craftsteak too, it was no problem to just waltz in and ask for a table. Unlike Wolfgang’s, Craftsteak has the trappings of a high-end restaurant. I actually saw two tables with only women seated. There was a tasty amuse-bouche of a cube of goat cheese on a thin wafer. At the end of my meal, a plate of petits-fours was dropped off. Wolfgang's has neither. Both restaurants have better-than-average bread service, but Craftsteak’s piping-hot Parker-house rolls in a cast-iron serving dish are some of the best in the city. A side dish of Wagyu confit potatoes was excellent. Both the dinner and the dessert menu at Craftsteak are reprinted daily. (At Wolfgang’s, it probably won’t be reprinted until the prices go up.) The menu has changed considerably since the last time I saw it. It no longer prints the biography of every slaughtered cow it sells, although there is still a choice between grass-fed and corn-fed beef. The strip steak is now offered at three different ages (28, 42, and 56-day), rather than six. The Wagyu offerings have been simplified too. The old Craftsteak was offering far too many options. But ultimately, we must judge a place like Crafsteak for its steak. And again last night, Craftsteak stumbled. I decided to splurge for the New York Strip aged 56 days. This should be the house’s signature item. At $52, it is the most expensive entrée you can order, except for Wagyu beef and steaks for two (porterhouse or ribeye, $88). I also thought it would be a useful comparison to the strip at Wolfgang’s, which is only $36.50. Early on, Craftsteak was criticized for not putting a char on the outside of its steaks. The menu still says "roasted," so I explicitly asked for a medium-rare temperature with charring on the outside. “Pittsburgh medium rare,” my server responded. I have never heard the term “Pittsburgh” applied to steak, but he assured me that this meant it would be charred. If the steak was charred, you could have fooled me. There was no char on the exterior that I could detect. Inside, the steak was indeed medium rare, but it was tough and chewy. This is what 56-day aging gets you? Wolfgang’s doesn’t tell you how long their strip steak is aged, but for $15.50 less, the New York Strip at Wolfgang’s runs circles around Craftsteak. I decided to give dessert a try. A pound cake topped with raspberries and ice cream was wonderful, as indeed was everything about Craftsteak that isn’t a steak. If Tom Coliccio could only figure out how to prepare a steak, he might have a three-star restaurant. But what good is a steakhouse that can’t do steak?

Even a tasteful redecoration would be very expensive, and I'll bet someone is still paying off the loans for the original version.

On the whole, I would certainly not call Liebrandt's Gilt menu "classical." It was not as far-out as El Bulli or Alinea, but it wasn't as mainstream as Jean Georges or Daniel. By NYC standards, it was more like WD-50 than anything else. But frankly, because it was more experimental, I thought there were several "misses" on the tasting menu I tried, and at those prices one is far less likely to forgive the missteps.

This article by Frank Bruni in Men's Vogue is about his dining habits, and how he stays in shape while ingesting 12,000 calories a day.

Given the fate of Atlas, Papillon, and now Gilt, I would suggest that the next move should be at a much lower price point, in a neighborhood like the Lower East Side that is more congenial to that type of experimentation.

I would have to agree with Bryan that intoday's NYC restaurant economy that price range qualifies as upper midlevel. While Asiate might not be quite as "safe" as Vong, that style restaurant has become relatively routine in major cities around the country. ← There are probably more than 20,000 restaurants in new York City. Menupages has menus for more than 5,000. I am quite certain that there are not more than 100 NYC restuarants with an entry price of $75 at dinner. Asiate, therefore, is higher than the 98th percentile, even if you limit it to the population with menupages entries. Hence, by NYC standards, I'd say Asiate's $75 minimum is quite expensive, and puts it well within the top 100, and probably within the top 50. Gilt's prices, of course, were stratospheric, with perhaps only 5-10 places in town as expensive.In New York, we have a disproportionate share of very expensive restaurants that no other American city can support on such a scale. On eGullet, a disproportionate share of the discussion is devoted to those restaurants. Perhaps we become lulled into thinking that these high-end restaurants are more typical than they really are.

You have a notion of "mid-level" that I'm not familiar with. At dinner, Asiate is prix fixe ($75) or tasting menu ($95) as the only options. That puts Asiate in probably the 98th percentile, with Gilt in the 99th or 100th. Asiate's service model, to me, appeared to be geared towards the upper end of three stars, and in fact was a bit smoother than Gilt's.I do agree that Gilt's cuisine had the "potential to offend," but Liebrandt's cooking is really in a category unto itself, at least in New York. Asiate's cooking is "safer" than Liebrandt's, because practically everything is "safer" in that sense. But I wouldn't lump it into the standard Asian-Fusion model. Asiate's food is quite a bit more adventurous than, say, Vong.

Given your parameters, I would recommend Jean Georges or ADNY. There's also nothing wrong with your original first choice, Per Se, but if you've been to The French Laundry, I would recommend trying something new. On the other hand, if you were really wowed by TFL, then Per Se will probably wow you too. I've been to Per Se twice, and it is a unique experience.All of Rich's suggestions for "non-amateurs," although very fine restaurants, are operating at a lower level than Per Se, ADNY, or JG.

The other day, my friend and I were mulling over our dining experiences over the last year. We've eaten at some very fine places, with Gilt being close to the most expensive. We had vaguely pleasant memories of the experience, but we couldn't specifically remember any particular dish that we had there. While we had no regrets about trying Gilt, it wasn't on our shortlist of places to try again anytime soon. That was the problem with Gilt. To survive, a restaurant needs to build up a flock of steady regulars. Liebrandt's achievement at Gilt was admirable, but it didn't inspire loyalty. I think that's what killed it. Bruni's two-star review couldn't have helped, but I don't think the Times review can close a restaurant all by itself. People don't depend on the Times for the last word, the way they used to. Plenty of places have soldiered on successfully despite a negative review in the Times (e.g., Asiate).

I don't know the economics of it, but I tend to think they should re-open under a new name — call it a new restaurant, so that they can draw the reviewers back again. Otherwise, they'll still be laboring under the two-star shadow.

A friend has just celebrated her 45th birthday. For the occasion, I decided to take her to Café Boulud, the three-star sibling of Daniel Boulud’s four-star flagship, Daniel. I’ve heard great things about Café Boulud over the years, but Andrew Carmellini, the chef de cuisine to whom it owes its reputation, jumped ship recently to open A Voce, leaving the kitchen in the hands of Bertrand Chemel. We weren’t blown away. One can never go too far wrong with seared foie gras ($26), but there was nothing distinguished about the preparation. Peking Duck ($36) was likewise competent, and an ample portion, but wasn’t special. My friend had a similar reaction to sweetbreads ($19) and hangar steak ($34). Her cheese course ($21) was one of the comparative bargains. One server offered a special dessert, but moments later another server told us it was unavailable. The strawberry grati ($13) was just fine, although quickly forgotten. On the plus side, I was impressed to see that the wine list had a full page of white wine selections under $60, and another full page with reds under $60. I’ve been to plenty of restaurants less ambitious than Café Boulud where the choices under $60 were few and far between. With so much more to choose from on the menu, I hesitate to say that Café Boulud is coasting, but both of us found the cooking uninspired, given the price point.

Two stars from El Bruni is entirely possible. We know these things about Frank: 1) The traditional trappings of old-school fancy dining are practically irrelevant for him. 2) He takes the Consumer Reports approach to restaurant reviewing. He doesn't like paying $40 for an entree the size of a golf ball. 3) At expensive places, he expects the service to be practically perfect. I'd say the margin for error at L'Atelier de Joel Rubuchon will be close to zero. Given what happened at Gilt and The Modern, two stars is a very real possibility if any of Bruni's usuall pet peeves are violated.

Yes, exactly.If one concludes that the stars are meaningless, then Bruni might as well pick them out of a random-number generator, and it wouldn't matter. But if the stars are carriers of meaning, then every screw-up debases the product. And in that sense, Sneakeater has nailed it. If Bruni had not been so generous with two-star ratings for "very good neighborhood joints," the rest of his ratings could be rationalized as being coherent. It's the two-star ratings for places like The Red Cat and Little Owl that has been the most problematic. I disagree, however, that Bruni will feel at all compelled to award three stars to the new Tasting Room. If Bruni was willing to slap two stars on Café Gray, Le Cirque, Alto, The Modern, and so forth, he won't mind at all with Tasting Room. He's been all over the place with his two-star ratings, but at three stars his ratings have been consistent.

On my website, I gave it 2½ overall, with 2½* for food and service, and 3½ for ambiance.I went a little higher on food and service because, although there were glitches, the problem is mainly one of consistency. When they're on their game, they clearly know how to get it right. But maybe I'm just a softie. If I paid 3-4 visits (as a pro reviewer would), and these kinds of things happened every time, my final rating would be 2 stars.

Although it was the lure of Sunday bargains that brought us there, decided to have the tasting menu. We were most impressed to find that a wine pairing was available for just $30. Many restaurants in Del Posto’s class would charge double that. To be sure, we got five small pours of relatively recent vintage, but the wines all worked well with the food, and at the price it was a bargain. After an amuse-bouche of fried zucchini, our menu was as follows: SALUMI MISTI with Erbazzone and Figs Grilled SUMMER VEGETABLES with Ricotta di Buffala Tocai Friulano, Bastianich 2004 Friuli The house-cured salumi were one of the highlights of the meal, extremely fresh and tangy. INSALATA di MARE with Prosciutto PERCH with Truffled Green Bean Salad Falanghina, Feudi di San Gregorio 2004 Campania I found the seafood salad dull and rubbery, but the Perch was perfectly prepared. GARGANELLI VERDI al Ragu Bolognese RISOTTO with Funghi Misti Morellino di Scansano “I Perazzi,” La Mozza 2004 Toscana The pasta was just fine, although as my friend remarked, it was nothing she couldn’t have prepared at home. While eating the mushroom risotto, I couldn’t help but think, “This is what they charge $50 for.” It was a competent risotto, but fifty dollars? Give me a break. Grilled RIB-EYE “Tagliata” 6-year PARMIGIANO-REGGIANO Vespa Rosso, Bastianich 2002 Friuli I’ve had bad luck with beef on tasting menus, which often seems a pale imitation of what the better steakhouses serve. But Del Posto’s rib-eye was first-class: wonderfully tender, and with a crisp char on the outside. The cheese course was again a bit of a dud. It’s wonderful to know that the parmigiano has been aged six years, but I found it overly sharp to the taste, and the accompaniments weren’t much help. MELON SORBETTO CROSTATA di Cioccolato Moscato d’Asti “Sourgal,” Elio Perrone 2005 Piemonte I enjoyed the melon sorbet. I must admit I’ve forgotten what the final course was like, but at this point I was so full that I felt they’d have to wheel me out of there. A generous plate of petits-fours went untouched. The room at Del Posto is gorgeous. The tables are amply spaced. Service was friendly, but there were some glitches. After I used my fork to eat the amuse bouche, a server replaced it at my side, instead of bringing a clean one. It’s a minor point, but no four-star restaurant would do that. Later on, there was a speck of dust floating in my wine (they replaced it without complaint). Another table ordered the grilled whole fish. We watched the staff struggle to fillet it for what looked like 20 minutes. By now, Del Posto ought to have the staff who know how to fillet in their sleep. For a couple of courses, the server’s description was mumbled to the point of being incomprehensible. Luckily we had a postcard-sized cheat sheet to look at (and which I brought home with me). Still, I had no idea that what looked like apricot slices that came with the parmigiano was in fact horseradish. We enjoyed our meal at Del Posto — make no mistake about that. But both service and consistency have a ways to go if the restaurant aspires to four stars.