Nathan

went back again on Friday night...place was packed to the gills at 11:30 (mostly diners). everything we tried was good. more kudos to the cocktail program (drinks by DeGroff)...the actual cocktails (all variations on mainstays) are well chosen and balanced. no jiggers though.

Bruni gives Kefi an enthusiastic writeup here: http://dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.com/200...fi-on-the-move/ he also notes that Kefi is moving to a much larger space sometime next year....

Didn't see a thread on this place which opened a couple months ago in SoHo. Ended up here last night cause Tailor appeared to have been rented out for the evening. Nice wine list. Decent bar and affable staff. Decor/Ambience is good. Began with a Jerusalem artichoke soup. This was fine, if a little lacking in full artichoke flavor, usual combination of stock and finished with cream. A nice touch was the addition of well-made potato chips for texture. But.....it was a huge bowl for $7. not sure I could do it at home for that. Followed with a superb burger. Burgers have gotten exponentially better in this town in the last couple years...and this is another example. Really good. Came with a huge pile of excellent frites. $14 for the whole thing. A couple next to me at the bar ordered the pork belly app with cranberry beans...looked good...large portion for an app. Ditto for their "crab sticks".... They also had a cod entree that was finished in front of the diner with broth...a haute touch that was talked about when it occurred in a three or four star restaurant five years ago (JG used to get plaudits because so many courses are finished at the table)...now everyone's doing it. If I lived within a few blocks I'd probably eat here a lot. It's probably a lot better than the west SoHo neighborhood mainstays: Cub Room and Raoul's.

I've only ordered delivery from SG so it's not really a fair sample...but my (very limited) perception was that it was a slight level below GSI, about equivalent to the Wu. but I had an only ok meal at the Chelsea GS on Monday night with a large group...trying a lot of dishes. I thought S&T was better than all of them.

well, with both Momofukus it's pretty clear that what occurred was a happy accident. I noticed that at Barfry as well...but I have no clue why.

I was once told that it has something to do with alcohol consumption (probably why I like lots of salt).

I just look at it is different sets of social expectations for different bars: 1. see and be seen lounges have one set of rules. 2. meet markets have another. 3. serious cocktail bars have another yet. I enjoy all three...often on different nights...sometimes at different times in the course of the same night. of course, category 3 also overlaps with category 4 ("closing the deal" bars)...but this shouldn't be news to anyone...that's always been the primary point (to customers anyway) of both Angel's Share and M&H. and PDT and D&C work admirably in that role as well. unfortunately, sometimes category 4 lends itself to some drunk making-out which may not exactly what category 3 is intended for...and I know that I've occasionally been guilty of that myself....but I figure that's more forgiveable at 3 or 4 in the morning...(civilized drinking ends by 1 or 2 in my experience) of course, sometimes bars perhaps intended to be one...and ended up being another. Employees Only probably intended to be category 3 but it ended up in category 2 a long time ago....(and it's marvelously ideal for that purpose)

I should note that I was talking about the bar in my living room. Not a bar where one actually charges customers.

my home-bar (which sometimes has 40+ guests at it) has two rules: 1. the bartender is always right. 2. vodka should only be drunk straight and chilled...and only if a Russian is present. (one honorable exception: Pravda makes a decent horseradish vodka served with a quail egg...which proves that 1 in a million vodka drinks can actually be decent)

Bruni once again shows his fundamental limitation. He uses the word "fussy" a lot, and it is never a compliment. ← except that he gave Fiamma three stars.

of course it's better classified "Italian" than French! La Pergola and La Calandre are both 3 star Michelin restaurants in Italy after all (one has an Italian chef, one has a German chef). but they're out of the mainstream of the Italian cucina. so appears to be Fiamma in a way that Babbo is not. part of the problem is that (as I was getting at with the JG analogy)...there now exists a form of international cuisine which could just be called "contemporary haute" or "cosmopolitan"....which also often has regional or national accents...

Richman is hardly an inexperienced diner. neither is Bruni (now). labeling can be rather reductive, but from what I've seen, Fiamma is no more Italian than La Pergola or La Calandre (and there are plenty of people in Italy who would tell you that those restaurants are not "Italian")... so...is it less "Italian" than Babbo? certainly. is it contemporary haute with an Italian emphasis? looks like it to me. in the same way that JG is contemporary haute with an Asian emphasis. I'm not sure that Bruni's formulation that Fiamma is a "poodle in a Prada scarf" isn't correct then. he also says: "Would you find these entrees in Italy, even up north? Maybe, in a very fussy restaurant. In most others, no. And who cares? They’re prepared with finesse and they’re the definition of luxury, no matter the geography, no matter the language."

I liked the desserts...but then I liked Stupak's work at Alinea as well. but I don't normally like desserts and I heartily dislike sweet items...so consider that a major caveat.

I've eaten at WD-50 four times. my first three visits were great. my last one (late summer tasting menu) was underwhelming. and the "pizza pebbles" are the worst restaurant dish I've had anywhere.

if I cooked the same five dishes day in and day out for 30 years they'd be really good too. and I'd teach the cleaning lady how to make them...really well. sounds like a robotic assembly line. worth a meal, sure. an accomplishment? not in the slightest. edit: one reason that other restaurants sometimes fail to deliver is maybe that they are 10000000000000000000000000000000000% more ambitious? more than five dishes? a changing menu?

the cynic in me says that a kitchen damn well better be able to serve the exact same five dishes competently over a 30 year period. I fail to see how that's an accomplishment. you could teach monkeys to do that.

L'Impero is too far up and a young restaurant. there are several places meeting that description in Frat Hill. maybe Cosette or I Trulli?

precisely. and I live in the WV which means that my commute to Hoboken is measured in minutes...while it would take me significantly longer to get to Murray Hill or the UES. which is why I consider Cucharamama a must for me to check out. but if it was located somewhere else in Jersey, the amount of motivation would drop drastically.

kitty corner from Corner Bistro

I ate there for a work lunch a number of years ago. it was fine. pretty space. not much else to say.

does Hoboken even really count as Jersey? serious question, not just trying to be provocative.

my understanding is that the inclusion of a restaurant in the Michelin Guide (I think over 500 restaurants are included in the NY guide) signifies that that restaurant is recommended. bad restaurants are simply omitted altogether. that's the idea anyway.

I agree.

I wish he had just come right out and said that. The way it's written makes it sound like he went there for dinner, which would have required a time machine. ← well, we both know the way publication deadlines work. this piece was written at least two or three months ago. at the time, Ko was purportedly open now (although a month ago I predicted January 08...which Eater is now predicting as well). in 2004 Vanity Fair accidentally published on the web an article on the Republican convention...before the convention occurred. when I lived in Miami I saw an E or Travel channel story on Ricky Martin's Casa Salsa, which had closed by the time the episode aired.

there were two chef changes at Ducasse. he did a rereview after the first one.