Nathan

had a feast here the other night culminating with the bo ssam. finally had the heirloom tomato salad....pretty darn good...like the nifty use of tofu as faux-croutons. agreed not to discuss the details of what we tasted but it looks like there might be a fun new dish or two this fall.

the nice thing about commercial syrups is that there are so many. I regularly use mint, rose, raspberry, blueberry and strawberry syrups....I just picked up an orange cream syrup which should be fun to play with.

ah. well they're available on Monday online.

familiar=I've been eating this for 30 years. familiar=this was new two years ago and for the last year has been trendy so I'm comfortable with it. when do RG's reviews run in print?...I always read them for comedy on Monday.

completely different sense of familiar.

that was just one weekend weeks ago. full liquor license. everything's standard now. has been for weeks.

my understanding (and many others have noted this) is that main dining room appears to do good business....it's all British tourists. there just aren't any NY'ers eating there. (it's significantly cheaper than eating in London)

I don't see any relation at all. Danyelle was noting that many older diners in her hood like to eat the same exact things they were eating 30 years ago while Bruni was noting that most diners who are into "hot scenes" (which Elio's is the farthest thing from) want dishes that they've become familiar with in the last couple years. in other words, Gemma is "hot" in a way that Tailor cannot be (right now anyway).

from the Gemma review, this is why I think Bruni gets (or at least writes more clearly about) today's NY dining zeitgeist more than anyone: "These are the makings of Gemma, a cheat sheet of a restaurant whose proprietors take fewer risks than a hurricane-insurance agent in Nebraska. They’ve turned to a fundamentally earnest cuisine for calculated purposes, and they know that many diners sprinting to the newest hot spot don’t really want to find anything new. They want reassurance that they’ve mastered what’s worth knowing."

it's always been one of my quick bite go-to's...especially in the winter...on perhaps my favorite street in NY.

That's great to hear, Nathan.Just curious, was that peekytoe crab salad served with tomato confit, by any chance??? ← no. not that I could taste anyway. just summer veggies.

I returned here for lunch...after taking a summer hiatus. I'm happy to report that, on Saturday at least, it's back to the usual stellar lunch. the current mozzarella dish with roasted quince isn't quite as good as the old version with pineapple (which was exceedingly good) but is still quite good. the peekytoe crab salad was a little boring (as peekytoe crab salads almost always are) but beautifully presented. tenderloin with fava beans and a puree of greens was first-rate, cooked perfectly. highly recommend. spotted a chicken dish being served to other diners which I'll have to return for this weekend... watermelon ice was appropriate for the Indian Summer we're having. apparently they have special lunch wine prices as well....my Cote du Rhone with the tenderloin turned out to be $5.

gotta recommend that new dessert with the mustard ice cream. had the passionfruit poached char again. seriously good.

Stopped in here on Saturday night. The decor has been slightly altered...the lighting's better. Menu is large, lots of tapas, apps and a few "dishes to share" (paella etc.). Both the tapas and the app portions are quite large. Execution and service are pretty good. So is the ingredient quality. Especially recommend anything with jamon or chorizo or shrimp. Unfortunately, a tuna dish was overwhelmed by cabrales (it seems like there is cheese in almost every dish...which is a little much). very small wine list by the glass (for a tapas place). don't bother with the cocktails. unfortunately, an octopus dish proved again that there are exactly three restaurants in NY that actually do right by Octopus (Sabry's, Babbo, Bar Room at the Modern)...and this isn't one of them. Crowd was a mixture of older and a few younger Murray Hillites. Dining room was almost full. the bar was completely empty (except for us). prices are very reasonable. It's a shame to see Urena go....but Pamplona is immediately better than 90% of the tapas places in NY. it's quite different from Tia Pol and it's not as good as Casa Mono...but it's definitely worth checking out.

Sidecar. The Old Fashioned isn't a good test for obvious reasons...people who otherwise know their drinks expect muddled fruits while other people will rule out a perfectly good bartender for including a muddled orange. A Martini doesn't work because even if the bartender knows better (and they usually do if they have any cocktail pretensions at all)....they're still going to assume that you want vodka and you want it dirty or even if you specify gin they'll still assume you want it dirty (even if they know better). so it's not fair to the bartender. As for the Manhattan, actually, they rarely flunk that. I don't ask for it in dive bars or clubs and in lounges or hotels or restaurants any bartender will usually give you Maker's in a 3-1. they'll shake it and there won't be bitters (sometimes they'll surprise with Angostura) but it'll be credible. so the Sidecar is the test. (usually high-end restaurants or hotel bars pass...other places are iffy...but you can be pleasantly surprised). plus it's a great test of balance.

first off, he didn't give Vong a zero. (edit: and Spice Market is less tired and is much prettier...or at least dramatic) second, "politicized" is not a synonym for "following precedent"...there is a body of work predating Bruni and he must respect that (many think he doesn't respect that enough but that's a separate discussion...he'd really have them up in arms if he dropped a restaurant three stars). third, no review is written in a vacuum. context matters. there are two star reviews (like Little Owl) that read like four star reviews (if you ignore context)...but are really saying "this is an over-achieving one-star restaurant which is as good as possible for its category so it gets two"....and then there are reviews which are intended to be wake-up calls to once great restaurants (the Peter Luger review, the Bouley review) that are basically saying "get your house in order" and guess what? every reviewer writes these.

with all respect, that's completely unfair. it's an existing three star restaurant...that has't radically changed since when those three stars were given (hasn't changed concept or menu etc.)...he can't just give it zero. especially not when it's the best of its genre when it's on. edit: dropping a revered NY institution by three whole stars (instead of one) would be quite the statement... look at it this way...Spice Market is a one-star restaurant. but when it is (inevitably) downgraded...it'll get two....no matter who the Times restaurant critic is at that time.

I'll give myself credit for having already raised this exact issue earlier in the thread (I didn't use the word "spongy" but I was complaining about the crusts - which generally suck). And Nathan pointed out that the "Joe's" I referenced is actually at Bleecker and 6th. The weird thing is that although the place I mentioned (which I have not visited in the past four or five years) was just "Joe's" - not "Famous Joe's". I'm wondering if they really moved up form the corner or of the other place closed and the new guy can't use the name but settled on"Famous Joe's" so that people would assume a connection. I'll be in the city for the last weekend of September and staying in that neighborhood - I'll walk over and check it out. ← for whatever reason, they moved...I'm pretty sure its the same people and everything's identical inside. meanwhile, a generic pizza place took over the old location...no doubt attempting to capitalize on confused tourists.

no doubt. but the one that seemed strange to me and which I've never gotten used to is the "plain slice" or "pie"....probably doesn't help that I don't really like cheese....(and from a purist perspective, a plain slice wouldn't have cheese...marina v. margherita)

its not volume to turn tables...its a particular use of dance music...the fast syncopation...

unless I'm brain-farting, Joe's is on 6th and Bleecker. it used to be on the corner and then moved slightly north. after trying that I became assured that I just don't like NY style pizza.

turnover. industry studies indicate that they turn tables faster with up-tempo music.

yup. haven't seen the Arrack yet. Swedish Punsch is supposed to be on its way as well.

hmm...well, going to the young out-of-towner's point. 1. my roommates from Texas order Domino's (in their defense I don't know who else delivers pizza at all to our building...and Domino's provides the breadsticks and soda and the like necessary for watching the game). 2. I don't order from Domino's but not having been raised on the east coast...I've never gotten into the plain pie. just don't like it. (I do enjoy the Neopolitan marinara (one of the two main varieties of Neopolitan pizza)....which omits the cheese altogether....but this has apparently never caught on in NY.)

yeah, I read somewhere last week that Hanson was going to do bbq...I guess that's a sign that it's about over....