ASM NY

Where are you seeing PYO?

When considering going for a la carte or the tasting menu, there is a very important thing to keep in mind. Most of these restaurants will do "half portions" of almost anything on the menu. So you can create your own "tasting menu" made of half portions (and people you might be going with can also do the same). I have found that is the best way to try the most items in the restaurant.

Something else all together. They named CRU preparations in which they vacuum seal fruits or vegetables in syrup (and in some cases with added flavoring like mint or rose water), and are refrigerated, the syrup infuses the fruit and it changes their texture and flavor, as well as adding a certain "transulsence" to them. Why exactly CRU and not something else, have no idea, but in the 2005 book, they make reference to any idea or concept they have seen in any other restaurant (and there are many of these references), they make no mention of CRU or any other restaurant for this technique.

We made a last-minute decision to go to Urena Friday night. The place was perhaps 60% full, not too surprising for a summer in the city. We followed Bryan's recommendation and ordered a la carte, however we realized that most of the interesting items are only available on the tasting menu. The table next to ours had the tasting menu and it seemed to be moving very smoothly, I don't think they took more than 2 hours for the whole dinner. We ordered the lasagna, the Mero, the scallops and they let us order the lamb off the tasting menu. We found the quality of the food to be very good and very well executed. I didn't think much of the ambience, but was not horrified like so many others. I did find however, a disconnect between the quality of the food and the atmosphere, as Bryan noted. For the prices the restaurant charges, one is expecting a little bit more than the food being good. It struck me as expensive, but in reality I think that it's more a consequence of the environment not being at the same level as the food. As I mentioned earlier, we were happy with the food we ate, but it is clear that the more exciting food is served on the tasting menu. Not making these items available a la carte, is a mistake in my opinion.

There are just a tremendous number of restaurantes in the Basque country that are worth visiting. Top of the list, in my opinion should be Arzak. But there is also: Mugaritz, Martin Berasategui, Akelare, Fagollaga, just to name a few. These have been discussed in the following forums in more detail: Mugaritz and Arzak San Sebastian Gastronomic Trip to San Sebastian

Sounds AWESOME Bryan, looking forward to seeing what you have in store. The Z Kitchen project sounds very interesting, especially if you can document all its progress going forward. It will be like a mini "Alinea Project" for the up and coming amateur cook. While I am sure you will encounter some legal/regulatory issues regarding Z Kitchen, I am sure that you can find a way to push it through. When all is said and done, I don't think that there is a regulation against having people over for dinner. If not, you'll have to go underground, which will probably bring more clientele your way!

I am very surprised as well... I thought it always had a decent amount of people. Never easy to get a table for brunch.

Fatty Crab Tehuitzingo (nostalgia mostly) Cendrillon Jai Ya Thai (best Tom Yum I've had outside Thailand) Saigon Grill

Sorry if it's too late for your dinner. I don't know of what the proportion would be for milk, but in a recipe I saw in elBulli 2005 cookbook, they create mozzarella spheres, by blending fresh mozzarella cheese and some heavy cream and pouring that into the alginate bath (5g of alginate per liter of water). This is done without adding any calcium chloride whatsoever. Note, that much unlike the other sphere recipes I have seen in there, this one is left to cook longer (about 12min) but it does have a more "cheesy" texture, which might not be what you are looking for. I would suggest you make the alginate bath and start dropping milk in there and if it doesn't work, start adding little by little the calcium chloride to the milk until it reacts. Let us know how it goes...

I think it also depends what match you want to go watch. In my opinion, it's a lot more fun to watch the game in a bar/restaurant that is frequented by locals of one of the teams that is playing (the drawback is however, that you basically have to "choose sides"). Are there any specific teams or games that you are looking to watch?

Whoa. ← Actually, I don't believe that the watermelon (or the other fruit) on the plate were actually "cooked", it is however fair to call it sous vide because they are prepared in a vacuum, with a light syrup or other ingredients and left for a little while. The process adds an interesting texture and translucense to the fruit.

I went for my second visit yesterday, and while I won't go into a dish-by-dish review, I will say that it does remain in my opinion, one of the best high-end places in NY today. Here's a quick list of the things we had (I may have some of these wrong as it was a lot of dishes): -Caipirinha marshmallow -Black sesame financier -Goatcheese tartlet -Salmon tart -Spring pea royale with apple -Oyster with smoked tea air -White Asparragus, beer sorbet, almond Powder -Watermelon sous vide -Split pea soup, scallop, cuttlefish ravioli -Crab salad with caviar -Chanterelles dish -Morels with sassafras foam -Sole poached in frankincense, summer truffle, quail egg -Seabass en planchette, summer truffle -Apple wasabi sorbet with olive oil -Rabbit, smoked potato, rabbit "meatball" -Lamb, arichokes -Traditional Cheese dish: A tasting of 6 cheeses -Modern Cheese dish: Goat cheese ball dipped in liquid nitrogen with zucchini gelee and truffled popcorn, gruyere with tamarind -tarragon foam, lemon sorbet, orange gelee -mandarin with lychee sorbet -pineapple, licorice panna cotta, rhubarb sorbet, honey tuille -orange chocolate cake, chile ancho -carrot "cake", saffron -mignardises As far as things that were similar to my last visit, there was one repeat dish (the wasabi-apple sorbet with olive oil), and a variation of an past dish (oyster with a smoked tea "air"). Of the 5 desserts we tried, only 2 were new (tarragon foam and pineapple-licorice). Another thing that was consistent was the service, which was top-of-the-line. Of the things that I found different this time around were for starters the place was pretty packed, compared to the first time we visited. This time around, there was a "modern" option to the cheese course, which was also the first time I had noticed the use of liquid nitrogen at the restaurant. I did have quick visit to the kitchen at the end of our meal, and while I wasn't there long enough to see all the gadgets, I will comment that the kitchen is a lot larger than what you can see from the dining room. Overall we found the food to be very solid. Most of the dishes we really liked, a couple of them were just "good". There was nothing in the main dinner service we hated. The carrot and saffron dessert we did not like at all. We are looking forward to going back...

This may be a more appropriate discussion for another topic, but I honestly believe that places like Bluehill and WD-50 don't create their menus with what the average American will like in mind. I also think that in this day and age, and particularly in New York, you can go with as much or as little processed food as you'd like. Much in line with what you would experience in Europe.

My experience is that you want to serve ASAP. Especially for the smaller "caviar"-sized spheres. It doesn't need to be done on the spot, but there is a noticeable difference of caviar that is 2 hours old and 1 day old.

I think you have to experiment a little bit, but you will find that you can still make some decent foams without dairy and without gelatin. I tried the abovementioned potato gnocchi spheres and they came out great. Either way, you can always doing the inverse Alginate bath, CaCl into the foam. Try 1lb cooked potatoes, 450g water in which you cooked the potatoes, 30g olive oil, 10g alginate, load into the iSi and have fun...

The key is the natural calcium content of what you are trying to "sphereize". If you try to mix alginate with say cheese or milk, it will react with the calcium in the cheese and it will start to gel and ruin the sphere. So if there is calcium in the ingredients, mix with calcium chloride and drop in an alginate bath. Bryan, given that you already bought your iSi whip. Try the following: put the ingredients together that you would normally use to make a foam, and mix those with the alginate and put inside the siphon. Then, using the attachment that will give you the most uniform cylinder, empy the foam into the calcium chloride bath (you will get one long "noodle"). And cut the noodle with scissors. You will be left with foam spheres, which also have a very interesting texture. elBulli does it with potato foam to create gnocchi. Just remember not to use dairy in creating the potato foam for the abovementioned issue.

Bryan, Check out this here. I buy mine from here. They carry both ISI and other brands at very good prices.

If you are in the mood for Moroccan, I would suggest trying El Sultan. For seafood, check out La Caracola.

Have fun Bryan... we look forward to seeing some pictures!!!

Thanks for that... interesting to see so many of these places pop-up. Modern Greek and tapas seem to be the new trend in the city.

I used to be a fan of the place until about a year ago. Overall I think that the food is pretty decent, but nothing out of the ordinary. One time however, I ordered the "grilled fish" (may have very well been the same as oakapple's seabass). And while it looked great, it tasted like gasoline. The taste was just awful. I sent it back, and the manager tried it and apologized profusely. Haven't been back since. Not sure what happened to my fish that time, but it kinda killed molyvos for me. I agree with oakapple's comment that they have a lot more competition, places like Estiatorio Milos (right across from Zegfield) and the new place that just opened on Park Ave. South in the 20s (can't recall the name).

Great pics hshiau!

Interesting post lauderdale75. Haven't gotten around to trying the beef tendons, but I will definetly try them the next time. Has anyone noticed any difference in quality of the food from their location in Midtown and the one on Lex/30s?

Please forgive me for asking the obvious, but if not for a profit, why are they investing in it? Don't get me wrong, I like the place a lot, and I hope it does very well. But based on what you are saying, should we assume that if it were empty every night, that it will never close down? I don't know enough of the financial aspect of restaurants to say whether a place like this can or cannot make money, but I would be inclined to think that if it were full every day, that it would make a nice profit. And to reiterate, I am not implying that the place doesn't do well, or that it loses money, as I said, I like the place a lot. But I am having trouble understanding what the motivation would be for the Sultan to finance a place like this.

I couldn't agre more. I am puzzled by the lack of comments regarding the food people have had there...