CherieV

Wait a moment, Paula, are we blaming him for all of these things? Many people have horrific jobs for demonic chefs and don't do the things you have elaborated here ... and were some employees perhaps even better off financially for working for/with him? Would believe that adding the line "employed by Gordon Ramsay restaurant ______" would give someone a chance for a better job actually ... He cooks, he entertains ... remember the song from Gypsy? "You gotta have a gimmick" (if you want to get applause) ... his gimmick is acerbic hostility with a soupçon of verbal abuse rendered at high decibels ... ← Watching this reminded me of my days in the kitchen with Georges Perrier at Le Bec Fin. He is a piece of work too. But many of us that suffered through his daily tantrums ended up with quite a nice career which we can give him some credit.

I recommend Rat's in Hamilton and also KC Prime for a buisness dinner in that area. There's not much there that is not a chain restaurant.

I'm glad to see you all were bothered with the stemware too. Besides me (of course) there were some pretty nice bottles being popped and we drank out of the same crappy glasses that we get a bar?! I wonder why they cut corners here? Their food is worthy of great wine and I hate not drinking great wine out of proper glasses. I think bringing your own glasses is tacky and pretentious but I understand if you must.

Finally, finally had dinner at Django!! It was my fiance's birthday and they fit us in at 9:30. Food was amazing! Service was just OK but take into consideration I worked at Le Bec and the Fountain so I am a hard judge of service. The food though will have me coming back! We ate 4 courses each and every bite was well worth the indulgence. I started with a fish chowder finished with hushpuppies. Really light and delicate is how I can describe it. My fiance started with goat cheese gnocchi in a porchini ivory sauce. Unbelievable! Please order this if you are going in June. Very delicate with sublte mushroom flavor. Second, we had octopus puttanesca salad and a roasted prosciutto salad. Really good too but not my favorite. Entree's were guinea hen and lamb. Really nice and supurbly prepared. I enjoyed the rustic style of the food and the flavor combo's. The chef has a very refined palate and executes his dishes as well as I have ever seen either in the US or France. This meal was well worth twice what I paid for it! Not that I am complaining. Our cheese course was one of the best examples I have seen since Artisnal. They covered all the bases with style, type and pungency. Well done to say the least. Dessert we had a goat cheese cake which was light as air and delightful. I can't wait to return and we are so lucky to have such talent in this city.

For me I have to say the escargot at Le Bec Fin in Philadelphia. If you've ever had it you will understand. Truffle rissotto is a close second.

Vietnam is one of my favorites! Spring rolls all kinds are great! Crab and tomato soup Chicken lemongrass soup Beef wrapped in grape leaves Salt and Pepper squid This is my short list.

Funny you should ask, I just ate there last night for the first time with some friends. I really enjoyed it. It was very busy and I thought everything was great.

Believe it or not we can do this in Pa. It is a state decision and I think that it has helped restaurant wine sales.

Well, I dined there for the first time tonight since the new opening. It wasn't terrible. The service had some issues, especially the food runners which brought the wrong food to the wrong table each time. The food was good. I had the snapper soup which was good but in my opinion not as good as SSOH. Then the small house salad which was fine, and for my entree a special which was broiled halibut in a morel mushroom and oyster stew. Tasty but unrefined. That seemed to be the theme of pretty much everyone else's meal as well. Good but not fancy. In spite of the bad review the place was packed all night. The managers were visible as well as a personal appearance from John Taxin's sister which greated many of the tables. So it is still a good place to bring out-of-towners for a bit of Philly history, and if you have a hefty expense account that helps too.

I have a buisness dinner there on Wed so I am very curious to say the least. I do have to say that with all the great restaurants to patronise in Philly, this would not have been my choice. But I am forced to make an appearance where I do buisness with my distributor. So Bookbinders it is, I will give you all an update. Can't imagine the oysters and snapper soup to be better or even as good as SSOH! But I'll let you all know.

As are: American cheese and sweet pickle sandwiches cream cheese and jelly sandwiches potato chips dipped in cream cheese ← I like dill pickles wrapped in American Cheese slices also my Dad used to make me cream cheese and jelly sandwiches for lunch when I was young. Mussels dipped in malted vinegar was a favorite of my Grandfather. I think this is a British thing.

Oh good, another high end steak house chain West of Broad! Just what we need!! So now within 4 blocks we have: Capital Grill, Palm, Mortons, Prime Rib, Smith and Wolinsky and Ted's Montana Grill. Am I forgetting anyone? Delmonico coming anytime soon or Old Homestead???? I guess you can all tell that I'm not much of a steak house lover.

I heard a rumor that P.F. Changs or was it Ruby Foo's (same difference) is going to open in the Avenue B location on Broad. Also, a Melting Pot is coming downtown as well. I have to say these aren't bad chains as they go and will be tourist traps for theatre goer's I suspect. Just took at Times Square, all the wonderful restaurants in NY and the Olive Garden has a line around the block everyday. Go figure.

Actually, that's not too far off the mark. She said something similiar to " You can look over the wine and dinner menus , and I can get your cocktails for you. Do you prefer sparkling, still or tap waters, becasue I can bring that to you as well" OH, SO I ORDER THINGS FROM YOU, AND YOU BRING THEM TO ME...WAY COOL...aaaagggghhhh. And, with all respect to Katie, If the inventory control person comes in on a wednesday morning, and knew there were four bottles of wine abc, and saw that 4 botlles of abc wine were consumed tuesday night, they can do three things: 1. Get his /her hands on wine for service tonite. 2. reprint the wine list to ( sorry, can't imagine the 30 sheets of paper needed to reprint an updated list could break the bank...and if a restaurant doesn't have a decent word processing program to handle the change relatively easily, they should invest in one. )( on that note, you could just put "temp out of stock" next to the wine name, not changing the layout.) or 3. the servers can be notified of the gap in inventory, so that when this wine is ordered, they can immediately inform the customer of its temporary unavailability. What if there are more than two or three out of stock? Then someone is not doing their job. Or, as I suspect, its a wine list designed to get accolades from Wine Spectator or somesuch. It is very frustrating for a diner who highly values wine selection to be told they are out of a wine, and more often than not, the second selection is not available as well. ( In this instance, I am referring to wines on the list over $100) ← If only it were that easy Kim. I was the bev manager at The Fountain Rest and it was nearly impossible to have the extensive wine list we had and everything be in stock with the correct vintage. It is more than just reprinting the list every night. Having the PLCB involved in your program means that there is another tier of people and paperwork waiting to screw something up. I could go on and on. The fact is if you never managed an extensive wine program in Pa you will not be able to understand the challanges it creates. When Katie managed the Bev program at the Bass I was one of her sales rep's. On several instances her order got messed up and I jumped through hoops just to get her something by the weekend. If I couldn't come through she was stuck. The amount of paperwork and rules Pa has in place causes many bev managers to be stuck without product. There just isn't enough time in a day to fix all the errors. You just do your best.

I lived in Valencia back in '93, finishing college there. I was a Spanish language major and all of my linguistic classes were taken while in Valencia. I was taught (ll) should be pronouced as another poster said yl. Very difficult actually for English speakers. Hence, as I learned in Valencia it's Pie-aye-la. (Paella). Also, I have yet ever to have Paella in the US even close to what you get in Valencia. It definately is the the olive oil content coupled with the crisp rice on the bottom of the pan. I remember it being cooked in outdoor ovens that looked like pizza ovens. I live in Pa so if anyone has any recommendations in the NE area let me know.

That was the only place on my list and judging from the feedback I'm guessing it's the only place to eat in Pittsburgh Primanti's seems to be Pat's to me. The place everyone knows. I wanted to know where their (metaphoric) Tony Luke's is. Or Rangoon. Or Capogiro, Or ... I guess that there aren't many pittsburghers on this board? ← I am a Philly person but I do quite a bit of buisness in Pitt. There are some good restaurants. Check out Eleven, it on the Southside part of the city. It has a nice wine bar and great food. It's buisness casual. Also Monteray Bay just North of the city is great. Seafood rest that has a spectacular view of the city. In Shadyside there is The Casbah and Soba restaurants. They are funky Stephen Starr kind of places. Check out their website. www.bigburitto.com

Check out Bookbinders for private parties, I know the place is huge and it just reopened after a complete overhaul. It's a Philly staple so it's worth a look. I just posted this same response for another thread thinking I was responding to this one. I'm a little goofy today...

How about checking out Bookbinders. It just reopened and really has always been a historic restaurant staple in Phila. I know the place is enourmous and so far I have heard good things. Hope this helps.

I made it to The Smoked Joint last night finally. I have to say that I enjoyed it very much. My fiance and I love BBQ and can be very critical when it comes to authentic BBQ. Anyway here is my evaluation, for what's its worth..... We wanted to start with the smoked Baba but they had run out. Maybe next time as I have heard good things. I had a margarita instead which was very good. We got the combo for entrees. Mine was the chicken and ribs. The chicken was nice and smokey but very very dry. Ribs were excellent. Slaw was awsome, sweet potato fries were a bit soggy for my taste. My fiance got the pulled pork and the brisket with baked beans and collard greens. He really enjoyed his combo also. I didn't taste his sides but I did taste the brisket and pulled pork and thought they were great. The bread served on the side was great too. We ordered a side of mac and cheese and it was good. The cornbread was exceptional as was the pecan pie for dessert. We will be back.

Well, thank you so much for the warm welcome Katie!!! I read this board often and really look foward to adding my 2 cents Oh, I already have....

Trust is another restaurant that got a horrific review and struggled until it closed. Then of course Starr put El Vez there ASAP.

Personally, I am glad BP got called out for there wine list and prices. I have always felt that Starr hasn't given the attention to his beverage program (wine in general) that he should. His buyers vary from place to place and definately in knowledge. He practically has no training program and for the quality of restaurants he is putting out he needs to get on board. Maybe this review will give him a wake-up call that he can't get to the next level without a comprehensive well thought out wine list. Coming from The Four Seasons, believe me I was under the gun to make a good profit through beverage. I had been confronted many times from out of towners wondering what the deal is with our prices. Pa is more expensive usually and only is it very recently that we have had well priced alternatives in the State Store (Chairmen Selections) but that is hardly enough to count on to put together a list. We have to work with our system and it does cost more. Wine by the glass is a good way to help bev cost and so is banquets. I hope Starr now pays a little more attention to the big picture of what he is doing. That is my rant about him for now ....

The culinary center and winery that I work for is hosting a dinner at The James Beard House on Thursday. Has anyone ever attended one of these events?

I have yet to find a Spanish restaurant that brings me back to the authentic dishes of Spain. Real paella, made like they do in Valencia, is the one meal I crave most. I have eaten at Bollo in NY, It was great don't get me wrong, just not authentic. Any reccomendations? I am a hard critic of Spanish food since I lived in Valencia, Spain for a year. But I am open to the search!