spaetzle_maker

That will be the point where, I believe, the restaurant will need to choose between alienating its supporters and behaving hypocritically. ← I don't understand what activity would be alienating to the restaurant's supporters? I think that the online reservation system makes sense in terms of allowing everyone a fair shot at getting a reservation, even if I'm not awake early enough to make a reservation and benefit from this. I also don't understand what kind of hypocritical activity you are envisioning. Clearly an online reservation system is unbiased. What do you think will change about that which will somehow become hypocritical?

I don't see how you think that their online reservation system is an example of a fake, hypocritcal, patronizing version of egalitarianism. Can you please explain how an online reservation system that is providing seats based on a faceless request would be biased?

I think that they are making a lot of headway getting through the bugs of the online system and they've been responsive to the requests submitted via the "help is here" link.

Jesikka, apparently you don't speak for all regulars. Sure, some will follow Chang to the gates of Hell in his grand egalitarian experiment (unless of course it's just a facade), but some are already fed up and it's only day two. ← Waiting for a seat in a restaurant is a bit different from following some guy I don't know to the gates of Hell. From what I understand, Martha Stewart needed to wait for a seat when she ate at Noodle Bar.

Because the regulars haven't participated in the system. They've been invited to previews. It will be interesting to see how those same regulars feel later on. The momofuku restaurants have always been fair in the way they've handled waits for seats at both Noodle Bar or Ssam Bar. There have been busy nights at both restaurants where I have had to wait a very long time for a seat, so I know for a fact that regular customers do not get priority in seating. In this regard, the online reservation system is no different from how it currently works at Noodle Bar and Ssam Bar. Having to wait for a seat has never made me feel annoyed or alienated. When I experience difficulty making a reservation at Ko, rather than feel alienated, I will happily go to Ssam Bar and just try again for Ko on another day. You can hold me to that statement.

So this is sort of onsen tamago ("Hot Spring Egg"), only smoked? That's the first mention I've come across of the smoked aspect. I wonder if it's smoked in the shell. ← Now I've been really puzzling over how the egg was smoked. Would any smoking procedure be able to permeate through the shell of the egg? There was no visual indication on the egg itself that it had been smoked - the white of the egg was still white. Is it possible to smoke some liquid and apply it to the egg after it is out of the shell?

I enjoyed that consomme as well. Tasty with a good soothing warmth. The only thing that gave me a pause was that I didn't taste kimchi.

This is a wine called "Helio-something Project" that's on the Ssam Bar glass list. It's REALLY good. ← I think I found it: http://www.scholiumwines.com/ Yes - this is a very nice wine...

So this is sort of onsen tamago ("Hot Spring Egg"), only smoked? That's the first mention I've come across of the smoked aspect. I wonder if it's smoked in the shell. ← I don't know how it is smoked. No matter what method they use, I probably can't do it at home so I'll have to be content to enjoy it whenever it can be found at a restaurant. Since this egg is smoked, it doesn't need to be sous vide to be considered special!

One more thing - I had mistakenly stated up thread that Ko seated 14 - it really does seat only 12, so I think Johnder was correct. I had also said somewhere that the lighting seemed darker, but I wasn't exactly sure. Last night when I went, I was sitting in good 'ole seat number one (felt like old times). I realized while sitting there that the lighting was pretty much the same. It was the material on the floors that was different. It's much darker and is now similar or identical to what is being used at Ssam Bar whereas the floor in the old Noodle Bar was probably hard wood. It's very sleek and attractive.

I also really enjoyed the pairings when I went last night. Most memorable was the tempranillo with the beef short rib and the sake with the shaved frozen fois. The sake with the fois was just perfectly balanced. I found the amuse of a house made english muffin with bayleaf and chives to be very nice texturally and very tasty and it paired well with the cava. Also, there was a wine that I enjoyed and it was called something like "Skollium Project"? Nathan, do you remember what that was? I think it came with the scallops. The first 3 desserts that I had last night were paired with something that tasted like a fortified wine with carbonation. I cannot remember what ithis wine was called. Something like "eeiii" or "iiee" but one of the vowels was really a "y". Nathan, did you have that this evening? Do you remember what it was? These first 3 desserts were quite good: A lychee ice cream on top of sesame. Delicious. Then a milk/cereal pudding with avocado and chocolate/cereal - very inventive. Then the pineapple sorbet with candied pineapple - I think there are photos of this - a very dainty dessert. The fried apple pie is my favorite. I think what cinches it for me is that I enjoy a high ratio of pie crust to filling and by default you get that when it's a personal slice of pie. It was nice to finally be able to finish a meal at a momofuku establishment with a short espresso.

When I went last night, I was actually kind of freezing, probably because I got soaked in the rain prior. I don't think that the open kitchen really made things that hot inside of Ko. Last night the chef who was working in front of me (Sam) specifically mentioned that the egg was NOT sous vide. It is cooked within its shell, which is what would account for the egg's beautiful shape, as apparent in donbert's or Kathryn's photos. The egg is also lightly smoked, yielding an absolutely beautiful flavor which went so well with those soubise onions and hackleback caviar. Absolutely lovely. The chips are so cute and little because they are made from fingerlings.

This dish is one of my favorite dishes of all time. The crunch stuff is a pinenut brittle. All of it is wonderful.

I agree - it's really great.

I think a bunch of us misheard the word soubise as sous-vide.

And now we can arrange to have a pizza delivered to him.

Was it with the shaved fois? I remember the shaved fois being paired with a sake.

Thanks Donbert! Looked "soubise" up on wikipedia and that term definitely is making more sense with regards to the onions than "sous-vide"!

I thought the food at Ko was exquisite. I do agree that this food is within the reach of Ssam Bar, but both restaurants are functioning within vastly different parameters. The fact that Ko will have only 8 or so dishes on the menu a night will allow for a certain level of quality and attention to detail that may not be possible at restaurants with a much larger menu, serving 5 times as many diners. I think the comparison to Degustation is apt in terms of Ko's atmosphere. The plating style is slightly similar but definitely not the same. But, obviously the flavor profile is different and that's a huge difference. While I love Degustation (has anyone had that soft-scrambled duck egg? Oh. My. God.) , so far I think the food at Ko has more of a mind-blowing quality. As far as the osetra/hackleback question: I'm the person asserting it was hackleback. This is based on how the dish was described when it was put down before me. I could not have misheard "hackleback" if "osetra" was said. But really, I don't see how it matters anyway. The worthiness of this restaurant is not determined by the specific variety of a dollop of caviar on one dish. In fact, I can't decide which component of that particular dish I liked the most: was it the luxurious, coddled egg? The pudding-like soubise onions? The tiny potato chips that didn't make a mess of crumbs or get stuck in the corners of my mouth? And yeah - that caviar was pretty darn nice, but my point is that every component of that dish was equally worthy of praise. There were about 80 other mouthfuls of incredible food in that meal besides the one dollop of caviar. Just ask Sneakeater - I walked 4 miles home after that dinner and I couldn't stop telling him about the shaved fois with lychee and pinenut brittle, or the fried apple pie! There's a lot of good stuff going on at Ko aside from caviar. Edit: I didn't make sneakeater walk with me. I'm not cruel like that. I was talking to him on the phone.

I've been trying to figure it out by counting the faces I recognized and then counting the people between those faces that I didn't recognize There were two across the front - I was sitting there with one other person. I'm remembering eleven people sitting along the wall, but I believe there was one empty stool on the end closest to the door.

I was there last night too! I thought there were 14 seats.

Now that is funny! Your insistance that it said grits on the menu had me totally doubting myself! Now I'm just going to have to fight you more vehemently in the future, Nathan!! Lesson learned!

I was there last night, and this time, the duck confit was definitely paired with egg on the menu. The grits were paired with the roast quail. Perhaps they're just juggling these around. ← Maybe. When I was there, the woman sitting next to me had the quail and the fact that it was served with grits was plain as day. The texture of what I had the other day was a little bit different from what I had the first time, but only to a minor degree and not enough for me to double check the menu- I thought it either deflated slightly or that the curds were just a little bit more pronounced. In terms of taste, the duck confit was very dominant when compared with other components of the dish. I love duck.

What? Are you kidding?! Maybe I was there on Tuesday? Edit to add: I didn't really look closely at the menu - I saw duck confit and ordered. The first time I had this dish a few weeks ago, it was definitely egg. The dish that I had the other night was so similar, the only difference was that the "egg" part was less foamy than the first time and, um, a little bit more gritty. I thought that maybe it waited at the pass a few seconds too long and the "egg" had deflated, but you may have explained the reason why the texture was different. Anyway, the first time I had the dish, it had a fois vinaigrette. That may have been what the seasoning was that made you like the gritty egg.

That's funny - I went on Wednesday and it was eggs. guess they changed it.