Sneakeater

Thanks. I'm THERE.

I know that cocktails that you order at a bar rather than make yourself sort of violate the tone of this thread, but last night I knocked back several of a new cocktail to me: the Champs Elysee. I tried a few other things as well, but kept coming back to this, as it was exactly what I was in the mood for. Here's a a recipe I pulled off the web. Sammy the fabulous bartender at Milk & Honey (and other related NYC spots) used Green Chartreuse instead of the Yellow the recipe calls for. As he put it, "the more intense and bitter, the better!" (You can see why you WANT this guy to be mixing your drinks.) 1 oz brandy 1/2 oz Yellow Chartreuse juice of 1/4 lemons 1/2 tsp powdered sugar 1 dash bitters

Pegu Club makes a Manhattan with Cynar instead of vermouth, and it's fantastic.

I'm surprised nobody's mentioned Alfanoose. If it isn't New York's greatest felafel etc. place, it's certainly one of them. Is it still open in its "new" location, which is on either Pine or John St.?

It should come as no surprise that Franny's in Brooklyn, home of the Fernet-and-Seven-Up cocktail, also has a great strega cocktail (called Il Sole). I wish I could remember what's in it. Strega, lemon juice, mint, maybe some soda, maybe even some gin . . . .

I think a little of both. It's near the Garden and so is popular with Garden-going sports fans. And it does seem kind of touristy. Although, now that I think of it, you don't really see a lot of obvious tourists there (as you do at, say, Tavern on the Green). I think it just fell off a lot of people's radar at some point. (Maybe during the stretch that Bux adverts to when they were closed -- although I really don't remember that.)

Yeah, but if he makes them himself he has to invite the whole board over to have some. That thing looks GOOD!!!!!!!!!

I've certainly eaten pork in Florence.

Oh god yeah. I'd say I hear, say, "neeswah" about five times more often than I hear "neeswazz".

Right right right. That's EXACTLY it. Contrary to what Eric Azimov said in the Times today about reds, off-dry whites go fantastically well with foods of many kinds. Unfortunately, the sweetness scares off certain serious wine drinkers.

I feel ridiculous purporting to give you of all people wine advice, but I've got to say that that Alcase blend by Zind is currently one of my very favorites. I now order it whenever I see it. Glad to see that someone else is as anal and irritable as me. Although that isn't the way I meant.

But of course, the point is, just as there's plenty of great art available for public viewing in museums, there's plenty of great wine available at substratospheric prices for us piddling middle-class peons to buy and enjoy. There's also plenty of great art, from ancient to old masters to modern, that's parked in private collections that none of us can see. Just as there's also some great wine that is priced higher than we piddling middle-class peons can pay. Life is just like that, ya know?

(I thought, this is payback for all the money I've spent in recent months buying drinks for women.)

I was sitting at the bar at Keen's a couple of months ago, having dinner. I started chatting with the two guys sitting next to me, who were the owner of some kind of information services company and a star employee he'd recruited from South Africa. After dinner, I was feeling expansive, so I ordered one of their more expensive flights of scotches. It was nearly $50. I can honestly say it contained one of the best scotches I've ever had, a very old (thirty-something years, I think) Springbank. When the bartender came to collect for the scotch flight, the company owner insisted on picking it up. "No no no," I said. "You can't imagine what this costs." He said it was on the company's dime, and I shouldn't worry. I DEFINITELY recommend the scotch flights if someone else is paying.

The pub cut of the mutton chop is literally half of the main-menu mutton chop. They whack it in half.

I recommend the prime rib. And I'm going to recommend that you NOT do what I did, which was order the pub cut instead of the full-size cut. The full-size cut comes on the bone, which obviously is far preferable. Just as an update to my last post in this thread, I've since ordered the mixed grill (available only on the pub menu; not on the main menu -- although the pub menu is available in the main room, and the main menu is available in the pub room). It was disappointing, and I'd recommend skipping it.

It was that good to begin with.

Where exactly would you have to have been born to appreciate Spam?

And Midtown's so fucking expensive. I can't give any concrete recommendations, since it's been more than 20 years since I worked Downtown, but when I moved up to Midtown, I was like in shock how much worse the lunch choices were, and how much more they cost.

(What a drag that what should be the happiest thing that's ever happened to you had to turn into this hassle!)

Just be grateful you're not receiving any middle-of-the-night emails from your fiance.

YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's not fun? Sorry, then.

Of course you're not stepping on toes. This is called "vigorous discussion." It's fun, isn't it?

Sorry bout that.