macrosan

Sometimes it's an advantage to fall asleep the moment the curtain goes up I suspect I don't have what you would call a full meal, Tony. Two courses, light main (maybe fish or chicken) and no wine.

Wow, ReallyNice, thanks for the detailed reply. Would I be right in saying that in a salmon pasta dish, there's every chance the salmon wouldn't get up to that 145deg ?

Don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying he should stick to Neapolitan style because it's "authentic" (ugh, how I hate that word) or even traditional, but just because it's good. But you're right that there's no point in Mario saying, as he fires the staff and goes bankrupt "Sorry, guys, but at least the pizza was good, wasn't it ?" Your point about ingredients is well made. My limited experience of pizza in New York is that the toppings all seem to come out of some standard do-it-yourself pack, and there seems to be a view that the dough is only needed to keep the toppings separated from the plate. ...and I still hope they don't call Mario's pizzas "pies"

Inigo Jones used to do a pre-theatre special. Tried it once, and the food was excellent but their timing was shot. They managed to serve coffee just as we were running out of the door to get to our show

I think it would be a shame if he did that in haste. OK, so I just happen to be a fan of Neapolitan/Sorrentine pizza, and of course Otto has to make money. But it seems to mee that New York is thoroughly inundated with pizzerie cooking pizze to the American palate, and I would not have thought it needs another, even with Batali's name attached. I hope Mario will persevere in trying to persuade New Yorkers that there is another style of pizza out there which they will probably enjoy if they give it a chance. And I hope that New Yorkers don't start calling it a "pie"

OK, so that's tonight's supper sorted. Now tomorrow lunch ......

Many interesting points have been made on the actual effect of provenance upon flavor, quality and desirability to the consumer. But the main value of provenance to me is to provide a means of assessing in advance of tasting whether or not I am likely to enjoy the food, and judging in advance whether or not I think it is good value. The best example is wine. I am not a connoisseur, and I have no appreciable level of general knowledge of wine. So when I choose from a wine list, my preference is to order a specific wine that I have previously enjoyed, or failing that a generic or chateau that I have previously enjoyed. I then use price as my barometer for which is the best year available on the wine list that I am willing to afford. With food, that is even more important. At least with wine you can be pretty certain that you will receive what you ordered - you get to see the label on the bottle, and to taste it unadulterated. With food, by the time it's cooked and dressed it could be visually unrecognizable and difficult to judge by taste, so the consumer is far more dependent upon trust in the restaurant. I cannot be alone in having experiences where the menu says (let's say) braised wild duck in plum sauce, and the dish presented tastes remarkably like regular battery-reared duck, but in fact as presented it's impossible to be certain. Sure, you can just conclude that you don't much like it and not order it again, or not go back to that restaurant, but that's too late in the context of enjoying the meal you just ordered !!!

Ages of kids ? Are you looking for "fun for kids" places ? Location ? Will you be driving ?

I don't want to remain off-topic for too long but I don't accept your implicit definiton of what constitutes a good public park. If you want nature reserves or large natural areas, go out into the countryside, for heaven's sake. A city park is, and should be, a beautiful artifice based on a theme of flora, which inevitably then attracts fauna to provide a further point of natural interest. I think that St James Park is exquisite and would be difficult to better. Epping Forest (which was mentioned earlier) is not a park, it's a forest. Edit: Mustn't allow Wilf to jump on previous bad syntax

Gary, how on earth do you support that statement ?

I can't formulate my assessment questionnaire style I'm sure it was Wilfrid, very early on in this thread, who said that New York is a "can do" place, a place where all things seem possible. That's what overrides all of my detailed judgements of everything from litter on the streets to high dining. For me, New York has an electricity and dynamism which makes almost any activity in New York more exciting than the comparable activity in London. My experience of NYC restaurants in my sixty plus visits to the city spanning twenty years is that the general standard is better than London, at all levels from Burger King up to the finest, although I detect that the gap has narrowed a lot in the last ten years. The key for me lies in a combination of motivation and expectation. In New York, the city of the wannabe, everyone from floor sweeper up to restaurant owner seems so much more motivated to do the best he/she can than is the case in London. And the other side of that coin is that customer expectation, and demand for value and service, is higher in New York. I wouldn't like to live permanently in NYC, because the pace of life and self-imposed demands are greater than I would choose. I am not culturally conditioned to that. I prefer what I find to be the more human and tolerant culture of London. But there is no city in the world I would rather spend a couple of weeks in than New York.

Some weeks ago, I ate tagliatelle with smoked salmon in a cream sauce at a restaurant. I felt ill for the next 24 hours. I was then told that warm smoked salmon can suffer the same microbial problems as warm fresh salmon and warm chicken, ie the proliferation of salmonella or other bacteria. Is there any truth in this ?

Gordon, I sincerely hope that is intended to be ironic

I want to add cherries to my list, because apparently that's the correct answer and I don't want to be accused of being fructally challenged.

Just had lunch there today. The room is very big, but divided up nicely into sections so it isn't too daunting, but it's certainly not what you would call cosy ! At 12.30 it was empty, and by the time we left at 3pm there still weren't more than a dozen people eating. Of course the snow may have had much to do with that. The lunch menu, £18.95 for two courses and (I think) £24.95 for three, was interesting and varied. The starters were amazingly complex sounding, and I particularly recall "Jerusalem artichoke soup with confit of pigeon leg". I had pan-fried red mullet with artichoke other vegetables. This was a tail section of red mullet which arrived scorpion style, it's tail arched over the body, a kind of feathery arrangement in place of the real tail. The texture and flavor were excellent, and the vegetables set off the dish nicely. Main course was sauteed venison. This arrived in three pieces, cooked exactly as I like it (red but not too bloody in the centre, brown outside). The meat was tender, but somewhat lacking in flavor. It could have been almost any meat, and certainly had no trace of gaminess. The vegetable garnish was sweet and sharp, and very much reminded me of my experience at The Capital, where I had been unable to eat the vegetables with a lamb dish, because they were excrutiatingly sharp. In this case, I ate a few vegetables and left the rest. The wine was a Pinot Noir (I didn't choose it so I know no more) which was pleasant and (I think) reasonably priced. Service was friendly and efficient throughout. Our server totally won me over when she brought the bill (to my colleague) and immediately announced "Service charge is included". I have never ever heard that done, and I complimented her on doing so and asked her to pass my comment to the management. Overall a pleasant meal, but not exceptional. I don't know the immediate area well, but I think it's lacking in decent restaurants, so this place may well be worth knowing for business lunches.

That's caused by that spiky skin it has, Scotty.

Isn't it interesting how many times raspberries have been mentioned

Stefany, I think that can only be done in the Thread Whose Name We Dare Not Speak

Prof, can I share that subscription with you ? I'd take out my own, but that might be considered elitist. I emphasise the word dominance in the OED definition, and I repeat my own preference for "common parlance" as opposed to "redbrick parlance" Do people who went to the other place have a CED ?

I'm not happy about the definition of "elitist" as "believing the elite should lead" that the Prof proffers. I think that, at least in common parlance, an elitist is one who claims intrinsic superiority over others. That is superiority of knowledge, of intellect, of means, and of lifestyle. Now if that is so, then I think the answer to Adam's question is "no". Interest in food may well be considered quirky (as Miss J suggests) but I'm not convinced that is so in Britain any more. The widespread presence of food-related TV programmes, magazines, sections of newspapers and so on, suggest that interest in food has become commonplace. Adam's later suggestion that his interest in a commodity that he can't afford is also no elitist. Very many people who love opera cannot afford to see it regularly. Same is true of interest in antiques, and so on. "An interest" is firstly an intellectual pastime, and a person's particular interest rarely says anything more about them except that they have the interest.

One vote for loganberries please. I have a bush in the garden which produces about 30 berries each year, and if I'm lucky I beat the fox to them and they're wonderful.

I've never seen anyone lecture a Scottish pastry. How many of them go on to higher education anyway ? Perhaps the Balic knows. Having observed your thespian styles (well, a few of them at least) Adrian, I would say to you "Do not despair. The pastry lecturer may have been wrong. I detect latent talent there".

Whassat ? What do you know about Donovan that I haven't heard ?

I note in this thread a repetition of the notion that restaurants in New York are generally more expensive than in other cities. My instinctive view is that this isn't so. It certainly may be true that NYC has a very large number of expensive restaurants, and that they tend to be grouped in small areas, and these factors may give a perception of high price, but comparing like against like I have generally found them pretty similar to London. I acknowledge that I haven't been to Craft, but judging from what I read I would think that $85 - $100 is entirely reasonable, and very much in proportion to places like Foliage, Petrus, Capital and so on. I cannot remember a meal at the high end in New York which I found to be unduly expensive (against expectations), and I have always found middle-to-low end restaurants in NYC to be amazingly good value compared to London.

Well I guess you could sprinkle a little extra salt and pepper on it I read the menu in November 2001 and again in November 2002, and from memory it didn't seem to have changed. But as we're talking about my memory, which some allege is just a figment of my own imagination, then ....