macrosan

OK, this needs to be said once, and once only. For the guy who spends half his life on this board complaining about ad hominem attacks, such words are ill-judged. END Steve, your problem is that you insist on turning every thread away from its author's intent, and often this board's wishes, and you attempt to redesign it for your own purposes. So now why don't you listen, and try to "get it" ? This is a thread about Blue Hill, the restaurant, not about elitism in dining, or about Steve Plotnicki. The original purpose of this thread was to assist members of eGullet to decide whether or not they might wish to visit Blue Hill. Much of my contribution here is aimed at trying to determine whether Blue Hill (remember, Steve ? That's the subject title of this thread.) is, or is not, a fine dining establishment, and whether or not it serves good food to its customers. Now you Steve, clearly say you're not interested in discussing that question, so I suggest you reserve your patronizing comments about my contribution for another thread where they may (or may not) be relevant. So in this context, I reiterate my view that if SteveP were correct in his assertion that Blue Hill serves significantly inferior food to customers who order off the menu, then Blue Hill would not be a place for many people to try. To be absolutely clear, "inferior" means "below the standard to which the restaurant aspires". I also reiterate that I believe SteveP is wrong in his assertion. That takes me on to the second point of issue. I have asked Steve twice for objective evidence that he is served significantly better food when he doesn't order off the menu, and he simply declines to do so. That is his prerogative, of course, but if he can't offer any more evidence than "I enjoyed it more" then he simply has no further contribution to make to this part of the debate. I will therefore, for the time being, hold to my own view. This is that the "betterness" of the food is what some contributors here have referred to as the "total dining experience", in other words it is the knowledge in Steve's mind that he is receiving a privilege and an affirmation of his status as a connoisseur which gives him a warm feeling, and therefore greater enjoyment of his meal. Of course the food itself may be marginally "better" in some respects, such as a novel experiment by the chef, or use of a marginally fresher mushroom. Equally obviously, it might be marginally "worse" because an experiment doesn't work, or just because the chosen mushroom is not to Steve's taste. But at the end of the day, the food at Blue Hill is limited primarily by the skills of the chefs. I entirely accept that a chef can put that little extra magic into a meal when he is motivated by the respect of knowledgeable diners, and of course that may well produce a better meal, but the degree of "betterness" can only be marginal. Nothing wrong with that, and I would happily accept the benefit of that marginal improvement. That margin might even make the difference between and excellent meal and a great meal. But to suggest that it would make the difference between an excellent meal and a poor meal is nonsense, and an insult to a professionally motivated chef and to the restaurant. The importance of this whole issue in the debate is that Steve is claiming that Blue Hill is a mediocre restaurant if you order off the menu, and an excellent restaurant if you ask the chef to take charge of your meal. (The adjectives may be inexact, but in principle that is what Steve has said). Now if Blue Hill repackaged itself to offer only tasting menus and "Chef's Choice" then that would be absolutely fine, and in fact a fascinating marketing and culinary concept. But right now they don't do that. As someone said earlier, if everyone who knew anyone started asking for Chef's Choice (which is what SteveP is advising everyone at eGullet to do) then pretty soon the whole place would collapse. Therefore I would expect that most people will want to judge Blue Hill on the basis of the food served off its menu, and on that basis Steve considers Blue Hill ordinary at best, so he agrees with me. Briefly returning to the "overall dining experience", part of what I seek in that experience is what Tony referred to. I enjoy browsing the menu, testing my taste buds to see what kind of food I might like that evening. I also don't want a great chef to waste his superb scallop accompaniments on my dish, because I won't eat scallops. I don't want his fresh cepes if my last three meals had cepes, and I want to try something different. So of course I want some choice in my selection of what I am going to eat, and of course I'll be delighted to have suggestions from the chef or my server. I will stress yet again that I have no objection to privilege, or resentment of those who obtain it by any ethical means (which does include use of money). I personally do not get a buzz from being treated in such a way, but I quite understand the attraction that some people have for it. What I can't tolerate is when people who are receiving these privileges sneer at those who aren't simply as a means of reinforcing their own status. I also will not be browbeaten into accepting misperceptions of reality in the style of the Emperor's clothes.

No I'm not saying that (yet). He is claiming that the special meal will contain better quality ingredients and (I think) that it will also be cooked better. Actually, Jaybee, your question is more interesting than mine, so I hope Steve will answer that too

Jaybee, I absolutely accept that a meal specially prepared for you by a great chef will be a memorable experience. I would also remember such a meal. The point at issue here (in my debate with SteveP) is that he is claiming that the quality of food served in a special preparation significantly exceeds the quality served to the adjacent table to the people ordering off the menu. I do not accept that in any fine restaurant. Also, in your case the chef offered to prepare a special meal for you. Steve, by contrast, proposes that people should ask the chef to prepare a special meal for them. Although I find Tommy's view of this a little stronger than my own, I agree in principle with him that such a request by a diner is arrogant. It's interesting that your poached duck dish was served with entirely different accompaniments from mine. Perhaps the cooking method was also different. What is clear is that the dishes we were served were indeed totally different in effect, to a degree that could not be explained (I think) by variability in cooking. Maybe the chefs were different, and they deliberately cook the dish differently ? Certainly I will confirm that my dish was as bland a piece of duck as I have ever eaten. Oh how I hope that someone at Blue Hill, or maybe from the kitchen of another fine restaurant, will enter the discussion

I'm frankly appalled, Steve. Are you saying that :- a) Blue Hill is a top end restaurant b) There is something inherently inferior about two day old salmon c) Blue Hill will nevertheless sell two day old salmon to its customers d) And yet Blue Hill is a top end restaurant ? What planet have you moved to, Steve ? What makes you think that you're the only person in the USA who knows what a turbot is ? You're just being patronising without the benefit of any knowledge or understanding of the people you're patronising. Let me repeat my previous challenge to you. What objective proof do you have that you get better food when you let the chef choose than when you choose for yourself ? It's quite probable that you want to believe you're getting some privileged benefit, so you're allowing your judgement to be swayed. As a matter of interest, how many other people do you know (acknowledged experts) who have had your experience of disappointment when choosing from the menu, and significantly greater satisfaction when taking the chef's choice ?

Steve, I really don't have the problem. I know plenty of great restaurants where I can have great food without going through the contortions of making advance arrangements, where I can order exactly what I want to eat without having the chef's specific approval, and where I don't have to be patronized by retsaurant staff who think they're doing me some sort of favor, or giving me undue special treatment And I still don't accept that the kind of arrangement making you describe, and seem to relish, gets you any significantly better food than I get. It may make you feel better about it, and I have no problem with that, but I don't think there's any objective reality to it. I'd love to have you explain to me why you think you get better food than a walk-in at Blue Hill (apart from perhaps fresher cepes). The answer needs to be some sort of objective test you've carried out, not a series of asumptions on your part. At this stage, the only objective analysis I can think of is if you say that all the experts who walk into Blue Hill report that it's a poor restaurant, while all the "specials" report it's a great restaurant. But neither of those statements is true, is it ?

Steve, I think you're just missing the whole point here. Blue Hill is a business, and their business is to sell food. The way they do that is to show customers what they have available on their menu, then they invite those customers to select what they would like. They do not show customers a list of "what is good today", they seem to do that only for those customers who ask them specifically to do so. If what you're saying is that the good food is reserved for a certain sub-class of their customers, then what they're doing is deliberately and knowingly serving sub-standard meals to the others. Now that would be their choice, and no doubt they would at some point go out of business by losing the majority of their customers --- unless the privileged few start to eat there every day at inflated prices just to support their favored supplier. If what you're suggesting is true then Blue Hill has a faulty business model. Further, from a professional standpoint, it would categorize the owners as confidence tricksters. You see, if I sit down at Blue Hill and order poached duck, and the chef believes that the poached duck that day is anything less than the quality of poached duck that he aspires to produce, then I expect to be advised not to order it. As it happens, I think you're kidding yourself. I don't believe any of this bullshit. Of course I understand that the special privileges obtained by some customers are attractive to them, maybe a little exciting, and I have absolutely no problem with people wanting or obtaining those special privileges. I quite understand the extra enjoyment that might be obtained by just saying to a chef "cook what you like" and waiting to be surprized by the results. Of course I accept that such a meal might contain some exceptional attention, and this might indeed make it marginally better than a "standard" meal. But to suggest that the privileged meal will suddenly leap onto a whole higher plane of culinary achievement is, in my view, more a symptom of emotional aspiration and self-delusion than of actual food fact. I hope I'm right, and I would just love to hear that I'm right from the chef of Blue Hill or any other fine dining establishment.

Oh shit. Where can I make up the other nine-tenths ?

I think Thom had it all sewn up nicely way back in this thread. The other factor unique to this breed of businessperson is that they are not interested in developing a capital asset in their business, and they prioritise their lifestyle before their business model. The practice of developing a provincial business (which includes restaurants, shops, hotels, craft workshops, and so on) as part of a lifestyle change is surprisingly common. People in city jobs decide they want to live in a particular "idyllic" location, and their means of doing so is to open their own business there. They then happily run their business for a time, then decide to retire, and close their business. In the case of a hotel or shop, they will often sell the business as a going concern. But their primary concern will be to realise the capital value of the property, not the business. This seems to be the case in most (if not all) of the examples in John W's report. I personally know at least six people to whom this process applies. Of course, some of their businesses were simply financially unsuccessful, and part of the reason for that was that they were driven more by the desire for a lifestyle change than by a valid business model. Incidentally, I also totally disbelieve the theory that this is a British phenomenon. It almost certainly happens in exactly the same way in every developed country in the world. The fact that SteveP hasn't heard of these types of restaurants closing in France is for exactly the same reason that I haven't .... we both haven't been looking for the evidence

I thoroughly enjoyed lunch at Lupa on Monday. This had to be a fairly light "last meal in NYC before I caught my flight back to London" meal. Started with Escarole Salad with cheese (I can't remember which one). Good, fresh ingredients, well dressed, and well balanced. I didn't like the bread they served, which was more like a sweet bun than bread. At lunch time, they have a more limited menu than at dinner, including a dish of the day for each day of the week, and Monday's was Lamb Sausage. I was tempted, but I chose Crispy Duck (which turned out to be a confit) with white grapes. An excellent dish, tender and full of flavor. I had a caraffino of wine This really lived up to its name --- it was a very small carafe, not much more than a large glass, which was highly priced at $12. So of course I had two The wine was an excellent Sicilian red, Terra delle Sirene. Service was pleasant and easy, the atmosphere lively even when the place was just over half full, and prices very reasonable. I'll have to try it again for dinner.

Thank you Nick My resolution now is never again to post there, although I may occasionally be tempted to peek in to determine the next candidate for destruction

It obviously had to happen sometime. I just had a meal at Babbo which was only very good rather than excellent I went on Saturday night at 8pm and had to wait just over an hour for a seat at the bar. The place was JAMMED. I guess because of this, service once I got my seat was somewhat offhand, and that was I started with Duck Bresaola which was, on reflection a mistake. The dried duck was OK but no more, although greatly helped by an orange marmalade and beautiful fagioli. Really, I should have ordered a "full" starter. Main was Barbecued Skirt of Beef with Endives and Green Salsa. The meat was tender and well flavored, the charred endives a great accompaniment, but the salsa didn't help the dish at all, it needed to be much sharper. There was a fantastic vegetable decorating the dish, seemed like strands of red onion (I florgot to ask, and the service was, as I said, offhand) and this was sharp and clean. I would have preferred this to the salsa. I drank a Sicilian red suggested by the bartender. Smooth and pleasant, but too sweet and mild for my taste, and not the best of wines with barbecued beef. Very enjoyable, but not the best of Babbo. Still, if I never get a worse meal than that, it will remain my favorite New York eatery. An informed source at the bar told me Mario is opening his pizza joint in early January. It's going to be on 8th Street at %th Avenue, and it's named Otto after it's location. Edited to add the following Babbo will serve either tasting menu at the bar, but it must be for two people or more. In fact, a young couple were taking the pasta tasting menu while I was there ... I noticed that the pace of service was very slow, although this may be considered a plus for many people.

Given the laws of probability, I guess that with 40+ people each eating several courses we were bound to find at least one cooking error. I'm so sorry it was in your basil chicken though! Mine was about the juiciest piece of chicken I've EVER eaten and certainly one of my favorite dishes from the evening. Did you happen to ask the others at your table if their chicken was also dry? Now why don't I think of those things myself ? I have now asked two of my dining companions, and half a dozen others who were there, and I seem to be the only one who had the problem At least now I know what I have to order when I go back there --- chicken !!!! As you said, producing that quality of food for a party of 40 was indeed a remarkable achievement, and to get one individual plate wrong was inevitable.

Had dinner at Blue Hill on Thursday. Overall, I found the food bland and uneventful, but really enjoyed the atmosphere and service. The restaurant was smaller than I expected, but I have no idea what formed my expectations Tables were a little close together, but then I not long ago ate in a Michelin 3-crown restaurant which was much more cramped. The adjacent table, where a couple were really enjoying their wine became just obtrusively noisy as the evening wore on, but it really wasn't a huge problem. The atmosphere in the restaurant buzzed nicely, and altogether I felt comfortable and relaxed. The service was excellent. Our young server wasn't particularly knowledgeable, but he was pleasant, helpful and relaxed. So when asked to advise on a wine choice, he did little more than point us to the wine list, then upon having a wine mentioned to him he described it as "balanced and rounded" (standard I-have-heard-the-sommelier-say-that-to-customers speak ) and when I asked if the mushroom starter included porcini which were billed on the atsting menu, he said "Ah, if you had ordered the tasting menu, I would have told you we have no porcini because our supplier let us down". But he laughed at my jokes (any server gets bonus points for that, because very few other people laigh at my jokes) and he really tried hard to make us comfortable and happy. The service high-point was when the maitre d' took out dessert order. I had noticed apple terrine on the tasting menu, but it wasn't on the main menu. I asked if I could have the apple terrine, waiting for the frown and the glare and the "Oh we don't usually allow that, I'll have to ask the chef if he's willing to do that" .... but what I got was "I'm sure that will be no problem. The dish on the tasting menu is a little small, so we'll make a full size dish for you, of course". Terrific ! So let's finish with the food. I had the pre-starter of raw yellowfin tuna. I hadn't realized they had that variety of the fish in American waters, because I've only ever seen seared tuna on American menus . This was really enjoyable, good texture and flavor. My "real" starter was mushrooms with rice. Presentation was wonderful, with the rice packed in an oblong, and the mushroom sliced and laid over the rice, each slice overlapping. It looked like a sushi dish. The mushrooms were almost tasteless, even less flavor than canned mushrooms, and so was the rice. Nice texture, but bland. My main was the restaurant's signature dish of poached duck. This was sliced breast, and it just didn't taste of duck. In fact it tasted of very little at all. The meat was tender, had a good texture, very soft on the tongue, but honestly it was almost flavorless. If I had eaten this blind, I would have guessed it was stewed veal. The sauce was pleasantly salty, and quite rich and strong, which clearly overpowered the meat, but then Chinese tea would have overpowered this meat. Apple Terrine with Gingerbread Icecream completed my meal, and this was the star. The apple was held back from being a puree, just chunky enough to give good texture, strong sharp/sweet flavor, and a good spicy ginger flavour in the well textured ice cream. Altogether, I found the meal unexceptional. Nothing to object to, but little to enjoy in the flavors. The cost was $108 per person without tip, and including about $25 per person for drinks. I found that on the high side, although not at all outrageous. I enjoyed the experience, whcih goes to prove how important ambience, good service, and good company affect my judgement of a meal. But I don't think I'll go back. Babbo for one has better food at a much lower price, I prefer the overall balance at Gramercy Tavern. Blue Hill is not my kind of food.

I'd like to add to my previous post, and comment on a few of the individual dishes. First, my #1 dish, the Bhel Puri. I'm told this is a pretty standard dish in Indian restaurants in the USA, but I've never had it in the UK, despite having eaten many hundreds of Indian meals. Maybe that's because the majority of "Indian" restaurants in the UK are Pakistani, and Bhel Puri is a Hindu rather than a Moslem dish ? Whatever, I adored this dish. It was fun seeing it made at the table, and the combination of textures (crunchy to soft) and flavors (smooth to sharp) of the individual ingredients made the total dish exceptional. The Crispy Okra (or Bhindi, or Ladyfingers in English) was amazing. Okra is a strange vegetable, with a good flavour, a hard skin, but a slimy interior. This preparation enhanced the flavor and totally removed the sliminess. I could eat these as a table snack all day and all night long. The Tandoori Lamb Chop was my #3 dish. I have had Tandoori Lamb many times, but never a complete chop on the bone. Often the marination is too heavy, or the sauce coating the lamb too strong to the point where it overpowers the lamb. Most commonly in my experience, meat (lamb or chicken) can be simply overcooked in the tandoor. My assumption has always been that given the high temperature in the oven, if the meat is left in just moments too long, it gets quickly overcooked, so it needs careful attention by the chef. In this case, in all respects, the lamb chop was perfect. I also loved the apple and cranberry chutney, and the rice. I didn't try ther crab or shrimp dishes, or the boar chop, altho I have to say they looked superb. The two dishes that disappointed me were the Spinach and Lentil Cake (great flavor, but too dry for my liking) and the Basil Chicken (again, I loved the taste, but my portion was very dry). The Kulfi was ... well, Kulfi The Indians have a lot to learn from the Italians about making ice cream but the fruit soup it came with was sharp and palate-cleansing, and that was good. A thought about the menu as a whole is that finishing with three meat chops was a mistake. This really was an enormous meal, and I think most people struggled to finish it. Perhaps serving the lamb/boar chop earlier in the meal, then a couple of small dishes before the venison chop, would have helped people to digest And smaller chops would definitely have helped !!! In purely food terms, this meal certainly challenged the UK dinner at The New Tayyab, and believe me when I say that this is the highest compliment I could pay to the food. A few of the Diwan dishes were superb. As a total "event" the Diwan dinner was unbdoubtedly the best Indian meal I have had. Again, my thanks to everyone who made it possible, and to all the eGullet friends I met who helped make the occasion memorable.

So here I am, sitting in an Internet cafe in Greenwich Village with some time to spare, and I just had to post in here. I'm going to do a brief post now, but I'm going to give some more considered thoughts when I gate abck to the UK next week The main over-riding impression of the evening was the wonderfully gracious hospitatlity of Suvir and all the staff. This wasn't just "service with a smile", it was "home hospitality" in the true Indian tradition. The second impression is the quality of the menu, which I can only describe as outstanding. Of course there were a couple of dishes which were "ordinary", and a couple that didn't quite come off, but the creative thought that went into designing the meal, and the sheer cooking quality of so many of the dishes, made this a genuinely memorable meal. The third over-riding impression was the volume of food. Oh gosh, I was embarrassed not to be able to finish that venison chop at the end and I just hate leaving good food My nominations for the three most outstanding dishes of the evening were the Bhel Puri on Tawa, Lamb Chop (with Apple cranberry chutney and mint rice) and Karai Bhinidi (Crispy Okra), none of which I have experienced before, and which were all faultless in execution. I also loved the tamarind-based sauce (or chutney). My one regret of the evening was that I didn't get to meet more of the eGullet family. I suppose that was inevitable given the huge turnout, so I guess I'll just have to get over here again for the next event I know a huge amount of planning and thought went into making this happen. Suvir, of course, must get the lion's share of the ovation, but I'd also like to thank Yvonne for my lovely (still-life) avatared name badge (which I shall keep to remind me of a great evening) and Suzanne for so graciously suggesting to me that I hadn't paid my money and not even hinting that it was deliberate

Maybe the problem is (and I say this entirely without sarcasm) that the "gastronomic elite" who give these restaurants their reputation are so small, and therefore eat so infrequently there, that the reputation lingers on for lack of proper re-appraisal. Or perhaps (and now I rescind my previous parenthetical qualification) that elite feels that to reverse their past approval would be a form of self-criticism, therefore they simply decline to do so.

Surely the point about FMJD dishes is that they are not to be expected on every visit to these stellar-priced restaurants, but their alternatives should at least be excellent. At these prices, given the quality control, service level, and general care that price commands, one should never ever have a poor dish, let alone a bad one.

Is this a serious question? No it wasn't, Suvir I was just musing over what wine to bring, looked out of my window and saw the cold rain sheeting out of a grey November sky, and I instantly thought of mulled wine The thought translated unconsciously to my post

Can they mull wine in a tandoor ?

On the subject of "social circulation", I also believe this should remain unorganized. The UK eGullet dinner at the New Tayyab was a brilliant culinary and social success, and all that happened was that twice during the dinner someone shouted out "Everybody move round" and everyone did Where they moved to, and excatly when they moved, was discretionary. Granted we were "only" 20 people, it worked very well. Suvir, it would be helpful if you would publish the earliest time of arrival as soon as possible, since I will be "off the air" from Saturday onward, and I'd hate to turn up too early I'm very much looking forward to this

You must have had a lot of confidence in their shooting ability But then I guess you'd have settled for a brace of sheepdogs if their aim had been way off

Charlene, I had a Ducru Beaucaillou 94 at Comme Chez Soi a couple of weeks ago and I loved it I'm sure SteveP is right, but if indeed the wine I had would get even better in a few years, then I'm certainly going to be looking for it on wine lists everywhere Personally, I would never BMO for choice. It's too much hassle to cart a bottle or two around, and if I'm going to a high-class restaurant I'd much rather trust their judgement than mine on wine. Sure, I know I'll pay a premium for that, but the £50 markup, say, that I'll pay is likely to be not very significant in the context of the total bill.

Love letter = condom (Olde English c. 1960) I've never met this md' prick. Last two times I was at Babbo, there was a very nice, friendly young lady with long hair at the desk. I will be eating at the bar at Babbo on my vists to NYC. It has quickly become a mustn't-miss New York experience.

Ahhh, you can't beat a bit of good, old-fashioned irradiated sh*t

Paul, is it my imagination, or is your red chilli pepper avatar glowing a little brighter ?