robert brown

Steve, I bet this thread puts to shame any other guide to DC restaurants. I notice you give little attention to Kinkaid. Last time we were in DC was in April when we were working on a project in the IM Pei building across the street. We couldn't understand what the man's reputation was built on. What is your opinion of the restaurant? (if you want to give it). Otherwise, the next time we are down there we will no doubt profit from your advice and that of the others in the thread.

Steve, welcome back and thanks for your kind words. Where have you been? Are you involved in the gift certificate visit? I hope Lumpy and I won't mislead you, or anyone else for that matter.

Bux, I'm still trying to get a couple of posts out about Italy. Maybe by the end of next week. I actually have something to write from which I will derive some income!

Danielle, welcome back. We missed you. Oursin is sea urchin. It sounds good what you ate. Bux, just this afternoon my brother the hispanist and I were talking about the possibility of journeying across the top of Spain (from Rossas to Santiago) just as you and I discussed the other evening. There are even a few areas he hasn't seen. We look forward to picking your brains. You feel about Spain what I feel about Italy!

Bux, I had them at my "discovery of the year 2001" restaurant, Miramonte L'Altro" outside of Brescia. They came from a breeder in Translyvania, so the waiter told me. But isn't Transylvania part of Hungary as well, now that I think of it?

No, they care enough to spend at the very best. You and I have grazed the subject and will no doubt discuss it further. Of course you should realize that sometimes I have to rely on the minimal amount of anecdotal evidence. The two biggest "fessers" I ever came across in Paris are both Jewish. One I have known since 1971. I owe it to him for getting me and my wife started when he brought us to Chez Denis (where M. Rostang is now) a few months before Craig Claiborne and Pierre Franey had their famous "blow-out" American Express/Channel 13 Auction dinner there. Jack Lang asked him to start a museum for cuisine; he designed the dining room of Robuchon's last restaurant; and was the restaurant reviewer for "L'Evenement de Jeudi". The other was a young doctor who we ran into three afternoons in a row: at Le Pre Catalan, Jamin, and the first place of Guy Savoy. At the third lunch we couldn't restrain ourselves from going over to talk to him. He told us he had lunch everyday in such restaurants by himself. Now that's eating!!! Newspaper need to consume like people, so maybe that accounts for the coverage of big-name chefs in the media. Another subject we may want to tackle at some point on e-Gullet is this whole matter of the way the Anglo-Saxon media treats food and wine This is not what I have in mind, Steve, but did you ever check out a big magazine store in France and see how many magazines about food and travel (including book-type coverage in magazine format) there are? Maybe this takes up some of the slack. The restaurant we discussed on the phone, Albert's, in the pedestrian zone of Nice makes a decent risotto and pasta. But why not drive another 35-40 minutes and have the real Ligurian stuff at Baja Benjamin or Balzo Rossi on the sea road right after you cross the border at Menton?

Steve, as you no doubt know,when one co-publishes a book, it means paying for a translation of the text, probably rejiggering the recipes at least for metric conversion, and resetting or laying out all new type. Simon knows all of what is involved as he seems to be concerned with subsidiary rights or setting up co-publishing deals, yes?. But with book publishing in the crapper, the number of such deals must be way down. Whom and what do you mean by a restaurant in France being hurt in terms of outside exposure by the inability to speak French? I'm not sure "haute cuisine" is the local culture. The local culture is local cuisine.( Maybe not Paris). While I realize my friends and professional acquaintances in Nice, and to some degree in Paris, do not seem the least bit interested in dining at 2-3 star restaurants except on the rarest of occasions for a special occasion or to try one time. They eat and cook Nicoise or go to small restaurants. The French whom I see and know and eat at the big-name restaurants have been either Jewish and/or rich. I have to split, but we can carry on later as I haven't finished. Was that the Auberge de Theo you were thinking of in Cimiez? So-so "internationale" Italian. Allegro it must be down by the port. Went in August. Not enthralled. It smelled like a NY Italian restaurant. (Edited by robert brown at 10:15 am on Jan. 10, 2002)

The best squabs I ever had were from Transylvania. Unfortunately I didn't eat them there.

Shouldn't this be posted in Rosie's forum? Seriously, there is supposed to be some major paintings (maybe a Zurbaran, Wilfrid? But I'm not sure) in Bayonne. Has anyone been because I haven't.

Mikec, The restaurant in Provence sounds like a few hundred in Italy. Have you given it a whirl?

When I look through the food book section at B&N, it seems that there is a preponderance of cookbooks on Italian and American cooking with lots of books about categories of preparing types of food such as fish, meat,salads, soups, vegetables,etc. That there are fewer French cookbooks (and notice how many that do get published are by Anglos such as Julia, Ann Willan, Patricia Welles) by chefs from France. I think this is because , first, that Americans have been convinced that the USA is now what France used to be in terms of gastronomy; second, people may feel French cooking is too time-consuming, difficult and requires too much substitution of ingredients; third, there is no unifying conceptual or identifying handle since 1990 for French chefs as strong as the Nouvelle Cuisine; and, fourth, American publishers seem to be unwilling these days to want to co-publish books by French chefs that originate in France. Remember the series of cookbooks by Troisgros, Chapel, Guerard, Girardet,etc. from Edition Laffont? Or the all-color big books from Georges Blanc or Roger Verger? It always comes down to money.

Let me put it another way. In the art book business, it is possible for a wealthy collector to subsidize or foot the entire bill for a book on whatever comprises his collection.; this in order to try to enhance the value. It is a form of vanity publishing, but with the imprint of a well-known, respected publisher. I suspect, but it's only a hunch, that this is what is going on in the glossy cookbook field. I would also imagine that the Anglo-American chef-restaurateurs have more money available for this kind of self-promotion than the Continentals. Does anyone out there have any first-hand experience and can confirm or deny what I have written here?

I still haven't learned to type, Margaret. Perhaps I had best start writing my one-lliners in "Word" where I can use a spell checker! Will the new e-Gullet software have one?

Margaret, a clever, interesting and unexpected response. It shakes my belief in the Itentionist Fallacy.

I don't have a definitive answer, no longer being in the field (which I haven't been since 1970); but might it be possible that a lot of these cookbooks, as are art coffee table books, subsidized by their authors? Simon would know these stuff.

JPB, is Harrald's still around? I don't think so. I used to stop at the Old Drover's Inn in Dover Plains (off Rt. 22) on the way back from the Berkshires, but that was 6-7 years ago. It's a pleasant place (Relais & Chateaux, for what's that worth these days) with the food typical American provincial; sweet, heavy, more emphasis on "look" that artistry. CIA-type stuff. Nonetheless, it may offer a lot relative to its neighbors. Can anyone provide fresher info.? In fact, is it still there?

What about my favorite expression for the main course, 'plat du resistance"? Irresistable. (Edited by robert brown at 4:53 pm on Jan. 8, 2002)

Bux, thanks for liking my info. I have never seen a "Paul" outside of Cannes, but I bet you're right. The Cours Salaya is more atmospheric and should be seen in conjunction with a morning visit to the Vielle Ville de Nice. The Cannes market is a fitting conclusion to a stroll up the rue Meynardiers. Did the Paul in Lille have a green and maybe yellow sign, or was green the color of the exterior?

Are you supposed to read it with a grain of salt and some ketchup?

Rstarobi, to add to Steve's "sagesse", I would disagree with him only about the market situation. Marche Forville in Cannes is a great market that in terms of goods beats the daylights out of Le Cours Salaya in Old Nice. Except for the farmers' section in front of the Prefecture of the Alps-Maritime, the stuff there is of supermarket quality, although at this time of year no market is near its peak. But for out-an-out food shopping and looking at food, nothing around beat this covered market in Cannes for scale and variety. The market itself is at the west end of rue Meynardiers, one of the Cote's best gourmand streets. Tops is the cheese store Ceneri, a.k.a. "La Ferme Savoyarde". Though it is not as "funky" looking as other great food shops, there is a large selection of perfectly aged all-over France and regional cheeses. For breakfast, buy some of the "fromage blanc de Normandie", which looks somewhat like cottage cheese, but is heavenly rich. The bakery "Paul", east of Ceneri about 100 feet, has terrific bread and nice sandwiches. Also look at the rotiserie stand directly across from Ceneri for a "travers de porc" that is delectably greasy. Ernst, both the charcuterie and the patisserie are each superb. You may want to take home some of the confiture from the bake shop. Steve has eaten in more of the smaller restaurants in Cannes than I have. Brits make a deal of Neat (as in Richard Neat) the British chef. I haven't been, but maybe some of the blokes on the site know his cooking. But our meal at the Majestic's Villa des Lys restaurant in the summer of 2000 was very good, almost great. It is unfortunate that I don't recall the details except it wasn't overly-friendly. I still think La Terrasse at the Hotel Juana offered the best high-end meal I have had on the Cote so far. Too bad it is closed in Winter. But Maximin in Vence will be open. It should be your first priority. This August we had the duck with black pepper that was the best dish we have had in our four meals so far. The other two-star-rated restaurant, Bastide de St. Antoine on the edge of Grasse, has failed to provide me with a meal as good as when its owner-chef Jacques Chibois was at the Gray Albion Hotel in Cannes. However, I have had some nice individual dishes, and perhaps you will do just fine. Avoid the Moulin de Mougins at all costs. It has fallen further than any formerly-great restaurant in France that I know of. I agree with Steven about Loulou in Cros-de-Cagne. We are always looking for good fish soup and it has the best. A bit pricy, but excellent, is the grilled fish and shellfish. The grilled meat looked really nice, but I have yet to order any of it. Charlot 1er next door is less expensive and lots of fun. It is best for oysters, but their straight grilled fish of the day is reliable, and don't miss the "degustation" appetizer: decent foie gras de canard, two stuffed mussels, a ravioli with a rich cream sauce, and a couple of oysters. I could go on, especially if you are going into the back country or into Provence. Steve is also right about the Colombe d'Or. We take drinks there in the small but pleasant bar and eat elsewhere. Le Diamant Rose is a favorite. Technically in La Colle sur Loup, but at the entrance of St.-Paul-de-Vence, my wife enjoyed it a couple of years ago without me. Oh yes, I almost forgot the terrific "glacier, Villefeu just off La Croisette across from the Gray Albion Hotel. No cones served inside, but great concoctions or "degustations" of several scoops. How long will you be in the Cannes area and where do you intend to venture out? (Edited by robert brown at 9:11 pm on Jan. 7, 2002)

Steve, I been to La Chaumiere (aka around our house as " show me air and I'll show you life") several times. I have seen every nationality of Europe and lots of Monaco "residents" and gringoes, but never, ever a Frenchman. I take my fellow gringoes there because I figure they want to tie into a grilled piece of meat, usually steak, after being away from home for a while. ( It is a nice change and they all enjoy the food). It is a formula place: Everyone gets served a basket of "crudites"; a dollop of duck and rabbit pate; prosciutto and melon;a salad with a creamy cheese dressing; I believe, and for dessert fruit, a "tarte tatin" or chocolate mousse with which they deposit on the table a big silver pot of "creme fraiche" to which you may help yourself to as much as you want. These dishes are uniformly decent. The main event is a decent, but not great, steak (12 oz?) comparable to our sirloin. Since you are a Lobel's devotee, you would probably not be enthralled, based on the most recent one I had, which was not on a par with the ones before. My favorite main course is the "cote d'agneau" that I imagine comes from Sisteron. It is a good-size specimen with a nice burned crust. It seems to be different than what we get here. Chicken is also available, but you have to call that morning to have it. But you should also call ahead for the lamb chop since one time that I went, they had sold the last one and were serving "gigot" instead. I believe they give you a baked potato with the meat course. Until two years ago, the only wine was a house wine, the stuff called "La Merenda", just like the famous, overrated restaurant near the flower market. Now they have a wine list that is small and overpriced. Not knowing they had switched to selling "better" wines, I asked if I could bring a bottle with me; they could not have cared less. What else? They have valet parking; most, but not all, seating is family style at long tables (lots of friends and family groups); I think they close Sundays and around November for vacation; it is better to sit on the covered veranda; the bathrooms are just beyond the kitchen; and the folks who run it are friendly. It is open only for dinner and is not mentioned in any of the major guidebooks, not even the Guide Ganthier. Does that help? Did you get my e-mail of a few days ago? I got a notice that delivery was delayed. And how did that blue emoticon get in there? (Edited by robert brown at 12:52 am on Jan. 7, 2002)

LML: As Don Rickles likes to ask, "What's your heritage?"

Masaharu Morimoto has been a leitmotif in my gastronomic life for more than ten years. For about two years, circa 1990, he was our neighborhood sushi chef at the recently-defunct East Side Lenghe’s on Third Ave at 83rd St. My wife and I and others constituted a coterie that once or twice a week put ourselves in Morimoto’s hands. (Back then we called him simply “Mori”.) With the limited ingredients of a standard, all-purpose Japanese restaurant, he nonetheless made us unusual Japanese dishes: interesting rolls, yellowtail cheeks and shoulders, and a variety of hot dishes for which he would disappear into the kitchen for several minutes at a time. Ultimately Barry Wine, who was running the food operation for Sony, got wind of Morimoto, whose pan-oriental appearance (he is part-Japanese, part Chinese), endearing smile, slightly raspy voice, gift for cutting up (in both senses of the word), and rapid-pace, sing-songy speech that is sometimes hard to understand give him a large amount of charisma, and we lost him to the five-seat private sushi bar in the Sony Building. Two years later, on our first visit to Nobu, we saw him working behind the sushi bar. Very soon after, he was directing the other sushi chefs, eventually becoming the Executive Chef. Within the past five years, his position at Nobu led him to prestigious outside work; one time he told me how he had just returned from Europe where he had been engaged for several days to be a chef on someone’s yacht. Then, of course, his career took a giant leap forward with his “victories” on the Iron Chef program, to the extent that he was able to appropriate the program’s title to describe himself. I watched only one of the programs and thought that the Japanese chef from Restaurant Alain Chapel in Kobe was better trained and much more sophisticated, making me wonder how well Morimoto would fare on his own. On the evening of January 4, as a Christmas present for two friends, we drove to Philadelphia to find out. In a prime downtown space, the 700 block of Chestnut St., Morimoto opened his first restaurant with Philadelphia restaurateur Stephen Starr (first, because others are envisioned, with the next being scheduled to open this summer at Washington and 14th Streets in New York). On entering from the street through Plexiglas doors and a reception area, we were taken aback by a tunnel-like room with an undulating ceiling of narrow wood slats that may have been ten times longer than it was wide. The overall effect made me feel as though I were in some otherworldly place that evoked what three years ago would have been called some 21st-century giant space station. The white upward- curving walls covered with fabric that created forms running through the middle that evoked spoons without handles seemed inspired by the biomorphic forms of Jean Arp or Joan Miro, as did much of other aspects of the restaurant such as some of the furniture and the bar area. On ground level the seating was democratically laid on in a way that evoked both a double-aisle economy class cabin of an airplane and the configuration of an open office. Tables for two were on a riser that ran down the sides of the dining room; larger tables were sectioned off by low Plexiglas barriers that all changed colors periodically and uniformly: white, pink, light green, and pale blue. All together the restaurant seats 140 and its socio-economic goals are Conranesque. In the rear was the sushi bar that accomodates 13 people, the surface of which was made of curved green plastic. A small, cozy bar where you can also eat creates a truncated second floor from which there is a birds-eye view of the dining room that heightens both the bustle and dramatic décor below. Morimoto’s is an audacious, avant-garde setting designed by the noted Egyptian-Canadian industrial designer Karim Rashid. The main event at Morimoto is ambitious in its choice of dishes, especially when one adds in all the sushi/sashimi possibilities. An Omakase dinner is available at ๠, 贄, and 贘. As grazing is the order of the day, we thought it best to call Morimoto to our table and collaborate on choosing the dishes a la carte that would get us most of the way through the meal. The conceptual comparisons with Nobu are obvious and, I suppose, inevitable. Overall, it is the same sort of restaurant in terms of the kind of food and the informal, friendly, well-executed service that only flagged toward the end of the meal when the restaurant became even noisier and more crowded. Ultimately we tasted eight dishes, ending up with three that we could directly compare to Nobu and five of Morimoto’s own creations. We found Morimoto’s sashimi salad with baby greens and shoyu dressing superior to that at Nobu, due in large part to the addition of shavings of smoked bonito. Yet, when we received Nobu’s famous black cod with miso as reinterpreted by Morimoto, the dish, which he enhanced with an ingenious, if inappropriate sardine cracker, mustard sauce, red and green peppers and fermented soy sauce, had us shaking our heads in wonder as to how someone could allow such a maladroit, misconceived dish to be served. The third Nobu dish, which Morimoto seems not to have altered, the sashimi-style Kobe beef with soy sauce, chives, ginger, and scallions could have been transported in tact from Hudson Street. At either restaurant, it is a remarkable pastiche of texture and diverse-yet-harmonious tastes. With his very own dishes, Morimoto more than acquitted himself. The Chilean sea bass (a fresh, perfectly cooked piece) with black bean sauce, shaved ginger and hot oil was on the mark. Yosedofu, which is a theatrical dish because tofu that is brought in a heated earthenware pot turns while you wait from a liquid into the soft texture of finished tofu. It was unfortunate that a slightly sweet and watery crab sauce and the other sauce of fermented soy beans were not what was demanded by the tofu. Our one kick at sashimi, since previous visitors seemed under whelmed by the quality of the raw fish, was Toro served three ways; cubed, sliced, and chopped and wrapped in algae. While perfectly adequate, we wondered about the provenance that, according to Morimoto was the Mediterranean, as well as the role of his object of pride, the cryogenic freezer that goes down to minus 90 degrees. (Perhaps when medical science figures out a way to revive dead tuna, Morimoto will be able to offer the whole fish once again fresh.) A better choice was the drunken shrimp “yopparai”, grilled in sake and served with a Thai dipping sauce (like naam plaa, which turned out to go the best with the yosedofu) and accompanied by strips of a thinly rolled grilled, chewy substance that our waitress told us was the ferments that accumulate at the bottom of a sake barrel. She also told us that the shrimps had been alive 18 minutes ago, but not who was watching and who was counting. Saving describing the best for last, even if it was the second dish we ate, our dish of the night was the 10-hour Pork Kakuni. In this dish, the small piece of pork tenderloin was braised for 10 hours and served with a rice “congee” or porridge that is a staple of Japanese breakfasts. A previous diner had complained about the pork’s stringiness. Such was not the case with us. It was sweet, soft and flavorful and a perfect foil for the mild and delicate rice porridge. This was a masterpiece for which we would consider going Greyhound to have once more. We climbed up to the bar for dessert sans café. We shared an order of three scoops of the five- Japanese-spice ice cream, whose taste I thought was not far from cinnamon and nutmeg, along with a slice of rice cake (in the Western sense of the word) that was an interesting blend of rice kernels and flour served with a small scoop of somewhat icy chocolate ice cream. Other than a noticeable drop-off in the pace of the service, we were annoyed by the almost miniscule amount of sake in each bamboo container. The sake was of excellent quality: soft, delicate, subtle, and made, according to our waitress, “especially for Morimoto in Kyoto”, At ฦ. per container, the four that we ordered during the course of the meal were inadequate, making the sake overpriced. The wine list was fairly large (perhaps around 60 choices) and very eclectic. The wines on it that I was most familiar with, Chablis and other white and red Burgundies, were fairly-priced but too new to drink. Our cost for the meal with tip was 贄. per person. I doubt you can bring your own sake. Two months is rather short for a restaurant to be in existence to determine definitively its qualities. It seems, based on the comments of earlier visitors, that the restaurant is on an upward trajectory. The quality of what we ate ranged from one mishap of a dish to five that were very good to exceptional. For eight in total, this is hard for any restaurant to equal. All the Central New Jerseyites and Eastern Pennsylvanians have a wonderful eating resource readily in reach. For those of us in New York, I would advise waiting for the New York restaurant to open if traveling to Philadelphia to eat at Morimoto has been the sole activity you have in mind. . Morimoto told us that once he opens in New York, that will be where he will be spending most of his time. Robert Brown & Susan Reinhold (Edited by robert brown at 11:16 pm on Jan. 9, 2002)

Lumpy, thanks. I'm trying to find the time to report my impressions. The visit was interesting and had a lot going on in several ways. Maybe by tomorrow afternoon as my post will not be a short one.

Does anyone know what dogs are used at the Red Rooster on Rt. 22 in Brewster? The place is a fun stop if you're going to the CT lakes or the Berkshires. What opinions are out there? I like the place in general, but haven't had a hot dog there in a long time.