robert brown

Ann, in last year's (2001) Guide Gault-Millau, the present Jamin (at the same address as M. Jamin's) gets a respectable 17/20. Now I remember a very nice review by Patricia Wells of the place as taken over by Benoit Guichard, a Robuchon disciple. Maybe you can ask him to at least make you the mashed potatoes. Why not reserve and have a talk about it and maybe another pure Robuchon dish? Has anyone been recently?

If you Esca my advice, I wouldn't advise you to go there regardless. Of the three Joe & Mario's I have been to (Esca, Babbo, and Lupa) this is the one that failed to please me. I don't, however, remember the details. The chef was young (he came out to meet someone we were dining with) and obviously not too experienced. (I forgot where he had been where he wasn't in charge of the kitchen). But other people like it, so wait to see what other responses your thread elicits. (Edited by robert brown at 11:54 pm on Jan. 3, 2002)

A little background for you, Ann. Jamin was Raymond Jamin, a restaurateur who, before hiring Joel Robuchon whom he discovered, or lured away from the dining room of the Nikko Hotel (Les Celebrities, which I believe was related to a short-term restaurant at the Essex House that Alain Ducasse now occupies) was equally known for having a trotter named after him by the Champagne magnate that owned the horse. Jamin was about the most successful trotter of his day and known and adored by the masses for eating artichokes for his principle daily rations. He raced in New York in some championship races, all of which, I believe, he won. In any event, he was a huge deal in the New York City sports pages and the national magazines. Jamin's restaurant was on the small side, but very comfortable. His maitre d'hotel for a while was the son of the cult chef Jean Delavayne, who had a restaurant ( La Camillia) in the Paris suburb of Bougeval and was considered to be a prototype chef of "La Nouvelle Cuisine". When I knew Jamin through writing a story for a horseman's magazine, given the trotting angle, Gerard Besson was the chef. He then opened a restaurant with young Delavayne that still exists in Paris. Following him in M. Jamin's kitchen was Dominique Bouchet, who has been for many years the chef at La Tour d'Argent. Finally, Robuchon took over the cooking and when M. Jamin retired, he sold the restaurant to him. Eventually Robuchon changed the name to "Restaurant Joel Robuchon" and then moved to larger quarters which, upon his retirement, became the first location of Ducasse's Paris restaurant. I only had Robuchon's cooking one time, in 1994. Of the scores of meals I have had in Paris, it was the only one I felt that measured up to the best meals in the provinces. I did have the potatoes. But what sticks most in my mind was the busboy who kept asking us if we wanted a piece of "countryside bread." Robuchon has several disciples, but the only one whose cooking I have had is Frederic Anton at Le Pre Catalan. It was a really bad meal as was the one taken by another e-Gullet poster. I'm not even sure if there is anyone cooking in a pure Robuchon style, let alone recreating any of his dishes. There is such a premium today to being an "artiste" that his signature dishes may be nothing but a memory. Maybe if he opens up in New York he'll bring the mashed potatoes back at โ. a pop (as a side dish, of course). Telling you more than you bargained for, your humble food historian, (Edited by robert brown at 11:15 pm on Jan. 3, 2002)

Just be prepared for lousy service; but the food at Helen Darroze is wonderful. Keep in mind, though, that I was there in 6/99. (Edited by robert brown at 2:50 pm on Jan. 3, 2002)

Hank, thanks for the report about Bacon. I only have had the bourride there. It was incredibly rich, like it went straight to my gall bladder. Delicious, of course. I will definitely give their boulliabaisse a go I always suspected it was good. It sounds like you hang out in those parts. La Bourride in Cros de Cagnes is a bad place. Loulou/La Reserve we like a lot for coquillage and simple grilled fish. The meat looks good, but never triend it. It's always grilled. Charlot Ier always has good oysters; bouilliabaisse adequate. But the last time we went for langoustine, supposedly the start of the season, were not fresh to all three of us. July is the peak of the season for the local ones and we may have stopped in a bit too soon. Speaking of the coast road between Antibes and Nice, we always enjoy getting cous-cous royale (and nothing but is made there) at La Gazelle d'Or. But phone first as they are quirky about opening up. We think, though, that the cous-cous at Dharkoum in Menton is slightly superior. Tajine is good there as well.

I only drink the "normale"di fizzano. I can't afford the Riserva.

Peter, Sorry I couldn't jump on your query as I was out of town and just returned from Western Mass. However, thanks to Steven for giving you the info.

Cabrales, It's been a while since a chef in France who gave me a bad meal came to my table. But I believe the last time it happened, I simply nodded my head hello and he know not to stop. I find it best when a chef kind of hangs around in an adjoining room making himself accessible and allowing you to decide how forthcoming you want to be.

Talk about a restaurant that's so far away from both buzz and the culinary radar screen, then Eli's (as in Zabar) is front and center. It seems to be an establishment where just people from the neighborhood go, and not always a lot of them at any one time. Because of summertime and then 9/11 I hadn't been there since May until last night. Before then I considered myself a regular customer. The hiatus, however, gave me the chance to see it in fresh eyes. In my opinion Eli's is still a culinary diamond in the rough. The staff, which experiences very little turnover, is comprised of men and women who are without exception friendly, efficient, and caring. The chef Scott Bieber prepares food that is somewhere between comfort and sophisticated American, and which is a very good accompaniment to wine. (As a lot of serious eaters, Eli is a Burgundy/Cote du Rhone partisan as reflected on the wine llst. I also bring my own which is a practice that is heartily accepted there). Since my last visit, there appeared to me to be an effort to make the restaurant more affordable. I had a lusty, flavorful terrine of rabbit with cranberry relish and a small salad of mazuna and Parmesan all put on the same plate. (ป). A mixed grill of two quails, mild Italian sausage and a superb lamb chop was immensely satisfying (ว. if memory recalls). Their classic lemon merinque cake is a favorite (it's a very big piece you get) as is a chocholate parfait with peppermint and pistachio ice cream. A cheese cart with 16 varieties (and no limit on the number you could choose) all looked to be ready to eat. To me it's a civilized restaurant, attracting the same kind of crowd as Cafe Boulod or the old Sant'Ambreous: older and seemingly sophisticated and well-travelled. Friends have complained about the ambiance, but for me the room is in good, subdued taste with serious, unobstrusive background music. I find Eli's to be a rarity in New York: a tranquil restaurant that's meant to go to regularly, without pretense, and conceived for gastronomy and nothing more. (Edited by robert brown at 1:59 pm on Dec. 29, 2001)

Bux, that's a good point you make with the Roanne example. You also provide a French Tourism Ministry corollary to a regulation that I bet is little known and that causes a lot of unneeded expense and unwanted meals: that it is illegal for a hotel to make a pension or half-pension scheme or arrangement obligatory. I have always meant to find out if the same holds true in other countries, Italy especially. Does anyone out there know? As for Margaret's opening post, obviously I would not necessarily stay at a destination restaurant with a few rooms (invariably simple) if there were a better hotel nearby. However, I wouldn't do the converse:stay at such a place and not dine there. In the part of France I have gotten to know best, the hedonistic 06 (Alpes-Maritimes) there is a hotel-restaurant called L'Auberge de la Madone, in the perched village of Peillon (one of the "Most Beautiful Villages of Provence", 19 km. north of Nice in the foothills of the Alps. It has 20 rooms averaging a bit over 贄. The food is very good, although much of the time it is limited to just two menus. We take people there often and everyone loves it. Lots of places, Margaret, to "Chiner": Markets in Nice, Villefranche, Antibes, Cannes. etc. (Edited by robert brown at 10:27 pm on Dec. 28, 2001)

Bux, I just spoke to a friend who lives in the same building as Collette Rossante, a partner in Dim Sum GoGo. According to him, the new chef took over about a month ago, but had been the sous-chef under Chef Guy. I didn't notice a difference the last time I ate except for the lesser-quality shrimp, which someone went out and got at a nearby fish market expressly for us.

Cabrales, you bring up two adjuncts of dining worth delving into. In general I do not like the ritual of chefs doing “la ronde” in the dining room. It is distracting and puts one into the position of trying to conjure up in a hurray what to say. First, you do not know if the chef is in the room to speak to everyone or, as you say, a special person or several selected people. I find myself hoping he will pass me by. Also you can see many people being made uncomfortable, with the result that they nod to the chef who then keeps right on going or being put in the position of muttering some sort of praise that may not be heartfelt (unless you’re like young Shaw who never tells it like it isn’t) Of course I don’t hide under the table or get up and go to the men’s room. By this time I can acquit myself since after a while you develop pat responses and remarks. Each great chef goes about it differently. I found Fredy Girardet to be the worst. He invariably came out and walked around in a perfunctory, really-could-not-care manner, speaking to everyone in this Imperial, condescending manner. The best I ever saw at working the room was Pierre Troisgros. He’s a jolly-looking fellow who really knows how to put you at your ease. Alain Chapel would march into the dining room with kind of a scowl on his face and not moving his upper body. He would walk straight over to whomever it was he needed or wanted to speak with, and then he would walk out with the same posture he came in with. The best interaction I ever saw was at the restaurant Guy Savoy first opened: a small former bistro on one of the avenues that leads into the Place de L’Etoile. It had about ten tables and was long and narrow. When he wasn’t in the kitchen, he stood behind a small counter at the front of the room where he was easily accessible and could watch everyone, even, as I recall, kibitzing with some of his clients. But what I find almost stomach-turning is a Division Two CIA chef doing the tour of his dining room. That’s really beyond patting oneself on the back. As someone who approaches serious-restaurant going from a phenomenalistic, experiential, cross-cultural perspective, it doesn’t satisfy me to expend my sensory energies solely “on the food and other aspects of the applicable restaurant”. I imagine when I first started out eating seriously in France, this is what I did. At some point early on, however, what might be called the voyeuristic aspects of world-class eating began to play a significant part, especially in mediocre high-class establishments. Whenever possible I try to eavesdrop; I like trying to find out what wine other diners are drinking; nearly best of all we like weaving unsubstantiated stories or fantasies about our neighbors-what they might do in life, where they are from, how savvy the might be as gastronomes, what kind of a relationship they may have. I could go on and on. Perhaps someone will start a thread about people’s extra-food experiences in restaurants. Anyway, it’s not something unusual: Ruth Reichl made her reputation by looking around while she ate. It is just that often memories such as what Bux experienced at Pierre Orsi or the time an irate diner at the table next to mine at Le Bernadin shoved a maitre d’hotel into another neighboring table because the shoved one asked the shover to let the next party take over the table are often the experiences that mark a restaurant visit especially when the meal is entirely forgettable. (Edited by robert brown at 4:55 pm on Dec. 28, 2001)

My criterion for determining if an establishment is a hotel with a restaurant or a restaurant (first and foremost) and a hotel secondarily is that if management (invariably an owner-chef) would be pissed off if you took a room and ate elsewhere, then it is the latter. To me, Troisgros and the Moulin de Lourmarin are restaurants first. Their management would be irked if you booked a room and didn't take at least lunch or dinner there. Let's say, however, that you booked a room for two nights at the Moulin and wanted to have one dinner at Les Fenieres, I don't think anyone at the Moulin could or would complain. In fact, I can remember years ago (and maybe they still encourage it) there was a notice at Les Pres et les Sources d'Eugenie (Michel Guerard) stating that they encouraged you to try other restaurants in the region. I always thought that this was an exceedingly selfless gesture even if it was aimed at the "curistes" who were staying for a week or more. Of course the situation gets blurred the smaller the establishment is or the less well-known the chef. I think, however, that unless you are staying at an Ibis or Bleu Marine-type of hotel, any auberge that tries to have a serious kitchen is one you should eat in if you are spending the night in the same premises.

Steven S. and anyone else who may want to comment: You notice again in yesterday’s NYT food section another declaration, this one by Grimes, that New York is the best restaurant city in the world (Manhattan he said this time). I’m starting to think (and this hunch is one I have a fair amount of confidence in) that the reason for the Ducasse pans last year fit into my belief that one major job of the New York/National food writers is to hype the notion that NYC is indeed the restaurant capital of the world. I believe that all the people who trashed Ducasse took offense of his coming into town as something like a commuter (as opposed to being a transplant such as Daniel and Jean-Georges, which is okay in the eyes of the critics) and trying to bowl over the local fat cats in one felt swoop. In other words, it was as if they could not allow this French-based interloper to have the best restaurant in town, even if it meant resorting to skewing him for extra-culinary aspects of the restaurant. The one flaw in this argument is why, after a year, Grimes changed his tune and now pretty much says that, indeed, Ducasse has the best restaurant in New York City. That it probably is by far may be perhaps left him no alternative. In the meantime, have other critics come around to his change of mind? As to the wider issue of what gives anyone the right to declare New York the best restaurant city in the world, (especially someone who is supposed to be spouting informed opinion), what gives them the right to put forth such a concept? Does Grimes think New York chefs have access to the best ingredients? What about Paris? Does New York have the most kinds of cuisines? What about London or Tokyo? Does New York have the most audacious or talented chefs? What about Paris or London? What thoughtful, even-handed or informed restaurant critic would want to write that? Who among us has explored all the significant restaurants of New York, London, Paris and Tokyo? No one, as it is an impossible task.

Dim Sum GoGo didn't quite open this year. It did so last November as the managing partner told me the other night. The menu still mentions Chef Guy, but perhaps the restaurant hasn't printed new ones. We'll have to ask when we go. I always have a bone to pick whenever anyone writes words such as "It has become almost reflexive to call Manhattan the best restaurant city in the world". However, you can't fault Grimes for his singling out the place in Chinatown we have been urging everyone to visit. Nice work, Bux

Bux, I wish there were. There really should be one since going out for bouillibaisse provokes a lot of fellowship. Nonetheless, your research is at least getting the subject off to a good start.

Jan. 4 is the scheduled visit. I'll try to remember as much as I can. Meanwhile I think there's a lot of commentary on the Philadelphia Inquirer site.

Bux, I took it on myself to jump from the "Scarcity" thread to here since I am curious to know if you can remember the bouilliabaisse restaurant you went to in Marseilles. Some years ago we went to one Eli Zabar likes the most. It begins with a "B" I think and not on the port. But I don't have my Michelin handy. It would be fun to try and nail down one day the best half dozen or so bouilliabaisse restaurants along the coast. I guess Tetou in Golfe-Juan would get the most mentions. But a year and a half ago the foodie friend we took there trashed it because of what he perceived was the lack of quality of the fish and the purely decorative function of the tiny crabs. Irrespective of that, I believe I read that a liberal use of rascasse is a marker of a serious bouilliabaisse. (Edited by robert brown at 12:33 pm on Dec. 27, 2001)

I think you forgot to tell us when this all took place. When was it?

Steve K,. Unless there were ersatz herbs, spices and plants growing in some abandoned tenement plot on the Lower East Side, I do not think Michel Bras will be opening any time soon a branch in Manhattan. I realize, however, that your quizzical musings are theoretical. It is hard to know what celebrity European, Middle-American or West Coast chef would have success in New York. Perhaps Alain Ducasse is the only one who might do it. In a way, Thomas Keller has already done it if you count Raquel’s, which was on Varick St. in the 1980s, and which I though was very good, but not a standout. I am sure that the restaurant was not his, either. (Has anyone heard how Medi is doing? No one seems to mention it. It is a restaurant Roger Verger has a hand in.). As for Adria, do you think he has found his optimal creative level being open part of the year, making his place accessible mostly for those diners enthusiastic enough to get there, and devoting a good part of the year in his “atelier’ in Barcelona? (By the way, I have never been there, but made my statement about savories and desserts simply putting together what I have read). And speaking of desserts, I have had several of Bras’s early desserts since I went there several times from when Gault-Millau discovered him around 1985 until my last visit in 1996. And can you tell me, Steve. As the NY Times tried to establish the "authorship of, is Bras responsible for the “moelleux au chocolate” being served in what must be a thousand restaurants worldwide? I wish I could remember the other desserts that I had there). (Edited by robert brown at 10:50 pm on Dec. 27, 2001)

Bux, That's a really great example; I would be hard-pressed to come up with anything better. Orsi has been on my "must visit" list for visiting. How were the dishes served to the mere mortals?

Since everyone is responding to my post just above, let me try this for better luck. Something I have been cogitating on when I was last food touring: What can be most memorable about meal or a place where you eat is the surprise from an unexpected quarter. Examples of this are striking up a conversation with an interesting person or couple at the next table (especially in a foreign country for some reason); encountering a food artisan delivering produce to a restaurant as you are leaving, and then being presented an example of whatever it is. This has happened to me twice in the past six months in Italy where I got an amazing porcini mushroom in Barbaresco territory and a cheese at midnight outside of Asti. Anyway, you get the point. (Others can be being given a tour of the kitchen or a great wine cellar of even having what I call "gastronomic racing luck" in which something knocks you off your plan and you think that what you ended up having to do was even better; or just walking into a restaurant off the street that turns out to be much better than anticipated). I like those kind of surprises. They are easier to remember and I cherish them as much as my memories of great meals or magnificent dishes. (Edited by robert brown at 5:15 pm on Dec. 26, 2001) (Edited by robert brown at 5:17 pm on Dec. 26, 2001) (Edited by robert brown at 9:50 am on Dec. 27, 2001)

Bux, do you have any idea what the enforcement mechanism is going to be on this stuff? I can easily imagine the French doing the enforcing, but when it comes to an "outside" agency, it's hard to imagine makes of "fromages fermiers" bowing to any pressure. They'd shoot any EEC enforcer first! I hate the whole thing, but the more chaos the better it is for us and our greenback. Maybe I'm blowing smoke, but I'm still counting on the cheese-making farmers coming down from the hills and mountains with their unadulterated cheeses, Romantic that I am. (Edited by robert brown at 4:22 pm on Dec. 26, 2001)

The biggest and most frequent surprises I get in a restaurant occur when I open up the bill. Seriously, though, do any of you frequently find mistakes on bills? If so, what kind? Do you worry that paying a combination hotel-restaurant bill the next morning is a rich source of potential chicanery? Do you find computerized bills more reliable than hand-written ones? Do you worry when you get a vague bill, such as the ones that say just "wine" or "vin" or "2 dinners"? Otherwise, I go along with Bux in trying to order the chef's best-known dishes on a first visit. Also I agree that restaurants that change their menu tend to be better ones that don't. A restaurant that changes its printed portion seasonally should at least offer several daily specials. But that's another question. Do you find yourself reluctant to order a typed or hand-written daily special figuring that it's maybe a brand new dish that the kitchen staff may have not mastered? One can always ask, I guess; but I find myself frequently shying away from those. How do you all feel about that situation? (Edited by robert brown at 12:14 pm on Dec. 26, 2001) (Edited by robert brown at 12:15 pm on Dec. 26, 2001)

Bux, your analysis is right on. Thanks for posting the lunchtime dim sum; there is much more than at dinner. As you mention the main course dishes, I can say that they are so much more interesting and better-prepared than 99% of those in the other Chinese restaurants. We always order plate of mushrooms, chives, and walnuts. Beef with ginger is not the greasy dish with small pieces of faded ginger, but rather, clean-tasting with large pieces of tender, flavorful, very fresh ginger. I think that the ฮ-35 a head with beer or wine is one of the best value for money meals you can have in New York. While that may be several dollars a person more than most Chinatown restaurants, the difference is well worth it. I also like the waiters who are all Chinese and young, caring, and communicative. (Edited by robert brown at 5:21 pm on Dec. 25, 2001)