Wilfrid

I hear you, Steve. The list will have to shrink a little more eventually. All these comments are very welcome.

That's immensely helpful, Nina, thanks. I wouldn't discount the hero suggestions, although there's always the question of practicality - not having the time to go midday, but not wanting to base an evening round a hero either. But let's keep track of them. Da Tommaso - in Brooklyn? There's one by that name in the theater district which I don't like. The list is getting more manageable. I will do some research to see if there's a good balance of regional styles and types of restaurant. Pizza DiFara;Patsy's. Heroes Corona Heights Pork Store; Leo's Latticini; Dafonte's. Restaurants Manhattan:Arqua;Centolire;Da Andrea;East Post;I Trulli; Il Giglio (or Il Mulino - same owners);Lavagna;Le Madri;Petrosino. Brooklyn: Al Di La; Areo; Bamonte's;Da Tommaso;Queen. The Bronx: Roberto's. Queens:Don Peppe;Lenore's;Manducatis;Piccola Venezia.

Er...no, let's leave that alone.

Wilfrid -- You know that question is somewhat moot for me. Yep, me too. I think my serious solution would be to eat the cheese (not the dessert), and try to skip eating something else during the day.

Thanks for the warning, rstarobi. Liza, I may just have trouble eating anywhere called "Gonzo". Found Fat Bloke's pizza write-ups, with a little help. Looks like he would strike Grimaldi's, Lombardi's and Tottono's from my list. He speaks well of Dennino. But looks like Patsy's and DiFara are the serious options.

You used to be able to get a decent fresh roasted chicken sandwich in the average British high street sandwich shop. Processed chicken roll was making inroads when I expatriated, however. I would go for roast chicken, some dark meat at least please, on soft white bread, and I am afraid I love it smothered with mayo. Hellmann's will do. Shoot me.

So it was "rousting" coyotes, not "roasting" coyotes? Never mind.

What about not ordering wine? Completely beyond the pail?

Pizzas. We've discussed the subject elsewhere and I don't mean to re-hash it. Fat Bloke's pizza reviews don't seem to be available on his web-site currently, but from what I can glean from earlier discussions the serious best pizza contenders are: DiFara Sally's Patsy's (East Harlem) Grimaldi's Lombardi's Totonno's in roughly that order. How does that look?

I am adding I Trulli, having been reminded that I like the Enoteca next door. I gather Il Giglio is a sibling of Il Mulino and perhaps less hassle. What about this Fiamma place in SoHo? Just a scene? I have the impression that it's not part of the New York Italian experience I'm looking for. (I'll also correct some spellings next time I post the list).

You have a good point, Gavin. I wouldn't want to miss out on some fantastic piece of New York Italian culinary history just because a new place round the corner has fresher mozzarella. I hope everyone is taking that into account. Liza - Il Giglio? Nina - or anyone - is it a realistic proposition to cut the Brooklyn list by half? Update: Manhattan Arqua Centolire Da Andrea East Post Lavagna Le Madri Max Patsy's (but which one?) Petrosino Scalini Fedeli Brooklyn Al Di La Areo Bamonte's Cono O'Pescatore Da Tomasso Queen Bronx Roberto's Queens Don Pepe's Lenore's Manducati's (???) Piccolo Venezia

Is it cooking if I throw the last of Toby's pork stomach in a pan with some pieces of blood sausage, warm them through, then toss them in a salad of spinach leaves with truffle oil, white wine vinegar, and freshly ground salt and pepper? Because that's what I did. Robert Mondavi Coastal Cab Sauv - pleasant in a fruit gum sort of way.

Okay, I'm cutting. I have re-read Fat Bloke's reviews on the Fat Guy site; Manducati's sounds like a pain unless your a regular. I put a question-mark by it. Also, looking at earlier comments, support for Gnocco seemed highly qualified, and there doesn't seem to be any reason to choose La Parma over Don Pepe's. Minetta's I went to years ago, and it didn't thrill me (it's telling how few of these places I have been to). What about Il Mulino? Worth the hassle? Also, there are a number of little Lower East Side places on the list. I've walked past them all, and not been drawn in. Do any really stand out as essential?

I don't know Italy well enough to comment, but isn't the situation similar in Spain? As soon as you step above the bistro level, you're into pink velvet jackets, bow-ties and so on? I am not talking about at the "seaside", of course. I am wondering if it is a European phenomenon - not pan-European, but at least very common in Europe.

Okay, I got the list so far into shape. I need to cut it by about fifty per cent. I am going to do some research myself, but this would be a good time for people to chime in with comments like "Apizz is really not in the top twenty" - that's an example, not to pick on Apizz. Do I have the best pizza down here, by the way? I gather the branches of Patsy's, other than 117th Street, are about pizza - is that where I should be eating pizza? I think a general exploration of Arthur Avenue is a must, so Roberto's stays on the list. Manhattan Acapella Apizz Arqua Centolire Col Legno Da Andrea East Post Gnocco Lavagna Le Madri Max Minetta's Patsy's (but which one?) Petrosino Scalini Fedeli Supper Brooklyn Al Di La Areo and Da Tomasso. Bamonte's Cono O'Pescatore Queen Bronx Roberto's Queens Don Pepe's La Parma Lenore's Manducatti's Piccolo Venezia

Billy's STopless, in the interests of strict accuracy.

At some point I will try to categorize all these suggestions and see if I can figure out which are the best bets. Then you can all explain to me how I'm wrong. thanks again

Very helpful. Thanks.

Such an obvious idea, that some fool is bound to do it . Anyway, I found Cabby's menu (Rachel got there first). It confirms my hunch. Entree prices in the low to mid-twenties are very fair for a restaurant of this standard. They are in line with prices I paid at Aix - a less ambitious restaurant in a less fancy area. At Aix, the entrees were garnished. I think if you pair one side dish with each entree at Craft, you come out with prices in the low thirties. Still fair. However, I believe diners average more than one side per entree - which starts to be a lot of vegetables. Unless you're careful, you are then paying around $40 per entree (which is really more appropriate at a level up from Craft), but there's also a fair chance you are over-ordering, or ordering unnecessarily because the stuff sound nice. $85 for the chef's menu is exactly what the price should be. (I don't know how much it's changed in the last yearm but this has not been a period of steep hikes in restaurant prices.)

I wish more restaurants had web-sites with indicative menus. Because, agreeing with Fat Bloke, what we really need is to compare a Craft menu with menus from, say, Veritas, Union Pacific, Eleven Madison Park, Gramercy tavern, etc, in order to see if it is out of line with its market.

Despite his vast riches, Steve - oddly, when you come to think of it - doesn't pay me to defend him. And he can look after himself. But here's a freebie. I think Steve said that $100 a head was reasonable for the food consumed at the Rayner meal. Within the context of restaurant prices in central Manhattan, his remark is absolutely unexceptionable. Yes, you can run up a steep bill at Craft if you order numerous sidedishes. But is the restaurant's pricing way out of step with its market? Absolutely not. Comments about price I see in in various forums (and the chocolate thread springs to mind as a recent example) often seem to me to reflect a naivete about what things actually cost. Steve's correctives in these contexts are frequently valid. We can deplore the fact - and I can quite understand many of Jay's readers will do so - but you can easily pay $70 a head (before tax, tip and wine) for a lousy meal in a corner bistro in Manhattan these days.

Okay, forget about my tastebuds. The pastry chef succeeded in completely confusing me. The dish must have been this (from Grimes): "A so-called Provence salad, a layering of candied green tomatoes, thin-sliced fennel, and melon topped with a Chloraseptic-green scoop of mint sorbet. The dish is intriguing. It really does grow on you, gradually; it's a pastry chef's version of tough love." Oh yes. I thought those apples were a bit funny. Anyway, it was dead green, and quite horrible.

Thanks guys. No hurry, we can develop this over the weeks to come, I hope.

Is it that individual dishes are overpriced, or that one is more likely to order several sides there, where at another restaurant one might order only one, or two to share?

I wish I had time to respond in more detail, but thanks for that point which I don't think we've focussed on sufficiently before. The Rabelaisian celebration of food and drink is only one side of the cultural coin. The very important other side is the tradition of asceticism, austerity and self-denial. There is a discourse about food which is very reminiscent of a discourse about sex in its negativity. Perhaps this can be developed at a later stage, but Huysmans is an excellent example. A writer moving out of spiritual crisis into an ascetic Catholicism, he does pay attention to what his characters eat - and despite (or perhaps because of) their profound love of music, literature and architecture, their dinner is at best a pot-au-feu, at worst something far less appetizing. He does introduce a cheerful gourmand character in 'L'Oblat', but the other characters' reactions to her confections are distinctly conflicted.