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I really question this, not because I've had better in NY, but because the duck at Peking Duck House is so much worse than the stuff I've actually had in Beijing. Is PDH really as good as it gets?

Using that scale, you would have to give a luxe joint serving utterly original junk 10s in all categories except the one that would lead most other raters to give the place no stars at all. Rating scales can be built to take that sort of thing into account. For example, you could assign an overall rating based on the lowest category score, which solves the luxe junk problem but doesn't solve what we might call the Imperial Palace problem: given the wine list, Sifton would've been required to give that place a bottom-rung rating. But this is basically exactly what Zagat does, and, net of issues with the reliability of Zagat ratings themselves, is not inherently flawed. In general some sort of numerical rating should probably be in place. Everything else aside, reviews are there to be useful to the reader, and being able to sort and filter to find a specific restaurant adds a lot of value. Ultimately a review is supposed to help me figure out where to eat; being forced to read through every single one helps me a lot less than being able to, say, look for all restaurants with 2 or more stars in a given area.

My mental point of comparison here is more something like the tasting at Corton, which is currently $135 according to the website. Not as many sequential courses, but with the use of side dishes at Corton, comparable in the variety of food served, in my opinion. I don't think the comparison with EMP's Gourmand is quite apt – if nothing else, it takes a lot more time than the dinner tasting at Ko. ETA: Or, for that matter, the tasting at wd~50.

I think it was some sort of mushroom ravioli? Relative to other options, Ko seems a fairly questionable value now at $125, especially given the lack of amenities. At this point, they're charging as much for food as the more conventional 3-star restaurants, especially given the hassle of getting a reservation at Ko. Then again, enough people seem to disagree with me that all their reservation slots are still taken every day.

http://www.the-feedbag.com/profound-questions/ftc-blogger-regulation-what-does-it-mean-for-we-food-bloggers Interesting to read Ozersky make the same points he made earlier here in more detail on The Dash Feedbag.

On prime nights, PDT reservations are ridiculous to get; I've literally spent half an hour straight mashing redial just to get through. You'd probably have an easier time getting a table at M&H. Though the flip side is, if you're already at Per Se, the marginal benefit of going to M&H for drinks is lower than that of going to PDT, given style of drinks and all. Although I find it quite amusing that these places are referred to as "old school", given how new they all are.

It was $69 when I went last week, and the website (now updated to have the fall menu too, featuring "New York State Squab", heh) still says $69, so any price bump must have been very recent.

Interesting. Do you know if it is still the case that they're serving food at the bar?

Fantastic pictures – less the pork belly, the Gourmand menu was also substantially the same at the beginning of July. A little bit weird that it almost hasn't changed at all, though. I may be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure that I've had a French 75 served to me in a champagne flute at M&H before, and the last time I ordered a Death in the Afternoon at White Star, it was definitely served in a champagne flute. I'm pretty sure the flute is the canonically correct option for things based on champagne, though I guess I haven't had anything champagne-based at any of the SCBs that fall more into the modern-ish vein.

Tailor claims to be serving an expanded bar menu for the remainder of August, but I've never been by to check, and I don't know offhand how vegetarian-friendly their menu is. I don't know offhand if Ssam Bar is still as anti-vegetarian as they were; for my money, though, if I wanted to get a dinner at a good restaurant that also offered top-notch drinks that are characteristic of the NY cocktail scene, Ssam Bar would be my first pick.

I went there a month ago, and only got an empty caviar tin with no menu inside.

Are we reading the same review here? The entire narrative seemed to me to be that EMP has improved dramatically.

I do wish they had more than just that one dessert, though. Maybe I just go there too often.

I go there in jeans and a t-shirt all the time! My favorite dish there right now is the grilled octopus and avocado salad, but the tasting menus are probably the smart choice for ordering.

The phone # actually changed again at the end of May, but I'm not sure if we're allowed to distribute the new one, since it's not the same as the one on the website. Their email seems to work fine, though.