Bux

I suspect that outside of a handshake, almost all tips are on the credit card. In these days of an ATM on every corner, I don't usually carry around enough cash to cover a tip that even a cheapskate might leave at Per Se. A good number of years back, I was rather unexpectedly comped a meal for three people at a major upscale restaurant. Of course I had expected to pay the bill with a credit card and the three of us had to search deeply in our pockets and purses to come up with might have been a reasonable tip for the service. As we had earlier been upsold on the wine by the waiter who likely knew we were to be comped, I really owned him a larger than usual tip. I suspect our pile of twenties, tens, fives and ones were a clue we were unprepared.

Going back in time to a point well before the site existed, I've often found myself involved in a thread about restaurants, when well into the thread, it dawns on me that when I say "restaurant," I'm thinking white tablecloths and the other guy is thinking formica. JeAnneS' point is well taken. Service in a moderately priced restaurant is as different a situation from service in a place such as Per Se, as it is from that in a barber shop. It's not that the little restaurant is in another league, it's that they're not playing the same game as Per Se. Hell, the ball is different and there are far fewer players on the field at any one time. Many of us who rail against tips in restaurants may well dislike the whole concept of tipping for a professional job whether it's for legal services, accounting services, buying a cake in a bakery or a cup of coffee in a take out, but this thread is about restaurants so we talk about tipping in restaurants. I've traveled a fair amount in my time and have almost always been uncomfortable about tipping when in a foreign country. In Spain, almost everyone I've asked has a different answer that's ranged from "it's included in the menu price" all the way up to "ten percent." The latter by someone who proceded to leave five percent the next time we dined together. Then he explained it was all about the type of restaurant. I'm sure I've been called "sport" and "s.o.b." in Spain. It's no wonder I found Japan so hospitable. Tipping is considered insulting there. Even in this country, there are so few services where we can tell people we'll pay them what we think it's worth after they've served us. I find that an offensive and embarrassing relationship in the abstract, but in reality, it's one supported by the waiters, especially in the top restaurants where a pro can earn a very good living and where only the pros survive for long.

Just in case you check in the morning, let me add Artisanal, on 32nd Street just west of Park Avenue, although I haven't been there much. Outside of Korean restaurants, with which I have no first hand experience, I can't think of any restaurants immediately near Macy's. I don't know if I don't know of any because I don't eat in the area, or if I don't eat in the area because I don't know any restaurants there (or if there are none worth knowing). Wait, there's Keen's Chop House on 36th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. I was there once as a kid. It's famous for its mutton chops.

Don't be silly. In France, where service is included, it's not uncommon to leave a few coins on the bar or 5% at a restauraurant. Some people leave 10% at a good restaurant and that's in addition to the included service. Tips are always in cash, never added to the credit card amount. My guess is that a minimum service charge will not decrease the take for waiters in the long run. Rich, you refer several times to your experience and in a way that implies it's more extensive, or at least more reliable than the independent studies. Could you explain why? I find the studies reasonably reliable. ← Believe me Bux, if I'm being silly, you'll be the first to know - I promise. I'll even e-mail you privately if that would help your cognitive abilities. What they do in France has absolutely no relation to what will occur here. I think that's clearly evident from the political and socio-economic climate in both countries. While there may be some people who will throw a few dollars extra into the pot, I doubt many will, especially at 20% of the total bill including wine. At Per Se's prices, it would be rare that more than a few would leave more. I've always found personal experience to be more reliable than studies. For one, the methodology (which may be flawed) is unknown except to the study's sponsors. Secondly, there are always built-in prejudices with studies - the same as with political polls. Finally, when studies are done where cash is involved they are notoriously inaccurate. Anyone who has taken Economics 101 understands that. People are not completely "up-front" when speaking about cash. And cash is left for tips - at least occasionally. When I worked as a waiter, I witnessed certain people making substantially more than others and it wasn't for one night or one week - it was over several years. Obviously, the study or studies never included the restaurants where I worked. So to answer you're opening query - no I wasn't being silly, just factual. I hope this helps in solving your dilemma. ← Rich, it appears somehow you misunderstood or attached too much importance to my choice of the term "don't be silly" and that you felt personally insulted or slighted to the extent that you needed to attack my abilty to understand in lieu of debating the points. For putting you in that embarrassing position, I deeply apologize. Trust me, I don't believe anyone here believes you are silly because of what I say. My comments do not make you look silly. It was simply my jovial and light hearted manner of noting that in a country where the service was included, ironically, the practice of tipping has not been eliminated and that slowly, tips are rising in France. Of course France is not the US, and ever since the end of the Second World War we've been defiently rejecting any influence the culture of cheese eating near-communists may have on our life style, especially in the realm of dining and restaurants. I actually don't know what will happen here. I have no reason to question the fact that your long term experience as a waiter over a long period of time, as well as your experiences as a diner that transcend independent studies of groups of diners, leave you in the perfect position to predict exactly how the majority of Per Se's diners will react. I certainly have no clue. Moreover, based on your posting history, I will be the first to agree that you've always found your personal experience to be more reliable than other people's studies. Without having studied Economics 101, I couldn't begin to dispute that there are always built-in prejudices with studies or that you wouldn't be the first to e-mail me about any prejudices you held, if you held them. I don't mean to be facetious. Those studies do not include your experiences and from your experiences, and you are able to dismiss those studies. Obviously, when we factor in both your experience and that which you dismiss, we have a larger sampling. About the only thing I know is that I don't insult other people's intelligence or question their "cognitive abilities."

It may simply be that there's a generation gap between what you know to be true and how the world exists. I don't know the range of restaurants at which you worked, nor the period in our history that such employment covered, but today's average diner and waiter, not to mention surgeon, all seem younger then they did when I was younger. It doesn't seem reasonable to hold to one's personal experience over that of independent surveys, although I understand the emotional problem in letting go. To hold on to personal experience that's not current and argue as if it's both current and common, is not going to offer the basis for sound arguments likely to influence others.

My assumption is that a restaurant declares 100% of what's included as a tip on the credit card slip, at the very minimum.

Although I haven't been in years, I have a soft spot for Picholine. Ouest is really another neighborhood. Of course there's Jean Georges and the TimeWarner batch.

A couple of questions and points to make. Does NY State/City law provide for 'minimum' state wage law for service personel or ist it like MA where service personel does NOT receive state minimum wage? . . . . ← "$3.85 per hour in New York City" according to Fat Guy's opinion piece in the NY Times Tipped Off. "Over time, as in any service-oriented business, waiters loyal to the restaurant will perform better and make customers happier than waiters loyal only to themselves." Perhaps, but the question remains, will the wait staff feel more loyal to a restaurant that has greater control over their tips, one that leaves tipping a more free market arrangement, or one that pays them a living wage regardless of how busy the restaurant is and how much they upsell the diner? When I'm enjoying the food, I'm more likely to order dessert. It's the kitchen staff that's more likely to be getting me to increase my tab. Why aren't they sharing in the service charge? Keller may indeed have a better way, but will it be adapted by other restaurants? I've watched too many inferior plans, systems and projects outsell their superior rivals. PT Barnum and HL Menken knew that.

Don't be silly. In France, where service is included, it's not uncommon to leave a few coins on the bar or 5% at a restauraurant. Some people leave 10% at a good restaurant and that's in addition to the included service. Tips are always in cash, never added to the credit card amount. My guess is that a minimum service charge will not decrease the take for waiters in the long run. Rich, you refer several times to your experience and in a way that implies it's more extensive, or at least more reliable than the independent studies. Could you explain why? I find the studies reasonably reliable.

I know that at one of NYC's four star restaurants, clients with "house accounts," that is those who sign their checks and get a bill at the end of the month, a 20% service charge is automatically added to the bill. I don't know what percentage of those regulars do the special handshake with the captain or manager, nor do I know their Christmans gift pattern, but I suspect those regulars all receive excellent treatment. I'm pretty well convinced that the waiter's making the most in tips on any given night at most good restaurants are those who get the "good" tables rather than those who give the best service. I've read the same studies Fat Guy has. They all show that tipping is related to the tipper's habits and attitude and that each tipper is far less influenced by the actual service received. As for rewarding good waiters and not paying for bad service, it's not an option I have in most other places. Certainly I don't have that in department stores or other shops. I wonder how many people tip more for a good haircut than a bad haircut. Most people I know just take their business elsewhere, which is what happens as well in restaurants. I don't care how good the food is, people will rarely return if they experience bad service. For that reason, it's essential for a fine restaurant to make sure they employ only excellent waiterstaff. As for pooling tips as an unworkable example of communism in the captialist society of a restaurant, the waiter works for the company and by all rights should be paid a salary by the company. If I'm responsible for determining his wage after the meal, why don't I have the same privilege of stiffing the cook, or perhaps if I'm responsible for paying for the waiter, I should contract independently for service. In truth, the restaurant owner is responsibile for seeing to it that I not only get good food, but good service as well. They are, as one poster has already noted, inseparalble when it comes to my overall dining experience.

Le Relais Bernard Loiseau in Saulieu is rated at three stars in the current 2005 Guide Michelin.

I think the Jersey show best captured a range from the sacred to the profane so far and thus seemed to offer redeeming value to those offended by the self indulgency. I thought the Howard Johhnson scene was exceptionally poignant. As someone who has eaten in HoJo's on main highways as a kid and remembers them as bustling places, this cavernous hall with a lone diner and what appeared to be a single employee working the grill and waiting tables was masterly. I have a suspicion that it was shot in off hours with the manager agreeing to cook the grilled cheese sandwich and serve it, but so what. It was poetry.

I haven't been there in about a month, and before tomatoes were really in season. In past summers they've had truly excellent heirloom tomato salads and have run whole tomato tasting menus. Heirloom tomatoes are becoming more common and easier for the rest of us to find in the market, but they have their sources and like other top restaurants in the city, tap into the best of local seasonal produce. I generally have the tasting menu. Sometimes, if I'm lucky, as a long time and fairly regular patron, I get something special thats not on the menu anyway, so it's hard for me to advise on what to order. Then again, they have my complete trust so that more often than not, I don't look at the menu. The wine list is fairly small and I've generally been able to trust them on chocies when in doubt.

I was very pleased with the conrast between my smoked fish and raw shrimp and the lamb offal. I would be curious to taste his cooked fish, but if I were to be in Madrid in the fall or winter, I would definitely return for game. The pigeon dish from your choices sounds appealing. I love pigeon and birds with dark meat as well as offal. It's interesting that he serves duck hearts. I don't think I've ever seen them on a menu, but they're easy to find in NY's Chinatown and I used to prepare them when our daughter was a child. When she was very little, she liked to eat bowls of small round food. Of course we made small meatballs, but poultry hearts were ideal and they became a favorite dish.

I think that's true for traditional indigenous, authentic, etc. dishes. I would tend to except the classic haut cuisine dishes as codified by Escoffier. The codification laid down the law pretty much precisely as to how a dish was to be cooked and garnished to a very great degree, leaving far less room for individual interpretation. forty years ago, I assumed my progress in becoming a sophisticated diner would be tied to remembering the codes for garnishes and the like so as never to be surprised at the appearance of a dish. Today of course, most sophisticated diners go to creative restaurants hoping to be surprised by the chef's creativity and ingenuity and we no longer expect a three star restaurant to cook the same dishes as the two star restaurant, only a little better.

Not too long after vmilor was introduced to Arce, Mrs. B and I were also taken there. By the end of May, there was no question of game on the menu, but we had no complaints. In every season there is something special to be had in Spain that is special and there are special restaurants that escape the attention they merit. Although without a Michelin star, I don't know that it's accurate to describe Arce as unnoticed. It does have a sol from Campsa and was highly recommended in an article from the Sunday NY Times Travel section on restaurants in Madrid that's been sitting on my desk since the week after we returned from Madrid as a reminder to reinforce vmilor's recommendation. It seemed that one doesn't just order from the menu at Arce, but neither is there a set tasting menu offered. Rather, chef Iñaki Camba arrives at your table asking questions about your appetite and tastes as he discusses some of the things he's prepared to cook this evening. Camba doesn't play the role of a welcoming host, he is that host. He's not making you feel he's cooking for you. He is cooking for you and it seems as important to him as it is for you to feel the restaurant is his home and that he's not just in the kitchen working at his job, but feeding his guests. The dish I will recall longer than many others was unfortunately one I didn't order but which I had a spoonful of from my neighbor's plate. It was the most flavorful dish of spring peas. I love vegetables and really enjoy them when they're served to me, but like many people, I don't focus on ordering them often enough when I have the chance. The Spanish, contrary to the prevailing tourist opinions I've read, have some excellent vegetable dishes in the national, or maybe in the many regional repertoire(s), but this wasn't really a dish I would have associated with Spain, which only proves that I've got much more to learn, or that Iñaki is a suprising cook who follows his own dictates. Actually the latter is a forgone conclulsions, although it doesn't negate the former. Camba seems to be an old fashioned hands on cook although his food is neither old fashioned nor fashionable. Nevertheless, I sensed a respect for the craft more than the art of cooking and and a focus on taste rather than presentation. The beauty of a macaroni dish was in its texture and depth of taste from the reduced sauce in which it was cooked. It was like Catalan pasta rather than Itallian pasta. His lightly smoked fish and meat, as well as a raw shrimp dish are very contemporary dishes, but personal expressions rather than technically ground breaking. It's exceptionally satisfying food, but it's also food you think about. This is not to say there's an abdication of a cook's responsibility to make every dish attractive. I think his china alone speaks for his interest in the visual effects. Here's the bread plate for example. By the way, that was an excellent roll. Mrs. B and I Had much the same menu with an exception. We started with Ahumados hechos en la casa: pulpo, salmon fresco, bacalao y presas de solomillo (fish and veal smoked in house: octopus, salmon, codfish and veal all sliced very thinly and served with a little mashed potato and olive oil). Gambas frescas, machacadas sobre salsa tartar con gelatina de la cabeza (fresh shrimp pounded thin served over a tartar sauce with a gelatin made with the juices from the shirmp's head) followed. Then came a Surtido de cetas (assortment of mushrooms: cepes, perechicos, etc.). Esparragos blancos de Navarra simplemente hervidos y servidos con aceite de oliva y limon fresh asparagus from Navarra, simply boiled and served with olive oil and lemon juice for Mrs. B. Fideau con salsa de crustaceos (elbow macaroni with a crustacean sauce) for me. Finally Higado de cordero con el corazon, riñones y pulmones encebollados (lamb liver with the heart, kidneys and lungs with sauteed onions) for me. What I recall as roast pork for Mrs. B. I have a photo but no notes.

That looks like cuttle fish to me.

I'm not always sure where to draw the line between squid and cuttle fish, but seiche is definitely not octopus.

Marlena, I suspect there's kind of a man bites dog sort of news in Slater's comment. If 90% of the French population eats croissants, brioche and tartine beurre for breakfast, but the rest of the world thinks that's all they eat, the fact that 5 or 10% eat cocoa puffs or corn flakes becomes news. Worse yet is that kind of news gets blown out of proportion. The other thing, and to which you allude, is that regardless of the percentages, is it more interesting to focus on our similarities or our differences? At least in this sort of situation, I'd agree with you that it's the local customs that are the interesting aspect. For all that, when we were traveling with our daughter who must have been in college, or maybe high school, what do I remember her feeling she had to bring back for her friends? It was something like cocoa puffs, but with a funny name. We have friends in the Bas Languedoc. They live in a tiny village. There's a boulangerie one village over. They make an attempt at baking croissants. Personally, I'd discourage the wasted efforts although they make some decent bread. Better bread and pastry comes from the nearest town, a short drive away. Thus breakfast at their house is always toast. After dinner, the remaining bread is sliced and put in a plastic bag to be toasted for breakfast. There's usually some excellent honey and maybe a local artisanal jam. There are usually some oranges to squeeze. She has tea and the rest of us have espresso. I don't know that this is typical of anything, and in fact, these are Americans.

I think he was quite candid about being bored at the national feast and quick to tell us the food was gross. There was a certain suspense in wondering if he was going to be bored stiff or frozen stiff first. Still it was entertaining, but those looking for some real evenhanded insight into highlights of the culutre are probably not going to be happy with the episode. It's really turning into the anti-travelog and for those who have seen enough travelogs, that in itself may be enough to justify its existence. Tony's travel persona is the foil to Rick Steve's Pollyanna, or perhaps the balance. The only really annoying thing about the episode was that he was suppplied with the ubiquitous Heineken beer for his picnic.

July and August are my least favorite months to be in Philadelphia.

The other night, for the first time, they served two soft corn tortillas with each taco instead of the single tortilla they'd been serving. It made the whole thing so much easier to eat especially as their tacos tend to be jucier than others I've had in Manahattan. What makes is so much not a destination place, but nevertheless so appealing to me, is that there's a only narrow shelf inside that serves as a counter on which to eat, but the sidewalk is wide and there's not much street traffic that's not headed for the tacqueria, cafe or restaurant and there are a bunch of people standing around in the street eating tacos when it's crowded. It's kind of like something you'd expect to find at the beach, but not in Manhatttan.

I tend to agree and to distinguish that from the way a cuisine is modified as it travels or as new ingredients are brought into play. A tomato sauce in Italy doesn't qualify as fusion to my mind just because tomatoes were originally foreign to Italy. Meatballs and spaghetti doesn't qualify either just because it's not native to Italy. Perhaps it's an Italian-American dish, but like Tex-Mex, it's not fusion like say Pacific Rim cuisine. Although in another class perhaps, I don't think I'd classify the watering down of a cuisine for foreign local tastes or the substitution of local products in a dish cooked overseas for locals of the overseas country as fusion. In fact, I think of fusion cuisine as a term coined to cover a specific philosophy and group of concepts common to many creative chefs in the last quarter of the 20th century.

Any further information on this? Looking at Da Vittorio's website - http://www.davittorio.com/ - I see La Cantalupa, a banquet and events place under the same ownership, that's apparently been operating since 1996 if my interpretation is correct. Admittedly, I don't really read Italian. La Cantalupa has a dining room that serves 370 people and a terrace that holds 450 people. This doesn't seem as if it would be the new restaurant, although the new restaurant could be on the same property or using the same name. I can't find any information regarding a move on the site. I'm also aware of how painfully out of date many web sites are, just as I'm aware that these kinds of moves are sometimes months behind schedule.

It's also not my idea of summer food. Come to think of it, most Shanghai dishes, or at least the ones I like, seem to be heavy foods. I haven't been in Joe's Shanghai in years. The opened Joe's Ginger north of Canal Street and we go there a fair amount however. Similar menus, but I think the menu at JS is more extensive. Posting for same day recommendations can be frustrating. I just got to the thread. I hope you went for the Shanghai food as recommended. I think that's what they do best, but I've enjoyed most of the other food I've had there. They used to make a very good rendition of baby bok choy with black mushrooms, or regular bok choy when baby bok choy wasn't available.