Spice Market

[Bond Girl]

JG wrote the forward in Hesser's book on her husband.

[Jinmyo]

It comes as no surprise that her review of Spice Market or any Jean-Georges restaurant for that matter will be skewed. It must have been a pleasure for her to write a whole review about a Jean-Georges restaurant instead of having to throw references in while reviewing a less important place.

O-ho-ho-ho.

[Jason Perlow]

Today's entry on the Upsaid Eurotrash Blog has some uh, colorful things to say about Amanda's Spice Market review.

[Lesley C]

I also had a tough time getting through the review because it was bogged down with adjectives. And I read the description of the restaurant three times and still couldn't picture it.

Also, notice there wasn't a single negative comment in the entire text. I never trust a review that reads like a PR document. One, just one little negative in there would have added some much needed balance to all the praise.

[bloviatrix]

Today's entry on the Upsaid Eurotrash Blog has some uh, colorful things to say about Amanda's Spice Market review.

Codswallop. I've got to add that word to my vocabulary.

[kinichiwa]

I am amazed at the 3 star review... I personally feel that Ms. Hesser should have recused herself from reviewing a restaurant that is owned by a friend. If not that, then she could a least have spared a sentence to let the public know that Jean George has written either a blurb or the forward to her book "about her husband". (as Marion Burros did about her "friendship" w/Mario Battali and Joe Batianich in the infamous Casa Monos review)

We are all aware that the star system is not just about the food. The ambiance, service and the all around comfort level will factor into the equation. In this instance it could have garnered the restaurant 2 stars. If the food I have eaten there is any example 2 stars would have been pushing it.

[Fat Guy]

I personally feel that Ms. Hesser should have recused herself from reviewing a restaurant that is owned by a friend. If not that, then she could a least have spared a sentence to let the public know that Jean George has written either a blurb or the forward to her book "about her husband".

Or she could have just written a fair, independent, objective review.

[tan319]

Today's entry on the Upsaid Eurotrash Blog has some uh, colorful things to say about Amanda's Spice Market review.

OK, this eurotrash site is funny as hell, thank you, Jason!!!

I liked this one, from Hesser's review.

Talk about a thesuraus(sic?)

"A tangy herbal galangal sauce is whipped into a celadon foam."

Greyish yellow green didn't sound as appetizing, I guess.

But, that's cool.

Didn't Gael Greene used to write stuff like this?

I want to go to this place as soon as I get back east.

This sounds like a really good 2 star place, though.

BTW, did Mix get 2 or 3 stars?

[Fat Guy]

Two stars for Mix (from Grimes, not Hesser).

[kinichiwa]

Well, I guess the Fat Guy is right, after today's review I will always wonder if Ms. Hesser really is being objective or just "waxing poetic" about another friend's restaurant.

It wouldn't be so tough to bear if we all didn't realize how much reviews mean to business and just as much to the customer hoping to get their monies worth!

[Bond Girl]

That Euro trash blog was laugh out loud funny! In all fairness, I think the Spice Market is a good two stars, by giving it three, Amanda Hesser is driving her credibility to the ground.

[tan319]

Two stars for Mix (from Grimes, not Hesser).

And you didn't feel like it was a 3 star, correct?

For the kind of restaurant they are?

[Fat Guy]

I think Mix should be a three-star, no question. I'm sure that's the sentiment of quite a few well-dined eGulleters who've had great meals there. But I don't want to diverge onto a Mix tangent -- we've got a few Mix threads we can use for that.

[Jason Perlow]

And don't get me started on Hearth...

[Bux]

I also had a tough time getting through the review because it was bogged down with adjectives. And I read the description of the restaurant three times and still couldn't picture it.

I also had a bit of trouble with feedback between the three stars I noticed on my way into the restaurant and the "Late Night with David Letterman" T-shirt on the maître d'hôtel. Then I got hung up on the the multcolored description of a set out of blade runner, but was she saying J-G was like a club owner at 66 before he realized he was a sensualist? It was good to have seen the three star rating first, because softened mushrooms, sauce clinging in a light loose layer and "fried stiff" are not the terms that make me salivate the way three stars does. Unlike the eurotrash blogger, I wondered who determined that the soup is eaten with a spoon. I mean who determines that the dish is not from a part of the world where the soup bowl is lifted to the lips? I wondered if Martha Stewart designed the ginger ale with a "perfect" zip. Blood orange mojitos are what I want when I'm dreaming of eating food in Asian streets. A Pattaya "screams with passion fruit but is delicately bubbly." Is that a surprise, is that a place for a "but?" Knowing the food goes better with cocktails than beer or wine is a clincher and I'm convinced it's anything but a three star restaurant. I'm waiting for the correction to appear next Wednesday.

[Pan]

Today's entry on the Upsaid Eurotrash Blog has some uh, colorful things to say about Amanda's Spice Market review.

Thanks, Jason. That was really funny!

[SobaAddict70]

If only she had rated it four stars so we know where she REALLY stands.

Soba

[Bond Girl]

And don't get me started on Hearth...

Me too!

[Fat Guy]

Three stars for Hearth makes more sense than three-star chicken wings, but two stars is probably the most appropriate rating for Hearth. Hearth is a great two-star restaurant. If you look at ADNY, Le Bernardin, Per Se, et al., as the restaurants operating at a four-star level, and you look at Craft and Gramercy Tavern as three-star restaurants, it doesn't make any sense to give three stars to Hearth. The restaurant simply lacks the luxury appointments, ingredients budget, and quantity of service to propel it into that category. Instead, you get excellent cooking at an extremely reasonable price point in a neighborhood-restaurant setting. That's what being a great two-star restaurant is all about. If, at the conceptual stage, Hearth wanted to be a three-star restaurant it would have been engineered according to a different plan. I'm sure there was always the secret hope that a critic might like Marco's cooking so much that Hearth could get three stars, but I'm equally convinced that Hearth was built from the ground up to be a great two-star restaurant.

[wordplay]

Today, Manhattan User's Guide asks Hesser, Why?

(Click on "Weekend Pleasures" and scroll to the bottom.)

[Bux]

If, at the conceptual stage, Hearth wanted to be a three-star restaurant it would have been engineered according to a different plan. I'm sure there was always the secret hope that a critic might like Marco's cooking so much that Hearth could get three stars, but I'm equally convinced that Hearth was built from the ground up to be a great two-star restaurant.

I'm pretty well in agreement with you on this. The problem may well be in the fact that the NY Times four star system has been shot so full of holes by recent reviewers that it's become easy enough to justify any rating for any restaurant if you simply need to point to a dozen other places for reference points. The food at Hearth, based on single visits and in my opinion, is considerably better than at Bolo, but no better than at Blue Hill.

Four stars should allow for a more exact classification than three stars, but I'm afraid Michelin ratings for all their subjectivity, are a lot better and more reasonable than the NY Times. Here in NY, we've come to accept two stars as a restaurant worth making a reservation to eat at in advance and expect any place worth our time and money to have at least one star. In France most people eat at unstarred restaurants most of the time.

My interest in food in the abstract is such that I find it suprising to see a three star review that turns me off from the food. Nevertheless, with the insider information that Gray Kunz is involved in the restaurant, I am interested in experiencing it for myself. Kunz is no god, but over the course of a few meals I've had from his restaurant kitchens, my expectations would be very high. I don't think he's a better chef than Jean-Georges, but possibly because JG has been involved in so many restaurants of varying calibers and Kunz has been more of a myth in recent years, I have a higher expectation as a result of Kunz's invovlement.

I'm being somewhat facetious about "insider" information. Kunz's involvement in Spice Market has been widely reported, even in the NY Times. It seems a serious lapse of information transfer to the diner to omit mention in the review. Then again Vongerichten is only mentioned ten times, not counting the number of times he is referred to by pronoun. Anyone care to search and find the record number of times a chef is mentioned in a restaurant review?

[Daniel]

I really dont see how blue hill and hearth can be compared. I recently went to hearth with a friend who knew paul and marco. We asked them if we could have something more then the 48 dollar tasting menu more around a 100. Paul looked at us and said, i could give you something, but its not going to be close to a hundred bucks a piece. And i think his response prooves FG'S point, that they dont use the more expensive ingrediants to even qualify for three stars. I had pretty much every entree and appetizer on the menu and most things were good, but not fantastic. Most very simple, yet tasty, but certainly not as complex or well crafted as the food at blue hill.

One dish i felt completely didnt work. I had this one beef soup, with parmasean croutons, and sea salt. This dish was almost inedible. It was so super salty. That would never have happened at blue hill. I would say hearth is a great two star place.

[SobaAddict70]

And i think his response prooves FG'S point, that they dont use the more expensive ingrediants to even qualify for three stars.  I had pretty much every entree and appetizer on the menu and most things were good, but not fantastic.  Most very simple, yet tasty, but certainly not as complex or well crafted as the food at blue hill.

Babbo doesn't use super-duper expensive ingredients and it's a three star restaurant. Biltmore Room isn't Blue Hill and it's a three star restaurant. On the other hand, Jewel Bako uses top notch ingredients all the time and it doesn't have a three star rating.

You can eat very well at Babbo for approximately the same prices as at Hearth. If price differential were the main defining factor in handing out stars, then we'd have more three star and four star restos in New York than hairs on a donkey's tail. Matters of taste being what they are, in my opinion, the food at Hearth easily compares with that at Craft or at GT.

Soba

[Daniel]

Babbo doesn't use super-duper expensive ingredients and it's a three star restaurant

You are right, you are right. Nothing is a rule. And I should have included intricate dishes, combinations of flavor, as well as expensive ingredients. I think that the food at hearth used simple ingredients, and processes, perhaps with the exception of the rabbit dish which I loved. I also think the casual atmosphere, and the ugly uniforms the waiters wear all make it a great two star.

Mario uses such unique ingredients, combinations, and excellent preparations, that the food alone deserves three stars even before you throw in the beautiful space, the refined settings and staff. And now that i am thinking about it i think more then one star should seperate hearth and babbo.

[Bux]

I really dont see how blue hill and hearth can be compared.

I didn't mean to imply they were necessarily comparable, although I could see someone preferring either one to the other on subjective grounds. Blue Hill's cooking has more finesse in my opinion and would most certainly be the more likely to get three stars. Still, if all the restaurants in NYC were lumped into only four classifications, it would not be outlandish for these two restaurants to be in the same group. Likewise, I wouldn't be offended or suprised to see Blue Hill lumped in with Cafe Boulud and Gramercy Tavern. My point was that there are three star restaurants where the food is not as interesting nor as well conceived or prepared as at either Blue Hill or Hearth. Of course I've had only one meal at Hearth and while I loved it, I wasn't quite as moved as I was by my first meal at Blue Hill. then again I get more jaded every day.

I suppose this is relevant to the review in the Times, rather than to the main topic of this thread.