Bruni and Beyond: NYC Reviewing (2004)

[Fat Guy]

Michael behaved badly so we put him on the night shift.

Oakapple, my feeling about the sample-size argument is that the sample size for restaurant reviews is always too small. Especially when you're talking about service and consistency issues, how could even 10 visits be considered a meaningful sample to a scientifically inclined person? Moreover, in terms of the number of samples pertaining to a given review (as opposed to longer term sampling over time) nobody but nobody does more than the New York Times critic. Most of the professional newspaper critics are dining out 2-3 times per review and that represents the sum total of their review-related dining. The Times critic is dining out somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 times a week, both for the main review and the "Diner's Journal," and is able to visit restaurants he doesn't review so as to acquire perspective. He has the budget to make those visits anywhere -- not just for the purpose of comparing Peter Luger and Wolfgang's, but also in order to compare, say, Per Se and French Laundry, or if he so chooses ADNY, ADPA, and Louis XV. So by the standards of the industry -- which does not operate under laboratory conditions -- it really can't be said that the Times critic has a small sample size. What Bruni has right now seems to be limited perspective, some gaps in his background, and some questionable strategies for crafting reviews.

[robyn]

Does that sound like a "flunking" review to you? It certainly doesn't to me!

Now, I do have to admit that this praise is difficult to square with the "overbroiled" comment at the end of the review. And this may be Bruni's real failing to date: a failure to communicate clearly. But reading the review in its totality, you cannot possibly conclude that Wolfgang's had come anywhere close to "flunking" at the art of broiling a steak.

I have never (and will never) dine in a NYC restaurant to eat something as basic as a steak.

Far be it from me to tell you what to order, but there is quite a bit more to making a first-class steak than merely getting the doneness right. The big steakhouses age their meat, which makes an enormous difference. They are also able to get higher quality beef than is found at your typical community supermarket. Even if you have the same product quality and age it yourself, it is no small feat to produce the "crunchy, tender, smoky, earthy" taste Bruni referred to. If you can do all that consistently, I congratulate you. But lastly, there is of course the pleasure of having it all done for you, which is one of the reasons we eat out.

Agreed that the review comments seem to be inconsistent. Perhaps Bruni's standards are different than mine. I like my beef rare - and I don't care how good the beef is - if I don't get it rare I send it back. In fact - the better the cut of beef - the more of a tragedy it is to overcook it IMO.

I'm sure New York has great places to eat steak - but so do many other cities (my own included). And it's something I can do myself very easily on the rare occasion that I want to eat a steak. When I travel to a place like NYC - I want to eat the things I can't get at local restaurants - things I'd never ever consider trying to cook in my home. Just a personal preference on my part. Robyn

[Pan]

concerning my post about the politics of the NYC newspapers (even though I was just stating what is a general consensus - nothing controversial there)

Now, you're trying to argue that it's a "general consensus" that the Times is an "ultra left-wing paper." I'd call that a highly tendentious remark, but more importantly, one which would tend to provoke strong responses on an off-topic subject. So please, let's consider that tangent closed.

You write:

I can't think of a reviewer that I didn't or don't like

You may have felt I was implying a personal animus toward Bruni on your part. You may not have any personal animus toward him, but you have taken strong exception to his reviews. So let me rephrase my question: When is the last time there's been a main New York Times restaurant critic whose reviews you generally liked?

[rich]

You write:

I can't think of a reviewer that I didn't or don't like

You may have felt I was implying a personal animus toward Bruni on your part. You may not have any personal animus toward him, but you have taken strong exception to his reviews. So let me rephrase my question: When is the last time there's been a main New York Times restaurant critic whose reviews you generally liked?

No Michael, I knew you weren't making it personal.

Generally, I liked Bruni's first two reviews - thought the Babbo was top notch except for the line about the "music as emblematic." (Still think it's a silly reason to "take away" stars, but that's another issue that has been beaten to death.)

The last two reviews had serious flaws, but it had nothing to do with his opinions about the food.

I generally enjoy all reviews and reviewers because I think it's fun to read other people's thoughts about restaurants. So I really can't single out any NY Times reviewer that I have liked over another in the last thirty-five years or so. Mostly, they're all the same - just a person giving their opinion about a restaurant.

And you never mentioned why you were awake at 3:00 a.m.

[oakapple]

Most of the professional newspaper critics are dining out 2-3 times per review and that represents the sum total of their review-related dining.

Compare this to theater and music critics, who often publish reviews based on just one observation. Now, granted a restaurant offers a menu of choices, while a theater or concert offers the same thing to everyone that attends. But live performances are not identical every time, even if the personnel remain consistent. And in theater and opera, there are cast changes, but usually it's only the opening night cast that gets reviewed.

Although restaurant critics make multiple visits, I suspect they order different items on each visit, so each dish is tested only once. If the restaurant fouls up their signature dish the night Frank Bruni tastes it, that's tough luck — just like if a Metropolitan Opera tenor cracks his top notes on opening night.

Edited July 1, 2004 by oakapple (log)

[Pan]

And you never mentioned why you were awake at 3:00 a.m.

You wanna make something of it?

[rich]

And you never mentioned why you were awake at 3:00 a.m.

You wanna make something of it?

No, I'm just jealous.

[mikeyrad]

I think that the idea of appoximating a side-by-side test between Wolfgang's and Peter Luger is a good idea.  Bruni mentioned in the review that he had been to Wolfgang's at least twice, and I'm sure that he has visited Luger many times.  However, from reading the review, it seems that the "side-by-side" was performed only once.  This means that the thickness of the steak at both restaurants was measured once.  Also, the doneness of the steaks was compared just a single time.  No tendency to overbroil, underbroil, or sporadically over and under broil is mentioned.  My problem with Bruni's "experiment" is that the sample size is too small to be reliable.

The more I think about this comment, the more I conclude that it is totally specious. Every critic in town that has reviewed Wolfgang's has compared it to Luger. It's an unavoidable comparison, and nobody on eGullet had questioned whether those other critics had a large enough "sample size" to do this. Bruni merely did something further, which was to compare them on the same day, and furthermore, to make that excursion the focal point of his review. He could simply have done what all the other critics did, which is to include the comparison without mentioning his two-Porterhouses-in-one-day steak orgy, in which case it likely would have passed under your nose without notice, and without the accusation of a purportedly inadequate sample size.

Bruni specifically compares the thickness and doneness of the porterhouses served by both restaurants. So if Bruni is an eGullet lurker I'd like to know if he measured the thickness of all of the porterhouses that he sampled at Wolfgang's? Were they all the same thickness? Were they all overbroiled? Did he sample Luger's multiple times during the review period? Did he measure the thickness of all the porterhouses that he sampled at Luger's? Were all the steaks at Luger's the same thickness, the same doneness? If the results were consistent based on multiple visits to BOTH establishments then my objection to the review would not be the testing methodoloy; but possibly even more troubling -- unclear writing.

[Bux]

Just to follow up on my last post. To show how "off" Wolfgang's review was. The headline mentioned "cardiologists." This has no place in a restaurant review. If I want to read the medical/science section, I can find it myself.

If the health aspects of food are not germane to a restaurant review, what would you say about cleanliness? Of course health concerns belong in a food review and as oakapple already noted, reviewers have great license in where they can go in making their points, or even just to entertain. Personally I found the cardiology references trite and the jokes just stale, but I suspect he thought he was dealing in commonly accepted folk humor. Maybe his residency in Rome left him out of touch with American vernacular or in touch with an out of date attitude. Nevertheless, I thought he made it clear that he doesn't find too much to talk about in regard to a steak house. Did Craig Clairborne ever review Peter Lugar? This is all part of the initial period where we get to know Mr. Bruni and it strikes me that some people here are looking for insight while others are just looking to put him down.

The most irrelevant stuff in this thread is the comment about his paper's political leaning. That came in a paragraph that accused it of both leaving NYC and being the only paper left representing one extreme of the political spectrum, both of which would have no bearing on the quality of its restaurant critic's reviews even if they were'nt in conflict with each other.

[robyn]

If the health aspects of food are not germane to a restaurant review, what would you say about cleanliness?

I look at the sanitation aspects of a restaurant with one eye - and the health/sociological/political aspects of a restaurant with another quite different eye. I'd like to know if a restaurant is unsanitary. But if people want to eat beef - or genetically modified food - or foie gras - or Chilean sea bass - or triple cream cheese - or any other kind of food that might be unhealthy/politically incorrect /whatever at a restaurant - that's up to them. I don't think the latter has a place in a restaurant review in the "mainstream" media. And I would appreciate it if people who don't approve of their choices confine their objections to speech (as opposed to vandalism). Robyn

[picaman]

From the review:

"Luger also hewed to our medium-rare request. Wolfgang's had overbroiled.

But not by much."

If Bruni is reviewing a steakhouse and his steak is not delivered to order, should he send it back and note that fact in the review? Sending back an steak not cooked to one's liking is standard practice for steakhouse customers.

My first reaction is a hesitant yes, acknowledging that this opens a big can of worms that may negate the logic of my answer. Would the reviewer then be bound to endlessly order steaks if necessary to obtain a perfectly cooked steak for review? Should this theoretical multiple ordering then figure negatively (they can't cook steak properly) or positively (the restaurant goes to any length to please a customer) into the overall impression of the restaurant? Perhaps his steak was "close enough", but does its imperfection unfairly color the review?

Certainly at the very least, in a steakhouse review, mention of the reviewer's perception of the restaurant's handling of this issue would be welcome, as this is a common experience for customers and one that is crucial for many.

Jamie

[rich]

If the health aspects of food are not germane to a restaurant review, what would you say about cleanliness? Of course health concerns belong in a food review

I respectfully disagree Bux. Cleanliness has nothing to do with the "cardiology" comments. There has been enough press about the pros and cons of eating beef over the last 20 years that to "waste" space on this type of "humor" is pointless.

If a reviewer wants to mention that a restaurant serves heavy sauces and rich food that's fine. But when you're reviewing a steak house, it's totally redundant to discuss the problems with eating beef. I would assume when people decide to patronize a steak house, they have already made their decision about that.

I haven't noticed anyone trying to put Bruni down. It seems to me, the major concerns have been his lack of insight, writing style and methodology. Those are just observances, not personal attacks. In fact, if anyone has been "personal," it was Bruni in his Bouley review.

[oakapple]

If a reviewer wants to mention that a restaurant serves heavy sauces and rich food that's fine. But when you're reviewing a steak house, it's totally redundant to discuss the problems with eating beef. I would assume when people decide to patronize a steak house, they have already made their decision about that.

I have to agree with Rich. The cholesterol joke (and from the tone, it very clearly is an attempt at humor) appears six times in the review. After its first or second appearance, it was time to move onto some substance. We can debate whether restaurant reviews are the place for general health tips, but that's clearly not what's going on here. Bruni is just poking fun at restaurants that serve huge steaks. He's also poking fun at himself, for having attempted the ludicrous feat of eating two of these steaks in the same evening—something even Dr. Atkins probably would not recommend. Given what is obviously a very limited space budget, Bruni should have focused on what we really want in a restaurant review, which is information about the restaurant itself. Sure, we got some of that, but coverage of the non-steak menu items was limited to a couple of sentences.

Edited July 2, 2004 by oakapple (log)

[Fat Guy]

For a working restaurant critic, the mere fact of eating two steaks in an evening is just not a big deal. It may seem like a big deal in one's first month on the job, but this sort of intensive comparative eating is common to the profession wherever there is a budget for it. When you eat at seven or eight restaurants in a single day, it maybe becomes newsworthy (I've done that sort of thing when on travel assignments, and once a guy from a local magazine came around with me and wrote about how many restaurants we visited -- I guess that was deemed interesting to the magazine's readers), though Robert Sietsema has been known to push well into the teens. Learning that a restaurant reviewer ate two steaks -- and, more likely, simply tasting parts of two steaks -- is about as groundbreaking as learning that a new Porsche can go really fast. What was interesting was not that he ate a lot of food but, rather, that he did a comparison that is more definitive than the impressionistic "I ate at Luger's last month and Wolfgang's today and, yeah, I thought they were really similar" type of report you get from people who don't eat for a living. So the setup is all there: now we are going to get the non-impressionistic, side-by-side, professional verdict. And instead in the end we get mostly impressionism.

[Bux]

If the health aspects of food are not germane to a restaurant review, what would you say about cleanliness? Of course health concerns belong in a food review

I respectfully disagree Bux. Cleanliness has nothing to do with the "cardiology" comments. There has been enough press about the pros and cons of eating beef over the last 20 years that to "waste" space on this type of "humor" is pointless.

There's where we find common ground. While I understand that some people found a puritanical edge to those comments, my sense was not at all that Bruni was lecturing on how to eat a healthy diet. I am convinced it was a feeble attempt at making jokes and can more easily accept the criticism that he should have been providing more information, or even just opinion, about the restaurant. I think a member or two have commented that he doesn't appear to have much to say about steakhouses or doesn't take them seriously enough to warrant more than he's said.

I think we could hold a lively debate on whether a steakhouse deserves as high a rating as a haute cuisine restaurant or as much column space. The latter may be the more interesting topic. I can usually tell how important a restaurant is in the eyes of the GaultMillau guide to restaurants in France, not only by the rating (based on a perfect score of twenty) but by the length of the text devoted to the restaurant. Where the quality is at the same level, I get the sense that the restaurant with the longer review is the more important one. Perhaps Bruni would be happier to write less about a great steakhouse than a good French restaurant. Perhaps there's more to say about a creative restaurant than one producing the same excellent food it has for years on end.

I didn't mean to imply that cleanliness and cardiology were related other than that they can both be applicable to a review of food or restaurants as can so many other topics.

[bloviatrix]

I think we could hold a lively debate on whether a steakhouse deserves as high a rating as a haute cuisine restaurant or as much column space. The latter may be the more interesting topic. I can usually tell how important a restaurant is in the eyes of the GaultMillau guide to restaurants in France, not only by the rating (based on a perfect score of twenty) but by the length of the text devoted to the restaurant. Where the quality is at the same level, I get the sense that the restaurant with the longer review is the more important one. Perhaps Bruni would be happier to write less about a great steakhouse than a good French restaurant. Perhaps there's more to say about a creative restaurant than one producing the same excellent food it has for years on end.

Blovie and I were discussing whether or not a steakhouse deserves to even be reviewed. Steakhouses are their own little universe, and ultimately you're looking at the quality of the beef and how well it's been cooked. The spinach and potatoes should be good, but you don't want anything too original. If anything, creativity would be frowned upon in an steakhouse.

In the end, we decided that steakhouses are the culinary equivilent of genre fiction - crime/mystery in particular.

[Bux]

Some people find steakhouses the epitome of dining out.

[robyn]

Some people find steakhouses the epitome of dining out.

And do I ever know it. We have 2 Ruth's Chris here - and a Morton's - and some local places - and they all do a great business - particularly when there are major sporting events, conventions or corporate golf outings in town. Meanwhile - places that are as expensive as steakhouses - but aren't steakhouses - don't - for the most part - do anywhere near as well. I must say my basic impression of the average steakhouse customer here isn't all that favorable - but I have to temper that impression with a few grains of salt since the majority of them are members of groups of guys who are "doing the town" while their wives are back home. And then there is the famous Jacksonville Jaguars dinner at Morton's every year - but that's a whole 'nother story (although it doesn't change my basic impression). Robyn

[Fat Guy]

It's too early to tell how the "Diner's Journal" column will impact the starred reviews, but looking at his "Diner's Journal" entries on a standalone basis it seems Frank Bruni is doing a much better job with these than his predecessor did. He's not afraid to write actual criticism, and it seems that he may be (wisely) using the "Diner's Journal" to cover restaurants he doesn't necessarily expect to review. Last week's piece on Garden Cafe was a nice bit of reporting and this week's exploration of Pure Food & Wine was especially compelling.

[robyn]

It's too early to tell how the "Diner's Journal" column will impact the starred reviews, but looking at his "Diner's Journal" entries on a standalone basis it seems Frank Bruni is doing a much better job with these than his predecessor did. He's not afraid to write actual criticism, and it seems that he may be (wisely) using the "Diner's Journal" to cover restaurants he doesn't necessarily expect to review. Last week's piece on Garden Cafe was a nice bit of reporting and this week's exploration of Pure Food & Wine was especially compelling.

I really liked the Pure Food & Wine writeup. After I read it - it crossed my mind that perhaps Bruni is simply someone like me - a reasonably intelligent person who's a decent writer - who has eaten his share of good eats - and who has his share of likes and dislikes.

I'm not sure these are great qualifications for being the head food critic of the NYT - but it means I'll probably take a close look at his opinions. I'm curious - what's the general opinion of the "raw food" scene in NY? I think it's a little silly (except when I'm on a diet and eating at home) - but I know it has lots of rabid supporters on the west coast. What Bruni basically said is it's ok intellectually - perhaps very politically correct - but not good eats.

Perhaps it doesn't take much guts to say that in NY (it would take a lot of guts in California). It would be like the head art critic for the NYT going to some art shows in NY - e.g., in the conceptual art realm - and saying the work sucks (I figure I can use the word "sucks" since Sharapova used it in her post-match interview today ). But that assumes that the NY view is identical to the California view. Are the "orthodox" foodie views the same on the right coast and left coast?

If they aren't - that would be interesting news. Kind of like the current fight in the art world between the "conceptual" and "nonconceptual" people (which has given rise to some interesting sub-fights in university art departments).

Anyway - I'm interested to hear what NY/California people have to say. Robyn

[Pan]

Robyn, what I have to say is that we have plenty to discuss about food criticism in the Times without bringing in art criticism.

[Suzanne F]

But that assumes that the NY view is identical to the California view.  Are the "orthodox" foodie views the same on the right coast and left coast?

Gee, I wouldn't know. I was brought up Conservative. My, how we change.

But hell, even in NY there's no agreement about food. No consensus, that is. How could there possibly be any so far apart (in so many ways)?

I'd be interested in trying Pure Food and Wine -- how else can one make a decision about the merits of a place? Bruni's writeup helped me figure that it's worth checking out, nothing more nor less.

[SobaAddict70]

With Mr. Bruni's review of Mas, we begin to see the inadequacies of the NYT four tier rating system:

I was served several entrees that were only slightly warm as they arrived at the table and veering dangerously in the direction of cold just minutes later.

Mr. Zamarra bakes squab in a clay shell, producing astonishingly moist flesh.

The pasta atop the lasagna was limp and floppy. The mix of mushrooms beneath cried out for more binding than the ricotta cheese provided. The dish dissolved into a watery mush.

Desserts, too, featured an equal number of misses (a lavender-infused chocolate ganache with Guinness-stout-flavored ice cream) and hits (banana tuiles with acacia honey ice cream).

This is a restaurant that rates one star? Mas is probably a two star restaurant but a review like that made it seem more like half a star to me.

Soba

[Jinmyo]

Soba, at least it seemed to talk more about the food than his other reviws have.

Go, Frank, go! Come on, you can do it!

[robyn]

Robyn, what I have to say is that we have plenty to discuss about food criticism in the Times without bringing in art criticism.   

In all seriousness - I think there's a lot of crossover these days. Just read some message about Trio - where the writer's mouth was sprayed with scented stuff that was meant to kind of bring about the experience of food - without being food. Now that surely is evocative of a lot of things going on in the art world these days.

And in all seriousness too - I don't think anyone who doesn't know about and have some comprehension of things like conceptual art or deconstructivist architecture has a clue about what's going on in these restaurants. Not that I necessarily approve of - or like - what's going on. It's just that the context is important.

You're not seriously suggesting that these things are unrelated? Of course not. That's why today's NYT has an article about the auction of everything Damien Hirst did for the restaurant Pharmacy in London. Moreover - I suspect you could supply us with the contemporary analogues in the world of music (I could probably hum a few bars - but I'd be encroaching on your area of expertise). Robyn