Overhyped culinary scene?

[vserna]

(Re-edited to cut down the number of excerpts, for copyright reasons.)

Below are excerpts from a long article, 'US leaves a bitter taste', by Michael Steinberger (the award-winning wine columnist for Slate) in the (London) Financial Times today. Here is the full text (subscription may be needed to read it in a couple of days.)

....

"François Simon is the influential restaurant critic for Le Figaro and a writer perennially irritated by the complacency of the French culinary establishment. Recently Simon visited the US expecting to return home with a glowing report on the American dining scene. Instead, he flew back to Paris with a distinctly bitter taste in his mouth. He ate at New York's three most acclaimed restaurants, Le Bernardin, Daniel and Per Se, and all three meals fell substantially short of expectations," writes Steinberger. He quotes Simon: "There were some good things, but nothing that was really fantastic. There was something missing."

Simon says traveling from Chicago on the famed Route 66 gave him an even ruder shock. Steinberger quotes Simon: "I'd wanted to be able to report that the US is getting better and better as food goes and to tell the French we're not always the best. It was so disappointing to not be able to say that."

This opinion "is certainly at odds with the prevailing wisdom in the US, where a self-congratulatory tone permeates the discussion of high-end cooking nowadays," Steinberger says. "Many chefs, restaurateurs and critics say Americans are eating better than ever, US restaurants are better than ever, and the culinary centre of gravity is shifting inexorably in America's direction." He says it's true that for sheer diversity of fare, ethnic and regional, the US is the best place. "But can a country in which probably 95 per cent of the population eats merely to live and has no appreciation of food beyond its ability to satiate the appetite truly be considered a great-food nation?"

According to the writer, in France, Italy, and Spain, "food is a matter of cultural pride," and that is not the case in the US. He quotes Alice Waters of Chez Panisse: "The vast majority of Americans have no relationship to food that is pleasurable, healthful, or responsible."

Of the "pockets of enlightened eating", the author stresses the importance of New York, "one of the world's finest food cities - in its own way, perhaps even the best." But, he says, there's just one world-class cheese shop in NYC (Murray's, in Greenwich Village), no first-rate patisserie, "perhaps one or two" decent bakeries, no good place for prepared foods.

The best thing is the improved, "never more vibrant" restaurant scene. But Steinberger believes the raucous hoopla, turning cooks into "rock stars", is skewing things. "Everywhere, it is the same seductive storyline: haute cuisine is dying in France, and along with the Spaniards, it is us, Americans, unburdened by tradition and always receptive to new ingredients and new ideas, who now have all the energy and creativity at the stove."

But Waters believes the hype has got a bit ahead of reality: "We are still learning. We're out of kindergarten."

The hype may be hurting the quality of restaurants, Steinberger says: "Recent visits to celebrated New York restaurants have been decidedly unmemorable. None of the meals were bad, but the kitchens all seemed to have been on autopilot. Perhaps the bosses were absent; rare is the top US chef these days who is not juggling multiple restaurants and side ventures.

He singlesout Vongerichten, Palmer and DiSpirito as having spread themselves too far and wide, which he says is affecting the quality of their work, while Puck and Batali are among those who "have managed to build empires without sacrificing quality."

But the US can still become a "gastronomic superpower" somewhere down the road, the author says.

Edited January 8, 2005 by vserna (log)

[John Whiting]

The answer can be given in a single sentence: The article concentrates on culinary authority coming from the top down; a genuine national cuisine comes from the bottom up. The author(s) should have paid less attention to the high fliers and more to the vast world of ethnic cuisine, both imported and indigenous.

EDIT: I've just retrieved the entire article without a sub. This may remain possible for a day or so.

Edited January 8, 2005 by John Whiting (log)

[Suzanne F]

Simon experienced an even ruder shock driving from Chicago to Los Angeles via the famed Route 66.

Maybe he needed to do a bit more research before he left instead of relying on some romantic ideal of bygone days. Probably he never got over the shock that it is almost impossible to even FIND Route 66 in some areas.

[vserna]

  Maybe he needed to do a bit more research before he left instead of relying on some romantic ideal of bygone days. Probably he never got over the shock that it is almost impossible to even FIND Route 66 in some areas.

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We Europeans always engage in our own road movies when in the US. And there are many chunks of Route 66 that are easily found today! What remains to be seen is whateverf of gastronomic interest there ever was along Route 66... I guess Simon meant the towns: Chicago, St. Louis, Amarillo...

[vserna]

The article concentrates on culinary authority coming from the top down; a genuine national cuisine comes from the bottom up.  The author(s) should have paid less attention to the high fliers and more to the vast world of ethnic cuisine.

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I'm not sure this is entirely the case, John. It does address the overall culinary scene, i.e. away from le Bernardin. I'm not saying the conclusions are correct or incorrect, only that it does look at the problem of a 'national cuisine' from the bottom up. For instance:

"In France, Italy, and Spain, food is a matter of cultural pride, connoisseurship is regarded as a virtue, and mealtime is seen as more than just a pit stop. Clearly, the same cannot be said of the US. "The vast majority of Americans have no relationship to food that is pleasurable, healthful, or responsible," says Alice Waters, the owner of Berkeley's legendary Chez Panisse and a woman who can justly be described as the doyenne of American Epicureanism."

"Certainly, there are pockets of enlightened eating, but even these leave something to be desired. New York is unquestionably one of the world's finest food cities - in its own way, perhaps even the best. No city does more cuisines with greater aplomb than New York. On the other hand, New York is home to exactly one world-class cheese shop (Murray's, in Greenwich Village). A first-rate patisserie? Forget it. A decent bakery? Perhaps one or two. A noteworthy traiteur? There are a number of excellent Jewish and Italian delicatessens but as prepared foods go, New York is a wasteland when compared not only to Paris but to London and Rome as well."

[Jinmyo]

Certainly "Americans are eating better than ever, US restaurants are better than ever." And that's true of Canada as well.

But that's in comparison to the very dire conditions of past decades. And is still the condition of most of the food that most people cook and eat.

[Jaymes]

"In France, Italy, and Spain ... and mealtime is seen as more than just a pit stop. Clearly, the same cannot be said of the US."

I think that's true for the majority (although nowhere nearly so high as 95%) of Americans. For mealtime to be other than 'just a pit stop,' it has to be a leisurely appreciation of the moment, the destination itself, rather than being merely a means to an end, a necessary pause to take on fuel.

And I don't think 'leisurely' has ever really been a part of our national character. We weren't initially settled by the leisurely crowd, and even today, I think our inclination is to 'grab a bite' and then get on with it...whatever 'it' is.

Those folks that got onto Route 66, in an effort to take the Mother Road to California, were trying to improve their lives. And they were in a hurry to get there. They weren't interested in lingering along the way, savoring this meal or that.

And I think that's an apt analogy.

Obviously this is nothing but pure speculation on my part, but I'll go even further by saying that of all the places in the US where I've lived and traveled, I think that the 'best' food, and most identifiable as a 'regional cuisine' (if not a national one), is the American deep south. And also, that seems to me to be the US region best at doing 'leisurely.'

The only other US region that comes to my mind is the southwest, where the Mexican influence is strong -- another culture that seems to do 'leisurely' better than we do.

Edited January 8, 2005 by Jaymes (log)

[Behemoth]

But can a country in which probably 95 per cent of the population eats merely to live and has no appreciation of food beyond its ability to satiate the appetite truly be considered a great-food nation?

Sorry, but I would hardly make a sweeping generalization about the US based on the people I observe along route 66. I happen to live along a rural section of route 66 but I would wager that 95% of the population does not. You could possibly make sweeping generalizations about the diets of American cows...

edited to add: Okay this really bugs me. There is a certain level of cultural chauvinism needed to maintain that one cannot have a world-class city without a french style patisserie. I'll pick the puerto-rican roast pork sandwiches in Brooklyn over some overpriced overwrought confection in Paris anytime, thanks very much. (Though it would be nice to have better cheese...)

Edited January 8, 2005 by Behemoth (log)

[Tess]

I was also able to read the article with no subscription.

Arguments in that form annoy me. "Is xyz as good (or whatever) as some people say it is?" The answer is almost inevitably no. It's one of the easiest forms of argument to make and it's pretty much impossible to refute. Does it tell us anything?

I don't mind bashing of American food but I like to hear specifics. Where exactly did those restuarants fall short? He really ought to be able to say more than "It just wasn't fantastic." The way it's written, it's pretty much a piece of non-news to me, although I enjoyed seeing what Alice Waters had to say.

[Chris Amirault]

Two responses:

Below are excerpts from an article, 'US leaves a bitter taste', by Michael Steinberger (the award-winning wine columnist for Slate) in the (London) Financial Times today.

"On the other hand, New York is home to exactly one world-class cheese shop (Murray's, in Greenwich Village)."

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That seems an unfair swipe -- unless the quality of the cheese sections at Dean & DeLuca, Balduccis, and especially Fairway have tumbled quite a bit. Any NYers care to comment? What would Steve Jenkins say?

On the other hand,

Last year, Gourmet magazine ran a cover story proclaiming chefs to be the new rock stars, and placed on its cover a photo of five well-known chefs vamping it up like members of a band and using kitchen equipment as mock instruments.

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Did anyone else cringe when they saw this? What the hell was up with that? I'd love to know any back stories about it.

[Mabelline]

...sigh...I am just SO concerned that someone from across the Atlantic once again thinks we are louts who can neither cook nor eat well. I have a reprint of "The Compleat American Housewife" where an entire chapter is devoted to sticking up for American style cooking and dishes, circa 1776.

It is just like Jaymes said in regards to Route 66, the most memorable 'joints' along there were exactly that and nothing more...and most times made memorable by the style of building, or the 'hook' such as the 72 oz. steak.

What really torques me a lot of times is some of Ms. Water's comments. We have been eating slow-cooked, homegrown, and healthy a long time before she decided to convert California and the rest of us poor unfortunates. Thanks for the vote of confidence, ma'am.

[Robin Shuster]

disappointing small restaurants are not limited to the US.

I live in Provence 3 months a year and it is very difficult to find good restaurants of the kind he clearly hoped to find along rte 66 in the part of Provence (Alpes de Haute Provence) where I live. (Italy seems to have held on to theirs). Too many Agri Gel trucks delivering frozen foods to family restaurants. Lousy tomatoes. Horrible bread.

[docsconz]

I think Alice Waters is right. "American" cuisine is in an early evolutionary phase. Clearly, we as a nation and more specifically people who care about food are eating better than ever before. Where we particularly shine compared to other nations is in the depth and breadth of cuisines represented well on our shores. We still do well at the high end too. I'm not really sure what Mr. steinberger was looking for, but I am somewhat surprised that he didn't find it at Per Se. Nevertheless, while great ultra-high end meals are often found in the US amongst some truly exciting restaurants, it may be that this level is more reliably great in certain parts of Europe than in the US. Itis also probably true that the lesser restaurants are more reliably good than in the US, especially if one is not being guided by advice from eGullet

[vserna]

I'm not really sure what Mr. steinberger was looking for, but I am somewhat surprised that he didn't find it at Per Se.

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It's not Steinberger, it's François Simon who was disappointed by Per Se, apparently.

[vserna]

...sigh...I am just SO concerned that someone from across the Atlantic once again thinks we are louts who can neither cook nor eat well.

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If I am not wrong, Michael Steinberger is an American.

[vserna]

I'll pick the puerto-rican roast pork sandwiches in Brooklyn over some overpriced overwrought confection in Paris anytime, thanks very much.

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For... dessert?

Edited January 8, 2005 by vserna (log)

[NulloModo]

I'll pick the puerto-rican roast pork sandwiches in Brooklyn over some overpriced overwrought confection in Paris anytime, thanks very much.

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For... dessert?

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When confronted with the choice of dessert or another savory dish, I will take the savory dish every time...

[docsconz]

I'm not really sure what Mr. steinberger was looking for, but I am somewhat surprised that he didn't find it at Per Se.

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It's not Steinberger, it's François Simon who was disappointed by Per Se, apparently.

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My bad

[Behemoth]

I'll pick the puerto-rican roast pork sandwiches in Brooklyn over some overpriced overwrought confection in Paris anytime, thanks very much.

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For... dessert?

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Okay, a steamed chinese bun with red bean paste then. (I'm not much of a dessert person but that is neither here nor there.)

The thing is, travelling on our section of route 66, there is no way the author could have known about the saturday morning farmer's market downtown, or that the mennonite lady sells excellent grass-fed beef and lamb in the bike store on saturday mornings off season, and in the Unitarian church parking lot in the summer, or about the awesome mexican taqueria farther up main street, etc. etc. The chains are easy to find, what is part of why they are so popular, but there is good stuff in even the smallest towns, if you know where to look. God knows I disparage the American diet as much as the next person, and complain about the midwest all the time, but having lived here for nearly two years there have been a lot of positive surprises as well.

[Bux]

When confronted with the choice of dessert or another savory dish, I will take the savory dish every time...

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That's a subjective obfuscation of the real argument that we're a meat and potatoes country with no finesse in our diet. This is not to agree with Simon, but to say that just because you're not interested in what he misses, doesn't refute his point. If anything it supports his contention.

It can be a little confusing at times, if scanning the article quickly, to remember when Simon is speaking and when Steinberger is talking and it may even be less clear when Victor has to paraphrase Steinberger quoting Simon -- I'd urge readers to read the original if it's still on public view -- but a critic is always on dangerous ground in a foreign country when his experiences are in rapid succession. Worse yet, I'm not sure Steinberger made the best defenses. Murray's, for instance, has some wonderful cheeses and stocks some of NY's best restaurants with those cheeses, but I'd expect a "world-class cheese shop" to educate their customers and not to be content pawning off over the hill selections. I can still go into towns with a population far smaller than that of the neighborhood a block or two around Murray's and get first rate advice, albeit of a smaller selection of types of cheese, when I'm in France. Steinberger is bound to fail if quality is not part of world class in his defense.

As for Simon, I don't know how familiar he is with American ways or how comfortable he is traveling in the states. I can't begin to guess how educated a traveler he is in this country. I've been traveling on and off in France and have friends and relatives who live there as citizens and aliens. I'm finding it harder to get a good meal and easier to get an inedible meal these days than ever before. I don't think it really pays to compare America and France without taking several things into account. The U.S. is so significantly larger and far more diverse than France. Both countries are dynamic and moving in different directions in different areas. In general food is getting better in the U.S. and I don't think it's unfair to suggest it may be getting worse in many ways in France today. For all that, some things are getting worse and some things are getting better on both sides of the Atlantic. The other day I had a rather slovenly prepared fast food meal in which the ingredients on offer were said to be from growth hormone free animals. In fact the pork was Niman Ranch and the chickens were Bell and Evans. Was this a good sign or a bad sign that crappy food was now prepared from healthier ingredients or that fine ingredients were put to such use? I don't know, but some comparisons are very difficult.

The worst of it all for those who want to dispute either writer is that we don't exactly know what it was that Simon found disappointing about Per Se, Daniel or le Bernardin or what his expectations were. We've had several threads about what the French can learn from the U.S., and what they have learned in terms of food and dining. I recall one specific thread in which I contributed a story about a young French chef who had recently opened a restaurant in St. Jean de Luz on the Basque Coast. He went to culinary school in France, but came to Daniel in NYC to apprentice. He told me the attention to detail there was superior to what was expected in France and he was impressed by the quality of the produce. He worked with Payard, who was then pastry chef at Daniel, and fell under his influence. One of the first things he did when he opened his moderately priced restaurant in France was to make all of his desserts in house. It seems that just about every other restaurant in this tourist town orders theirs from a wholesale supplier of finished products. The other thing he did was create a menu that didn't copy the cookie cutter philosophy of almost all the restaurants in town. The big question is whether the locals will pay a couple of euros more for interesting food. Do they care? While we were speaking to him, one diner came over to tell him how delighted he was to find this place. Can I determine that Americans have both the better restaurants for teaching and the more discerning diners from this anecdotal evidence, probably not any more than Simon can state the opposite.

In the end, Steinberger doesn't do such a bad job of straddling the fence, which may be the most defensible place to be. He writes ". . . haute cuisine is dying in France, and along with the Spaniards, it is us, Americans, unburdened by tradition and always receptive to new ingredients and new ideas, who now have all the energy and creativity at the stove." But he also quotes Alice Waters when she those stories are "presumptuous" and that "We are still learning. I think the real issue here is movement -- up or downwards movement -- and I don't know that either country is at it's peak right now, or that the movement is uniformly up or down in either coutnry either.

Note that he refers to "us, Americans." It appears he is an American.

[edsel]

Two responses:

Below are excerpts from an article, 'US leaves a bitter taste', by Michael Steinberger (the award-winning wine columnist for Slate) in the (London) Financial Times today.

"On the other hand, New York is home to exactly one world-class cheese shop (Murray's, in Greenwich Village)."

←

That seems an unfair swipe -- unless the quality of the cheese sections at Dean & DeLuca, Balduccis, and especially Fairway have tumbled quite a bit. Any NYers care to comment? What would Steve Jenkins say?

On the other hand,

Last year, Gourmet magazine ran a cover story proclaiming chefs to be the new rock stars, and placed on its cover a photo of five well-known chefs vamping it up like members of a band and using kitchen equipment as mock instruments.

←

Did anyone else cringe when they saw this? What the hell was up with that? I'd love to know any back stories about it.

←

Did anyone see Thomas Keller on the Dennis Miller show the other night? Keller was running circles around Miller (no surprise there). Talk about "rock stars".

...sigh...I am just SO concerned that someone from across the Atlantic once again thinks we are louts who can neither cook nor eat well. I have a reprint of "The Compleat American Housewife" where an entire chapter is devoted to sticking up for American style cooking and dishes, circa 1776.

It is just like Jaymes said in regards to Route 66, the most memorable 'joints' along there were exactly that and nothing more...and most times made memorable by the style of building, or the 'hook' such as the 72 oz. steak.

What really torques me a lot of times is some of Ms. Water's comments. We have been eating slow-cooked, homegrown, and healthy a long time before she decided to convert California and the rest of us poor unfortunates. Thanks for the vote of confidence, ma'am.

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In Ms Water's defense, I think that her efforts on behalf of "real" American cuisine speak for themselves. The "We're still in Kindergarten" remark came across as a bit condescending, but I think her heart is in the right place.

disappointing small restaurants are not limited to the US.

I live in Provence 3 months a year and it is very difficult to find good restaurants of the kind he clearly hoped to find along rte 66 in the part of Provence  (Alpes de Haute Provence) where I live.    (Italy seems to have held on to theirs).  Too many Agri Gel trucks delivering frozen foods to family restaurants.  Lousy tomatoes.  Horrible bread.

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Well, that's just demoralizing.

...The worst of it all for those who want to dispute either writer is that we don't exactly know what it was that Simon found disappointing about Per Se, Daniel or le Bernardin or what his expectations were...

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Exactly. What were his expectations of the high-end restaurants in New york, and why was he disappointed? Even more baffling to me is the romanticization of Rt 66. I'm only familiar with the central-OK and high-desert-CA portions of RT 66, but I can't fathom why anyone would expect to find a great culinary experience there.

[vserna]

The worst of it all for those who want to dispute either writer is that we don't exactly know what it was that Simon found disappointing about Per Se, Daniel or le Bernardin or what his expectations were.

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That part of the article is indeed full of holes. My guess is that Steinberger, in offering his own view of the NYC restaurant scene further down in the story, seems to be in basic agreement with Simon on this fact: that too many top-notch places seem to be "on autopilot". And I wouldn't disagree with that, recalling some of my more recent experiences, but not all!

Obviously the American restaurant system, with so many sittings needed to make a profit, with so many diners simultaneously at a restaurant, is bound to turn the chef into a far less directly involved orchestra conductor or general manager (the telltale expression "executive chef" is an American creation, not used in Europe), and in some cases the delegation of duties, the sheer organization works less successfully than in others.

That said, how many French two- and even three-star restaurants often seem to be "on autopilot" these days? Too many.

[Steve Klc]

I think one of the reasons why eGullet has achieved the mindshare it has so quickly, Victor, is the fact that as an international community we've been trying to discuss these very same issues for years. With that as a background, it's hard for me not to view the conception and execution of this article as full of intellectual holes--so too is the attempt to discuss it in one thread here as if this is newsworthy, somehow original thinking, or pretend it hasn't already been discussed in great length on eG, especially the French rested on their laurels too long, French cooking remained too rigid and conservative, the French have been overtaken by Spanish inventiveness, the freedom European chefs admire when they come to the US, the lack of one supposed "American" cuisine, etc.

To me, this article comes across as nothing more than a cheap, convenient, anti-American drive-by shooting fed willingly to a British media outlet by a perhaps disingenuous "American" writer who should probably stick to writing about wine rather than food (and his wine writing is very good.) Yet again the usual suspects of the anti-modern US dining scene are trotted out, like Ed Behr and Alice Waters, who give quotes they've given a million times and which serve their interests culinarily-speaking since they don't feel as ingrained in the mindshare of the modern American dining scene rising around them as they'd perhaps like to be. I'm surprised Steinberger didn't find room for Luddite allies like Corby Kummer to relate some cautionary slow food tale or Colman Andrews to champion something "simple-authentic-honest-pure-though not Rick Bayless" found in Saveur (Steinberger also writes for Saveur, by the way.) Easy target chefs who have stretched their own boundaries are pinned up, like Jean-Georges, Charlie Palmer and Rocco, to score a cheap rather than reflective point. It's mentioned that too small a percentage of our population appreciates good food and cooking--be it high end or artisinal--that we don't have one "national" cuisine--but what isn't pointed out is why we should consider that important?

I think what's always lost trying to fit convenient generalizations about the US into small articles is our huge size, both in terms of population and geographical sweep, and our diverse disconnected regional nature which sometimes comes in conflict with our "national" appreciation and acceptance of food or cooking. Victor, you made a comment about not disagreeing with Steinberger/Simon--in the main--by recalling some of your most recent experiences at top-notch places in the US being on autopilot--I'm curious--just how many days have you spent here and how often have you eaten in "top" US places in the past 1-2 years? Who helped you define "top?" How often have you eaten at the just below top level places when you have visited--the younger chefs not quite yet in the media glare? Now whatever that number of total meals is--10? 20? more? it doesn't really matter--magnified by however many cities you visited--and that number here is not really that important either--do you think that qualifies you to have made some kind of similar sweeping implication as put forth by a Steinberger or a Simon, and would you have allowed yourself to be quoted in a similar article like this, if you were asked? I suspect you would have correctly reined your statement in but that your very critical nature and intellectual honesty may have held you back from even being quoted. You, as most foreign visitors to the US like Simon, have little idea what it's like to dine out on a regular basis in any one major American city, let alone enough cities, to begin to form an opinion about our chefs and restaurants that could be broadly applied. Most actively engaged culinarily-aware Americans don't travel enough and dine out as often in other cities. The most we ourselves do, like most foreign visitors, is return with snapshots, static impressions of a few meals which are dated the minute they're edited and bound into an album, and which may have been out of focus when we took them anyway because we don't know how to use our camera, or have a poor understanding of composition.

[Busboy]

I think the article was in, in may ways, right on. I can't comment on Per se or Le Bernadin, but the unfortunate fact is that for vast swaths of the country, it is far easier to buy a quality handgun than a decent meal. And for every good restaurant that opens up -- Per Se, or the excellent places that Steve works with -- there are dozens of Applebees and Outbacks that open up, drawing many times the number of diners that the good places draw, every night.

I had the good fortune to speak with Michael Landrum of Ray's the Steaks just before Christmas, and he seemed slightly mystified by the cult status his excellent restaurant has achieved. He said, (I hope I am parphrasing properly here) "in any other country in the world, my restaurant is just a neighborhood restaurant" -- delivering an honest, quality-driven meal at a reasonable price. But, because the bar is so low here, Ray's becomes a regional phenomena.

In recent years, there have been some heartwarming trends. For the relatively small percentage of Americans who appear to care about such things, cheese, wine, excellent produce and meat, and restaurant food that would have been considered stunningly innovative a couple of decades ago -- and that's still pretty good today -- are available. But, drop randomly into any zip code in the US that isn't an ethnic enclave and pick a restaurant for dinner. The food will suck.

Someone upthread said that a true dining culture starts at the grassroots level and I think that's true -- and that's why, despite the emergence of some excellent chefs, the US dining scene is still in the dark ages.

[Bux]

You, as most foreign visitors to the US like Simon, have little idea what it's like to dine out on a regular basis in any one major American city, let alone enough cities, to begin to form an opinion about our chefs and restaurants that could be broadly applied. Most actively engaged culinarily-aware Americans don't travel enough and dine out as often in other cities.  The most we ourselves do, like most foreign visitors, is return with snapshots, static impressions of a few meals which are dated the minute they're edited and bound into an album, and which may have been out of focus when we took them anyway because we don't know how to use our camera, or have a poor understanding of composition.

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I realize I'm not the "you" who is being addressed here, but you raise an interesting point. While a foreign visitor, or at least an astute one with an educated gastronomic perspective, brings an important point of view we need to hear, he also brings a certain lack of familiarity. There's an asset and a deficit that's going to be apparent and we need to make the best of his points. The visiting critic's judgment should be taken with a grain of salt, but it's far less interesting anyway, than the points he may raise in defending his judgment.

Many of us, Europeans and Americans alike, don't deal well with the enormity of this country and its diversity. The industrialization that's that's been more intense and occurred earlier here has had it's effects on the appearances of regional cuisines and on what people eat. Our pioneering of industrial packaged food and packaged restaurants, our food appears indiscriminately bland across the country. Those who speak of the revolution of American cuisine seem to imply we're on an uphill march since the country was founded. It's not true. Most of the twentieth century was probably spent destroying our culinary heritage with the saving grace of immigrant cultures bringing ties to cooking rather than opening cans and boxes. What's happened in France is not so different. It's just that they industrialized food much later. They've imported our McDo, and they have their own franchised restaurants which are getting harder to avoid not only on the highway, but in the centers of their historic towns. Their three star chefs are their heros and get great media coverage. To assume that represents a national interest in eating well, would require a similar assumption that since our basket ball players get that kind of press here, we're a nation of physically fit athletes. Eating well in France is a spectator sport, not an activity universally practiced by the majority. Perhaps it's a poor analogy, but the French public is interesting the news of how their chefs score, but far less so in how they cook.

Back to the subject of our size and diversity, even with its gloss of franchised restaurants, my guess is that I doubt I'm all that unique in being a New Yorker who's far more able to speak more knowledgeably about French or Spanish gastronomy than I am about food and dining in New England, the deep south, the southwest or most of California. It may be as easy to make sweeping generalizations about Europe as about the US, but it's hard to paint a narrow knowledgeable view of either.