Fat Guy Lays it on the Table

[slkinsey]

I've been recognized and received special treatment at some restaurants because I'm on eGullet.

I have too, but I picked myself up from the sidewalk, wiped off the dirt and grease from my trousers and ate next door.

You were lucky. I had to make bail.

[Bux]

I would say that high end restaurants are cooking for people they'd like to become regulars. That is to say, they're cooking for people who are likely to appreciate their style of food and are not going to bend in the wind to please a very general public's tastes. An anonymous reviewer who doesn't understand the food has less chance of driving the right diners to the right restaurant than a critic who can explain the food as well as describe it.

The most impartial critic would be one from Mars who's just arrived, but I doubt he'd be in much of a position to understand the food well enough to help me decide if I should try the restaurant. We all bring our prejudices to the table and if we're honest they come through our reviews so the reader is forewarned. I will agree that an anonymous reviewer can bring a degree of impartiality to a review and that's a positive thing. I won't argue that it doesn't matter. I will argue that it's not as important as some people think it is and that in more cases than we'd like to admit, the trade offs may make for a much more rewarding and informative review. On the other hand, if impartiality is all a reviewer can bring to the restaurant, he's not prepared to write a review I'm likely to find rewarding enough to read. I'm glad to see Steven express agreement that anonymity can serve the idea of consumer advocate, because we don't need to pretend otherwise to argue that this is a limited part of a good review.

[Dirk Wheelan]

An anonymous reviewer who doesn't understand the food has less chance of driving the right diners to the right restaurant than a critic who can explain the food as well as describe it.

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And then there's the anonymous critic who does understand the food...

On the other hand, if impartiality is all a reviewer can bring to the restaurant, he's not prepared to write a review I'm likely to find rewarding enough to read. I'm glad to see Steven express agreement that anonymity can serve the idea of consumer advocate, because we don't need to pretend otherwise to argue that this is a limited part of a good review.

I don't understand why this fallacy is so popular on this thread?

I agree when you say that anonymity is 'important', but that good writing is more important.

However, what I don't agree with, and what no one, despite some impressively convoluted logic, has demonstrated, is the assertion that anonymity and good writing are mutually exclusive. Although it would be convenient for all those arguing for celebrity critics' superiority, anonymity and good writing are not at variance with one another. Indeed, if we ascribe some value to anonymity, and a greater value to good writing, then the combined value of the two is greater still. Consequently, by your own reasoning, well written anonymous reviews are the ideal towards which critics should be striving.

On the other hand, I quite understand why many food critics wish to promote themselves. The problem is when they justify this self-promotion up with the pretext that it somehow makes their work better. It doesn't. It just enhances their status and reputations. Of course, there's nothing wrong with this... if one cares to admit it.

[jhlurie]

I think the value of good writing is quite clear. It demonstrates education and intelligence. While people can posess those qualities and still be bad writers, the percentages favor the good writers.

Of course I'm supposing that education and intelligence have some connection to "taste". I'll admit that's a thornier part of the argument. Then again, its probably easier to prove than the opposite.

Personally, my ideal review would actually be written, in stages, with input from more than one individual. The first (and perhaps second) visit would be anonymous, presumably by some trusted confederate(s) of the writer. A follow-up visit would be done by the "known" writer, which would provide the opportunites which Steven suggests exist in that scenario. In essense, you'd get the benefit of both experiences.

[slkinsey]

. . . what I don't agree with, and what no one, despite some impressively convoluted logic, has demonstrated, is the assertion that anonymity and good writing are mutually exclusive.

I don't think anyone is arguing that. What people are arguing is that there is a great deal of information to be gained by interacting with chefs and restaurateurs -- information that can inform the work of writers and reviewers and thus enrich what is passed on to readers. What people are further arguing is that these potential gains are lost to the "anonyous" writer or reviewer who maintains no relationships in the industry. And what people are yet further arguing is that many, albeit not all, of the justifications given for anonymity are complete bunk (e.g., that such writers are, in fact, actually anonymous and aren't receiving special treatment anyway). Here in New York we have the clear example that most of the very best criticism and most informative writing has been done by writers like David Rosengarten who are deeply involved in the business and have many relationships in the industry, and further that most of the worst criticism and least informative writing has been done by writers who were not involved in the business and didn't have relationships in the industry.

So what people are saying is not that anonymity and good writing are mutually exclusive, but rather that anonymity and involvement with the industry are mutally exclusive and that involvement with the industry is highly coorelated with better, more informative, more informed food writing and criticism.

[rich]

The problem is when they justify this self-promotion up with the pretext that it somehow makes their work better. It doesn't. It just enhances their status and reputations. Of course, there's nothing wrong with this... if one cares to admit it.

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The self-promotion aspect is major problem for critics. Yes, it must be terribly difficult to refuse to be interviewed as the top culinary expert in New York City, but at what price?

I think you need to know the industry and the workings of a restaurant to write a meaningful review. Can someone achieve this in anonymity? Difficult, yes. Impossible, no. The real problems occur when critic(s) begin flaunting their personna.

It may come to this - what's more important - the critic or the review? When the critic believes it's the former, then you wind up with major descriptions of bathrooms, rock music and lamps falling from tables. If it's the latter, that stuff would be anecdotal.

[Dirk Wheelan]

. . . what I don't agree with, and what no one, despite some impressively convoluted logic, has demonstrated, is the assertion that anonymity and good writing are mutually exclusive.

I don't think anyone is arguing that.

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Then I think you should carefully re-read Bux's last post.

On the other hand, if you carefully re-read the last few pages of the thread, you'll notice that an effort was made (by me) to distinguish between general food writing, and the far more specific task of restaurant reviewing. As I said then, there is no reason why a restaurant critic cannot learn everything he or she needs to know by experiencing the end result; namely the meal. The only perceivable benefits of the schmoozing approach to restaurant criticism are benefits for the critic himself.

I repeat, I am only talking about restaurant criticism.

[rich]

but rather that anonymity and involvement with the industry are mutally exclusive and that involvement with the industry is highly coorelated with better, more informative, more informed food writing and criticism.

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But isn't it possible to achieve both anonymity and involvement. While I don't have a major problem with the anonymity issue, I think it serves a meaningful purpose.

I was only half-joking in a earlier post when I described how it could be possible to achieve the above. Let's say the NY Times named you their chief critic (Congrats!) but it was announced that your name was Sue Smith. You could still mingle with your industry contacts and remain current within the industry while at the same time review restaurants under your secret identity.

Yes, some people may eventually guess, but no one would be sure (except those you told and the paper). There would always be a level of doubt. Want proof? No one really knew who Deep Throat was until a few months ago. Pretty cool secret for 30 years.

[slkinsey]

As I said then, there is no reason why a restaurant critic cannot learn everything he or she needs to know by experiencing the end result; namely the meal.  The only perceivable benefits of the schmoozing approach to restaurant criticism are benefits for the critic himself.

I simply don't believe this is true. Or rather it is only true of a certain kind of review that offers a certain kind of limited information. I believe that there is more and different information to be gained from a deeper level of involvement, and experience tells me that critics who have that deeper level of involvement tend to produce produce more informative reviews.

I'm not sure it's accurate or fair to characterize all critic/industry interaction as "schmoozing" either, if you mean it in the pejorative sense of "to chat with someone in order to gain a personal advantage for one's self."

But isn't it possible to achieve both anonymity and involvement.

As a real-life practical matter, I think this is impossible.

[rich]

But isn't it possible to achieve both anonymity and involvement.

As a real-life practical matter, I think this is impossible.

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Even involvement as a food writer, but anonymity as a restaurant reviewer?

[Fat Guy]

All these pleas for anonymity would make a lot more sense if there were mountains of examples of great, impartial, unbiased, deeply knowledgeable anonymous critics and mountains of examples of terrible, compromised, unfair non-anonymous critics. But the reality is quite different. For example, the statement "Frank Bruni is a better restaurant reviewer than David Rosengarten because Bruni is anonymous when he dines out and Rosengarten is not" is false for the following reasons: 1) Rosengarten's reviews are better-written, more valuable to the diner, more focused on food and more likely to predict good and bad meals; 2) Bruni is rarely anonymous at any restaurant that would typically recognize a non-anonymous critic; and 3) Bruni's reviews are full of personal biases and idiosyncrasies whereas Rosengarten's are much closer to being arms-length and objective. Anonymity is a red herring, not least because it is so rarely achieved but also because the proof is in the pudding: the important thing is what the critic writes. A non-anonymous critic who is self-aggrandizing is a bad critic; a non-anonymous critic who uses his non-anonymity for the benefit of the craft of reviewing and doesn't let it interfere with his critical distance is on his way to being a good critic. The anonymity issue has tremendous symbolic importance to the dining public, because it preys upon the worst "they fuck you at the drive-through" fears of restaurantgoers, but it is more of a distraction than anything else.

[slkinsey]

But isn't it possible to achieve both anonymity and involvement.

As a real-life practical matter, I think this is impossible.

Even involvement as a food writer, but anonymity as a restaurant reviewer?

Put yourself in the shoes of a restaurateur. If "food writer Jerry McAngus" came to eat at your restaurant with several friends four or five times over the course of a few weeks and then never returned, and "restaurant critic Helen Hepplewhite" came out with a review a few weeks later. . . how long do you think it would take you and your colleagues to connect the dots?

Given a situation where the writer doesn't write very many reviews and where there is a substantial lag time between the reviewer's visits to a restaurant and the appearance of the review, it might be possible. This would have to be something like a once-monthly review with a two to three month lag time to work for any length of time in a major restaurant city.

[Dirk Wheelan]

Anonymity is a red herring

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Just repeating this over and over is not going to alter the fact that, all other things being equal, anonymity adds to the value of the review for everyone but the critic.

The anonymity issue has tremendous symbolic importance to the dining public because it preys upon the worst "they fuck you at the drive-through" fears of restaurantgoers, but it is more of a distraction than anything else.

I think you underestimate the bearing that 'the fears of restaurantgoers' has on the industry. Indeed, it's not just restaurants and critics, but a public also, which pays to be served by both of them.

[slkinsey]

Anonymity is a red herring

Just repeating this over and over is not going to alter the fact that, all other things being equal, anonymity adds to the value of the review for everyone but the critic.

Er. . . neither is your repetition of this assertion.

[Fat Guy]

all other things being equal, anonymity adds to the value of the review for everyone but the critic.

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All other things are not equal. Anonymity reduces access and therefore the ability to acquire information of relevance to a review. Not a reported piece -- a review. In addition, the theoretical ideal of anonymity is never achieved in practice. What is relevant to the real world of restaurant reviewing is how these things actually work, and in actuality the reviewers who claim to be anonymous are recognized anyway. And the general attempted use of anonymity in restaurants establishes a negative dynamic between the press and restaurants, and sends the wrong message to the public. Moreover, the requirement of the pretense of anonymity also negatively impacts the quality of writers who will be hired to write reviews in the first place, e.g., David Rosengarten, Jeffrey Steingarten and Alan Richman could never get hired to write New York Times restaurant reviews because all three have appeared regularly on television -- yet all three are far superior writers and would be far superior New York Times reviewers to Frank Bruni.

[slkinsey]

Really Dirk shouldn't be calling it "anonymity," but rather "having no relationships or contact within the restaurant industry." Because that's what he's really promoting. It strains credulity to believe that any regular restaurant critic is ever substantially anonymous.

It does make it look a bit different, though, when it reads: "all other things being equal, having no relationships or contact within the restaurant industry adds to the value of the review for everyone but the critic."

[Bux]

. . . what I don't agree with, and what no one, despite some impressively convoluted logic, has demonstrated, is the assertion that anonymity and good writing are mutually exclusive.

I don't think anyone is arguing that.

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Then I think you should carefully re-read Bux's last post.

. . . .

←

Perhaps you're suggesting I rewrite it. Whatever you read, I didn't write that they're mutually exclusive on an abstract level, only that as one gets knowledge in a field, one become known in that field. Once one sets foot in a restaurant kitchen, the odds drop that one is anonymous in all kitchens. Once you speak to a student at the CIA the same thing happens. It's a trade off.

I could write reviews as Frank Bruni, but if it was ever discovered I was he, I'd be accused of duplicity and asked what it was that I had to hide. Furthermore, although my recognition in a restaurant as a reviewer would be nil, my prejudices would be questioned all the more and my reviews of any restaurant in which I might be a regular would be all that much more suspect.

Let's say I got my knowledge of food while studing under an assumed name and working in restaurants under an assumed name. I then write reviews under a different assumed name. I give a four star review to the restaurant of a guy who knew me under another name and the truth somehow comes out. Can you imagine what people would say, especialy since I wasn't really anonymous when I ate in that friend's restaurant.

[markk]

And so I'd like to tell a restaurant-review story that I inteded to tell much earlier in the thread, and now I'll present it in case it lightens the mood and gives everybody a small diversion...

There's a local newspaper in Hoboken, although I use the term loosely (newspaper, that is, not Hoboken) that has always published restaurant reviews. I'm going back 15 or 20 years here, but I've told this so many times that while I think I've lost the printed review, I can paraphrase it well enough from memory for the purpose it will serve here. Hoboken had its number of Chinese takeout joints, and as it began to gentrify and yuppify, the first "noodle shop" opened. Well, there weren't really ducks hanging in the window (they claimed that wasn't 'sanitary' and that they had them in the fridge in the back), but it certainly wasn't a noodle shop like we'll all think of for sure. And the only duck on the menu was an appetizer portion of 1/4 or 1/2 half duck, and they had the first Cantonese Wonton soup that you could add one or two meats to, but that was about as far as they went.

And so our husband and wife team of critics reviewed it, and I always imagined that somehow they were elementary school students who somehow were able to get married and write reviews, for they wrote, and I promise you that I'm quoting it from memory pretty close to word-for-word perfect,

"Most of the Chinese people in the world eat at a kind of Chinese restaurant that most of us have never seen or set foot in - a Noodle Shop, with wonderful roast ducks and racks of roast pork hanging in the windows, and pots of simmering broth to cook all kinds of wonderful noodles in to add the meats to. Such and Such which just opened in Hoboken is just that kind of restaurant, and one of the first noodle shops to open anywhere in New Jersey. And so we couldn't wait to give them a try.

"They also have the standard Chinese dishes as well, so to afford ourselves a fair comparison with other Chinese restaurants around, we decided to try the Chicken with Broccoli. The chicken was moist and plump and tender, and the broccoli was so obviously fresh that you could actually taste the chloryphill (yes, it really said that). And the sauce was definitely a step up from the usual fare. A must try dish at a must try restaurant."

Now I ask you my fellow gulletteers, any comments?

[Jason Perlow]

I think they have potential for a promising career at the New York Times wednesday food section.

[LindaK]

Perhaps I missed this upthread, but what does this say about the popularity and influence of Zagat's? Anonymity but not necessarily knowledge abounds. I realize their review is not the product of "a" critic but multiple critics. How influential is this to most restaurants? I can't imagine the high end places care what their Zagat ratings are. Perhaps we need to differentiate who reviewers are writing for--various classes of restaurants (loaded word, I know, but it fits) and their respective patrons.

[Pan]

Funny story, Mark!

I have something to add about the discussion of anonymity in reviewers, though. Some eGullet Society members are pretty damn reliable when it comes to their appraisals of restaurants, and some of them are very good writers. Do you suppose some of those are not known to restaurant personnel as "reviewers"? Well, technically they aren't reviewers, but I think I've made my point, which is that now that there are sites like this, true anonymous reviewing can take place, in such a way that the anonymous reviewer (reporter, whatever) has an online identity but is just a customer to restaurants.

[jamiemaw]

all other things being equal, anonymity adds to the value of the review for everyone but the critic.

←

All other things are not equal. Anonymity reduces access and therefore the ability to acquire information of relevance to a review. Not a reported piece -- a review. In addition, the theoretical ideal of anonymity is never achieved in practice. What is relevant to the real world of restaurant reviewing is how these things actually work, and in actuality the reviewers who claim to be anonymous are recognized anyway. And the general attempted use of anonymity in restaurants establishes a negative dynamic between the press and restaurants, and sends the wrong message to the public. Moreover, the requirement of the pretense of anonymity also negatively impacts the quality of writers who will be hired to write reviews in the first place, e.g., David Rosengarten, Jeffrey Steingarten and Alan Richman could never get hired to write New York Times restaurant reviews because all three have appeared regularly on television -- yet all three are far superior writers and would be far superior New York Times reviewers to Frank Bruni.

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I can subscribe to Steven's thesis on this. Anonymity is, ultimately, a poor disguise for objectiveness, clarity, knowledge and a visceral sense of context. While they're not mutually exclusive, being a good reporter--getting the story and setting it in context--is more important than the 'I came, I ate, I left' school. Much more.

And that's if anonymity can even be said to exist.

What's also important is a disciplined and consistent methodology and the ability to separate the fly shit from the pepper. The main reason anonymity might be prized by some is the notion that service might be upgraded or a meal cooked to a higher level. That's both a conceit and a fable. After a year in the traces, anyone worth his salt can read the service calibrations of a room quickly and accurately. And anyone visiting a dining room several times can also gauge the consistency of the kitchen.

Most restaurant reviewing is inward looking: What's on my plate? What a shame, and how mundane. Food requires extrinsic context because it's a reflection not only of who we are, but also of whom we aspire to be. Sometimes the W-5 of what we're eating is also supportive of a higher truth, and making that linkage is precisely what makes for energetic food writing.

In other words, an old school restaurant reviewer lets the world come to him, when the reverse, I think, is of inherently greater value.

I'm convinced that's why so many weekly newspaper restaurant reviewers burn out: they soon become the napkin-sniffing equivalent of train spotters. Or worse, Michelin inspectors. That their writing is without creation can be a rather debilitating realization (usually in mid-life), especially when writing about others so creative. There's no disguising that this is why the odd restaurant reviewer might choose to cross-dress.

Writers able to reach deeper into the sociology of the review stand a much better chance to achieve longevity and to sustain interest, both for themselves and their always intrigued readers. And that, I don't think, happens best in blissful anonymity.

Edited September 13, 2005 by jamiemaw (log)

[Jennifer Iannolo]

Jamie,

That was a bloody brilliant post; would that every reviewer might follow your sage advice. Sadly, I'm more inclined to believe they'll stick with the "Hoboken" format listed above.

Given the popularity of Zagat, and people's desire for the quick sound-bite, is there a place for such a type of inquiry for the newspaper-reading masses? It seems to me they want top-line information, and off they go. I, however (and I'm sure many here at eGullet), would appreciate more of the philosophical. We have a better chance of seeing God first, methinks.

But a girl can dream.

[zilla369]

Ordered my copy today; probably I should have used the eGullet Amazon link, but I was in Borders' and was trying to see if they carry it. The clerk was so nice and helpful, I ordered it from them. Probably I'll have to wait two weeks now instead of a few days, but I'm really looking forward to it!

[gaf]

[ADMIN NOTE: GAF has reprinted the review below, which appears on his blog -- see link at end of post]

Turning the Tables: Restaurants From the Inside Out by Steven A. Shaw. New York: HarperCollins, 2005. $24.95. Pp. xxiv + 216.

by Gary Alan Fine

In 1947 a British radio journalist wrote a thin volume that was to usher in postwar morality. Stephen Potter has been largely forgotten in the wave of cynicism that his work spawned and his book, The Theory and Practice of Gamesmanship, or the Art of Winning Games Without Actually Cheating, is little read. But gamesmanship entered our way of thinking about civic culture. The title of his third volume, One-Upsmanship, published five years later, expanding his tactics to all of social life, similarly passed into folk speech.

Potter recognized that we moderns want rewards that we have not fully earned by virtue of position or ability, but that in a world where we must judge strangers, a convincing facade is all that is needed. This approach, termed the strategic model of social life, was brought to scholarly fruition by sociologist Erving Goffman (Presentation of Self in Everyday Life). Goffman believed that social life was akin to acting and selves were but masks, a view that resonated throughout the 1960s and still does: life is a game with rules to be diddled. (Both Potter and Goffman could draw on Machiavelli, Diderot, Mandeville, and Veblen, but it is not until the post-war era that there slippery claims seemed intuitive).

The strategic virus spread, as we decided that living well is the best revenge against all those who would place us in our rightful place. We were taught how to survive in all of those privileged places where we did not properly belong by virtue of birth, education, or talent.

Nowhere was this crafty education more necessary than in restaurants. How could the Average Joe survive in a place in which one might actually have to pronounce French properly to escape the dreaded label "rube" - or worse "American." We all strived to be Francophonies. Many felt that restaurants were designed to make them feel socially naked, while stripping their wallets bare. If restaurants have changed - somewhat - they are still dangerous places for daters. Navigating a dining room is an effective means of matching a couple with roughly similar cultural capital.

Fortunately we have a book that provides a guide to that gastronomic minefield. The book is Jay Jacobs, Winning the Restaurant Game (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1980). Jacobs, the long-suffering New York restaurant critic for Gourmet, composes with a poison pen he must have borrowed from Potter. Jacobs writes with that vicious bonhomie that New Yorkers so treasure. Jacobs knows that "Most social activities are competitive and dining out is no exception. . . . Under a thin veneer of politesse, we meet one another at restaurants to determine who has the clout." The book is a brilliantly malicious how-to manual to transform losers into something approaching diners. (One gets a sense of the writing by learning that Ronald Searle did the illustrations). Jacobs recommends that we choose our turf, becoming a restaurant regular.

Although he doesn't cite Jacobs, Steven Shaw writes in this same strategic tradition. Mr. Shaw is known for having devised and overseen the growth of eGullet, the leading Internet food and restaurant site. Yet Shaw, as Jacobs, is both competitive and opinionated about dining. Certain dainty rival websites are unmentionables, Shaw's victorious secret.

Every writer selects a persona. While Jacobs embraces his inner curmudgeon, Steve Shaw wants our love, and is not above a little self-abasement. This former attorney embraces the moniker "The Fat Guy" - and what better evidence could there be that American culture is teetering on the brink then that our authorities see personal humiliation as a good career move.

Steve Shaw wants to be our friend, and the friend of his food-givers, ripping only the sheerest of veils from the restaurant industry. Unlike Jacobs who - like Mikey - more or less mistrust everything all that is put before him, Shaw is enamored. He advises us, making bistros like beagles, "if you love restaurants. . . they will love you back." Even if designed to be a diner's guide, his is a big wet kiss for the restaurant industry. Shaw's introduction is labeled "Why I Love Restaurants"; Jacobs begins, "What Am I Doing Here?" Given all of Shaw's references to his "friends" in the industry - Tom Colicchio, Gray Kunz - they provide him with access that we mortals are denied. They seem to like him too. They really, really do. And who wouldn't with blurby sugarplums dancing between his covers. To be fair, Shaw surely chose these sources because he already admired them. (In contrast, I am on record that I will trade David Bouley a paragraph for dessert).

Shaw is an easy companion, light on his feet, low-maintenance to the end. His writing is plainspeak, not frothy; a book of Joe, not cappuccino. And I did learn from these pages. His account of the lifeworld of reservationists opens the door to a backstage world allowing us, following the strategic model, better to understand how to get where we want to be. I had little idea of the surveillance that operates in restaurant life; the amount of personal information that they collect is startling. Top restaurants seem as prepared for Bridezilla as for Al Qaeda. And after this review I will be viewed from thorny eyes as "critic of Steven A. Shaw." How I suffer for you.

Shaw, like Jacobs, is persuaded that the way to experience restaurants properly is to develop relationships. He claims, but fortunately does not carry the metaphor to its inevitable consummation, that the first meal is a first date. And, of course, he is right, although such a perspective is more useful for those with the resources to eat out regularly. Let us call it the "Cheers syndrome." The "Seinfeld syndrome" is, in contrast, that you will get crappy service no matter how often you return if you are jerks.

Not all chapters equaled the promise of the first. Although Shaw wishes to give deep truths about the restaurant industry in his guise of observer, he doesn't visit any restaurant long enough to understand the underside of work (there is no underside here). This book is the inverse of Tony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential where underside is the only side. What is needed is a recognition that the structural conditions of work and of temporal pressure contribute to the food that diners receive. As I have noted elsewhere, should your steak fall on the floor (OK, on the stove), what choice does the chef have but to serve it to you. Without knowing it, you demand it.

I admired the account of Sandor's tiny restaurant in Seagrove Beach, Florida (reminiscent of John McPhee's "Brigande de Cuisine"). The individual craftsman can do remarkable things, even if here, as with McPhee, the account may be enriched with a dollop of romance. Also a nice set piece is Shaw's account of Fernando, the "egg man" at Tavern on the Green (for a elegant piece that owes much to Shaw, see Burkhard Bilger's "The Egg Men" in the September 5, 2005 New Yorker).

Shaw is weaker when he leaves the kitchen, his boudoir. The controversies of food require more than description, but an assessment of the way that images of virtuous food are played out in a contentious society. One would imagine that the four-letter word PETA would be somewhere evident, but it isn't. Shaw dismisses those who wish their foods to reflect their politics, seemingly having little time for those who believe in foods that are organic, local, or authentic. (He blasts Slow Food, those goodmen and women who imagine the artisan in the fields. For the record, I am a member of this group, but am no better a member there than in most things). The case of foie gras could - and will - provide a window to how food politics becomes lifestyle politics. Only time will tell if Mike Bloomberg finds bloated poultry liver as easy a target as nicotine.

I admire eGullet as much as the next dweeb, but I couldn't help feeling that "The Restaurant Information Age" involved special pleading. Steve Shaw likes cooks and embracing the ethics of a Times critic would cramp his style. Frank Bruni is roughed up in these pages. Shaw argues, and there is some truth in his claims, that the critic should judge the artist at his best. Should we focus on those Leonardo caricatures that he sold for two bits each at the Florence county fair? And Shaw is right that there is only so much one can do when a VIP arrives: if you don't have plump strawberries, the Fat Guy gets the dregs, like the rest of us. Of course, he should expect fawning service for a pasha, but at least we can share his posh life. This kind of critic is not everyman, but Someone.

Shaw's strategy is to present several cases within each chapter (a residue from law school). In the case of describing the "The Business of he Restaurant Business," this strategy is ineffective, erasing those structural forces that organize the restaurant industry. It is interesting to observe the attempts of Gray Kunz to open a restaurant at the Time Warner Center (no more so than on a day on which Charlie Trotter called it quits as Kunz's neighbor), but we don't see the role that tax rates, building codes, labor markets, political pressure, and real estate vacancies play on which restaurants succeed. And how, for instance, do recent immigrants see restaurants as the ticket to the good life (cheap labor, coupled with easy rents and ignoring Bloomberg's burdensome laws), finding a community audience, even if chowhounds never discover these fragrant aromas. The depiction of Ed Mitchell's Ribs (of Wilson, North Carolina) tells us precious little about finances as messy as the ribs themselves.

Shaw concludes his text by speculating on the future of dining: pretty good, thank you. And located in W.'s USA. Just so long as we rescue authenticity from the authentologists (my goofy word, not Steve's). Novices to the food game will find Shaw's appendix a brisk compendium of culinary resources.

Will reading Turning the Tables provide $24.95 worth of better dining (or $16.47 worth of better dining from Amazon.com). Probably. Shaw exudes a chirpy warmth that one finds neither in Winning the Restaurant Game or Kitchen Confidential (much less in George Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London, Bourdain's ur-text). One finishes infected by the virus of Shaw's enthusiasm, strategic and simultaneously the billet-doux of a fat man in love.

**************

Fair is fair: Gary Alan Fine teaches sociology at Northwestern University and authored the virtually unknown Kitchens: The Culture of Restaurant Work. He still contributes to eGullet.

My Webpage: Vealcheeks