Lobster in New York

[gaf]

Shellfish's Bitch New York City Entry #110 Jordan's Lobster Dock, Grand Central Oyster Bar, Per Se, Eleven Madison Park

For most Americans July is hot dogs and apple pie, for me it is lobster and drawn better. Even since I vacationed on the Cape as a tot, lobster announces the heights of summer. And now the divines at Whole Foods damn me as a sadistic cad for my overheated pleasure. Perhaps I should stick to foie gras and placenta. But the truth is that I am shellfish's bitch.

In the past week I have repeatedly indulged in my cruel sport within our city limits: Per Se, Eleven Madison Park, Grand Central Oyster Bar, and Jordan's Lobster Dock. I regret not traveling to Nick's Lobster Restaurant on Jamaica Bay and the Lobster Box on City Island. Both Nick's and the Box may share the Down East ambiance I crave.

Jordan's Lobster Dock is a real estate tragedy. The restaurant and seafood market are situated in a fetching saltbox house on Shellbank Creek off Sheepshead Bay. Once diners could relax on a deck with a stunning view of the creek with its lobster skiffs. However, the damnable owners sold the half of the restaurant with the view to T.G.I.Friday's. Oy! Diners must choose between a sublime view and some pretty fine lobster. We chose the lobster, but it was served in one of the most depressing lunchrooms in seafaring history. The room, closed in and windowless might have served as an ethnic outpost if someone had cared to decorate it. For $60 for a three pound lobster, the industrial space was crushing. The staff matched the decor. No bibs, insufficient napkins and silverware, and astonishingly we were forced to leave a $3.00 deposit for a lobster cracker when we requested one. I grant that the clientele was more happily diverse than at most lobster shacks (a one pounder was $15.95), but it is hard to imagine a black market in plastic crackers.

The only worthy offering at Jordan's was the lobster, a very moist, tender, and creamy crustacean. Boiled simply, if not to the lobster's preference, it was excellent for an urban market. The cole slaw and French Fried potatoes were a wan afterthought.

Grand Central Oyster Bar, opened in 1913, has a different problem. The space in the bowels of Grand Central with its tile-lined vaulted ceilings is one of the treasures of New York culinary architecture. Service was friendly and efficient. We enjoyed our oysters (a mixture of excellent Kumamotos and good Blue Points). The Cajun sauteed moonfish (opah) was passable, and the string beans didn't even reach that level. The lobster (a two pounder) was satisfactory, but not at the level of tenderness one might discover on the coast. The meat did not match the room.

In the last month I have been returning to some of my most treasured restaurants to give my memory a jolt. This week it was Per Se and Eleven Madison Park.

I have said to all who listen that my two best meals in New York this year were at Per Se. However, after eating the Chef's Tasting Menu recently, I can't claim that Per Se wins, places, and shows. My meal was exceedingly pleasing, and it is only in comparison with Per Se 1 and 2 that I must subtract a star. There was much complexity and many quotation marks. However, fortunately for my story, the best dish of the evening was Chef Benno's lobster, described with quotation marks included as: Sweet Butter Poached Nova Scotia Lobster, "Ragoût" of "Ris de Veau," Corn Kernels and Morel Mushrooms with Watercress "Leaves" and Corn "Pudding." It was a sweetheart of a dish and exquisite in design. Its tragic flaw was its size, one reason that I have shied away from long tasting menus. This dish would have been a memory-maker had it been doubled and astounding had it been tripled. A plate with this much complexity needs to give the diner time to cogitate and masticate. We were eventually served some fourteen courses. If I could have selected a four course menu, what a meal it would have been, and the lobster would have been the star.

Eleven Madison Park was the most pleasant surprise of the year: some friends consider Danny Meyer's haute restaurant the comeback kid under the brilliant Chef Daniel Humm. On this second visit, I was convinced, until I reached dessert, that this might be the meal of the year. (There is no restaurant with more congenial or happier service: not in the Alain Ducasse metier). The cheese course and two desserts were not as assured or compelling. Cornbread ice cream might seem like a good idea on paper, but it is less inspired on the plate. However, our text for this sermon is lobster.

Chef Humm's lobster dish was the equal to Chef Benno's: Orange-Broth Poached Nova Scotia Lobster with Purée of Chantenay Carrots and Gewürztraminer Foam(and think of the savings on quotation marks!). Dining at Per Se and Eleven Madison Park reveals that while both are influenced by a Molecular (Agape) Cuisine, Chef Humm is the more experimental, and yet throughout there is a confidence that flows from a chef who persuades us that he knows what he is doing. Of the chefs working in this vein - tradition not quite the most apt word - it is Chef Humm who has transcended the constraints of this style. Never attempt flinging paint until you can a limn a portrait. The lobster chunks were surrounded by large squares of carrot (one might call them dice a la Las Vegas craps). The orange sauce, carrot puree and a foamy swig of Gewürztraminer was an ideal mix. And it was one of four astounding dishes that night.

Yet, despite these triumphs, I ache for a buttery New England boiled dinner served with sea spray on the Cape: God's lobster. Is He shellfish's bitch? If if He is, do crustaceans damn him too?

And, now, home to Chicago. That's all folks!

Eleven Madison Park

11 Madison Avenue (at 24th Street)

Manhattan (Flatiron)

212-889-0905

Oyster Bar

Grand Central Station, Lower Level (42nd St. and Vanderbilt Ave.)

Manhattan (Midtown)

212-490-6650

Jordan's Lobster Dock

Knapp Street and Harkness Avenue

Brooklyn (Sheepshead Bay)

800-404-CLAW

Per Se

Time Warner Center

Manhattan (Columbus Circle)

212-823-9335

My Webpage: Vealcheeks

[Alchemist]

Marys Fish Camp does an amazing Lobster Roll.

[Pan]

[...]A plate with this much complexity needs to give the diner time to cogitate and masticate.[...]

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Yeah, and masticating won't make you blind.

I'll miss your eloquent reviews of New York restaurants. Have a safe trip back to Chicago and don't be a stranger.

[BryanZ]

For most Americans July is hot dogs and apple pie, for me it is lobster and drawn better.

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Me too, me too.

I've enjoyed reading your impressions of New York, gaf. The breadth, depth, and detailed accounts of your culinary experiences have in turn influenced the dining decisions of many an eG'er, myself included.

[nakji]

As a (former?) Nova Scotian, I'm intrigued that two of the restaurants insisted on billing their offerings as "Nova Scotia" lobster. Is it really better? Or does it just seem more exclusive than Maine Lobster?

Of course I remember growing up that everyone in the province insisted we had the world's best lobster, but having grown and travelled, I just wrote it off as provincial pride and propaganda. Were they right all along?

[Fat Guy]

The best lobster I ever had was from Point Judith, Rhode Island. Well, the lobster wasn't actually from Point Judith. She (lobster is one of the few animals whose gender is apparent when you eat it) was from the ocean. But the boat that harvested her was based in Point Judith.

Does that mean the best lobsters come from Point Judith? Of course not. There are many factors that contribute to the overall quality of a lobster. The time of year and the lobster's molting cycle can make the same lobster taste totally different from month to month. The handling of the lobster after it's caught is also important -- a lobster caught by a day boat and cooked that evening is not going to taste the same as that same lobster after it has spent three months in a FedEx warehouse tank. And of course the way the lobster is cooked makes quite a difference: grilling, boiling, steaming, poaching in butter -- these are all going to make a huge difference. Where the lobster is from? Probably not so important. I know they grow faster in warmer water, but I've never seen a demonstration of how this affects taste. And while diet surely affects taste, it's either not as pronounced as with mammals or there isn't tremendous variation in diet in the different lobster fisheries. Some people think the size of a lobster makes a difference. I don't. In any event, it seems that anyplace the Homarus americanus lives, it can be great or it can be terrible.

I think restaurants labeling their lobster as Nova Scotia lobster are just being accurate about the origins of an ingredient. Nova Scotia lobster does not seem more exclusive than Maine lobster to most Americans. Many restaurants will lie about the origins of their Nova Scotia lobster and call it Maine lobster, because Maine is so heavily associated with great lobster. (There are also all sorts of brokerage arrangements whereby Maine suppliers buy and resell Canadian lobsters.) But Canada just has more lobster -- in most years I believe the lobster harvest up there is about twice the size of the Maine lobster harvest.