A waiter placed a shallow white bowl before me. On the bottom, making the corners of a square, lay four pastel-colored florets: yellow, ivory, pink and green. He poured in cauliflower soup and set down a bagel. “The topping on the bagel is ‘Dubarry’: chopped cauliflower and Comté cheese,” he explained. “In Escoffier, dishes made Read More
When Heath Ledger’s masseuse found the actor unconscious Tuesday, she called Mary-Kate Olsen for advice before dialing 911. The NYPD spokesman said, "I’m not going to speculate on why 911 was not called first." [City Room]
Also, multiple types of anti-anxiety meds and sedatives, all prescribed to Ledger, were found in his Read More
To Michael Ruhlman, dining at a four-star restaurant is akin to a religious experience. “The meaning of life could be found in an onion,” he writes in his new book, The Reach of a Chef, “and the battle of a busy restaurant service could deliver you to an altered state of being—equal parts grace and Read More
When I called to make a reservation, I was brought up short for a second when a male voice answered “A Voce. Dante speaking.”
Dante Camara (not Alighieri) is the maître d’ at A Voce (which means “word of mouth”), a new Italian restaurant near Madison Square Park. The team behind this venture is impressive. Read More
“Refined” is not an adjective normally associated with Korean food. The hallmarks of the cuisine are kimchi, chilies and garlic. Meat is barbecued over smoking tabletop grills, and bowls of rice act as foils to spicy stews and sauces. But the cooking at D’Or Ahn, a new Korean restaurant in Chelsea, takes a radical departure Read More
In February, New York Times food critic Frank Bruni reviewed Alain Ducasse at the Essex House. Mr. Ducasse’s restaurant, the city’s most expensive when it opened in 2000, had overcome initial carping about its prices and pretensions-a choice of pens for diners to sign the checks-to win four stars from The Times’ William Grimes in Read More
Putting the High In Low,
Ducasse Mixes It UpThe smartly dressed man and woman at the next table had just finished a business lunch at Mix when their waitress appeared with a giant bottle of Nutella, the chocolate-hazelnut spread. Using a shallow silver utensil that was rounded at both ends, she spooned some of the Read More
Wednesday 23rd
Will the almost-Ivy Lolitas of Barnard College meet their match in the glossy-lipped gamines of Glamour magazine? Will young women who stay up late scrutinizing Thomas Hardy’s use of pathetic fallacy embrace the Blahnik-shod gals of Glamour as role models who prove that all the toil in college will one day be Read More
Meal of a Lifetime May Be
Cure for Orange-Alert Blues
Fling your paper down in disgust: The world is falling apart and here I am, eating a six-course black truffle dinner at Alain Ducasse! I was invited by a friend who felt that we needed cheering up.
The smell of truffles, which come Read More
A Fresh Face in Tribeca
Lives Up to Its Name
“Is this place done?” One of my friends stared at the two blurry color blow-ups of part of a seascape that were pinned to the wall with thumbtacks. We had just sat down to dinner at Fresh, a new seafood restaurant in Tribeca, which Read More
