222 replies to this topic

[changeup]

True, an important distinction.

[oakapple]

I haven't enjoyed a blog post as much as this in a long, long time.

[Wilfrid]

It so happens I've heard good things about Adour lately, so maybe, just this once, Fat Guy is telling the truth.

He is. Very good indeed and I especially urge any beef fans to go and eat the beef cap while it's available. Safest to check as it isn't on the online menu.

Pink Pig review.

[Suzanne F]

So have they finally figured out how to make and cook decent pasta? My biggest disappointment at Essex House might have been the pasta course, which was unevenly cooked and generally awful.

You do make Adour sound worth scraping together the pennies.

[Wilfrid]

This was a fine pasta dish.

[Orik]

Thanks, that looks convincing.

[Sneakeater]

Just a quick note.

The "Ducasse's Greatest Hits" menu (in celebration of his 55th birthday) will only remain available, as I understand it, until next Friday. I can now tell you that it's well worth having. (Remember, this is Didier Elena executing those dishes.) Think about it.

[sethd]

Just a quick note.

The "Ducasse's Greatest Hits" menu (in celebration of his 55th birthday) will only remain available, as I understand it, until next Friday. I can now tell you that it's well worth having. (Remember, this is Didier Elena executing those dishes.) Think about it.

I am not at all surprised that you enjoyed Chef Elena's take on "ducasse's greatest hits menu" at Adour. Ducasse's dining philosophy of 60% ingredients and 40% preparation is what marks his restaurants, not any specific dish. Indeed the only dish that is common to all his three star restaurants in Europe is his Baba.

[Sneakeater]

The problem with that approach in New York is that, at the prices he's able to charge here, the ingredients just aren't as spectacular. It's a problem we just have to live with here.

Which is why it matters to have a first-rate on-site chef like Chef Elena in charge of execution.

[ulterior epicure]

The problem with that approach in New York is that, at the prices he's able to charge here, the ingredients just aren't as spectacular. It's a problem we just have to live with here.

I don't know who made up this myth that excellent produce is beyond the reach of New York, or even the U.S. It's simply not true. It can't be.

[Sneakeater]

It's not that it's not available. It's that spectacular ingredients -- I mean more than just produce -- cost A LOT of money, and for apparent cultural reasons American restaurants can't charge as much as European ones and so can't use the very very best raw materials.

I can't think of why else top European restaurants consistently have better ingredients than top American restaurants.

ETA -- I go into this rant -- along with my cheese rant -- every September.

[Sneakeater]

I'll add that if this isn't true on the West Coast -- I don't have enough experience eating there to know -- then it's got to be because spectacularly good produce and other raw materials are cheaper out than here in the East. It certainly makes sense to me that they would be.

[ulterior epicure]

I can't think of why else top European restaurants consistently have better ingredients than top American restaurants.

Because they are romanticists, and we are capitalists. And I'm not being trite here.

New York is capable of affording better. The people there just don't demand it.

[Sneakeater]

That's what I mean. The people here aren't willing to pay enough for restaurant food to permit restaurants to get those ingredients. Despite the complaints about restaurant prices in New York, the problem is that prices are too low (for the very best).

[ulterior epicure]

That's what I mean. The people here aren't willing to pay enough for restaurant food to permit restaurants to get those ingredients. Despite the complaints about restaurant costs in New York, the problem is that consumers won't pay enough (for the very best).

Well, you're a hard-line, life-long New Yorker. What's wrong with you (in the plural)?