371 replies to this topic

[Sneakeater]

When Sons of Fucking Essex institutes a chef's tasting menu . . . .

[Wilfrid]

Ha! This is the place which constantly solicits custom online and through mailings but installs a bouncer on the door to discourage anyone going in.

[Orik]

Actually, it was Liebrandt who simplified his earlier work in order to get Corton open. Some of us thought that Gilt should have had four stars, and no one suggested that of Corton at the beginning. I haven't been to Corton in a couple of years, and he may have started amping it up again, now that he's safe from Frank Bruni. But initially, Corton was pretty tame (although still very good) by comparison to Liebrandt's earlier stuff.

Just as a side note, I used to think Bruni's review of Gilt was behind some of this, but more recently I've learned that Gilt would have closed on the same date even if Bruni were to give it five stars out of four (fact, not speculation).

I don't know what the considerations were when opening Corton.

[oakapple]

Eater hears rumors of a 12 seat chef's counter in the basement of Guy Fieri's new Times Square restaurant.

Speculation on the price of the tasting menu starts now.

[Sneakeater]

I think I see a shark that has definitively been jumped.

[Wilfrid]

I don't know. Emeril has had a chef's dining counter in his NO flagship for many years. Of course, you're about as likely to find him there as you will be to find Guy Fieri in Times Square.

[Sneakeater]

But Emeril is actually a chef.

[oakapple]

Emeril is a celebrity now, but for a while he was a serious chef. I'm not sure Guy Fieri has ever done anything serious -- but if he did, it was for about 15 minutes, before he started yelling and wearing sunglasses.

[Lex]

Emeril is a celebrity now, but for a while he was a serious chef. I'm not sure Guy Fieri has ever done anything serious -- but if he did, it was for about 15 minutes, before he started yelling and wearing sunglasses.

You know who's well on the way to turning into Guy Fieri?





Eddie Huang.




In fact ...

[Wilfrid]

I have never eaten Guy Fieri's food, and it may be awful, buy y'all are doing him a disservice. Chef* at a place called Johnny Garlic's since the mid-'90s, and I actually know - without googling it - that his specialty has been some kind of Americana-sushi fusion.

ETA: Now googling, I see it's a small chain. The first one opened in 1996.

*Okay, it looks like I'm wrong and he was primarily co-owner/manager. I had assumed he was in the kitchen at these places. Carry on.

[Nathan]

I have never eaten Guy Fieri's food, and it may be awful, buy y'all are doing him a disservice. Chef* at a place called Johnny Garlic's since the mid-'90s, and I actually know - without googling it - that his specialty has been some kind of Americana-sushi fusion.

ETA: Now googling, I see it's a small chain. The first one opened in 1996.

*Okay, it looks like I'm wrong and he was primarily co-owner/manager. I had assumed he was in the kitchen at these places. Carry on.

He has worked in the restaurant industry for over 25 years though...that is something.

[Orik]

I do wonder if another explanation might have been the economic boom attracting expatriate europeans where the style was historically more prevalent than in the US

I just don't know how prevalent it was before the '20s. That's about as far back as dining guides go. I just don't have a sufficiently vivid memory of the historical menus at the NYPL from earlier periods.

Now conveniently online and somewhat transcribed:

http://menus.nypl.org/

[Wilfrid]

$85 is the new cheap!

 

Time Out lists "affordable" tasting menus.

 

ETA: $85, of course, means $130 after you add tax/tip and a very modest beverage consumption: more likely $150 a head. 

[Orik]

Torrisi is $75? 

[Wilfrid]

Mm, and I couldn't help noticing that it's not what Torrisi calls the "tasting menu".  That's the price of the regular prix fixe dinner (once $45).

 

The tasting menu is $160.

 

I can bore on about how "tasting menu" has lost its original meaning through loose usage, if anyone cares.