Chevalier at The Baccarat

[Orik]

If there's bread and butter it's French. If there's bread and oil and you pay for them it's Italian, if you don't pay then it's Spanish. If the staff shouts something like INCOMPREHENSSSEEE!!! when you walk in, it's Japanese, if the air is thick with MSG fumes, Chinese. Everything else is just called New American, which means they take something, cook it, and put it on a plate.

[Wilfrid]

Michael Anthony is nothing if not a French chef.

 

Anyway, Kreuther is serving Tarte Flambee! Ooh-la-la!

[Wilfrid]

If there's bread and butter it's French. If there's bread and oil and you pay for them it's Italian, if you don't pay then it's Spanish. If the staff shouts something like INCOMPREHENSSSEEE!!! when you walk in, it's Japanese, if the air is thick with MSG fumes, Chinese. Everything else is just called New American, which means they take something, cook it, and put it on a plate.

If they throw it at the plate and almost kind of miss, it's Nouveau Nordic.

[Adrian]

Michael Anthony is nothing if not a French chef.

 

Anyway, Kreuther is serving Tarte Flambee! Ooh-la-la!

But he's not serving French food at gramercy.

[Wilfrid]

Are Rebelle and Racines serving French food?

[taion]

Is Restaurant David Toutain French? Would it be French if it served the exact same food in New York, but everyone who worked there were American?

[Adrian]

Are Rebelle and Racines serving French food?

i would imagine so, but I've never eaten at either. Racines looks it, and I haven't seen rebelles menus or photos of the food.

[Wilfrid]

Have you been to GT under Anthony?

[Adrian]

You're not having enough fun, I've edited:

 

Is arpege French? Would it be French if it served the exact same food in New York, but everyone who worked there were American?

[Adrian]

 

Have you been to GT under Anthony?[/quote

 

 

Yes.

[taion]

Instead of thinking in terms of a categorical French or not-French, put the food (just the food!) on a continuous scale of French-ness.

 

I think you should observe that EMP is more French than GT, and that in many ways a place like Restaurant David Toutain is not that far from many restaurants that we consider New American.

 

It's an interesting thought experiment. Part of the answer obviously is that food and technique are not the only things we consider when we decide whether a restaurant is French.

[Anthony Bonner]

But pretty much everything high end in the us lies on that scale outside of high end sushi.

[mongo_jones]

 

If there's bread and butter it's French. If there's bread and oil and you pay for them it's Italian, if you don't pay then it's Spanish. If the staff shouts something like INCOMPREHENSSSEEE!!! when you walk in, it's Japanese, if the air is thick with MSG fumes, Chinese. Everything else is just called New American, which means they take something, cook it, and put it on a plate.

If they throw it at the plate and almost kind of miss, it's Nouveau Nordic.

 

 

if you post a photo of the food and i don't like it, it's indian.

[taion]

But pretty much everything high end in the us lies on that scale outside of high end sushi.

That's the point. But you can talk about wd~50 being on a very different point on that scale than Daniel.

[oakapple]

This is basically my point - people love fancy French food, just don't package it with bonsoir and Monsieur if you want it to succeed.

 

Eleven Madison Park is the proof that you're mistaken. They never bonsoir'd or monsieur'd you there. Ever. They never had Charles Masson's butter ritual there. Ever.

 

But suppressing those old-fashioned anachronisms wasn't enough. They had to make the restaurant American. If it were the French restaurant you're claiming it is, they'd scare a lot of people away.