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Next to Honor Bobby Flay


AaronS

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it does seem really odd to me. I was wondering if anyone here could opine about mesa grill. eta: apparently it closed in 2013, I assume whatever excellence they’re celebrating was long gone by then.

charlie trotter died in 2014, and his restaurant closed the same year mesa grill did.

Edited by AaronS
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But wait.  Isn't the concept of Next paying "homage" to other chefs?  Didn't they start out by doing an Adria run (I mean, I was there)?

What seems weird about this is that these current choices are so mainstream.  Wasn't Next supposed to be "progressive"?

Edited by Sneakeater
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5 hours ago, AaronS said:

I was wondering if anyone here could opine about mesa grill. eta: apparently it closed in 2013, I assume whatever excellence they’re celebrating was long gone by then

We felt Mesa Grill was very good in the early-mid 90s, and I remember it when Flay was actually in the kitchen. (I thought my wife would pass out when he came over to the table to say hi, not because of us, but because of who we were dining with).

They also had a pretty damn good bar program (especially tequilla), which for most restaurants at that time, was progressive.

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9 hours ago, Sneakeater said:

But wait.  Isn't the concept of Next paying "homage" to other chefs?  Didn't they start out by doing an Adria run (I mean, I was there)?

What seems weird about this is that these current choices are so mainstream.  Wasn't Next supposed to be "progressive"?

I was at the Adria thing too. What's perhaps a bit odd here is that cooking the food of El Bulli in Chicago was a realization of Adria's vision (at the time) - precise processes that can be executed anywhere by anyone - whereas Flay's incredibly skilled hand (as seen on TV) makes it seem silly to replicate his work from recipes. 

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Bobby Flay has generally run good restaurants in New York (not talking about the national chain stuff). Mesa Grill and Bolo were both enjoyable (even if you could assume a long wait to be seated). Bar Americain started out well. I liked Gato. And I consistently saw Flay in the kitchen at all those places.

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trotter makes perfect sense, flay seems like an ironic choice but my only experience of him is eating next to him at uncle boons and thinking that his very beautiful wife seemed miserable and then seeing they got divorced shortly thereafter.

I guess I can see why they would want to show their versions of what’s in child’s books.

Edited by AaronS
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14 hours ago, MitchW said:

We felt Mesa Grill was very good in the early-mid 90s, and I remember it when Flay was actually in the kitchen. (I thought my wife would pass out when he came over to the table to say hi, not because of us, but because of who we were dining with).

They also had a pretty damn good bar program (especially tequilla), which for most restaurants at that time, was progressive.

Bobby's walk to the table used to be pretty runway

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