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Archive of Ask a Waiter

5/ 7/08

9:00 AM

Alex Day of Death & Co. Cringes Over Dirty Martinis

"If someone is adamant that they want their Cosmo, we can make them something similar like a pomegranate gimlet."Photo: Melissa Hom

Alex Day started going to Death & Co. as a customer, when he lived around the corner and was a manager at the Back Room. “I was almost a groupie of the bartenders at the time,” he tells us. Six months ago, he crossed over to the other side of the bar, and now the menu features one of his drinks, the Light & Day — a mingling of gin, orange juice, maraschino liquor, and yellow chartreuse. He hopes to add to that when the staff brainstorms the spring cocktail list this week — in the meantime we thought we’d talk to him about cocktail culture.

"I will maybe make a joke and cringe when I make a dirty martini." »

More: alex day, death & co., east village

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4/29/08

6:15 PM

Former Elaine’s Bartender Brian McDonald Tells All

"Elaine had a very mature crowd."Photo: Melissa Hom

In Last Call at Elaine’s, Brian McDonald recalls his time as a recovering alcoholic, tending bar at the glamorous Upper East Side saloon-cum-salon from 1986 to 1997. McDonald left Elaine’s in the most heroic of ways, after a publication party there for his first book. However, it’s clear from his memoir that Elaine Kaufman, the firebrand who still runs her eponymous restaurant after celebrating its 45th anniversary this month, had a great deal of influence on his second career. We asked him about his time with her and what she thought of his tell-all.

"I saw Nick Nolte blowing lunch outside." »

More: brian mcdonald, elaine's, george plimpton, last call at elaine's, mick jagger, nightlife, ringo starr, robert evans, upper east side

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4/23/08

9:00 AM

Tenjune Doorman Aalex Julian Nixes Kevin Connolly's Entourage

"It’s very easy to get a big ego."Photo: Melissa Hom

This weekend, meatpacking club Tenjune will be an after-party spot for movies being shown at the Tribeca Film Festival. One person who knows to expect guests like Mariah Carey, John Cusack, and Hilary Duff is doorman Aalex Julian. Over the course of a few years, he worked the doors at Cain, Pink Elephant, Home, and Guest House before being brought on by Eugene Remm and Mark Birnbaum to open Tenjune. He tells us he’s one of maybe four doormen in the city who are in a position to negotiate their compensation (he gets a shift pay per night in addition to a percentage of table revenue) — part of the reason he’s now been manning the club’s doors for nearly two years.

Michael Jordan: "You can be on my team any day." »

More: 1 oak, aalex julian, guest house, home, meatpacking district, nightlife, pink elephant, socialista, tenjune

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4/15/08

6:25 PM

Andres Glasner of Waverly Inn Highly Recommends Siberia

"They cut us off because we’re shaving so many truffles."Photo: Melissa Hom

Memphis-born Andres Glasner wasn’t trained to massage celebrity egos when he joined the opening team at the Waverly Inn. He says the emphasis was on service. Nevertheless, he happens to have provided that service to a Who’s Who of A-listers — though he’s not allowed to say just who! We tried to fish some details out of the actor-in-training.

"Just walk on in." »

More: emil varda, graydon carter, waverly inn, west village

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4/ 1/08

5:00 PM

Jeremy Sullivan of Kobe Club Gets $5,000 Tips From Rush Limbaugh

"Our business speaks for itself."Photo: Melissa Hom

Jeremy Sullivan was born in Missouri. He has been working as an actor in New York for the past five and a half years (you may have seen him mud wrestling in the nude with Matt Damon in The Good Shepherd) and has been a waiter at Kobe Club since its ever-so-rocky opening early last year. With some wondering whether threats of a recession will bring restaurant prices down, we asked him for insight into a place where businessmen don't think twice about ordering the $700 pour of cognac for dessert — something that, as a midwestern boy, still flabbergasts him.

"Money is literally no object." »

More: derek jeter, jeffrey chodorow, kobe club, rush limbaugh

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3/25/08

6:30 PM

Julia Dubovichka of Tatiana Explains ‘Eggplant Caviar’

Photo: Melissa Hom

It’s Brooklyn restaurant week, and, as we’ve pointed out, there are a host of options. Perhaps the most distinctive one — and perhaps the one that involves the longest commute — is Tatiana, the Brighton Beach institution that doubles as a boardwalk restaurant and a lavish nightclub where the performances are every bit as mind-blowing as the ones you’ll find at the Box, even if they’re lighter on the S&M. We asked a waitress who’s been there seven years, Julia Dubovichka, to tell us which balcony (the one with the waterfall or the one with the fish in the floor?) is most suitable for our birthday celebration.

"Cheaper than in McDonald's or Wendy's." »

More: brighton beach, tatiana

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3/18/08

5:30 PM

Rose MacDowell, Author of ‘Turning Tables,’ Only Cried on the Job Once

Rose MacDowell: "Heather used to hide a glass of Chardonnay
behind one of the plants."Photo: Melissa Hom

Identical twins Heather and Rose MacDowell waited tables for five years in Manhattan before penning their novel, Turning Tables, out next week. Rose won’t name the restaurants they worked for, offering only that she was at one of the Ark Restaurants in Manhattan (it operates the Bryant Park Grill and others), while her sister worked at a defunct Italian restaurant in the Columbus Circle area. Nevertheless, she was quite candid about the industry she says she could only cope with via on-the-job hookups and shots snuck from behind the bar.

"It's a very tension-filled environment." »

More: ark restaurants, heather macdowell, rose macdowell, turning tables

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3/11/08

5:00 PM

Lurie De La Rosa of PDT Asks That You Put Your Pants on and Leave

"Our hostess opened the door to see this man taking his pants off."
Photo: Melissa Hom

Lurie De La Rosa knows a thing or two about cocktails: She worked at Pegu Club under Audrey Saunders (her “New York mom”) and with Jim Meehan, who asked her to help him open his debut spot PDT. “I wasn’t sure what he meant by a ‘hot dog bar,’” she tells us. Indeed PDT is unique in that it pairs Crif Dogs with Snoop Dogg, something De La Rosa says was “scary for a little bit. I came from this world of classic music and jazz.” But she has adjusted admirably and is now part of a family that includes Wylie Dufresne, David Chang, and the occasional naked patron.

"Don't waste your time coming to PDT if you just want a rum and Coke." »

More: blue hill, david chang, little branch, milk and honey, pdt, pegu club, per se, wylie dufresne

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3/ 4/08

5:00 PM

Antoinette Morelli of 2nd Avenue Deli Makes Sure You Don't Sneak In Chocolate

"You can't come here with a bottle of water; we have to ask you to put it away."Photo: Melissa Hom

When we called the 2nd Avenue Deli asking to speak to a server, we assumed they’d hook us up with one of the one or two old-timers left over from the East Village original. Instead, they looked to the future, and we were connected with Antoinette Morelli, who was a bank teller (and before that a server on the World Yacht) before starting at the pastrami palace’s new location. “Coming to work that first day,” she told us, “I had butterflies in my stomach because we had all the media here and we couldn’t move. They thought I wasn’t going to make it, but I surprised them.” She surprised us, too, by sounding like an old hand.

The first week we opened I had Mayor Koch. »

More: 2nd avenue deli

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2/14/08

9:30 AM

One if by Land's Michael Lombardozi Won't Let You Make Babies in the Bathroom

"They’ll order the 'Pinot' for the lady. You have to ask, 'Pinot Noir? Grigio? Blanc?'"Photo: Melissa Hom

By now even the unrepentant Paul Jankas of the world know that One if by Land, Two if by Sea is widely regarded as the most romantic restaurant in the city. Normally we’d hesitate to match a cheesy holiday with a played-out restaurant, but now that new chef Craig Hopson, formerly of Picholine, has replaced the humdrum chicken Kiev with entrées such as turbot poached in coconut milk with peeky toe crab, mango and sea beans (you can peruse the new menu here), we don’t feel the least bit corny about asking Michael Lombardozi, a waiter at the West Village institution for seven years, to walk us down lovers’ lane.

"Recently there was an incident in the bathroom." »

More: one if by land, two if by sea, west village