How Mireille Guiliano Doesn’t Get Fat: Breakfast at Balthazar
When Mireille Guiliano first came to America as an exchange student, she gained weight for the first time in her life. Many years later, after becoming a CEO of Veuve Clicquot, she penned the buzzy No. 1 best-seller French Women Don’t Get Fat, now out in paperback. After 25 years of splitting her time between New York and Paris, Guiliano is still amazed by the large portions here, and by the New Yorker’s tendency to eat on the go. “To eat your bagel and your muffin with coffee on the subway is gross,” she says. “How can you do it with the smell and the noise and the moving? I’d rather starve.” She’s also still shocked when she sees people eating on the street or standing up. “For French people, you’re supposed to eat at the table. Besides the bed, it’s the most important piece of furniture in the house.” So what’s she been eating at the table this week?
The Other Critics
Russian Tea Room Slammed; Einstein’s Theory Applied to Cambodian FoodChristmas comes in January for Danny Meyer, as Bruni awards both Eleven Madison Park and the Bar Room at the Modern three stars. [NYT]
Using the Theory of Relativity, Sietsema explains why Kampuchea is special without really being special at all. [VV]
Alan Richman jumps on the Russian Tea Room with both feet. Key words: “gummy,” “inedible,” and “your grocer’s freezer.” [Bloomberg]
The Other Critics
Two Angles on Cafe Cluny; Meehan Devours ‘Avian Oddities’Loud, crowded and unimaginative, Cafe Cluny still hews closely enough to the Balthazar mold in both the front and back of the house to earn one star from Bruni. [NYT]
Paul Adams likes Cluny even better, calling the food “impressive,” and laying off the cultural context. He’s just here for the duck. [NYS]
Meanwhile, Peter Meehan is fascinated by the “avian oddities” served at all-chicken spot Yakitori Torys and writes enthusiastically, though not exactly convincingly, of the joys of eating chicken bones and necks. [NYT]
The Gobbler
Ms. Gobbler’s Turn: Her Favorite RestaurantsIn pale imitation of great gastronome scribblers like Calvin Trillin and the late Johnny Apple, the Gobbler has written, perhaps too often, about his wife’s taste in food and restaurants (just read his last review). Possibly also like them (the Gobbler doesn’t know Mr. Trillin, but he met Apple during his gruff, un-cuddly, pre-foodie days), the Gobbler is often accused by his wife of egregiously distorting her views (you bet he does). Ms. Gobbler would like the world to know that her most-used word is not “yummy,” that if given the choice, she’d prefer to eat at home, and that her favorite drink really is champagne. “Also, you always make me sound elfin,” she told the Gobbler just a moment ago, “and I am not elfin.” In a hasty (and desperate) attempt to clarify the record, I’ve asked Ms Gobbler to list her current favorite restaurants in town. It goes without saying that Mr. Gobbler approves of these fine establishments, too.
In the Magazine
Life Among the Beau MondeTwo Intelligencer items caught our eye this week: a Keystone Kops farce involving truffles, bound for San Domenico, sniffed out by a Homeland Security dog at JFK; and tales of the media elite confronting their likenesses at Cafe Cluny’s “demi-celebrity portrait gallery.” Both stories have a melancholy note, suggesting as they do the emptiness of wealth and privilege — not that we don’t still lust for truffles and fame ourselves.
Truffle Kerfluffle at Border [NYM]
Sketchy Café Society [NYM]
The Other Critics
Love Gets No Love From Bruni; Strong Falls in Love With Self at Cafe ClunyBruni shares Platt’s horror over Lonesome Dove’s “hairy and scary” welcome mat and agrees the “mistakes don’t end at the front door.” For one, the quail quesadillas and rabbit empanadas taste like, well, chicken. Still, it’s not all bluster: “Mr. Love seems dedicated to getting first-rate cuts of meat, and if the rub-happy kitchen goes overboard in seasoning them, especially with salt and pepper, it certainly knows how to cook many of them.” [NYT]
Forget the two-hour rule at Ramsay at the London: Paul Adams fumes over getting bum-rushed at Goblin Market: “When a place goes to such lengths to make it clear that they don’t want customers, I for one am glad to oblige.” [NYS]
At David Burke’s Hawaiian Tropic Zone, the dishes taste “like they came from a war zone, not a tropic zone.” But then again “at a human zoo like this, the quality of the food just doesn’t matter.” [TONY]
The Other Critics
Raves for Picholine and Porter House New York; Everybody Else Damned With FaintBruni has his birthday party at “reinvigorated” Picholine and, to the tune of three stars, declares it “arguably the nicest restaurant surprise of this disappointing season.” [NYT]
Meehan has mixed feelings about Lunetta but concedes: “Mr. Shepard can cook.” [NYT]
Alan Richman goes slumming at the Port Authority Bus Terminal and finds signs of promise at best. “Metro Marche is not a great restaurant. Unless Escoffier takes over the kitchen, it will never be a fashionable one. It could become quite respectable, though.” [Bloomberg]
In the Magazine
The Australian Invasion
This week, Rob and Robin report on an unlikely but welcome addition to New York’s restaurant scene, Australian pub Sheep Station, which is located in Brooklyn’s version of the outback — between Gowanus and Park Slope. Perhaps our intrepid food editors are warming to Australia — they give Sheep Station a thumbs-up for its cool room and hearty dishes, and earlier this year, they penned “Australian for ‘Food,’” a primer on the nation’s cuisine.
Also in Openings this week: East Village wine shop Tinto Fino, West Village bistro Cafe Cluny, and Soho brasserie Bar Martignetti.
Openings: Sheep Station [NYM]
