All Posts Tagged: ‘le cirque’
Tables Available at Benoit; Le Cirque, Picholine, and Gordon Ramsay at the London Fully Booked
Franklin Becker to Replace Gary Robins at Sheridan Square; Octopus Abounds on Menus
• Franklin Becker is replacing Gary Robins at Sheridan Square. According to the PR firm, “Franklin will change the menu slowly and keep anything that has become a signature item.” [Eater]
Related: Breaking: Gary Robins Out at Sheridan Square
• Union Square Cafe, Fleur de Sel, and Le Cirque will keep their Restaurant Week special deals in place even after the citywide promotion ends. [Zagat Buzz]
Related: Summer Restaurant Week Brings Back a Chance to Steal a Meal
• Now that chefs know how to actually cook octopus, it’s becoming more and more popular with diners. [NYP]
Alain Allegretti to Possibly Open New Restaurant; Rayuela’s Street-Food Spot Opens Tonight
Astoria: Fresh Start Market is hosting a fund-raiser Saturday night for a cleft-lip-surgery charity and will have wine, cheese, and live music. [Joey in Astoria]
East Flatbush: "Cool people" like Andrew Feinberg, of Franny’s, opt for the Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket on Saturdays to pick up supplies from Ronnybrook Dairy and Blue Moon Trout. But it's not really shocking, since Franny's is in Brooklyn. [Mouthing Off/Food & Wine]
Flatiron: Former Le Cirque chef Alain Allegretti may be opening an eponymous restaurant on 22nd Street, off Fifth Avenue, as soon as this month. [Snack]
Lower East Side: The Rayuela team unveils its Latin-street-food spot, Macondo, on East Houston Street tonight, and they have funky cocktails on the menu like a frozen avocado-and-mescal colada. [Strong Buzz]
Midtown East: Zen Burger's now serving a few more vegetarian versions of McDonald's standards, including an off-menu Filet-O-Fish. [Midtown Lunch]
Union Square: The Village Pourhouse's owners have opened SideBar, their latest boozy pub in a line of many more to come across town. [Bottomless Dish/Citysearch]
West Village: When you order the Spotted Pig's burger naked (without blue cheese), "the thing truly does taste like steak on a bun." [Hamburger Today]
Five Chef Families
In the beginning (or around 1941), Henri Soule created Le Pavillon. Le Pavillon begat La Côte Basque … and the New York restaurant genealogy began. Ever since, every restaurant that attains prominence in New York serves as a feeder system: A chef makes his bones and leaves to open his own effort, and his chef de cuisine rises to chef; the sous becomes chef de cuisine, and so on down the ranks. In this way spreads the great New York family tree of restaurants. Some are oaks mighty enough to support several branches; others more closely resemble saplings from A Charlie Brown Christmas.
We’ve created our own set of chef family trees here, charting the stars that emerged from four of New York’s best restaurants, Le Cirque, Daniel, Jean-Georges, and Craft, plus the now-closed-but influential 71 Clinton Fresh Food. Given the popularity of cocktail bars, we also looked to see what Pegu hath wrought. Chefs (or mixologists) on the tree must be currently heading their own kitchen (or, as in the case of Johnny Iuzzini, a pastry kitchen). Welcome to the triple-canopy jungle that is the New York restaurant scene.
Tables Available at Benoit and Cru; Gordon Ramsay Fully Booked
Secret Is Out About Uni Butter and Tuna Truffle Sandwiches
Baby eels, before Eric Ripert gets his hands on them. Photo: Melissa Hom
"I'll Have What DeNiro's Having": The Most Exclusive Dishes in Town [Page Six Magazine]
Tables Available at Picholine; Bar Boulud and Le Bernardin Mostly Booked
Tables Available at Benoit and Picholine; Balthazar and Le Bernardin Mostly Booked
‘Daily Show’ Writer Sues Batali; Ex-Babbo Sommelier Cooks for You
• A former Daily Show writer who was hired to work on a book to accompany PBS’ forthcoming Spain…on the Road Again butted heads with Mario Batali over the project and is now suing the series producer’s company. [NYS]
• Jeffrey Chodorow’s lounge atop the Empire Hotel opens this week, but the pool is open to hotel guests only. [TONY]
Related: Poolside Bar Set to Open Atop Empire Hotel
• Le Cirque’s former chef de cuisine, Jason Kallert, has thrown Friars Club regulars for a loop with his highbrow creations, even if some courses are “vaguely dated.” [Feed/TONY]
Related: Le Cirque Loses Its Young Chef De Cuisine to the Friars Club
Elettaria Comes Up Short; Bar Milano Does Too, But Somehow Gets Three Stars
The room looks great and (some) of chef Akthar Nawab's food was great, says Frank Bruni in his one-star review of Elettaria. But both falter for Bruni, who has problems with the way the space flows, and who finds the dishes ranging wildly from brilliant to total letdowns. [NYT]
Related: Restaurant Tour: Elettaria
Restaurant Girl lays three stars on Bar Milano, despite the fact that the pastas are mostly lousy, and the noise is “unbearable.” Except for that, it's great! [NYDN]
Randall Lane didn't even order any pasta but still thought the place worthy of only three stars out of six, with pushy servers and underwhelming meat dishes. [TONY]
Le Cirque Loses Its Young Chef De Cuisine to the Friars Club
Jason Kallert at the Friars Club. Not shown: London
Lee, Freddie Roman…Photo courtesy the Friars Club
Defeated Cheftestant Just Wants to Help Fat Cops
Andrew can make anything look demented.Photo: Courtesy of Bravo
Tables Available at Daniel and Etats-Uni; Gordon Ramsay Fully Booked
Tables Available at Picholine and Cru; Gordon Ramsay at the London Fully Booked
Maccioni Family to Open New Restaurant in Beekman Tower
Mauro Maccioni takes the lead.Photo: Patrick McMullan
Tables Available at Café des Artistes and Picholine; Gordon Ramsay and Daniel Mostly Booked
Tables Available at Cru and Fleur de Sel; Le Cirque and Le Bernardin Mostly Booked
Le Cirque Gets on the Wine-Bar Bandwagon
Just stop by Le Cirque and chill out. Really?Photo: Melissa Hom
Related: Grape Nuts [NYM]
Le Cirque and Picholine Mostly Booked; Le Bernardin Fully Booked
Jason Kallert Carries the Le Cirque Torch
A rock-solid classicist, no fan of "crazy Asian flavors."Photo: Melissa Hom
Each week, we highlight one of the city’s great — but obscure — young chefs.
Name: Jason Kallert
Age: 29
Restaurant: Le Cirque
Background: Kallert is a CIA graduate who, after time spent under the late Patrick Clark at Tavern on the Green and Union Pacific with Rocco DiSpirito, began a long association with Le Cirque, outlasting three executive chefs: Sottha Kuhnn at the original Le Cirque, Pierre Schaedelin at Le Cirque 2000 and the current iteration of the restaurant, and his replacement, Christophe Bellanca.
Self-described style: “Very simple and traditional. I’m not into too much technical stuff or using crazy Asian flavors and herbs. If garlic and thyme goes with lamb, I use garlic and thyme. I’m not as creative as some chefs. I like a classic approach.”
Tables Available at La Grenouille and Café des Artistes; Balthazar Fully Booked
Momofuku Ko Hoping to Open in Two Weeks; No Malice Palace Prevails
During last night's CB3 meeting, partner Andrew Salmon would reveal only that Momofuku Ko will hit capacity at fourteen, with no waiters and with fixed menus changing daily. “You sit directly across from the cook,” Salmon told the board. He kept the “vaguely Asian” food quiet, conceding only that it would include “all local ingredients … all sustainable development.” Unfortunately, he didn’t take the time to make sure a petition was including in the application, so no motion could be passed. Projected opening date: two weeks' time!
Kobe Dines on Kobe at Kobe; Nobu Gives Manning a Standing O
Fashion Week brought the usual celebrity infestation to town last week for glitzy after-parties, but we’ve already covered those. The real question is, where did the “normals” catch a bite? And of course by normals we mean billionaires, Nobel Prize winners, and Super Bowl champs, all of whom made the scene this week.
Sirio Speaks Out on That Guy From the ‘Times’ … What Did You Say His Name Was?
The scent of a lost star was still in Sirio's nostrils when interviewed.Photo: Melissa Hom
World According To…Sirio Maccioni [Portfolio via Gawker]
Le Cirque Back in the Three-Star Club; It’s La Belle Epoque Again at Adour
Who says Frank Bruni has no heart? After demoting Le Cirque last year, Bruni restores the third star, courtesy largely to new chef Christophe Bellanca’s masterly handling of ultraluxe ingredients and, of course, the Maccioni family’s trademark feudal service. [NYT]
Maybe you don’t consider the salmon at Dovetail “a religious experience,” the way Restaurant Girl does, but everyone seems to agree with Adam Platt that it’s a very fine restaurant and outrageously good for the Upper West Side. [NYDN]
Related: This Dove Flies
Ryan Sutton has filed the first review of Adour, and he makes it sound, at least to anachronistically minded readers, truly awesome. Did you know Adour is serving lobster thermidor? Lobster thermidor! In this day and age! Sutton is also impressed by the virtual wine list, as most other visitors have been. [Bloomberg]
Freedom Tower Seeks Restaurant Developer; Le Cirque Does Restaurant Week All Month
Starting today, the Port Authority is accepting early bids from developers for control of a two-story restaurant atop the Freedom Tower, with a grand opening slated for early 2013. [The Real Estate/NYO]
More bad news about the FDA: It’s “so understaffed that, at its current pace, the agency would need at least 27 years to inspect every foreign medical device plant that exports to the United States, 13 years to check every foreign drug plant and 1,900 years to examine every foreign food plant.” [NYT]
Le Cirque’s Restaurant Week menus are such a hit that the Maccioni clan is going to make them available every weekday in February. [Zagat]
Michael ‘Bao’ Huynh Out at Bun; A Le Cirque Documentary
Michael “Bao” Huynh has left his post at Bun, saying he couldn’t get along with his partner. Next up: a new noodle shop in Tribeca. [Insatiable Critic]
Burgerphilia: a new term about burger obsessives we won’t be using. [Time]
Related: Daniel Boulud’s Downtown Burger Place Finally Signs the Lease
A Table in Heaven, a documentary that looks at Le Cirque’s move from the Palace Hotel to the Bloomberg building, was screened at the Sundance Film Festival and promises to show Sirio Maccioni’s tendency to exceed the restaurant’s 2 percent cap on free meals. [NYDN]
City to Reenact Calorie-Display Rule; Bloodbath Near Spotlight Live
The city’s Board of Health is set to reenact its legally contested rule requiring all restaurants with fifteen or more eateries nationwide to post the caloric value of food items on their menus. [NYDN]
Related: Fast-Food Biz Wins Fight Against City Hall
Restaurants and nightclubs currently owe the city $14 million in health-code violation fines, which means that high-roller venues like the Rainbow Room can get away with stiffing the city out of $50. [NYP]
Times Square’s Spotlight Live became the latest scene of club violence when one man was killed and five others stabbed there yesterday morning. [NYDN]
Balthazar and Le Bernardin Fully Booked; Picholine Mostly Booked
Tables Available at Cru and Picholine; Gordon Ramsay Fully Booked