06/30/08

Cart-Mania at Blue Hill at Stone Barns

Like wearing miniskirts after 40, it takes a lot of good taste and daring to get away with tableside carts. When we see a stooped waiter pushing a wheeled contraption our way, several not-so-positive memories flash through our mind.

Posted at 07:37 AM | Permalink | Comments: 3

06/25/08

Trend Game: Beertails

We’ve been noticing a marketing trend among the vast Triple B beers (big, bland and beige). Brands like Miller Chill and Bud Chelada are mimicking the Mexican beertail, michelada.

We’re surprised, since a michelada (the name is thought to come from mi chela helada, or “my cold beer”) is a hard sell for most American palates: this is no lime down the neck of a Corona, folks. Americans have famously unadventurous taste in beer—preferring wan, pale lagers-- and a true michelada is cold beer adulterated with some (or all) of the following: Worcestershire sauce,

Posted at 07:58 AM | Permalink | Comments: 0

06/23/08

Blue Smoke Chop House in Greenwich: Danny Meyer’s Slightly Creepy Enlightened Hospitality Comes North

After a recent re-read of Danny Meyer’s biography-cum-religious-doctrine, Setting the Table, we emerged comforted in the knowledge that we took the correct career path. Unlike Mr. Meyer, who spends insomniac nights thinking of ways to please his customers, we began to feel that our diners were a nuisance.

Posted at 05:12 PM | Permalink | Comments: 3

06/19/08

Blue Smoke Rises Over Greenwich

Is the city too hot? Was it 9/11? Or did those big city restaurateurs finally realize that suburbanites make up a large part of their dining public. Why not just serve us closer to home?

Posted at 10:28 AM | Permalink | Comments: 1

06/18/08

A Sweaty, Saw-Dust-Stuck Chat with Andy Nusser About Tarry Lodge

We showed up to the construction site that will be Tarry Lodge—opening in either August or September—on the hottest day of the year thus far. And FYI, air conditioning is not installed yet, so we sweltered as we poked around the unfinished, multi level space waiting for Joe Bastianich to show up for photography.

Posted at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments: 0

06/16/08

Top Chef Meets a Barber

So we tune into Top Chef, as we do every Wednesday night, and who do we see? Chef Dan Barber gracing my dirty, shameful little televised pleasure. Words uttered, as we spewed root veg chips all over ourselves? “Holy crap—is that Dan?” – or a close-ish facsimile.

Yes, folks, it was Dan—who was joining two other super-dignified culinary eminances, Eric Ripert and April Bloomfield, to act as sous chefs to the hapless, sweaty cheftestants. We were chuffed: Westchester in the...

Posted at 09:17 AM | Permalink | Comments: 3

06/09/08

Palomino at a Gallup

We recently caught up with powerhouse chef Raphael Palomino, who, like Chef Neil Ferguson and Chef Peter Kelly, is burning up the roadways between his many restaurants. If we were highway cops and looking for likely suspects, we’d clock all these mobile high powered chefs: these guys have their clogs to the metal all day long, not that we’re finking.

Turns out that Chef Palomino has crossed the mighty river and has opened a branch of Pacifico near Lehigh. Pennsylvania. Pacifico, of course, is Palomino’s cheerful Nueva Latino featuring...

06/02/08

Porch Sippers

We were watching one of our favorite food shows—Best Recipes of the World with Mark Bittman—and we heard a resonant wine phrase: "porch sipper." We were intrigued.  After all, a good porch sipper has qualities that distinguish it from a wine you might drink in a 72-degree, climate-controlled restaurant.  It’s cooling, refreshing, light on the palate.  It goes with the sort of food one serves at home, in summertime. And it must be what you crave on a humid, but lovely summer night, to be drunk outdoors, accompanied by a bug or two, maybe after you’ve mowed the lawn or returned from the...