Rolling the Dice: Morandi

Every week, we take our turn with Lady Luck on the BruniBetting odds as posted by Eater. Just for kicks, we track Eater’s bet too, and see who is better at guessing what the unpredictable Bruni will do. We track our sins with an imaginary $1 bet every week.

The Line: Tomorrow, Frank Bruni reviews Morandi, Keith McNally’s foray into Italian cuisine. Eater’s official odds are as follows (√√ denotes the Eater bet):

Zero Stars: 5-1
One Star: 2-1 √√
Two Stars: 6-1
Three Stars: 90-1
Four Stars: 25,000-1

The Skinny: Morandi had a shaky start, with many critics finding the food uneven, the service scattered, the crowds unbearable, the décor inauthentic and claustrophobic. I can only take Eater’s word for it that things are getting steadily better at Morandi, because frankly, nothing I’ve read has made me eager to go there.

The Brunologist loves Italian food, and some of his most generous ratings have gone to Italian restaurants. But it’s the one genre in which Bruni can’t be fooled. I have to think that when he wrote his love letter to Esca last week, it was with the certain knowledge that the Morandi review was up next. I therefore expect to find a noticeable contrast between the two, with Morandi earning a weak one star, at best.

The Bet: We are inclined to agree with Eater that one star is the most likely outcome, and that is normally how we would bet. But with the oddsmakers offering only 2–1 odds for that choice, we are going to roll the dice on zero stars, which at 5–1 odds is the more attractive wager.