Number One in Edinburgh

Edinburgh has two Michelin star restaurants: Number One and Martin Wishart. I tried the tasting menu at Wishart’s a couple of months ago, and last week I decided to see what Number One could do. While both restaurants have their strengths, I would have to give the slight edge to Number One.

Located in the basement of the Edinburgh’s marquis hotel, the Balmoral, Number One exudes a sense of luxury. There is an ample and comfortably appointed lounge area to enjoy a drink before sitting down for your meal. The walls have a dark, highly polished sheen. They’re covered with small modern artworks that don’t distract you, but in fact are witty and eclectic if you take the time to study them. The tables and banquettes are plush and generously spaced.

The service at Number One is impeccable. As I watched them operate over two and a half hours, I couldn’t help but be impressed by the teamwork and precision. A team of five servers covered the whole restaurant (it is not that large, and not all the tables were taken), and while they had their individual duties, they operated as a coordinated unit. Now the sommelier serves you a glass of wine, and the next moment he’s serving appetizers at the next table. Now the lovely French woman is serving your soufflé, and the next moment she’s refilling wine glasses at the opposite corner of the restaurant.

I ordered the chef’s tasting menu with paired wines, which clocks in at £85 before tip. There were five courses plus two amuses and six glasses of wine in this degustation. Although most of the portions were small, as you’d expect on a tasting menu, I walked out quite full, and in fact skipped breakfast the next morning. All of the dishes were plated beautifully, in designs clearly intended to delight the eye as well as the stomach.

I had never ordered a full wine pairing before. It adds a significant premium to the meal, but I have to say it’s worth it. You get a selection of diverse wines that is expertly chosen to suit the menu, quite a few of which you probably would never order on your own. They are smaller pours than wine ordered by the glass, but with six of them included it’s about as much as most people care to drink. I did have trouble pacing myself, though: you were never sure how much time you had before the next course was to arrive.

Your meal begins with freshly-cut bread. A server wheels over a cart, with six large breads baked that day. You choose one (mine was walnut grain), and he cuts off a slice. Soft butter is already there on your table. A few minutes later he’s back to offer more. The bacon bread tempted me, but I held off, knowing there was much to come.

The amuse-bouche was a tiny cup of tomato consommé, which I found a bit disappointing. The more successful amuses-bouches display some culinary wit, which this uninspired dish lacked. The champagne paired with it was similarly unexciting.

A wonderful foie gras came next, served with oatcakes and mushroom chutney. It was paired with an intense New Zealand fruit wine that complemented the liver taste perfectly. The fish course was a scallop in a light curry sauce, accompanied by braised oxtail. This was the hit of the evening, and unfortunately that lonely scallop was gone all too quickly. This is the drawback of a tasting menu.

The meat course was less successful. Six slender lamb medallions were sufficiently tender and tasty, but I’ve had far better lamb elsewhere. Sauces are Number One’s strength, but this lamb was served in its own juices. Nothing was done to raise it above the ordinary. The grilled sweetbreads that came on the plate were far more memorable. Some writers have suggested that meat courses are not as well suited to a tasting menu, because they require larger portions to make a culinary statement. I can certainly see the point, although I’ll have to try the format a few more times before deciding whether that’s true.

The cheese course was generous to a fault. The server wheeled over a cart with a wide range of selections. I told him I preferred the exotic and offbeat, and he cut six thick slices. It’s easy to order a $15 cheese course in New York and get three skimpy pieces, so this was refreshing indeed. He asked if I wanted any more, so there didn’t seem to be a hard limit. Anyhow, at six pieces this was a more substantial course than the entrées had been, so I thought it best to stop there (with dessert still to come). I can’t describe cheeses, but the six I sampled were wonderful. They were paired with a sweet port wine.

There was a small pre-dessert of apricots and cream, followed by the main dessert, a raspberry and white chocolate soufflé. This is a specialty dish at Number One, which I’ve had on previous visits. It came with a white dessert wine, which the sommelier described as a palate-cleanser. I’m still trying to guess what that means.

At US$200 (including tip), my splurge at Number One was well worth it. This could turn into an expensive hobby.

Jean-Georges Vongerichten's '66'

Note: 66 closed in 2007. Matsugen, a Japanese soba restaurant, is its replacement.

A vendor took me out to dinner at 66 on Monday night. That meant I wasn’t paying. We had a fun night out, but I wouldn’t rush back to spend my own money there — not because there’s anything wrong with 66, but because there’s plenty of other fun places I haven’t tried yet. My feeling now about 66 is, “been there, done that.”

66 is Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s riff on Chinese cooking. Neither the menu nor the wine list is long, but this is not a complaint. Vongerichten has narrowed the stereotype Chinese menu down to the things his kitchen can execute well. Aside from a dessicated plate of overcooked spareribs, every dish was fresh, tasty, and inviting.

The menu is divided into appetizers, dim sum, rice/noodles, and entrees of vegetables, fish and meat. The apps top out at about $14, although most are under $10. The entrees top out around $26, although most are around $20-22. As at Spice Market, plates are brought out when ready. Our server assured us that all of the dishes are designed for sharing (which wasn’t always true), and encouraged us to do so—which we did.

There’s a tasting menu for $66 (get it?), which our server advised was “personally selected by Jean-Georges” (no surname required). Three of us were willing to go that route, but one of our party was skittish about trusting the famous chef’s judgment, so we created a more conservative tasting menu of our own. Our server advised ordering one app, one dim sum, and one entree/vegetable course per person, which turned out to be an ample amount of food, and indeed perhaps a tad too much.

I can’t find a menu for 66 online, and I can’t remember everything we ordered, but I’ll run through a few of the highlights. The two standout appetizers were cubes of pork belly and shrimp prepared two ways. We ordered four different kinds of dumplings, of which I remember three: foie gras, mushroom, and lobster. All were excellent, and you’re not going to find them on the typical Chinese menu.

We ordered a fish entree, which I believe was a grilled sole. It was an undivided fillet, and it quickly crumbled into bitty pieces when we tried to divide it among the four of us. It was a wonderful dish, but hard to split among a large group. The traditional duck with scallions and pancakes was more successful in this regard. Here, Vongerichten was just replicating a Chinese standard (albeit with happy results), without putting his own stamp on it. A plate of mixed vegetables (including the inescapable snow peas) and a sweet & sour chicken dish completed the main courses.

The cocktail menu included a concoction called Mother of Pearl, with rum and coconut milk, which was so wonderful I ordered a second. After dinner, I ordered a 14-year-old Oban (single malt scotch), which was very reasonably priced at around $15, and included about twice as much as you normally get in a restaurant portion. Our meal concluded with chocolate fortune cookies—once again, Jean-Georges is winking at us.

The Richard Meier décor has been much written about. It is spare, sleek, and doesn’t at all resemble your typical Chinese restaurant. The entrance on Church Street (between Leonard and Worth Streets) is so subtle you could easily miss it. My hosts had no trouble getting a 6:30 reservation, and when we left about two hours later 66 was not yet full.

66 (66 Church Street between Leonard & Worth Streets, TriBeCa)

Food: **
Service: **
Ambiance: *
Overall: **

Bloomie Froze NYCO out of Ground Zero

According to today’s Times, the Bloomberg Administration was pivotal in freezing the New York City Opera out of the cultural equation at Ground Zero.

Long unhappy with its current home at the New York State Theater, the NYCO had lobbied hard to be part of the site plan at Ground Zero. The Opera was thought to have the inside track, long before the LMDC issued an invitation to cultural institutions that eventually drew some 115 responses.

But if the NYCO moved out of Lincoln Center, the State Theater, which the city owns, would be without a tenant for the 22 weeks a year that the opera performs and rehearses there. That’s a budget hole that Bloomie would rather not have to fill.

To be sure, there were other objections to the Opera’s downtown plans, including the fact that most of the rebuilding officials simply aren’t opera fans, and therefore don’t see much merit in an opera house. But the Mayor’s influence seems to have been pivotal, especially as Governor Pataki didn’t seem to have strong feelings one way or the other.

The NYCO went so far as to hire noted architect Rafael Viñoly to design an Opera House that would fit the peculiar geometry that the Liebeskind site plan imposes. The main performance space would actually have been cantilevered over the sidewalk, with space in the building for a smaller stage, a restaurant, and even a movie theater. It was all for naught, and the NYCO now finds itself with nowhere to go. Staying where they are remains an option, but the Opera has been largely ignored in the Lincoln Center redevelopment plans, since everyone assumed they were moving.

The Times included a conceptual drawing of the Opera House we could have had. I’m sure the NYCO still hopes to erect it … somewhere.

NY Mag on Far West Side Redevelopment

The cover story in this week’s New York magazine is all about Deputy Mayor Daniel Doctoroff’s expansive plans for the Far West Side of Manhattan, particularly a new stadium for the New York Jets.

Of course, to Doctoroff it isn’t a stadium, but a multi-purpose facility for conventions, concerts, restaurants, the Olympics … and, oh yes, the Jets would play there too. I’m still skeptical about the idea, but I must admit the article makes as as good a case for the project as can be made, while also pointing out the drawbacks. Most of the arguments have been pretty one-sided, so it’s refreshing to see a feature piece that’s balanced.

A 6,000-page environmental impact statement is expected in a few weeks’ time. I’m sure it’ll make light bedtime reading.

Wonderful Town

Wonderful Town is the kind of feel-good musical that I thought was gone forever — that is, until Thoroughly Modern Millie came along a couple of years ago. Both share a similar premise: midwestern yokels come to New York to find their fortunes. Town and Millie, written half-a-century apart, appeal to the post-9/11 Broadway audience that wants to be sent home smiling.

Enjoying its first revival, Wonderful Town is bouncing along nicely at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre (the former Martin Beck, on W. 45th St, just west of 8th Avenue). Our matinee performance was full, but the weekly stats on playbill.com show that it’s grossing only about half of capacity, so the show might not make it past the summer. That would be too bad. Wonderful Town offers some of the best fun I’ve had on Broadway in a long time.

The slender plot concerns sisters Ruth and Eileen Sherwood, who’ve come to New York from Ohio. Eileen wants to break in as an actress, Ruth as a writer. Eileen captivates every man she meets, while Ruth laments that there are “One Hundred Easy Ways to Lose a Man.” They rent a studio apartment in Christopher Street, sharing the neighborhood with a motley crew of colorful supporting characters.

The songs are by Leonard Bernstein, with lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. For a show with such distinguished pedigree, it’s surprising there’s no certifiable hit among the bunch, but they’re all a bucket-load of fun. Many of the shows of this era haven’t worn well, but Wonderful Town still seems fresh. Give it a try, while you still can.

Culture at the WTC

Daniel Liebeskind’s site plan for the World Trade Center includes placeholders for two cultural buildings. On Thursday, we finally found out what will go inside. The LMDC’s bake-off of 115 candidates concluded with four cultural institutions chosen:

• The Joyce International Center for Dance, which would build a 900-1000 seat theater for a rotating series of international dance companies. The Joyce has smaller spaces in SoHo and Chelsea, which it would keep.
• The Signature Theater, which would build three theaters of 99, 299, and 499 seats. Known for presenting seasons dedicated to a single playwright, the Signature would offer up to seven world premieres a year, and would also share the space with the TriBeCa Film Festival.
• The Drawing Center, which would offer exhibits of international artists and also provide community education programs. It would move from its current home in SoHo to the WTC site.
• The Freedom Center, the only one of the four that doesn’t currently exist anywhere, which would offer programs that “symbolize the indomitable spirit of the people of this land, the indomitable spirit of people from other lands, of the people of this city who may have been down but certainly not out.”

The New York City Opera, once considered the favorite to anchor the WTC’s cultural center, finds itself on the outside looking in. LMDC chairman John Whitehead had strongly pushed the opera, which he believed would be better able to attract the high-profile donations needed to fund the cultural buildings and the memorial. But the NYCO needed a 2,200-seat theater, and many doubted whether such a big space could be filled during the many months of the year when the opera isn’t in season. Rebuilding officials also questioned whether the opera was a logical fit for the kind of tourist traffic the site is likely to attract.

Although I’m an opera fan, I have to admit that the Joyce-Signature proposal is a more compelling use for the limited space. The four proposed theaters, ranging from 99 to 1000 seats, will create a new cultural center rivaling Lincoln Center, and I have to agree that it will be a lot easier to keep these theaters bustling all year round. The NYCO’s 2,200-seat opera house would have been dark more often than not.

I know little about the Drawing Center, but it sounds promising. The proposed Freedom Center makes me yawn. The last thing we need is pompous assurances of the value of freedom, particularly as the memorial planned for the site is likely to make much the same point. Perhaps the Center’s blue-ribbon sponsors can persuade me, but for now it sounds like an underwhelming concept.

The NYCO still wants to get out of Lincoln Center. Whitehead and City Councilmember Alan Gerson have pledged to find another home downtown, but I’m hard pressed to imagine where it could be. Lots that could accommodate a big-box opera house aren’t exactly plentiful, and the City Opera needs a magnate location — something that’s even more scarce.

In the meantime, the four selected cultural institutions have a tough road ahead. The two cultural buildings will cost hundreds of millions to construct, of which only a token sum will be available from the LMDC. None of the four has any track record of fundraising on this scale. Several prominent community business leaders have already turned down the job of fundraiser-in-chief. A six-month “feasibility study” is to be launched next month. Now it gets interesting!

Thalassa: Greek Seafood in TriBeCa

Note: Click here for a more recent review of Thalassa.

*

Thalassa is a Greek seafood restaurant. The Hellenic influence is on display everywhere, but with fish imported daily from all over the Mediterranean, you can think of Thalassa as simply a very fine seafood restaurant.

Thalassa means “the sea” in Greek. The letter theta is everywhere, from the china, to the banner outside, to even the doggie bags. The design radiates cool blues, making Thalassa a most soothing place. Billowing fabric covers the exposed brick walls. Perhaps it is meant to suggest sailing ships, but it also absorbs the sound, making Thalassa a place of calm, even when it is full.

Our party of 3 shared a starter of calamari. We’re all used to strings of calamari, breaded and immersed in the deep fryer. This dish was totally unexpected. The calamari was wrapped in the shape of a sausage around stuffing of feta cheese, parsley and pine nuts. We were simply amazed.

Thalassa’s menu offers a number of standard entrées, as well as a whole page of fish by the pound, which varies depending on what’s available. The restaurant recommends one pound of fish per person, but you have to order a whole fish, and not every selection is available at every weight. You’re dependent on your server to explain all this, and our server had a bit of trouble getting it across.

In the end, my friend and I settled for a two-pound sea bass, which we shared. A pound of fish sounds like a lot, but remember this is the uncooked weight. After the head is removed and the fish de-boned, this turns out to be just the right portion size. It was a nice flakey fish with a rich taste. The fish-by-the-pound selections don’t come with anything else, so we ordered a side of asparagus to go along with it.

My mother chose one of the standard entrées, Snapper Spetsiota, which is described as “oven-baked in a clay vessel with tomatoes, onions, fresh oregano and white wine.” This turned out to be a very large portion, which she enjoyed immensely, but she had half of it wrapped up to take home for tonight’s supper.

Thalassa boasts a long and varied wine list. We settled on a modestly-priced but obscure cabernet, which was such a hit that we asked the staff to give us the label, so that we can buy ourselves some more. (Yes, I know: red wine with fish … do forgive us!)

We passed on dessert, but at the end of the meal we were each presented with a silver box with the familiar letter theta printed on it. Inside was a sugary pastry puff to send us on our way. All evening long, service was superlative. It’s a big town, but at least from my own experience, Thalassa is the best restaurant in town that has never had a rated review from the New York Times. Two subsequent visits have confirmed my extremely favorable impression of this restaurant.

Appetizers at Thalassa are $8-18, mains are $24-36. The market fish selections available last night were at $26-45 per pound, with most in the $26-32 range.

Thalassa (179 Franklin Street between Greenwich & Hudson Streets, TriBeCa)

Food: ***
Service: ***
Ambiance: ***
Overall: ***

Artisanal: Hommage au Fromage

Note: For a later visit to Artisanal, click here.

*

Artisanal is chef Terrance Brennan’s ode to cheese. I understand he has his own factory in Manhattan, where many of the chesses are manufactured. The distinct odor of eau du fromage permeates the whole restaurant. One lucky table gets to sit in “The Cave,” where many of the cheeses are stored. We weren’t that lucky, but cheese is everywhere. There’s even a retail counter, where you can buy a hunk of your favorite cheese to take home.

My mother, who’s visiting from out of town, has traveled in France extensively, and even lived there for a year. She said Artisanal immediately transported her to a brasserie in Paris. The Adam Tihany-designed interior conjures up the original brilliantly. The tile floor and other exposed hard surfaces makes it a bit noisy, but we had no trouble hearing our own conversation.

Your server greets you with a bewildering array of menus. There’s the dinner menu, with wines on the reverse side; a separate premium wine menu; a cheese menu that lists themed servings, optionally paired with wines; and a cocktail menu. Later on, there’s a dessert menu and a new cheese menu with the cheeses listed individually.

The main dinner menu, however, is packed onto just one page. Starters run $7.50 to $21.50, mains $17.50 to $29.50. Fondue is either $24 (petite, serves 1-3) or $40 (grande, serves 4-6). A $30.04 prix fixe is available every night, though it’s worth noting that if you add a flight of cheese, a party of two is still going to have trouble getting out for under $100.

Things start well with a basket of fresh bread and a dish of butter so soft it spreads like whipping cream. I ordered an appetizer of Bleu Cheese and Walnut Crisp, served with asian pear, watercress, and warm bacon vinaigrette. It looked like a green salad, but the flavor of Brennan’s astonishing bleu cheese put all others to shame. I’m no cheese expert, but I’ve never experienced anything of this quality.

I then had a lamb porterhouse, a cut that neither of us had ever heard of. It was a bit smaller than the typical New York Strip steak, but for lamb it was an enormous piece of meat, very tender and cooked perfectly to the medium rare I had ordered. (The lady at the next table asked for medium, but she also got medium rare, and was dissatisfied; after she sent it back, it returned well done.) The lamb was served on a bed of stewed rice, tomatoes and olives that was a perfect compliment to the meal.

You can’t visit Artisanal without sampling the cheeses, so we ordered a plate of three. What do you call the guy who comes over and takes your cheese order? Is he the fromagier? Anyhow, he looked like he was about 16. We asked for two goat cheeses and an “exotic” bleu cheese. As at Picholine, you get back your own copy of the cheese menu, with your choices circled. One of those he gave us wasn’t even on the printed menu, and it was probably the best of all.

At the end of the meal, our waiter looked at my plate, and said, “You did good!” I’m glad to know he approved. We certainly did!

Artisanal (2 Park Avenue at 32nd Street, Murray Hill)

Salud!

Note: Salud closed in 2012, after the restaurant was destroyed by Hurricane Sandy.

*

The arrival of any new restaurant in the Seaport district is newsworthy, because there are so few of them, and what’s there is in general so bland. Pier 17 itself is the haunt of tourists and weekend revelers, although Sequoia at the end of the pier is worth a visit for satisfactory seafood and some of the best views in Manhattan.

Salud is about a block away from the Seaport’s main drag. The space was formerly a sushi bar called Orange Peel. The place has been gutted, and it is now the most civilized dining space so close to the Seaport. Walk in, and the hubbub nearby is left behind. There is a cool dark glow to the polished wood tables and white walls. An live ensemble plays Spanish music, but although Salud’s space is small, the noise doesn’t overwhelm table conversation.

The cuisine is described as “South American,” of which I have no other experience with which to compare. The menu offers both Tapas (about $8-12 each) and entrée-sized mains (about $17-25 each). Fish/seafood dishes, the restaurant’s specialty, outnumber meat/vegetable dishes. I wasn’t that hungry, so I ordered two tapas. Rellenos stuffed with seafood were a big hit. The plate came with three hot cupcake-sized rellenos, each with baby shrimp, clams, and calimari inside (at least, that’s what I took the ingredients to be). Crispy & spicy chicken was not as happy a choice, as the chicken had been a bit over-cooked. The dish had potential, though. It reminded me of General Tso’s chicken, but it was a cut well above the freeze-dried versions found in so many Chinese restaurants; it just needed to come out of the deep fryer a bit sooner.

My mother ordered hanger steak, which she reported as flavorful, but having too much gristle. This is the hazard of ordering steak in a restaurant that doesn’t specialize in steak.

I was especially taken with how witty the platings were. My mother’s french fries, for instance, came stacked like Lincoln Logs. The crispy & spicy chicken came with diced green and red peppers arranged around the outside edge of the plate, framing the food. The rellenos had a white cream sauce, overlaid on the seafood in the shape of a letter Z.

I don’t mind hopping on the subway, but this is my neighborhood, and sometimes I want to stay close to home. In a part of town where there haven’t been many options, any new arrival is something to cheer about. It’ll take a few more visits to take the measure of Salud, but for now I’m happy it’s on the scene.

Salud (142 Beekman Street at Front Street, South Street Seaport)

Food: *
Service: *
Ambiance: *
Overall: *

F.illi Ponte

Note: Click here for a more recent review of F.illi Ponte.

For years, I’ve seen the huge, faded sign along the West Side Highway pointing the way to F.illi Ponte. The sign alone made me skeptical: if you need to toot your horn that loudly, maybe the smart money is going elsewhere. So although I work in the area, I was never motivated to give the place a try. A lunch invitation the other day finally brought me to F.illi Ponte.

The restaurant has been on this desolate edge of TriBeCa since 1967, a time when the area was still largely an abandoned warehouse and factory district. Recovery has come slowly to Debrosses Street. The immediately surrounding area still seems to be a land that Time forgot, although I don’t think this feeling will last long. Just a couple of blocks away, loft conversions proceed apace. The dining room is on the second story, offering nice views of the Hudson river, and less inviting views of still-abandoned warehouses, parking lots, and dilapidated piers. The dining room was about half-full for lunch, with a clearly up-scale crowd.

I went for the restaurant’s supposed signature entree: “Angry Lobster,” which takes its name apparently from the crushed red peppers and other spices in the mix. It is not ‘fra diavolo’, but just pleasantly spicy. I have never seen such a huge lobster, which seemed to weigh about eight pounds. It came on a rectangular plate around two feet long. I probably enjoyed this more than any lobster I have ever had, thanks to the dizzying array of spice flavors.

I was also reminded why I seldom order lobster: it is just too much hard work to tease the meat out of the creature’s crevices. My colleagues admired my industry, but I don’t like expending so much effort for my food. Even with the four utensils provided, it was difficult to get a grip on the recalcitrant claws, and I began to think that the name of the entree said more about the lobster’s revenge for the terrible end it had met.

The server announced a number of specials, including a vegetable soup, served hot or cold. Three of us ordered it cold, but the kitchen served us the hot version. The waiter rushed out a few moments later, profusely apologetic, but we decided to eat the soup as presented. We also weren’t offered soda refils, which I’d chalk up to inefficiency rather than policy.

F.illi Ponte carries two stars from the New York Times, and it’s not the place for a cheap date, with entrees ranging from $28-46. I didn’t ask what the lobster cost (it was shown on the menu as a market price item), but I’m sure it was above $40. Everyone at my table was pleased with his meal, and several had been there a number of times before, which suggests that F.illi Ponte is sending patrons home happy, even with an astronomical bill. I wouldn’t mind a trip back, but at these prices I’ll wait till another vendor invites me!

F.illi Ponte (39 Debrosses Street at West Street, TriBeCa)

Food: *½
Service: *½
Ambiance: **
Overall: *½