Entries in Keith McNally (15)

Wednesday
Apr092008

France Makes a Comeback

barboulud_outside2.jpg brasseriecognac_outside1.jpg

In today’s Times, Florence Fabricant reports that traditional French restaurants are making a comeback (“There’ll Always Be a France, Especially in New York”).

Evidence:

  • Daniel Boulud has just opened Bar Boulud, with a classic French bistro and charcuterie menu.
  • Later this month, Alain Ducasse will open Benoit in the former La Côte Basque space. Ducasse already opened another French restaurant this year, Adour, in the former Lespinasse space.
  • Next Monday, Brasserie Cognac opens in West Midtown. Rita Jammet, who owned La Caravelle, is on hand as a consultant.
  • Keith McNally, who owns perhaps the most successful casual French restaurant in New York, Balthazar, is converting Minetta Tavern (in Greenwich Village) into a French bistro.
  • Later this year, David Bouley will convert his three-star Austrian Danube into a French brasserie, Secession. Bouley is also moving his eponymous flagship French-inspired restaurant to a new space about a block away from its current location.

benoit_opening.jpgWhat’s notable is not merely that these restaurants have a nod to the French tradition, but that many of them are overtly traditional, serving the old standards (lobster thermidor, cassoulet, duck à l’orange) that were considered dinosaurs a short while ago.

Bouley told Fabricant, “I see traditional food coming back. It’s also newly popular in France, and it’s great to see. I have an emotional connection to that food, to my grandmother’s cooking: some of my family comes from Arras and Tours. And I love the tradition — braising rabbits and boning fish tableside, but in a relaxed atmosphere.”

These new restaurants lack the “jacket-and-tie mandatory” atmosphere of their “Le” and “La” predecessors, but in many other ways they’re throwbacks.

I, for one, am delighted. It’s not that these restaurants are uniformly excellent. I love some of them (Le Périgord, Le Veau d’Or) and have been underwhelmed at others (La Grenouille, Adour). It’s just fascinating to see that restauranteurs are giving New Yorkers something different by giving them something traditional.

Frank Bruni, who usually finds French food so dull, is going to have to brush up on Escoffier.

Wednesday
Apr252007

The Payoff: Morandi

In today’s Brunology lesson, Professor Frank hands out what must be the weakest one-star review in New York Times history. To be sure, we expected no better than a weak star for Morandi, but we never imagined that Keith McNally could be trashed this badly, and still escape with his manhood intact:

Morandi’s overworked Chianti bottles and its canopy of brick arches — no matter how old the brick — aren’t whimsical; they’re just clichéd. Unlike Balthazar and Pastis, which Mr. McNally cunningly sculptured to look old before their time, Morandi can simply feel tired before its time, and not quite worth the struggle to get in and stay upright in the scrum.

Frank did find a number of dishes he liked (which saved it from the goose-egg), but we don’t recall a one-star review as harsh as this one. But then, Frank has never goose-egged an Italian restaurant, has he?

We were prepared to take the long odds that Morandi would indeed get zilch, so we lose $1 on our hypothetical bet. Eater took the one-star wager, and wins $2.

          Eater        NYJ
Bankroll $20.00   $27.67
Gain/Loss +$2.00   –$1.00
Total $22.00   $26.67
 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Won–Lost 8–2   8–2
Tuesday
Apr242007

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.

Tuesday
Jun202006

Pastis

Note: Pastis closed in February 2014, as the building it occupied closed for renovations. Owner Keith McNally claims it will re-open in 2015. We shall see.

*

A colleague and I visited Pastis a couple of weeks ago. It wasn’t my choice. I have nothing against the place, but I’ve seen the long lines plenty of times, and I doubted that it would be worth braving the crowds. However, he made a 7pm reservation, and at that hour the restaurant was only just beginning to fill up.

My colleague mentioned that Pastis seems to be one of those iconic New York restaurants where you’re supposed to see celebrities—or that’s the theory, anyway. We didn’t spy anyone famous. He mentioned that he’s watched Sex and the City only four times, and twice the characters dined at Pastis.

Well, what about the food? I had a mediocre steak tartare and a decent grilled sea bass. A not unhappy experience, but certainly nothing to justify the restaurant’s reputation. Tables are both small and uncomfortably close together, the noise level is loud, and menus double as placemats. At least the prices are reasonable.

You won’t eat badly at Pastis, but we could hardly see what all the fuss is all about.

Pastis (9 Ninth Avenue at Little West 12th St, Meatpacking District)

Food: *
Service: okay
Ambiance: fair
Overall: okay

Pastis on Urbanspoon

Sunday
Apr112004

Mad for Meatpacking

It’ll tell you how hopelessly un-hip I am, that, until yesterday, I had never been to the Meatpacking District since it became anything other than a neighborhood where wholesale meats are sold. The area is bounded roughly by Gansevoort St on the south, 14th St on the north, and Ninth and Tenth avenues. I say “roughly,” because like any hip neighborhood its boundaries are stretching. My Manhattan street atlas limits the district to the two square blocks bounded by Little West 12th, 14th, and Ninth and Tenth Avenues. But nowadays, even places on 15th St have Meatpacking aspirations.

A lot of the district’s hip nightclubs hadn’t opened their doors when my friend and I walked by in the late afternoon, but we were able to get a look in many of the restaurants. After a long walk from the Financial District, we were ready for a short break. Zitoune (46 Gansevoort St) snootily refused us an outdoor table when we ordered soft drinks, claiming a $10 minimum outside. We tried Macelleria next door, where they happily accepted our order for soft drinks and biscotti (ironically, we spent more than $10 anyway). The whole time, Zitoune never did use the outdoor table they denied us.

There’s a large triangular space where Gansevoort, Little West 12th, Ninth Ave, and Greenwich St converge at odd angles. At one of the outdoor tables at Zitoune, Macelleria, or nearby Pastis (9 Ninth Ave) you get a panoramic view of the Meatpacking crowd’s comings and goings. The intersection seems to demand a life-size statue of Mr. Gansevoort (or whoever/whatever that street was named for). If we were in Europe, it would have one.

I wanted to see what Spice Market (403 W. 13th St.), Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s latest hit, was about. From the outside, you’d barely know it’s a restaurant. Inside, the $5 million decor overwhelms the senses. It seems no one opens a destination restaurant in New York these days on the strength of the food alone. We peeked in around 6pm, as the place was just beginning to fill up, and the staff didn’t mind terribly that we were there only to gawk.

We were particularly intrigued by the sensuous private rooms at the back of the downstairs bar, where you pass through curtains of gauze into a world of your own. I wonder how those creamy white luxuroious sofa pillows will look after red wine is spilled on them a few times, but for now they look inviting. Whether or not Spice Market deserves the three stars the Times awarded, as eye candy it amazes.

Many other restaurants caught our eye, but we were struck by the friendly reception we received at Vento (intersection of 9th Ave and 14th St), which doesn’t even open to the public until April 19th. The staff are just practicing for now, and the tables were all set for a friends-and-family dinner. The flatiron-shaped building, dating from the Civil War, is all the decor Vento needs.

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