|
|
|
|
September 24, 2007
Guilty about Gilt, Fiamma's Gifted Star Whisk. Ed Brown Preview.
Dear Friends and Family,
Launching a new website is like falling in love with a demanding man. It keeps you awake nights wondering if you said enough or, too much. You can't focus on anything else but The Site. You brood constantly on what to do to keep him amused and coming back.
Beyond the Gilt
 This is to explain how it happens that I never got around to posting a report in BITE: My Journal about an exceptional dinner at Gilt last June. An evening Definitely -Worth-the-Splurge. Quiet. Romantic. Elegant, old- fashioned service. The $78 prix fixe could surge to $250 for two if you're thirsty. I think the staff managed to serve five exquisitely arranged courses without a single "enjoy." That's worth $5 all by itself.
I had stopped by Gilt in 2005 with the obsessively playful British ex-pat Paul Liebrandt who opened Gilt in the show stage kitchen in the Vuillard Mansion of the New York Palace Hotel. I still get shivers remembering a bitelet suspended on plastic wrap, just one of his gambits, some of them quite delicious but ultimately annoying.
But now Christopher Lee, long-time alter wisk of Daniel Boulud had taken over the kitchen and was getting good buzz. In the shocking pink glow of the glorious landmark room with its plastic accents, not many tables are occupied. Besides us is a trio dressed in workout gear. Except for an occasional too much ado on one plate, the food has gone from unabashed Byzantine to faintly Rococo and mostly delicious. Modulated Marvin Gaye on the sound system fills the emptiness but still we find ourselves whispering.
Even a palette of accessories on the edge of the plate can't quite dilute the sensuous impact of diver scallop seviche wreathed in voluptuous sea urchin. With the kitchen dedicated to turning out pasta every afternoon, delicate richness of sheep's milk ricotta cheese ravioli is no surprise. Over the decades anything served á la "Wellington," has had to overcome rejection for retro frippery, but Lee's yellow fin tuna with foie gras and porcini wrapped in spinach and thin leaves of pastry has the finesse to melt such snobbery. And the Road Food Warrior, who can be especially nasty when food gets too precious, has compliments for his lamb, the rack and a ragu of the shoulder served with a golden raisin falafel for comic relief.
Fall dishes have already moved onto the menu since our dinner but pastry wizard David Carmichael (ex of Oceana) will be exploiting the last of the great summer fruit in his desserts. His breads are exceptional too: Don't try to choose between his cake-like focaccia and a buttery fan of a roll. Have both. And when the dapper Rafael Jovel bows, playing the devoted family retainer, and sLOWLy lifts the lid of a carved heirloom box of fabulous chocolates, take three.
Reaching for Stars at Fiamma
 Steve Hansen came to the restaurant business by way of the garment center and a heady fling with commodities so I might have guessed that eight or nine or a dozen restaurants would just fill a small cavity of his appetite for success. Having sold half his BRGuest company for $158 million, the proposed seeding of his concepts worldwide might have seemed like a full schedule. But no, he's been juggling his PrimeHouse New York opening this week at 381 Park Avenue South (27th Street), and overseeing the remix of his three-star Fiamma on Spring Street.
With a $400,000 rehab, a fortune in the latest new tabletop essentials and a master sommelier lured from Atelier de Robuchon, Hansen has relaunched Fiamma. Seduced from five diamond (AAA) coziness at the Ritz Carlton in Tyson's Corners, Chef Fabio Trabocchi's food has three stars, maybe four, written all over him. That snugly tailored gunmetal grey tunic advertises a Camera ready chef. Read what I think of my first tasting of his complex play on Italian classics in New York magazine today and watch for a longer version of that report with photos on Insatiablecritic.com tomorrow.
Ed Brown in Coming Attractions
The best taste in my mouth all week came, not in a restaurant (though it was a good week for gourmand grazing) but at a table in an apartment on Riverside Drive overlooking the Hudson. It was Ed Brown, showing off his menu ideas for Eighty-one - his ambitious new spot across from the Planterium on the upper west side months ahead of a projected December opening. Somehow I got included with a collection of writers from magazines with deadlines a month in advance. And that's how I encountered the fabulous scallop and foie gras ravioli in a sunshine yellow vin juane sauce with the first froth I've tasted in weeks that had an actual flavor, a foam by any other name that actually enhanced the dish instead of coating it in pallid ick.
Brown had his entire crew on parade to feed the dozen fussy mouths assembled: a chorus line of waiters that looked like they'd been chosen for good looks and trendy coifs, and the all-stars recruited for the first ever restaurant all his own, Chef de Cuisine Jean Cuevas, Executive Sous Chef Yuhi Fujinaga, pastry chef John Miele and mixologist-partner Nick Mautone. Brown seemed eager to make a point that after all those years at the Sea Grill, he has no problem mastering meat. Proof lay in the crisp skinned Niman Ranch pork belly with beluga lentils, and his braised lamb shank on ferro with cauliflower, Brussel sprout leaves and tomato confit. This is real food, meticulously sourced, handsomely presented without pretension, meant for a clientele in blue jeans and suits, with or without their hair combed. "We're going to offer Upper west side hospitality," says Brown.
We were surprised to discover that everyone at the table, and Ed himself, are Upper West Siders. And then - not really surprised at all. "I was surprised how long it took for chefs to follow Tom Valenti's lead on the Upper West Side, but now the time seems right to me."
We don't need a seat in the Rose Planetarium to see the constellation of shooting stars headed our way. Daniel Boulud near Lincoln Center. Tom Valenti and Zak Pelaccio cheek-to-cheek in a pair of storefronts on Broadway at 77th Street. And Upper West Sider Jonathan Waxman, chef-partner at Barbuto, opening Madaleine Mae on Columbus Avenue at 82nd Street. We'll even have our own branch of Magnolia Bakery cupcakes.
Papa Comes Home Again to Rain
I'm counting count Thai chef Taweewat Hurapan as a nice little blip in the cuisinary renaissance of the Upper West Side. "I can make other people rich but I can't make money for myself," he told me as he explained why he had to abandon a proud stand at Hurapan Kitchen on Seventh Avenue South. My rave for his delicious riffs on Thai classics was not enough. "We had to wait too long for the liquor license and then we waited all summer for the sidewalk cafe permit. If you don't have sidewalk tables in the Village people think you're not open. They just walk by. It finally came, but too late."
With investors unwilling to pour in more money, he sold the lease to Sompong Thuthavorn who has installed Maya.
So Hurapan and his son are back home at Rain where he is busy restoring the menu. Look for juicy tamarind sticky ribs, rare beef in spicy salad with lemongrass and Fuji apple, thin-pounded scallop slices in a sophisticated saffron tapioca bath with chopped grape tomatoes, and Peking duck entrée tucked into soft bread pockets to dip into Cabernet-hoisin sauce.
Bravo's New Better Half
Could you take over your mate's job with two days coaching? I'll be wearing a hat hoping to obscure my face at least a little as one of the judges on Bravo's new "Better Half," where couples compete to win $20,000 by training their spouses in the other's profession in just 48 hours. If I tell you my co-judges are restaurateur Donatella Arpaia and Top Chef Season One Winner Harold Dieterle you won't be surprised to learn that the first two couples will be training their "better halves" to be professional chefs. The show premieres Oct. 3 at 11p.m. and moves into Bravo's 10 p.m. time slot one week later.
 My better half, the Road Food Warrior, was feeling homesick for Aspen so he took off last week, leaving me without my resident photographer. Dinner guests are promising to stand in for my guy, digitally that is. Meanwhile, he sent the photo above from a walk at Maroon Bells.
|
|
|
|
|
|
