lars makie
lars makie
Yep, that's the list I saw last night.
11 mad
- Thread starter scottreiner
- Start date
scottreiner
scott reiner
Since I prefer that chefs at this level do exactly what they want to rather than cater/pander to the masses' variant whims (and that includes my whims, BTW), I like that aspect. To accomplish this, I think they've made the changes they needed to make. There's ego, yes, but I think that's usually necessary in an establishment that wants to work at their level, and (one hopes) to continue to push that level.
My last meal there was not perfect in that we waited 75 minutes for our reserved table (and were the last ones in the restaurant as a result...by over thirty minutes, which in a cavernous and echo-y space like 11MP's is kind of off-putting). Of course they handled the situation like any worthy Meyer restaurant would, and so it wasn't ruinous, but it still shouldn't have happened...and getting better control of what was an awfully large space can't hurt in this regard. The food/wine/pacing once we finally sat, on the other hand, was extraordinary. I'm eager to go back.
I definitely see what they're getting at regarding lunch. Two visits to NYC ago, I had lunch at Le Bernardin. It was not a 3(M)/4(NYT)-star experience, and the principal reason (there was more than one) was that they were serving lunch as 11MP no longer intends to: too rapid, too formulaic, far too much bustle and visual graffiti on the floor. They don't have any choice if they want to serve people who actually have to get back to work at some point, and I don't fault them for it at all. But I don't fault 11MP for making a different choice, either.
Bourdain's much-quoted disdain for tasting menus is a little hypocritical, as he'll readily admit when challenged on the point: over the period since he first made that statement, he's praised tasting menus at Mugaritz, Arzak, Moto, Bo Innovation, Primo, the Chang empire, and a half-dozen other places I could name if I wanted to go back through some of his shows. His opinion on tasting menus depends very much on whether he is having one he likes at the time or not. He didn't enjoy himself at Alinea, and so he took the shot, though it wasn't nearly as harsh as Marco Pierre White's criticism.
Really, there's room for lots of different approaches that work for different people. Some of whom like the options involved in a five-minute tray of octopus balls and bubble soda on a bench at 236 East 9th St. and ten courses of heavy classicism at 43 East 20th St. equally well. Horses for courses.
Mark, I'll have some Alinea thoughts for you soonish, if you want them.
My last meal there was not perfect in that we waited 75 minutes for our reserved table (and were the last ones in the restaurant as a result...by over thirty minutes, which in a cavernous and echo-y space like 11MP's is kind of off-putting). Of course they handled the situation like any worthy Meyer restaurant would, and so it wasn't ruinous, but it still shouldn't have happened...and getting better control of what was an awfully large space can't hurt in this regard. The food/wine/pacing once we finally sat, on the other hand, was extraordinary. I'm eager to go back.
I definitely see what they're getting at regarding lunch. Two visits to NYC ago, I had lunch at Le Bernardin. It was not a 3(M)/4(NYT)-star experience, and the principal reason (there was more than one) was that they were serving lunch as 11MP no longer intends to: too rapid, too formulaic, far too much bustle and visual graffiti on the floor. They don't have any choice if they want to serve people who actually have to get back to work at some point, and I don't fault them for it at all. But I don't fault 11MP for making a different choice, either.
Bourdain's much-quoted disdain for tasting menus is a little hypocritical, as he'll readily admit when challenged on the point: over the period since he first made that statement, he's praised tasting menus at Mugaritz, Arzak, Moto, Bo Innovation, Primo, the Chang empire, and a half-dozen other places I could name if I wanted to go back through some of his shows. His opinion on tasting menus depends very much on whether he is having one he likes at the time or not. He didn't enjoy himself at Alinea, and so he took the shot, though it wasn't nearly as harsh as Marco Pierre White's criticism.
Really, there's room for lots of different approaches that work for different people. Some of whom like the options involved in a five-minute tray of octopus balls and bubble soda on a bench at 236 East 9th St. and ten courses of heavy classicism at 43 East 20th St. equally well. Horses for courses.
Mark, I'll have some Alinea thoughts for you soonish, if you want them.
scottreiner
scott reiner
i'm having dinner there next wednesday, i will report.
kirk wallace
kirk wallace
Excellent!
Put it on YouTube, please.
They already have stars, don't they?
But yeah, this whole "oh noes, food tourists!" thing is a kind of a quaintly moot cry after the horse has burst from the barn, cavorted across the open plain, fathered children with several mares, and gone on to its destiny as glue and Parisian steak, isn't it? Because I'm sure no one reading that article, or here on this forum, has done anything but randomly select restaurants when traveling to a city other than their own. I mean, how could one? It's not like there are TV shows, or books, or online fora, or magazines, or newspapers, or guides, or similarly-minded friends to consult for advice on where to eat.
Sharon Bowman
Sharon Bowman
For real.
Keith Levenberg
Keith Levenberg
Which is still for sale all over the place so I don't think my wine board posts are squeezing anyone out
Jeff Grossman
Jeff Grossman
Mark,
Here is a write-up I did for Jay Miller, who was supposed to attend this dinner at Alinea but who did not:
-----
Alinea looks like very little from the outside. Signage is muted and there are no street-level windows.
Go through the front door and you are in a disorienting corridor - dim lights, curved walls, mirror at the end - till you find the second door to the restaurant. You enter on the kitchen floor (it's off to the right and absolutely packed with chefs) and are escorted upstairs to the dining room.
The room is dressed all in greys and taupes. The wall opposite my seat, in fact, had no decoration on it at all; there were some kind of simple greenery against the wall behind me. The table is wood and painted flat black. No cloth, no salt+pepper, no votive, nothing on it except for 6 rice paper flags (which have marigold leaves and cilantro leaves pressed into them). Chairs are large and comfortable. The room is quiet and remains so throughout the 4.5 hr long meal. Every effort is made to reduce/eliminate clinking and clanking. (This might have been Jay's favorite part of the whole experience.)
As there is no choice of menu we simply chose water (Badoit for the sparkling, "chilled filtered tap" for the flat). I was satisfied to take the very first champagne on the list, Jose Dhondt NV Brut for $75. It was a middling champagne, not too bready, not too minerally, which made it adaptable to the food. We only ordered one bottle so it lasted about 6 or 7 courses....
Service was excellent. Aside from the usual napkin-folding, waterglass-topping and flatware-laying monkeyshines, the staff did pick up that Jim and Bruce are lefties and adjusted their services to the other side. We must have had 3 or 4 waitrons keeping watch on us -- I can recall at least the red-haired girl, the frizzy-haired guy, the baby-faced guy, the senior waiter, and the floor-boss.
Sundry more:
- Jim requested no onions and his dishes came out with different ingredients all night: carrot here, daikon there.
- Every course was cleared completely before the next course began.
- If someone got up from the table, the whole meal was paused until they returned.
- Bruce and I took our jackets off; we were the only men in the room to do so.
Now, the food. This link has most, but not all, of our menu:
click
The key to the menu typography is:
- listed towards the left is more savory, towards the right is more sweet
- the bigger the circle, the larger the portion
- the darker the circle, the more intense the flavor
And this link has photos of some of our menu:
click
(as is: truffle explosion, hot potato, yuba stick, creme tube, transparency)
(almost: bacon/sweet potato/mustard)
Now, finally, our menu:
Passion Fruit - "hurricane", flor de cana 4 year, matusalem, clasico, sailor jerry
Lemon - "pisco sour", don cesar pisco, cane juice, frozen and chewy
Cucumber - "juliet & romeo", plymouth gin, rose, mint
Cherry - "improved manhattan", buffalo trace, carpano antica, maraschino
Kumquat - "sazerac", rittenhouse rye, peychaud's, demerara
English Pea - iberico, sherry, honeydew
Lobster - lychee, gruyere, vanilla fragrance
Tomatoes - pillow of fresh cut grass aroma
Yuba - shrimp, miso, togarashi
Chao Tom - sugar cane, shrimp, mint
Distillation - of thai flavors
Pork Belly - curry, cucumber, lime
King Crab - rhubarb, lilac, fennel
Hot Potato - cold potato, black truffle, butter
Lamb - reflection of elysian fields farm
Black Truffle - explosion, romaine, parmesan
Tournedo - a la persane
Bacon - butterscotch, apple, thyme
Lemon Soda - one bite
Transparency - of raspberry, yogurt
Bubble Gum - long pepper, hibiscus, creme fraiche
Earl Grey - lemon, pine nut, caramelized white chocolate
Chocolate - coconut, menthol, hyssop
The first five were the Edible Cocktails. The Hurricane was a slurry of passion fruit pulp (with seeds) served in half a passion fruit. The rest were solids and served on little stands, reminiscent of something from a chess set. My favorite of these was the lemon, chewy and cold and sharply citrus. The Juliet was a hollowed-out cube of cucumber with the rest of the ingredients piped into the middle. (I found a photo of the stands: click)
English Pea was a small cup of semi-freddo cream mixed with several preps of English peas: fresh, shoots, freeze-dried. There were bits of honeydew, ham powder, and two translucent spheres of sherry. Fascinating dish and one of my memorable ones for the evening.
Lobster looked a lot like "Sweet Potato" in the referenced photos: a chunk of lobster bound under panko with lychee and gruyere, fried, then skewered with a vanilla bean and served in the tall wire cage. Others liked this better than I did.
Tomatoes was, to me, an example of how this style of cuisine goes off track. The dish itself was chunks of several kinds of heirloom toms served with sundry accompaniments (powdered mozz, olive oil jam, sticky onions, etc.). By my lights, it could have stopped there -- peak summer tomatoes need no fiddle-faddle to make me lust for them -- but, instead, the plates were balanced upon pillows -- yes, like the kind you would rest your head upon -- that were filled with steaming-hot grass clippings obtained from the yard of the high school across the street. The idea is to add another aroma that invokes "summer" in your mind, but, honestly, I smelled very little grass in that grass and I didn't need the prodding.
Yuba is the skin pulled off some form of tofu as it ferments. It's been dried, twisted, wrapped, baked, sent across the equator three times, submitted to 8 atmospheres of pressure while being driven on a Zamboni, and god only knows what else. It went snap and had a nice shrimp + sesame flavor. There was a miso mayonnaise in the base.
Chao Tom was a bit of sugar cane soaked in flavorants. We were instructed to chew it a while and then spit it out.
Oh, yes, note that it is not sufficient for the food to come on wacky equipment nor is it sufficient for the waiter to tell us the story of the dish. It is also important to be told _how_ to consume it.
Onward.
Distillation was a cordial glass of clear liquid. Scents of green pepper, hot pepper, cilantro, and shrimp rose out of the glass. We were told to knock it back in one.
Pork Belly is a do-it-yourself spring roll. The waiter brings you a rectangular glass plank on which are numerous ingredients: two cashews, Hawaiian black salt, chunks of lime, slices of mango, balls of English cucumber, a slurry of basil and lime juice, a tiny spoon of red pepper paste, and a few more. You lift the plank and put it aside. Under the glass plank is a wooden plank which has a shaped groove cut into it. In the groove are a pair of brass legs which fit together to form a little four-legged tripod. Now the waiter removes the rice paper flags from the middle of the table and lays one across the tripod and another places a hefty spoonful of pork belly on it. Then, you choose which ingredients you want to add -- the waiter says to just add everything -- roll it up and eat it. This was a universal favorite at the table... every nibble brought some other combination of flavors up.
King Crab is a three-stage course. The waiter delivers a large white porcelain sphere to your place. There is a slight indentation in the top that holds a bit of cold crab panna cotta with the other ingredients sprinkled around. Lift the dome and there is a saucer, perched in the manner of a double-boiler, that holds a room-temperature chunk of crab meat with more pungent flavors. Lift that and the bottom contains a hot gratin of crab, rhubarb and cipollini onion. Three temperatures, three different preps, but the same basic ingredients. Opinion was divided on whether the warm or the hot version was best; the cold one was not comparably good.
Hot Potato is a signature dish: A small wax dish of cold potato soup is pierced at the edge by a pin. At the end of the pin is a sphere of hot potato that is draped with a slice of black truffle. Pull the pin, the potato drops into the soup, and knock it back in one. Amazing.
Lamb is a big plate and, honestly, I can't remember all the fiddle-faddle. I remember there were several presentations of lamb on the plate: two cubes of fat that have been deep fried, rare loin meat snuggled up onto a skewer, and more. I enjoyed this one.
Black Truffle explosion is a truffled soup dumpling. Since it is served on a spoon that rests on a bowl that is nothing but a bottomless rim, this is another 'knock it back in one' dish. Predictably, I loved this one.
Tournedo is an Escoffier recipe. As done here, it is a hefty chunk of sous-vide Wagyu served atop a peeled stewed green cherry tomato, a tiny rice-stuffed green pepper, and a piece of banana. This dish was not received well. Although the meat was tender and tasty, the combination with banana just did nothing for us. Also, people were starting to get full and this was the biggest plate.
Bacon is a single thin rasher, dangling from a wire across the aluminum cradle. Yer basic Millionaire's Bacon, minus the cinnamon. The dish serves as a bridge between the savory and sweet portions of the meal.
Lemon Soda is one bite. The waiter held aloft a thin wooden palette loaded with tiny transparent triangular packets filled with a white powder. "Trust me, just pop it into your mouth." After 10 seconds or so, the packet melts and you get a burst of sweet lemon. (Big whoops.)
Transparency is a little tougher than Saran Wrap but not really crackly hard. It tastes like raspberry.
Bubble Gum comes with a story: Grant has wanted to capture the flavor of Dubble Bubble for a long time. He petitioned the company but they wouldn't release the flavor mix to him. So, he finally found a way to extract the flavor from the pieces and put it in this dessert. The dessert comes in a tube. The front is loaded with hibiscus, then a bolus of creme fraiche, then a bunch of tapioca pearls. A little weird because Dubble Bubble, to me, is a kinda nasty cherry flavor, but, in any case, most of us liked it, even if it made all kinds of obscene noises while being consumed.
Earl Grey looked like a bowl of chow mein: a greyish, chunky, hashy mush with light brown noodles. The noodles were white chocolate and the mush was made with pine nuts. Clever but not my favorite.
The final course, Chocolate, is actually the largest portion, I think. It also took the most work and was the most fun. First, we were asked to lift our glasses so they could roll out two silicone mats; they covered the table. Next, dishes of food were brought to the table and stacked on two sides. Then, two chefs joined us. They placed glass tubes on the table and poured some hot chocolate pudding in each one. Next, they distributed chunks of coconut meringue (well, more chewy than that but that's the best guess) and some unsweetened chewy coconut balls. Next, they drizzled coconut sauce and menthol sauce all around the table. (Due to the texture of the cloth and the viscosity of the sauce, the coconut drops squared up over the course of a few minutes.) Next, they scattered dark chocolate shortbread crumbs. Next, three loaves of liquid-nitrogen-dipped chocolate mousse were deposited on the table and coarsely broken into chunks. The chefs threw a few sprigs of hyssop on it and left. And we have... the surface of Neptune... pitted craggy chocolate rocks, smaller light and dark stones peeking up through the mist, and six disks of chocolate pudding.
We have spoons.
We scrape dessert off the table and into us.
At no time did I taste hyssop.
Finally, we were done. Four and a half hours later. Bruce was fidgeting. Karen was falling asleep. Cindy was long ago full. We took a quick look at the kitchen and then took a cab home.
Many thanks for that in-depth description, Jeff, and excellent reportage on your part. I take away from that several important lessons, the first of which is that we will likely never go to Alinea as Jean would detest the experience: too long, too much food, too overcomplicated. (She is not terribly fond of tasting menus to start with, and molecular gastronomy is not her favorite food trend, either) She indulged me last year by celebrating my 50th at the restaurant of my choosing, El Celler de Can Roca in Girona, but that was most likely a one off for us. For my part, the whole presentation sounds more than a bit too precious for my taste, and I am presumably part of their target demographic. Go figger. From your description, I gather that aspects of the meal were too much for you, too.
Mark Lipton
Mark Lipton
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
Jeezuz fuckin' Christ, Jeff, you should be put in a straightjacket.
Claude Kolm
Claude Kolm
Thanks, Jeff. I think I'll have a better time at Bar Agricole tomorrow night.
Jeff Grossman
Jeff Grossman
I suppose it's better to learn it now than when the check comes.
Here and there. I have a lot of endurance and a lot of curiosity so that gives Manipulative Chefs a lot of leeway. (Although most of my friends were fading by the end of the meal I could have persisted a bit longer.)
It was fascinating, particularly the service aspect. (Oh, all right, and to see what the hell else Achatz has had machined out of steel and porcelain. And it isn't every day someone serves you a single bite of food skewered by a whole vanilla bean.)
And, lest we forget, it is unreasonable to expect 17 pow! bam! wow! dishes in a row. Neither of my lengthy dinners at French Laundry or Troisgros accomplished that, either.
ETA: In response to your comment about it all being too precious for you: I think it is important to recognize that this really is Kabuki, to use the term in the Times article. The plain walls, the aural stillness, the trinkets, the teases, the false choices... it's all romance for the jaded diner.
Add to that that, even if achieved, 17 p!b!w! dishes in a row would probably be exhausting and overwhelming. I suspect that, as with music, dynamic range and contrast are needed to keep the audience engaged. Too much bombast is, ultimately, a bit of a drag IMO.
I have two experiences with this sort of dining, one at Manresa years ago and the other at Can Roca last year. Both were fascinating experiences, but I'm content to keep them as infrequent occasions in my life. In both instances, most dishes were interesting and even entertaining, with a few such standing out as truly memorable. Certainly whimsy and shock are both goals of this sort of cooking, but I'm still conventional enough to want my food to taste good [insert emoticon here].
Well put, Jeff. I'll strive to become jaded enough to appreciate experiences like this.
Mark Lipton