Il Mulino
I'm relatively comfortable being the odd man out at a table. Long years playing the devil's advocate with my European friends has made sure of that. It's not that I disdain people's disagreements - if friends I respect think I'm wrong, that's a clear signal that I should think again. Once I do that though, I've never been too worried about being alone. A lot of people I admire have been disagreed with.
I preface this snapshot with those rather too philosophical musings because Il Mulino has one of the most sterling reputations in New York. The bible of most amateur New York restaurant mavens, Zagat's, rates it at a stratospheric 27, raving about Il Mulino's "ambrosial" food. Critic after critic has kept the restaurant at the top of diners' lists. We were even joined at lunch, when I visited, by former New York Stock Exchange chairman Dick Grasso - if $150 million can't buy you taste, then I'm not sure what can. So when I found the food at Il Mulino barely average, I followed my instincts in having a long hard think about the restaurant in the last day or so - enough people of sufficient experience and intelligence disagreed to give me pause. But I trust my palate and my judgment. Based on those things, my verdict is clear- the food at Il Mulino is not worthy of a famous restaurant. It not only fails the test of value, but my baseline test of competence - given the same ingredients, can I do better at home? For Il Mulino, the answer is a shocking but clear "yes".
Il Mulino is famed for the antipasta that precede the meal, and even your menu. Once we sat down, the various bits of Italian mezze began to arrive, and they certainly looked like they ought to be good - a whole parmesan was brought to the table to be divided en place, plates of salami, fried zucchini, bread toasted in olive oil, bruschetta topped with fresh tomato sauce. But each item prophesied disaster, though I didn't want to believe it at the time. The meat was unaccountably tasteless - as if there wasn't any fat at all, though you could see the mocking cubes of lard right there. The thin slivers of shaved fried zucchini were so oil-logged that they were almost inedible. The bruschetta was inoffensive, if one ignored the mediocre bread, the parmesan could have been better (and it's not like one has to go far in New York to buy better parmesan), and most shocking of all, it was entirely clear that the crostini had been made the night before. If it had been any less obvious, I wouldn't have believed it - but there was no mistaking the soft crumble of left-over toast that day.
Things didn't get any better when the maitre d' arrived to take our orders. I'm not of the school that believes that chefs should accomodate the diner - if you want to have a restaurant where there aren't any menus, and the diner is entirely at the mercy of what's available and fresh, that's fine. Just tell me how much it costs, and I'll make a judgment about the quality of the chef at the helm. Similarly, I have no problem with specials - even the best restaurant has food it needs to get rid of occasionally, and it is true that sometimes the kitchen is privy to a shipment of something particularly delicious but in short supply. But in either case, I have to know how much it costs - I can't tolerate restaurants that force you to guess what they're going to charge. Il Mulino is one of the worst offenders on this score I've ever seen, because while there is a menu, many of the most putatively interesting dishes are counted out on the mysteriously pudgy fingers of the staff - "I can make for you", our waiter said, "this, and that, and maybe this, perhaps, and this - and I forgot, there was also the other". As for what it cost - who knows? Though the fact that the specials were at least 50% more expensive than the menu items became apparent from the bill of over $80 a person at the end. And that, to me, signifies a lack of respect for the customer, and a failure of the restaurant's duty as a servant rather than master.
When my plate of fried zucchini flowers arrived, stuffed with mozzarella and topped with a pungent sauce of anchovy and capers, I had a moment of hope. These, I thought, couldn't help but be good. And yet, Il Mulino failed me again. The flowers, so delicous golden and crisp, had gone brown and soggy. As for the excellent cheese tucked inside the delicate vegetable, that was entirely overwhelmed by an overpowering sauce. It's not that I dislike anchovy sauce - I like it very much indeed. But there's well done anchovy sauce, and its less accomplished cousin. And this, I'm afraid, was the black sheep of that particular culinary family, unbalanced, too salty, too strong. Given the kitchen's limitations, that dish would have been so much better with a simpler sauce of fresh tomatoes and the same capers, layered underneath the flowers. I don't know why they went with this recipe instead, aside from the carelessness borne of resting on one's laurels.
I ordered an octopus salad as my main course, largely because octopus is one of my favorite types of seafood, especially at the sushi table - there, the Japanese wash it in salt to remove its brine, pound it (traditionally) with daikon radish to make it easier to eat, and then boil it briefly to cook and colour it. Il Mulino had necessarily followed much the same method in making its salad of baby octopus, scallions, olive oil, and lemon - and yet, the kitchen had somehow made a mess of it. There was too much sauce, and it tasted of too little - salad ought to be annointed rather than doused in dressing that tastes of something other than water and onion. The octopus was desperately overcooked - like small tubes of red tinged rubber, while the 1980's style presentation in a sheath of Bibb lettuce was an unnecessarily outdated pastiche of a second rate brunch shrimp cocktail. Even the dubious appeal of nostalgia was muted by the frayed edges of the leaf - was there really not a piece of fresh lettuce to line my bowl with? Or was I not as important to them as Mr. Grasso?
Dessert was a muted affair at our table, stuffed as we were with portions that verged,and crossed over, into the vulgar. Unwilling to leave without a sweet end, though, our party shared a predictable, though good, tiramisu - strong in coffee and chocolate, layered with a creamy zabione - and also ordered some fresh strawberries and a bowl of yet more of the meringue-like sauce. As we staggered outside, a disconcerting thought crossed my mind - is it wrong to be so annoyed at such a luxurious meal? How can I justify such damning criticism of an admittedly overindulgent bachanal, provided not my expense but out of my employer's pocket - isn't that kind of childish grousing the very height of greed?
Well, there is some of that, I admit. But the real height of greed is charging what Il Mulino does for poorly executed and over-hyped food in an atmosphere that suggests that the customer ought to be grateful for the privilege of dining there. I'll admit that the pasta other people ordered seemed competent, though I can't comment definitively from the small tastes I took. Maybe one shouldn't expect too much else of Il Mulino, an avowedly old style Italian-American restaurant. But I don't buy that argument - for the astronomic prices they charge, and the fawning praise they receive, Il Mulino deserves the strictest and most impartial scrutiny. It should deliver strong and winning dishes across the menu - and should continue that strength even into its amuses bouches and service. Sadly, Il Mulino does none of those things - preferring instead to dazzle the apparently awestruck with empty show. I'll admit that my impressions are from only one visit - that's why I don't term this article a review, but a snapshot - nonetheless, it's clear to me that the door is open for a new king of Manhattan italian cookery. Babbo, which I hope to visit soon, may well be the answer. I certainly hope it is.
6/25/2004
6/22/2004
Tropica
My meal today was at Tropica Bar & Seafood Club, situated a convenient distance from work in the Metlife building, and accessible through Grand Central Station (quite the pleasant side effect when it happens to be raining, let me assure you). Though the seafood was of high quality, my opinion of the cooking is rather less positive. Indeed, for a bill of well over $100 for two, without any alcoholic drinks, I would expect much more sophistication and craft. As it is, I would avoid Tropica in the future, and counsel any readers to do the same.
The meal began with a shrimp and scallop ceviche, served in a very large cocktail glass. Indeed, too large a cocktail glass - the size of the serving had nothing to do with taste and everything to do with a desperate desire to charge $14 dollars for a starter. Furthermore, I'm unsure why the ceviche was drowned so liberally in a sauce of what tasted like tomato, lime, and cilantro - and if the sauce had to be that prodigous, why not serve something delicious to sop up the liquid? What I got instead of some interesting croutons, for example, was a piece of fried plantain. How much less useful an accompaniment would there possibly be for half a gallon of pungent sauce? Maybe they should have added a spoon with a giant hole in the bottom too.
My second course was a seared and then pan-roasted halibut on a "ragout" of potatoes and mushrooms. The halibut was properly cooked, only just converging towards flakiness, and the sauce would have been interesting but for one fault. The supposedly new potatoes had obviously, evidently, indisputably, been sitting around for more than a week. They literally dripped of starch - and while I have no objection to starchy potatoes, they had no place at all here. Who does Tropica think they're kidding, sneaking their old potatoes into a heavily flavored sauce? Do they think their lunch public has no sense of taste at all, or that they can hide their obvious faults with large glasses of ceviche? I was not impressed with this short cut. It's not that I fault them for trying to use up old potatoes- but if you're going to do that, how about some dish where other flavors mask the ingredient's inferiority? In the same situation, I perhaps would have grated the potatoes, washed them to get as much starch out as possible, and then fried them in either a potato pancake or a straw potato cake. But a preparation that literally demanded waxy salad potatoes should never have left the door of their kitchen in that condition.
Dessert, by contrast, was an entirely pleasing, if slightly bland, key lime pie topped with what seemed like a sort of large gingersnap cookie. I'd happily eat it again, though $4.00 would have been a much more sensible price for what is at best a piece of down-home baking than the required $8.50. But I guess when your clientelle consists of the expense account crowd, you can pull numbers out of a hat - it seems to work for Tropica.
My meal today was at Tropica Bar & Seafood Club, situated a convenient distance from work in the Metlife building, and accessible through Grand Central Station (quite the pleasant side effect when it happens to be raining, let me assure you). Though the seafood was of high quality, my opinion of the cooking is rather less positive. Indeed, for a bill of well over $100 for two, without any alcoholic drinks, I would expect much more sophistication and craft. As it is, I would avoid Tropica in the future, and counsel any readers to do the same.
The meal began with a shrimp and scallop ceviche, served in a very large cocktail glass. Indeed, too large a cocktail glass - the size of the serving had nothing to do with taste and everything to do with a desperate desire to charge $14 dollars for a starter. Furthermore, I'm unsure why the ceviche was drowned so liberally in a sauce of what tasted like tomato, lime, and cilantro - and if the sauce had to be that prodigous, why not serve something delicious to sop up the liquid? What I got instead of some interesting croutons, for example, was a piece of fried plantain. How much less useful an accompaniment would there possibly be for half a gallon of pungent sauce? Maybe they should have added a spoon with a giant hole in the bottom too.
My second course was a seared and then pan-roasted halibut on a "ragout" of potatoes and mushrooms. The halibut was properly cooked, only just converging towards flakiness, and the sauce would have been interesting but for one fault. The supposedly new potatoes had obviously, evidently, indisputably, been sitting around for more than a week. They literally dripped of starch - and while I have no objection to starchy potatoes, they had no place at all here. Who does Tropica think they're kidding, sneaking their old potatoes into a heavily flavored sauce? Do they think their lunch public has no sense of taste at all, or that they can hide their obvious faults with large glasses of ceviche? I was not impressed with this short cut. It's not that I fault them for trying to use up old potatoes- but if you're going to do that, how about some dish where other flavors mask the ingredient's inferiority? In the same situation, I perhaps would have grated the potatoes, washed them to get as much starch out as possible, and then fried them in either a potato pancake or a straw potato cake. But a preparation that literally demanded waxy salad potatoes should never have left the door of their kitchen in that condition.
Dessert, by contrast, was an entirely pleasing, if slightly bland, key lime pie topped with what seemed like a sort of large gingersnap cookie. I'd happily eat it again, though $4.00 would have been a much more sensible price for what is at best a piece of down-home baking than the required $8.50. But I guess when your clientelle consists of the expense account crowd, you can pull numbers out of a hat - it seems to work for Tropica.
6/20/2004
Fritto misto
I don’t have much time to cook right now. Actually, it’s not really a matter of time but of opportunity. I can cook after 9 pm, when I often get home – but I often don’t feel like cooking the kinds of things I want to eat, given the enormous lunches so often provided gratis by the law firm. For the rest of the summer, then, I’m going to experiment with the cooking version of my restaurant “snapshots” - short tidbits relating to one quick dish or experience over the last week. The dinner last Sunday was my first try in that direction – but it’s a style I’m still working on to perfect.
In any case, I went to the Union square farmer’s market this morning looking for floury potatoes, fresh eggs, and perhaps some dandelion leaves or some other interesting bits of greenery. The idea was to have a pleasant summer brunch for dinner, in the form of eggs hollandaise perched atop a potato pancake – if I was feeling particularly devilish, perhaps I would find some organic bacon to render, yielding some cooking fat for the pancake. But that’s really the wrong way to go to a farmer’s market, now that I think about it. What you should do is go with an open mind, ready to buy whatever looks delicious – or catches your eye – or just seems like the kind of thing you’d like to eat that night.
Once I saw these zucchini flowers sitting in small boxes at one stand, I knew there just wasn’t anything else to do. They looked fresh, and were cheap – and I had just been mumbling to myself about the distinct lack of vegetables in my diet this summer. It’s not that I’ve given up on my commitment to healthiness – the amount of fruit I shovel indecorously onto my plates is almost obscene. But for whatever reason, I haven’t been eating a lot of greenery. These elegant squash with their delicate blossoms still attached fit the bill perfectly.
Zucchini flowers have a relatively limited number of uses. You don’t want to overcook them – and it’s rather a shame if you cut them up at all. The great Mario Batali suggests a tortellini of them in his book on Italian country cooking – and there’s also a recipe I’ve seen somewhere involving buffalo ricotta. But to my mind, the most basic choice is the best. Zucchini flowers ought to be dipped in a mix of milk, semolina, flour, salt, pepper, and olive oil, and then fried in a deep vat of yet more flavorful oil. They shouldn’t be over-battered – make sure to use as little as possible, and when they come out, the only flavoring they should see is some more salt, and perhaps a wedge of lemon. The resultant vegetable is crisp on the outside, delicate and intensely tasty within. One you arrange them hot, and crusty and salty on your plate, you'll realize they need no meaty accompaniment to serve as a glorious dinner. Take my advice – the next time you see these things anywhere, buy them while you can. They’ll pay dividends not only that night, but if you’re like me, for mornings of daydreaming after.
I don’t have much time to cook right now. Actually, it’s not really a matter of time but of opportunity. I can cook after 9 pm, when I often get home – but I often don’t feel like cooking the kinds of things I want to eat, given the enormous lunches so often provided gratis by the law firm. For the rest of the summer, then, I’m going to experiment with the cooking version of my restaurant “snapshots” - short tidbits relating to one quick dish or experience over the last week. The dinner last Sunday was my first try in that direction – but it’s a style I’m still working on to perfect.
In any case, I went to the Union square farmer’s market this morning looking for floury potatoes, fresh eggs, and perhaps some dandelion leaves or some other interesting bits of greenery. The idea was to have a pleasant summer brunch for dinner, in the form of eggs hollandaise perched atop a potato pancake – if I was feeling particularly devilish, perhaps I would find some organic bacon to render, yielding some cooking fat for the pancake. But that’s really the wrong way to go to a farmer’s market, now that I think about it. What you should do is go with an open mind, ready to buy whatever looks delicious – or catches your eye – or just seems like the kind of thing you’d like to eat that night.
Once I saw these zucchini flowers sitting in small boxes at one stand, I knew there just wasn’t anything else to do. They looked fresh, and were cheap – and I had just been mumbling to myself about the distinct lack of vegetables in my diet this summer. It’s not that I’ve given up on my commitment to healthiness – the amount of fruit I shovel indecorously onto my plates is almost obscene. But for whatever reason, I haven’t been eating a lot of greenery. These elegant squash with their delicate blossoms still attached fit the bill perfectly.
Zucchini flowers have a relatively limited number of uses. You don’t want to overcook them – and it’s rather a shame if you cut them up at all. The great Mario Batali suggests a tortellini of them in his book on Italian country cooking – and there’s also a recipe I’ve seen somewhere involving buffalo ricotta. But to my mind, the most basic choice is the best. Zucchini flowers ought to be dipped in a mix of milk, semolina, flour, salt, pepper, and olive oil, and then fried in a deep vat of yet more flavorful oil. They shouldn’t be over-battered – make sure to use as little as possible, and when they come out, the only flavoring they should see is some more salt, and perhaps a wedge of lemon. The resultant vegetable is crisp on the outside, delicate and intensely tasty within. One you arrange them hot, and crusty and salty on your plate, you'll realize they need no meaty accompaniment to serve as a glorious dinner. Take my advice – the next time you see these things anywhere, buy them while you can. They’ll pay dividends not only that night, but if you’re like me, for mornings of daydreaming after.
La Bergamote
I was planning on holding this snapshot until later, when I was ready to release my larger project on bakeries. But sitting at La Bergamote this morning, I looked over the line forming at the front of the small Chelsea boulanger and realized that I had seen the fellow right at the back somewhere. No, he wasn’t an HLSer. And I don’t think I recognized him from my undergrad years – he looked entirely too nattily dressed for that. Then it struck me. It was my first New York semi-celebrity sighting – Ted, the food maven from Bravo’s hit show “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy”. Actually, though I enjoy the program, I’ll admit that I don’t like his cooking very much. Sure, I understand he’s trying to give the clueless something they can do in a few minutes, but I still think he can do better. And I will say that he wasn’t looking quite as chipper as on the show, though few of us are on Sunday morning. But it is true that he must have good taste in croissants. Because on that point La Bergamote has no equal in New York, at least so far as I’ve found.
I wouldn’t buy a sandwich from La Bergamote. The bread might be good enough, but the sandwiches are wrapped in plastic rather than stacked freeform like in a normal boulanger. As anyone can tell you, that means rubbery unappetizing bread, rather than the crispy, crackly crust that so characterizes baguette. Which is a shame, because their selection is sandwiches is correct. Not too wide, or too self consciously inventive – just the basics of the French palate – ham, ham and cheese, sauccison beurre, jambon de bayonne, pate de campagne, all with or without pickles. If only they didn’t wrap the things in cling film – but what better a clue that the sandwiches aren’t fresh?
Despite that sin (and it is a great sin, I think), La Bergamote is worth going to. The croissants, and particularly the dark, deeply caramelized almond croissant, are excellent, buttery, flaky – as close to a Parisian boulanger as I’ve ever seen in the US. My one complaint is that the baker seems to habitually overbake the things. I understand that this is an affectation some bakers like, but I think he’s occasionally overdone it, crossed the precarious line into burned. Nonetheless, for just over two dollars each, these are the best examples anywhere in the city, with the one caveat that I have not yet tried the much more expensive Payard Patisserie’s effort. But even if Payard matches La Bergamote in taste, which I doubt, the stuffy dark bastion of quasi-French pretension in the upper East side can’t match La Bergamote for friendly service, or a nice place to have a café au lait. So my recommendation is almost unconflicted for La Bergamote – and its presence makes the rest of my bakery project harder to complete, since I’d rather go back there than try anywhere new.
I was planning on holding this snapshot until later, when I was ready to release my larger project on bakeries. But sitting at La Bergamote this morning, I looked over the line forming at the front of the small Chelsea boulanger and realized that I had seen the fellow right at the back somewhere. No, he wasn’t an HLSer. And I don’t think I recognized him from my undergrad years – he looked entirely too nattily dressed for that. Then it struck me. It was my first New York semi-celebrity sighting – Ted, the food maven from Bravo’s hit show “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy”. Actually, though I enjoy the program, I’ll admit that I don’t like his cooking very much. Sure, I understand he’s trying to give the clueless something they can do in a few minutes, but I still think he can do better. And I will say that he wasn’t looking quite as chipper as on the show, though few of us are on Sunday morning. But it is true that he must have good taste in croissants. Because on that point La Bergamote has no equal in New York, at least so far as I’ve found.
I wouldn’t buy a sandwich from La Bergamote. The bread might be good enough, but the sandwiches are wrapped in plastic rather than stacked freeform like in a normal boulanger. As anyone can tell you, that means rubbery unappetizing bread, rather than the crispy, crackly crust that so characterizes baguette. Which is a shame, because their selection is sandwiches is correct. Not too wide, or too self consciously inventive – just the basics of the French palate – ham, ham and cheese, sauccison beurre, jambon de bayonne, pate de campagne, all with or without pickles. If only they didn’t wrap the things in cling film – but what better a clue that the sandwiches aren’t fresh?
Despite that sin (and it is a great sin, I think), La Bergamote is worth going to. The croissants, and particularly the dark, deeply caramelized almond croissant, are excellent, buttery, flaky – as close to a Parisian boulanger as I’ve ever seen in the US. My one complaint is that the baker seems to habitually overbake the things. I understand that this is an affectation some bakers like, but I think he’s occasionally overdone it, crossed the precarious line into burned. Nonetheless, for just over two dollars each, these are the best examples anywhere in the city, with the one caveat that I have not yet tried the much more expensive Payard Patisserie’s effort. But even if Payard matches La Bergamote in taste, which I doubt, the stuffy dark bastion of quasi-French pretension in the upper East side can’t match La Bergamote for friendly service, or a nice place to have a café au lait. So my recommendation is almost unconflicted for La Bergamote – and its presence makes the rest of my bakery project harder to complete, since I’d rather go back there than try anywhere new.
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