Why not review Harlem?

Zubin Jelveh at Portfolio.com posts complaining about the lack of food reviews by Frank Bruni of the New York Times in Harlem. His point, in short, is that despite rating on Menupages for Harlem restaurants that equal the ratings on Menupages for restaurants in the East Village, Bruni rarely writes about Harlem.

To some extent, this regional problem is endemic to every restaurant reviewer. In Washington, Tom Sietsema of the Post was recently reported to the Ombudsman for neglecting the Maryland suburbs (if I recall correctly). The response of every reviewer I've seen when confronted by this variety of accusation is that they go where the restaurants are even while making sure they're not neglecting good restaurants in less trendy areas. The challenge of reviewing breadth is harder for Bruni in New York than for anyone else anywhere. He has the opportunity to review one restaurant a week, 52 a year. There are easily 52 significant openings a year of which the food community in New York demands a review, not to mention returns to old standbys (see here).

It is simply impossible, in that context, for Bruni to also hit, say, a home style southern restaurant in Harlem just as a matter of geographical breadth. Without some knowledeable buzz to justify his effort and time, there isn't any demand for his imprimatur on such a restaurant - he would be performing a disservice to his readers by wasting a column on it. To the extent, further, that there are innovative or especially good restaurants that aren't hyped and identified to Bruni immediately, these are dug out and brought to notice by the New York restaurant market's elaborately cascading sorting mechanism - first by the veritable blanket veritable blanket of amateur food review that Chowhound has thrown over the city and then by New York's subsidiary food reviewers (New York magazine, Gael Green, Eater, Grub Street, Restaurant Girl, etc, etc, etc). I would argue, contra Jelveh, that New York's restaurant market is frighteningly efficient. Good places are dug out, identified, tested by knowledgeable pioneers, and then mobbed, and places that don't hit the mark are slaughtered with brutal rapidity.

I would argue in a little more depth about the differences between Menupages and the high food press, but I'll leave it at that for now.

Spherical olive

I watched last night's Top Chef episode to learn that the show's token Italian won the "challenge" (make lunch at Craft) with a beef carpaccio with a fancy schmancy "spherical olive" - that is, olive puree molecularized back into the shape of an olive. But, of course, putting aside the fact that the carpaccio was not very original and easy, the much vaunted olive was just a bald faced copy of Adria's signature garnish. New American, as the judges kept saying? Not quite.

Romanette

There's quite a fun discussion of the word "romanette" going on over at Volokh's, a word meaning a lower case roman numeral in the context of legal documentation (as in, "now let's turn to Section 5.1(b), romanette 3"). As Volokh explains, Chief Justice Roberts recently stopped a lawyer who used the term for an explanation, as he'd never heard of it, and the comments at Volokh indicate that those of us who've practiced transactional law think romanette a common-place term, while our litigating brethren don't.

To go on the record, I don't like romanette, though the alternative "3 in the hole" to mean the same thing as the above is even less pleasing. As I mention in the comments over there, some way of distinguishing little "i" from "1" is important, so I guess we just made up a term.

I love the discussion of law firm terms that ensues in the comments, though. As I note, for example, I'm constantly doing the bidding of people who want to "bottom out" problems, as in "let's bottom that out ASAP". And we too at my firm use "it is what it is" all the time, both in our personal and professional lives. But my favorite phrase on the thread, which I had never heard, is to "open the kimono", as in "we need to open the kimono at this point". Apparently this means that the time's come to disclose everything or not keep anything hidden.

I can't wait to see the first caterer's face when I use that later this year, when working on my wedding. "Now listen here, we just need to open the kimonos now." Or maybe, "I can't live with the kimono half open, you know". Or, "I'll open the kimono if you do the same".

Hmm.

Achatz again

Gael Greene says some things I suspect I'd agree with about Grant Achatz's food:

Chestnut-baked potato, quince and smoke come next, just before Keller’s luscious foie gras galette. I want to like Grant Achatz’s food. Truly I do. I don’t want to seem uptight or an incurable old fogey. But perhaps I am. Making something edible out of unlikely components or something inedible out of a classic – like Achatz’s lamb with fennel and Pernod alongside a hot rock covered with coffee grounds, dried citrus peel and spices, three of them in three bowls on the table – “coffee-scented air” – is no guarantee of pleasure. A giggle isn’t enough. I want to be surprised by adventure in texture and flavor. I want to be bowled over by an explosion of flavor, transported by scents and savor beyond imagining. When Keller says “oysters and pearls” and sends out pearls of caviar, I smile and bask in that delicious notion. And I’d embrace the notion of coffee air with a smile if only the lamb tasted wonderful.

On the other hand, a super blog friend who has actually tasted Achatz's food said the below to me a while back. As I keep saying, I will have to taste this damned food in the end.

I share your general attitude about the chemicalization of food in a time when people are finally learning to do the opposite. But my one 12-course meal at Alinea really was incredible, with lots of combinations of flavors and textures that I had never before encountered, or even contemplated. I'm not saying that I'd want to eat food like that every day, or even every year, but at the same time some of the techniques were sufficiently interesting and inspiring that I hope and expect they will trickle down to the home cook (like the creative uses of freezing cold). The analogy that struck me was to high fashion: models strut down the runway half-naked in weird concoctions of feather and silk-- many of these things are not attractive, and certainly unthinkable for day-to-day wear, but some of the artistic developments (a line, a cut, a color) find themselves in very stylish pieces available in clothing boutiques 6 months later, and in the Gap 3 years after that.

Little Bits

UPDATE: I should add that I've thought more about nibbles and appetizers because they are so often the best part of a meal out. While I don't necessarily hold with the tapas/small plates trend that has overrun New York and much of the rest of the culinary world (though is it now receding in the face of hamburgers? I think so) it is a fact that I often remember what I ate when I arrived at the restaurant, and less what I ate later. I think part of it is that these small bites are short and punchy - they deliver their flavor in pitter-pat jabs, rather than in the dull thud of a roast - and are less cabined by convention. In size too, they tease without satisfying. One can never get tired of an amuse bouche, while no matter how good, repetitively sawing a prime steak can become tiresome. But I can't put aside the theory that I enjoy them better because they're at the start of the meal, when my anticipation is at its height and my hunger too. In any case, it is no surprise that many of the trademarks of the best restaurants (Oysters & Pearls, anyone) are starters, and not main courses.

I've been thinking more and more about little bits recently - hors d'oeuvres, appetizers, snacks, amuses. I feel as though I can produce a fairly creditable meal, most times, but don't know much beyond crostini to give to guests (assuming I had any) when they arrive. I notice the idea of using fingerling potatoes as an appetizer receptacle recently, and thought of sour cream and pancetta as nice accompaniments. I simply boiled the potatoes until cooked, rendered the pancetta, and then cooked the potatoes in the pancetta fat until browned. Topped with some greek yogurt rather than sour cream, the cooked pancetta, and chives, and these were delicious.

Dinner was a spatch-cocked chicken rubbed with salt, paper, and spanish paprika. We drank Cloudline's 2006 Pinot Noir, which was, to me, a sort of deceptive Pinot Noir - much more fruity than I would have expected.