Virtual Gourmet

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Readers may now access an Archive of all past newsletters--each annotated--dating back to July, 2003, by simply clicking on ARCHIVE .

Having already published "A Gentleman's Guide to Dining Etiquette" (http://pages.prodigy.net/johnmariani/040726/) I called upon my readers to contribute what they considered good etiquette for women out to dine. Here are the results, with grateful thanks to all those who contributed: Suzanne Wright, Melissa Libby, Miriam Silverberg, Martha Tiller, McCall Mastroianni, Nicole Hunnicutt, Marissa De Long, Marsha Palanci, Janet Isabelli, Beth Flintoft, and John Curtas.

1. . . . never applies lipstick at the table after eating. And never gets her lipstick all over the glass.

3. . . . never quibbles about the exact amount each of her dining companions spent.

6. . . .never discusses the details of her divorce. (Others' divorces are all right.)

7. . . . always offers to pick up the tab--or at least the tip--on the second date.

8. . . . never replies "I dunno, where do you want to go?" when asked where she'd like to eat.

9. . . . may get a little tipsy and act a little flirtatious with her special someone at a restaurant, but knows the difference between "sexy" and "sexual."

12. . . . never goes to the powder room more than once during the meal, and simply excuses herself from the table without explanations of where she's headed.

15. . . . always quietly settles the bill if she's paying without studying it minutely

19 . . . . never orders first until she gets the prompt from her host inviting her to do so.

Alain Ducasse is nothing if not indefatigable, for he is currently owner or consultant or manager or in charge of more than a dozen restaurants and enterprises, including his original flagship, Louis XV in the Hôtel de Paris in Monaco, La Bastide de Moustiers in Provence, 59 Poincaré, Spoon+, Il Cortile, Aux Lyonnais Bistro, and Alain Ducasse at the Plaza-Athenée (all in Paris), Spoon+ restaurants in London, Tokyo, St. Tropéz, and Mauritius, “bar & boeuf” in Monte Carlo, Auberge Iparla in the Basque country, L’Hostellerie de l’Abbaye in La Celle, Auberge L'Andana in Tuscany, and at least one restaurant due to open in Las Vegas next year.

Alain Ducasse at MIX with actress Carole Bouquet and film director Sofia Coppolla at the debut of Ms. Bouquet's wines to the U.S.

   I have commented often enough in the past on my concerns when a chef is so peripatetic and so rarely in any one kitchen, but the talent--and resources--devoted to making Ducasse's enterprises something quite out of the ordinary in most every case is remarkable indeed, and his associates and minions are trained to maintain a level of excellence few other culinary titans have been able to sustain with such continuing finesse. Which is not the same thing as saying Ducasse's enterprises are all of a kind, or even of an identifiable style, as, say, the restaurants of Wolfgang Puck or Emeril Lagasse are. Ducasse works in too many genres for that to be the case.  What they may lack, however, is personality.
     This was very much the case when he opened the NY restaurant--Alain Ducasse at the Essex House (155 West 58th Street; 212-265-7300; www.alain-ducasse.com), for Ducasse came and went within weeks of opening this very important NYC front to attend to the Plaza-Athenée in Paris; the food media pounced on the place for its extravagance, the offer of a dozen knives for one's meat and ten pens for one's check, and the absence of Ducasse himself. After months of major tweaking, the restaurant garnered better reports, including four stars from the NY Times, though the initial bloom had worn off, and, with tabs above $250 per person, it has never been easy to fill the dining room.
   So, when Ducasse's chef de cuisine, Didier Eléna, left a few months ago, Ducasse, with a keen sense of irony, hired his friend and master cuisinier Christian Délouvrier (below, right), who had been chef in this same space when it was called Les Celebrités, then at the posh Lespinasse in the St. Regis hotel. yuj

When Lespinasse closed last year, Délouvrier announced he would open both a casual bistro and a fine dining restaurant, but when those deals fell through, Ducasse came courting, and it looks like a French marriage made in heaven, even if the groom, Monsieur Ducasse, is too often away on business.
I have no clue what the two men discussed as to what the new menu would be, but I have a strong suspicion that Délouvrier would never agree merely to adapt his friend's recipes, as is the case in other of Ducasse's establishments; further, I sense that Ducasse has put his full faith in Délouvrier, for now, after five years, ADNY not only has a great chef but a real personality in the soft-spoken Gascon who is perfectly content to stay in the restaurant cooking his own unique way. rttt

     The dining room itself (right) looks better than ever, a bit brighter perhaps, and they've fixed the acoustical glitch that allowed everyone in the room to hear everyone else's conversation in the room as if through an earpiece. Service, too, seems to have a new, more youthful gait, less pretentious, more helpful, and always generous.
    Délouvrier's cooking over the years has ranged from sumptuously classic with modern flourishes to ingeniously creative. Now it is at an ideal balance of the new and the refined, more delicate than ever, with every ingredient counting for something in tandem with the rest.
    With my wife and son in tow, I asked Délouvrier to do three menus for us and to have sommelier André Compeyre choose our wines, which began with Bruno Paillard Rosé Champagne, chosen from one of the deepest, broadest, and most expensive wine lists in America, although there has been an effort to offer bottles that are somewhat more affordable than the reams of $200 California cabs, $300 Chablis, and $500 Barbarescos.
    The first thing that struck me about our meals was how every single dish--we sampled about 20 in all--were so perfectly seasoned; we never picked up a salt or pepper shaker, and the spices, as in a lovely filet of Dover sole "en viennoise," with pepper sauce, never blanketed any other flavor. We began with dishes like wild Alaskan salmon, served just warm, with osietra caviar and a tangy "belle-vue" garnish; carpaccio of blue fin tuna came with the best asparagus I've had all summer, graced with a light aïoli and ginger condiment; sea scallops were marinated in olive oil and served rather like a tomato cocktail, while duck foie gras with a lemon-date marmalade had just the right balance of fat, sweet and sour. Best of all was a little cocotte of green peas simply cooked with butter and crayfish, a dish we could have eaten much more of and skipped the rest of the meal.
    Main courses were every bit as impressive and every bit as light. Striped bass was cooked "en barigoule" with baby artichokes, with which Compeyre's choice of a 2000 Alain Voge Fleur de Crussol was inspired, since artichokes fight with 99% of the wines in the world--and always win. I found a tart of lobster a little chewy and the citrus emulsion oddly metallic in taste, but squab was wonderfully gamy, but not too gamy, served with duck foie gras, asparagus and black olives, with which a 2000 Nemerever Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon was superb. By comparison sautéed rack of veal was merely delicious, not exceptional, but the creamed morels added marvelous luster to the dish.
    Next came several perfectly matured cheeses, with a 2000 Conterno Fantino Mon Pra from the Langhe district of Italy, followed by baba au rhum (with a rum of our choosing from several on a cart), various chocolate marvels, coconut mousse, juicy sorbets, then a parade of cookies, candies, marshmallows, and cakes, which we enjoyed with a sip of 12-year old El Dorado Demerara rum.
    This was definitely the work of a master chef, whose personality is writ large in every dish. Ducasse has done New York, and, essentially, himself, a great favor by bringing Délouvrier back to the Essex House, where he is cooking better than ever, seemingly unfettered by all except the desire to be the best.
    Three courses here cost $150, four $175, and a grand seven-course plus tasting menu of the kind we enjoyed, $225. One last note: they've got to do something about the tiresome, byzantine telephone message you get when you call. Is it so difficult to have a human being answer the phone these days?

MIX (68 West 58th Street; 212-583-0300; www.mixny.com), Ducasse's more casual NYC venue with restaurateur Jeffrey Chodorow, is quite another thing, and it too has had a change of style and chef. When it first opened last fall, few knew what to make of the oddly configured menu; At the time I wrote, "The menu is broken into 'First of Mix,' which are starters and soups; 'Must of Mix,' which doesn’t make any sense in either English or French but explained on the menu as 'To share or not to share, as you prefer'; 'Second of Mix,' which are what we call entrees and the French plats, fish and meats; and 'Third of Mix,' which are desserts. The numerology refers you to the pricing here: one First, one soup, one Must = “The Mix of Mix” at $48; three-course menu= $72, pre-theater menus = $36 and $45. Lunch is à la carte (main courses $16-$39) or prix fixe at $36 and $45." The whole thing was just plain silly and wholly confusing. (One captain told me, "I still have nightmares over that menu!")
     If Mix suffered from being misunderstood upon opening last fall, it now wants very much to be loved. The current press releases contend that Ducasse and Chodorow set out to “demixtefy Mix”by clarifying and simplifying the concept while maintaining the original intentto combine traditional American favorite dishes with French flair. The menu has now changed to a regulation appetizer, main course, dessert formatThey have also gotten rid of the charmless Petri dishes some food came in. Prices, however, haven't budged much, with dinner appetizers $13-$22, main courses $26-$46, and desserts $11-$12, which is not cheap and will probably keep many people from dropping in for a casual meal at Mix. Even at lunch main courses run $26-$36, though there is a well-priced 3-course $39 lunch; two courses, $29.
     Chef Damon Gordon, formerly of the Blue Door on Miami Beach, has taken over the kitchen and focused everything well. Some of the signature dishes remain--the irresistible elbow pasta with ham, butter, and truffle jus, thank God!--but there is novelty here too, and I enjoyed the food much more than I had in the past. You begin with great bread from Pain Quotidien, along with Mix's signature peanut butter and jelly, cute, but its cloying sweetness will just about kill your appetite.
      We had excellent fluke seviche with eggplant caviar, corn blinis and spiced lime juice; a combo of Dungeness crab, with soup and a not-too-sweet, perky, very French citrus marmalade. There was everything to love about the spring vegetable vichyssoise with an enticing herb "island" floating in it, and shellfish and potato chips--very crunchy, like tempura--came with a velvety mustard sauce. Main courses include "farm-raised pork" (where else would it come from?), very good, succulent, and tender, with bitter greens, cornbread and barbecue sauce, while softshell crab had a crunchy salad with a piperade condiment, and roasted duck breast à l'orange was a superb turn on an old classic, here served with bittersweet Belgian endive. Tenderloin of bison comes with a shallot confit and sauce bordelaise. Risotto with morels and a veal broth was lovely.
    For dessert the holdover black-and-white pizza sounds more appealing than it is, and Four Seasons panna cotta was rubbery. The best of the sweets we tried was the Mix candy bar, which was chocolate heaven.
     Mix's wine list, under Bertrand Despinoy, has been priced downward from its previous stratosphere, with several affordable bottlings now.
     Parisian designer Patrick Jouin's decor has not changed much, with its stainless steel curtain, a translucent bar that changes color throughout the evening, a “seating module” called le bâteau, and white brick walls covered with clear rose-colored panels. The rest rooms are still fitted out with “classic Louis XV chair/toilets made of Corian.” I do wish they had tablecloths, and the Euro jazz-rock music can be disconcerting after an hour or two.
   Ducasse and Chodorow are determined to make Mix work in NYC (there's another planned for Las Vegas), and have made every effort to draw glam parties to the premises, as when actress Carole Bouquet introduced her excellent new Passito di Pantelleria wine there. I hope it all goes well, for Mix isn't another West Side bistro or trattoria serving the same tired menu. There's fun and good food to be had here. And now you can understand the menu.

LARBS WILL DO THAT

"Renu Nakorn’s food is spicy, but what makes it wonderful is the fresh play of tastes, a fugue of herbs, meatiness and citrus that is quite unlike anything at your corner Thai café. There’s a blistering larb of finely ground catfish; the thinnest sour strands of shredded bamboo; great Thai beef jerky; and an extraordinary version of steak tartare that is so delicious it could sear the hairs out of your nostrils."--Jonathan Gold, L.A. Weekly.

* On Sept. 13 Renee and Colin Alevras of NYC’s The Tasting Room have teamed with Napa winemaker Clark Smith to host a wine dinner presenting organic and sustainable wines. Contributing to the uniqueness and educational aspects of the evening, half of the wines are not available commercially. $150 pp. Call 212-358-7831.

* On Sept. 15 restaurateur Richard Sandoval will pair his Modern Mexican cuisine with Mexican wine, Tequila, and colorful cocktails for a traditional Independence Day fiesta, at his NYC restaurants Maya (212.585.1818) and Pampano (212-751-4545). $49 pp.

* On Sept. 17 Cakebread Cellars will be featured at an Autumnal Dinner at Equinox in DC. $90 pp. Call 202-331-8118.

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EDITOR'S NOTE: This newsletter is also available on the very comprehensive food site www.sautewednesday.com
which has dozens of other links to food articles from around the world, and also at www.Gayot.com. New York Corner reviews are also available at
www.nycvisit.com/johnmariani

MARIANI'S VIRTUAL GOURMET NEWSLETTER is published weekly. Editor/Publisher: John Mariani. Contributing Writers: Robert Mariani, Naomi Kooker, Kirsten Skogerson, Edward Brivio, Mort Hochstein, Lucy Gordan, Suzanne Wright. Contributing Photographers: Galina Stepanoff-Dargery, Bobby Pirillo. Technical Advisor: Gerry McLoughlin.

John Mariani is a columnist for Esquire, Wine Spectator, Diversion and the Harper Collection. He is author of The Encyclopedia of American Food & Drink (Lebhar-Friedman), The Dictionary of Italian Food and Drink (Broadway), and, with his wife Galina, the award-winning new Italian-American Cookbook (Harvard Common Press). To purchase from amazon.com, click on the image below.