Eat: The Word Archives
Dispatch from Sobe: T-Minus 2 Days
Left, Lee Schrager, festival honco; right, Devin Padgett, managing director of the festival
Time for a quick dispatch from South Beach, where festival officials are readying the place for the 2008 South Beach Wine & Food Festival. We'll be on the ground starting Wednesday late, Until then, Lee Schrager, keeper of the festival, will be sending us his dispatches. Lee: "We're at the Grand tasting village here. Ocean Drive, 4 blocks from 10-14 streets, Almost 1/2 mile of wine, spirits, food, demos, sponsors, exhibitors. Over 20k+ people will go through site alone from fri- sunday."
SobeWire: Tony Bourdain Handicaps the Golden Clog Awards, Part I
On Friday, the first annual Golden Clog Awards will be doled out in South Beach. These, the premie baby of Michael Ruhlman and Tony Bourdain's darkest places and booziest nights, are an alternate universe version of the Beard Awards, complete with real categories, nominees and, for each winner, a statuette for mantelpiece display. Since the emcees of the Golden Clogs here are two of the biggest names in food, their deliberately lo-fi laser light show spectacular may prove one of the hottest tickets at South Beach.
Yesterday, we caught up with Bourdain, who was kind enough to break down the categories and nominees for us, in this, the first annual Golden Clog Awards. And away we go.
SobeWire: The 2008 Golden Clog Nominees Announced!
Michael Ruhlman and Tony Bourdain have concocted The Golden Clog Awards (Ruhlman has previously announced as much on his blog), a quirky little awards event born out of "too many beers and late night yakitori," as Bourdain explained to Eater yesterday. The awards ceremony, or "awards ceremony," will take place this Friday at 2:00 PM in Miami Beach, as part of the 2008 South Beach Wine & Food Festival, which does lend a certain, frightening air of credibility to the proceedings. Later today we'll bring you a chat with Bourdain about the whole shebang, but at this time, may we present the official list of nominees in the first annual Golden Clog Awards (official statuette above).
Unconfirmed Rumormongering: Keith McNally To Buy Minetta Tavern?
Minetta Tavern: The new Morandi?
Here's a bit of luscious, grade-A, unconfirmed Keith McNally rumormongering, straight from the Greenwich Village tipline: "Heard an interesting rumor while out last night...apparently Keith McNally put in an offer of $1.2 million to buy Minetta Tavern...Kinda a weird one in my humble opinion, but I heard it on good word from the owner of another area bar that recently opened." More: As far as we know, the VIP resy number hasn't been released yet. Developing.
· Minetta Tavern [official site]
Adventures in Food Technology: The Col-Pop Revealed
The crazy kids over a Serious Eats have uncovered a pretty genius fast food item imported from South Korea: a dual compartment soda/chicken cup, or Col-Pop. A plastic insert in the top of the cup holds chicken (or anything you want) while the bottom contains your ice cold beverage. Right now these babies are only available at BBQ Chicken locations in Chelsea and Flushing, but we're expecting this to hit the mainstream soon. Real soon: no question they're pork bun compatible. The naysayers at Gizmodo have weighed in about the ineffectiveness of the cup (condensation is an issue), but the Eater Department of Consumer Testing calls that a minor detail. Hit play for more details and some top notch Adam Kuban-age.
· Snack to the Future: The Col-Pop, an All-in-One Chicken Nugget and Soda Cup [SE]
Adventures in Branding Superbowl XLII Edition: Brady's now Manning's
From the crazy Upper East Side, blogger 78thand2nd has a dispatch on Second Avenue sports bar Brady's, which has quite cleverly renamed itself in preparation for this Sunday's festivities in Phoenix. To the 10028: "UES dive bar Brady's on 82nd and 2nd is going to make it damn well known that the name of the bar has nothing to do with anything related to the Patriots or their quarterback Tom Brady -- and the bar has been temporarily re-branded Manning's, in honor of Giants quarterback Eli Manning."
· Brady's Hates Tom Brady, Re-Names Itself Manning's [78thand2nd]
Adventures in Branding: It's 1849 Everywhere!
Stickers bearing the year 1849 have been appearing around town for awhile, but our interest in them has been piqued anew by neighborhood blog 78th and 2nd, which has been tracking the appearance of said stickers across the Upper East Side. The weird thing? The stickers appear to be spam from Central Village hellhole 1849—which, apparently, knows that future customers primed for its charms are best found, uh, in the East 70s. Anyway, don't miss 1849's official website, ya hear?
· Ugh, 1849 [78thand2nd]
· 1849 [Official Site]
In Sum: This Week in Bluefin Tuna
Much in the way that the Chicago foie gras ban or any mention of trans fat regulation sends chefs, industry types and interested parties into a tizzy, so, too, has the current killer food discourse on mercury levels in blue fin tuna. It started with the Times A1 story on Wednesday about alarmingly high levels of mercury in sushi found across the city, then splintered into two debates: 1) How accurate was the report? (answer: very); and 2) Is the mercury really so harmful as to warrant sounding the alarm, and should we be scared of eating blue fin tuna?
At a table of chefs and insiders last night, the answers we overheard were, respectively, yes and hell no. But, to each his own. One should find an answer to these questions and settle on a plan that suits your blue fin cravings. Below, the further reading you need to be satisfied, whether you're never eating the stuff again, or you're about to spend the weekend on a sushi binge.
· The Danger of Not Eating Tuna [Time]
· Would You Like Mercury With Your Sushi? [Newsweek]
· Fish Lobby Responds to Bluefin Mercury Scare [~E~]
· National Study Finds High Levels of Mercury in Tuna [NYT]
· High Mercury Levels Are Found in Tuna Sushi [NYT]
Fish Lobby Responds to Blue Fin Mercury Scare
The National Fisheries Institute, an advocacy group for the seafood industry, released a statement this week, questioning the accuracy of Marrian Burros article about the high mercury levels in bluefin sushi in various New York restaurants (Burros backed up her own story with a follow up on the Dining section blog). Basically, NFI says, keep on eating the good stuff. It's not surprising that they've taken this position, but here it is:
On the iPod™: Lunch at Prune, Preserved for Posterity
Nearly four years after Frank Bruni kicked off his tenure as Times restaurant critic with a stinging critique of Mario Batali's playlist at Babbo, everyone and their brother and their sister has hopped on the "What's on such-and-such restaurant's MP3 player?" train. So gosh darn it if we're not feeling left out!
Luckily, an Eater spy enjoyed lunch at East 1st Street favorite Prune last week—side note: the burger remains spectacular—and jotted down the names of the songs emanating from the house iPod. The genre-busting intensity on display that day will Blow. Your. Mind.
To the playlist. >>Top Chef Chicago to Feature 7 NYC Chefs
Top Chef's fourth installment, this one set in the fair city of Chicago, hits the airwaves March 12. What does the new season have in store, other than a new set of dizzying promo photos like the one at right? A bunch of new wannabe stars from New York City. We've parsed the Bravo press materials, and here's what we've got on the contestants currently residing here:
· Manuel, 33, Texas, worked at Le Cirque 2000, "worked with executive chef Mario Batali at Babbo Restaurant where he quickly rose to sous chef," currently executive chef at Dos Caminos Third Avenue
· Nikki, 35, NYC, owns and operates 24 Prince
· Spike, 27, Clearwater Beach, chef de cuisine at Mai House
· Dale, 29, "Filipino background," sous chef at Buddakan
· Mark, 29, New Zealand, sous chef at Public
· Lisa, 27, Toronto, worked at Asia de Cuba, Rain, Public
· Andrew, 30, Fort Lauderdale, restaurant background unclear
Anyone who knows more about these folks, fact-check, svp? Our thanks in advance.
The full contestant bios, after the jump. >>Eater Inside Gone Wild: Chop Suey
For an unmitigated shitshow, Chop Suey, the restaurant that is just now opening in the revamped Reniassaince Hotel in Times Square, really isn't half bad. First, why it's like a derailed freight train: 1) Both Zak Pelaccio and Will Goldfarb are consultants on the restaurant. Pelaccio will put his name on anything that comes to him with a five-figure handjob included. Goldfarb, well, yeah. Pelaccio, the consulting chef and the marquee name on all press materials, came dressed to the opening party last night as a civilian. Dude could have at least pretended he walked through the kitchen. In a month, neither chef will remember ever having had anything to do with this place—and then we'll get to see what's what. 2) Actually, just see number one.
But, it turns out this restaurant has one of the best views (above) of Times Square to be had and, though it is extremely early to call, their food offerings thus far seem straightforward and flavorful. Here's an instareview, from the inbox: "Went to Chop Suey for lunch today. Not serving the whole menu yet but what they did have was good. Had the scallion pancakes with a kind of pear jam/chutney. Then had the rock shrimp with slices of pork belly. Pork belly was cut very thin like proscuitto, didn't really affect the taste of the dish. Also had HK-style noodles w/ pork and red peppers. Still teething problems w/ service (our bottle of sparkling water came out warm) but a good overall first impression."
Further reading in the archives and at Metromix.
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