Restaurant Widow

Breaking Market News

If you are still in shopping mode for Thanksgiving, and thinking that perhaps your options for local goods are over, fear not: the folks from Wayward Seed Farm will be at the North Market tomorrow (Tuesday) at noon, and Wednesday at 10am.  Saturday they were even selling homemade pie dough, so who knows what all they might have in store.  They definitely plan to have potatoes, squash, and greens and leeks, so there's plenty to fill out your table.  Go ahead and buy one of the giant squash.  I did, and it was very tasty (more later).  Happy eating!

Crumbs, News, Events, etc.

Every time I get a press release, I think I'll remember to post it as an event, and then I never do.  So I decided to post some North Market news I received this week, along with a few other tidbits from the previous week.  I know I still have tons of things to write up - I still have restaurants and wine tasting notes from our trip to California, and I'm making cranberry-quince preserves right now, so if they turn out, I'll tell you all about it.  Part of the reason my writing (and cooking) has been sporadic is that for some reason, the time change always renders me tired, groggy, lethargic, sleepless, and with the short term memory of a flea.  Actually, I have no idea what sort of short term memory fleas have, but I still thought it was a good comparison.  Hopefully I'll be back to normal soon (after all of the Thanksgiving cooking is finished and eaten, perhaps).  Today I finally ordered my turkey from Weiland's - a Bowman & Landis bird for $2.70 a pound - I hope he had a deliriously happy life, because he's certainly a pricey little bugger.

So, here are a few crumbs from the week:

• The North Market (finally) has a series of great cooking classes in the works, featuring great Columbus chefs.  A series or a single class would certainly make a great gift for the foodies in your life.  Cooking classes begin January 9th, with Johnny Dornback from Basi Italia.
• In other North Market news, they have published a new cookbook.  It is $20 and can be purchased at select retailers in the market.
• In local blogging news, I had the pleasure of attending a Social Media Cafe at COSI, hosted by COSI and WOSU.  It was quite interesting, and I was only disappointed that I had planned to go to dinner later and so had to duck out early.  Central Ohio seems very reluctant to embrace "new" media, all the while the newspapers are struggling, and I've become more and more convinced that WOSU does not care about attracting young supporters.  I emailed them to see if they would be interested in having me on to discuss Columbus restaurants, but they seem determined to have the same tired men on, discussing restaurants which closed before I was born (it happens every time - in fact, it's become a new form of entertainment for Husband and I, counting how many defunct restaurants they mention).  No offense, Jo(h)ns - it's just that, maybe, just maybe, a few people under 35 have an interest in food and restaurants.  Current restaurants, not the Marzetti's which used to be on Broad street in the 50s.
• At any rate, enough whining about the state of the battle between legit press and new media: you can read more about the meeting, see videos and pictures, and read other bloggers' reactions at Elephants on Bicycles (who is that girl in green?  Why do her ears seem to stick out so far? she's never been self-conscious about that before) No Neck, and on WOSU's blog.

CSA & Columbus Farm Market Report for November 17th

Wow, was it ever cold out there this morning!  It certainly made me wish I wouldn't have forgotten my gloves.  Cold and all, there were a number of intrepid souls out this morning - there was certainly enough to easily round out your local Thanksgiving experience.  Lot of potatoes, sweet potatoes, squash, greens, lettuce, and gourds.  It was also, alas, my last CSA box of the year.  I guess it'll soon be time to test out all those goodies I've been freezing during the growing season.

Today's CSA box (half above, half below, with Mimi) included lettuce, a full dozen eggs (I've got to start baking or something, I have such a backlog of eggs - yikes!), some goat's milk soap, a daikon radish and a black radish, along with a butternut squash and a tiny little pumpkin, along with my yearly allotment of 5 pounds of Kennebeck potatoes, which are really, really good - so light and fluffy and rich, you really don't need a ton of fat, and a trio of Autumn corn for decorating:

I also hit Wayward Seed farm, where I picked up a bunch of Chinese red radishes, a bunch of broccoli rabe - every since we were in California (where everyone pronounced it broccoli robbie - it's rahb, by the way, aka rapini), I've been thinking about all of the spicy sauteed greens I had there - and half of a giant - I mean giant - squash called Marina Chioggia, something I've never had before.  In line with me was a girl who wanted to try it but didn't have an army at home to cook for, so farmer Adam was nice enough to cut it in half and sell it to us for a song.  More on that later, when I cook the beast.

Book Review::Elements of Cooking

When I first heard about the Elements of Cooking - from Ruhlman's blog, no less, gotta love the old blogosphere - I was completely intrigued.  At first, the idea of the cookbook seemed a little mundane - revisiting the classics, etc. etc., but this book is about reinterpreting the cooking of the chef for the home cook.  Frequently, for those who have never trained as a chef (or line cook or even server, for that matter) can lack a fundamental understanding of just what it is which makes restaurant food so good, and so much better than home cooking.  It's something Bourdain touches on in Kitchen Confidential (it appears I am incapable of reviewing any book without somehow referencing Bourdain.  I wonder what that means), when he talks about why you can't cook better than a chef.  Home cooks make lots of mistakes - using cheap, old, or inadequate ingredients, overcooking everything, being afraid of high heat, strange ingredients, or strange shopping locales, being intimidated by fishmongers or butchers, being afraid to ask questions, all sorts of things.  This book confronts all of those fears.  And it points out a few you might not realize you have.

The book begins by explaining a few basic ingredients in great detail - stock, eggs, butter.  It explains why you need the very best of each ingredient, it tries to explain the importance of veal stock - I think it's one of those things you just have to use to understand; most people have no idea how much veal stock they consume, as it is a base in many meat-accompanying sauces in restaurants.  Using stock as a base, many different types of sauces and other ways to use stock are discussed. This section also goes into great detail about salt - how to salt, how to salt water for starch or green vegetables, how to brine.  This section is of particular interest because many home cooks are afraid to salt heavily, especially when cooking starches.  The different types of heat are also discussed - dry heat, steaming vs. boiling, braising, etc.

The remainder of the book is an alphabetical listing of cooking terms and helpful hints.  When I say helpful hints, I'm not being trite.  There are tips for making your own croutons, buying meat, and cutting vegetables.  Perhaps the most helpful aspect of the book is in translating "chef" cooking terms for the home cook.  There are lots of terms restaurant people and cooks tend to throw around which the lay person might not immediately understand.  Even I am guilty of doing this in recipes, I think - I might say "deglaze the pan with 1/2 bottle of red wine," because I think everyone knows what deglazing is.  Or exactly what "nonreactive" or "reduce" mean. There are also helpful hints I always think of writing about, but never do, such as "Keep a Sharpie on hand in the kitchen and label and date your food," a favorite trick of mine, being that I have the worst memory. 

There are very practical hints for buying cookware - what you really need, such as a chef's knife and a good, large saute pan. 

The book can also help diners parse out menu terms; rouille, jus, cured, sous vide - even terms such as saute or risotto, which I am always amazed when diners don't recognize - are explained in great detail along with advice on how to use these terms in one's own kitchen.

The book also includes a list of Ruhlman's own favorite sources, many of which I also have constantly at hand, which should be used as a guideline for any wannabe foodie.  Occasionally I will be talking to a table and I'll start to discuss some term or cooking method, and a guest at the table will say "How do you know that?" and I'll just shrug and say "Harold McGee."  Ruhlman also sites McGee a lot, typically with a (see McGee) at the end of a statement, something I plan to copy. 

Elements is an extremely accessible and very smart kitchen companion.  It can be read cover to cover or in fits and starts.  I highly recommend it for any home cook who wishes to move from the level of casserole to cassoulet.

Have a Local Thanksgiving

I'm sorry readers, but there's no reason to reinvent the wheel.  This is a repost from last year:

It's that time of year again, time to think about Thanksgiving - to host or not to host, to dine in our go out, to order in or make everything yourself?  I know, I'm overwhelmed just thinking about it.  If you have any dedication to eating locally and supporting your local farmers, there are many options for keeping your thanksgiving as local as possible.  Later in the week, I will be posting alternatives to cooking in your own home for all of you who have asked, but this post if for those of you lucky enough to be cooking everything yourselves!

The key to hosting any successful party is, or course, flawless organization, seamless execution and unlimited resources.  For those of us lacking in one or more of those areas, your best friend should be THE LIST.  Make a list of everything you need to do and then organize it in a manner that makes the most sense to you.  Williams-Sonoma has a good brochure online with recipes and a checklist, and of course, Gourmet, Bon Appetit, and the Food Network also have good versions as well.

First up, turkeys - now, here's something you might not have known if you haven't cooked a fresh turkey before: they don't take as long to cook as previously frozen birds.  As far as I know, the science on that one is still out, but there's no need to get up at 4 in the morning to put a turkey in the oven so that it can turn into turkey jerky by the time you finally get it on the table.  If you choose to go with a fresh bird, you should be ordering your turkey now to be sure it is reserved, and plan to pick it up Tuesday or Wednesday before Thanksgiving so that you will have a chance to brine it (you are going to brine it, aren't you?).  These days, they sell brining bags in most grocery stores.  Of course, you can really use those giant roasting bags, but don't tell the folks who are charging you $10 for 2 brining bags.  If you are in a pinch or don't feel like messing with Alton Brown's 20 ingredient brine, then don't.  A simple mix of 1 cup kosher salt, 1/2 cup sugar to one gallon water is fine and will accomplish the purpose of a brine: juicy meat.  You can really even leave out the sugar if you like.  See?  I've already saved you time and money.

Turkey Sources:
North Market Poultry and Game (59 Spruce St.just north of downtown) in the North Market - I have purchased their turkeys many times in the past and have always been pleased.  In addition to fresh turkeys, they have great homemade chicken stock and all manner of game to compliment your feast.  614.212.7237
Carfagna's (1405 E. Dublin Granville, Columbus' NE side) has locally grown, fat Ohio hen turkeys available for Thanksgiving pre-order from the Lewis Turkey Farm.  Turkeys are reasonably priced at $1.99 a pound for whole turkeys and $3.99 for breast only (although why anyone would want to do that is beyond me, but I digress).  614.846.6340. 
Weiland's Gourmet Market (3600 Indianola Ave in Clintonville) is taking orders for their Bowman & Landes Farms free range turkeys.  Bowman & Landes is one of Ohio's largest free-range turkey farms and is located in Miami county.  Here's an interesting article from last year's USA Today about the farm and the rise of free range turkey farming.  614.267.9878.
The Hills Market (7860 Olentangy River Rd, aka rt. 315 that far north in Worthington) is also offering Bowman & Landes turkeys this year.  614.846.3220.
The Anderson's General Store (7000 Bent Tree Blvd in Dublin) is offering Ohio-raised Albright Farms free range turkeys this year, 614.766.9500.

There will still be some farmers left at this week's North Market Farmer's market, and, if last week's market was any indication, there will be potatoes, sweet potatoes, greens, and winter squash galore.  While the growing season has pretty much wound down here in Central Ohio, there are still many ways you can support your local farmers this Thanksgiving.  If you're really industrious, you can even set up some storage and buy extra for December's holidays, as well. 

Happy Eating!

Things to Do in Columbus::November 14th Edition

Updated Thursday with Tiny Canary, last entry.  Well, this week really begins the holiday season here in Central Ohio, so it would seem.  Is is just me?  I'm not quite ready for all of that yet.  Typically, Husband and I put our tree up the weekend after Thanksgiving, and it's really hard to believe that is just 10 days from now.  I was shopping at Costco yesterday, and they are in full holiday gear.  I just can't bring myself to start buying wrapping paper yet.  A decision I am sure to regret when confronted with the significantly diminished choices available December 23rd.  *sigh*

• First up, tonight at the Drexel Gateway (University District), you can have a cheap date at the Columbus Underground "Dinner and a Movie."  There will be drink specials, $5 and the $5 movie, which is the Dajeeling Limited.  Meet upstairs in the Lava Lounge.  More info.
• Tonight is also the lighting of the Statehouse Holiday Tree (5:30 - 6:30).  Santa will be there. 
• This Friday begins Wildlights at the Zoo.  Always a fun event - where I fist discovered, in high school, that chestnuts roasting on an open fire are not as great as they sound.  But still, always pretty cool.
• Thursday the Wexner Center will host the best of the Ottawa International Film Festival (7pm).  The show highlights what's going on in animation from the world over - not appropriate for the kiddos, sorry.  For the rest of the great events this week at the Wex, click to their website.
• If you still haven't made it to the Monet exhibit at the Columbus Museum of Art, here's your chance to take the kiddos and celebrate Monet's birthday - this Sunday at the museum.  There will be lots of art and family-friendly activities.  Click for more info.
• While you're at the museum, be sure to go to ProMusica's Stop!Look!Listen! show for the kids.  It really sounds pretty cool.  Of course, I was a music nerd as a child, so that might just be me.
• This Sunday is the annual Twig's Bazaar - more than 300 booths of handicrafts.  A great place to jump-start your holiday shopping, kids!  More info (the first event listed is a dog show; scroll down).
• Guess what?!  You can see Phoebe Damrosch read from Service Included this Friday as part of the Thurber House's Evenings with Authors series.  Click for more information (scroll down).
• This weekend, CAPA will present the Secret Garden; shows take place Thursday through Sunday, with matinees both Saturday and Sunday; tickets are $27 - $65; click for more information.
• Support indie crafts by buying your holiday gifts at Tiny Canary this weekend at Junctionville Studios in Grandview.  Over 40 crafters will be showing and selling their wares; it seems pretty cool.  Besides all of that, it takes place on Saturday and SUNDAY, so that I can finally go to an event I'm telling you to go to!  Hurray!  Click above for more information.

Lisa's Tried & True Thanksgiving Recipes

I can't believe it's already that time of year again, but here's my annual link to my favorite Thanksgiving recipes.  I promise you that my family and I have made these year after year, and they are always delicious.  Every once in awhile I toy with the idea of having less traditional offerinces, and every year we go back to the same old favorites. 

Party Potatoes
Sweet Potato Casserole (don't let the term casserole scare you - I promise, even lifelong sweet potato haters will love this)
Lisa's Perfect Sprouts (lifelong Brussels Sprouts haters will love these, too)
Pumpkin Cheesecake
Bon Appetit's Creamed Corn Gratin
Alton Brown's Turkey
Alton Brown's Cranberry Sauce
Lisa's Green Beans with Bacon

Zuni Café

The View of the kitchen from our table at the Zuni Café

Once again, it was time for my last night in the Bay area, and once again, I knew Zuni was the right place to visit.  I had been dying for Husband to try it, because I thought it was perfect for him, and I was right.  I had originally tried to secure a reservation for our first night in town, and I'm glad I couldn't, because all of our other dining experiences would have paled in comparison. 

For the uninitiated, Judy Rogers is a James Beard award-winning chef, if that means anything to you, and her style is simple: use the best possible ingredients and pair them in the best possible way.  Simple, but still no mean feat.  If Zuni were in Columbus, I would seriously consider eating there once a week.  It's that much of a gem - and it's reasonably priced, which is even better.

As is our want to do, we opted for several appetizers instead of an entree.  We like to sample the menu without getting bored, which is why, for the last time, we did not get the chicken.  Although we were seated in what is possibly the best seat in the house - a table on a tiny little mezzanine which overlooks the kitchen, so I got to see a chef working the wood fired oven, and the chicken did look delicious.  This chef immediately looked up and caught me taking pictures (no, I was not using a flash) and I became shy, so I didn't get as many good pictures of his work as I wanted.  It was really something to see someone cooking meat in a wood fired oven - people do pizza in a wood-fired oven all the time, and while that takes talent, it can usually be accomplished in about 10 minutes.  Cooking giant pork chops and entire chickens, on the other hand, really requires some skill, and we were quite impressed; we both decided that must be the top position in the kitchen (sorry for the bad pic; I was trying to be discreet but he kept spotting my attempts):

Being a Sunday night, they were out of a few things we wanted from the raw bar - the kumomoto oysters, and the periwinkles.  Neither of us have had periwinkles before per se (although we have had escargot, and being that both are snails, I suppose we have, but I digress).  So we opted for another variety (alas, neither of us can recall what they were).  Now, if you hate oysters or you think you hate oysters, take another look at them.  It was, after all, at Zuni that I learned to love raw oysters for the first time, thanks to our well-informed server.  I was also influenced by a scene in A Cook's Tour, where Anthony Bourdain talks about eating raw oysters in France and the epiphanal experience it was for him.  So here's what you do - after, of course, visiting a reputable source for your oysters - bring the oyster to your nose and close your eyes.  Smell the first time you visited the ocean, the first time you stood in the shallow water and felt the salty breeze on your face.  Eating an oyster is like eating that experience, every time.  It should smell salty, and oceanic - not like rotten fish, mind you, but like lots of fish living in the ocean, like vacation.  All oysters have different flavors and characteristics, some as a result of their species, but variations are largely due to their location and diet.  Oysters are especially savory and delicious because they produce MSG to balance their salt levels in the ocean.  (I'm going to quote Ruhlman here - see McGee.)  People seem to be divided on accouterments for oysters; traditionally, a squeeze of lemon or a mignonette - an acidic sauce made from champagne vinegar, black pepper and shallots - make for a nice foil to the richness of the oyster.  Husband prefers his unadulterated, but I am quite fond of mignonette, and like a little drizzled over.  Hmm.  Seems I've made this post more about the oysters and less about Zuni.  I'll fix that by saying Zuni takes their oysters seriously, they are shucked to order in the wide open, and are served with a lemon wedge and a scathingly acidic mignonette (which, in this case, is a good thing).  Our oysters being shucked:

And our oysters:

Next up was a frisée salad with rabbit in a saffron vinaigrette.  This was a salad so nice, we hadn't finished the first one when we had to order a second.  Seriously - it was one of the best things I have eaten in a long, long time.  And again, amazingly simple and well-balanced.  Just the simple ingredients - the frisée, the perfectly sweet vinaigrette, the rabbit loin, and then little rabbit lardons - perhaps a confit of belly or leg, rendered to resemble bacon, and just a few chopped almonds to lend sweetness and texture.  Because frisée is so bitter, it requires more than just a good dressing: a good dose of salt will completely transform the bitterness.  Many times when presented with a frisée, I find I have to add salt for myself to balance the bitterness.  Not so here. It was truly amazing:

Of course, we had to order a bowl of polenta, which was perfection - molten hot, so that the mascarpone topping it just melted right in, adding creaminess.  Heaven.  I love polenta.  For years, I worked with a Chef who was a polenta/grits master, and I miss eating the leftovers at the end of the evening (my waistline doesn't, to be sure, as Chef thought equal parts cream and stock should be used in the cooking of the cornmeal, and then about half as much butter should be stirred in.  Yikes.  Yikes, but Yum.)  I didn't take a picture of the polenta, because I had it on my previous visit, and it looks about the same.

We also had housed-cured anchovies, along with shaved extra aged Parmesan, celery, and house cured niçoise olives (I detected a curious but tasty note of vanilla in the olive brine. Very interesting).  I hate to beat a dead horse here, or anchovy, or whatever, but again - the closest attention paid to the simplest ingredients, everything treated remarkably well.  It can be so difficult to do correctly, it takes such an innate and correct understanding of each ingredient as an individual and the dish as a whole.  It can be difficult, and yet Zuni manages to hit every note:

And then there were the ricotta gnocchi.  Oh.My.  I am going to try to replicate these at my earliest opportunity, although I remember a friend trying to do it and calling me in a panic because they didn't call for flour, and seemed impossible.  Husband and I surmised they might make their own ricotta at Zuni, or else they use a very dry version produced somewhere especially for them.  It's very hard to find drier ricotta, which is why it's really hard to make a proper cannoli filling.  Again, the simplicity was the big winner here - the heavenly, lighter-than-air dumplings were swimming in a light broth of lemony butter, with spinach to cut through the richness:

And then there was a plate of thinly sliced Serrano ham, rich and salty, paired with a celeriac slaw and pomegranate seeds.  Again, a fine pairing of perfect, simple ingredients.  Something I hope to attempt to recreate for my Christmas party, for anyone lucky enough to be invited:

And then, alas, we had come to dessert.  Typically, Husband refuses to share or participate in any sort of dessert.  Usually this means I don't get anything either, but whilst on vacation I decided to order whatever I wanted.  Furthermore, the Zuni Café cookbook is the source for a very fine chocolate pot du creme recipe which I have made several times, so when I saw the caramel pot du creme on the menu, I knew I had to have it.  Ethereal.  I have no idea how they get the texture so amazingly smooth and flawless, but it was really, really good.  A perfect match with Husband's Germain Robin brandy, but not so great with my grappa (which I did kind of realize upon ordering).  Such is life:

Don't you just hate a glowing review?  The bartender was almost comically snooty.  Seriously, the typical fussy, accented European maitre d' sort of snob, who could barely summon the desire to even pour us a glass of wine.  Table service seemed a little uninspired, compared with my last visit; actually the foodrunner/backwaiter was much more personalable than our server, so I would ask the managers of Zuni to promote the friendly backwaiter with the buzzed hair, and apologize that I couldn't find you to give you some extra grease at the end of our dinner.  But, to close on a positive, the bread at Zuni is fantastic - I believe baked in house in that wood oven - and they give you salt! as they are marking the tables.  Not that I really needed to add salt to anything (except the very good butter), but I'm always comforted knowing it's there if I need it.

I almost hated to begin with our last meal, but the truth is, I didn't take a lot of pictures of food on this trip (our host will certainly laugh at this, as he was amazed by how many times we automatically paused before eating to photograph our food; it's a habit by this point); I hope you won't be too disappointed if I have to use nothing but my words to recreate our experiences, I just wanted to relax and take a vacation. 

I hope to have the rest of the trip written up very soon!  I would encourage everyone to purchase the Zuni Café cookbook; it's really great (it taught me everything I know about roasting a chicken).  It's full of precise tips and instructions and practical kitchen advice.

Info:  The Zuni Café 1658 Market St. 415.552.2522

CSA Report for November 10th

Just a brief trip this morning - Worthington & Clintonville have closed up shop for the year, although there will be the Worthington winter farmer's market this year, of course - the first is Saturday, November 25th 1pm - 4pm at the Griswold Senior Center, 777 High St (161 & High st in Worthington). 

There are still a few intrepid souls out at the North Market - actually, quite a few, considering how cold it was this morning.  The market is still full of pumpkins, squash, greens (it's the best time of year for them) and potatoes, so there will still be plenty out there next week for your Thanksgiving feast.

This week's CSA box included eggs, lettuce, arugula, braising greens, a black radish and a Daikon radish, as well as potatoes and fennel.  And I forgot to take a picture, so please forgive me!

Book Review::Service Included

Good news, readers: I have found my literary calling. 

Ah, books about the service industry.  When it employs so many people, how can there be so few good books about serving others?  The back of the house has Kitchen Confidential, a nearly flawless portrayal of the daily grind of the line cook, and we get Service Included, a darling memoir about a woman determined to get someone else's man.  *sigh*  This book should have included a pink cover with a picture of a pair of Manolo Blahniks and a cocktail, in which case it would have been better represented. 

So here's the literary calling part: I am going to write a book about the front of the house which will actually be good. It will be full of bad behavior, questionable but artfully used profanity, and off-color jokes ("Does it have to have profanity?" my mother asked).  The one shocking story in this book is so out of place and offensive that it seems completely artless.  My book will be full of the same funny and sad stories we all see and tell each other every day.  What it will not be full of is precious writing, and I won't go out of my way to make myself sound adorable and charming, which I'm not. I won't be smiling to the point of mandibular pain on the back of cover of the book. Agents and publishers, I will consider the first 100 offers. 

So I think it's pretty apparent right off the bat how I felt about Service Included. First of all, there's the Pollyana, humorless writer (one gets the feeling that everything funny in the book was said by someone else, and stolen), who admits in the book that she is one of those people who must have everyone like her, and if they don't, she will try and try until they want to kill her. If I worked with this girl, I would make her cry within her first 4 days of work, no problem. That might make me sound mean, but then again, I also wouldn't make it my mission to steal her boyfriend. Basically, this girl has the perfect job to write a great memoir about waiting tables (captain at Per Se), and instead she spends all of it describing her affair with the restaurant's sommelier, whose girlfriend also works at the establishment. She is then surprised when the entire staff ends up hating her and the sommelier continuously cheats on her. We are supposed to think she is the hero. There's one line where, ostensibly thinking about the restaurant but clearly on her paramouric (it's a word; I just made it up) quarry, she says to herself "4 stars. Eyes on the prize."  That is supposed to be love?

Damrosch is so self-absorbed that she cannot manage to capture a real sense of the other characters in her life – they are reduced to snarky qualities. There is the sarcastic sous chef who, not surprisingly, hates Phoebe as much as I do (much to her furrowed brow consternation, because she finds herself so darned cute & charming, how can anyone not like her) and one of the best scenes in the book is when the sous chef says to her "Phoebe, you're one of those people who has to have everything like you, aren't you?" When she affirms this, he says "I'm not" and turns his back to her. For that reason alone, I love this man. It is also clear that the author is the only important woman in her world. All other females are treated with disdain – very few are even given names. When the author and a few of her serving buddies decide to do a taste test of New York's marrow bones (oh! To have numerous options!), the one other female in the group is portrayed as whiny when, after 3 orders of marrow bones, she can't eat another bite of fat and is begging for something green. Listen here, Phoebe: there's a reason most people serve a bitter green salad along with marrow bones – to cut through the fat. 

One obstacle when writing about oneself is trying not to indulge the side of you which would always make you seem cute and charming and fabulous. Consider this:

"We guzzled 20 different wines, pausing only briefly between each to consume vast quantities of aged cheddar and hard, salty crackers."

Vs.

"We savored each of the 20 wines the winery had to offer, shivering slightly in the early autumn morning breeze, wrapping our cashmere sweaters just a little closer, we swirled syrah and cabernet in our crystal and discussing the finer points of each – the notes of violet, of wood and earth, of tobacco leaves. To accompany, the finest cave-aged cheddar money could buy, crunchy with denatured protein crystals, with crackers as light and ethereal as the best cultured Vermont butter would allow."

Don't you kind of want to stab the second me? Just admit it. Maybe I'm just mean, but I deplore that second kind of precious writing. It always seems to come from a place of "look at what I could do that you couldn't." And furthermore, I wasn't wearing a cashmere sweater. And if I were, it would be full of moth holes, and I still wouldn't be able to let it go into the trash bin. I'm not ashamed of my frumpiness, and I never want to pretend to be something I'm not.

One obstacle in the book is a matter of conception: in choosing to write about her particular restaurant (because who doesn't want a behind-the-scenes look at Per Se), Damrosch is somewhat limited in her writing; if she dished everyone she worked with and for, they would hate her even more. 

I never got the feeling that the writer understood the desirable nature of her job, or of the food she was serving.  She rarely describes any of the dishes, and calls the house sorbets "whatever crazy concoction the pastry chefs thought up."  In the first chapter, after she waits on Keller and his Sous Chef elect (in a different restaurant) and is challenged on the variety of persimmons being used, she goes into a little education about said fruits.  I actually enjoyed that chapter, and was hoping the rest of the book followed a similar structure - a story about the restaurant, and then a little educational essay.  My hopes were quickly dashed.

There are some interesting parts of the book - the brief and all too few glimpses we get into the service and philosophy behind a restaurant such as Per Se, the demands of the job, the fact that no one can use any scented products (something I agree with; anyone who's had a wine tasting ruined by someone's old lady perfume knows better than to ever wear heavily scented products to such events, or dinner).  However, because this book is primarily a chick lit book (don't get me wrong, I do read some chick lit; I'm a girl, after all, and therefore am occasionally seduced by the pink cocktail/shoe covers), the four-star setting fades into the background of an uninspiring love story. 

I am perhaps alone in my distaste for this book; it's just that I thought it could have been so much more than it was.  If you still want to read it, there are no end of glowing reviews out there in the world, just Google it.  If I didn't have the book on loan from a friend, I'd offer it to someone for free. I find that perhaps I am a little sexist in these sorts of memoirs - I also hated Amanda Hesser's Cooking for Mr. Latte, another love-story memoir written by a too-cute heroine who almost refuses a second date with a man because he ordered *gasp* a latte after dinner, when everyone knows a latte is a breakfast drink, and no one who's anyone would drink milk in their coffee after 10am.  I suppose it depends on whose clock we're on, because I am enjoying a latte even as we speak, and it is noon, and breakfast.  Oh, and for the record, I waited on an Italian chef last night who, after dinner, ordered a cappuccino. So take that. When Damrosch mentions Cooking for Mr. Latte, I almost fell out of my airplane seat, it was just too perfect.  A match made in culinary purgatory.