Bar Boulud

Trying to get a walk-in table during the first week of the much anticipated opening of Bar Boulud was a hope and a prayer. Located across from Lincoln Center, it has the upper west side crowd as well as the opera and ballet crowd to draw from even if it ends up not being a destination restaurant.

Even though it's only been open for 2 days, there's been enough buzz where I couldn't get a reservation. In fact, I was told that there were only limited reservations left for the next month. They take reservations up to a month in advance and they do have a couple of tables, a community table, and the tasting bar available for walk-in's. I'm not sure why but it looked like there were 4 hosts which seemed to be way overkill for a reasonably small restaurant. But I'm sure Chef Boulud knows what he's doing. We went in at 9:30pm on Saturday night and there was an hour wait. Since we live a couple of blocks away, we put our names down and went home.

When we returned, we were promptly seated at the tasting table in the back, a round seating area that looked like it would be perfect for wine tasting. I do anticipate wine tasting events being held here in the future. The menu is extensive and can be located on menupages.com. We went with the large degustation tasting of charcuterie and the pork belly appetizer...pretty much the first page of the menu. I'd never had so much pate, terrines, etc in my life but I did find the differences in the textures and flavors quite interesting. I don't think my wife was as fond of that particular part of the menu. I must say that the pork belly was disappointing. I'm all for fat but there was too much of it and I think it could have been fried a bit more. Plus the flavor just wasn't there.

The selection of wines by the glass is still limited as they're stocking the wine cellar. They anticipate a much larger selection in the next couple of weeks. We went with a glass of an American pinot noir and one of a French pinot from Givry. However, the waiter was very adamant that we both ordered the Givry. I was very annoyed about that. He said we both ordered the "pinot" but, of course, this doesn't make sense if there are two on the wine list.

Service in general was a bit erratic. We would sit for long periods of time without anyone checking in. We also had to ask for a cup of hot water 3 times before someone brought it. Perhaps it was just our waiter. Either way, the restaurant has just opened so we'll give the service a chance to get smoother.

For dessert, we shared a chocolate mousse with chocolate hazelnut gelato, nuts, and some crunchy chocolate bits. This was very good and I look forward to trying the other desserts sometime.

Bar Boulud is a welcome addition to the Lincon Center neighborhood. We do need to go back and check out the other parts of the menu. I hear there are also two private dining rooms downstairs for parties and they will be opening for lunch at the end of the month. Think they'll have wi-fi? :)

wd-50

Is innovation in cooking a good thing or are we seeing too much innovation just for innovation's sake? There are many advocates and detractors to restaurants like wd-50; some love the concept and thoroughly enjoy the experience while others cannot understand the flavors combinations nor the foam, soil and gelatins that are clearly non-traditional. Going to a place like wd-50 is like dinner theater to me: good food while being entertained by the cleverness of the preparation and the potentially odd mix of flavors. I'm in!

I had dinner with a couple that was in town from Chicago for the holidays. Agreeing that we were definitely getting the tasting menu, we prepared ourselves for the 4+ hour dinner. I had been to wd-50 three time previously and enjoyed myself each time. I'll try to give you a general gist of the evening but since it was several weeks ago (yeah, i'm about as lazy as you can get), my memory is not too clear.

Let me just hit the highlights. The pizza pebbles with pepperoni and shitake mushrooms was really good. Basically, it was balls of some sort of tomato puree, some other balls of pepperoni and shitake flakes. Not necessarily the best flavor-wise since it did taste a bit like frozen pizza but it was still very whimsical and fun.

Another dish I liked was interestingly enough called Knot Foie. I suppose it's not foie the way you normally see it but is a tourchon tube of foie tied in a knot. It was sprinkled with fleur de sel, nuts, and some gelatinous balls of fruit. I wasn't all that crazy about the nuts but the fruit and foie gras were great.

Chef Dufresne also does a take on eggs benedict. This was discs of egg yolk, a thin strip of bacon and a breaded ball of hollandaise sauce. This was probably my favorite dish of the night.

The only real miss of the night for me was the cuttlefish with squash, chamomile, orange, and toast oil. It just didn't do anything for me. I couldn't taste the cuttlefish at all which completely defeats the purpose in my opinion.

Nevertheless, I enjoyed my 4.5 hr meal. If I'm looking for strong classic flavors, wd-50 is probably not the place I'd go. However, for interesting combinations, a good mix of texture and flavor, and innovative takes on standards, wd-50 and Tailor are your only real choices in New York.