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MARIANI’S
Virtual Gourmet
May
21, 2005
NEWSLETTER
Restaurant
Figure in Madrid Photo by Galina Stepanoff-Dargery
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In
This Issue
LAS
VEGAS: ROBUCHON MAKE HIS MOVE
by John A. Curtas
NEW
YORK CORNER: Lentini by John Mariani
QUICK BYTES
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
LAS
VEGAS: ROBUCHON MAKES HIS MOVE
by John A. Curtas
To date, L’Atelier in Las
Vegas at the MGM Grand (702-891-7358; click)
is the only American outpost of one of France’s most celebrated chefs,
Joël Robuchon (NYC’s L’Atelier is
scheduled to open later this year at The Four Seasons Hotel there), and
by
opening in Vegas first, he has not only shifted the paradigm of French
food in
America to the west, but in one fell swoop completed the
transformation of
Sin City into a serious dining destination that no chef or restaurateur
or food
writer in the world can afford to ignore. Ruth Reichl, the editor
of Gourmet magazine has called Joël
Robuchon’s coming to Las Vegas the single
biggest event in American gastronomy in the past 50 years. He has also
opened
his fine dining venue, Mansion, of which more in later.
Alain Ducasse
already has his name on Mix at the Mandalay Bay, and when Guy Savoy
opens a dead ringer for his
Parisian temple of gastronomy here next month (in Caesar’s Palace), not
even
the Euro-centric snobs will be able to dismiss the culinary revolution
taking
place in the high Mojave
Desert.
For fifteen years, between 1981 and 1996, Robuchon
ran a
single three-star Parisian restaurant that was widely considered the
best in
the world. As a dedicated, restlessly creative and passionate cook, he
had
little use for media chefs who spent more time in front of the cameras
than in
the kitchen. Articles of the day often spoke of a quiet
perfectionist who
was rarely seen or heard but whose presence was felt everywhere and
sensed with
every bite.
It’s now old news that in 1996 Robuchon burned
out and
retired at age 51 while still at the top of his game. While he
didn’t say
it at the time, he sensed before anyone in France that the market for elaborate, seven-course,
three-hour big-deal meals was dwindling. But rather than
mourn the
slow demise of the cooking and restaurant that he did so well, Robuchon
reinvented himself, and in doing so, turned the conceits and
conceptions of
fine French dining on their head. By opening
L’Atelier—“workshop”—in
Paris three years ago he combined an open kitchen surrounded on three
sides by a
counter with the look of a sleek Japanese sushi bar from which diners
watch a
team of intense, almost religious-looking cooks produce incredible,
mostly
French food served like Spanish tapas by informed and friendly waiters.
Last
year he opened a branch in Tokyo’s Roppongi Hills District. Now, he
has reproduced the experience at L’Atelier inVegas.
I
had been told that a
sense of exquisite
food being perfectly rendered is palpable when you enter any of his
restaurants, and I didn’t believe it until the first time I stepped
into
L’Atelier. Immediately upon being seated, you’ll be asked if you
are
familiar with the French-restaurant-as-sushi/tapas-bar concept of the
place. If not, they walk you through the ordering options.
Devotees
know to concentrate on the left side of the menu and order as many
small plates
as your appetite and budget will allow. Those who insist can
fashion a
more typical meal from the right side, where larger portions of the
same food are
presented as entrees, poissons, viandes
and desserts--but what fun is that? The joy of L’Atelier is
letting your
appetite and imagination take flight with some of the tastiest food you
will
ever encounter.
You might begin your
tapas-like
repast with crisp langoustine fritters served with a smudge of basil
pesto. The tempura-like batter gives a crunchy shell to the
sweet,
mineral-rich crustaceans that have a unique taste of their own.
From
there the possibilities range from good prosciutto served with toasted
tomato
bread, or ethereal poached kumamoto
oysters sitting in their shells in a warm bath of salted butter, to a
beautiful
piece of sautéed duck liver atop a tiny minced citrus “gratin”
that plays the
sweetly acidic tang of citrus off the fattiness of the foie gras.
Other
don’t-miss items include roasted
tiny quail stuffed with foie gras, calf’s sweetbreads roasted upon a
sprig of
fresh laurel served with braised romaine lettuce stuffed with more of
the same,
and a simple egg poached in a light mushroom cream and served en
cocotte.
Each of these is given the simplest of titles on the menu, as in: La Langoustine, Le Jambon, Les Huitres, Le
Foie Gras, Le Ris De Veau, La Caille, and L’Oeuf, but English
explanations
are provided. There is nothing reserved, however, about the
flavors that
come bursting forth from each of the main ingredients.
And
there’s nothing diffident about a
French
chef confident enough to feature Italian prosciutto or a textbook
perfect Le Vitello Tonnato, and even Les
Spaghettis--a cheesy version of Rome’s carbonara,
albeit with the addition
of heavy cream. Even more substantial
courses such as L’Onglet (hanger
steak), Le Rumsteck (a spicy tartare
with hand-cut pommes frites), and La
Morue--creamy, quickly seared cod floating in an intense vegetable
broth--highlight
what a perfectionist (ably assisted by Executive Chef Steve
Benjamin and
Pastry Chef Kamel Guichida) can do with the best ingredients money can
buy. Great steaks are available all over Vegas, but the Nebraska, grass-fed ribeye here is cut to order and
may be the
best of the bunch.
Desserts generally follow a pattern of treating a
well-known ingredient like raspberry or pistachio in a way that
respects the
main ingredient but pitches it to the diner in surprisingly artful
ways.
Who would have thought to pair pistachio with Chartreuse? That
digestive
libation usually sends the American palate running for the soda
fountain, but
it works wonderfully when made into a subtle, herbal and eggy
soufflé that
marries and melts the pistachio ice cream placed within it.
Photo by John A. Curtas
Likewise, Le Framboise
finds yuzu ice
cream encased in a white
chocolate ball melted by a warm coulis
of raspberries--turning a
picture-perfect creation into the ultimate hot/cold fruit soup (left). Another
winner (actually there isn’t a loser on the whole menu) is Le
Chocolate that hides a dense chocolate mousse under white chocolate
ice
cream rolled in Oreo cookie crumbs. I usually hate anything made with
white
chocolate--actually I even hate the idea of white chocolate—but
I licked
my plate.
The second
Joël Robuchon restaurant in the MGM Hotel/Casino is
something very
different--Joël
Robuchon at The Mansion (877-702-891-7925; click). The intimate 65 seat dining room
is vaguely art nouveau in appearance, and designed to deliver very haute French cuisine. One thing
these titans
of
gastronomy mention only in passing, though, is that a meal for two runs
a
minimum of $500-$1,000.
The
“price is no object crowd”
(which includes much of
the national food press), may consider such discussion tacky, but
evaluating
the price-to-value ratio of Mansion is mandatory for the rest of
us.
That being said, the tariff is worth it if you are a passionate
foodie,
an inveterate Francophile, or the type that doesn’t blink at dropping
a C-note
for three bites of exquisite sea urchin flan with fennel or a seawater
fresh
scallop cooked in its shell with lemon and seaweed butter. Five
years ago
I wrote that a grand meal in one of Vegas’s budding gourmet restaurants
would
set you back a car payment. Now, it’s a house payment.
The website
for the restaurant says:
“The Chef of the Century returns to the Stove with His First Fine
Dining
Restaurant in the United States.” That almost gets it right.
More
accurately, Joël Robuchon has put his trusted lieutenant, Chef
Claude Le-Tohic,
behind the stoves at the MGM Grand Hotel/Casino in Las Vegas to oversee and cook the cuisine that made
Robuchon
famous. More important, Mansion is sui
generis, and, for the time being, the only place in America to
sample his extraordinary food that used to be spoken of in hushed and
reverential tones by chefs and patrons alike.
The intimate 65-seat dining room, designed by Pierre-Yves
Rochon, is
vaguely Art Deco/Ruhlmann-esque in appearance, with nary a nod to
post-modernism. The design evokes 1930s Paris and serves as the delivery vehicle for some
of the
best French food ever to appear in America. Everything about the place screams
money, in a reserved, tasteful, Vegas sort of way. This
tastefulness may
clash with the gargantuan, confusing, noisy and annoying MGM, but it
cossets
the rich, and the well fed as well as any place, anywhere. The
dramatic
black and purple hues may not be to everyone’s tastes, but the food
should be, especially if those tastes run
to a very
modern, and very expensive evocation of Cuisine
Francais.
So
what do you get for sacrificing
your mortgage for a meal? The dazzle factor begins with the bread
cart. That cart is wheeled over as you are finishing your
aperitif and
contains no less than twelve different kinds, from a simple baguette to
bacon
studded epi lardon to petit pain
au lait, to a saffron-infused brioche. If ever there was
reason to
ignore the admonition not to fill up on bread, this is it.
From there Chef Le-Tohic will likely
send
out an amuse of Granny Smith apple
“pearls” perched on a vodka gratinée
topped with yuzu foam. But don’t let the foam fool
you. There is none of that trendy how
many angels can dance on the head of a pin tomfoolery going on in
this kitchen. Instead,
expect deceptive
simplicity
and pirouettes only when they are called for. French food is
about
nothing as much as the extraction and intensification of flavors, and
Mansion lives
up to the billing.
At a recent meal the amuse
was followed by two cool triangles of compressed millefeuille
pastry holding layers of
poached foie gras and smoked eel. Our other entrée
(French for "first course") featured a light, see-through, almost
non-existent
“dumpling”
containing sweet langoustines, surrounded by a pool of a langoustine
reduction
and steamed cabbage. After that came another amuse of
Wagyu marrow atop a marrowbone filled with fava bean purée
infused with rosemary (right).
I’ve never understood all the shouting about
favas, but now I do. Their almost piquant earthiness played
dramatically
off of the richness of the marrow. The dish couldn’t be more
perfect, and
like all of the preliminary courses went splendidly with a rich
and stony Henri
Gouge ‘02
white Nuits-St.-Georges, which was a hefty $175.
Be
forewarned: no matter
what you order —anything short of the $350 sixteen-course meal-marathon
will
be
sprinkled with an amuse here and a
palate cleanser there, just so the kitchen can strut its stuff.
So hold
off on that third baguette slathered
with demi-sel butter (always at
the perfect temperature), no matter how much you crave it.
If I have
a minor
complaint it is that the exotic seasonings boasted of on the menu are
often
more recessive than dominant. A good example would be in the
spoon-tender
abalone in a “ginger” court bouillon containing exquisite baby
artichokes and
morels that was scrumptious and rich without being filling and without
any
prominence of ginger.
Photo by John A. Curtas
All
courses are
available à la carte, although with the premiums placed upon
them ($80 for four
bites of the whitest, most delicate veal you will ever taste), it
behooves you
to go with the standard tasting menu that has ballooned to $215 for six
courses
as of my last (and third) visit. It started at $165 when they
opened, but
that now seems as nostalgic and reasonable as $2.50 for a gallon of
gas.
Gripe as I might, I must concede this experience is as close to dinner
in a
Michelin 3-Star in Paris as has ever been duplicated outside the
Île de
France. And at last look, the starter courses at Pierre Gagnaire
or
L’Ambroisie started at around 100 euros. By comparison, Robuchon
is
practically giving this stuff away!
One thing they do
give away is some of that fabulous bread—as you are leaving the
restaurant. Robuchon must be a baker at heart because he began
the
practice of giving every customer a baguette at the original Jamin in Paris. That was his signature long before
the Chef of
The Century accolades took hold, and the elegant simplicity of those
loaves and
rolls are still his signature calling card.
Before
bagging
the brioche and rushing home to check on that second mortgage, consider
spending some time with Le-Tohic’s Breton lobster, baked in a sealed cocotte and served as a stew of
asparagus and morels with large, tender chunks of the most intense and
gamy of
these crustaceans. The kitchen demonstrates a light hand with
fish that
highlights texture and flavor with a minimum of flourishes--as when
turbot gets
a subtle lemongrass foam and stewed baby leeks as its only
accent—bringing an
almost Japanese sensibility to the dish. Amadai (Japanese
tilefish) is likewise treated with a less-is-more
approach by being pan-fried and served in lily bulb broth, that barely
perfumes
the sweet delicate flesh and its crispy skin.
Should turf outweigh your surf
inclinations, the pintade (left)--French
guinea hen--is roasted to order, which takes
an hour, feeds two, and is a thing of beauty. And if you
are still suffering
from the sticker shock of a $40 New York strip at most of Vegas’s high
end
steakhouses, just wait until the $115 Wagyu ribeye hits your
wallet. It
is, however, probably the best in town.
You will
be
offered cheese from a beautiful cart holding eight or nine varieties,
all
French, and all in impeccable condition. (Some, I noted, may even
be from
unpasteurized milk and thus be semi-legal. At least that’s the
way
the
Epoisses tasted to me—with an umami-like
dimension I had not experienced before.)
You will
also be offered a winelist that
is not for the faint of heart. It is in impeccable condition as
well,
especially for those who consider wine buying a manly test of, well,
manliness.
Trophy hunters will find more than a few hard to find specimens--Guigal
“La
Turque” ’86 ($1,010), Château Palmer ’59 ($2,700), Château
Pétrus ’82 ($8,500),
Vieux Château Certan ’00 ($545)--you get the
idea. Those who
batter and bruise more easily will have to hunt for something even
rarer:
a good bottle for less than a hundred dollars. No one dining here
is
exactly taking in laundry to make ends meet, so this “failing” is
hardly
noticed by the well-heeled patrons, and has rarely been mentioned in
the press
thus far.
With
the exception of the
flawless passion fruit soufflé with sage ice cream and a
high-riseing passion
fruit compote (right),
desserts are probably the weakest part of the meal. The bar is
set so
high with the savory courses that pastry chef Kamel Guechida probably
thinks he
has to keep topping himself. He and his desserts would
benefit from
not trying so hard to impress, so that his considerable talent can
shine
through the gimmickry. His sugar ball with panna
cotta cream is too much concept and not enough
execution. You break through the brittle ball and there you are,
with a
broken ball and some panna cotta
cream. The millefeuille with
light cream and caramel sauce is as tasty as any of these ingredients
can be
but hardly the apotheosis of pastry making. And the raspberry compote
with poppy
syrup, lychee nage, and grapefruit
sorbet amounts to a whole lotta fruit flavors and little else.
Amends are made,
however, with the
exquisite petit fours (petit fours being French for: “I can’t
believe
they’re serving us more food.”). And in the spirit of generosity,
they
let you take as many of those home as you
want.
Photo
by John A. Curtas
NEW
YORK CORNER
by
John Mariani
LENTINI
1562
Second Avenue
212-628-3131
www.lentinirestaurant.com
NYC's Upper East Side has
long taken a drubbing from the food press--and rightly so--not for
being a gastronomic wasteland but for having too many of the same kind
of restaurant, mainly Italian, most following menu formulas set decades
ago.
Their faithful customers go to them for the
same dishes year after year, the most salient example being Elaine's,
which rolls on as a snotty celebrity haunt with mediocre food and a
menu that rarely changes, the kind of place you'll find old-line NYC
journalists with writer's block, editors with their new interns, and
agents with their third wives hobnobbing with hairy Hollywood writers,
fat producers and squinty-eyed agents swigging overpriced Chianti while
gnawing on a
ho-hum veal chop. Few other Italian restaurants on the upper east
side rise much above that level.
The exceptions would include the marvelous Il
Monello, the vivacious Vivolo, the warmhearted Raffaele, and
the glorious Lentini, an extremely handsome, very
affable, five-year-old ristorante
with a Pugliese accent, thanks to owners Enzo and Giuseppe Lentini (right), who come from Mola di Bari
and who have long been part of the Italian restaurant scene in NYC. This is a highly personalized
restaurant, with Enzo out front, impeccably dressed, cordial to a
fault, in charge of a stellar winelist, and a real professional in
every regard. Giuseppe, for 17 years at nearby Elio's, is in the
kitchen working very carefully, dish by dish to reproduce flavors you
won't find easily in NYC.
The dining room is of that particular
size that allows for intimacy without seeming in the least cramped.
Terracotta walls, mahogany wood, huge sprays of flowers, and Murano
glass give the room color and warmth throughout. How lovely to
see tablecloths again after dining at so many new hot spots too cheap
to use them! Wineglasses are of fine quality too. Thank God there is no
piped-in music.
You begin with good bread and
olive oil as Enzo describes the evening's specials, noting that if
there is any other dish your heart desires they will try to make it for
you. There is hardly any need for this since there are so many
dishes here that will entice you, starting with beautifully grilled
golden, very meaty baked sardines with buffalo mozzarella, breadcrumbs,
and the perfume of rosemary. Tuna carpaccio with radicchio and
truffle oil was as good as any in the city. I was happiest with the
pan-fried octopus, crisp, tender, flavorful, not in the least oily.
Pastas are outstanding and
well-proportioned. Bucatini
all'amatriciaina, a famous pasta
from the Abruzzo-Lazio border, is correctly made here so that you taste
every element of tomato, pancetta,
and sweet onions. For a rich
but not at all heavy pasta, have the risotto with radicchio and
Gorgonzola cheese, the rice perfectly cooked, the cheese coating every
grain. Spaghetti con sarde,
an assertive dish with plenty of
garlic-soaked breadcrumbs and sardines (left), is a specialty here, as it
should be. And although seafood is often ill-treated in Italian
restaurants, Lentini does a beautiful farfalle
with mussels, tomatoes,
and a parsley pesto with
sliced potatoes.
If you are in the mood for fish, you
have
a choice of filet of sole in a white wine and butter sauce, or orata
baked with white wine and a little tomato, the flesh of the fish
glistening and succulent throughout.
Those who love tripe are a demanding
sort for the same reason people who hate tripe don't order it: if
poorly prepared it smells and tastes chewy and rank. Lentini's is
a textbook example of how it should be made, the way aficionados like
me love
it--tender, fresh, infused with tomato and Parmigiano and cuddled with
a blend of carrots, onions, and celery. This is one of the finest
versions I've had outside of Italy. They also serve delicious calf's
liver alla veneziana with
caramelized onions sautéed in white wine and
served with creamy mashed potatoes. Less adventurous eaters will be
very happy with the the scaloppine of
veal with tomato,
prosciutto, and Parmigiano.
Desserts are
housemade--unusual for Italian restaurants in these parts--and include
superlative examples of ricotta cheesecake, espresso-flavored panna cotta, and cannoncini (below), like little cannoli,
stuffed with lemon custard.
The winelist, with a Wine Spectator award of excellence,
has breadth and depth, with a commendable number of half-bottles and a
good selection of Champagnes. The Italian white wine selection is
quite good, with unusual bottlings like '99 Villa Russiz Graf de la
Tour Sauvignon ($57) and '96 Donna Fugata Mille e Una Notre ($108)
joining more familiar offerings. The reds are richer still with rare
wines like '97 Colterenzio Cornell Cornelius Rosso Grand Cru ($106) and
'97 Ercole Velenose Rosso Piceno Superiore Poggio del Finare
($56). There are many very good selections under $50 too.
Lentini expresses that wonderful Italian virtue of sprezzatura--the art of concealed
art, seeming to be effortless by working very hard to make something
very lovely.
Lentini is
open daily, from 5 PM. Antipasti run $9-$13, pastas (full
portions) $15-$24, main courses $18-$30.
MEAN GREEN MOTHER
FROM OUTER SPACE
A couple in Scottsdale, AZ, claims
to have the world's largest artichoke
plant growing in their backyard. "Her name is Seymour, after
'Little Shop of Horrors'," Angela Gerling
said. "It took me well over an hour to count all the artichokes she has
on
her now." The vegetable is ten feet
in diameter, almost six feet tall, with 43 flowers.
VILKOMMEN!
BIENVENUE! WELCOME!
"Gay tourism is booming--and with How to Say
Fabulous! in 8 Different Languages, you'll always know how to
speak the
native tongue. This hilarious phrase book features hundreds of
outrageous phrases, all translated from English into French, German,
Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish. There are
sections on Night Life (Are there any gay bars around here?), Shopping
(Those shoes! I must have those shoes!), Opening Lines (I am a flight
attendant/choreographer/actor/owner of a greeting card store), Dining
Out (You've had worse things in your mouth!), Parting Glances (I never
meant to hurt you), and much more. With a hilarious mix of
practical, impractical, bitchy, and often obscene phrases, How to Say
Fabulous! in 8 Different Languages is the perfect companion for
gay
tourists and armchair travelers."--Publisher's promotional copy.
QUICK
BYTES
* On May 23
NYC’s Pair of 8’s in conjunction with Pellegrini
Vineyards and East End
Excursions will present a 5-course by Chef Michael Clancy dinner
featuring
wines chosen by wine director Tiffaney Prewitt and food from Long Island’s North Fork.
Pellegrini’’s tasting Room manager, Chris Cornwell, and Susan
Wilber, of
East End Excursions, will introduce each wine. $65 pp. Call
212-874-2742.
* From May 24
- 28, the 15th Annual New Orleans Wine and
Food Experience will show off
the city’s rich
cultural heritage through indigenous cuisine paired with over 400 fine
wines
from vineyards around the world against a backdrop of local art,
architecture,
music and rare antiques. For info go to www.nowfe.com.
*
In Boston, Radius'
communal table series will be as follows: May
29: Mushrooms: oysters, chanterelles, morels,
hen-of-the-woods,
lobsters, porcini, cremini, portabello, hedgehog, and Burgundy; June 12: The Art of Infusions; June 26: Butchery; July 10: Cheese--Helpful
guidelines, and test the hypothesis with wine and cheese from France and beyond. Cost: $25.
Call 617-426-1234.
*
On May 29 the 2nd
Annual Schnack Stahl Meyer Hot Dog Eating Contest Finals will be held
at Schnack
Restaurant in Brooklyn, NY. (www.schnackdog.com).
This contest is all about contestants eating a single 30” 100% angus
beef
Stahl Meyer hot dog on a specially
baked 28” bun. To compete, eaters must
pre-qualify in a “Dog Off/Eat Off”
heat prior to the competition.
* On June 5 Chef Troy Graves of Meritage
Café and Wine Bar in Chicago is
offering guests a final taste of foie gras (banned by the Chicago City
Council) with 5- and 7-course tasting
menus
for
$85 pp. Wine pairings additional. Call (773) 235-6434 or visit www.meritagecafe.com.
. . . Fixture's Chef de
Cuisine, Sarah Nelson, will be offering a foie gras menu until June 30,
2006 for $35 pp.call (773) 248-3331 or visit www.fixturechicago.com.
*
On June 7, an evening of dining,
delectable wines, dancing
and a luxury auction will be held at NYC's Central
Park Conservancy's Taste of Summer benefit, with funds to go to the
Conservancy's ongoing care and preservation efforts in Central Park. It will be held under a beautiful tent at the
Bandshell, located mid-Central Park at 70th street. Guests will
be treated to tasting plates from 40 of NYC restaurants incl. Fred's at
Barney's New York, Zocalo, Thalassa, Tavern on the Green, SQC
Restaurant and
Bar, Toqueville, Osteria del Circo and Orsay. VIP
guests will be treated to the cuisine of chef/restaurateur
Jean-Georges Vongerichten. Tix start at $350 pp. Call 212-310-6691 or visit www.centralparknyc.org.
* On June 8 the Hotel
Bel-Air in Bel-Air, CA, will again host “New
Zealand BBQ with Meadowbank Estates,” featuring 27 different varieties from 7
winemakers. The
cuisine for the evening will be featured in stations including *Roasted
New
Zealand Lamb, Rock Lobster Tails and Artisan Cheeses served under the
summer
sky on the front lawn. $115 pp. Call 310-943-6742.
* On June 8, Blackbird
restaurant in Chicago
will host Heritage Foods USA for a 5-course benefit dinner for the
Terra Madre
project of Slow Food USA, featuring
heirloom Red Wattle pork, by Chef/Partner Paul Kahan. $125
pp. Call 312-715-0708.
"THE
SWEET LIFE" CRUISE
This fall, from Sept. 29-Oct. 6 John Mariani (left),
publisher of Mariani's Virtual
Gourmet and food & travel columnist for Esquire Magazine, will host
and lead a 7-day cruise called "The Sweet Life," aboard
Silverseas' Millennium Class Silver
Whisper,
with days visiting Barcelona, Tunis, Naples, Milazzo (Sicily), Rome,
Livorno, and Villefranche. There will be a welcoming cocktail
party,
gourmet dinners with wines, cooking demos by John and Galina Mariani
co-authors of The Italian-American
Cookbook), optional shore excursions will include a
tour of the Amalfi Coast,
dinner at the great Don Alfonso 1890 (2 Michelin stars), a private tour
of the Vatican, dinner at La Pergola (3 Michelin stars) in Rome, a
Night Cruise to Hotel de Paris and dinner at Louis XV (3 Michelin
stars)
in Monaco, and much more. Rates (a 20% savings) range from $4,411
to
$5,771. For complete information click.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MARIANI'S VIRTUAL GOURMET NEWSLETTER is published weekly. Editor/Publisher:
John Mariani. Contributing Writers: Robert Mariani, Naomi
Kooker, Kirsten Skogerson, Edward Brivio, Mort
Hochstein, Suzanne Wright. Contributing
Photographers: Galina Stepanoff-Dargery, Bobby Pirillo. Technical
Advisor: Gerry McLoughlin.
John Mariani is a columnist for Esquire, Wine Spectator, Bloomberg News and
Radio, and Diversion.
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 Italian-American Cookbook (Harvard Common
Press).
Any of John Mariani's books below
may be ordered from amazon.com by clicking on the cover image.
My
newest book, written with my brother Robert Mariani, is a memoir of our
years growing up in the North
Bronx. It's called Almost
Golden because it re-visits an idyllic place and time in our
lives when
so many wonderful things seemed possible.
For those of you who don't think
of
the Bronx as “idyllic,” this
book will be a revelation. It’s
about a place called the Country Club area, on the shores of Pelham Bay. A beautiful
neighborhood filled with great friends
and wonderful adventures that helped shape our lives.
It's about a culture, still vibrant, and a place that is still almost
the same as when we grew up there. To read an excerpt click.
Robert and I think you'll enjoy this
very personal look at our Bronx childhood. It is not
yet available in bookstores, so to purchase
a copy, order from amazon.com
or click on Almost Golden.
--John
Mariani
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copyright John Mariani 2006
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