Hard to wrap one’s mind around twinkling lights and holiday spirit when it is 82 degrees in Los Angeles and I am looking out the window at my garden in exuberant bloom but I wanted to write a little more about our stay in New York City and address again the topic of food as art, art as food. An amazingly vast subject and my small contribution will be in two segments.
New Yorkers are serious about food and the range of cuisines is impressive. Food being an integral part of celebrating the holidays we did partake – though never need an excuse when in NYC.
I am very fond of Eleven Madison Park and loved its new “interactive” menu that just gives a minimal grid of sixteen ingredients to “offer an experience in which our guests can enjoy the inherent surprise of a tasting menu, while still maintaining some control.” With no descriptions other than the ingredients, diners are encouraged to take an active part in the various dishes discussed with their knowledgeable servers and the cooks. I think it is also one of the most beautiful rooms in the city of many beautiful rooms. Well deserved, this past year the restaurant has been presented with some of the industry’s highest awards and anointed one of the world’s 50 best.
Eleven Madison Park has a Michelin Star, as do some of our other favorites, the Gotham Bar and Grill, Gramercy Tavern, the River Café and SHO Shaun Hergatt.
The “legendary” three Michelin star Le Bernardin is not my favorite. Who knows why it hasn’t captured me, and since I was brought up with “if you cannot say something nice, don’t say anything” I will stay with not saying much, though I need to mention why we cancelled the previous time we were in NYC. When confirming our reservation, the reservationist pointed out that our table was “reassigned” at a specified time. Hmm.
So we went to Daniel (also three Michelin stars) where the fabulous food, perfect service, and stunning setting always enchant. And I will share a story about our Daniel experience also: after ordering our meal we saw a plate of sweetbreads served at the next table. We asked our waiter how come we didn’t see it on the menu as we would have ordered it. A courtesy plate arrived soon after!
When in NYC we seldom miss the Museum of Modern Art, and always include lunch at Danny Meyer’s The Modern. Overlooking MOMA’s sculpture garden it is another superbly scenic restaurant, great food, great service, handsome people.
This time we went after watching a performance of “Stop, Repair, Prepare: Variations on ‘Ode to Joy’ for a Prepared Piano,” created by the artist duo Jennifer Allora (b. 1974) and Guillermo Calzadilla (b. 1971), who have been named the United States representatives for the 2011 Venice Biennale.
It was the ninth in MOMA’s Performance Exhibition Series which was begun in 2009 to bring installations documenting past performances, live re-enactments of historic performances, and original performance pieces to various locations throughout the museum. Blending sculpture and performance, Allora-Calzadilla carved a hole in the center of a Bechstein piano, creating a void in which the performer stands to play the Fourth Movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony – a structurally incomplete version as the hole in the piano renders two octaves inoperative. For MOMA’s atrium the performer leaned over the keyboard and played upside down and backwards, while moving with the piano across the vast space herding observers around. The imperfections of the performance underlined the contradictions and ambiguities of a melody that has long been invoked as a symbol of humanist values and national pride.
Another wonderful lunch spot after visiting MOMA, shopping or walking in Central Park is BG, Bergdorf Goodman’s recently refurbished seventh-floor bar and restaurant. Kelly Wearstler, the California design doyenne, turned BG into a “contemporary tribute to the social salons of a bygone age” with silk wallpaper and a soft color palette. One can also linger at the bar which has an impressive cocktail menu, and fantastic views of the Park. Definitely the place to go, skipping the Oak Bar that, much like the Plaza, will never be what it used to be. Gave it two tries since it reopened and there won’t be a third.
Indeed, we spent most of our time midtown and I’ll add another warm experience for a cold winter evening: a bowl of chicken soup with fluffy matzoh balls and a corned beef sandwich at the Carnegie Deli (sorry, I do love it) after a concert at Carnegie Hall, or a brisk walk down from the ever handsomer, ever more invitingly transformed Lincoln Center (if able to resist Bar Boulud.) The New York Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff described architects Diller Scofidio & Renfro’s restrained renovation: “If all art represents, in part, psychological struggle with the work of our parents’ generation, then the Lincoln Center project is more a gentle, probing examination than an effort at outright obliteration.” Still, preservationists and landscape architects spoke out against plans to change the dimensions of Philip Johnson’s reflecting pool, the position of Henry Moore’s sculpture within the pool, and the removal of renowned landscape architect Dan Kiley’s travertine “urban forest” planters, but as work winds down on the $1.4 billion project, on the world’s largest performing arts center and home to thirteen arts institutions, what is important is the enhanced visitor experience, both inside and out.
(Diller Scofidio & Renfro designed the popular and successful High Line elevated urban park in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District; they also recently won the commission for Eli Broad’s new museum next to Gehry’s Disney Hall downtown Los Angeles; and the firm is designing an inflatable meeting hall for the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington that is due to open in 2012.)
To be continued with a few more art and foodie stories from NYC in a couple of days.
