food & wine best new chefs

oh my god, you guys. food & wine held their annual "best new chef" party at the four seasons tonight and i got to go! i'm still dying inside that i went. dana cowin (editor in chief of the magazine) held this little twitter contest where she'd dole out clues and the tweeps would try to guess who the chefs were. i mostly googled insanely and when i'd get it i'd find out that like 4 other people had it first. some of the clues were easy, some i still don't understand. regardless, some chick from chicago won! and she fucking flew out for this damn party! and i commented something to the effect of, "damn. i spent a LOT of time doing this and it sucks that i lost." and then i found out that i didn't lose at all! tickets were waiting for me at will call. HOLY SHIT. YES. it was at the four seasons which looks pretty much eleven madison park BEFORE it was eleven madison park. high ceilings, lots of 5 foot high flower arrangements (also like del posto, so i'll probably mention it to robert who does the del posto and esca floral arrangements to get his take), 3 staff members per guest and just decadent beyond belief. because i'm the fangirl i am, i recognized every damn person there. i finally met andrew carmellini from locanda verde. i had to say, "yeah, i'm that blogger. sorry." but he was as nice as could be and we had short, lovely little chat. he'd made meatball sliders. i was happy to report that my last dinner there was fantastic and that my friend brought a large work party there afterwards as well and they LOVED it too. "so you're friends with ahiram," he said, which was true. but he didn't know that we were only friends at all BECAUSE i was going to his damn restaurant so often. but anyway, yes, cheers to ahiram who is endlessly charming and a total superstar. 

lockhart steele was there. we discussed faustina's review in the nytimes, out tomorrow (but posted tonight) and hinted at by jeffrey tascarella's twitter feed. "but while his kitchen is exciting, faustina is not." is a killer of a sentence. sifton was right that the portions are described as small and then are bigger in person. sometimes much bigger. and i'm a prime example of someone who thought they weren't ordering enough but then ended up with WAY TOO MUCH. (and it's totally better to have more than less but the dishes aren't particularly cheap so some people might not want to over-order.) but his main issue was with the space, which is something that feels unfair to judge a restaurant by when they didn't build it and it's part of a hotel. so, yeah, the bathroom is outside the restaurant and down some stairs. and YES, the place is chic to the point of frigidity. it ends with, "all this would be depressing if the food weren't so good." which is kind of shitty. if the food is that good, it should get two stars, period. this is MANHATTAN. he knows how fucking hard it is to find good space on this island. 

but i digress. lockhart introduced us to his good friend sarah simmons,food and wine home cook superstar. she's amazing. she blogs here and she's pretty much just what i need. i'm a single girl who doesn't know how to cook for 1. she does. also, she loves dogs so we're totally going to be friends. sarah then brought us over to dana, the EIC of F&W who is so tiny and lovely. sarah and dana then turned me over to alessandra, a F&W assistant editor and she was also bubbly and charming and wearing a stunning green jewel-toned dress. and the F&W travel editor was wearing a stunning orange dress that (sadness!) was from india so i'll never own anything like it. otherwise, it was super star studded. the gorgeous seamus mullen was there. he has an asian girlfriend! which means, in my head, i have a chance with him in another life. todd english was there, the man famous for his asian fetish. marcus samuelsson looking sooo beautiful in a bright orange scarf. wyle dufresne, tom colicchio, anne burrell, danny meyer, drew nieporent, ad infinitum. we were there to honor the best new chefs and met roy choi who is cool as shit. he called out my half-asian-ness ("it's workin' for you") and told me i had to come visit the restaurant next time i was in L.A. we met an owner of blackbird in chicago who, of course, knew our friend pam. everyone knows pam. and for dessert, just as i was leaving some girl runs up to me and says, "i'm sorry, who makes your dress?" my answer: "h&m" "NO! you look like a million bucks!" she wailed. yes. yes indeed. i mean, i threw on a theory belt and some moderately expensive heels but the dress was a whole $25.00. she was flabbergasted. i was flattered beyond belief. we both win since h&m will likely make the dress again this summer so she knows to keep an eye out for it. but i'll seriously live on that compliment for the next two weeks, at least. 

but the best, BEST part? i'm kind of hating work. actually, i'm really hating work. my job sucks and i'm not cut out for it. and lockhart and sarah and alessandra all said, "quit the damn job and start doing something with food because you obviously love it." and it was just such a relief to have real people tell me to do what is floating around in my head as just a whim. and they offered to send my writing (you know, the food/travel stuff i do) to real editors. and my writing teacher has been super supportive and really thinks that i could write about food if i wanted (i do! i do!) so, well, maybe i'll start pitching the shit out of people to see if anything comes of it. colin is a prime example of someone who throws himself into stuff and gets rewarded tenfold. he takes risks, unabashedly, and they pay off. it's inspiring and i think i need to start trying it myself. virgo-risk-averseness be damned. 

congrats to the folks at locanda verde. a much deserved best chef and best new restaurant from time out. voted on by people who eat and, collectively, have pretty damn good taste in food. i'm proud to call myself a regular and a groupie. kate krader may be one of the few people to eat there more often than myself and she delivers the news that the fava bean crostini has returned! huzzah!!

also congrats to joseph leonard, another place that i might stop by weekly and totally adore, even though my beloved brussels sprouts are out of season and off the menu. harumph. but, like, they make a fucking KILLER bloody mary so i will continue to send them my business and wait for fall to hit again before the brussels come back into my life. 

other exciting food news that i keep forgetting to mention: i finally tried a mangosteen. i've been wanting to stumble across them in chinatown but for all my visits through, haven't seen the thing. it's illegal to import them to the US but not, apparently, to canada, which is where i found them all over the damn place. the skin is easily peelable and they're so much smaller than i'd imagined. i'd thought they'd be the size of an orange. they were the size of a clementine. so tiny! and a lot of work for the small amount of fruit that you actually end up with which tastes like a lychee but then there's this annoying pit in the middle. totally disappointing. 

faustina

have been spotting lots of blogging creatures lately. i saw nick denton at bacaro, ricky van veen at joseph leonard and ben leventhal at the NBC food carts (click through that ben link and read that Q&A, because his answers in there crack me up. he might even be nice but the whole thing just reeked of overblown ego and he sounded SO high maintenance. my friend aviva read it and said, "i have a mini crush on lockhart", however). ricky, on the other hand, just looks nice. one word: dimples. he's one of the cutest grown men i've ever seen. and he's an adult and i'm sure hates being called cute because guys hate that word and they'd much rather be HOT. anyhow, i'd be disappointed if i found out from someone that he was a jerk. it all comes down to the basic desire to be able to trust your instincts. it's why i'm borderline obsessed with joseph gordon-levitt. he just seems so smart and thoughtful and perfect. although, my friends have had to work with a lot of celebrities at their jobs and someone will inevitably perk up with a, "oh, he's such an ass in real life" or "ugh, he's the hugest dick!" and they'll have several stories to back it up. so back to that times Q&A, i go to faustina with justy last night and none other than lockhart steele and sloane crosley (i have the hugest girl crush on her. she was actually on the list i'd e-mailed to doree when she wrote that thing on girl crushes) get sat right next to us. i talk to justin about whether i seem crazy if i tell them that 1.) i know who they are and 2.) admire their work. so i did just that. holy hell are those people NICE. i mean, SO nice. and funny. and lovely. and they ate the same food as us (plus some). i'm not sure i really conveyed my adoration/dependence i've developed with eater.com. how i obsess about new restaurants and know the chef's name anywhere i go. and get opening night resys to almost every big opening. it's my favorite hobby.

so: faustina. i LOVED jeffrey tascarella's piece at eater on bruni. i started following him on twitter so was up to date on all things faustina. took up a wednesday resy, tweeted at jeffrey that i was coming and brought justin with me. the server recommended 3-5 dishes per person. we ordered 9 total (before dessert). it was WAY too much. i should clarify that, considering the mix of dishes we had, it was too much. the ricotta with truffled honey was a little dollop with two skinny bread sticks. something i could have eaten in a single bite. we got the sauteed olives. again, quite nibbly. the poached duck egg w/fonduta came with 3 massive pieces of grilled ciabatta, so, huge. we got the oysters (3) with mojito gelee and the orata with pink peppercorns and seaweed. both totally reasonable portions. i thought about ordering another crudo, or another of the orata itself which was so buttery, cut with just bit of bite from the pepper. so far, so good. when we ordered the server recommended one more dish, suggested a pasta. he said the servings were very small and indicated such with a little circle made with his thumbs and index fingers. so we got the black truffle risotto, which, i should just stop ordering risottos because i don't like them that much. everywhere i go the consistency is different and i'm not sure what it's really supposed to taste like but i'm never that WOWed by it. but, black truffles, so it's a wash. the pasta with tomato and sea urchin was awesome. savory and kind of creamy without being too heavy. the sauce's consistency reminded me of conant's famous spaghettithat he serves at scarpetta. his sauces aren't too wet which means they really cling to the noodle. here's where i'll mention that the pasta sizes were a bit larger than had been described. this is a good thing because we're getting more for our money but a bad thing because we were basically stuffed and dead at our seats by this point. and we still had two more dishes coming out. it was to the point at which we considered telling them to box it up before they got to the table.

the pork belly with mustard seeds and roasted potatoes (forgive me if i'm messing up the descriptions a bit, i'm doing it from memory and am too lazy to google the menu). i usually get pork belly because it melts in your mouth and feels a bit like meat butter. and it feels BAD for you. this one was a tad dry and much less fatty than i'm used to. though less decadent, it felt healthier. then we also had the short ribs with spaetzle which was perfect. exactly the type of thing you want to eat on a day when you got a foot of snow and things are slushy and miserable outside. the meat was tender, the pasta bits, garlicky. the bad thing was that justin and i were force feeding ourselves at this point with somewhat agonized looks on our faces and we'd slowed down substantially. then we got into this WHOLE conversation about our families and love and our expectations of both. they let us linger and the cramping had let up some so we ordered dessert. a chocolate hazelnut mousse parfait thing that came with biscotti and this itty milkshake. OKAY. let's talk. that milkshake was AWESOME and there needed to be more of it. a lot more of it. we almost got into a fight over the last sip. i would have thrown the first punch had jeff tascarella himself not come up to us and said, "are you jasmine? did you tweet me?" why, yes. yes i did. THE INTERNET IS GREAT. we chatted for a bit, i told him how much i enjoyed his writing (which he should do more of, or at least put it somewhere people can read it) and that dinner had been fantastic. then he brought over two glasses of what he described as his favorite wine, the donnafugata ben rye passito di pantelleria. it was a perfectly sweet way to end what was more of an epic meal than justy and i had planned for. if i had a do-over i'd cut out one or two of the fonduta/pasta/hot dishes and get another crudo. then i'd hopefully have room for two desserts. i'll report back after my next visit, which will be soon.

oh, and re: those NBC food carts, it was kind of a fun way to spend an afternoon. I'd figured out all the answers and gave them to my co-workers and we all ended up winning but in different slots so when most people get to go to 1 cart, i maybe went to three of them? this is a wrap-up of the three carts i saw. i missed the porchetta sandwich but that's okay, i can go to locanda for that. the winner was boulud and his burger. medium rare, tomato relish, buttery brioche, YES. and he had on the cutest hat with earflaps and a shirt that read "eat my sausage" and looked like he was having a really good time. anyhow, daniel boulud flies right to the top of my list of people i want to adopt as my grandpa. right next to roger angell.

i would PAY to be josh capon's friend. how cool is he?