THE GURGLING COD

A Benihana chef on the SP12s?

Gilbert Arenas is the best celebrity blogger not named Raymond Smuckles, and the best athlete/blogger since P.J. Stock.* Gil's most recent post details the release dates and concepts for the 19 (!) versions of his new sneaker. You won't want to miss the Cubano or the Channel Zero, but the most intriguing offering is the last -- Hibachi, "the Benihana collab." How does a Japanese steakhouse chain contribute to the design of a sneaker? Will there be faux grill marks for the tread? Will they be steak-scented? Is Devon Aoki involved? How is it possible for Arenas to blog using an Olivetti portable? So many questions unanswered. Have I established a sufficient pretext to post some P.J. Stock career highlights?

Steak inflation

Quite some time ago, I was a teaching assistant for a survey course at an Ivy League school. Towards the end of the semester, we got a little talk about how it was OK to give students in the class Cs, if they deserved Cs. The impact of the talk was to give the impression that A and B were really the grades to be giving, and that's what I did. Even if they scuffled,  even if the work was inconsistent, they were still students at this fancy university, so there was effectively a floor on evaluating their performance. I was reminded of this experience as I read along as Bruni took Peter Luger to the woodshed, and then gave it two stars, anyhow. For those of you scoring at home, this is the same number of stars alongside a glowing review of Ssam, which was considered a ringing endorsement of David Chang.  On what planet does it make sense to equate a really well conceived, interesting and ambitious, but casual restaurant, with a fancy institution that has clearly fallen on evil days? Yes, apples and oranges, (or lucky peaches, more precisely) but the star system implies a kind of commensurability, doesn't it? The only answer I can see is that Peter Luger is simply in a different league.

First they came for the martinis...

Just yesterday, I went on a longish rant about the imminent threat posed by referring to a concoction of peppers, cheese, vodka, seltzer, and Sprite as a "martini." Even printed in America's News Paper Style Supplement of Record, a single cocktail available at a single LES restaurant might not threaten the semiotic conventions that allow us to communicate, and in particular, know what we are putting in our mouths. As previously reported, the Chocolate Manufacturers Association is petitioning the FDA to change what "is" is when it comes to chocolate.* This story popped back up in the news when M&M/Mars pledged to continue making its chocolate bars out of, uh chocolate. Good for them, but its sort of alarming when the CEO of a chocolate company has to say  "changing the definition of what chocolate is would be a mistake," because it implies  that the industry, or industry in general  has the power to make  such changes. While we all  worry about  the counterfeit and  tainted goods coming out of China, it might be a good idea to keep an eye on the semiotic  prestidigitation  going on right here  in the US of A. 
*The CMA followup press release suggests that they know they are doing wrong.

Peppadon't Preach

There are few things as tiresome as a cocktail pedant. The Geneva Convention guarantees that every human being is entitled to enjoy a Manhattan free from a harangue about the variety of bitters used in the preparation. Martini pedants are a particularly irritating subspecies, what with the endless ways of saying how dry they want it. Yes, Ian Fleming's Bond would turn up his nose at the appletini, but if it helps paralegals get rooty with the Kim C*ttrall wannabees, who's complaining?

That said, there is a point beyond which revisions of a given recipe, food or cocktail, are not simply violations of good taste, but assaults on the semiotic conventions that make language work. A "Chicken Caesar" is a bad idea, but it at least involves cognizance of what a Caesar is. Serving baby carrots and aoili and calling it a "hearty summer Caesar" is an attack on the idea that words have referents. The Little Giant Peppadew Martini falls into this second category. The peppadew seems like a lateral move from the olive, but whatever. Food and food journalism would wither without being able to say things like "peppadew is the new chipotle," and if the peppadew is, indeed, like, so hot right now, why not put it in a drink?

Stuffing cheese into the  condiment you are using as martini garnish seems like a bad idea, as it's hard to see how contact with the vodka would not produce a whey-like slick on the surface of the cocktail. Where the whole thing goes off the rails is in the final instruction: "Shake well, strain into a 6-ounce martini glass and top off with equal parts lemon-lime soda and seltzer." This is  no longer a recognizable mutation of the martini, but a vodka & soda / vodka and sprite with a cheese-stuffed pepper. It may be a collision between what you tried to get your date to drink at your junior prom and chiles rellenos in a glass, but it sure as shit is not a martini. Language - pwned once again by T:!

Cooking it Old School

Just when  you think the entire internets is just videos of Obama supporters sitting on birthday cakes or something, actual useful content pops up. Thanks to the good folks at Bartleby.com, the entire 1918 Boston Cooking School Cookbook is available on your computer. Between Fannie and Wild Style clips on the You Tubes, you, too can live old school like Ed Koch.

Forty Deuce

Do you, like so many Americans, suffer from occasional feelings of cultural anxiety? Did you mortify your date by confusing a Jeff Koons sculpture with the work of the Sanrio corporation? Are there times when you would like to be able to distinguish between avant-garde and kitsch, but carrying bulky Clement Greenberg essays would ruin the line of your jacket? Fear no more -- "Vegas/LA hotshot" Ivan Kane has an easy rule of thumb: high art = no pole:

Kane, who owns clubs in Los Angeles and Las Vegas, said the club will feature two 20-minute dance shows seven nights a week, but the sexy dancers will not be nude, nor will they have any contact with patrons. "There's no nudity, there's no lap dances," Kane said. "There's no pole. It's high art."

Try it and see:
The Rite of Spring? No pole -- high art.
The Cheetah Lounge? Pole -- not high art.

I'll have the filet of Noth

A Chowhound poster raises the eternal question of which NYC restaurant is right for ladies who are too young for Misshsapes, but too old for American Girl Place:

My teenage daughter is turning 17, and she wants to go to a Sex and the City type of restaurant. I have made reservations for them at Tao, but have heard that at Tao, it turns into a nightclub, which will ask them for ID. Is this true?
They want to go someplace where it is very "cool" and where they could enjoy themselves. They want a hip and young crowd. They are very responsible, so im not worried about alcohol.
I have read some very mixed reviews about Tao. Anyone have any other suggestion?????

Be sure to follow the thread for the twenty or so helpful suggestions before anyone points out that there's something a little bit disturbing about a mom asking a message board for tips on how her sixteen-going-on-seventeen year old daughter can emulate the lifestyle of Carrie Bradshaw. (Via Eater.)

Blue Seats Lose

As long as we are feeling sporty, Michigan fans looking for someone who had a worse weekend than themselves need look no further than the bowels of the Lower East Side. The early reports on The Blue Seats put it firmly in the pantheon of the debut-to-Deathwatch dining establishments. The initial gripe has followed with unanimous (so far) piling on. The biggest issue seems to be an objection to the idea of paying $50/hr for the privilege of watching football on television. Curiously, the enthusiastic preview from Strongbuzz made no mention of the seat rental policy.* Perhaps hiring Lloyd Carr as maitre d' is what Blue Seats needs to turn it around.
*The details of this policy are tricky to piece together from the comments. What is not tricky is that very few bars seek to be identified with a "100% Murray Hill" clientèle.

Sunday Night Soups

Our long national nightmare has ended, and both the amateur and professional football seasons have resumed. Over to Serious Eats, I will be posting a weekly soup receipt linked tenuously thematically to the Sunday night game on NBC.
Despite the timely and insistent exhortations of Hank II, the level of football preparedness was not all it could have been this past week, and the Week 1 post went up a little bit late for realistic soup preparation. We will iron out the kinks, and check SE during the week for shopping and prep tips. Now and again, there will be some additional notes and tips here, under the Sunday Night Soups category. Chargers/Pats this Sunday, so stay tuned for the electric eel chowder.

Gordon Ramsay -- The Smoky Tornado?

We all cringed at the news that Gordon Ramsay had scorched his nuts, even if the word "comeuppance" occurred to those of us who were skeeved out at the revelation that Gordo was known to cook commando. However, from here, it looks like focus, rather than inattention. Up to the nut scorch, it had been a tough stretch for the pottymouthed impressario. What better way to get attention off of your struggling restaurant and embattled TV show than to set one of your own testicles on fire? Well played, sir -- well played.