From Schlub to Stud

Let's go Metro!

2012-01-31T05:35:00.000-08:00

This is my roundup of everything that's happening in Downtown Brooklyn's MetroTech area.

The stuff about the snake is gleaned from my own personal experience -- I remember coming out of the Fulton Mall's A&S and walking past the defunct movie theater (the same movie theater where I saw such '80s classics as "The Karate Kid" and "Back to the Future" when they first came out) and saw a snake charmer with what looked like a 9 foot long snake!

I nearly ran! (I managed to just walk quickly away.)

The area still has a ways to go, but, yes, it has made some remarkable progress.

Happy new year!

2012-01-28T10:34:00.000-08:00

Here's wishing you a (slightly late) Happy Year of the Dragon!

I actually wrote an account of a food crawl I took in Chinatown a couple of weekends ago here.

Of the places I went to, Peking Duck House was my favorite.

...But as a Chinese-American friend of mine said when she heard the list of places I had visited: "Ah... you had Chinese food for white people."

It's sort of true. To get a really good Chinese meal, I almost think Manhattan Chinatown is over. You have to go to Flushing. (There are, of course, great and authentic Chinese restaurants in Manhattan -- but very few of them are in Chinatown.) But if you're looking for a place to celebrate, check out Legend for some seriously good Sichuan food.

The future craziness of the GOP

2012-01-28T10:20:00.001-08:00

A while ago I decided that nobody out there in schlubland really wanted to hear my peculiar brand of politics. Besides, this country has too much political punditry. (Seriously, when did people start talking about the state of the union or the GOP debates the way they used to talk about the Mets? "You see the debate last night? Boy, Newt really stepped in it. He's through. Definitely will be eliminated by Super Tuesday.")

But now that the GOP nominating process is drawing to a close (winner: Mitt Romney) and the national election stage is set (my money is still on President Obama to win) I suppose I'm entitled to sound off just a little on the silly season.

A liberal like me should be breathing a sigh of relief. While I can't stand the man it looks like the GOP is turning to (Mitt) and I think he's probably a loser in November, he's considered the "moderate" conservative in the race. And as the choice of the party establishment this is a hopeful sign that the GOP is turning down the temperature on all their tea party nutsiness. They're serious about governing again. Whoever is President in November, be it Romney or Obama, the country will not go off a cliff.

I beg to differ.

While I'm hardly in the predictions game, I will make one (because I haven't seen anyone make it): It's going to get a lot worse for the GOP before it gets better.

After all the ugliness of campaigning, nominations and a general election are over, there are two possible scenarios here that I envision for the GOP, neither of them are all that good.

(1) Mitt Romney wins the presidency.

The GOP will have learned a very bad lesson; namely, they don't have to contribute to the recovery, they don't have to think seriously about governing, they don't have to do anything other than obstruct, obstruct, obstruct and they'll get their way.

And rather than moderating their impulses, I think a win in November will embolden them. They will demand that President Romney, whom they don't trust in the slightest, take a series of loyalty tests. They will want healthcare dismantled -- period. They will want originalists on the federal bench -- period. They will want money to the EPA, the arts, public education and everything else slashed to the bone. They will want a Paul Ryan budget pushed through and if it means dismantling medicare, good!

Of course, much of this will depend on President Romney's behavior -- but I don't have a lot of optimism there. A man of such colossal ambition as Mitt Romney will want a second term. He certainly will not wish to have a primary challenge from his right. (The man doesn't do particularly well on the campaign trail in the first place.) But the right wing of the party will be watching him very closely. And if he doesn't do something meaningful to prove his bona fides, they are going to make his life hell.

Once again, the goal posts in American political life are moved further to the right.

(2) President Obama is reelected.

Obviously, this is the scenario I would favor. But I hardly think it will return the GOP to earth. If anything it will make them crazier for the following reasons:

(a) They have already been down this road before.

Last cycle, the GOP held their nose and voted for a man they loathe and despise: John McCain. The man every Democrat liked. (Until they really had to vote for him.) The man who opposed the Bush tax cuts. The man who wrote the dreaded McCain Feingold legislation. The one Republican the base of the party could not stand.

(b) If this happens to them a second time, they will feel that moderation is a mug's game. Maybe if they stuck to their guns they would have pulled off a victory.

It's sort of an insane argument. (So the electorate rejected a moderate Republican for not being conservative enough by going instead for a liberal Democrat?) But it's one that's taken seriously by the true believers.

(c) The "sticking to their guns" argument is crazy -- but not completely crazy. Yes, an excited base can swing an election. Particularly if it's close. And my bet is that 2012 is going to be close.

Of course, while a reasonable person would say that a Romney/Obama election will be a hell of a lot closer than a Gingrich/Obama election, the base won't believe that unless it actually happens. Should Romney lose, there will be a great many recriminations of his problems as a candidate (The Onion, as always, summed up this problem perfectly in their article Romneymania Sweeps America) but I thought Rick Santorum (of all people) summed up Romney's problems in the debate the other night -- Romney neutralizes the most salient criticism of President Obama: healthcare.

Healthcare reform is very unpopular (I think it should be popular, but that's a different discussion.) Nominating the guy who came up with the idea isn't going to make much headway with the average voter if you're trying to offer a contrast to the president.

You're already starting to see how the craziness will manifest itself. Grover Norquist is already (ALREADY?!) talking about impeaching President Obama in 2014 if he lets the Bush tax cuts expire. You will hear a lot of that in 2013 if Obama is reelected. (Jonathan Chait predicted a second term impeachment a long time ago.)

And even if President Obama is not impeached, in this scenario the right wing of the party will say to the moderates: We went moderate in '08, we got Obama. We went radical in '10, we got Congress. We went moderate in '12, we got Obama again. So we're nominating a radical in 2016.

A lot can happen between now and 2016, but I think the GOP is going to have to nominate a radical and lose hard before it snaps them to their senses. But it will not bode well for the country in general. Sigh.

Good DR

2012-01-14T15:43:00.001-08:00

Yes, your schlubby friend fired his first gun ever last November at Casa de Campo, in the Dominican Republic. (The accompanying story was published in the New York Post on Tuesday.)

I have to admit (New York liberal objections aside), it was kinda fun.

Although, I will also admit: I was not as good a shot as I expected to be.

All those years of playing Duck Hunt on Nintendo apparently don't translate into good shooting skills.

Oh well. I'm probably never going to shoot another gun again. But worth trying once.

Humm dinger!

2012-01-13T12:08:00.000-08:00

Daniel Humm, the great chef at Eleven Madison Park, spoke to me about his favorite dining spots in New York -- you can read it here.

If you don't know Mr. Humm and his cooking, he's pretty hot right now. Adam Platt recently declared 11 Mad the best restaurant in the city. (Better than Per Se, better than Masa, better than Jean-Georges, better than Daniel... although, according to the Plattmeister not a 5 star restaurant. Huh?)

He also got his third Michelin star, and has the Eleven Madison Park cookbook out. (Which is a very gorgeous book -- even if the recipes are really a little too hard to try out at home. But that's the case with most celebrity chef cookbooks.)

I went to 11 Mad last year -- for my fiancee's birthday. It was pretty delish. (Not the single greatest meal I've ever had, but unquestionably excellent.) I have the feeling that he's entering the celeb chef realm -- so you might hear a lot more about him over the next couple of years.

And Humm's food picks around the city were good ones. Very little was haute or chichi -- a lot of them were hidden and secret. Enjoy!

Do do that fondue that you do so well...

2012-01-12T10:26:00.000-08:00

My little history of fondue and its recent revival can be read here.

I don't see the sidebar part online -- which is all about the etiquette of eating fondue -- but there are essentially four rules:

1) Don't double dip. (Who are you, George Costanza?)

2) Stir the pot.

The one criticism one of my experts made of the finished story was that I made it sound a little too easy... the truth is, that if you don't stir the pot when you dip, you'll create a giant cheese cinderblock at the bottom. Definite no-no.

3) One piece of bread at a time.

4) If you drop your bread in the pot you have to buy the next round of drinks. (Or, if you're female, you have to kiss the chef.)

Enjoy!

Would you pay $19 for a grilled cheese sandwich?

2012-01-11T07:01:00.001-08:00

This is the question I asked in last week's New York Post.

I was surprised at how many people said, "Hell yes!"

Indeed, Terrance Brennan of Artisanal makes a pretty good case for why the grilled cheese is underpriced:

Cheese is damned expensive!

Yes, gourmet cheese is a fortune. But I always felt that the glory of the grilled cheese is that a downscale version (i.e. the Kraft single) is perfectly delicious, and therefore, there's no need to blow big money on a chichi version. (One publicist sent an email to the Post saying that the restaurant she reps does NOT serve a grilled cheese. The relevant item was a croque monsier... What a crock!)

But, I must admit, a lot of these fancy grilled cheeses were delish.

All I want for Xmas

2012-01-02T18:57:00.000-08:00

So... how much do you love your kids?

I found some parents who gave their kids some really good presents: i.e., a new apartment.

Happy holidays!

Fry and see

2011-12-21T13:05:00.000-08:00

In their continued efforts to kill me, The New York Post sent me to report on the third annual Latke Festival at BAM on Monday night.

It was delicious. (If extremely fattening. And I'm not sure if I ever want to eat another latke again.)

One can read my brief account of it here, along with the winning recipe and a really nice photo gallery of some of the prettier looking latkes.

Of course, I was not the only reporter there. The Forward was there, as was the Wall Street Journal. (And I'm sure a few other places I missed.)

I thought the judges picked well for the winner -- Jason Weiner's (of the restaurant Almond) bluefish, goat yogurt and dill latke. Weiner did an excellent job. I'm only a little disappointed I didn't have the space to talk about a few others that I really liked.

My three other favorites (aside from Jason's) was Mae Mae Cafe's latke, which was made like a Reuben sandwich on a "rye" latke. (The chef told me it was her first time making a latke -- but she did an excellent job.)

I also liked the duck confit latke (pictured), and The Plaza's foie gras latke.

Happy Hanukkah!

The time I made Christopher Hitchens laugh...

2011-12-16T14:23:00.000-08:00

I don't claim to have known Christopher Hitchens -- except through his work. (Probably the way he would best like to be known.)

However, I did meet the man once.

It was after his debate with British MP (and all around thuggish antisemite) George Galloway on the subject of Iraq. Nick Denton hosted drinks at his Soho loft afterwards and I crashed. (My friend, Mike Weiss -- who penned these two tributes to Hitchens today here and here -- had been a legitimate guest and he invited me to tag along.)

For some reason (at around 3 or 4 in the morning) I was invited to tell a joke. I told the following:

Shelley and Byron die and are taken to the pearly gates. As they approach, St. Peter looks them over and says, "Well, well.... you have both been pretty naughty. But we do have space for a poet. One poet. So here's what we'll do. We'll have a bake off. I'm going to give you the subject, you will each have an hour, and when I return, I'd like a poem. The author of the better poem will be admitted to heaven. The subject will be my favorite place down on earth, Timbuktu."

St. Peter leaves the two poets alone with paper and pen and returns an hour later. "OK, boys, what did you come up with? You, Shelley -- why don't you start."

Shelley began:

"With feet upon the burning sand,
"I gazed upon the promised land.
"And in the far off distant view
"The paradise of Timbuktu."

"Very nice," replies St. Peter. "Now you, Byron. Read me your poem."

With a wink, Byron says:

"Tim and I, a hunting went --
"and spied three maidens in a tent.
"As they were three, and we were two,
"I bucked one, and Tim bucked two."

Not only did Hitchens laugh, but he was extremely complementary of my ability to remember both poems. (I admit, that came with practice.)

Not to join the throngs of fans and tributes (which I find slightly puzzling given how many enemies he made over the course of his life) but I admired Hitchens greatly. (The only thing that I've seen about him that was negative was this, funnily enough, in Gawker.)

There were many issues on which he was quite simply nuts (like, say, the Clintons), but I admired how ardently he clung to his (sometimes nutty) vision of the truth.

Long after it was obvious that America had been sold a bill of goods on Iraq (at least in terms of its threat to our national security) Hitchens refused to agree.

Hearing him argue the case (as he sometimes did ad nauseum) I sometimes started agreeing with him -- even recognizing how crazy some of his points were.

If all you wanted was some acknowledgement of just how shitty a job the Bush administration conducted the invasion, you were probably wasting your time. Hitchens had no interest in making you happy.

The night of his debate with Galloway, when he faced a mostly hostile audience and proclaimed his solidarity with a free Iraq over a penal state under the thumb of a crime family, I stood up and cheered. (I feel a little silly about that in retrospect, but Hitchens had a gift for raising one's blood.)

More than a contrarian, I think he was a romantic.

And there was his wit -- that glistening, sumptuous wit. It was a pleasure to listen to a man as smart as he expound on just about anything.

Of course, like many prolific writers (and Hitchens put out thousands of words every week), not everything Hitchens wrote was great. Much of it felt like he was too much in his cups when he sat down to begin writing. But when he was on fire, the man could hold his own with H.L. Mencken or any other polemicist. (I strongly recommend his memoir, Hitch-22.)

His last piece in Vanity Fair was truly painful to read. The man had been through a great deal of torture at the hands of his illness. I'm glad he's out of his misery -- and I'm glad that the one time I met the man I left him laughing.

Match. Set. Xmas.

2011-12-16T08:46:00.000-08:00

I'm a little late posting this, but my colleague and pal Christina Amoroso and I did a roundup of sites around the city where famous holiday movies were shot.

I wrote about "Elf" and "Miracle on 34th Street" (the original -- certainly not the remake!)

I also wrote a sidebar about a few more movies with an NYC/holiday setting (or at least partly): Trading Places, Gremlins, Scrooged and It's a Wonderful Life.

Of course, It's a Wonderful Life did not take place in NYC. It took place in (the fictional) Bedford Falls. But BF was supposedly based on Seneca Falls -- a 5 hour drive from the city. While that ain't close, they take it seriously enough so that I sort of felt like I should include them. (An "It's a Wonderful Life" museum and a Hotel Clarence, named after the Henry Travers character in the movie.)

Happy holidays!

2011 in Real Estate

2011-12-08T13:49:00.000-08:00

My review of 2011 (and look ahead at 2012) in real estate can be read here.

Curbed was nice enough to link to it.

As an editor at the Post said upon reading my article:

"It's like nobody learned jackshit over the recession."

Yeah, that pretty much sums it up.

How much Lower can you goer?

2011-12-03T20:18:00.001-08:00

I'm a little late posting this, but here's an article I wrote two weeks ago about the deals you can get on the Lower East Side....

...if you can find them!

Life imitates Onion headlines

2011-12-03T20:00:00.001-08:00

Rumors of extramarital affair end campaign of presidential candidate who didn't know China has nuclear weapons

Thus spake The Onion in a headline that was:

a) 100 percent true.

b) Not needing a follow-up story to go with it.

I weep for my country.

Of course, I will happily cast my vote next November for Barack Obama (yes, I still think the guy is a ninja) so I'm not following the GOP nomination process too closely...

But, seriously, how did we get this far?

The front-runner for the nomination of one of the two major parties in this country did not know that our biggest world rival has nuclear weapons. (Which they've had for, uh, almost half a century.) That's Sarah Palin-level ignorance.

And this is not even mentioning his incomprehensible ravings on Libya...

But I suppose Americans love a circus. And that's what they're getting. The cynic in me feels a little disappointed Herman couldn't stay in a little longer -- he was the most entertaining of the bunch. (Minus, of course, The Donald.)

Is NYC facing a bagel crisis?

2011-11-26T19:33:00.001-08:00

The short answer:

Yes.

The longer answer:

It's been dying for decades.

In the wake of the crisis at H&H (their west side bagel plant is in danger of closing down), I put my thoughts on the death of the New York bagel here. (It generated more mail than any article I've written in years.)

Truthfully, it's nearly impossible to find a decent bagel in this city any more. At least, not like the bagels I ate when I was a kid. My favorites are probably Absolute Bagel on Broadway between 107th and 108th and Bagel Hole in Park Slope (7th Ave., between 12th and 13th Streets).

But in the old days, of course, the city had at least one great bagel spot in every neighborhood.

Sigh.

Frankly, I think this is in the same depressing vein as what's happening in Jewish cuisine in general. (There are only a handful of Delis worth visiting in the city, either. David Sax has long taken up that campaign.)

Thank you, Ambassador Huntsman

2011-11-09T07:30:00.000-08:00

President Obama's former ambassador to China, Jon Huntsman, does his dirty work for him. (I wish this were playing on an endless loop. I love the music!)

Harlem is doing better than you thought

2011-11-06T06:20:00.000-08:00

A lot of real estate watchers out there assumed that Harlem was doomed in this recession.

We felt that Harlem was reliving some (unfunny) real estate history.

Just as the neighborhood was overbuilt more than 100 years ago with the coming of the IRT line (the city's first subway) and property values plummeted when recession hit, most observers in recent years felt that Harlem real estate was one of two areas in Manhattan where developers were completely overbuilding. (The other being the Financial District.)

Buildings that were unfinished when the recession hit were doomed; buildings that were only partially sold were likely to remain that way.

But it looks like this is not entirely the case.

Developers aggressively cut prices (the average went from $836 per square foot during the height of the market in 2007 to $582 now) and thus managed to work through the glut of inventory -- the sales figures are the best on record.

I wrote about this here. And the Real Deal was kind enough to pick up on my story here.

Thonx for coming!

2011-11-06T06:11:00.000-08:00

Last week, in honor of Bronx Restaurant Week (happening right now! Check it out here) Baron Ambrosia led me to several of his favorite spots in the borough.

If you don't know the great Baron Ambrosia, he is the Odysseus of the Bronx food scene. He wanders the borough, samples its wares, and films it all for his show Bronx Flavor.

He's also an extremely sweet and hilarious guy.

I wrote up his picks for Restaurant Week here.

My favorite was Coconut Palm. If you've never had chicken gizzards, this is your chance to try them. (Chewy, but not in a bad way. And in this delicious curry sauce. It really smacked one out of the park.) Also on the menu: black pudding (which is made in-house), duck fried rice (perhaps the best fried rice I've ever tasted) and fried shark. (That was the only thing that was slightly disappointing. But not bad, by any means.)

But, in any event, this week is a great excuse to visit some Bronx restaurants -- go out there and try 'em!

In Memoriam

2011-11-01T12:09:00.000-07:00

I feel slightly bad saying this, but this might be my favorite clip of Andy Rooney in recent years. He's just soooo pissed off.

First as tragedy, then ....

2011-10-24T08:31:00.000-07:00

In looking at my political crystal ball for 2012, I would advise my readers to think back a few election cycles. Because I see 2012 unfolding in more or less the same way.

In 2004, the Democratic party had a choice to make:

They could nominate a fiery, articulate, half-nuts former governor of Vermont for the presidency. This would send the Democratic base into spasms of ecstasy -- and probably go down in crushing defeat come November.

Or they could nominate John Kerry.

Kerry -- a smart guy, a capable guy, a nice guy -- was simply too milquetoast to compete against the likes of George W. Bush. And he went down in defeat, too.

Am I crazy, or is the GOP doing pretty much the same exact thing right now?

The Howard Dean role is this time being played by Herman Cain. He strokes the GOP id in just the right way: He gives angry, half-crazy speeches. He favors a flat tax. (Which is wildly popular with the GOP base, much like Dean's opposition to the Iraq War.) He's socially conservative. And he takes the charge that the tea party is racist off the table.

He is the tea party's dream candidate. And if he were to be nominated, he would give President Obama a 1964-sized landslide victorty.

The John Kerry role is being played by Mitt Romney.

Mitt has three problems that Kerry had.

1) Mitt has taken a few mainstream positions which makes him more electable in a general election, and makes him despised by the base. (The base held their noses because of Kerry's Iraq War vote.)

2) David Brooks said yesterday Romney had a "Stepford problem" -- which, again, was one of Kerry's massive flaws. (Not that he looked like a hot robot, but that he was hopelessly inauthentic.)

3) They were both flip-floppers.

I suppose (2) and (3) are intertwined. I actually think flip flopping can be a good thing. If circumstances changed, it's only sensible that you should change your position. But the fact that all of Mitt Romney's flip flops were very politically convenient, makes nobody believe that he really holds these positions. They think he will govern like a quasi-liberal.

I think this is a mistake.

Whether Mitt Romney really holds pro-life or anti-health care positions is largely irrelevant. If he is elected president, he will have to take big steps to assure the conservatives that he's one of them. The GOP will not allow him to nominate judges to the federal bench that they do not sign off on. For someone who is already distrusted, they will never accept on faith that he is nominating good conservatives. (Don't believe me? Harriet Miers would like a word.)

Does anybody really believe that Romney is a man of political courage, who will stare down the grassroots activists and rainmakers in his party?

All this leads me to think that when Romney is eventually the nominee (tea party spoilers aside) the battle of 2012 will look very much like Kerry versus Bush. Expect a very close electoral map.

Patty pad

2011-10-14T13:03:00.000-07:00

If you don't know of George Motz (and you like hamburgers) you should!

Motz is the author of Hamburger America, and a couple of weeks ago he invited me (in my capacity as NY Post reporter) to take a look around his South Slope apartment.

It was pretty cool!

You can read the resulting story here.

Back to the grinder

2011-10-13T19:54:00.000-07:00

Hey schlubfans!

I know it's been a long time. They're keeping me busy at the old newspaper mill.

Like, for example, this big round-up I did of new (or newish, in some cases) sandwiches.

Almost all of these sandwiches are worth trying. Although some are certainly more worth trying than others.

If you had asked me yesterday which my favorite was, I would have said BaoHaus. BaoHaus, for those of you who follow my musings closely, is the domain of one Eddie Huang. (I wrote about this young man exactly a year ago. Go figure!)

But I should also add: I did check out the place this afternoon to see if they had gotten any traction from my article, and the wait was far, far nastier than anything I had experienced in the past. And the frenzy of people made the food suffer, slightly. (If I had to write the thing over I definitely would have adjusted the waiting time. Which was very good the first time I was in. But a good 15 minutes today.)

My runners up were City Sandwich and Num Pang.

But I definitely got a new lunchtime sandwich shop to replace Subway, and that's Potbelly.

Mmm...mmm... UN

2011-09-23T14:20:00.000-07:00

Big news week for the UN:

Palestinians ask for a state!

Iran continues to act douchey!

And, of course, there's my story in Wednesday's NY Post about where the diplomats at the little countries go when they want some home cookin.

We picked five countries with under a million people.

The most interesting story was probably the Bhutan restaurant. It's a sushi restaurant... but the owners are from Bhutan. And, if you call in advance, they'll make you some authentic Bhutanese food. (It was almost like going into a speakeasy.) I got a dish of dry and spicy cured pork and beef -- which was terrific! (A little chewy. But good.)

Unfortunately, a lot of the story wound up on the cutting room floor. But here are some of the juicy details.

My favorite of the restaurants (that I visited) in terms of taste was probably the Cypriot restaurant -- seriously delicious.

Marc Weydert, an attache for the Luxembourg mission to the UN told me that Lea Linster is the only female chef who has won the Bocuse d’Or competition -- and she's from Luxembourg.

That being said, there’s no straight Luxembourg restaurant in New York City. (Café Luxembourg on the Upper West Side was named after the Luxembourg Gardens in Paris.) And trying to find some of the more rustic Luxembourg dishes such as "Wäinzoossiss" (a special Luxembourg-style sausage made with spices and wine) or "Kuddelfleck" (tripe or cow’s stomach, coated in breadcrumbs and fried in oil) is a hopeless cause. However, "Gromperekichelcher", which is the Luxembourg equivalent of potato pancakes, are not too difficult to find an approximation of.

And, Weydert adds, Luxembourg wines are making an appearance in New York, too. La Cave, a wine shop in Mamaroneck, NY, is about to start carrying some of the best Luxembourg wines: Riesling, Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc and Gewurztraminer.

Finally, I was a little disappointed that I wasn't able to get into more detail about the Icelandic food at Scandinavia House. According to Morten Sohlberg, the owner, the lamb "is lamb which we raise on our own farm upstate. It’s a specific breed that comes from Iceland."

East Harlem for $500 per foot

2011-09-15T15:03:00.001-07:00

If you are looking for your first apartment, you might consider East Harlem.

Prices are $500 to $600 per square foot.

In fact, I found a guy who is paying less to buy an apartment than to rent in the neighborhood!

Moreover, a lot of these buildings require only a 5% (or in some cases less!) downpayment.

But you'll have to live without a Starbucks or a decent Chinese restaurant.

A last word about Rick Perry & the death penalty

2011-09-15T14:42:00.000-07:00

Not to belabor the point, but along with the great New Yorker story about how Rick Perry sent an innocent man (Cameron Todd Willingham) to his death, there was another one that I feel is worth bringing up:

The case of Anthony Graves.

Graves, who had been on death row since the early 1990s was recently freed after the obvious flaws in his case came to light. (One should definitely read Texas Monthly's Herculean account of the case.)

Of course, Governor Perry has taken almost all the wrong lessons from this horrific miscarriage of justice.

Perry proudly points to Graves as an example of the system working.

There are almost no words to counter this. But if you read the original article about how nearly every cog in this machine failed (and how it was close to two decades after he was first thrown in jail that his case was thrown out) it was a stunning thing to say. But it certainly speak to Perry's fitness to executive office.

A decade later

2011-09-11T05:33:00.001-07:00

It's difficult to believe that it's been 10 years since 9/11.

The Times has an excellent round-up of first-hand experiences from that day, as well as a round-up of all the implications of the attacks (in literature, on our economy, in the Arab world, etc.)

Of course, every publication did something this week to memorialize that horrible day.

The New Yorker's coverage was particularly heartbreaking. The great George Packer (The Assassins' Gate) and the great Adam Gopnik (Paris to the Moon) wrote twin pieces about American erosion in the past 10 years (how veterans came back from Iraq and Afghanistan with virtually zero prospects of getting a job, and a general decline-of-the-west article, respectively) that both left this schlub feeling depressed -- particularly Packer's. (Unfortunately, the articles are firewalled.)

New York magazine had an interesting idea to treat the issue as a 9/11 encyclopedia. Entries start at Abbottabad and end at Zazi, Najibullah (the failed, homegrown terrorist) with everything from "Survivor, Last Pulled Out" to "Freedom Fries" in between.

The Post has a huge tribute issue out today -- but earlier in the week, your humble correspondent got to do one of the more upbeat stories: How the Financial District rebounded after everyone thought it was as good as dead. And, indeed, (with some massive hiccups along the way which I didn't have space to get into) it did just that.

And, perhaps, I should leave it there.

"No sir, I've never struggled with that at all."

2011-09-08T09:13:00.000-07:00

I'm sure nobody out there in schlubland wants to hear your humble correspondent sound off on the death penalty. (Actually, unlike most of my other liberal opinions I'm for it in principle. Against it in practice.)

But whether you're for it or against it, there was something absolutely ghoulish in Rick Perry's answer to last night's death penalty question -- and the deafening applause when the number of the executed (234) was trotted out.

If the death penalty is necessary, it should be a grim business. A necessary evil. And we should never applaud its use.

Moreover, the fact that Rick Perry didn't lose a wink of sleep over this is just disgusting. Two years ago, the New Yorker took great pains to show that at least one of these men was probably innocent.

If you haven't read it yet, the story of Cameron Todd Willingham makes you want to shout at Perry, "Why the hell not?"

Ne'er do Wells

2011-08-18T12:54:00.000-07:00

Quite the controversy is a brewin' in the food world.

In the right corner is M. Wells, beloved Long Island City diner which is closing shop this month after less than a year, after the landlord jacked the rent up.

And in the opposite corner is GQ food columnist, Alan Richman.

The controversy goes like this: He went to the diner once and had a great meal. He went twice and also had a great meal. He went for a third time and had a terrible meal.

The food (usually terrific) was middling, and the service was horrible.

The next day he got an email from the owner saying that he had apparently pinched one of the waitresses on the tush.

Holy shit!

It's quite an accusation. And not having any extra knowledge other than what appeared in the article, I probably shouldn't weigh in on it. But I will say that the accusation sounds phony to me for several reasons.

1) If it was true, I would be surprised if Richman would draw attention to it by actually publishing a column about it. (After all, he had a perfect excuse for killing the article: M. Wells was closing. It's not really the actions of a guilty person.)

2) The motive for a phony accusation is there, as Richman points out in the column.

3) If this ever comes to a head, Richman has witnesses (three people at his table) to back him up.

4) Sarah Obraitis (the M. Wells owner who was in email contact with him) seemed, by the end of their exchange, to be backing off the accusation. (The accusation moved from "hardy pat on the ass" to "tapped one of our female servers inappropriately.")

5) For all the press this article has received, I have yet to see Obraitis -- or anyone else at M. Wells -- publicly challenge the review, bring forth the accuser, or issue any kind of rebuttal. (Part of me is scratching his head wondering why a reporter hasn't called her and asked for her side of this? Where are you, Eater and Grub Street?)

6) If Richman did this, it would soil his reputation. It seems such a weird, gratutious thing to do.

All that being said, I'd like to hear more details from the other side. But I'm inclined to think this accusation was bogus.

Turdblossom shits all over Rick Perry

2011-08-18T11:10:00.000-07:00

Former Bush speech writer, Matt Latimer, pens a column on Karl Rove's disdain for the new savior of the GOP, Rick Perry.

The inside baseball here is tantalizing.... but not quite tantalizing enough. If I were Latimer's editor, I would have thrown it back to him.

I've read the thing twice, and while, yes, I believe that this hatred exists, I still don't quite understand what the cause of it was.

As far as I can tell, the animus is based on three things (which are really all the same thing):

1) Perry has succeeded without Rove's blessing.

While one should never diminish the power of the petty dispute, this would seem to me to be so minor as for me to say that, no, I don't believe it. If it really is true I'd demand that someone who knows both parties (on or off the record) confirm this with evidence.

2) It's about money and succession.

Fine. And what are the details of this, please?

Yes, these sorts of things might be too insidery for the rest of the world to care. But that's the meat of great drama, isn't it? What money are we talking about? Who's money? The GOP's? The big donors? This whetted my appetite.

3) It's a plain old piece of Texas political muscle flexing.

As in, "You think you're in charge down here, Rick Perry? Think again!"

OK, maybe that's it. I understand that local political fiefdoms obey different rules in different ways. But one would think that a man like Rove, who ran a national campaign, wouldn't care so much about local Texas politics once his political showhorse (Bush) had left. I suppose that people as driven as Rove never forget the details. (It partly explains their personal success.) But I'd like to know more. I feel there has to be some incident that someone could point to.

The most perplexing thing about this, of course, is that Rick Perry is George W. Bush. (Perhaps without the breeding and with about 15 to 20 fewer IQ points.) One would think that this would be the kind of folksy Texan Rove would be behind with every fiber of his being. And maybe that's the biggest reason Rove can't stand him: The caricature is unbearable. (Which might explain why the Bush family hates him, too.)

High Five

2011-08-18T10:35:00.000-07:00

My visit to 1212 Fifth Avenue.

The building is on the park and only about $900 per square foot! (Of course, it's also on 102nd Street...)

Rock it to me!

2011-08-14T13:37:00.000-07:00

I'm a little late posting this, but for you rock nerds out there, check out my "At Home With Allison Hagendorf" in the Post a week ago.

Allison is the host of Fuse's "Top 20 Countdown"... and she's awfully cool! Her CD collection is sick.

The Long and Wining Road

2011-08-14T13:24:00.000-07:00

There!

I get to use the headline I had wanted to use originally for my story about local wineries! ("Grapes of Rapture" is not bad.... but I thought "Long and Wining Road" was better.)

Oenophiles with a car would be wise to check out a few of these places. (I really liked Cameron Stark's "Big O" wine at Unionville. And Revolutionary Red was also excellent -- and really well priced!)

But schlubs like me with neither a car or a driver's license are probably out of luck. Almost none of these wineries are accessible via public transportation. (I got there because I went with publicists or photographers who could drive.)

For those who are looking for something a little more accessible, Millbrook Winery, which has a shuttle from the train on the weekends. (I wrote about them here.) Or I would also recommend an afternoon either at Brooklyn Winery or Brooklyn Oenology (both of which I wrote about here.)

Happy drinkin'. (If you go, go with a designated driver!)

Cold case

2011-08-03T13:07:00.001-07:00

My bete noir, Mandy Stadtmiller, and I do a point/counterpoint in today's New York Post.

Mandy takes the position that all those newfangled ice creams out there (bubble gum curry with black cherry) are just lovely.

I take the position that the classics are far better. (The real test: When you were a 7-year-old kid, is there any chance you would have picked that froufrou crap over a chocolate cone?)

Among my favorites:

Carvel. (Of course.)

Blue Marble. (Best butter pecan I've ever tasted -- and I'm not even that big a fan.)

Van Leeuween. (I've only been to their truck, but it's pretty good!)

Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory. (I went to this one for the first time when researching this story, and I have to say: The chocolate chip is uh-mazing!)

Ronnybrook Milk Bar.

Enjoy -- just don't OD. The hotness probably doesn't melt the calories fast enough.

Don't worry. Be happy.

2011-07-29T12:05:00.000-07:00

Developers are starting to wade into NYC waters again.

Check out my story in yesterday's Post.

In Memoriam

2011-07-24T05:36:00.000-07:00

I'm sure that many interesting things will be written about the great Amy Winehouse in the coming days. (And if you're looking for great things already written, check out my pal Dvora Meyers' take on the hot mess that was Amy Winehouse in Tablet.)

But I think letting Winehouse speak for herself (above) is the best way to appreciate her incredible, tragic talent.

Alexander Portnoy's spiritual heir?

2011-07-11T13:02:00.000-07:00

I would advise my more squeamish readers to skip the link I'm posting here (and maybe stop reading right now) but ...

A guy was busted on a flight to Denver for, uh, pleasuring himself in his seat.

Sick!

(That said, I also think that no bail sounds a little ridiculous.)

Somewhere, Philip Roth is smiling...

Day tripping

2011-07-10T13:55:00.000-07:00

Speaking of summer food stories, yesterday I also came up with a round-up of good food excursions.

Lots of farm-to-table dinners, the Hudson Valley food festival, and you should definitely check out Patrick Connolly's pop up dinner series. (I went to the one in East Hampton with my gf -- and it was awesome.)

I was particularly proud of the headline ("Off the eaten path") which caused a stir in the features section (there were "All right!"s and high fives) ... that is, until I told my parents.

"Yeah, I've run that before," my mother said.

This is the reason you should never go into your parents profession....

On the townhouse

2011-07-10T13:44:00.000-07:00

For architecture, NYC history and Louis CK geeks, check out my article on the history of the New York City townhouse -- as well as a slideshow of five different townhouses. (The one in Park Slope actually looks like a real bargain.)

I never quite understood why the filthy rich opt for glass condos over those Federalist and Anglo Italiante houses. (I suppose if I was one of those "masters of the universe" I might consider a Candela building or the Dakota ... but even then, I think I'd prefer a Greenwich Village townhouse.)

They're the city's most beautiful architectural marvels.

Moreover, in doing the research for this article, I got a chance to speak to Charles Lockwood, author of the classic Bricks and Brownstone and Columbia's Andrew Dolkart. (Any time I get a chance to speak to someone with serious scholarly training, the nerd in me starts kvelling.)

Chug-a-schlub

2011-07-10T13:39:00.000-07:00

Hey schlubs!

Being that we're smack in the middle of summer, here's mine and Christina Amoroso's guide to the new beer gardens of NYC.

I think Spritzenhaus was my favorite.

I also liked Bier International in Harlem. (Not a bad burger.)

Queens flush

2011-07-07T12:18:00.000-07:00

I'm a little late in posting this, but here's my round-up of the secret restaurants of Jackson Heights, Flushing and Elmhurst from last month's New York Post. (My colleague --and fellow Queens inhabitant -- Kirsten Matthew did L.I.C., Astoria and Woodside.)

I went on this high caloric expedition with Vikas Khanna (of Junoon), Danielle Chang (of Lucky Rice) and Zak Pelaccio (of Fatty 'Cue, Fatty Crab -- and many other Fatty enterprises.)

My fellow Queens readers will notice that a number of the classic Chinese restaurants of Flushing were sort of ignored. I told Danielle that we could not go to either Hunan Kitchen of Grand Sichuan or Spicy and Tasty. (Once a restaurant has been reviewed by the Times food critic -- as both of those great restaurants have -- it's no longer such a secret, in my view.) But nevertheless, she picked some excellent spots. (You should definitely try the Taiwanese shaved ice spot.)

But my favorites had to be the Elmhurst restaurants (if for no other reason that they were the biggest surprise.)

In fact, we didn't even have space for all the places we visited. We went with Joe DiStefano, author of any serious Queens' resident's go-to blog, World's Fare. (Joe's recent coverage of the new Flushing mall might have made my "secret restaurants of Flushing" list had I been choosing instead of Danielle.) One of the restaurants that we visited (which didn't make the cut) was Java Village -- an Indonisian place that Joe thinks is the best restaurant in Elmhurst.

I was sorry we weren't able to include it. It was awesome.

Happy hunting.

Bonds have more fun

2011-06-27T05:35:00.000-07:00

If you don't know anything about Bond Street, it's a row of chichi buildings just north of Houston Street.

It's also the street Will Smith is currently renting on while he's filming Men In Black III. (And Dr. Smith also checked out a possible condo on the block as well.)

Last month I checked out the newest addition to this block, 41 Bond.

My Midnight in Paris problem -- and ours

2011-06-25T10:59:00.000-07:00

I give Woody Allen's new Midnight in Paris a solid B+.

Many people (my GF included) think I am being way too hard on the movie.

After all, they say:

(1) It's Woody's best movie in years. (True.)

(2) It's got a reasonably good story. (Also true -- it's about a writer who, when he walks around Paris after the clock strikes 12, is hurled back into the 1920s.)

(3) Owen Wilson doesn't try to mimic Woody Allen (like Kenneth Branagh did in Celebrity much to everyone's embarrassment), but tries to make the character his own (like Sean Penn in the infinitely better Sweet and Lowdown).

All of which is fine and dandy. And, in my own defense, a B+ is a solid grade! (It was my average, more or less, at college!) Moreover, I enjoyed the movie while I was watching it. Owen Wilson is a surprisingly excellent surrogate for the Woodman. All true.

However, I thought there was so much more that could have been done with the idea. When Wilson arrives at a party and is met by Scott and Zelda (not quite knowing what the last name is), it's a somewhat amusing watching it dawn on him which Scott he's talking to... and the same thing happens with Gertrude, Ernest and Pablo.

But shouldn't there be more to this movie than winking introductions to the great artists who populated Paris during the roaring 20s? (The only actor whose impression seemed to go farther was Adrian Brody as Salvador Dali, whose intensity was funny in a way that Hemingway's wasn't.)

Anyway, here's hoping Owen Wilson becomes one of Woody's regulars.

Big Kent party

2011-06-25T10:51:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago I took a bike ride along Kent Avenue.

And even a jaded New Yorker like myself was surprised (pleasantly surprised!) by the amount of progress Kent Avenue had made.

A lot of the buildings that had been in the works for years are finally getting people in them. Brooklyn Flea and Smorgasburg have opened shop on N. 6th Street.

In short, a very industrial and ugly stretch has gotten much nicer.

I became so convinced, I managed to talk my editor into making this a cover story for NYP Home.

Enjoy! (And take a ride along the bike lane!)

The non-Jewish schlub

2011-06-25T10:33:00.000-07:00

I have found my non-Jewish equivalent!

I give you Louis CK, whose show Louie just had its second season premier on FX this last week.

I would invite all my fellow schlubs to check out this fat, balding, middle aged genius. (If you don't have cable, there are a handful of episodes from season one on the Louie web site.)

It's not just that Louis CK is funny. Anybody who watched any of his standup more or less knew that. But this show has nearly as much intelligence as it does comedy. It's very much in the Seinfeld/Curb-Your-Enthusiasm vein; Louis CK is a standup comedian and single dad in the city.

Just as CYE was a shade darker than Seinfeld, Louie is a shade darker than CYE. It might also not be quite as funny. I haven't seen anything on Louie that made me laugh as much as one of Larry David's great meltdowns. But if it isn't quite as funny, it's way more dramatic. And more artfully done.

The New Yorker's Nancy Franklin wrote an extremely an extremely smart tribute to the show two weeks ago, that I probably couldn't improve upon. (Subscription only.) And I got a sneak preview of some of the second season. It's true, not every episode is brilliant (I didn't love the Joan Rivers episode), but for every miss, there's a homerun. (The one where Louie is invited into a "friends with benefits" situation is genius.)

Long and short: Watch this show.

Reasons for not blogging

2011-06-25T10:24:00.001-07:00

Hey schlubfans!

If I were a prosecutor, I think there are four sets of charges that I would indict a blogger who goes a month without blogging on.

(1) Extreme laziness.

(2) A disproportionate amount of work in what he does to actually keep food on the table.

(3) Getting an extremely loving girlfriend.

(4) Having a computer breakdown.

I plead guilty to all four of these charges. I have been traveling almost every weekend for the last month (with reason 3) and for some reason, the FSTS web site was down last week (4), and I was too busy (2) -- and lazy (1) -- to call my provider. But it seems to be working now. So there are many things that I will be blogging about in the next 24 hours. Stay tuned.

In the meantime, my apologies. Keep on schlubbin.

Pal Joey

2011-05-27T11:24:00.000-07:00

My visit to Joey Campanaro's roof deck can be read here.

Two things:

1) Yes, the Fire Department did come.

2) The steak that he made was frickin' fabulous. (I mean, seriously, seriously great stuff.)

I'd met Joey a couple of other times -- most memorably at burger bash in Summit, NJ, where he whipped up with what was maybe the best burger I'd ever tasted. Joey is (as my grandmother would put it) quite a character.

A Flea Grows in Brooklyn

2011-05-25T10:45:00.000-07:00

Brooklyn Flea (that big Fort Greene-based street fair) has fled -- to Williamsburg.

Well, "expanded" is probably the better word. (But then I wouldn't be able to use that lede!) But, in any event, its new incarnation along N. 6th Street and Kent Avenue is called Smorgasburg. (Get it?)

I went this Saturday for the Post and it really is a foodie bonanza. It's crazy! There were more than 90 different vendors -- and they're expecting to have more than 100 by June.

Plus, there was a ton of things that I tried that I couldn't even get into the piece. (Maine lobster roll from Red Hook Lobster Pound, anyone?)

My three faves, though were definitely:

The Landhaus BLT.

The "Hot Griddle Mess" from SCRATCHbread.

The cold noodles from Shorty Tang.

High times

2011-05-24T08:04:00.001-07:00

I'm a little late posting this, but here's my big story about the next phase of the High Line.

One of the interesting questions: Will Part Two of the High Line be better than Part One?

Leonard Steinberg, one of Elliman's super-brokers, seems to think so. As do a couple of others that I spoke to.

I don't know yet, but I'll certainly be visiting when part two opens for business in June.

(And while you're visiting the HL, there are a lot of great --and super-expensive -- restaurants to visit that are worth a splurge: Mario Batali's Del Posto and Scott Conant's Scarpetta. Scarpetta is probably the cheaper of the two. And it's only opened for dinner. But if you go for an early, 5 pm-ish dinner, the spaghetti with tomato sauce -- very simple, but so perfectly done -- is worth the outrageous $24 price tag.)

D'oh!

2011-05-16T13:29:00.001-07:00

Hello schlubfans!

I know, long time, no blog. My apologies.

Since I last blogged, President Obama released his long form birth certificate, hosted the Correspondents Dinner and wacked Osama Bin Laden.

Donald Trump proclaimed victory, stewed in anger at said dinner, and promptly ended his campaign.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm a little sorry to see the Donald get out.

Of course, I suspect that my loyal readers who know my political tendencies will say that this is because if Donald Trump got the nomination, President Obama would be a shoe-in for re-election.

That's only part of it.

I am actually rooting against the lunatics in 2012. Yes, I'm 99 percent sure that nominating Sarah Palin would result in a 49 state landslide for President Obama. (And, yes, I'd be happy about that.) But I'd much rather the GOP were a more serious party with realistic candidates. Liberal friends should take note: the GOP will be elevated to the executive branch some day. When that day comes, we should hope that the party is embracing semi-serious people like Mitch Daniels -- even if they make the possibility of an Obama defeat slightly more likely.

But I think I would have made an exception for Trump.

He would've just been so... crazy.

I must have watched that youtube saying, "Listen you motherfuckers..." 50 times.

Now, maybe Donald Trump doesn't know about politics. Maybe he doesn't know about diplomacy. Maybe he doesn't even know about business. (How many times has this guy filed for bankruptcy?) But he knows what makes for great TV.

Forward Marche!

2011-05-03T06:10:00.000-07:00

Yours truly went on a press trip to the Marche region of Italy last month -- these are my adventures!

And, for the record, Uliassi and Antico Furlo were two of the best meals I've ever eaten.

To know her is to love her....

2011-04-28T14:32:00.001-07:00

My friend Dvora Meyers has a brilliant meditation on the Jewishness of the hot mess that is one Amy Winehouse in Tablet.

I never quite saw Winehouse in Jewish terms... More, in Janis Joplin-burning-bright-and-not-long-for-this-world terms. But Dvora makes a convincing case.

If you take nothing else from this article, it will give you a chance to appreciate just how tender a singer Winehouse can be -- especially when she sings a sweet, simple long song like "To Know Him Is To Love Him" -- written by that other Jewish hot mess.

The Wiz

2011-04-18T10:33:00.000-07:00

I'm a little late getting to this, but as a big movie buff, I don't think an event like the passing of the greatest living film director should pass without comments by yours truly.

I should probably qualify that.

Sidney Lumet, who died last week at the age of 86, was one of only about three (maybe four) people who could be considered the greatest living film director. The only other two I think were seriously in contention were Francis Ford Coppola (who stopped making good movies a long time ago) and Martin Scorsese (ditto, more or less).

I suspect that most of you have seen his three great masterpieces: Network, Serpico and Dog Day Afternoon. If not, you should run out and rent them. They are three of the very best movies of the 1970s (especially Dog Day), bar none. (Network feels more eeriely relevant -- and less like a satire -- with every passing year, particularly with the advent of Glenn Beck.)

But the thing that I'm amazed by, in thinking over Lumet's career, is just the sheer number of first rate movies (that weren't quite as great as those first tier films I just mentioned) that Lumet directed. Sure, he had his share of stinkers. (Like, say, The Wiz.) Some of his movies which were wildly praised when they came out did not hold up well over time. (Like The Pawnbroker.) When he took on social or political issues (like with Fail Safe) he often fumbled (just think of what Stanley Kubrick did with more or less the same material when he directed Dr. Strangelove which came out the same year.)

But despite all this, he leaves behind a titanic body of great work. Here's Max Gross' list of second tier Lumet movies, which you should run out and rent as fast as humanly possible.

12 Angry Men. This one is a little like The Pawnbroker, in that it doesn't quite hold up. And a little like Fail Safe, in that it's an issue movie. But it's also quite clever. And while Lee J. Cobb tends to chew the scenery a bit it still holds up from that era as one of the better "social issue" films. To see just how badly this kind of material could be handled, all you have to do is watch William Friedkin's hopelessly lame 1997 remake.

Bye Bye Braverman. One of the great forgotten Jewish comedies of the 1960s. Every time I get eggrolls, I think of this one.

Murder on the Orient Express. MOTOE almost edges into greatness territory. It has an all-star cast, and it feels like watching one of those stylish, studio pictures from the 1930s with an epic cast, like Grand Hotel, where you expect champagne to flow from the faucets in the sinks. It is also possibly the best-ever adaptation of an Agatha Christie novel. (I think it surpassed Christie's original.) Moreover, even as a big commercial romp, it manages to squeeze in some great moral drama. (The ending was also recently parodied on an episode of 30 Rock!)

Prince of the City. One of the best movies about cops ever made. Period. (I'll never quite forgive the great Pauline Kael for failing to appreciate this tragic, heartbreaking movie. Or Roget Ebert, even though he's kinder.) Moreover, I admire the restraint Lumet showed in the fact that he refused to cast a big name as the lead actor -- he went with Treat Williams, because he didn't want the audience to spend a half-hour getting over their pre-existing associations with a Pacino or a DeNiro. (Sadly, Williams never did anything as good again.)

Deathtrap. For a filmed play, this one is excellent.

The Verdict. I'm slightly biased on this one, because it's based on the novel that my father ghost wrote. But it is one of Paul Newman's best performances. And as a courtroom drama, it is fascinating, riveting stuff.

Daniel. This one is nowhere near as good as E. L. Doctorow's The Book of Daniel about the Rosenbergs (and their kids) but it's worth watching if only for Amanda Plummer's loony performance.

Find Me Guilty. Some were saying that this was a great movie... I'm not sure about that, but it's certainly enjoyable.

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. Now this is a great movie. Or a near great one, at any rate. The fact that it was directed by a man in his 80s shows just what a master can do when he's in the zone. In addition to being a movie of terrific moral complexity, of the performances one comes to expect in Lumet's movies, it almost looked to me like Lumet had picked up something from Quentin Tarantino. Not just in theme (a robbery gone awry) but in the fact that he decided to play with timelines -- and do so expertly.

For more on Lumet, Slate has an interesting podcast about the man and his work -- which also includes a segment about my old classmate, Mehgan O'Rourke's extremely heartbreaking memoir about her mother (which I will write about later this week.)

Bam!

2011-04-15T13:02:00.000-07:00

Although I've sort of vowed to keep politics off this blog (sort of) I would like to commend President Obama on his kickass speech this week.

The President ripped into Paul Ryan's ridiculous plan to gut Medicaid and Medicare -- and thank goodness.

For a great takedown on Ryan's plan, read Michael Kinsley's column. Or, actually, you should maybe read the President's speech.

Schmucking a trend

2011-04-14T10:32:00.000-07:00

...And I thought Gross was a bad last name!

Jeffrey Goldberg has the goods on the unfortunately named, Sister Mary Schmuck.

Granted, I'm sure poor Sister Schmuck is sick of the jokes, but as someone who's Gross, all I can advise her is to have a little more of a sense of humor about it.

Trump or Palin?

2011-04-13T09:37:00.000-07:00

If forced to make Sophie's choice between Donald Trump or Sarah Palin, I'm not sure which one I'd choose. Maybe (to the chagrin of Anyone But Trump) I'd go with the Donald.

But I have to admit...

I sort of have a guilty desire to watch the Donald get into campaign 2012.

An already circus-like atmosphere of Newt, Palin and Bachmann all trying to out-crazy eachother just got served. The Donald will triumph over all. No, I'm not sure he's quite as crazy as Michelle Bachmann. But he sure as hell can say some crazy stuff.

In honor of Passover

2011-04-12T10:17:00.001-07:00

This is a little early, but it's time to get in the mindset.

Wow -- Matthew McConaughey can act. Sort of.

2011-04-11T12:43:00.000-07:00

Hey schlubfans. Sorry, I know I've been bad. What can I say? I was out of town for work. (I'll post the link when it's published.) And I've been hard at work on the new book. (And the Maxette* takes up my remaining time.)

But here I am.

Coming at you with two new movie reviews.

First up, Lincoln Lawyer, starring the slippery, can't-stand-his-annoying-Texas-accent and can't-act-for-shit Matthew McConaughey.

Well, Matt just put me in my place. Turns out he can act. (At least when the role is right.)

Which doesn't mean the movie is great. But it's a hell of a lot better than the same kind of fare you'd find at your cineplex. Lincoln Lawyer is a legal thriller, and McConaughey plays a savvy but extremely cynical (and, at first, extremely sleazy) hustler/lawyer who operates his practice out of the back of his Lincoln sedan.

It's a good office for him -- it keeps him moving. He ferries between courthouses, police stations and jails as he talks with judges, bailiffs, D.A.s and his clients, all of whom are decidedly crooked.

The first few scenes of McConaughey, as he engages in the nut-cutting of a small time lawyer in the big city -- trying to negotiate his clients out of prison sentences (or severe prison sentences) -- are a marvel. Big, burly, violent men ask McConaughey for his help, and with his glib, shit-eating grin and his East Texas twang, he obliges. Brusque, dissatisfied DAs try to bully him into a plea bargain, he turns them down -- with the smile again.

I think the reason McConaughey works so well in this role is because one sort of always viewed him as slightly sleazy and, well, slightly dumb. McConaughey displays little bits of intelligence and cunning in The Lincoln Lawyer, and it comes as a surprise. Who'd have thought there was a mind at work behind those blond locks and that chiseled exterior. Mick Haller (McConaughey) is, likewise, the type who gets a kick out of being underestimated. He gets a kick out of being a lot smarter than he is given credit for.

And he also gets a kick out of being a man unafraid to travel in sketchy circles.

In a way, The Lincoln Lawyer benefits from low expectations. The story Haller/McConaughey is caught up in is not a whole lot more complicated than one would see in a TV drama: There's a case Haller gets that reawakens the conscience long dormant in the cynic. But the simple plot is executed well. There are a few neat plot twists (as well as some things that don't make much sense) but the script itself is probably a solid B+.

Stunningly, it's McConaughey that kept my attention -- he lifts it up into A-/A territory. (That, and a really killer R&B soundtrack. It really is one of the better soundtracks I've heard in a while.)

But if The Lincoln Lawyer benefitted from lowered expectations, Source Code suffers from raised expectations. The New Yorker liked it. As did my pal Lou Lumenick.

But I found it a little dull.

Part of the reason is because the premise was spoiled by every review I've read. If you've not read any of the reviews, this might be an interesting experiment: Stop reading this blog post. Go see it, and decide for yourself. Because I think knowing the premise kind of killed it for me.

Now stop!

The premise is.... Jake Gyllenhaal plays a man who must go back in time to avert a catastrophic terrorist bombing. He has (through the movie's weird rules) only eight minutes to do this. He can keep going back, even after the bomb blows, but he can't alter the past while he's there. The best he can do is bring back information to prevent the next bombing.

But once you know the movie's rules, it's easy to get bored with every trip back in time. If it was a little more cleverly done (if, say, Christopher Nolan had been assigned a rewrite) it might have worked. But I was ready to leave early.

*I can't call the girlfriend a "schlubette" as I did with girlfriends past (hey, Matthew McConaughey reference!) because she is decidedly not schlubby. In fact, she's jarringly competent and put together. Lord only knows what she's doing with me, but I'm not about to question my good fortune.

Green day

2011-03-24T08:37:00.001-07:00

'Morning, schlubfans.

Today, your humble correspondent has two features in the New York Post.

First up, I did a piece about Jesse and Amanda Glickenhaus, two people living at the Visionaire (an eco-friendly, LEED certified building in Battery Park City) who decided to up their game by designing the apartment all green. From the lights, to the picture frames, to bleach needed to clean up their dog's mess. (Yes, their mutt, Molly, puked while I was there.)

And I have to give props to the Visionaire: I'm highly allergic to dogs and cats (which is actually a fairly big problem -- my lady has a cat) and despite the fact that Molly was shedding, I didn't sneeze once for the more than two hours I was there.

I credit the Visionaire's double-filtered air for that. (So, if you're reading this honey, if you'd like to spend upwards of $3 million on an apartment, we can keep Baron.)

Second up, I have an article about a couple of guys who are using used shipping containers to make houses... in the Hamptons!

Wow

2011-03-18T09:02:00.000-07:00

Better than his Charlie Sheen impression?

Jimmy Fallon is on, baby.

Is the schlub a manchild?

2011-03-17T09:22:00.001-07:00

PSA: Ben Stiller Speaks Out Against Shaken Manchild Syndrome
Eh, sort of.

They're kissing cousins, certainly.

But, then, most single men under the age of 35 are a form of manchild. It really only becomes a problem when you hit 40 and your apartment still looks like a college dorm room and you're single.

A drinker, with a writing problem

2011-03-16T13:08:00.000-07:00

Hey schlubfans!

Check out my travel piece about Dublin in today's NY Post.

And happy St. Pat's!

Southward Ho!

2011-03-10T08:47:00.000-08:00

Check out my video about Mondrian SoHo -- oh, yeah, and the story that goes with it about southern SoHo which is getting nice and fancy!

Also, I wrote a little sidebar about Mondrian's restaurant Imperial No. 9, and quoted its chef, Sam Talbot. Today is a good day for Sam (who, I should add, is incredibly nice): he's also got a pretty rad profile in the Times!

Winning

2011-03-06T10:12:00.001-08:00

This Charlie Sheen impression is pretty uncanny...

I have to admit, I'm of two minds about the whole Charlie Sheen meltdown.

On the one hand, I find it sort of hypnotizing. (As someone at the Post said, "Charlie Sheen is our Egypt.") Celebrity meltdowns are rarely this entertaining. Lindsay Lohan, for example, is more painful to watch than entertaining.

The Mel Gibson meltdown was, at first, extremely fascinating. Only an utter fool could be surprised that in the privacy of his home, Gibson was a barbaric antisemite, racist and misogynist. The fact that every day, more and more pearls were uncovered was great. However, when I actually listened to the tapes of his phone calls -- the rage, the violence, the insanity -- I suddenly wasn't fascinated any more. I was simply disgusted.

At least Charlie Sheen seems to be enjoying this breakdown. At least he's going out with style. At least he's got a pair of porno actresses to keep him company in his Hollywood palaces.

On the other hand...

I would be enjoying this fully if I didn't believe that Sheen is, in fact, a violent man who abuses women. It's an impossible fact to overlook.

The antidote to The King's Speech

2011-03-06T10:02:00.000-08:00

I can't say that I wasn't completely wrong about The Social Network triumphing over The King's Speech...

But I was right about one thing: The King's Speech sucked.

This video from Sir Mike Tyson is a great antidote.

Oh, I wish I was an Oscar Meyer winner...

2011-02-25T09:13:00.000-08:00

Well, it's that time of the year.

The time when Max Gross quietly grits his teeth at the utter rubbish that wins an Academy Award, while far worthier stuff gets the shaft.

And yet....

I sort of love the whole beauty pageant atmosphere... The horse race between spoiled (and often talentless) glamour-pusses... Figuring out just how wrong the Academy is going to get things in their ranking of quality versus dreck.

In short, it's great sport.

And there are Oscar pools to win! (Not to brag, but I've won them before, and I usually place in the top three.)

For this reason, it's important to actually pay attention to the handicappers and conventional wisdom. And to vote with your head -- not your heart.

Nate Siver, who is perhaps the savviest reader of polls in journalism, also does some Oscar handicapping -- but I strongly advise taking Silver's predictions with a grain of salt.

Silver is unquestionably a genius at reading polling information (and correctly modeling it on a computer) but two years ago his model got a number of very important categories wrong. (He predicted Taraji Henson over Penelope Cruz as best supporting actress... and I stupidly listened to him.) And I think the Academy's voting system is a lot more susceptible to whimsy than Silver takes into account.

The Post's Lou Lumenick has his own ranking -- which definitely gets a little more micro than Silver on the categories. (Gruffalo for animated short? OK, Lou. You know better than I do.)

You can also go to intrade (where Colin Firth is given a 94.4 percent chance of winning best actor!) or The Daily Beast, or pretty much any other entertainment web site in the country.

So here's the Gross model on what I think is going to win (based on some of these predictors) and why.

Best Supporting Actress:
There seems to be some division between Melissa Leo (who was really great in The Fighter) versus Hailee Steinfeld in True Grit.

I'm going with Steinfeld. Although it should be noted, this might be a case of wishful thinking, as I think Steinfeld gave the better performance. (Although only slightly.) But I think it will be TG's one major award of the evening, and they will give it to who everyone agrees was the highlight of the film.

Best Supporting Actor:
Christian Bale is a lock. There's some talk about Geoffrey Rush getting it, but I think this is mostly nonsense for two big reasons. (1) Rush has already won for Shine, and (2) The Academy is going to want to give The Fighter a consolation prize.

Best Animated Feature:
Toy Story 3. Duh.

Foreign language film:
Biutiful. Although generally Lou knows better than I do (he picked "In a Better World") -- and I'm very curious to know his reasons -- I think the better known the film, the greater the chance it has to win. And Biutiful (which I admit I haven't seen) is starring Javier Bardem. The director has had a few mainstream Hollywood hits (like 21 Grams and Babel -- two movies I couldn't stand.) I'd say it easily had more viewers and more friends in the industry.

Adapted screenplay:
The Social Network. Both CV and MPG agree. (Although if I were picking the Academy Awards and not for a betting pool, I'd pick Toy Story 3 on that one.)

Original screenplay:
The King's Speech.

I have a confession to make. I haven't seen it yet. I will before the Awards ceremony. (Saturday probably.) But I am not looking forward to it. Everything I've been led to believe tells me that it's the kind of dull, mannered movie I'd hate. But The King's Speech is the favorite to win (by virtually everyone) and so it's unlikely there will be an upset from The Kids Are All Right. (Even though that is the picture I'd give the statue to if I were picking.)

Best Actor:
Colin Firth. I'd prefer to see Jesse Eisenberg get it, but Eisenberg is young. The general reasoning is that he'll have many more chances. Firth didn't get it for A Single Man, and the Academy has a history of making it up to actors next time. (So cheer up Jesse.)

Best Actress:
Natalie Portman. I thought Black Swan was completely ridiculous. However, OK, I accept the fact that everyone and their grandmother thinks this was a harrowing performance. (Whatevs. But I'll just say: Annette Bening deserves it much more.)

Best Director:
David Fincher. This is kind of a hedge (which I'll explain in a second), but, sure, most people are giving Fincher (who has directed some great movies, like Fight Club) the edge over Tom Hooper. I'll buy it.

Best Picture:
The Social Network. This is decidedly not the conventional wisdom. Intrade gives the Kings Speech an 81 percent chance to win best picture. Those are steep odds. And I admit, I'm going out on a limb here (especially having not seen KS yet.) I also admit that while this list is the way I'm voting in my Oscar pool, if SN wins, the chances go down for Fincher winning best director, too. (That's the reason I'm hedging. I'm probably wrong on one of these. But I'd like to maximize my chance to get at least one right than both wrong.)

But here are my reasons:

(1) I think people liked The Social Network more than KS. At least, I didn't hear anybody saying what a good time they had at KS. I did hear that at the SN. And academy voters no doubt feel it's a heady enough movie (which is sort of true) that it's OK to like it and vote for it for best picture.... something they weren't necessarily comfortable with on Avatar.

(2) There have been too many little-movies-that-could that have won the award in recent years, from Slumdog to the Hurt Locker. I think it's time for a well financed studio venture. And while KS has been financially quite successful, SN has earned approximately double the box office. (In fairness it cost much, much more to make than KS.)

(3) Unlike in an election, where people often compromise their favorite candidate with one who has a more realistic chance of winning, few Academy voters are going to vote for KS "because everybody else is." I do think it's slightly worrying that the producers and directors guild voted for KS, but the academy as a whole is bigger than that.

None of these can unfortunately match the fact that KS is the favorite to win by nearly every critic and handicapper. I'm probably wrong. But I sense an upset. In any event, it's going to get my vote on the pool and I'll probably eat crow for all of you on Monday.

Advertisements for myself

2011-02-24T10:54:00.000-08:00

My latest on how to trade up (or down) in real estate. (In an absolute dollar sense, this is a good time to buy.)

Tip number one: Sell your place before you start looking for a new one.

Plugs and kisses

2011-02-22T10:33:00.000-08:00

In a modest attempt to get myself to blog more, I'm going to make this a week of plugging things for my friends. (Calm down, calm down... nothing I'm recommending isn't something I wouldn't read myself.)

First up, I'd like to mention my friend Dvora Meyers' site Unorthodox Gymnastics. (Dvora is a writer, a recovering Orthodox Jew and a gymnastics nut.)

Her article today is about how the Orthodox Union is approaching sex ed through a new web site -- namely, they favor an abstinence approach.

The sex ed stuff is more or less what you'd expect. (Crapola along the lines of, "condoms can break"; "you could have suicidal thoughts after sex"; "men prefer virgins", etc.) But Dvora has an interesting tidbit at the end of the article:

"As much as I mock this site (and believe me, I've only scraped the tip of the iceberg), it is still more than what I was offered in high school, which was nothing. In the sixth grade, we learned about menstruation and there endeth the lesson."

Fascinating.

OK, stay tuned for a plug for my godfather's new web site tomorrow.

Family jewels

2011-02-17T13:20:00.000-08:00

Half way through my "At Home With" Francois Latapie I started getting very nervous...

The stuff that Francois (of the new restaurant Lyon) was telling me was so damn good that I started to get very worried he'd start trying to tell me not to use the stories.

Francois and Suzanne Latapie's apartment is a real treasure trove of amazing goodies -- some illicit, some not. Francois' grandfather is Louis Latapie, and the grandson has at least three or four of his grandfather's works up on the walls. Francois also has a few stolen paintings (read the article), skulls from crypts, and much, much more. It was one of the most fascinating tours I've ever taken of an apartment.

But like most reporters who are not on deadline, I always like to double-check my notes, and I decided to bite the bullet, make sure that I got everything right and risk a confrontation in which he'd say something along the lines of "You can't print that!" (Which leads to an argument where you say, "You never said that before!")

I called Francois up and asked him a few questions about a painting that his grandfather had lifted from a cathedral in Alsace that was firebombed during World War I. "That painting that your grandfather got from the cathedral in Alsace..."

"Yes," Francois said, "it was in Colmar. C-O-L-M-A-R."

I loved this guy. (And his utterly charming wife, Suzanne, and daughter Sophie!) I only hope the French government doesn't read the piece and make him give his art work back!

Viva la revolucion!

2011-02-11T14:27:00.000-08:00

Like everyone else I know, I'm more than a little nervous as to what comes next in Egypt...

But only an utterly heartless person can see the joy of the people throwing off an autocrat and not be extremely proud. Proud not to be an American -- proud to be a human being. Today is a great day. We should all salute the Egyptians who helped make this happen.

Someone I know said, "You don't really think it's going to be a democracy, do you?"

Sadly, no I do not. The sneaking suspicion I have (which is due in part to my there's-no-such-thing-as-good-news Jewish nature) is that the Muslim Brotherhood will step in to fill the power void. Which could tilt Egypt towards two things that I really don't want to see: Sharia law and war with Israel.

But that chapter has not been written yet. I refuse to not honor the Egyptians for doing what was long overdue: Casting off tyranny.

Moreover, not only did the Egyptians rightly refuse to compromise (Mubarak had to step down. Every other ship had sailed.) But they got what they want with such admirable restraint. This revolution has been largely bloodless -- and I'm slightly stunned by this.

In a region where for the last decade or so, Palestinian suicide bombers have been egged on to do their horrific work, well, this is different. This is a change. Dare I say, a big one. And I very much hope the Palestinians are paying close attention to what happened in Cairo for the last 18 days.

We'll all see what happens tomorrow. I'm nervous. But excited, too. Viva!

Everything you always wanted to know about new development* but were afraid to ask

2011-02-04T12:19:00.000-08:00

My latest on the state of new development.

The takeaway:

Banks are still being extremely conservative... but developers are, indeed, starting to gear up for new development.

There are a significant number of new projects being unveiled in the coming weeks/months.

Just don't take Woody Allen on as a patient

2011-02-01T11:47:00.000-08:00

Thrillist reports that there is a new "naked therapist."

"Power through arousal" is the catchy online tag.

Maybe therapy isn't such a bad idea after all.

Eric Cartman's new theme song?

2011-01-23T12:36:00.000-08:00

I'm a little late getting to it, but this is brilliant.

Couple of things:

1) I'm not entirely sure this isn't actually the product of hipsters. (Was it unironically ironic?) I'm not sure. But I could see the argument. (Just like in the great Hipster Olympics video, there was certainly contempt for the hipster, but it was melded with fascination and affection.)

2) I love the "if I want to like Van Halen, I'll fucking like Van Halen line" -- however, I really do hate Van Halen.

Naughty or NIssa?

2011-01-21T13:12:00.000-08:00

Ryan Lizza has a must-read article in this week's New Yorker about the extremely shady background of the new chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Goverment Reform (and car alarm king), Darrell Issa.

You remember Issa -- in addition to being the guy who funded Gray Davis' recall in 2003, he's the congressman who recently told Rush Limbaugh that President Obama's administration was "one of the most corrupt presidencies in modern times." (A claim so absurd that Issa himself started walking it back almost immediately.)

Well, it turns out that in addition to his penchant for demagoguery and impolitic dumbness he's also (probably) a criminal.

There is strong circumstantial evidence that he is a car thief; an arsonist; guilty of insurance fraud; that he fired one of his employees by while pointing a pistol at him (as well as other weapons charges). In a more charitable interpretation, he is just extremely, extremely unlucky -- while also being extremely, extremely lucky. (Isn't it lucky that three weeks before his factory burned to the ground he upped his fire insurance? And managed to take all important and relevant documents out of the building?)

Certainly, Issa would not be the first person in politics who broke a law or two when he was a teenager. But the list of sketchy actions that Issa is said to have committed is long. And it stretches well into his adulthood.

And this is the guy with subpoena power?

Movin' on up?

2011-01-20T12:59:00.000-08:00

My update on the state of the rental market.

The take aways:

Incentives are starting to disappear. Not everywhere. And not all of them. If you're looking for something in a new building you can very easily get a month off (at least). But a lot of those big older buildings have pretty much stopped offering goodies to get the lease signed.

Rents are up. (Sigh.)

They're probably going to be higher. This has been a surprisingly active winter for the rental market... which should make renters a little nervous about waiting until the height of the rental season (June).

If you want something new, your best neighborhoods are probably Midtown West (which still has a lot of new stock) and FiDi.

"Let's go see Hemingway."

2011-01-20T09:21:00.001-08:00

Fascinating article in Vanity Fair about J.D. Salinger excerpted from Kenneth Slawenski's new bio J.D. Salinger: A Life.

Great stuff about his life as a soldier. And I was particularly surprised to learn that Salinger palled around with Ernest Hemingway in Paris during World War II.

...Holden would not approve.

Awesome!

2011-01-14T21:23:00.001-08:00

My Best Friend's Birthday

2011-01-14T12:53:00.000-08:00

Quentin Tarantino's first movie.

Not terrible. Not genius, either. But you can definitely detect Tarantino's sense of humor.

Did I say Asian mothers were the same as Jewish mothers?

2011-01-11T14:59:00.000-08:00

If I did, I have to apologize. Because, according to Amy Chua's article in the Wall Street Journal, I have to go back on that assessment.

Chua's article about Chinese mothering made me sort of fearful for her children. (And, no, it didn't come close to my childhood.)

Included in acceptable behavior (according to Chua, not me) is:

- A willingness to scream when your kids bring home a bad grade and refer to your children as "garbage."

- Ridicule of your child if she is overweight.

- Refusal to allow your children normal things like playdates with other children or sleep-overs.

- Banishment of distractions like TV or videogames.

- Starvation, threats and deprivation of sleep should the child fail to perform.

I'm not exaggerating a word of this. (The last instance is in which Chua's daughter had trouble learning a difficult piano piece. She was kept at the piano until she learned it, not being allowed up for water or bathroom breaks.)

While I have always been wary of criticizing someone else's parenting, if you ask me this is skirting the line to outright abuse. Growing up in the Chua house sounds like growing up in reeducation camp.

Chua is entitled to her opinion, I suppose. She believes fully in the rectitude of this school of parenting. I'm sure her daughters will be at the top of their class at Harvard, and she'll feel vindicated when they get high paying jobs. But to me, she sounds like an ogre. I'll take my mother, who might make a crack about my waistline, but does it while she's cramming pot roast down my throat.

The most expensive burger?

2011-01-11T11:55:00.000-08:00

According to the Wall Street Journal this burger (pictured) at Hubert Keller's new Vegas restaurant goes for a staggering $5,000.

The good news: You get a bottle of 1995 Petrus with it. (But, as the Journal points out, you can buy one sans burger for $2,500.)

Too cute by half

2011-01-10T11:34:00.001-08:00

Apparently, if Ben Popper's article in the Observer is to be believed, the hotties on dating sites are not the ones who are the most sought after...

It's the ones who are cute, but certain guys find unattractive.

It makes sense. From personal experience, I rarely try to chat up the most gorgeous girl at a party. Not that I haven't gone out with some extremely beautiful women, but as a guy on the prowl, I know how important it is to punch your weight. I therefore usually wind up talking to the "undervalued" females (as Popper puts it). These are people I know are cute and attractive, but I also recognize are not univerally seen as such.

Which, ironically enough, makes me think that this provides schlubs on the prowl with an opening: Maybe you should talk to the most beautiful girl in the bar if all her less-than-stunning friends are being monopolized.

Straight Flushing

2011-01-07T08:28:00.000-08:00

Learn all about the condo wave hitting Flushing, Queens in my story in yesterday's NY Post Home section.

This was one of those stories where I couldn't justify doing a massive food roundup video along the way (maybe I could have, but the holidays interfered) but, of course, a fresser like me has much to talk about in the Flushing Chinese food scene.

There are at least two restaurants on Robert Sietsema's favorite-Chinese-restaurants-in-NYC in Flushing that I'm dying to try.

Unfortunately, I rarely try out new places, 'cause I'm wedded to the old ones.

My favorite will always be Spicy and Tasty. But there are many, many other places to get one's Szechuan or Hunan fix on. Definitely try Hunan House. For dumplings, I like White Bear (just make sure that they're open -- I've been shit out of luck plenty of times). And, of course, one shouldn't leave Flushing without getting at least one $1 Peking Duck sandwich at Corner 28. And one shouldn't miss Xi'an Famous Food for noodles -- although it's less essential than the others. (Not because you shouldn't try it, but Xi'an got so popular that they opened another branch in Manhattan. But a Flushing Xi'an expedition is worthwhile, because it is in a sort of seedy food mall with all sorts of delicious spots nearby.)

How long was somebody waiting to use that headline?

2011-01-06T09:00:00.000-08:00

The New Yorker''s Mike Peed has a very interesting piece about the international banana crisis.

Apparently, the Cavendish banana faces a deadly fungus that threatens to wipe out the world banana supply.

So... how long was someone waiting to use the headline "We Have No Bananas"?

Suicide letter full of Simpsons references

2010-12-30T08:32:00.000-08:00

The Onion reports.

Great idea (especially to schlubs like me who looooove the Simpsons) but I'm not sure it was executed well. Should have been studded with more Simpsons references throughout.

2010 food in review

2010-12-29T11:28:00.000-08:00

Well, 2010's almost over. 2011 is nearly here. But this schlub always likes to give his takeaways, in movies, books, politics and food.

Let's start with food first (mostly because everyone -- from Adam Platt to Sam Sifton to Eater -- is starting to post their year-in-review roundups). Tomorrow will be politics. Friday will be books and movies.

Chef/restaurant-wise, I think the big story of the year was Michael White. Not that White hadn't been around for ages, but he opened two new restaurants: Osteria Morini (which is spectacular -- Sam Sifton needs to get his head examined) and Ai Fiori in the new Setai on Fifth Avenue (I haven't sat down for a proper meal, but went to an opening party there. The hors d'oeuvres were quite good. And the room was nice.)

In a way, White was poised to be another Mario Batali. The next gold standard for Italian food in the city, opening restaurants at an extraordinary clip.

But after an extremely successful run with Chris Cannon (which also included Convivio, Alto and Marea) they are parting ways. You always wonder how much these sorts of business partnerships relied on each other, (obviously there's no question White can cook... but can he manage a business?). So it will be interesting to see how the aftermath shakes out.

However (and maybe this has something to do with the gossip in me) I thought this was a more interesting year in food journalism than it was in restaurants or trends. I'm thinking of three stories from the hack biz that I thought were far more interesting than David Chang's Ma Peche or Mario Batali's fourth star at Del Posto:

1) The ambush and outing of the LA Times food critic, S. Irene Virbila.

2) Josh Ozersky's wedding story.

3) The fact that Frank Bruni has become a much more interesting writer now that he's not doing reviews.

Virbila's story happened only about a week or so ago: she was patiently waiting for a table at LA's Red Medicine (40 minutes after her reservation) when she was recognized and thrown out. (Apparently, managing partner Noah Ellis doesn't care for her reviews.) And not only was she thrown out, but Ellis snapped a photo of her and posted it on the internets.

In this day and age, the fact that Virbila took pains to keep her identity a secret is commendable. Ruth Reichl used to go to places in disguise -- but by the time Frank Bruni was writing reviews, all you had to do was type his name into google images to find out what he looked like. There are very few reviewers who still make the effort to conceal what they look like (Robert Sietsema and Adam Platt still do).

Ellis' extraordinarily bullying treatment makes him sound like more than just a thug: He sounds like someone who doesn't have much faith in his restaurant to stand up to critical scrutiny.

Ellis has made the weak defense that Vibrila's harsh reviews have cost good people business. Maybe. But that's sort of like blaming your teacher when you bring home a crappy report card. Yes, your teacher could have passed you. But you are supposed to, you know, learn the material. Eating out costs a lot of money. And Virbila provides an extremely important service: She saves her readers from wasting their time and money on a bad meal. Someone said that she is akin to a consumer advocate -- it's true.

And (aside from the drama and the ghastly behavior it involved) the Vibrila / Ellis dustup raised a real question: Can there be a truly anonymous food critic in this internet saturated day and age?

A good case for why anonymity is important was made in Reichl's book Garlic and Sapphires. Reichl's first big review was of Le Cirque. She visited the place once in disguise and was treated like shit -- kept waiting at the bar; put at a meager table near the kitchen; barely acknowledged or attended to. But when she went as herself, she got the deluxe treatment: Not only was every waiter at her beck and call, but the food improved. The raspberry tarts she ordered had noticeably bigger raspberries.

Readers should know this sort of thing. It's a shame that a shmuck like Ellis not only couldn't recognize this but went out of his way to throw a wrench in it.

Josh Ozersky's story, on the other hand, put the journalist on the defensive.

If you don't know the story, Ozersky (whom I've met a number of times -- although I doubt very much that he remembers me) wrote an "advice" column for Time magazine in which he explained how to have great food at your wedding:

Get it catered by Michael White and Jeffrey Chodorow (amongst others) -- like he did in his own wedding. (Now, why didn't I think of that!)

But it would seem that Ozersky left out a critical piece of information: He didn't pay a dime for this food. (It was supposedly a "wedding gift" from these titans of the industry.) Which made the claim that this was practical advice for an average reader planning their wedding utterly ludicrous. And made one slightly suspicious of the fact that Ozersky praised the food at his wedding to the skies.

Robert Sietsema (whom I also know) called Ozersky on this in an open letter in the Voice and explained, point by point, why this was such a terrible breach of ethics. And, in a way, I don't think I can duplicate what Robert said any better than he did, so read it.

I was a little stunned to hear that in the fallout, Ozersky managed to keep his gig with Time. But the incident does raise a critical question for my fellow journalists: Just how cozy should food writers get to chefs and industry people? Ozersky has managed to get various scoops (sometimes great scoops) over the years because he's buddy-buddy with all these people. But can we ever trust his taste on food when we know that he gets these goodies for free? I think the answer is no.

And, finally, one of the most surprisingly good thing to come out of food journalism: Frank Bruni quitting his gig as chief restaurant reviewer.

Not because he was bad at it. (I've written about his pluses and minuses before.) But leaving criticism has turned him into a much more interesting writer. This story he did about a kosher pizza restaurant and wine bar in Crown Heights is one of the better things the Times printed all year.

And, after discussing this with others, it made me realize just how stale the reviewing form is. It's so rare to find a reviewer who breathes life into a restaurant. (Most critics only shine when they're taking a place to pieces.)

It's good to have you away from the restaurants, Frank!

Harlem gets even tastier!

2010-12-27T12:38:00.001-08:00

A couple of months ago I did a video for the Post's web site about the burgeoning restaurant scene on Frederick Douglass Blvd.

When I reported it, Marcus Samuelsson's (pictured) Red Rooster was in the planning stages, so I couldn't include it (and I don't believe it's on FDB), but now it's here.

And my great friend, Jordana Zizmor of the Huff Post, reports that it's spectacular. (Samuelsson liked Jordana's article enough to link to it on his web site!)

We know where this schlub will be going when the snow melts....

All my favorite crazy people...

2010-12-26T16:36:00.001-08:00

In today's edition of "All My Meshuggena Friends" I'd like to put in a plug for my pal, Karol Markowicz of Alarming News.

Karol -- a poker buddy, and fellow landsman -- was pretty great on the Brian Lehrer show last week. And this lefto schlub has to give her some props... Although I disagree with Karol on 98 percent of everything she says, she holds her own pretty well against Clinton administration aides like Jami Floyd.

And I'll even go Karol one better: When says, for example, that she opposes the DREAM Act because plenty of immigrants go through the proper channels, come here legally, etc. she makes a fair point. And, yes, I agree the DADT vote wasn't a brave one -- or, if it was, it shouldn't have been. (But of course this doesn't stop the Republicans from voting against this stuff from being dead wrong! And the mandate is unconstitutional? Oh please, Karol! Call me when you've repealed medicare, then we'll talk.)

Take a listen.

Max Gross sees movies so you don't have to

2010-12-24T07:59:00.000-08:00

Yes, you know that the holiday season is fully upon us when the movies that might as well have the words "Oscar bait" sprawled across the poster start coming out...

This year's crop has been mixed. But here's my December roundup of what this schlub has been watching -- from best to worst.

Barney's Version. Not without its problems, but this Paul Giamatti picture (taken from a Mordechai Richler novel), is probably the most fun of all the movies I've seen this month. If you've ever seen (or read) The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, you know that Richler can present less-than-sympathetic jerks in a jaunty, carefree way that makes you root for them. Giamatti is the jerk in question, and while he hasn't lost his patented sad-sack quality, you can also see exuberance behind his dark eyes. He plays Barney -- a philanderer, a schlemile, a bundle of cruelties, a possible murderer -- who is also lusty and ravenous for experience. We follow him from his first youthful romances until his final one. Dustin Hoffman has the best role he's had in at least a decade, as Barney's gleefully crude father. Minnie Driver is great as Barney's spoiled second wife. My quibbles with it: Giamatti's third wife (Rosamund Pike) was, I think, miscast. (She is very not Jewish.) Likewise, Barney's best friend, Boogie (Scott Speedman) is incredibly not Jewish. And, finally, Giamatti's rival, Bruce Greenwood, was too pure and earnest to be taken seriously, (or liked). But I can't say I didn't enjoy this flick.

True Grit. I sort of wanted to hate this movie for two reasons. (1) I thought it was a dumb idea to try to replace John Wayne in one of the best roles he's ever had. And (2) my parents hated this movie ("True shit," my father called it,) and I generally trust their aesthetic taste. But I can't say I didn't like this Coen brothers remake. While I agree with my father that Jeff Bridges is no John Wayne, he did a good enough job and I admit this new "True Grit" was very well done. It is a darker western than the kind Hollywood used to churn out in John Wayne's days, but that's not a knock against it.

The story is about a 14 year old girl (Hallie Steinfeld) who must hunt down the killer of her father, and enlists Bridges to do the hunting. He's a one-eyed drunkard. Steinfeld is truly spectacular. She plays this no-nonsense 14 year old with a kind of jarring competence. Schlubs who watch this movie might realize that they'll never be as together and in control as this adolescent. (It's sort of maddening.) "True Grit" is really Steinfeld's movie. Matt Damon does a pretty good job as a Texas Ranger, also on the hunt for her father's killer, and while Bridges certainly doesn't embarrass himself saying the same lines as the Duke, he almost tries to make Rooster Cogburn too dark. I also thought Barry Pepper was great in his five minutes of screen time as Ned Pepper. But overall, it was lively, entertaining and a very solid picture. (I'm planning on re-watching the original. I might have to post again on this film.)

How Do You Know. Can anyone explain why this movie doesn't have a question mark at the end? I thought there had to be some purpose behind it, that it might be some relevant plot point. After all, a movie company doesn't churn out tens of thousands of posters and ads and trailers without spellcheck or grammar-check, right? But after thinking it over, I'm pretty sure it was just an oversight... and the reason is because I think a lot of this movie was sort of carelessly thrown together. How Do You Know is a romcom with Reese Witherspoon as a professional softball player trapped between two guys, an easy-going major league pitcher (Owen Wilson) and an earnest businessman who might be going to jail for fraud (Paul Rudd). What did Paul Rudd do? Nothing. Or so we can believe. The filmmakers don't take the time to really explain what he's being accused of.

Writer-director James L. Brooks (whom I'm a great admirer of) sort of painted himself into a number of corners with this movie. Rudd is faced with an impossible choice -- go to jail for a couple of years, or send the guilty party to jail for the rest of their life. Rudd's either an incredible sucker, or a selfish dick. How can this be resolved? It can't. At least not in the way Brooks set it up. The end feels enormously unsatisfying. Moreover, Paul Rudd (who I also like immensely) tries too hard to be winning. (I felt like cringing on a number of occasions.) He doesn't have the necessary chemistry with Witherspoon to make this movie fly.

Which isn't to say there aren't some good parts. I laughed out loud on several occasions. The dialogue is good and the characters interesting (Witherspoon in particular had the most depth and grit of the bunch). But this is one I'd wait to see until it came on TV.

I Love You, Philip Morris. This is a movie about a cop (Jim Carrey) who realizes that he's (1) gay, (2) patently crooked, (3) in love with Ewan McGregor. Carrey leaves his wife and children, moves to Florida and starts living the life of a con man charging his spending sprees on phony credit cards. (The movie does contain the immortal line: "Being gay is really expensive.") When he goes to jail for his transgressions, he meets and falls madly in love with McGregor, the eponymous Mr. Morris, and when he gets out he goes all out to keep his lover in style. (There was nothing in this movie about the cigarette company -- much to my disappointment.)

Carrey goes all out in this role. And ILYPM is a rarity: an unapologetic, mainstream gay comedy. (There's no message, no great battle, nothing to interrupt its hedonistic ethos.) I wish I liked it more than I did, but the story jumps over the place and began feeling pretty dull by the middle. Although, I will say that it's worth watching for the plot twist at the end, which almost made the whole thing worth while. Almost.

All Good Things. Not so good. The story of Robert Durst, the heir to one of New York greatest real estate families, is a truly fascinating (and truly weird) story. Lord only knows what happened, but some time in the '80s, Durst's wife disappeared. Almost 20 years later, Durst's best friend, Susan Berman (daughter of gangster Davie Berman), was murdered. A year later, Durst turned up in Texas, wearing dresses and living with some old Jewish guy named Morris Black who later turned up dead and dismembered in Galveston Bay. What the hell was Durst wearing dresses for? What was the relationship between him and Black? Was it sexual? Did he have a hand in Susan Berman's murder?

All of these questions would make for an interesting picture.... but for some inexplicable reason, this part of the action comes up in the last 20 minutes or so of Andrew Jarecki's lightly fictionalized version of the Durst story (the name here is "Marks.") Instead, Jarecki made the bizarre decision to focus on the unhappy marriage and the disappearance (read: murder) of Marks' wife. Talk about burying the lede...

No, not Miley Cyrus!

2010-12-22T12:21:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure exactly what to make of this video...

My godpop (the eminent Lewis Grossberger) sent it to me. But it's amusing, so enjoy.

And while we're on the topic of Mr. Assange, check out Bill Hader's impression on SNL. It's moderately funny. (Actually, I think the impression is much funnier than anything Hader actually says. I sort of like the "Y'know that one profile picture [on Facebook] that makes you look thin? It's gone." But that's the only really funny like.)

Not so lame after all...

2010-12-21T16:58:00.001-08:00

Is it me, or are the Democrats kicking serious GOP keister in this lame duck session?

Exhibit A: The tax compromise.

Sure, Dems like me didn't like giving windfalls to Warren Buffett.

But any bill which Jim DeMint hates must have something going for it. (Also, the more I read about it, the more this sounds like an exceedingly clever second stimulus. In which case, my hat's off to you, Mr. President.)

Exhibit B: Don't Ask Don't Tell.

An already historical presidency just upped its game! DADT is dead -- and it was about frickin' time.

This is a major piece of civil rights legislation (possibly the biggest ever tailored to the LGBT community) and the President, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and even the dread Joe Lieberman deserve to take a victory lap. (It doesn't change my contempt for Lieberman... But, yes, my hat is also off to the gentleman from Connecticut.)

Exhibit C: START looks like it's a go.

How the hell did that happen?!

At the beginning of the month Jon Kyl was saying that it was dead, and now it's back?

Of course, START might be the most important thing in this lame duck session. It is essential in terms of keeping loose nuclear material under safe watch and getting Russia to apply diplomatic pressure towards Iran. Killing the treaty looked like sheer partisan lunacy.... and, yet, it looked like that was precisely what would go down.

Well, thank goodness cooler heads prevailed. Hats off to Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton and all the former GOP national security topdogs who lobbied the senate to make this happen.

Exhibit D: 9/11 Responders.

I'm not 100 percent sure if the GOP -- or the pundits for that matter -- realize just how badly they fucked up on this bill.

This is the easiest vote the GOP ever took. Healthcare and benefits for the guys who ran into the World Trade Center on the darkest day our Republic has ever endured to save their fellow Americans. It's difficult to even try to imagine a more no-brainer piece of legislation.

And the GOP held it up because....

Wait, what was the reason again?

Oh, yeah. They weren't sure how to pay for it. After all, their priority was to pass a tax cut for millionaires and billionaires. (Sorry -- I mean "small business owners.")

Now it looks like the responder's bill is back on the table before congress adjourns. And they're saying it will probably pass.

So let me get this straight: The GOP voted against popular legislation (extremely popular in their own base!) that's going to pass anyway, because they thought they had to take care of tax cuts first.

I can't wait to hear how they try to explain this away.

While I generally hate those sorts of "gotcha" moments, no party has so richly earned a slew of attack ads come 2012 that Dems should scream from the top of their lungs: THE REPUBLICANS HATE OUR 9/11 HEROES!

THE REPUBLICANS COULDN'T FIGURE OUT A WAY TO GIVE HEALTHCARE TO 9/11 RESPONDERS ON THE SAME WEEK THAT THEY WERE GIVING BILL GATES AND WARREN BUFFETT MILLIONS OF DOLLARS IN TAX CUTS!

So, finally, my hat's off to you GOP. You played your cards reasonably well in 2009/10. You captured the House and a number of Senate seats. But you gave us a nice little parting gift. Something that I don't believe the public will forget. Merry Xmas!

HO-HO-Hooch!

2010-12-18T08:20:00.000-08:00

One of the good parts about being a journalist is that they'll sometimes send you out to a story to drink your fool head off.

Witness the video above. And the accompanying story.

(Also, credit where credit is due: I admit that New Cork City is a better headline than the one I suggested - Ho ho hooch!)

DEE-lovely!

2010-12-17T12:48:00.000-08:00

Yesterday the Post ran my "At Home With Dee Dozier".

Dee is an extremely talented (and extremely beautiful) folk singer. (Although the folk is infused with more than a little country twanginess.)

She is also absolutely bursting with southern hospitality and sweetness.

When I went to interview her I got stuck on the train for an hour and showed up unforgivably late... But Dee was perfectly understanding and good natured, and even had muffins and coffee!

Moreover, her music is soulful, anguished and lovely. I think she's going to be a big star. You heard it here first.

And you can hear it live, in person, at Joe's Pub on January 5th.

Plugging away....

2010-12-17T12:46:00.000-08:00

I'd like to offer a plug for this video (in which Reason magazine asks several pundits what the greatest threat to free speech is) -- primarily because my pal Robert George is in it.

Great job, Robert!

Weeper of the house

2010-12-14T10:50:00.000-08:00

All right, here are three reasons why John Boehner's recent crying jags are unbearable.

(1) They're extremely vain.

When he cried on election night, he wasn't crying because the GOP had won some sort of great victory or because it was an affirmation of GOP values or some other such nonsense.

"I spent my whole life chasing the American dream," he said, his voice cracking.

So this is all about you, John? This is your moment? Please spare us.

(2) They're kinda phony.

Not that I believe that Boehner is faking it on his 60 Minutes interview. (It looks way too lame to be faked.) Nor do I believe he was faking it when he wept at getting a pro-life award. Or when he watches a child give the pledge of allegiance. (Both true.)

But he's crying about hokum symbols of Americana and religion.

Has Speaker-elect Boehner ever cried at, oh, say actual human misery? When he was shouting "Hell no!" to healthcare reform earlier this year, did he shed any tears over people who are denied insurance coverage? Or who go into bankruptcy because they can't pay their medical bills?

(3) It's so lame.

Didn't anybody ever tell this guy that the term "crybaby" is not a positive thing?

And (this is only partially tongue-in-cheek) are we really entrusting this much power in a guy who can't keep it together for a Lesley Stahl interview?

What. A. Baby.

Let's have a toast...

2010-12-14T07:14:00.000-08:00

My real estate overview of 2010.

Xmas movies not about Xmas

2010-12-13T12:19:00.000-08:00

Slate has a pretty good roundup of alternative Xmas movies. Not straight up Xmas movies like It's a Wonderful Life (which I go back and forth on between thinking it's a complete piece of shlock or a flawed work of genius), but under-the-radar ones. This is when Xmas is almost incidental... but nevertheless a character in the movie. And whose role might be bigger than initially thought.

Like, say, Die Hard.

Michael Agger's analysis of the great Die Hard is an extremely funny one -- I hadn't ever thought of the scummy Euroterrorists as anti-Santa Clauses. And it's probably the best one on the list.

I would also like to point out that in nearly every one of his movies Shane Black makes Xmas a character. (Lethal Weapon, despite the fact that it stars the odious Mel Gibson, should probably be on this list.)

Also, I would add Gremlins (a childhood favorite) and Go! (hipster, ecstasy fueled X-mas.)

Bluffing?

2010-12-09T12:31:00.000-08:00

It's been a rough week for the President. Many are saying President Obama got outplayed in the tax cut negotiations by the GOP. (At least two articles appeared impugning the President's poker playing skills.)

To be honest, I'm not sure.

I admit that my love of the president does not always make me the most sober judge. While I don't think a tax cut for the rich makes any sense, policy-wise, the President was probably right when he said that raising taxes on the vast majority of Americans would have been disastrous.

That was what FDR did in 1937 when he was trying to counter inflation and balance the budget. The result was a serious recession in which unemployment spiked.

Giving a big xmas gift to the wealthy might feel unbearable, but it is more bearable than throwing millions of hard up people off unemployment. Obama also got a big payroll tax cut. These are not insignificant gains.

Yes, we're all going to sigh when we have to pay for all this down the road, but we've got to keep our priorities straight, and making sure nothing disturbs the recovery is the priorty right now.

However, the interesting thing I keep hearing is that this episode might embolden a primary challenge against the President from the left.

To continue the poker metaphor, I think the left is bluffing. But, if they're not bluffing, let me say this:

It would be the best thing that could happen to Obama.

"But Max," I hear you saying, "all the recent one-termers lost because they faced a primary challenge within their own party."

"Yes," I reply, "I see you've been watching plenty of cable news. I'm impressed."

It's true, that George H. W. Bush got a challenge from the right by Pat Buchanan. Jimmy Carter got Ted Kennedy from his left. Gerald Ford was dogged by Ronald Reagan. And these challenges from the right and left wings of their parties certainly sapped support.

But three things:

1) I do not see a credible alternative to Obama in the Democratic Party. (It can't be just that Joe Blow shows up and puts his name on a ballot. There needs to be millions of supporters for this to have an effect.)

2) For better or worse, it's not the fact that Obama is insufficiently left wing that is driving down his poll numbers. If anything, it was his healthcare legislation. The more he gets challenged on the left, the more attractive he looks to the center.

3) The primary challenge wasn't the reason these presidents lost. These presidents got primary challenges because they were doing a shitty job and probably would have lost anyway. If Ted Kennedy hadn't challenged Jimmy Carter, I'm still confident Carter would have still screwed up in the general.

I also think that you're starting to see the seeds of Obama's reelection this week for two other reasons:

a) With the payroll tax cut, Obama got, as David Leonhardt wrote, a "second stimulus." If, as Leonhardt reported here, this shaves a half-point to a point off unemployment, it will be well worth it and redound to his credit in 2012.

b) The GOP is not going to last very long without a major blowup.

You're starting to see it already. They stopped the signing of benefits for 9/11 responders? Seriously?

I actually asked one of my right wing friends how they could possibly do such a thing. He gave me a response which was credible, I suppose, but it doesn't change the fact that this kind of thing makes them look crazy. (Which of course they are.) It's a political loser for them. As are the hundreds of other tricks they're about to try, given the level of wackos that were just elevated to the House in the 112th Congress.

Not that I know anything, but you heard it here first.

Where schlubs have been eating...

2010-12-09T08:42:00.000-08:00

It's Thursday and you know what that means:

Max Gross's weekly restaurant roundup and food update!

(If you didn't know that this was a regular feature, that's OK. I just instituted it. And, besides, I realized I hadn't quite chronicled my food outings in some time.)

1) Wall & Water, the new restaurant in the Andaz Hotel.

I went last night with some friends, and I have to say: Pretty darn good.

If I lived in the Financial District and I didn't want to spend a fortune on BLT every time I left the house, I'm sure I'd think the place was a godsend. Not that the place is cheap, exactly. (The people I was with had a "friends and family" discount that made everything half price.) But you can get a burger for $17 and a beer for $6. Most of the entrees were in the mid-$20 range.

We started with the raw bar with some extremely good crab's legs, a spicy shrimp cocktail (which I didn't care for, but everyone else at my table loved) and oysters on the half shell. It was a really well put together platter of shellfish.

Also for an appetizer, I got a pheasant sausage with roasted apples which was simply delicious.

The mains were also quite good -- one of my friends got an outrageously good mac and cheese. (And this is said by a person -- me -- who doesn't even like mac and cheese!) It was served bubblingly hot in a iron skillet with a browned, cruchy layer on top, like a good baked ziti. It was probably the best of the main dishes. (Although as a word of warning: the portion is not huge. I recommend ordering it as a sidedish to be split amongst the whole table.)

I ordered the snapper (a special) which was perfectly well cooked in a broth with muscles (which I liked slightly less) and another of our diners ordered the short rib which was very tasty.

Finally, the cheese plate and the desserts should not be skipped.

The cheese plate for two was a ridiculous amount of cheese -- and they were all very tasty. One of my fellow diners ordered a "rocky road" dessert which was chocolate mousse studded with nuts and marshmallows. It was excellent. But my apple pie with ice cream was stupendous -- a mini-apple pie (also served in a skillet) with a layer of crystalized sugar on top. Oy vey! It was deeeeelicious!

2) Glaze in Midtown.

This is a teriyaki focused lunch spot that just opened yesterday. I got a peek inside for the press dinner. I went with a friend and ordered pretty much everything.

It ain't bad, either. (This city had a sad lack of good teriyaki options. The place I once frequented near my office, Teriyaki Boy, I stopped going to after it made me ill a few months back.)

The teriyaki sauce is a little too sweet for my taste, but it certainly wasn't bad. But any person going into the restaurant should try the charred pork rib. Fell off the bone. Not too fatty. Nice sauce. (It almost tasted like eating brisket.) That was the big winner.

The chicken and pork gyoza are also worth trying. And the miso soup was terrific. (Avoid the cold soba noodle salad. Meh.)

3) M. Wells might officially trump Balthazar as NYC's best breakfast.

Those were hard words for me to write. I love Balthazar. I think it's one of the best restaurants in the city. And their English breakfast is better than anything I ate during the 6 months I lived in the U.K. But I stopped by M. Wells on Sunday for breakfast and my god. My GOD! I don't know how they did it, but it was by far the best egg-and-sausage mcmuffin I've ever tasted (there was a little drizzle of cheese and green tomatoes, and something else I could quite figure out).

And the week before last, I had a weird eggs benedict -- with roasted root vegetables, that was spiked with bacon -- which was also outrageously good.

If you want to go schlub gazing, this might be my new regular Sunday breakfast spot.

4) Finally, I would like to recommend my editor, Andy Wang's, roundup of Singapore snack spots. It made me hungry. And made me want to travel to the far east.

Elaine Kaufman: No love for the schlubs

2010-12-03T13:34:00.000-08:00

Elaine Kaufman, owner of the eponymous eatery and literary Uptown hangout, Elaine's, died today.

I interviewed her a number of years ago for the Forward ... she did not take a shine to me.

During a lull in our conversation she said to me, "You're not very good at interviewing people, are you?"

Ah well... no hard feelings, Elaine.

A wild and crazy guy?

2010-12-03T06:36:00.000-08:00

Hilarious story in yesterday's NY Times about our old friend Steve Martin --

He sat down for one of those on-stage interviews with Deborah Solomon at the 92nd Street Y and was so boring that the Y decided to give the entire audience a refund!

Apparently, Martin and Solomon spent the entire hour talking about art, and not enough time talking about show biz. (And this didn't improve even though Solomon was handed a note mid-interview from one of the people from the Y requesting more "career" oriented questions.)

Wasting away....

2010-11-29T13:54:00.000-08:00

Greg Easterbrook has a really great article in the New Republic this week (subscription required) about the amount of sheer waste that goes on in the pentagon.

Serious people (and schlubs) should read it.