A Night of Terror!
I had to eat dinner last week at a restaurant which had won a Wine Spectator Award for Excellence!

The Award for Excellence is your guarantee:
  • The restaurant will have lots of smart-looking diners wearing lots of clothing that was recently sent to their dry cleaners
  • The dishes will be terribly complicated and you will feel a sense of inadequacy when you read the menu and have absolutely no idea what you will be putting into your mouth.
  • There is an army of personnel to set-up, clean, serve, deserve and take care of you.
  • They will ask you if you have any questions before taking your order.
  • They will stop at your table during the meal and ask how things are going, as if you are performing brain surgery.
  • They will call your main dish an entrée, even though everyone knows that the word entrée is the beginning of a meal, not the main course.
  • Each dish will be a battleground of different flavors, spices and preparations tending on the sweet side.
  • There are lots of "cool" cocktails....cocktails are in fashion these days.
  • There will be a voluminous wine list which doesn't necessary work with the restaurant's cuisine, but which has all the key recognizable names that get written about in the The Wine Press.
  • Grower Champagnes Rock....as do DP and several other of the Grandes Marques
  • The California list has at least one Marcassin even though the sommelier can't stand the wine
  • There is also a Bryant Family, Aruajo and Colgin, again wines the sommelier wouldn't be caught dead drinking
  • Lastly, as night follows day, the dessert wine list always includes a Muscat de Beaumes des Venise from Domaine Durban!

Of course, the most incredible thing about the experience is the Domaine Durban Muscat. Hat's off to the Leydier family for their total world domination of dessert menus! I don't know if anyone ever orders the wine, but it is certainly a decent enough wine and the fitting end to a pleasurable evening.

In contrast, eating delicious pork preparations at Rue Cler in North Carolina ten days ago was a truly refreshing and delicious experience. I walked around the restaurant and could not find a single person wearing dry cleaned clothing. In North Carolina, they still use water.

And, I can't wait to get to France and eat some bécasses at The First Annual Louis/Dressner Paulée des Vins de Loire to be held at the mysterious Site de la Cantrie in St Fiacre.

My fear of mass dry cleaning and Wine Spectator Awards of Excellence has dramatically increased my debt to Zipcar, as I find that I am irresistibly drawn to Brooklyn when I want to dine out.

Despite the evening's terror, we dined with a charming young couple who are fleeing New York to move to Portland, Oregon. They hope to live as eternal graduate students under the fertile Wilamette Valley soil. They are disgusted by how New York has turned out. We had a great time with them and are sorry they are leaving our grand city.
- Joe Dressner 1-29-2008 2:34 am
back to The Wine Importer

Too cool for school.
- anonymous (guest) 1-29-2008 3:21 am


I ordered brains, and was just making my first incision when the wait-PERSON appeared and asked how "it" was going. As the brains fell into my lap I said; " do you have any Araujo? This Aruajo just doesn't seem quite right!"
- anonymous (guest) 1-29-2008 4:35 am


Did they say "absolutely"?

Did they ask if you were still working on that?

Did you punch them?
- anonymous (guest) 1-29-2008 5:14 am


I behaved myself and showed restraint.
- Joe Dressner 1-29-2008 8:08 am


durban label is great
- anonymous (guest) 1-29-2008 10:14 am


We would all move to Portland if we knew what was good for us. But Brooklyn is a good start!
- anonymous (guest) 1-29-2008 12:19 pm


I can never stop at one bécasses. Three is sooo much better.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Xmnl_G5R3Y&feature=related
- anonymous (guest) 1-29-2008 2:55 pm


Isn't the Award of Excellence the one you get just by paying the big fee?
- anonymous (guest) 1-29-2008 3:07 pm


No, you have to earn the Award!
- Joe Dressner 1-29-2008 3:19 pm


Wish the young couple well as they leave NY for America. They may de disgusted with what New York has become, but have you seen the rest of the country. Makes me shudder!
- anonymous (guest) 1-31-2008 10:55 am


A Night of Terror! Wasn't Groucho Marx in that?
- anonymous (guest) 1-31-2008 2:00 pm


What are your favorite places to eat in Brooklyn? I'm having trouble getting excited about any restaurants other than Vietnamese places in Chinatown these days. Everything about most restaurants, from wine to food to service, is just so annoying.

And who is this couple and how do I get in touch? BrooklynLady and and I are almost out the door ourselves, and we are born and bred here.

-Brooklynguy
- anonymous (guest) 2-05-2008 10:25 pm


We have reached the maximum number of people allowed to live in Portland. I think the gates are closed, better luck next time! Things are still somewhat more affordable here than other West Coast locales. I hear Salem, Oregon is lovely...
- anonymous (guest) 2-07-2008 5:38 pm




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