Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan

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November 30, 2009 By cheryl

East Side Social Club: Not Quite Monkey Bar Lite


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“Let’s meet here,” I had said, noting an Eater.com post that called the new East Side Social Club “a sleek sexy spot for the Monkey Bar rejects.”

My “been everywhere” friend Bob’s immediate response? “I never get rejected at the Monkey Bar.”

Good point.

Even so, East Side Social Club held some intrigue. Opened by Billy Gilroy (owner of Macao and Employees Only), with celebrity photographer Patrick McMullen as an investor and Devon Gilroy, who’s clocked time at Chanterelle and A Voce, helming the kitchen, the restaurant had generated plenty of buzz well before its doors officially opened last week.

The menu was designed to be Italian, with some modern American dishes with a locavore bent tossed in. And the cocktails, given Papa Gilroy’s other establishments, promised to be interesting.

We had no big complaints about either, really — the price and the ambience, however, were another matter altogether.

If you’re expecting anything like the fashionable, genteel comfort of modern supper clubs like Graydon Carter’s Monkey Bar, you’re going to be a little disappointed.

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Filed Under: Boites, Cocktails, Italian, New York, Restaurants Tagged With: A Voce, Acorn Squash, Beets, Berkshire pork chop, Billy Gilroy, Blood and Sand, Brown butter, Chanterelle, Chanterelle mushrooms. Farro, Cherry Liqueur, Chestnuts, Citrus vinaigrette, Cocktail, Devon Gilroy, East Side Social Club, Employees Only, Gnocchi, Macao, Monkey Bar, Orange Juice, Patrick McMullen, Pistachios, Richard Belzer, Ricotta, Sage, Scotch, Sheep's Milk, Taleggio, Vermouth, Whiskey

June 24, 2009 By cheryl

Shhh … People Are Eating


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Not that I was looking, but I may have found a restaurant that’s even quieter than Chanterelle, a place in New York that was so hushed when I dined there a few years ago that you could probably have heard a toothpick drop.

We’re not quiet folk, my sister and I. So we knew we were in for it when we stepped into L’Ambroisie in Quimper, France, and the place was so silent that you could almost hear the soft shufflings of proprietor Armelle Guyon as she glided from table to table taking orders.

There’s been quite a bit written recently about how noisy U.S. restaurants have gotten — like crowded train stations filled with shouts and clangs, really. However, when it comes to dinner, my quibble tends to be with places that are on the other end of the sound spectrum.

After all, who wants to feel like they’re eating in a stalled elevator sans muzak?

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Filed Under: France, New York, Restaurants, Tales From the Road Tagged With: Armelle Guyon, Cappucino, Chanterelle, France, L'Ambroisie, Lotte, Louvre, Mascarpone, New York, Pistachio, Quimper, Sable, Strawberries, Vannes

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