Carnegie Deli
Is the Carnegie corned beef sandwich shrinking? It's still impressive
and I'm not really complaining, but for the first time I can remember,
I had no trouble getting up for dinner six hours later.
John's Pizza
I'm tired of reading that John's has gone downhill. Perhaps I'm just
less discerning than the average chowhound, but it tastes the same to
me after 40-some years. In my opinion, it's still the best -- best
crust, best mozzarella, best anchovies, and best fennel sausage
anywhere -- truly a thing of beauty.
Mamoun's
Mamoun's (MacDougal & W. 3rd) is also still good, especially that hot
sauce, and the price of a falafel sandwich has increased only by a
factor of four over thirty years. But what happened to the attitude?
I had come to look forward to genuinely nasty service, and now
suddenly they're almost pleasant. Is this a post-9/11 business
strategy?
Avra Estiatorio
We had a Friday night reservation at Milos Estiatorio, but I
scouted the place in the afternoon and found the room to be sterile
and pretentious ("elegant and spacious", if you prefer) and the menu
(not posted, but available by request) unimaginative, except for
pricing. We ended up across town at Avra, which appeared more
interesting and was, I think, a better choice. But I've concluded
that haute Greek is just a bad idea -- an apparent attempt to improve
on the real thing by leaving out the garlic and spice. The result may
be generally unoffensive, but is sadly lacking in character. In this
case, the tarama, skordalia, gigantes, kalamarakia, garides, and
grilled sardines were all pretty tame, though helped along by a few
bottles of retsina. Two vegetable dishes, spanakorizo (rice and
spinach) and horta (steamed wild greens), were tasty, however, as was
the saganaki. The house specialty is grilled fish, very fresh and
expertly prepared, and priced by the pound with the clear intention of
emptying one's wallet. But with all those mezes, two small striped bass
were quite enough to feed a party of six.
Il Mulino
I should have realized, when they granted my request for a table
for six on Saturday night without even asking for a phone number, that
they simply hand out reservations indiscrimately with no intention of
honoring them. With a 10:00 reservation, we were finally seated
sometime after 11:30. The food may be good, but it's hard to tell
after an evening of pretzels and fried zucchini. Our protests were
met with a boastful reference to Zagat's observation that "enormous
popularity can mean 'waiting even with reservations'", which was
apparently taken by the management as approbation rather than
criticism. Anyone for a class action suit?