Remember Cello? Ten Years Ago

[Pink Pig Time Machine by Wilfrid:  January 16, 2012]

Cello.  There's a New York restaurant story.  Hidden behind a heavy wooden door on East 77th Street, it had become in the space of a couple of years a highly respected gastronomic temple of the pescatarian variety, helmed by a respected young chef, Laurent Tourondel.

Not long after I ate there, it abruptly closed, amidst rumors of collapse of financial support.  Tourondel, after a year away, set about establishing himself as the name behind a min-chain of steak, fish and burger restaurants.

It was if he had determined never to have the carpet swept from under his feet again.

I dined at Cello ten years ago, and everything was excellent with the exception of a captain with the habit of gazing around the room while speaking to you.

Smoked haddock crouton

Breadcrumbed diver scallops, mushroom ravioli, foie gras foam

Ahi wrapped in pancetta, foie gras medallions, ginger sauce, garlic potatoes

Livarot, Montbriac, Comté, Membrillo

Peanut brittle ice cream

Beignets, mignardises, etc

Pink Champagne, a white Meursault from Drouhin, Banyuls to finish.  This was luxury dining of a kind rarely now seen below the Times four-star level (Cello had three stars when it closed).

A lively week altogether.  I saw the splendid production of Clare Booth Luce's "The Women" at the Americann Airlines Theater with Cynthia Nixon and Jennifer Tilly.  I stopped by the tiny Malaysia Restaurant in an alley of the Bowery for their fine Hainanese chicken.  I cooked cailles vendangeuse - quails with grapes - and served them with a 1990 Nuits-St-Georges.

I also made it to a fairly new restaurant from Daniel Boulud, dB Bistro Moderne, where I ate the already famous burger stuffed with short ribs, foie gras and black truffles, before finishing my evening at Don't Tell Mama, that enduring piano bar on Restaurant Row.

Then it started lightly snowing.