Bonkers
By Andrew Zimmern
I generally have a sunny disposition, but everything leaves me red with anger these days. How could you not feel that way? Trooper-gate leaves me speechless, and despite the fleeting thought I had last week that things couldn’t get much worse, they really and truly have.
Wall Street rallied yesterday, but there’s no real plan for healing what’s broken. Unless Paul Krugman becomes the Treasury Secretary, I shall remain dyspeptic. There was actually a fluff piece on CNN yesterday about some ninety-somethings in the South reminiscing about dining on squirrel stew and other ‘wild foods’ during the Great Depression. It would be hysterical if it weren’t so poignantly sad and timely.
Everyone I know is hurting, one way or another, from what is cutely nicknamed the ‘credit crunch.’ And with the economy in such bad shape, plenty of businesses, restaurants, and others will not survive. I want to go back to worrying most about who makes the best burger in town, but right now that seems awfully trivial. These are serious times, and our elected officials need to be serious people.
Recent posters to this blog seem to think that the only way to support local restaurants is by ignoring the truth, which is that many restaurants out there are sucking the gas pipe; pretending these restaurants are not hurting doesn’t do anyone any good. Of course I support local eateries. I do it every time I dine out, which is frequently. My job is not to encourage locals to head to restaurants that have empty seats just for the sake of filling them. How ludicrous is that idea? Those who suggest that by not calling for some action in that vein (or not sending people to empty restaurants) I am being unsupportive of local restaurants are bonkers.
Yes, I get evaluated every week on the numbers of viewers who are tuning in to my show; oftentimes I see minute-by-minute numbers, even for re-runs, so I am in the same boat as anyone else selling a product. If there is a market for it, you stay in the game; if not, you are out. Simple. This conversation reminds me of the body count we ran on this site last year. The same point was made by the complainers back then. Why is everyone so afraid to confront the numbers? By posting numbers or by talking about restaurants, good and bad, that are losing business, we are calling attention to anomalies or trends in the industry that allow readers to draw their own conclusions. Then they can act on that info, voting with their feet.
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Tor Westgard, the chef-owner of Town Talk Diner, has sold the restaurant to the Theros Group, the same cats who own Rudolph’s and the St. Clair Broiler. Rest in Peace TTD. It will never be the same. Well, actually, it hasn’t been the same for awhile, but you get the point. The hottest spot in town in 2007 is now gone. What does that tell you?!
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Manny’s is packed, lunch and dinner. The move to the W Hotel seems to be the smartest move of the year for a high-end steak house. It exposes the restaurant to new customers and gives it more out-of-town travelers who can afford its product (W vs. Hyatt).
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Alinea, the cookbook, was spotted locally last week by my wife and I at YUM. I was livid. I had ordered that a year ago and have now seen it in several places despite promises by Achatz et al. that pre-ordering through the restaurant website was the best way to go. If you are in the same boat, don’t despair. We called Alinea, and Grant and team are personally unwrapping and signing all the limited-edition copies and then mailing them out by the end of this week. Whew!
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Collichio was in town last week to meet, greet, and demo his butt off for the Mpls.St.Paul Magazine event at the W Hotel. He is a wonderful guy, and in real life, he is quite the kind gentleman, much different than the character he presents on Top Chef. His new eatery, TOM, opens this fall in NYC and will only be open one night per week. TC will actually cook all the food. That’s what you call a tough table.
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Spotted: I did the TODAY Show today, and while in NYC, I saw some interesting people:
David What’s His Name, the winner of American Idol, eating at Nobu in Manhattan, surrounded by his people, twitching nervously, and looking around the packed room hoping someone would recognize him. No one gave a sh*t.
Maureen McCormick smoking cigarettes outside the stage door to the TODAY Show in between her segments. Her tell-all book is boring: “I did coke, I had sex, blah, blah, blah . . . ” Meeting her was a blast. What can I say? I am part of the Brady Generation.
Josh Brolin . . . really cool guy, much shorter in real life than I imagined he would be. Very swarthy. We chatted about his movie, the new Oliver Stone flick. Brolin is very smart and superbly nice, chatting with fans and friends for an hour in the lobby of 30 Rock.
Donna Mills. . . . I have never seen more makeup on a woman in my life. Knots Landing has been very good to her, I guess, since she had quite the entourage.
Nick Wallenda . . . star power, reality show charisma. This guy has a lot of deals in the works. Look for some new stuff from him on the TV really soon. Think Survivor but with circus school.
© 2008 MSP Communications, Inc. All rights reserved
Please Prof. Zimmern, explain to us what is broken and how you would heal it. As a reality TV host, I expect that you know the exact cure. Of course the Nobel prize winning Economist will help (unless he won the Nobel for economic theory completely unrelated to the current problem..) Oh wait, you only chose that name because he is in the news, and a critic of the Bush administration.
Posted by: Jason on October 14, 2008 at 1:00 PM
I am as loyal an MSNBCer as there is, but I've always found Paul Krugman to be boring when he does Countdown or Rachel Maddow's show. I know they don't hand out Nobel Prizes to idiots, but that doesn't help him on the political talkshow circuit - and neither does that bright orange Princeton backdrop!
I was also in NYC this weekend and couldn't count the number of news "crawlers" covering the story about "Woman calls Obama an Arab at Minnesota rally". Needless to say I did my best to hide the Gopher t-shirt I was wearing! Unbelievable!!
Posted by: Russ on October 14, 2008 at 1:12 PM
AZ is a name dropper to be sure.
I think in this time of cutbacks and mergers that the Travel Channel and the Food Network could merge and shows like Food Detectives and Bizarre Foods could be combined into one show called Bizarre Food Detectives. Of course we would have to insist that Ted Allen, a contributer to an Emmy Award winning show, be selected as the host. Or, maybe they could travel together and exchange recipes and postcards. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
Posted by: Travis on October 14, 2008 at 1:34 PM
Name dropper to be sure. Prof Zimmern is the Sid Hartman of food.
Posted by: Morg on October 14, 2008 at 1:45 PM
AZ,
I could pick up your Alinea cookbook for you. I'm eating there later this week and couldn't be more excited about it.
In regards to the politics, I'm think I'm about done. So many Internet posters type out so many mistruths and distortions of the facts it isn't worth responding. That goes for both sides of the aisle.
But Jason, I'll let you decide if Paul Krugman knew anything about the housing bubble. Check the date as to when Paul first advised it might be an issue:
http://powerlineblog.com/archives/011291.php
I must have missed the uproar when MSP did a feature on Hinderaker.
Posted by: Danny B on October 14, 2008 at 2:14 PM
Or to quote Kathy Griffen from her shows last week, "this country needs Suzie Orman as its Treasury Secretary. A good no nonsense lesbian to whip us into shape."
Posted by: Kelly Red on October 14, 2008 at 3:31 PM
I don't watch your show because I find it boring. Heck - your guest appearance on Bordains show was boring (nice try hiding the fact that you don't drink - not a bad thing - I don't either).
However - but you don't connect your hatred of Palin to the food industry. She is the governor of Alaska - not of Minnesota or any national office. So for gods sake - why do you insist on going down this road time and time again?
Posted by: yoshi on October 14, 2008 at 10:52 PM
I live in Dayton, Ohio - where I'm an alien. Cabbage rolls here reign surpreme, although this is the "upper south" - why do you think some call it Daytucky? Not that there's anything wrong with that . . . (drum roll)
My entire maternal line is Cajun and that is my primary cuisine, although I've never met a cuisine I didn't like. "Cajun Foodways" is one of my personal bibles, while it took me forever to figure out why stewed tomatoes are served in the best Dayton restaurants.
We've got it all here - pickled bologna, Ale-8-One, Esther Price chocolates and Chicken Louie, who is Hungarian by way of the African-American west side. And Mike-Sells potato chips - why are they so popular in southwest Ohio, eastern Indiana and northern Kentucky? "They are delicious!" One of the biggest culinary delights here (but not my favorite) are Mike-Sells dipped in Esther Price chocolate. I'd rather keep 'em separate.
Posted by: Martha Hardcastle on October 14, 2008 at 11:11 PM
I'm not sure how much should be made of the Town Talk Diner's closing. I go there semi-regularly for late-night snacks and drinks and it's always pretty full. On a brunch visit a couple months ago, it was also full. The sale may indicate that Tor Westgard wants to move on rather than that the Minneapolis restaurant scene is dying a horrible death.
This is an alarm that seems to be sounded yearly by people in the foodie world and it begins to wear thin. Talking about which great local restaurants are great and why is more likely to benefit them than all the doom and gloom.
Posted by: Elsa on October 15, 2008 at 7:47 AM
In 2008, Tor Westgaard escaped from Town Talk Diner. All they found of him was a muddy set of prison clothes, a bar of soap, and an old rock-hammer damn near worn down to the nub. I remember thinking it would take a man six hundred years to tunnel through the wall with it. Tor did it in less than five. Oh, Tor loved geology. I imagine it appealed to his meticulous nature. An ice age here, a million years of mountain-building there. Geology is the study of pressure and time. That's all it takes, really. Pressure and time. And a big damn poster. Like I said. In prison, a man'll do most anything to keep his mind occupied. It turns out Tor's favorite hobby was totin' his wall out into the exercise yard a handful at a time... I guess after Tim and Aaron left, Tor decided he'd been here just about long enough.
Tor crawled to freedom through five hundred yards of shit-smelling foulness I can't even imagine. Or maybe I just don't want to. Five hundred yards. That's the length of five football fields. Just shy of half a mile.
Posted by: geoff on October 15, 2008 at 10:24 AM
It's funny that AZ mentions David What's His Name from AI. I was at Porter & Frye 10/3 when AZ walked in and appeared to be scanning the place for faces that recognized him, but with a face that said "don't talk to me because this is my private time." Funny thing is, nobody gave a sh*t at Porter & Frye about AZ.
Posted by: Diner on October 15, 2008 at 10:56 AM
does anyone know if porter and frye gift cirtificate will be accepted at the hotel once they close?
Posted by: trevor on October 15, 2008 at 12:42 PM
Town Talk Diner was the "hottest spot in townin '07"?! Really.
As for ignoring the truth about numbers and restaurants, you really should let Dooley know, since she just wrote that Indio is packed with "black-dressed urbanites on Friday nights." I've been there on a few recent Friday nights and there were about 6 other people in the place. Has she even been there?
Posted by: Kristin on October 15, 2008 at 2:54 PM
Why are you so angry? This is not Minnesota nice. You must be going back to your New York roots. You sound so bitter and cantankerous. Since you brought up the Great Depression I just wanted to qoute my grandmother on the subject "It didn't effect us, we were poor, it only mattered to the rich who had money in the banks." My grandmother was a migrant worker who made the best tamales. Times like these we need some good comfort food.
Posted by: Melinda on October 15, 2008 at 3:06 PM
Cheese is the new black
Posted by: Dee Wayne on October 15, 2008 at 8:21 PM
I think it's funny that in one breath you say times are so bad that debating the best burger in town seems trivial, and in the next breath you're livid because YOU haven't received your copy of the Alinea cookbook. Talk about trivial.
Posted by: ah-ha on October 16, 2008 at 9:28 AM
can we get back to important subjects like who are the top foam driven chefs in town, Az could you put a asterisct next to the resturant/chef who advertise heavily with MSMP so i can adjust my list properly.
Posted by: suzy on October 16, 2008 at 10:17 AM
Did anyone hear the news about confluence? What's the story? Why'd you do it, Mark?
Posted by: simple soldier on October 19, 2008 at 11:05 PM
What a bunch of peevish, spoiled, anonymous little wankers. Making your personal, nasty little jabs almost like the grownups do! Go ahead and disagree with AZ all you want, but if you can't offer something SUBSTANTIVE in return then STFU unless you have the nerve to PUT YOUR NAME ON IT like Andrew does.
Oh. As I am not addressing AZ, but rather you little namecalling, lazy trolls, I will not give you the satisfaction of my real name. Should I wish to address AZ directly, that's another story.
Posted by: Miss Nancy on October 20, 2008 at 3:53 PM
"Andy sucks" - something tells me you didn't really know "Andy" (a name he's never gone by) in NYC back in the 80s when he was supposedly "a fun fat man."
Posted by: crack me up on October 24, 2008 at 9:05 PM