Oh, dear...we forgot that we ran out of "Cognac" that night. We notified the host, so he nonchalantly descended to the damp, nitrous basement--pace Edgar Allan Poe and "The Cask of Amontillado"--and pulled together an assortment of bottles. He quickly drained the dregs from every bottle into a decanter, swirled it, and poured the mixture into snifters. Back upstairs in the library, the host announced that the guests were "vairy lucky" as he "vas able to pull a Cognac from the vamily reserve." The gentlemen exchanged glances, took a snifter, smelled, sipped, and graciously commented. His deep voice throbbing with gratitude and honor, Mr. Salinger himself said, "This Cognac is very inviting..."
As was his wont, the host spoke loudly and forcefully of current affairs for about twenty minutes before directing the guests back into the salon for musical entertainment. Seating himself at the bench, he started with something grandiose and Listzian before launching abruptly into a Jerry Herman tune from "Mame" or "Hello, Dolly!" It was better than Liberace. Finishing with a two-handed chord and a heavy foot on the damper pedal, he cried, "Pierre! Your turn!" Taken aback, Mr. Salinger looked around. The other guests egged him on. Eventually he retired his snifter, seated himself at the bench, and played something simple. No late-nineteenth-century arpeggios for him; for the press secretary of the late JFK, only the reassuring precision of a Scarlatti sonatina.
Having scheduled the end of the festivities as tightly as every other part of the evening, the host abruptly announced, "It was pleasure having you all at ___________ this evening." We hurried to fetch the guests' coats regardless of whether they were finished with coffee or not. In hindsight, it seemed--and reasonably--that everyone left as a pack. In their wake, the host and hostess delicately perched themselves on the edge of the tattered antique sofa and assessed the quality and quantity of their evening's symposium. As we turned to finish cleaning up, we wondered what their guests were saying about their own experience of that evening, but perhaps certain mysteries of Georgetown are better left unresolved. In retrospect, it did seem that even Mr. Salinger's poodles were happy to depart into the dark, Washington night...
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
The Mysteries of Georgetown, Part Two
When we extinguished the first candle after the first course—the hosts' preferences for which included tomato aspic garnished with a slice of hard-cooked egg or pate de campagne with a single crouton—one of the things the guests could see less of was how dirty things were at the ____________. We made a habit of bringing dishwashing soap and cleaning everything before we started preparing the meal; there was no range hood, and no housekeeper, and everything had that smeared, dusty quality. The icebox was often frozen shut; once, when a guest asked for more ice for his drink, the host handed us an icepick and said to chip away some of the frost. We began to think that we were working in Schloss Neuschwanstein for Mad Ludwig himself. We know what we thought; what did the guests think?
The second course was always a salad of mixed, undistinguished lettuces with exactly two slices of plum tomato, two long strips of carrot peel, and a sprinkling of capers. The vinaigrette of the house was a saline emulsion of the drained liquid from jars of artichoke hearts, olive oil, and more salt. We figured out that the salt in all the food was meant to keep the "special wine" flowing, and the host continued to press his "family's estate production" on the guests throughout the meal. At a certain level of society, Americans resist excess drinking, at least in public; in private they may be alcoholics (or worse), but have the sense—probably derived from guilt, more than reason—to compartmentalize their overindulgence.
Second course cleared, we extinguished Candle Number Two. The room got even darker. Entrees were often beef tenderloin or pork tenderloin en croute. We served steamed asparagus no matter the season or French carrots drizzled with a sauce made from melted butter and Dundee Brand Orange Marmalade. The night of Mr. Salinger's dinner we served pork. After pulling the entree from the oven, we sliced off a serving and cut in it doggie-bite-sized pieces, put it into the crystal bowls and placed them into the refrigerator to cool. After serving the humans, before refreshing the wine, we pulled the bowls from the refrigerator and walked them to the dining room and placed one on each side of Mr. Salinger's chair where the dogs were waiting.
Throughout the meal, the host directed—no, marshalled—the conversation; he often scheduled—yes, scheduled—toasts and responses, all excessively formal. Yet another candle was extinguished after the entree, then dessert was served. Nine times out of ten it was sabayon in crystal bowls topped with a single strawberry garnish. As we extinguished the final candle, the host announced that they would adjourn to the library for demitasse, "Sherry, and Cognac." In the darkness, the guests had to help each other up and out of the damp room with no light except those from the sideboard candles; it was like a scene from The Poseidon Adventure. In the relative brightness (and safety) of the library, we served coffee. If only the guests knew the sugar in the silver server was from collected sugar packets we'd had to empty; they came from places as far-flung as McDonald's and four-star restaurants...
(soon, the conclusion of "The Mysteries of Georgetown")
The second course was always a salad of mixed, undistinguished lettuces with exactly two slices of plum tomato, two long strips of carrot peel, and a sprinkling of capers. The vinaigrette of the house was a saline emulsion of the drained liquid from jars of artichoke hearts, olive oil, and more salt. We figured out that the salt in all the food was meant to keep the "special wine" flowing, and the host continued to press his "family's estate production" on the guests throughout the meal. At a certain level of society, Americans resist excess drinking, at least in public; in private they may be alcoholics (or worse), but have the sense—probably derived from guilt, more than reason—to compartmentalize their overindulgence.
Second course cleared, we extinguished Candle Number Two. The room got even darker. Entrees were often beef tenderloin or pork tenderloin en croute. We served steamed asparagus no matter the season or French carrots drizzled with a sauce made from melted butter and Dundee Brand Orange Marmalade. The night of Mr. Salinger's dinner we served pork. After pulling the entree from the oven, we sliced off a serving and cut in it doggie-bite-sized pieces, put it into the crystal bowls and placed them into the refrigerator to cool. After serving the humans, before refreshing the wine, we pulled the bowls from the refrigerator and walked them to the dining room and placed one on each side of Mr. Salinger's chair where the dogs were waiting.
Throughout the meal, the host directed—no, marshalled—the conversation; he often scheduled—yes, scheduled—toasts and responses, all excessively formal. Yet another candle was extinguished after the entree, then dessert was served. Nine times out of ten it was sabayon in crystal bowls topped with a single strawberry garnish. As we extinguished the final candle, the host announced that they would adjourn to the library for demitasse, "Sherry, and Cognac." In the darkness, the guests had to help each other up and out of the damp room with no light except those from the sideboard candles; it was like a scene from The Poseidon Adventure. In the relative brightness (and safety) of the library, we served coffee. If only the guests knew the sugar in the silver server was from collected sugar packets we'd had to empty; they came from places as far-flung as McDonald's and four-star restaurants...
(soon, the conclusion of "The Mysteries of Georgetown")
Thursday, January 28, 2010
The Mysteries of Georgetown
"Welcome to the _______. Your name, please?" Though we expected the last guests—the evening's honoree and his wife—protocol still required us to ask. Standing with a pair of French poodles on the steps of a Washington, D.C., townhouse, they stared at us a moment, then gave their names. Taking their coats, we escorted them down the hall and into the main salon. The other guests, as directed—ordered, we might say—had arrived en masse at one minute past seven in the evening; some moments later, the hostess had descended from an upper floor. And the evening's host, Count _____, stood waiting in the crook of the baby Steinway grand to receive his guests of honor. As if posing for a full-length portrait, legs oddly crossed at his ankles, family-crested sword unsheathed at his side and bearing his weight, His Hochgeboren-ness offered a limp hand to the man and woman. And with that, a Dinner in Honor of Mr. Pierre Salinger began.
The point of this story both isn't the late Mr. Salinger. Not entirely. It's the host and hostess, and the manner and style of hospitality at that Georgetown address where, starting in the late Nineties, for about five or six years, we joined the on-call rotation as part of their ongoing, unfixed roster of staff. Of all of the gigs we've had, those at that home are among the most eccentric we've ever known. The inclusion of a pair of French poodles at a formal dinner was, in comparison, rather ordinary. Staged and tightly-controlled down to the minute, the occasions paid tribute to some prominent figure, and the array of personages and personalities who came up those townhouse steps never failed to intrigue us. When they were shown into that main salon, however, with its piano, its fireplace and its French Provincial furniture, their cushions protected by inexpensive teatowels, we wondered: did they, too, stop to consider why the room's impressive art was so formally displayed, complete with Plexiglass cases and identification cards detailing the pieces' provenance? Did they realize that, despite the fineness of the old-fashioned, cut-crystal Champagne cups, the linen napkin around the bottle in the silver bucket hid a product made by the cheapest bulk process? Perhaps, like us, they too were jaded. At a certain level of society, it's possible to see everything.
Then again, it's possible not to. (Which might have been for the best.) Downstairs, the cold, damp, half-basement dining room held eight seats at a rectangular gate leg table. In the corner, a large old wooden easel displayed the hostess's latest painting or sketch. The chairs didn't match, some Chippendale, others French Provincial, some with torn cushions, others with hand-worked needlepoint. Inexpensive bamboo blinds screened the door and windows. We set the table with Royal Doulton chargers, antique sterling, monogrammed napkins, and crystal wine glasses with negligible capacity. The lack of table linen wasn't strange, but the lighting scheme was: no electric fixture, just a single Gorham five-arm rondo candelabra in the center, and on a side table, a pair of single sticks with a foot-long pewter snuffer and a silver pitcher with plastic flowers. Like the chairs, the tapers were of varying colors, heights, and degrees of previous use. We lighted the candles at the beginning of the meal, and once the guests came downstairs and were seated, served the first course and poured the first round of wines. "These vines are from my vamily estate in Chermany," purred the host. The guests nodded, but did any of them know, as with our "Champagne" service, we'd poured Gallo Chablis and Hearty Burgundy into silver-topped decanters for just this purpose? They couldn't see very well through the dim candlelight in that chilly, nitrous room; could they see through their hosts' act? Were they meant to?
And did they know what a challenge seeing across the table would become, period? We cleared the first course, stacked the plates in the kitchen, and as instructed by the host, returned to ceremoniously snuff out one of the five candles. One course, one candle down. Four courses left, and only four candles...
(To be continued)
The point of this story both isn't the late Mr. Salinger. Not entirely. It's the host and hostess, and the manner and style of hospitality at that Georgetown address where, starting in the late Nineties, for about five or six years, we joined the on-call rotation as part of their ongoing, unfixed roster of staff. Of all of the gigs we've had, those at that home are among the most eccentric we've ever known. The inclusion of a pair of French poodles at a formal dinner was, in comparison, rather ordinary. Staged and tightly-controlled down to the minute, the occasions paid tribute to some prominent figure, and the array of personages and personalities who came up those townhouse steps never failed to intrigue us. When they were shown into that main salon, however, with its piano, its fireplace and its French Provincial furniture, their cushions protected by inexpensive teatowels, we wondered: did they, too, stop to consider why the room's impressive art was so formally displayed, complete with Plexiglass cases and identification cards detailing the pieces' provenance? Did they realize that, despite the fineness of the old-fashioned, cut-crystal Champagne cups, the linen napkin around the bottle in the silver bucket hid a product made by the cheapest bulk process? Perhaps, like us, they too were jaded. At a certain level of society, it's possible to see everything.
Then again, it's possible not to. (Which might have been for the best.) Downstairs, the cold, damp, half-basement dining room held eight seats at a rectangular gate leg table. In the corner, a large old wooden easel displayed the hostess's latest painting or sketch. The chairs didn't match, some Chippendale, others French Provincial, some with torn cushions, others with hand-worked needlepoint. Inexpensive bamboo blinds screened the door and windows. We set the table with Royal Doulton chargers, antique sterling, monogrammed napkins, and crystal wine glasses with negligible capacity. The lack of table linen wasn't strange, but the lighting scheme was: no electric fixture, just a single Gorham five-arm rondo candelabra in the center, and on a side table, a pair of single sticks with a foot-long pewter snuffer and a silver pitcher with plastic flowers. Like the chairs, the tapers were of varying colors, heights, and degrees of previous use. We lighted the candles at the beginning of the meal, and once the guests came downstairs and were seated, served the first course and poured the first round of wines. "These vines are from my vamily estate in Chermany," purred the host. The guests nodded, but did any of them know, as with our "Champagne" service, we'd poured Gallo Chablis and Hearty Burgundy into silver-topped decanters for just this purpose? They couldn't see very well through the dim candlelight in that chilly, nitrous room; could they see through their hosts' act? Were they meant to?
And did they know what a challenge seeing across the table would become, period? We cleared the first course, stacked the plates in the kitchen, and as instructed by the host, returned to ceremoniously snuff out one of the five candles. One course, one candle down. Four courses left, and only four candles...
(To be continued)
Monday, January 11, 2010
Ishtar Is Born...
This week's release of Peter Biskind's biography of Warren Beatty reminds us of a story that probably didn't make the pages...
We were working in the downstairs dining room at Babbo on New Year's Day, 2001, when a party of five walked in. During the pre-service briefing, maitre d' John Mainieri hadn't alerted the staff to expect either Beatty or Annette Bening by name, so it may have been as much of a surprise for him as for the rest of the staff and the guests when they showed up out of the blue early in the dinner service with a party of six. They were quickly shown to a table in our section, and we were particularly glad, even grateful, that through a rare and perhaps divinely-sanctioned change of pace, we hadn't made the usual wee-hours, restaurant-employee, booze-besotted run of the night before, and had instead gotten a good, solid rest.
Tony winner Judith Ivey and another couple (producers? old college friends?) were part of the group, which was very low-key and very relaxed. Neither Beatty and Bening were particularly dressed up, but neither were they dressed down. The talk at their table flowed at a steady pace for some time before they picked up the menus. It's always a little odd to watch a star actively reading a menu; the brief, necessary attention and concentration is like seeing them at work, watching them read a script. It's also a little odd to stand there and recite specials and answer questions. There's also the sense that a meal at a restaurant like Babbo, a meal that for many people might be a once-in-a-lifetime event, is for them simply a meal eaten in public rather than the privacy of home. For example, whenever celebrities are provided anything to eat or drink with the compliments of the house, they don't necessarily eat or drink it. With complimentary food, they might take a bite or two before returning to their conversation. But they can be confounding, even capricious. Just when it seems they're done, they'll take yet another bite. As a waiter, you have a communicate with the kitchen constantly, even more than usual, as starting the first course too soon or too late can throw the whole rhythm off. In good houses, there's usually a backwaiter or food runner especially deputized by the chef for communication. And when everything's working like it's supposed to, a restaurant feels like...well, like a talented group of ensemble actors.
Ms. Bening commented that despite the carbs, ordering pasta seemed the right thing to do. Once the order was out of the way, the group settled back into conversation. Bening was more of a listener, but Beatty was intently talkative. His intelligence was palpable, but not dominating. The party ate their main meal as unhurriedly as their amuses-bouches, and afterward picked for an unusually long time at an array of the wonderful desserts of the great Gina DePalma, Babbo's James Beard Award-winning pastry chef. (At one point, worried that the gelato was melting unattractively into the other treats, we asked Beatty if he wanted us to leave the puddled plate alone; somewhat loftily he replied, "I should think so.") When the bill was finally paid (by one of the unknown faces at the table), and the group began to gather their belongings, we mustered the courage to tell Ms. Bening that we saw her back in the mid-Eighties as Lady Macbeth at ACT in San Francisco. "Oh, no!" she moaned. "That was such a terrible production." "But you were very good," we assured her. "You and Henry Woronicz, who played Macduff, were the best things about it." "My gosh," she laughed. "How do you remember that? You must be an actor yourself." No, but we do like the theater...
We particularly remember the table next door. When the stars entered the dining room, the woman at that neighboring table blinked in recognition; while they were being seated, she took advantage of the rustle to lean forward and whisper excitedly to her husband. For the rest of the meal they could barely contain themselves, and we could tell that they were looking for some hairline-fracture opening to say something to Bening, who was closest. Finally their bill gave them their excuse. "Well, look at that," the woman said loudly, pointing at the date. "Oh-one-oh-one-oh-one..." "Well, what do you know?" the man responded. Bening turned. The woman, feigning the casual detachment of a customer filling out a deposit slip in a bank, repeated the sequence of numbers. Bening blinked, then, as comprehension dawned, repeated, "How about that? 'Oh-one-oh-one-oh-one'..." The couple nodded, pulled themselves up and out from their own table, and having obtained the kind of New York souvenir that usually only does come along once-in-a-lifetime, launched themselves into the night and the new year touched by the optimistic but glamorous thrill such an encounter provides.
We were working in the downstairs dining room at Babbo on New Year's Day, 2001, when a party of five walked in. During the pre-service briefing, maitre d' John Mainieri hadn't alerted the staff to expect either Beatty or Annette Bening by name, so it may have been as much of a surprise for him as for the rest of the staff and the guests when they showed up out of the blue early in the dinner service with a party of six. They were quickly shown to a table in our section, and we were particularly glad, even grateful, that through a rare and perhaps divinely-sanctioned change of pace, we hadn't made the usual wee-hours, restaurant-employee, booze-besotted run of the night before, and had instead gotten a good, solid rest.
Tony winner Judith Ivey and another couple (producers? old college friends?) were part of the group, which was very low-key and very relaxed. Neither Beatty and Bening were particularly dressed up, but neither were they dressed down. The talk at their table flowed at a steady pace for some time before they picked up the menus. It's always a little odd to watch a star actively reading a menu; the brief, necessary attention and concentration is like seeing them at work, watching them read a script. It's also a little odd to stand there and recite specials and answer questions. There's also the sense that a meal at a restaurant like Babbo, a meal that for many people might be a once-in-a-lifetime event, is for them simply a meal eaten in public rather than the privacy of home. For example, whenever celebrities are provided anything to eat or drink with the compliments of the house, they don't necessarily eat or drink it. With complimentary food, they might take a bite or two before returning to their conversation. But they can be confounding, even capricious. Just when it seems they're done, they'll take yet another bite. As a waiter, you have a communicate with the kitchen constantly, even more than usual, as starting the first course too soon or too late can throw the whole rhythm off. In good houses, there's usually a backwaiter or food runner especially deputized by the chef for communication. And when everything's working like it's supposed to, a restaurant feels like...well, like a talented group of ensemble actors.
Ms. Bening commented that despite the carbs, ordering pasta seemed the right thing to do. Once the order was out of the way, the group settled back into conversation. Bening was more of a listener, but Beatty was intently talkative. His intelligence was palpable, but not dominating. The party ate their main meal as unhurriedly as their amuses-bouches, and afterward picked for an unusually long time at an array of the wonderful desserts of the great Gina DePalma, Babbo's James Beard Award-winning pastry chef. (At one point, worried that the gelato was melting unattractively into the other treats, we asked Beatty if he wanted us to leave the puddled plate alone; somewhat loftily he replied, "I should think so.") When the bill was finally paid (by one of the unknown faces at the table), and the group began to gather their belongings, we mustered the courage to tell Ms. Bening that we saw her back in the mid-Eighties as Lady Macbeth at ACT in San Francisco. "Oh, no!" she moaned. "That was such a terrible production." "But you were very good," we assured her. "You and Henry Woronicz, who played Macduff, were the best things about it." "My gosh," she laughed. "How do you remember that? You must be an actor yourself." No, but we do like the theater...
We particularly remember the table next door. When the stars entered the dining room, the woman at that neighboring table blinked in recognition; while they were being seated, she took advantage of the rustle to lean forward and whisper excitedly to her husband. For the rest of the meal they could barely contain themselves, and we could tell that they were looking for some hairline-fracture opening to say something to Bening, who was closest. Finally their bill gave them their excuse. "Well, look at that," the woman said loudly, pointing at the date. "Oh-one-oh-one-oh-one..." "Well, what do you know?" the man responded. Bening turned. The woman, feigning the casual detachment of a customer filling out a deposit slip in a bank, repeated the sequence of numbers. Bening blinked, then, as comprehension dawned, repeated, "How about that? 'Oh-one-oh-one-oh-one'..." The couple nodded, pulled themselves up and out from their own table, and having obtained the kind of New York souvenir that usually only does come along once-in-a-lifetime, launched themselves into the night and the new year touched by the optimistic but glamorous thrill such an encounter provides.
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Farewell, 2009...
Gotham Bar and Grill occupies an enormous space on East Twelfth Street in what is technically Greenwich Village. Not the fourth-floor walkup West, but the lower Fifth Avenue Village. Twenty-five years after its opening, a veritable millennium in restaurant years, Gotham retains a singular New York City sense of energy and spectacle. The high ceilings, the parachute-fabric-swathed lighting, the floor-to-ceiling windows--day or night it feels exciting to be there. Working at Gotham back in the Nineties, we encountered a lot of boldface names, although the restaurant rarely closed for a Page Six-type event. We were likelier to see Dustin Hoffman stroll in incognito like Ratso Rizzo in a rumpled trench to see if we were still serving lunch, or Robert Redford unassumingly making his way around the perimeter of the dining room to a quiet table in the back.
We do remember one red-carpet event from our days and nights on Gotham's checkerboard parquet: the Spring 1998 premiere party for the movie The Object of My Affection, directed by Nicholas Hytner and starring Jennifer Aniston and Paul Rudd. The movie, based on Stephen McCauley's 1987 novel about a pregnant women who becomes attracted to her gay best friend, pulled together quite a number of theretofore underappreciated talents: Hytner was fresh off his smash Lincoln Center Theater Carousel revival, and Rudd was skimming the first crest of a career on the rise. As for Aniston, in addition to Friends, still high atop the ratings, she'd recently scored a singular personal (and professional) coup: dating Brad Pitt.
Pitt didn't attend the premiere party, but there were the prinicipals and plenty of others to note. Bret Easton Ellis, an early arrival, made a beeline for the food. Janeane Garofalo jumped whenever we proffered our lighted Zippo for her frequent cigarettes. Amy Irving asked us not to poke her with the serving utensils, and the model Hoyt Richards looked surprised when addressed by name. As for the stars, we didn't see Mr. Rudd, but during hors d'oeuvre passage in the rear dining room, we noted Miss Aniston's near-empty martini glass, and glided over to ask if we could get her another. "Yes," she said, pausing Rachel-style to drain the contents. "A Cosmopolitan. But..." --she raised the index finger that had been wagged so often at Ross (and Joey and Chandler)--"...with olives." She smiled her crooked half-smile. "I know. You probably think I'm weird." Not at all, we replied, smiling in an understanding way. A girl who drank Cosmopolitans with olives? Way to go, Brad. We got your girl's back...
We remember this event not just because of the rare conjunction of so many celebs in the Gotham's loft-like space, but because the crowd was unexpectedly loose and easy-going. With not a little sadness, we particularly remember one late arrival to the party. She showed up around the time the DJ put on an uptempo remix of that season's smash single, Andrea Bocelli's Con Te Partiro. An actress from a movie we loved and will always love, Brittany Murphy grabbed us by the wrist as we were passing with an open magnum of Veuve Clicquot and pulled us to the center of the dance area. She threw down a few good moves, so we threw caution to the wind, passed the magnum to a backwaiter, and joined her for a scant but unforgettable moment during which we became an even-bigger fan than seemed possible by her now-legendary performance in Clueless. We know that few line readings will ever match up to the razor-sharp snap! in her comeback to Alicia Silverstone, "You're a virgin who can't drive..." We were particularly intrigued by online rumors linking her to an impending adaptation of D.M. Thomas's novel The White Hotel. Sadly, suddenly, we are now left, like others, wondering.
We'd like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the many bright spirits we said goodbye to in 2009. May they rest in peace. And to the rest of us, best wishes for 2010.
We do remember one red-carpet event from our days and nights on Gotham's checkerboard parquet: the Spring 1998 premiere party for the movie The Object of My Affection, directed by Nicholas Hytner and starring Jennifer Aniston and Paul Rudd. The movie, based on Stephen McCauley's 1987 novel about a pregnant women who becomes attracted to her gay best friend, pulled together quite a number of theretofore underappreciated talents: Hytner was fresh off his smash Lincoln Center Theater Carousel revival, and Rudd was skimming the first crest of a career on the rise. As for Aniston, in addition to Friends, still high atop the ratings, she'd recently scored a singular personal (and professional) coup: dating Brad Pitt.
Pitt didn't attend the premiere party, but there were the prinicipals and plenty of others to note. Bret Easton Ellis, an early arrival, made a beeline for the food. Janeane Garofalo jumped whenever we proffered our lighted Zippo for her frequent cigarettes. Amy Irving asked us not to poke her with the serving utensils, and the model Hoyt Richards looked surprised when addressed by name. As for the stars, we didn't see Mr. Rudd, but during hors d'oeuvre passage in the rear dining room, we noted Miss Aniston's near-empty martini glass, and glided over to ask if we could get her another. "Yes," she said, pausing Rachel-style to drain the contents. "A Cosmopolitan. But..." --she raised the index finger that had been wagged so often at Ross (and Joey and Chandler)--"...with olives." She smiled her crooked half-smile. "I know. You probably think I'm weird." Not at all, we replied, smiling in an understanding way. A girl who drank Cosmopolitans with olives? Way to go, Brad. We got your girl's back...
We remember this event not just because of the rare conjunction of so many celebs in the Gotham's loft-like space, but because the crowd was unexpectedly loose and easy-going. With not a little sadness, we particularly remember one late arrival to the party. She showed up around the time the DJ put on an uptempo remix of that season's smash single, Andrea Bocelli's Con Te Partiro. An actress from a movie we loved and will always love, Brittany Murphy grabbed us by the wrist as we were passing with an open magnum of Veuve Clicquot and pulled us to the center of the dance area. She threw down a few good moves, so we threw caution to the wind, passed the magnum to a backwaiter, and joined her for a scant but unforgettable moment during which we became an even-bigger fan than seemed possible by her now-legendary performance in Clueless. We know that few line readings will ever match up to the razor-sharp snap! in her comeback to Alicia Silverstone, "You're a virgin who can't drive..." We were particularly intrigued by online rumors linking her to an impending adaptation of D.M. Thomas's novel The White Hotel. Sadly, suddenly, we are now left, like others, wondering.
We'd like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the many bright spirits we said goodbye to in 2009. May they rest in peace. And to the rest of us, best wishes for 2010.
Monday, December 14, 2009
We Wish You A Merry FLOTUS...
A block off Dupont Circle at the corner of New Hampshire Street Avenue and Q Street sits the Women's National Democratic Club, a late-19th century Victorian building with Arts-and-Crafts touches. The Club, founded in 1922, is an historic D.C. venue for Democratic women that has broadened its affiliation over the decades to all genders, if not all parties. In 1994, as White House Chef on travel, we were responsible for a medium-high profile holiday event for several hundred-plus guests: the Christmas tea of then-First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Through the First Lady's sizeable staff, we began planning a month ahead of the event, which was scheduled for 4:00 p.m. on a December weekday. The main menu included traditional tea sandwiches such as cucumber on white bread and smoked salmon on rye, as well as savory profiteroles filled with chicken or egg salad; beverages included homemade fruit punch, as well as coffee and tea service. Pastries were prepared by the White House pastry chef. One of our significant responsibilities was making a gingerbread model of the White House. We were given plans for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue that allowed us to construct--and we do mean construct--a copy to scale that was about three-by-four feet. Ten days prior, the First Lady's chief of staff delivered a final guest count of 250 to us and to the Secret Service. In the meantime, we spent about a week building the gingerbread version of the White House in the club's kitchen; getting it to the display area was going to be another substantial undertaking.
Presidential- and First-Lady-level social events typically require a two-hour window of readiness on either side. The reason for the window on the "far" side of the scheduled time is the need for flexibility in such public figures' hour-by-hour schedules; we never knew what political urgency might necessitate the rare speeding-up or far more common slowing-down. Either case always required keeping foods at proper temperatures much, much longer than necessary--so long that the trick was planning and preparing suitable menus while maximizing flavor and texture. Fortunately, the First Lady's Christmas tea menu included foods served at room temperature.
The two-hour window on the "near" side was necessary for the Secret Service to come through the venue with a detail team, including search dogs, for their security sweep, and then "shut down" the required "perimeter". All guests, having already provided personal information for pre-screening purposes, began arriving an hour ahead of time in order to go through magnetometers. Once through, they waited for the First Lady's arrival. And waited. And waited. We weren't allowed to serve so much as a crumpet until she got there, which made for an awkward hour of social business indeed.
FLOTUS arrived by motorcade, accompanied by her sizeable entourage of staff, security, press corps, and other handlers. Once inside the room, she and her staff maneuvered strictly and entirely within an enclosed area that permitted both access to and protection from the guests. While Mrs. Clinton had access to all 250 guests, her staff had access to on-site briefs about each one. A pre-selected, pre-security-screened waiter from the club's staff remained at hand to serve the First Lady on the say-so of a staff member who shadowed her for just such purposes; he brought the occasional and somewhat obligatory cup of punch or tea sandwich to the First Lady's side. In all photos of such events, the ropes and stanchions defining this area are cropped out; at a state dinner like the recent and now-notorious one for the Indian prime minister, they are considered inappropriate.
It took about an hour for FLOTUS to make the circuit of the entire room. Once all the guests were acknowledged, the First Lady, still within the cordon, stepped to a podium in the vicinity of the Gingerbread White House to thank all the guests for their support of the Democratic Party. Mrs. Clinton was brought through the kitchen where, as was her custom, she personally thanked us and the staff; we always appreciated this touch of class.
Then she and her team exited, as usual, through the venue's rear entrance, going back through the guests being out of the question. The guests remained in the reception area (typically, guests for presidential-level functions are held from exiting until the motorcade has cleared the secured area) and departed within a half-hour or so of the First Lady's exit. What no one, not the First Lady, not her various staff members, and not one of the guests realized was that, while about a half-dozen people were in the process of moving the Gingerbread White House from the kitchen to the display area the morning of the event, the two east columns of the South Portico crumbled, resulting in the collapse of the entire portico. We finished moving the whole thing into place, however, and for the rest of the morning two chefs repaired the structure with Styrofoam and frosting. The Gingerbread White House remained at the club for the rest of the month. If such a confection is being assembled for the Obamas this year, we can't help wondering if a gingerbread version of Tariq and Michaela Salahi are positioned just outside that South Portico and are waiting to get in...
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Cubanismo!
The Cuban artist Carlos Estévez believes “that works of art...are men’s supreme effort to conquer the universe.” Mr. Estévez, who was born and educated in Havana and still works and lives there, has a show up at the University of Buffalo Art Gallery called “Images of the Thought”. Earlier this month, we had the privilege of catering his opening reception.
The reception brought 200 people to the gallery, which is on the Main Floor of the UB Center for the Arts. As the guests arrived at 5, Mr. Estévez went through the galleries and briefly explained each work of art. He works in a wide array of mediums, from drawings to ceramics to painting to installation art. He has developed a distinctive visual lexicon that owes something to primitive mythology and cosmology as much as 19th and 20th century science. Human figures are prominently featured in his work; from a distance his canvasses, which have a somewhat neutral palette, resemble old-fashioned medical charts, like those used by palm readers or phrenologists. From mid-range to up close, the details in his work have the whimsy of Cornell, as well as the mandala abstraction of Kandinsky and Brazilian artist Beatriz Milhazes.
After Mr. Estévez finished explaining the exhibition, we started serving a buffet of Cuban specialties. We offered homemade beef empanadas, grilled eggplant on skewers, and plantain chips with mojo sauce, which is a light-textured, spicy citrus dressing, like a vinaigrette, that is common throughout the Caribbean (and allegedly originated in the Canary Islands). We made miniature version of the traditional Cuban sandwich with roasted pork loin, ham, mustard, and dill pickles grilled between bread. Lacking the necessary plancha that gives the sandwich its characteristic, panini-like flatness, we used a grill pan and weighted the sandwiches down under a baking sheet with a heavy, water-filled pot. Hundreds of guava-filled pastellitos were assembled and baked in advance by hand, and we fried up an enormous batch of savory, crunchy bacalaitos, a salt cod fritter. Without access to a good Cuban beer, we poured Corona and white wine and other soft drinks. We were pleased when the artist and many other commented on how authentic the food was; a Cuban émigré even mentioned that the bacalaitos were as good as she or her mother could have made.
“Images of the Thought” is up at the UB Art Gallery, on the UB campus in East Amherst, until mid-February 2010.
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