Bit of a random post -- a friend of mine posed this Q: "My friend is having sunday lunch with her dad in nyc in two weeks and wanted a good restaurant suggestion. She is a major foodie and cost is not any issue. Only limitation is ability to make a reservation on short notice. Ideas?"
Thoughts:
"Hm...so in addition to the notice, lunch -- especially Sunday lunches -- are usually a difficult proposition. A lot of the best restaurants don't serve sunday lunch at all (eg Gramercy Tavern, joel robuchon), all the high end fish places tend to be closed the entire day (Masa, Oceana, the Greek fish places, etc), and the Modern and Eleven Madison are closed for the entire day. That being said:
1.Per Se now has an a la carte option that's easier to get into; they also serve Sunday lunch w/their regular prix fixe menu, but I think the regular seating is still hard to get. (The a la carte option is not reservable via Opentable)
2. Telepan would have availability. It would be brunch-ish, albeit much more interesting options than the standard brunch (and they'd be fairly willing to synthetically create some kind of multi-course tasting menu-ish meal).
3.Various places that may not be as formal/high-end, but will have interesting and good food (and one could create a tasting menu of sorts)
-Gramercy Tavern's tavern room
-Casa Mono, where she can multi-course it w/tapas that are fairly value-additive (run by mario battali of Babbo fame)
4.There are various steakhouses that will be open, but the more foodie-ish ones (eg, craftsteak) won't be for sunday lunch. The only one I can think of that will be open/has more value additive options than "big hunks of meat" would be Porter House.
5.Post-lunch, you could send them to chikalicious, which has high-end desserts that can be fairly complex, and definitely multi-courseable. (Since Room 4 Dessert closed, I'd say they're the best/most interesting dessert place that doesn't just drown you in sugar)
More on 1:
At the start of March, one of New York City's priciest restaurant's Masa dropped its menu price
. It's a good time to eat in New York City for less because, as the Wall Street Journal reports,
another of the city's premier dining destinations, Thomas Keller's New York restaurant, Per Se
is introducing an à la carte menu. Since the restaurant opened, Per Se has only offered two multi-course dinner tasting menus at $275 a pop.
The à la carte menu which is served only in the restaurant's lounge, lets customers sample a few of the famed chef's dishes. You don't even have to make a reservation months in advance, you can simply walk in. The menu changes nightly and includes items that are part of the tasting menu served in the dining room. Of course you'll still be spending quite a bit, wine and cocktails start in the $15 to $20 range and most dishes are around $30 to $40."
