inflation stricken restaurant Standout chefs are setting aside less time and money for tasting menus — Side Dish has learned that many Big Apple restaurants have abandoned the expensive concept in favor of shareable a la carte options.
Industry insiders say new restaurants aren’t launching tasting menus, and those that already have are “reducing” the price point and the time it takes to enjoy — or endure — them.
“The cost of tasting menus has become very high due to inflation, the cost of ingredients and staffing costs,” restaurant consultant Donnie Evans tells Side Dish.
“People, even wealthy people, talk more openly about the cost of going out to dinner and tasting menus drive up the entire price point.”
Restaurateur Jeff Katz has seen this change firsthand.
Last year, he closed Italian eatery Al Corso, which offered a variety of tasting menu options at the former Del Posto location – despite the talents of renowned chef Melissa Rodriguez earning the restaurant two Michelin stars.
The seven-course tasting menu was priced at $265 per person, plus an additional $165 for wine pairings, while the five-course option was $210, plus an additional $115 for wine.
“We closed El Corso because it wasn’t working.” Katz told Side Dish. “People want to share their food.”
El Corro was not the only casualty of changing attitudes. Central Park South’s upscale Italian eatery Maria’s is ending its lunch and dinner tasting menus in 2022.
Other high-end restaurants such as Eleven Madison Park and Le Bernardin – famous for their tasting menus, which cost $365 and $225, respectively – now offer à la carte options, albeit at the bar, for EMP and Le Bernardin. In the lounge for.
For example. The French mainstay’s lounge menu offers a $48 lobster roll and a reasonably priced salmon entree for $28.
“I personally think tasting menus will become a thing of the past. People don’t want to pay $200 or $250 per person. It seems a little excessive – and when they go out to eat they want more options on what they eat,” Evans said.
Katz and Rodriguez are now collaborating on a new restaurant, Crane Club, which will open next week in the iconic Del Posto space in the shadow of the High Line at 85 Tenth Avenue.
It’s an address Rodriguez knows well.
In 2011, he was hired by Del Posto, where he first worked with Katz, who was the general manager.
The Italian fine-dining restaurant reached cult-like status under chef Mario Batali, until it fell under an avalanche Allegations of sexual harassment and assault Which forced him to exit in 2016.
While Rodriguez declined to talk about working in Batali’s toxic workplace — “It was a long time ago,” she says — she describes her kitchen as a very different place.
“I have a very inclusive workplace and I always have,” she told Side Dish. “Most of my work is mentoring and providing a workplace where people want to stay and come.”
Del Posto closed in 2021. That’s when Rodriguez and Katz — Katz’s former business partner, the late chef James Kent — teamed up and took over the space.
Katz and Rodriguez opened three different restaurants in the cavernous space: El Corso, wood-fired pizza joint Mel’s, and an underground cocktail bar known as Discolo.
Before he first partnered with Tao Group Hospitality to open the Crane Club, Mel was the only one still standing.
“We opened the mail about three years ago. We had a lot of fun with it, and we were often in al corso, bringing things into Mel’s kitchen to cook, so cooking feels like a natural progression. [at Crane Club] It’s more advanced than Mel’s pizza and veggies,” Katz said.
While Crane Club will occupy the same space as El Corso and Del Posto, it will be physically smaller and more intimate. A redesign has reduced the space from 24,000 square feet to about 18,000 square feet. It has 35 tables in the restaurant, 12 seats at the bar and three private rooms for 14 people.
The centerpiece is a live-fired, 12-foot Mibrassa grill, custom designed by Rodriguez, with a menu showcasing grilled vegetables, meats and seafood along with a 1,000-bottle wine list.
Dishes include wood-grilled Dover sole, dry-aged Frenched bone-in filet mignon, as well as grilled, marinated mushrooms, a tableside raw bar service, and pastas like a delicious sfogliatelle with fontina, a white truffle arancini, and Maine uni. Are. A shellfish vinaigrette topped with caviar. Desserts include banana layer cake with guava sorbet and chocolate vienna – based on chef Georgia Vodger’s “freezer aisle favorite.”
The bar program will be overseen by Chris Lemperle, who started Crown Shy and Overstory with Katz
Katz emphasized that the a la carte menu is for sharing.
“Like fashion and music trends, food goes through cycles,” Katz said.
“In New York, the dining public is not particularly interested in the lengthy tasting menus that chefs desire. “People want to eat what they want to eat.”
