What is Fine Dining, and why you should care about it

Welcome to my blog! Thank you for coming by to read. I never thought I'd have one of these because I'm not the journalistic type, but I figured it was a cool way to both document my personal culinary adventures around New York and provide friends and family back home with a link to receive updates on my life alone (sort of) in the Big Apple.

I figured what better way to start things than by explaining what is sort of a mystery to many back home--fine dining. What is it exactly, what's its place in society, and why should it matter to you? 

First, a Bit of History

The United States only has a few cities at the forefront of gastronomy: New York being #1, followed by San Francisco/Napa, Chicago, and you can now include Las Vegas and the Upper Mid-West area of Oregon and Washington. Notice I didn't include Miami, which is still catching up. Having lived in Miami over 20 years, I can easily say the restaurateurs and the city's people are more into trends and design than they are into food. In other words, you're more likely to visit a place in Miami because it has flashy decor and a nice view and arrive to find the same dishes as you would at any other place in town (crab legs, snapper with mangos, corn fed filet mignon, for example). The other driving force in Miami is steakhouses, such as Morton's, Capital Grille, Ruth Chris, etc. Although they have white linen and fancy waiters, they are only serving you steak and lobster. This is not fine dining--you can find filet mignon anywhere in the world. This is simply heating up a piece of meat--it involves no creativity or real cooking.

Fine dining in America first emerged by a lady named Alice Waters back in the 1970's at a restaurant in California called Chez Panisse. Alice found amazing "haute cuisine" (high cooking) in France during her travels and decided she could recreate this food in California due to the similar climatic conditions, which ultimately yielded amazing crops and produce. After only a few short years, Chez Panisse was revolutionizing the food world. Soon after, places such as Spago (Wolfgang Puck) and Stars (Jeremiah Tower) opened in California, further revolutionizing cuisine. 

In the 1980's, the trend really picked up in New York, Chicago, and D.C. You had places such as Le Cirque, the Quilted Giraffe, Le Bernardin, Windows on the World, and Gotham Bar and Grill opening in New York, Charlie Trotter's and Frontera Grill in Chicago, and The Watergate by Jean Louis Palladin in D.C. All of these places were headed by young, hungry chefs with French training or French origin. Unfortunately, along with many of these came the stigmas of elitism and haughty, uptight service. 

In the mid 1980's, this stigma was broken by a gentleman named Danny Meyer who opened Union Square Cafe in New York City. He offered fine cuisine and wines, but with warm hospitality and smiling service. Since then, restaurateurs of every level in the USA have realized a smile is just as important as the proper decanting of a bottle of wine.

Miami saw its own slew of haute cuisine in the late 1980's and early 1990's as well. Most known are the "Mango Gang," a group of chefs who introduced tropical flavors to haute cuisine. These were most notably Norman Van Aken (Norman's), Mark Militello (Mark's), Douglas Rodriguez (Yuca), and Allen Susser (Allen's). Several of these were in Coral Gables, but have since closed. Each chef is active in some form, though.

What do the Stars Mean???

There are several important rating guides that restaurateurs and foodies take seriously.

The first is the Michelin Guide. The Michelin Tire company created this travel document to rate restaurants from 1 to 3 stars in France. It was a handy tool for people traveling the countryside to know if a restaurant was worth a stop as they rode around in their new tires. Getting just 1 star is a big deal, and there are only 50-odd restaurants in the world with 3 stars. The Michelin guide started in France, made its way around Europe, and is currently featured in New York, California, and Las Vegas. It will soon hit Chicago.

Two other notable ones are "Relais et Chateaux" and "Relais Gourmand." These are two separate "clubs" of sort of French origin. They are highly selective associations that allow only the best restaurants and hotels around the world to carry their name by their door. They do not rank. They only invite you to their association if you prove you're good.

Finally you have the New York Times. Every Wednesday, the NY Times food critic will put out reviews on the restaurant he/she has recently visited. They get 0 to 4 stars. There are currently only six places in NY with 4 stars. Dining at a 4 star place is about equivalent to a Michelin 3 star, or Relais et Chateaux. A rating by the NY Times can literally make or break a new restaurant. A bad review means you will soon close, whereas a good review means you hit the jackpot.

So, Finally, What is Fine Dining???

Fine dining means to take fresh, organically grown ingredients, that are in season and cook them with incredible precision. They are then put together in creative ways to blend and contrast flavors and textures in your mouth in ways you thought unimaginable. Due to the high cost of these ingredients and the labor to prepare them, they will be expensive to the end buyer. Consequently, if you are paying top dollar for your food, you will want top service to go along with it. 

It is of upmost importance that the ingredients meet all the criteria I mentioned: fresh, organic, and in season. If it's not fresh, it has lost its flavor and texture. If it's not organically grown, it will lack taste due to the mass volume of production (when's the last time you commented positively on your micro-waved vegetables at Applebee's?) And finally if it's not in season, the produce will not burst with flavor. Would you eat a mango in January? No, because it will taste like grass, bark, and water. But eat one in the summer and it will burst in your mouth with ripeness. Many chefs are willing to pay high shipping charges to ensure fresh products. For example, don't be surprised if your lobster was caught yesterday afternoon in Maine and you are dining in LA.

Lest I forget to mention the wine. The wine is just as important to the meal as the food. Wine is drank with food for many reasons I'll explain in another post someday. But for the meantime, just know that it's important.

Why are the Portions so small???

The small portions exist for several reasons. First of all, there is probably not enough supply to warrant large portions. If the chef was able to source enough, he'd have to charge you even more to justify his fixed costs. Secondly, this food will fill you up. If the chef has sourced everything correct, the food will be rich in calories and nutrients. You will get full after only eating a bit. Lastly, the plates are small because you are meant to have many plates during your meal. Eat two little 3oz portions of fish, and you go home hungry. Have 3oz portions of soup, fish, duck, squab (pigeon), cheese, sorbet, and chocolate dessert, and you will go home satiated. Many chefs offer "tasting" or "degustation" menus. These are menus where you sample anywhere from 5-30 small plates over a 2-3 hour period. The menus progress from light dishes to heavy, often finishing with cheese that is paired with the wine left in your bottle after the meat course, a sorbet to cleanse your palate, and then 1-2 desserts.

In addition to the above, you will also get many extras at the best fine dining places. Your meal will start with an "amuse bouche," or mouth pleaser (boca-->bouche; amuse-->please). This is a small hors d'oeuvres meant to awaken your appetite. At the end, you will have mignardises and petit fours. These are small candies and confectionaries meant to accompany your coffee at the end of the meal. These are all freebies--you don't order them. Finally, many kitchens will send you extra courses for free if they feel like impressing you. For example, if you have some wine left in your first bottle, they may send a course out for free to accompany the rest of the wine. 

Why Should I be Interested in this?

You don't have to be. It is true not everyone is lucky to afford eating out at places like these, or sees the value in it. You may prefer quantity over quality. I love the chicken tenders at Friday's and the 2-for-1 beers at Chili's, I won't lie. Grog 25-cent pitchers are delicious because they are 25-cents. However, once you've driven a Ferrari, do you really want to drive a VW van? Similarly, once you've tasted fine wine, can you really cherish a $3 box wine? If you've had kobe beef, will you settle for a McDonald's hamburger? I certainly can't. 

The truth is for most of us with average wallets, going out to places like these are special moments. And the staff there knows that. Therefore, they make the dinner an experience for you instead of a just a meal.  Who doesn't like to be pampered? The smart people working at these places value food as a gift. They recognize keeping a chicken in a cage is not humane. They work with local farmers to support their efforts, thanking them with their business and paying top dollar for their product. Why wouldn't you support that as well? 

Are you vegetarian or have allergies? Guess what--just tell your waiter. Chances are they have a 9 course vegetarian menu already prepared, or a substitute for nuts and dairy. 

There is a time and a place for all kinds of dining. Those who look down upon others that don't spend big money when going out to eat are not true foodies in my opinion. They're fake and have only found a medium through which to flaunt money. A fan of food can find pleasure in the chinese hole in the wall just as much as they do in the 3 hour grandiose meal. The trick is that the chinese hole in the wall will have a grandmother making recipes by hand like her family did in the Chinese countryside.

Sometimes you only have 10 minutes to eat and $5, in which case fast food is an attractive option. Or perhaps you've had a few beers and it's 3am and Taco Bell is the only thing open. It's ok. Just remember there's a time for quantity, and a time for quality, and each should have its place in your wallet. 

I hope you were able to understand a bit more about what fine dining is. See you next time!


EDIT: I wanted to be clear about something else. It is perhaps best to say what fine dining IS by saying what it IS NOT. It is not about putting a bunch of green stuff on a plate and giving it a weird name. It's about the quality of the ingredients, presented to you in unique ways, and cooked so perfectly that each ingredient's taste stands out on its own on the plate. Each ingredient complements or contrasts with the others.