masa

The Five Best Restaurants in the U.S.

Filed under: Dining

Luxist readers nominated the restaurants that they believe to be the best and most luxurious restaurants in the country. From Napa Valley and Las Vegas to Chicago and New York, here are their top five favorite places (in alphabetical order):

Charlie Trotter's (Chicago)
While most top chefs boast degrees from the traditional powerhouses of the culinary world, Charlie Trotter is an exception. The chef of the Chicago restaurant that bears his name never had a former education in the world of food---but that hasn't stopped him from turning his eatery into a Luxist nominee in the best domestic fine dining category.

Charlie Trotter became a foodie in college after learning a few cooking tips from his roommate. Fascinated by the culinary arts, he took a year off from earning his degree in Political Science at the University of Wisconsin's Madison campus to read every book he could, including a ton of tomes on cooking. After graduation, he went into the catering business, eventually deciding that he wanted to run his own restaurant.

Tags: awards-main, best restaurants, best restaurants in the u.s., Charlie Trotters, four seasons, luxist-awards, Masa, Restaurant Guy Savoy, The French Laundry

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Masa: The Creation of a Master Chef

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Masa in New York is nominated for a Luxist Award for Best Domestic Restaurant

In soccer, there's Pele. In music, there's Madonna. When it comes to chefs, one of the most prominent one---name wonders is Masa, owner of the restaurant of the same name in New York. Not only for its proprietor's reputation but for its vaunted menu, Masa is a Luxist nominee in the best domestic fine dining category.

Chef Masa didn't always have just one name---he was born Masa Takayama, son of a family of seven, in Tochigi, Japan. He learned cooking as a child, working for his parents' catering business and fish shop. After high school, Masa found a job at Ginza Sushi-ko in Tokyo, working his way up from dishwasher to sushi chef. He moved to Los Angeles in 1980, eventually opening his own restaurant.

Gallery: Masa

Tags: awards-main, best domestic restaurant, Chef Masa, Japanese cuisine, luxist-awards, Masa

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A Taste of Jazz at the Time Warner Center

by Amy Cortese (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining, Events

Last June, a bunch of the nation's mayors got together and declared April 9, 2010 Jazz Day. April is already Jazz Appreciation Month (you knew that, right?), but the mayors designated a special day to encourage jazz related activities and programming.

Apparently, the folks at New York's Time Warner Center got the memo. On the first ever Jazz Day this Friday, the center's renowned chefs will come together to serve up a feast inspired by Bebop, swing and New Orleans jazz, and the cities that made them famous.

Called A Taste of Jazz, the evening will feature dishes from some of the hardest to get tables in town: Masa Takayama's (Masa) Jazzy Duck – marinated duck with foie gras inside of a mooshu skin, and Missy Robbins' (A Voce) Citrus Cured Sardines and Fennel, an homage to her hometown of Chicago. Michael Lomonaco (Porter House Steak) will cook up a NY strip steak and NY cheesecake, while Landmarc chef Marc Murphy explores his French roots with New Orleans-style shrimp gumbo. Thomas Keller's Bouchon bakery will contribute sourdough Parker House rolls filled with single origin chocolate custard.

That's just a taste of A Taste. There will also be slow smoked ribs with molasses bourbon BBQ sauce; 3 cheese mac & cheese, collard green quiche with lardon and micro kale, and more -- not to mention Bourbon-mint Iced Tea Bebops.

What about the jazz you ask? Leave that to the capable hands of Walter Blanding, saxophonist for the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, who will be leading a septet in jazz standards.

Blanding will also discuss his selections and perhaps tell a jazz tale or two. He might, for example, tell the story behind "A Train," the famous composition by Billy Strayhorn and Duke Ellington, which was inspired by the directions given to Strayhorn for his first meeting with Ellington.

Here are the deets for all you cats:

Time Warner Center
10 Columbus Circle, 2nd floor
Friday, April 9
6:30 - 9:00 pm
Tickets are available for $85 at www.circleoftaste.com
Directions: Take a taxi to 59th Street, Columbus Circle. Or better yet, Take the A train.

Tags: a taste of jazz, bouchon, jazz, jazz day, jazz events, jazz month, lincoln center, Masa, Michael Lomonaco, music, new york city jazz, thomas keller, walter blanding

Masa Drops Set Menu Price

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

We all define the term discount differently. At Masa, Manhattan's ultra-pricey temple of sushi, the cost of dining has dropped from $450 to $400 for the set menu. This may not seem significant but it may be the first time that the Michelin-starred restaurant at Time Warner Center has ever dropped prices. Masa's business manager Veda Nishikawa told Blomberg's Ryan Sutton that the recession had nothing to do with the price drop. A reduction in the cost of freight to fly in Masa's fresh fish daily inspired the restaurant to pass on its savings to the consumer. As oil prices drop the cost of global air shipping is reduced. Of course if Masa really wanted to impress diners they could roll the prices back to the $300 the set menu cost back in 2004 when the restaurant opened.

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Tags: fine dining, FineDining, manhattan, masa, restaurant, sushi

The World's Most Expensive Tasting Menus

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Tasting menu's don't come cheap, but the range of flavors and the chance to experience more of the chef's repertoire is worth it for many. Some of the best restaurants in the world have gone to serving nothing but tasting menus, Charlie Trotter's in Chicago for example, and others simply offer them as a luxury for those who can afford it and want something a little different. So where to go if you're really looking to drop some cash and enjoy the great tastes of the best tasting menus? Well the single most expensive tasting menu in the world belongs to L'Arpege in Paris and runs $466, with the second and third most expensive also going to restaurants in Paris: Alain Ducasse Plaza Athenee ($437), and Guy Savoy ($402). Masa, in NYC, comes in at 4th with their tasting menu priced at $400 for 25 courses.

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Tags: Alain Ducasse, AlainDucasse, Charlie Trotters, CharlieTrotters, chef, dine, dining, food, gourmet, Guy Savoy, GuySavoy, l'arpege, masa, menu, menus, most expensive, MostExpensive, paris, Plaza Athenee, PlazaAthenee, restaurant, restaurants, tasting, tasting menu, tasting menus, TastingMenu, TastingMenus

Forbes' Most Expensive Restaurants 2006

by Nicole Weston (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Using data compiled by the Zagat survey, Forbes has produced two lists naming the year's most expensive restaurants. One list deals with only US restaurants, while the other compares the prices (in US dollars) of places all over the world. For the global list, the final cost was considered to be the price of one main course, one (alcoholic) beverage and tip, while the US list was not limited to a single main course and included options such as prix fixe tasting menus. Both only priced dinner for one person, but due to the difference in standards, there are many prix-fixe only restaurants that didn't make the global list but might be a good deal more expensive, but here are the top three from each list as they stand: