This week on the NotAFoodie show we talk about the World’s 50 Best Restaurant list, multiple tributes to Anthony Bourdain on his birthday, and the Summer Fancy Food Show
The World’s 50 Best Restaurants:
This is the first year with a rule change for the World’s 50 Best. If you have ever won best restaurant in the world, you are no longer eligible to be on the list. Noma was able to appear on this list because they opened at a new location and are therefore considered a different restaurant. The company is working on a “Best of The Best” list which will include Alinea, Eleven Madison Park, etc;
I’ve long said that Cosme is “The Best a la Carte Restaurant in NYC” turns out I was wrong. They are the best restaurant in the entire country. They were ranked #23 worldwide, the highest of any American Restaurant on this list. If you didn’t listen to me before, good luck getting a table now. Let this be a lesson to everyone if I say a restaurant is good it is probably the best restaurant in the country.
Tom’s issues with the list that it was very European focused, and not necessarily “the most interesting or innovative.” I disagreed because out of the top 10 2 were from Peru and 1 was in Thailand. I happen to be very familiar with Gaggan, Central, and Maido because I was lucky enough to eat at Gaggan and ran a Nikkei restaurant that took a lot of cues from Central and Maido. I know for a fact that they are all innovative, and incredible.
Other standouts on the list included Blue Hill at Stone Barns and Le Bernardin.
Bourdain Day:
It has been just over a year since the passing of legendary Food Writer and Personality Anthony Bourdain. We here at NotAFoodie have talked about how much he has inspired us and continues to today. This is not a feeling that only we have but one that we share with people all around the world. Bourdain’s friends have declared his birthday June 25th to be Bourdain Day. This year Chef’s from all around the world tweeted memories of him, quotes, and art. It was all a very touching reminder that Tony brought the world together through food and showed us all that we were much similar than we thought.
The 2019 Summer Fancy Food Show:
Tom went to the Winter Fancy Food Show in San Francisco back in January and I was incredibly jealous and counting down the days until the show came to NYC. We applied for press passes and were granted them, so now I am an official part of Food Journalism, some might even call me a food journalist.
The highlights of the show:
Mike’s Hot Honey: These are some of the coolest guys in the industry, they hooked us up with product and recipe cards to make this incredible Pineapple Smash Cocktail
The Truffleist: Shoutout to Chef Casey Corn for giving us a tasting of their Truffle Oil, Hot Sauce/Butter/Mustard. It was a delight and a lot of fun
Brooklyn Delhi: Great Products but definitely their Curry Mustard was the most delicious Mustard I tried all day
Five Acre Farms: Shoutout to Dan for giving us 12 oz plastic bottles of chocolate milk, that I thought were delicious but didn’t want to finish. Tom absolutely crushed his bottle. He has a chocolate milk problem
Bono Sicilian Olive Oil: I met the Bono family a few days before I went to the event because they had dinner at Feroce where I work. I told them I would be attending the show and they told me to make sure I stopped by. They hooked us up with bottles of their incredible Sicilian Olive Oil, and their marmalades were delicious. They had all the time in the world to answer all the questions we had.
The Happy Group/Happy Eggs: A Farm in Arkansas that has their own proprietary breed of chicken that produces beautiful bright eggs and gorgeous yolks. I can’t wait to make a carbonara with their eggs. They show that all eggs are not created equally.
Hella Cocktail Company: A Brooklyn Based Bitters company that is debuting their canned Bitters and Soda. These are actually non-alcoholic but are incredibly refreshing and can be used to make a quick Spritz-esque cocktail with a little bit of Gin and Citrus. The Hella team also let us sample their entire Bitters line and answered all the questions we had . They are just really great people with a really great product.
Tempesta Artisan Salumi: As we were walking around Tom spotted a booth with vendors wearing black baseball caps that said NDUJA in bright red letters. He essentially grabbed my arm and brought me there. We posted up and spoke to Matt for about 20 minutes as he gave us samples of their entire portfolio including the Nduja, Pate, Wagyu Bresaola, Chorizo, Sopressata, and everything else you can imagine. The owner’s father is in Calabria planting thousands of Calabrian Chile Peppers so they can make Nduja. After tasting their entire portfolio, I was drunk on charcuterie. These guys blew my mind
