Lesley S. reviewed on 5/6/2009 + 50 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 2

Dining out with Ruth Reichl and her finely-tuned palate makes for a tasty morsel of a read. Here, the former food critic of The New York Times dishes up the backstory behind some of her most lively reviews, both glowing and scathing. A positive NYT review from "the most powerful food critic in the world" can easily mean hundreds of thousands of dining dollars for a restaurant, so her photo is pinned up prominently in kitchens throughout the city, and rewards offered by restaurant owners to servers for spotting her. In an attempt to dine undetected and find out what celebrated restaurants are really like, Reichl responds by donning a variety of wacky disguises in a culinary game of cat and mouse.

An interesting subtext of her stories is how outer appearance influences both inner character...plus the quality of service. As "Molly" the dowdy Midwesterner, she is treated so abominably by Le Cirque as to make her alter ego protest to her dining partner - in character - about paying for glamour and being made to feel frumpy, powerless and humiliated. A return visit a short time later as herself means being singled out by the owner, other guests unceremoniously shoved aside, and told: "The King of Spain is waiting in the bar, but your table is ready."

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