SMART MOUTH
In New York, Advanced French
Sunday, October 15, 2006; Page P07
L'Ecole translates as bargain gourmet dining in Manhattan.
After a half-decade living in France, I can reliably order food in restaurants in French and be understood. That's usually not the case when it comes to communicating to servers in my mother tongue (American English) in my birthplace, New York City, where something usually gets lost in translation. Maybe it's partly due to the transitory nature of the restaurant world in a trendy age in which foodspeak can have confusing or multiple meanings: margarita the drink, for example, or margherita the pizza.
  New York's L'Ecole: For gourmet dining on a budget. (French Culinary Institute) |
And so, in keeping with that rule, the lines of communication started off a bit fuzzy on a recent visit to L'Ecole, the restaurant of the legendary French Culinary Institute in the core of La Grande Pomme.
Of course, L'Ecole is no ordinary restaurant. Since 1984 the FCI, which refers to itself as "the center of the culinary world," has been churning out serious young culinary and pastry chefs under the tutelage of a faculty that includes star chefs such as Jacques Pépin (dean of special programs) and Jacques Torres (dean of pastry arts). For most of us, the real attraction of L'Ecole has nothing to do with celebrity credentials. If you want to dine in Manhattan without benefit of a fat expense account, L'Ecole is a bargain, offering a gourmet experience at downright affordable prices: A three-course lunch is fixed at $26.50 and a four- or five-course dinner at $39.95, plus wine and tip.
Everything is prepared in the massive FCI kitchens by student chefs and breadmakers who are in their final stages of coursework. Every day of the week there's a different menu, and the set of weekly menus changes completely every six weeks.
My wife and I booked a weekday lunch. We entered off the din of lower Broadway on the edge of SoHo -- a cacophony of jackhammers, trucks and the usual urban jungle noises -- and were soothed by the calm inside the light, airy dining room with its cream-colored walls, sleek modern wood touches and soft background jazz. We were led to one of 20 white-clothed tables by one of two hostesses who seemed to be practicing floating across the room with perfect posture. All around us, teams of servers in black uniforms worked quietly and efficiently.
Over the next 10 minutes we would meet a number of these young servers, and that's where the communication got a bit dicey.
Server Number One arrived -- his job apparently to ask if we would like to drink bottled water or tap water, and then to bring said water to the table.
"Bottled," I replied, and for some reason I found myself grasping for a word to describe water with bubbles. "Fizzy water."
A delicious sampling of breads arrived. A sommelier took our order of two pinot noir wines by the glass -- one from Burgundy, the other from California -- which are served in nifty small carafes that make sharing ideal. Then SNO returned with a squarish bottle and began to pour. Trouble was, there wasn't a bubble to be seen.
When I brought that to SNO's attention, he replied, "I thought you ordered Fiji water, sir." We worked out the misunderstanding between fizziness and Fijiness, and SNO apologized, then asked, "Are you okay, then, with sticking with this water?"
I had to say politely that no, it was not all right. SNO returned with fresh glasses and fizzy water.
Happily for us, the communication was perfect where it counted: on the plate.
For appetizers, my delicious roasted eggplant roulade with marinated goat cheese was artfully served on a square plate painted with a squiggle of tangy sauce. My wife's marinated goat cheese arrived in a bed of greens. The marinades, the generous use of fresh greens and the bold seasoning of the whole meal leaned to what you might call California-French, which is not necessarily a bad thing.
Both of us indulged in the special of the day, seared tuna. Tender cuts -- black on the outside and blood red in the center -- were fanned out on the plate with a frisee salad. Desserts of plum tart and a trio of small, flavored creme brulees were topped off with a treat universally understood in any language: a reasonable restaurant tab.
-- Robert V. Camuto
L'Ecole (the restaurant of the French Culinary Institute), 462 Broadway (at Grand Street), 212-219-3300,http:/
