Sheraton Zaps Zagat

The Zagat Guide is the great democratizer of restaurant criticism. Anyone can contribute a review, and every opinion counts the same. But is that a good thing? Not surprisingly, Mimi Sheraton, longtime restaurant critic (for the New York Times and Conde Nast Traveler, among others), comes across as a hard-core Tory on the subject in the September issue of Food & Wine.

Having visited the top-rated Zagat restaurants in eight cities, Sheraton delivers her opinions in the article. The short version is: She’s not terribly impressed with the people’s choices. “Because almost all of the restaurants with the highest ratings for food are extremely fancy-looking and expensive,” she writes, “I had to wonder if amateur critics are capable of separating the cooking from the surroundings.”

She agrees with the voters on The French Laundry (the Bay Area champ) and Norman’s in Coral Gables (the best in Miami). She dithers a bit over New York City’s Le Bernardin. But watch out, L’Espalier (Boston), Andre’s (Las Vegas), Inn at Little Washington (Washington, D.C.), French Room (Dallas) and Matsuhisa (L.A.). The last she finds to have slipped: “As [owner Nobu Matsuhisa] now divides his attention among his seven Nobu outposts around the world, Matsuhisa has suffered.” Though she likes some dishes, “many of the fusion specialties were over-salted and obscured by heavy brown sauces.” Sheraton concludes, “The indifferent preparations hardly justify the top rating.”

Top Cheese

California cheese makers won 19 first-place awards out of 44 categories at this month’s 2001 American Cheese Society competition, the Super Bowl for cheeseheads. Among the top placers were McKinleyville’s Cypress Grove Chevre, Marin French Cheese Co. in Petaluma and Fagundes Old-World Cheese in Hanford, which took three firsts each. Los Angeles’ Karoun Dairies took two firsts (for labneh and feta) and a second for its string cheese. Other winners were Redwood Hill Farm, Point Reyes’ Cowgirl Creamery, Oakdale Cheese and Specialties, San Luis Obispo’s Calpoly Creamery, Sonoma’s Vella Cheese Co., Turlock’s Lactalis USA, Tulare’s Saputo Cheese Co. and Sacramento’s Sierra Nevada Cheese Co. Best of show was won by Uplands Cheese in Dodgeville, Wis., for its Pleasant Ridge Reserve. For full results, check out the ACS Web site: https://www.cheesesociety.org/winners2001.htm

Alice Comes to E-Bay

Well, the end of the world has finally arrived. Alice Waters, the ultra-traditionalist founder of Chez Panisse, perhaps the definitive California restaurant, is now available on the hypermodern Web site e-Bay. Visit https://www.ebaypremier.com today or Thursday and you can bid on a variety of packages, including a private dinner party for four with Waters as personal chef. Or you might want to become “chef for a day” at the Chez, or even buy Waters’ home stove (not a Kenmore, it’s a La Cornue Chateau 80).

Of course, it’s all for a good cause. Proceeds will benefit the Chez Panisse Foundation, which supports youth and community projects and promotes sustainable agriculture in programs for public schools.