Gastronomic U
Meryle Evans reports.
| More Front Burner in this issue |
| Top of the tower |
| Farewell to a giant |
| Tuiles on wheels |
| Aussie oil in a box |
| Lemongrass and ant eggs |
| Sad good-bye |
| Egg safety |
New York City—I'm debating: a session on "The Chemistry of Sweet" with pastry chef Pichet Ong (P*ong), Maximilian Riedel's comparative wine tasting in his family's elegant "A Tasting with the Sommelier Series," a "Head to Tail" dinner hosted by Chris Cosentino of San Francisco's Incanto restaurant and food journalist Michael Ruhlman, a seminar on the "Art of Spicy Cocktails," or a Culinary Institute of America baking workshop? Phew! The learning curve for Gotham gastronomes has just gone off the charts with the opening on January 17 of the Astor Center. A multipurpose wine, spirits, and culinary facility at the corner of Lafayette and Fourth Streets, it occupies the second floor of the massive landmark 19th century DeVinne Press Building, now the spacious new headquarters of Astor Wines & Spirits. The center fulfills a lifelong dream of the store's owner, Andrew Fisher, who explains: "We've built a concept. It's a new approach to education, a new way of exchanging ideas, and, most importantly, a new forum for discussing how and what we eat and drink."
With a state-of-the-art professional kitchen, an amphitheater-style classroom called The Study, a flexible 1,700-square-foot event space called The Gallery, plus a partnership with the CIA, the center's executive director, Doug Duda, a noted food historian, has developed an enticing array of classes and events for both pros and wine and food aficionados.
During a series of previews last fall, I watched offal-elevating British chef Fergus Henderson apply his wizardy to pig's trotters in The Study, a facility patterned after the wine tasting oriented Rudd Center at the CIA's Greystone campus. Equipped with Viking ranges and 50-inch plasma screens, The Study's demonstration kitchen features specially designed light boxes for examining wine color as well as multiple sinks for discarding wine interspersed among the 36 seats. I attended a meeting of the Culinary Historians of New York in the high ceilinged, exposed brick wall Gallery, which had been set up for a lecture and reception, and stepped gingerly around cables and wires as workmen installed Jade ranges, Hobart mixers, and Traulsen refrigerators in the 1,106 foot kitchen, adaptable for hands-on cooking classes or chef prepared banquets.
At the January opening gala, 300 guests came to check out the Center, mingling in the kitchen with chefs Josh DeChellis (BarFry), Seamus Mullen (Suba and Boqueria), and Joey Campanaro (Little Owl), whose hearty finger food accompanied cocktails concocted by a bevy of the city's top mixologists. As center director Lesley Townsend summed it up in her welcoming remarks: "We've developed a place that facilitates exchanges between wine makers and whiskey drinkers, Michelin-starred chefs and masters of the Manhattan apartment kitchen, food historians and gastronomes."
The Astor Center's calendar and reservation forms are available online at www.astorcenternyc.com, along with prices for programs ranging from $65 for lectures to $895 for a five day CIA professional development course dedicated to "Controlling Your Bottom Line."
