This week the New York Restaurant Scene took to its favorite seasonal blood sport, the annual announcement of Michelin Star updates, promotions, and demotions. This year New York took a big hit with Jean-George’s restaurant being demoted by a star, a tragic loss for the city’s fine dining scene. The bigger effect of this demotion though is that by lowering Jean George’s restaurant from three to two stars, New York has been surpasses by San Francisco as the city with the most three-starred restaurants.
Currently, New York’s three star locales include Per Se, Le Bernadin, Masa, Brooklyn Fare, and Eleven Madison Park.
Jean George’s demotion does leave a lot of room to grow in the coming cycle and the restaurant has reportedly been advised on where they can continue to grow and adapt to earn back their star.
A great success for the New York restaurant scene though, is Eleven Madison Park. For a large portion of the cycle in which Michelin operates and announces these stars, Eleven Madison Park had been closed for renovations while the team trekked out East for their Hamptons summer spinoff, EMP Summer House, considered by locals to be the go-to spot for lunch of dinner this summer. Upon their return, the impact of the restaurant, which recently added “world’s greatest” to their titles, kept its stars despite due to their impact in the New York scene.
Photo Credit: Gary He
Another big moment in this year’s star announcements was the subsequent snubbing of Le Cou Cou, an homage to traditional French cooking from Daniel Rose and Stephen Starr located in the ground level of the lauded hotel 11 Howard. The restaurant was recently given a James Beard Foundation award, though this is the second year it’s been overlooked for a Michelin Star.
The other notable awards of the announcement were the single star-awarded restaurants, foreign-based eateries that have been considered smash hits in the city, The Clocktower and Rouge Tomate. The Clocktower, a traditional British tavern-styled restaurant courtesy of restaurateur Stephen Starr, relies heavily on its meat entrees, with the Steak for Two meal coming in at $125, and well worth it at that. Critics and drinkers alike often hailed rouge Tomate since it’s opening for the wine bar run by the incredible Pascaline Lepeltier as sommelier. Lepeltier has since left the restaurant, though his lasting impressions in the bar’s culture and direction are represented with this star.
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