Three of New York’s hottest restaurants right now offer sublime, inventive dishes – and a taste of culinary theatre
The city may never sleep, but it certainly can eat. We ventured to The Pool, Eleven Madison Park and The Aviary to get a taste of the fine-dining life – and they did not disappoint
When I die, I could think of worse ways to be sent off than with a wake for hundreds of friends at The Grill, New York’s hottest restaurant.
Located in the venerable Seagram Building on Park Avenue, the new spot from the Major Food Group (owner of restaurants including Carbone, which has a partner restaurant in Hong Kong) occupies the space of the former Four Seasons restaurant, a temple to modernist dining and an institution beloved like few others in the city since it opened in 1959.
Unfortunately, the day I visited The Grill – The New York Times’ top restaurant of 2017 – it was closed due to the aforementioned wake, the champagne flowing and the laughter raucous. But there was no begrudging the dearly departed, as two other exceptional restaurants were on offer in the same building, namely The Pool and The Lobster Bar. Together the three venues (which all share the same entrance) define see-and-be-seen dining in New York.
Unsurprisingly, The Pool is seafood-focused, the pool in question bubbling away in the middle of the room like a culinary jacuzzi under an enormous installation by artist Alexander Calder. It’s hard to imagine a more elegant, expensive dining room – one that makes a serious statement about its diners and their wallets.
There are the original shimmering bead curtains from the 1950s, the soaring ceilings, super-plush furnishings and one of the world’s largest collections of Chateau d’Yquem – the hugely coveted sweet wine from Bordeaux, including a priceless bottle from 1811.