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Le Bernardin Is a Genuine Four-Star New York City Restaurant |
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Yes, Le Bernardin is a great New York City seafood restaurant but it is
also more than that - it is actually a genuine four-star restaurant which
is owned and run by genuine French-born cooking mavericks Maguy and Gilbert
Le Coze. Gilbert's experience in French cuisine stems from his youth spent
assisting his father and grandfather in the kitchen of their family-owned
restaurant and inn back in France, the Hotel de Rhuys. Maguy grew up
helping her mother in the dining room of the Hotel de Rhuys. The New York
Le Bernardin is actually an offshoot of the original Le Bernardin which was
first opened in Paris and had won two Michelin stars within four years of
its opening. Not bad for a shoestring operation.
True to their background in Hotel de Rhuys, Maguy concentrated on operating
the dining room while Gilbert practiced his culinary expertise in the
kitchen. Le Bernardin eventually garnered its ranking as a four-star
seafood-only restaurant just three months after it opened in New York City.
Le Bernardin food and service is so good, it has been able to keep up its
excellent standards for over 10 years and retained its four-star
classification in all that time. At present, the New York Le Bernardin
kitchen is headed by master chef Eric Ripert (also a French-born cook) who
took over as kitchen chef and partner of Maguy Le Coze after Maguy's
brother Gilbert died. Fortunately, Ripert seems fully capable of filling
the shoes of Gilbert when it comes to maintaining the superlative standards
of Le Bernardin when it comes to great French seafood cuisine. In fact,
four years after Gilbert died, the Outstanding Restaurant designation
awarded by the James Beard Awards was granted to Maguy Le Coze while Ripert
received the tag of Outstanding Chef from the James Beard Foundation. And
of course in 2004, Le Bernardin garnered the top spot in New York based on
food, from the Zagat's Guide. Le Bernardin is so confident about their
expertise in French seafood cuisine that they have even published a
cookbook called Le Bernardin - Four Star Simplicity. Ripert himself has reaped many awards for his culinary skills, the latest
being in 2007 when he was dubbed Outstanding Chef in the United States by
the Beard Foundation. Le Bernardin actually considers its cuisine as plain home-cooking which
concentrates on offering the freshest seafood cooked in innovative ways.
For example, there is the lobster cappuccino, which comes to the diner in a
coffee cup - this dish is actually a combination of lobster meat, cream,
and celeriac broth topped by froth spiked with lobster coral. If you order
the black bass, cabbage, truffles and foie gras, you will find that it is
incomplete without the chef's trademark purple mustard-shallot sauce. It is
recommended that you try the seared yellowfin tuna that is flavored with
thyme and pepper, with a side serving of truffled vinaigrette, which people
say beats anything prepared by the famous chefs of Hawaii who are reputed
to be experts in tuna preparation. Fish is actually the specialty of the
house, so when in Le Bernardin do not neglect fish-based dishes when
ordering for your party.
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