Synopses & Reviews
New York is the greatest restaurant city the world has ever seen.
In Appetite City, the former New York Times restaurant critic William Grimes leads us on a grand historical tour of New Yorks dining culture. Beginning with the era when simple chophouses and oyster bars dominated the culinary scene, he charts the citys transformation into the world restaurant capital it is today. Appetite City takes us on a unique and delectable journey, from the days when oysters and turtle were the most popular ingredients in New York cuisine, through the era of the fifty-cent French and Italian table dhôtes beloved of American “Bohemians,” to the birth of Times Square—where food and entertainment formed a partnership that has survived to this day.
Enhancing his tale with more than one hundred photographs, rare menus, menu cards, and other curios and illustrations (many never before seen), Grimes vividly describes the dining styles, dishes, and restaurants succeeding one another in an unfolding historical panorama: the deluxe ice cream parlors of the 1850s, the boisterous beef-and-beans joints along Newspaper Row in the 1890s, the assembly-line experiment of the Automat, the daring international restaurants of the 1939 Worlds Fair, and the surging multicultural city of today. By encompassing renowned establishments such as Delmonicos and Le Pavillon as well as the Bowery restaurants where a meal cost a penny, he reveals the ways in which the restaurant scene mirrored the larger forces shaping New York, giving us a deliciously original account of the history of Americas greatest city.
Rich with incident, anecdote, and unforgettable personalities, Appetite City offers the dedicated food lover or the casual diner an irresistible menu of the citys most savory moments.
Review
Praise for Appetite City:
“In his fascinating Appetite City, William Grimes shows us how New York became, arguably, the best food city in the world. This is a wonderful book!” Jacques Pépin, author of The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen
“Appetite City, as all books on New York should be, is rich in social conflict and fun. The paradox makes for great food history.” Mark Kurlansky, author of The Big Oyster and The Food of a Younger Land
“Elegantly written and meticulously researched, Appetite City is a must-read for anyone who thinks they already know everything there is to know about the New York restaurant world.” Tom Colicchio, chef/owner, Craft Restaurants
“William Grimes is a certified expert on New Yorks culinary world. I cant think of another person who could have achieved what he has in this engrossing and enlightening book.” Bobby Flay, executive chef, Mesa Grill
“William Grimes has written a masterful and engrossing culinary history of New York. Its a veritable feast of anecdotes that will satiate foodies for years to come.” Drew Nieporent, restaurateur (Corton, Tribeca Grill, Nobu, and Centrico)
“Appetite City is a rollicking tale of big spenders, outsized appetites, and the way high rollers in New York made spectacles of themselves. Telling a story of celebrity restaurateurs, local delicacies, and New Yorks rapidly changing taste and complex social rituals, Grimes has made an important contribution to the social history of New York.” Eric Homberger, author of The Historical Atlas of New York City
Review
Praise for Appetite City:
“The latest book [from William Grimes] is a chronicle of New Yorks transformation from a Dutch village at the edge of the wilderness to what he sees as the most diverse restaurant city in the world . . . As for todays ‘era of the entrepreneurial superchefs, this vivid and vastly entertaining history positions it as the latest but hardly the final chapter in the culinary saga of the city with the bottomless appetite.” Dawn Drzal, The New York Times
“If H. G. Wells had decided to send his Time Traveler to report on the early restaurants of New York, I doubt he could have provided us a much better description of the citys rich culinary history than the one William Grimes has just written. Grimes, a longtime food writer for The New York Times . . . looks back, tracing [New Yorks] bewildering maze of food cultures and traditions, from its early markets and oyster bars to todays molecular-gastronomy-influenced restaurants . . . he touches on an amazing breadth of subjectsbeautifully, thoroughly, and with a depth of research . . . Join the author on his time-traveling journey through New Yorks rise as an appetite city, and you will be richer for the experience.”Julie Gunlock, National Review
“[New York] is not the most important restaurant city in the world, one could argue, but thats not the right argument, Grimes suggests. He walks us from restaurant-free streets of the early 1900s to open kitchens of 2004, and through a brisk, fun study of how a culinary afterthought became the most complex and irritating restaurant city on the planet.” Christopher Borrelli, Chicago Tribune
“In his fascinating Appetite City, William Grimes shows us how New York became, arguably, the best food city in the world. This is a wonderful book!” Jacques Pépin, author of The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen
“Appetite City, as all books on New York should be, is rich in social conflict and fun. The paradox makes for great food history.” Mark Kurlansky, author of The Big Oyster and The Food of a Younger Land
“Elegantly written and meticulously researched, Appetite City is a must-read for anyone who thinks they already know everything there is to know about the New York restaurant world.” Tom Colicchio, chef/owner, Craft Restaurants
“William Grimes is a certified expert on New Yorks culinary world. I cant think of another person who could have achieved what he has in this engrossing and enlightening book.” Bobby Flay, executive chef, Mesa Grill
“William Grimes has written a masterful and engrossing culinary history of New York. Its a veritable feast of anecdotes that will satiate foodies for years to come.” Drew Nieporent, restaurateur (Corton, Tribeca Grill, Nobu, and Centrico)
“Appetite City is a rollicking tale of big spenders, outsized appetites, and the way high rollers in New York made spectacles of themselves. Telling a story of celebrity restaurateurs, local delicacies, and New Yorks rapidly changing taste and complex social rituals, Grimes has made an important contribution to the social history of New York.” Eric Homberger, author of The Historical Atlas of New York City“New Yorks role as a fancy food capital began in the early 1800s as a pastry shop near the foot of Manhattan, run by two brothersGiovanni and Pietro Delmonico from Ticino, the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland . . . Grimes culinary history intensively covers eating and eateries in the most recent half of the citys 400-year existence.” Carl Hartman, Associated Press Jay Strafford - Hallie Ephron - Marilyn Stasio - Wed Lukowsky - Spider Robinson - Robert Silverberg - Richard A. Lupoff - Harlan Ellison - George R. R. 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Review
Praise for Straight Up or On the Rocks:
“A highly entertaining book that, all the same, treats the cocktail as a subject of legitimate historical interest. Indeed, Grimes claims it as a cornerstone of American culture . . . [He] makes the case intelligently, peppers it heavily with rich and whimsical historical anecdote and, more important, wit.” National Post (Canada)
Review
Praise for Appetite City:
“The latest book [from William Grimes] is a chronicle of New Yorks transformation from a Dutch village at the edge of the wilderness to what he sees as the most diverse restaurant city in the world . . . As for todays ‘era of the entrepreneurial superchefs, this vivid and vastly entertaining history positions it as the latest but hardly the final chapter in the culinary saga of the city with the bottomless appetite.” —Dawn Drzal, The New York Times
“If H. G. Wells had decided to send his Time Traveler to report on the early restaurants of New York, I doubt he could have provided us a much better description of the citys rich culinary history than the one William Grimes has just written. Grimes, a longtime food writer for The New York Times . . . looks back, tracing [New Yorks] bewildering maze of food cultures and traditions, from its early markets and oyster bars to todays molecular-gastronomy-influenced restaurants . . . he touches on an amazing breadth of subjects—beautifully, thoroughly, and with a depth of research . . . Join the author on his time-traveling journey through New Yorks rise as an appetite city, and you will be richer for the experience.”—Julie Gunlock, National Review
“[New York] is not the most important restaurant city in the world, one could argue, but thats not the right argument, Grimes suggests. He walks us from restaurant-free streets of the early 1900s to open kitchens of 2004, and through a brisk, fun study of how a culinary afterthought became the most complex and irritating restaurant city on the planet.” —Christopher Borrelli, Chicago Tribune
“In his fascinating Appetite City, William Grimes shows us how New York became, arguably, the best food city in the world. This is a wonderful book!” —Jacques Pépin, author of The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen
“Appetite City, as all books on New York should be, is rich in social conflict and fun. The paradox makes for great food history.” —Mark Kurlansky, author of The Big Oyster and The Food of a Younger Land
“Elegantly written and meticulously researched, Appetite City is a must-read for anyone who thinks they already know everything there is to know about the New York restaurant world.” —Tom Colicchio, chef/owner, Craft Restaurants
“William Grimes is a certified expert on New Yorks culinary world. I cant think of another person who could have achieved what he has in this engrossing and enlightening book.” —Bobby Flay, executive chef, Mesa Grill
“William Grimes has written a masterful and engrossing culinary history of New York. Its a veritable feast of anecdotes that will satiate foodies for years to come.” —Drew Nieporent, restaurateur (Corton, Tribeca Grill, Nobu, and Centrico)
“Appetite City is a rollicking tale of big spenders, outsized appetites, and the way high rollers in New York made spectacles of themselves. Telling a story of celebrity restaurateurs, local delicacies, and New Yorks rapidly changing taste and complex social rituals, Grimes has made an important contribution to the social history of New York.” —Eric Homberger, author of The Historical Atlas of New York City“New Yorks role as a fancy food capital began in the early 1800s as a pastry shop near the foot of Manhattan, run by two brothers—Giovanni and Pietro Delmonico from Ticino, the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland . . . Grimes culinary history intensively covers eating and eateries in the most recent half of the citys 400-year existence.” —Carl Hartman, Associated Press "Former New York Times restaurant critic (1999-2003) Grimes chronicles New York City's colorful culinary history from the early 1800s to the present. He notes the first takeout restaurant, the Eastern Coffee House, which advertised in the New York Post in 1813, and he describes the abundant seafood surrounding the city—huge Hudson River sturgeon and oysters as large as a dinner plate in the bays of Staten Island that were a staple of working-class diets. Tracing the migration of restaurants northward on Manhattan as the population moved, Grimes explains how Italian food arrived in the 1880s with the wave of Italian immigrants. The modern coffee shop appeared in the early 1900s. Photos accompany stories of the owners or developers of such classic New York restaurants as Schrafft's, the Horn and Hardart Automat, the 21 Club, Longchamps, and, more recently, Windows on the World and the Russian Tea Room. Footnotes underscore the thorough research completed for this well-written book. VERDICT: New Yorkers, readers who enjoyed Mark Kurlanksy's The Big Oyster, and those interested in food, cooking, and restaurants will enjoy this fascinating history."—Christine Bulson, Library Journal "'Paris has better French restaurants, Madrid has better Spanish restaurants, and Tokyo has better Japanese restaurants,' Grimes concedes, but 'no city... offers as many national cooking styles, at all price ranges, as New York does.' It wasn't always this way. As Grimes points out, it wasn't until the early 19th century that Manhattan and Brooklyn's culinary offerings extended beyond boardinghouse and tavern. His lively, profusely illustrated history veers in one fascinating direction after another, from the proliferation of oyster houses in the 1800s to the original recipe for chop suey. Grimes hits all the obvious high points—Delmonico's, the Automat, Le Pavillion, etc.—but also puts a spotlight on forgotten venues like Forum of the Twelve Caesars, an outsized theme restaurant from the same company that owned the Four Seasons. He gets personal in the final chapter, describing the scene of the late 1990s and early 2000s from his front-line perspective as the restaurant critic for the New York Times. (He has since moved on to the book review desk.) All the material is so fascinating that you'll wish every chapter was at least twice as long, but it's hard to imagine a more entertaining introduction to the subject."— Publishers Weekly
Review
and#8220;Lobeland#8217;s fine book leads us on a fascinating tour of New Yorkand#8217;s foodways past, letting us explore the farms and markets that supplied kitchens in the cityand#8217;s homes and restaurants and introducing us to men and women who raised food, sold it, cooked it, and ate it.and#8221;
Review
"New York's roots as the world's greatest culinary center are firmly cemented in Cindy Lobel's wonderful survey of the dazzling dining options of the nineteenth century. Her descriptions of markets, dining rooms, restaurants, and kitchens tell us not only what people ate but where they dined and how the city's rich ethnic diversity influenced it all."
Review
and#8220;Lobel's accessible cultural history takes us on a fascinating behind-the-scenes tour of New York's food system, covering everything from the provisioning of family kitchens to the emergence of the greatest restaurant scene in the world. Scholars and policymakers have recently recognized that food systems are a key to cultural and environmental sustainability, making this is an ideal time for Lobel's much-needed primer on the historic context for this essential human question. This is a must-read for all who hunger for a better understanding of how cities really work.and#8221;
Review
and#8220;[O]ne snapshot of New York in a century that brought enormous changes in eating and food productionand#8230;. Through the lens of food, the book surveys changes in the culture, demographics and politics of the city.and#8221;
Review
andldquo;Lobel uncovers the 19th-century roots of New York Cityandrsquo;s claim to be the food capital of the world and its implications of diversity, abundance, and exoticism associated with the rising urban US. . . . The bookand#39;s best sections cover the growing cultural expectations of urban restaurants in the rise of public culture that serviced specialized clienteles. Recommended.andrdquo;
Synopsis
Grimes offers a rollicking tour of the history of New York City's restaurants, exploring the ways in which sex and class determined where and how a person would eat, and how the city's restaurant scene mirrored the larger social and political forces shaping New York. Photographs.
Synopsis
New York is the greatest restaurant city the world has ever seen.
In Appetite City, the former New York Times restaurant critic William Grimes leads us on a grand historical tour of New Yorks dining culture. Beginning with the era when simple chophouses and oyster bars dominated the culinary scene, he charts the citys transformation into the world restaurant capital it is today. Appetite City takes us on a unique and delectable journey, from the days when oysters and turtle were the most popular ingredients in New York cuisine, through the era of the fifty-cent French and Italian table dhôtes beloved of American “Bohemians,” to the birth of Times Squarewhere food and entertainment formed a partnership that has survived to this day.
Enhancing his tale with more than one hundred photographs, rare menus, menu cards, and other curios and illustrations (many never before seen), Grimes vividly describes the dining styles, dishes, and restaurants succeeding one another in an unfolding historical panorama: the deluxe ice cream parlors of the 1850s, the boisterous beef-and-beans joints along Newspaper Row in the 1890s, the assembly-line experiment of the Automat, the daring international restaurants of the 1939 Worlds Fair, and the surging multicultural city of today. By encompassing renowned establishments such as Delmonicos and Le Pavillon as well as the Bowery restaurants where a meal cost a penny, he reveals the ways in which the restaurant scene mirrored the larger forces shaping New York, giving us a deliciously original account of the history of Americas greatest city.
Rich with incident, anecdote, and unforgettable personalities, Appetite City offers the dedicated food lover or the casual diner an irresistible menu of the citys most savory moments.
Synopsis
A rollicking journey through the history of New York Citys restaurantsNew York is a world restaurant capital. But this was not always the case. Few examples still exist to recall the era when chophouses and oyster saloons dominated the city and dining out was supposed to be quick and simple. It is a world hardly recognizable today, when dinner can stretch for hours and cost hundreds of dollars. In Appetite City, William Grimes offers a grand tour of the history of the citys restaurants, exploring the ways in which sex and class determined where and how a person would eat, and how the citys restaurant scene mirrored the larger social and political forces shaping New York.
Through dozens of irresistible characters and anecdotes, and a treasure trove of photographs, Grimes evokes both the belle epoque of Edith Wharton and the surging multicultural city of today. Appetite City is a memorable history of New York through its restaurants.
Synopsis
Cindy Lobeland#8217;s
Urban Appetities explores the coevolution of New York City, its politics, and its foodways. Between 1800 and 1890, New York grew from a seaport town with 60,000 residentsand#151;whose food came from local farms, waters, and forestsand#151;into a city of 6,000,000, served by an elaborate army of food-sector workers, including regional dairymen and truck farmers, western ranchers, and farmers in the South, the Caribbean, and the Mediterranean. New York became abundant with food and restaurants as never before. Yet its food system was also highly inequitable and notably corrupt. Lobeland#8217;s focus on the rise of New York as both a metropolis and a food capital opens a unique window onto the intersection of the cultural, social, political, and economic transformations of the nineteenth century. Her perspective provides for fresh consideration of the development of the market economy in New York; the rise of concerns about food quality and access to food; the development of a culture of conspicuous consumption; and the transformation of domestic culinary life. Altogether, Lobel illuminates the ways in which the cityand#8217;s physical and social growth was intimately connected to changes in its food networks.
Synopsis
Glossy magazines write about them, celebrities give their names to them, and youand#8217;d better believe thereand#8217;s an app (or ten) committed to finding you the right one. They are New York City restaurants and food shops. And their journey to international notoriety is a captivating one. The now-booming food capital was once a small seaport city, home to a mere six municipal food markets that were stocked by farmers, fishermen, and hunters who lived in the area. By 1890, however, the cityand#8217;s population had grown to more than one million, and residents could dine in thousands of restaurants with a greater abundance and variety of options than any other place in the United States.
Historians, sociologists, and foodies alike will devour the story of the origins of New York Cityand#8217;s food industry inand#160;Urban Appetites. Cindy R. Lobel focuses on the rise of New York as both a metropolis and a food capital, opening a new window onto the intersection of the cultural, social, political, and economic transformations of the nineteenth century. She offers wonderfully detailed accounts of public markets and private food shops; basement restaurants and immigrant diners serving favorites from the old country; cake and coffee shops; and high-end, French-inspired eating houses made for being seen in society as much as for dining.and#160; But as the food and the population became increasingly cosmopolitan, corruption, contamination, and undeniably inequitable conditions escalated.and#160;Urban Appetitesand#160;serves up a complete picture of the evolution of the city, its politics, and its foodways.
About the Author
William Grimes was the restaurant critic for The New York Times from 1999 to 2003. He is the author of Straight Up or On the Rocks (NPP, 2001) and My Fine Feathered Friend (NPP, 2002), and the coauthor of The New York Times Guide to New York City Restaurants 2004.
Table of Contents
AcknowledgmentsIntroductionand#160;ONE / andldquo;Convenient to the New York Marketandrdquo;: Feeding New York City in the Early National Period, 1786andndash;1830and#160;TWO / andldquo;The Glory of a Plenteous Landandrdquo;: The Transformation of New Yorkandrsquo;s Food Supply, 1825andndash;1865and#160;THREE / andldquo;Monuments of Municipal Malfeasanceandrdquo;: The Flip Side of Dietary Abundance, 1825andndash;1865and#160;FOUR / andldquo;To See and Be Seenandrdquo;: Restaurants and Public Culture, 1825andndash;1865and#160;FIVE / andldquo;No Place More Attractive than Homeandrdquo;: Domesticity and Consumerism, 1830andndash;1880
SIX / andldquo;The Empire of Gastronomyandrdquo;: New York and the World, 1850andndash;1890and#160;Conclusion: From the Broadway Shambles to New Amsterdam MarketNotesIndex