At least he has his bags of money...

My condolences to my favorite shiny headed chef, Tom Colicchio, who lost his one star Michelin rating for his New York City restaurant, Craft.



The 2002 James Beard Award winner for best new restaurant nationwide was one of four restaurants to lose its one star status.

Maintaining their status from last year, Jean Georges, Le Bernardin, and Per Se were all awarded three stars, the highest level in the Michelin ratings.

To see the press release on the 2008 Michelin ratings, click here.

The Next Iron Chef? The Next Show I won't be watching

So I just turned this show on, and I must say that this show is almost entirely unwatchable.



I love Alton Brown - Alton I love you! But why the f*%# are you up in everyone's business?!? Seriously, stop.

Also, the music - I don't know which music library they're pulling from, but it's way over the top - like making Iron Chef America look tame by comparison.

I know this is supposed to be horribly cheesy and in the same style as Iron Chef, but after watching a full season of Top Chef, I've got to say - I'm really missing Hung and Dale right now.

National Seafood Month at M&S

There are a lot of reasons why I like the month of October, but somewhere near the top of my list is the arrival of National Seafood Month. A number of restaurants will celebrate, but few do it better than McCormick & Schmick's.



I recently had a chance to go to a special tasting at M&S's K Street location, along with my friend Catherine, for their National Seafood Month menu, which is also designed to be heart healthy (something that's not exactly easy to find these days).

Included in the menu was a very good striped bass with udon noodles and a miso broth, and a albacore tuna steak with black eye peas and roasted red peppers.

I'd recommend stopping by; you and your heart won't regret it.

How important are we?

I think it's an interesting question - and one whose answer constantly evolving. Evidently we're important enough for the Wall Street Journal to do a story on food bloggers.

The story focuses on bloggers like me who primarily review restaurants, and the increasing influence we have on chefs and restaurant owners.

The story also highlights, and I believe is critical of, the practice of restaurants providing free meals to bloggers - even stating that one blogger doesn't take free meals anymore to increase the blog's credibility. Now I'll admit, I've gone to a number of free meals on account of my full-time job, with all involved knowing full well that I happen to blog, but eating free doesn't change the food. Free food doesn't taste or look any better. You can give me a free meal at Burger King and it's still going to be Burger King.

The article sites a Technorati stat that there are over 21,000 food blogs floating around out there. I think that number alone, regardless of methods, makes this community incredibly important, and indicates it'll be here for the long run.

Someone's got a case of the Fridays...

This next week is going to be tough - the show I'm a producer on is about to be Neilson rated and work is going to suck. What does that mean for the blog? Hopefully nothing, but I might only be able to get out a few posts during the course of the week.

In the meantime I have to give a big thanks to Amanda, the one and only Metrocurean, for including me on her Five Bites on Friday section.