Bar Boulud
Classic Tastes and Bonhomie
by John Mariani

Daniel Boulud grew up in Lyons, and, after rising rapidly, though dutifully, under the French system, through the kitchens of Roger Vergé, Michel Guèrard, and Georges Blanc, then upon arrival in America, built an enviable reputation at the Polo Lounge, Le Régence, then Le Cirque, and finally triumphed at his own Daniel as of 1993, still consistently ranked as one of the finest French restaurants in the world. He himself has won about every prestigious culinary and master chef award possible.

Boulud’s legendary attention to detail and consistency in the kitchen has been a hallmark he has always passed on to superb chefs de cuisine like Alex Lee and Andrew Carmellini. In recent years Boulud has expanded his holdings considerably, first to the wonderful Café Boulud, then to db bistro moderne–both in New York. His reach then extended to Palm Beach (a reasonable facsimile of his Manhattan café, but still a facsimile) and an admirable brasserie in Las Vegas.

All of which concerns me, because a cook can only put his fingers in so many pots. Yet thus far, while maintaining his presence at his flagship, he has managed to keep his other enterprises humming smoothly. Now, across from Manhattan's Lincoln Center, the master has Bar Boulud, which has been a stunning success since the night it opened. Boulud has never pretended he is cooking in his outlying restaurants, instead proudly promoting those chefs who work for him. At Bar Boulud he has put his faith in executive chef Damian Sansonetti, chef de cuisine Laurent Kalkotour, and a team of fast-paced, well-educated professionals, including wine director Daniel Johnnes and sommelier Steven Meir, who somehow keep the cheerfully frantic ambiance at Bar Boulud from becoming mayhem.

He has also enlisted the charcuterie talents of Sylvain Gasdon, who’d worked for years with Paris’s renowned Gilles Verot, and the wide range of charcuterie is at the heart of this new restaurant. The flavors of everything suggest that this is precisely the kind of artisanal sausages, pâtes, and terrines Boulud ate while growing up in Lyon, including fromage de tête, joue de porc, compotée de lapin, pâté grand-mère, pâté de campagne aux foies de volaille, andouille de Vire, saucisson cuit à l’ail, pâté en croûte, saucissons Lyonnais, and much more. I have never had better charcuterie anywhere.

You are cordially greeted and seated by maître d’hôtel Carrie Sumner, and if you just drop by, you might want to sit at the counter where you can just point to the wide range of charcuterie in front of you and have the cooks dole it out, as much as you want, as much as you can handle, as much as you can pay for. The complete menu is also available here.

Otherwise the 100-seat dining room, with its beautiful vaulted ceiling and backlit gravel wall, wooden booths, tables with textured mats and Riedel glassware, is appended with a “Tasting Table in the Round” where up to 14 guests can enjoy food and wines chosen by a sommelier in the center.
  
Bar Boulud’s winelist, 500 labels strong, is dedicated to great French wines of the Rhône valley and Burgundy, whose varietals are the basis of the pickings from California, Oregon, New Zealand, Australiia, Chile and beyond. There is a good selection of wines at every price level, so trust the sommeliers to guide you to something particularly interesting.

It is very easy and very tempting simply to gorge on all that wonderful charcuterie and an array of wines, not to mention the excellent breads by Mark Fiorentino, the butters, and cheeses. But this is a bistro, too, and I wouldn’t want you to miss the other dishes, starting with a generous frisée lyonnaise of peppery chicory, chicken liver, poached egg, lardons, and sourdough bread. You may feast on platters of seafood with an aïoli, or delight in grilled scallops, with mustard, winter slaw, and a tangy red cabbage marmalade.

Among the main courses—here called “plats de résistance”—there is a marvelous, classic coq au vin with fresh pasta, lardons, onions, and mushrooms, its braising sauce very dark from red wine. Wild striped bass swims in a sweet pepper stew with chorizo and haricots coco, and skate is stuffed with a wild mushroom fricassée and spinach with a butter-rich, syrah glaze. Big appetites will relish the braised flatiron steak with carrot mousseline and onion confit, and if steak frites is your measure of a good French bistro, you will be enchanted with the version here. For those who love blood sausage, Boulud’s boudin noir with caramelized apple is terrific, and the confit of duck with tarbais beans and vegetable fricassée textbook perfect.
   
There is a selection of impeccably maintained cheeses, like brie de meaux and 22 month-old mimolette, and then there are chef patîssier Ghaya Oliveira’s scrumptious bistro-style desserts, from a tarte fromage blanc with blueberry compote and sorbet to a gâteau basque, rich custard cake with brandied cherries.    
   
Despite ill-informed grumblings about the demise of French cuisine in New York, Bar Boulud, like Bar Blanc, Benoit, and a slew of other bistros, indicate strongly that the classic tastes and bonhomie of food cooked from the heart will never, ever disappear.

John Mariani is well known for his frank and poignant writing in Esquire, Wine Spectator, Diversion and the Harper Collection. He is author of The Encyclopedia of American Food & Drink, The Dictionary of Italian Food and Drink and co-author, with his wife, of the Italian-American Cookbook.