In the Magazine

The Storm Over Salt; Platt Goes to the Museums

Photo: Hannah Whitaker/New York Magazine

In the magazine this week, we consider the now-maligned salt. Prune chef Gabrielle Hamilton puts up an impassioned defense of sodium, noting that “salt makes everything it touches taste more like itself.” Adam Platt tries seven varieties, from pink to black, and realizes that there really is a difference. After a week of salty living, guinea pig Joshua David Stein is thirsty, bloated, and down a weekend in life expectancy. But how salty are your favorite dishes? We sent a few to the lab to find out. (Fans of ramen, hot dogs, and other delicious things may want to cover their eyes.)

In his review this week, Platt took in some culture at two museum restaurants: the Wright at the Guggenheim and Robert at the Museum of Arts and Design. The Wright’s Rodolfo Contreras is “a veteran restaurant hand whose flowery, gourmet style of cooking is more in tune with the museum’s stodgy, Fifth Avenue neighborhood than is the spare, contemporary space,” says Platt, who “didn’t detect any artsy references in the generic, generally uninspired food at Robert.” Perhaps a cook-off will cheer Platt; Rob Patronite and Robin Raisfeld find two native Texans making their a chili con carne in Brooklyn. Or cool your palate with Charles Rodriguez’s recipe for blood-orange salad.

The Storm Over Salt; Platt Goes to the Museums