Michael Bauer returned to Yountville to update his thoughts on Bistro Jeanty (warning: that link comes with an Amelie soundtrack), and sadly he finds it just as rote and sloppy as it was when he was there three years ago. The fourteen-year-old bistro from chef Philippe Jeanty has been running on “cruise control,” Bauer says, for the better part of the last decade, and that’s evidenced especially by the menu which hasn’t changed much in the last six years. He finds bistro standards like cassoulet and beef daube, but says, “when the temperature heats up, many diners may want something lighter that reflects the great produce of the area. You’re hard-pressed to find it here.” The sole meuniere remains the best thing on the menu, along with the tomato soup, but he found rotten lettuce in his butter lettuce salad, an overdressed lamb tongue salad, and an over-salted lamb’s neck osso bucco. The verdict: one and a half stars. [Chron]
Also, Mandy Erickson gives her take on LYFE Kitchen in Palo Alto, the new fast-casual, under-600-calorie-dish place from former Oprah chef Art Smith, which is set to take the country by storm. She says the place reminds her a little of the health-food craze in the seventies, but obviously the food’s a lot better. She digs the grass-fed burger and the roast salmon, but says to skip the desserts, and the over-sweet barbecue chicken flatbread. All told: two stars. [Chron]
And over at the Examiner, Jesse Hirsch reviews Dobbs Ferry, the “bicoastal homage” to a little-known suburb of New York City where one of the owners grew up. He finds a number of mediocre dishes, like the pork meatballs and eggplant rollatini, but, he writes, “I can recommend a handful of stand-outs, enough to cobble together a decent meal (if, say, you couldn’t get a table at nearby Absinthe).” He likes the sweetbread appetizer, for instance, and says they serve “the best version of chicken scarpariello you may ever encounter.” [Examiner]
