The ‘Top Chef’–‘Project Runway’ Mash-up We’ve Been
How did such a coupling take so long? Top Chef’s Dale Levitski (who was NOT invited back for this week’s holiday special) and Project Runway’s Jack Mackenroth are dating! Here’s the dirt: “We randomly met over MySpace,” says Dale. “I like keeping it incestuous. Keep it in the Bravo family,” says Jack.
Other pairings we’d like to see:
Sam Talbot and Uli Herzner
Mike Midgley and Wendy Pepper
Elia Aboumrad and Michael Knight
Have any suggestions for hot Project Runway–Top Chef crossovers? Play matchmaker in the comments.
Real Reality Couple: Jack Mackenroth and Dale Levitski Dating [BreakOUT News via Towleroad]
In the Magazine
The Tragic Tales Behind ‘Top Chef’So let’s say you somehow make it on to Top Chef or Project Runway, elbowing past the thousands of other rivals seeking to fertilize the egg of an upcoming reality-TV-show season. And let’s say you even win the contest, getting crowned Top Chef or No. 1 designer: Shouldn’t that be enough to launch a career? You would think it would be, but as Jennifer Senior’s article from this week’s issue reveals, it often isn’t — a fact we hope our own Top Chef non-winners, like our friends Joey and Lia, will remember as they return to the kitchens they knew before fame came calling.
The Near-Fame Experience [NYM]
Related: Joey, Latest ‘Top Chef’ Non-Winner, on Why Rocco Is a Douche Bag
‘Top Chef’ Non-Winner Lia on What Went Wrong
NewsFeed
Joe Ng Triumphs Over General TsoIn January, dim-sum aficionados reveled in the news that Joe Ng, the city’s top dim-sum man, was being promoted to executive chef of Chinatown Brasserie. Indeed, we named Ng’s creations the best in the city. Now the cook has introduced a new lunch menu centered on his delicate Cantonese-style work. The dim sum (beef and scallion buns, lobster-tail tempura, fried lobster-and-cream-cheese sticks) is complemented by a number of light dishes (wok-fried noodles, udon omelettes, and various kinds of soup noodles). If you’re still hankering for the heavier dishes they were serving at lunch, you can get them by special request. But as far we’re concerned, the new menu is all you need to know.
Chinatown Brasserie lunch menu [Menus]
User’s Guide
Seder Gets Spicy!Happening as they do at Uncle Marty’s and in church basements, Seder meals aren’t usually known for being very tasty. But if you’re not worried about the meal being kosher — we won’t say anything to Marty — you can go out and have an Italian, Mexican, or even Indian Passover celebration. Here’s where to go.
In the Magazine
What Shall We Eat Now That It’s Cold?The rib-sticking cuisine of central Europe, with its spaetzles and schnitzels, comes into its own, of course, when the cold weather arrives. This week, Rob and Robin suggest five restaurants that will sustain you over the winter. About Trestle on Tenth, they write: “Start with the pork-shoulder crepinettes, and proceed directly to the roast lamb saddle with bacon sauce.” Done and done!
R&R also round up four new restaurants on East 50th Street that are giving midtown some much-needed “multicultural flair”: Dos Caminos Third, Gyu-Kaku, I-Chin, and Tunisia Restaurant.
Schlag Is Optional [NYM]
Eats 50th [NYM]
NewsFeed
The Soda Shop’s Blast From the PastCraig Béro and Linda Donahue, the egg-cream aficionados behind The Soda Shop, have just opened a private dining space that’s perfect for small holiday parties — and getting a taste of Tribeca’s history. After breaking through to a decaying, walled-off space next door, the duo was inspired to decorate the room with artifacts salvaged from the surrounding ten blocks, many from construction-site dumpsters. Twisted cedar branches climbing up the brick allude to the horse stable that was probably once there, and Béro believes that the original, rustic-style fireplace was used by members of a small community of freed slaves in the late 1700s. The space is almost eerie, especially when Béro, a brooding foodie historian, begins telling you that he’s currently reading The Murder of Helen Jewett, the story of an eighteenth-century prostitute bludgeoned to death less than three blocks away. But fear not: Cheeriness returns in one sip of a strawberry milk shake.
— Alexandra Vallis
