The New York Diet

Socialite, Designer Tinsley Mortimer Dines at Cipriani, Has a Soft Spot for Domino’s Pizza

Photo: Melissa Hom

Think it’s odd that party fixture Tinsley Mortimer was recently flown to China to attend Fendi’s runway presentation on the Great Wall? Actually, the socialite (and ambassador for Dior Beauty) is big in Asia — she’s hard at work designing the fall 2008 collection for Samantha Thavasa (clothes sold only in Japan; handbags sold on Madison Avenue) and is preparing for the spring launch of a new line called Riccimie by Tinsley Mortimer. That doesn’t mean she goes out of her way to eat exotic. “I have a really poor palate,” she confesses. “So I tend to eat a lot of crap.” So is it crap, or merely guilty pleasures?

Saturday, October 27
I ordered Domino’s Pizza and pretty much feasted on that for hours. Living in Virginia, that’s what we really ordered a lot. I usually want the sweets — the Brownie Bites and CinnaStix — and I order the pizza to get to the sweets. They have this new pizza that’s really good, called the Crispy Melt. It’s a layer of the thin crust on the top with some baked cheese, and then underneath is the pizza. And I had the Oreo pizza, which is amazing.

Sunday, October 28
I ate some of the leftover pizza. Since I had ordered only one pizza and I got two, I had this whole other pizza here. I was thinking about throwing it away so I wouldn’t be bad on Sunday, but I didn’t. So it was in the kitchen. I had some peanut butter that day too. Lately I’ve been being so bad and pigging out and having these crazy eating moments. For me, it’s all or nothing.

Monday, October 29
I like hazelnut extra-large coffee with about seven or nine Equals and half-and-half. I get it from Serafina’s juice bar. I was working on catching up with bills and working on all this other stuff so I didn’t actually eat anything at all. But I met my husband for dinner at Le Steak. I had a really good, delicious steak with great steak sauce. And I had the Roquefort salad, which is amazing, and creamed spinach and a glass of red wine.

Tuesday, October 30
I had coffee again in the morning. Every day I go to this tiny hole-in-the-wall, Nectar’s Coffee Shop on 79th and Madison. It’s been there forever. There’s barely any seats and no bathroom. My husband grew up on the same street we live on now, and he’d go there all the time with his dad. I have this salad I get all the time with romaine lettuce, chicken, and Cheddar cheese.

For dinner I went to Viand. I had a cheeseburger, no bun. I typically do a low-carb lifestyle — we’ll call it that instead of a diet, though it is a diet in a way: I’ll eat a burger without a bun, and no fries and no ketchup drooling out of it.

Wednesday, October 31
I had my coffee in the morning, I went to Nectar’s for lunch and had that same salad, and then while I was at Cipriani’s for dinner, before the Cavalli party. I had tagliarini, and there was some sort of meat. A veal chop or something. For Halloween I was an angel, but I wore an amazing Cavalli dress. I didn’t have Halloween candy. I was worried about trick-or-treaters coming up to the building, but I knew that if I had candy out, I was going to eat it. But I’m more of a doughnut and cupcakes person rather than candy.

Thursday, November 1
I wasn’t feeling well, so I ordered pancakes because I needed some bread. That’s all I had. I’m going to this party tonight for Bob Hardwick. My mom is coming, so they’ll have dinner there. In Virginia we used to have grits a lot. I like them with honey on them so they’re sweet. I miss that. But we’re in New York. I don’t feel like there’s anything that you can’t get if you want it.

Socialite, Designer Tinsley Mortimer Dines at Cipriani, Has a Soft Spot for