Beef

‘Turning Japanese’: Philippe Plays Race Card Against Mr. Chow

Michael Chow.
Michael Chow. Photo: Patrick McMullan

The feud between Mr. Chow and Philippe is perhaps just as fierce as the one between Da Silvano and Bar Pitti, and its new staging area is Miami. There’ve long been tensions over the fact that the two restaurants were due to open their South Beach outposts 100 feet from each other, and now that Mr. Chow is close to launching, Philippe’s rep is playing dirty. She writes to us: “It is interesting to note that Mr. Chow has enlisted Szto Sawai [sic], a JAPANESE chef, according to South Florida Gourmet … could this mean that they don’t think they can find another Chinese chef to compete against Philippe Chow? Hmmmm ….. this turning Japanese might make Philippe Chow a winner in this war …. ” Interesting tactic. We’d note that according to HotelChatter, Saiwai was the head of Hong Kong’s largest restaurant group, but, uh, maybe we better stay out of this one.

‘Turning Japanese’: Philippe Plays Race Card Against Mr. Chow