Riled Review: Nobu

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NOBU
105 Hudson St. (Franklin St.), 212-219-0500

Those who know let the chef “do it for you,” at Nobu Matsuhisa’s Japanese-Peruvian that “doesn’t hold hot food at above 140°F.” Reservations are “next to impossible,” for cuisine prepared on “surfaces not properly washed, rinsed or sanitized.” Harvey Weinstein may be “seated next to you” with a table of “big ballers,” and you can know that “non-food contact surface was constructed with unacceptable materials.” Zinger: surface also “improperly maintained.”

New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene Restaurant Inspection points: 24.

(Originally published 10/18/06.)

Riled Review: Sushi Yasuda

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Sushi Yasuda
204 E. 43rd St. (bet. 2nd & 3rd Aves.), 212-972-1001

This "dream of a Japanese restaurant" doesn't properly display its "choking first aid poster." "Lighting is inadequate," in this "super-neatly designed" hotspot close to the UN. "Bamboo is everywhere," and behind closed doors the staff, "do not use proper utensils to eliminate bare hand contact with food that will not receive adequate additional heat treatment."

Leibovitz at the Brooklyn Museum

by Andrew Bast

For decades Annie Leibovitz has worked as a photographer for the nation's classiest glossies. Rolling stone covers? That's old hat to the 57-year-old photojournalist. Her portraits of a naked and pregnant Demi Moore, or of George W. Bush, his Presidential belt buckle blazing, likely flashed before your eyes in recent years, if the copies of Vanity Fair didn't spend a month on your coffee table.

But it's with an ever-more emotional eye that you'll have to see these gelatin prints now hanging at the Brooklyn Museum. Yes, Bush and Moore, big and in color, are on display, but more importantly, so is Leibovitz's far more arresting war work form Sarajevo and Africa. And then there's the tear-jerker portrait of her mother. 

Riled Review: Dojo

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Dojo
24 St. Marks Pl. (bet. 2nd & 3rd Aves.), 212-674-9821

This “regular NYU haunt” has “plumbing not properly installed, anti-siphonage prevention device not provided where required.” “Every New Yorker’s fast bite” has a “sewer disposal system in disrepair or not functioning properly.” Healthy fare everywhere in a venue that’s “not vermin proof.”

New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene Restaurant Inspection points: 61!!

Riled Review: Balthazar

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BALTHAZAR
80 Spring St. (bet. B’way & Crosby St.), 212-965-1414

“French to the core,” Keith McNally’s SoHo “be seen” touch of France hosts “improperly sanitized equipment or utensils.” The “succulent steak frites,” are “cross-contaminated.” And the staff, “ever more jolie than Pareee,” “do not use proper utensil to eliminate bare hand contact with food that will not receive adequate additional heat treatment.”

New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene Restaurant Inspection points: 22.

Inquirer's Riled Restaurant Reviews

A Food Issue wouldn't be complete without some restaurant reviews, so The Inquirer has plucked five New York City eateries from an unusual list: the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene's restaurant inspections.

It's a fully functional site. You can search by restaurant, borough or neighborhood. So we searched, mostly by name. And what we found were some frightening "quotes" (in that good, old Zagat way) of some of our favorite places to eat. One each day this week.

A point of reference: the lower a restaurant's score, the better. Higher than 28, and it gets disgusting. And while all our joints score at least in the 20's, don't think that's average. Quite the contrary. Danielle's Pizza Shop in the Bronx scored an encouraging 2 points.

Riled Review: Joe's Shanghai

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Joe's Shanghai (Manhattan)
9 Pell St. (bet. Bowery & Mott St.), 212-233-8888

"Best soup dumplings" in town steamed on "food contact surfaces not properly maintained." Crowds "come in droves" to scarf up fare "not protected from potential source of contamination," and prepared with "inadequate lighting." P.S. the zinger on top of "best Chinatown lunch" is "evidence of mice or live mice present in facility's food areas."

New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene Restaurant Inspection points: 26.