RUTH REICHL

Reichl's mother not so good around the kitchen: 288k WAV audio file 1Mb QuickTime movie Restaurant experiences have many variables: 256k WAV audio file 800k QuickTime movie Everybody eats three meals a day: 160k WAV audio file 488k QuickTime movie

Reichl's book Tender at the Bone

Eating New York

Mom's bad cooking, and New York's finest

April 13, 1998
Web posted at: 5:28 p.m. EST (2228 GMT)

BOBBIE BATTISTA, CNN ANCHOR: New York Times food critic Ruth Reichl said she was born for her particular line of work. In fact, it was a matter of survival, since her mother was an notoriously bad cook.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: That's just one of the tidbits gnawed off the "Tender at the Bone" memoir about her life as a restaurant reviewer.

BATTISTA: Ruth Reichl joins us this morning from our New York studios, incognito of course, and there's a good reason for that as we'll find out later. Good morning, Ruth.

RUTH REICHL, NEW YORK TIMES RESTAURANT CRITIC: Good morning.

BATTISTA: This book is as much about your family and your upbringing and what lead you to being a critic. ... so tell us a little bit more about your mother.

REICHL: If you had a mother like mine, you want to write about her too. This is a great story about my mother. One morning my mother woke my father up and said, "darling come into the kitchen, I need you."

And he sleepily groped his way down the hall to the kitchen and she put something into his mouth which he said was the single most disgusting thing he had ever tasted and he leaned over and spit it out at which point my mother said, "um hum, just as I thought. Spoiled."

O'BRIEN: You made the point that she felt like nothing could be spoiled. If you just kind of sliced the mold off, it's OK, right?

REICHL: Oh, absolutely. She also thought that you could combine any two things, so she had a few leftovers. She would combine corned beef and chocolate pudding and make a little casserole out of them.

BATTISTA: So this lead you to start cooking yourself.

REICHL: Well, it was self-defense. If you're sensible and you have a mother like that, you cook yourself. It's the only thing to do.

O'BRIEN: The potential for an accidental poisoning was very great. Right?

REICHL: Oh yes. And my mother, of course, thought that she was a wonderful cook, and my father said, "you know, your mother is such a great cook."

BATTISTA: He was a brave man. He was a good man, wasn't he?

REICHL: He was a good man. He was.

O'BRIEN: So from corned beef and chocolate pudding to Le Cirque. First of all we should point out that the reason you're incognito is as a restaurant critic you want to be able to do your job without being recognized. Right?

REICHL: Yes, exactly. My job is to go into restaurants and tell you what's going to happen to you, not what's going to happen to the restaurant critic of "The New York Times".

So to do that, I have to not look like the person that I really am.

BATTISTA: So what's interesting about this, because one of the columns you wrote for "The New York Times" was going to Le Cirque first disguised and then undisguised ... But two completely different experiences.

REICHL: The time that I went as just Joe Citizen, we waited 45 minutes for our table. Actually, I had a few versions like that and was never treated particularly well; never got a great table. I was with another woman the first time and actually the maitre'd came by after I had the wine list for about a minute and said, "I need that wine list. Give it back to me," and I couldn't get it back.

And then after many visits like that, I went back as me and it was an extremely different experience. I got there early. There was a huge crowd of people waiting, but my table was ready. I went right through the crowd. So I wrote two parallel reviews. This is what happens to you as a person, and this is what happens to you as a celebrity.

It was one of my first reviews at The New York Times and it was extremely well received.

BATTISTA: I guess, especially by Joe Q. Public. Did anything happen at the restaurant. Were there repercussions?

REICHL: Well, I don't know exactly what happened then, but a few years later the restaurant closed. They reopened as Le Cirque 2000, and I did it all over again. And I went many times in disguise, and I have to say that I was treated beautifully. I mean, I really felt that what had happened was that the attitude had changed. I want every restaurateur in New York to think that whoever comes in might be me.

O'BRIEN: Could be you. You've hit on a very key point here though. In your line of work, it's not like being a movie reviewer where everyone sees "Titanic" the same way. On the screen it's the same. But the experience can be so different for two different people, even on the same night, going to the same restaurant.

REICHL: Exactly. If you get the waiter who's in a bad mood, or you're seated next to someone who speaks very loudly, or you're right under the draft, that experience is different for you than it is for the person at the next table. And as a restaurant critic, my job is try and tell you as closely as possible what's going to happen to you, which is one reason why I go many times.

BATTISTA: And one of the things I like about the book is that you just don't write about the food. You do write about the overall experience because it is irritating to encounter that attitude with a capital A at a restaurant because, excuse me, you're here to serve me, I thought. I'm paying.

REICHL: You know one of the things that's really great about what's happened in America, is that as we have become more experienced restaurant goers, people are demanding more and that attitude with a capital A that you're talking about is really changing. I mean, people are really saying, "look I am paying for this, I want a good experience," and increasingly they're getting it.

O'BRIEN: Well, people don't want to be treated rudely, obviously, but by the same token, I think part of the experience in going to Le Cirque is that you're entering into this exclusive world and you want an air of exclusivity somewhat, don't you?

REICHL: Oh, absolutely. I mean, you're going there because Henry Kissinger may be at the next table and of course you expect that he is going to be treated particularly well. But that doesn't mean that you want to be treated badly. And that's important for restaurateurs to remember. That they don't have to treat you badly to prove to the other people that they're getting better service.

BATTISTA: Have you had one absolutely worst-case experience where it was just so awful you had a field day writing about it, or you felt sorry for the restaurant.

REICHL: Oh, I've had so many of those.

I think my favorite was where, after waiting about an hour for my lunch the manager came over and said, "I'm so sorry, your waitress just quit."

O'BRIEN: You know, these things happen to people. Do you ever get tired of your job.

REICHL: Never.

O'BRIEN: You have to eat out frequently, right?

REICHL: Oh, I eat out 11-12 meals a week. I feel really blessed. It's a great job.

BATTISTA: How do you stay slim?

REICHL: This is what people want to shoot. I have a good metabolism. I eat what I like. And if I'm in a great restaurant I eat it all. If it's not so good, I don't eat it all. The truth is, everybody eats three meals a day and I eat three meals a day too. I just happen to eat them out.

O'BRIEN: When you go, do you take your friends?

REICHL: Oh yes. My friends are all terrified that some day this job will end and the gravy train will end. I hope to take lots of friends.

O'BRIEN: Well, we hope it doesn't end anytime soon because I've always enjoyed your reviews. Thanks for being with us.

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