Newspaper Article

Dining With Moira Hodgson

Hodgson, Moira

2004

Overview

  I also felt queasy at the thought of spending the price of two round-trip tickets to England on just one dinner. O.K., so 90 percent of the fish is flown in from Japan (where, as everyone knows, a watermelon costs $50), but is it worth the expense? Masa Takayama is a celebrity chef who for years has had a devoted following at his tiny restaurant on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, which he sold before he moved to New York. Unlike most celebrity chefs, Mr. Takayama stays on the premises. If you sit at the sushi bar, you can watch the master at work, which is something to behold. The silently working sushi chefs, with shaved heads and loose- fitting black clothes, looked like Buddhist monks, and each one wielded a long, sharp steel sushi knife with a carved wooden handle. The fish was piled in a glass case in the middle of the work space. Mr. Takayama, center stage, was dressed in the traditional monk's gray-blue. He has a round, cheerful face and was chatting with an enthusiastic couple in their 40's, the man looking fresh off Wall Street in his striped shirt and tie. The rest of the audience consisted of two Pakistani businessmen and a perky young blonde with an older, balding date. She ordered a Coke. There was no uni, no kobe beef or truffles (and if there had been, our bill could have soared to $500 per person). It was certainly a wonderful meal, but too much money for one that included a great deal of mackerel. Next-door at Bar Masa, which doesn't take reservations, you can get dinner for two for about $200. But as far as Masa is concerned, while I appreciate Mr. Takayama's genius, it's not a restaurant I'll be going back to anytime soon, and certainly not if I can't sit at the bar. If I want great sushi in a more romantic atmosphere, I'll go to Jewel Bako or Megu.

• Publisher: New York Observer, LP
• Subject: Hodgson, Moira