Dining Out Advice

FRANK BRUNI WROTE his final column as food critic for the New York Times today. That doesn't really have anything to do with our lives, except that he offers some advice about eating-out in New York and I can't help but wonder if the advice would work in Paris, Lyon, or Bordeaux. Here's his suggestion for ordering at a nice, well-respected restaurant:

Scratch off the appetizers and entrees that are most like dishes you’ve seen in many other restaurants, because they represent this one at its most dutiful, conservative and profit-minded. The chef’s heart isn’t in them.

Scratch off the dishes that look the most aggressively fanciful. The chef’s vanity — possibly too much of it — spawned these.

Then scratch off anything that mentions truffle oil.

Choose among the remaining dishes.

Sounds over-simplified at first reading, but after thinking about it -- probably pretty good advice.