The Hudson Cafeteria: Celebrities, astounding designs--and a hotel room if the meal goes really well.Feb 11 '01 Write an essay on this topic.
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The Bottom Line You can't get trendier than the Hudson Cafeteria. Good for groups and those you want to impress; if you're lucky, you can catch a celebrity.
The Hudson Cafeteria, located inside the Hudson Hotel, is one of the trendiest restaurants in New York. Because the hotel only opened recently (October of 2000), we can expect the Hudson Cafeteria's popularity to continue for quite a while. I'd heard from several different types of people that this was the new celebrity in-place, and took the opportunity to enjoy a $20.01 lunch there during New York City's Restaurant Week in February of 2001 [for those that don't know about Restaurant Week: a plethora of restaurants in New York City participate in serving a prix fixe lunch for the price of the year (this year, $20.01 for 2001)]. The Hudson is an Ian Schrager hotel; I can only presume he is someone more astute architectural students than I would know. Apparently, it is Schrager's first New York City hotel in more than a decade. Its web site (http://www.hudsonhotel.com) describes how it "delivers a potent combination of urban adventure, daredevil design, and true affordability to arguably the most jaded city in the world, giving New York something even it has never seen before." Not unbiased, given the source, but the trip you must take through the hotel to gain access to the restaurant is indeed adventurous. When you enter from the street for the restaurant, you must go up an escalator, through the hotel lobby and down a corridor overlooking an outdoor garden. Everything from the lighting to the architecture to the grandiose space (especially for Manhattan) is intriguing. I thought I saw Tyson (the model) smoking in the corridor, but it was so dim, I can't be sure. The Cafeteria itself has...well, cafeteria-style seating: Large square tables with benches. If it had been crowded--and it wasn't--it could have been slightly uncomfortable for a romantic rendezvous, but it's probably an excellent place for groups. The benches don't provide any back support, of course, so for people with poor posture (like me), it's sort of an aesthetic nightmare. In the center of the room is the kitchen--with no walls--so you can see what the chefs and assistants are doing. The room itself has huge ceilings and is dimly lit, but bright enough due to outside light. I'm sure it's also quite beautiful at night. The menu at the Hudson has a lot of interesting items, most of which are priced, as you would expect, between $15 and $30. Although we selected our meal from the $20.01 prix fixe menu, I could see that the items available were also on the regular menu. I had, to start, iceberg lettuce with bleu cheese, which was, quite simply, OK. A huge portion of lettuce is served (we both had this, and neither could finish it, despite being quite hungry), with a good bleu cheese dressing. It tasted good but was neither astounding nor unique. Next, my companion and I split two entrees, macaroni & cheese and a beef stew. The macaroni & cheese was suitably brown, bubbly and encrusted, but was so incredibly oily--gobs of oil lay at the bottom of the bowl--that I ended up feeling pretty ill after the meal. It tasted good, but again, nothing spectacular, and nothing an average chef couldn't easily make at home. The beef stew was good, with lean, tender meat, but it billed itself as having horseradish, and neither of us tasted it. For dessert, we both had chocolate cake, which was rich and moist, with many layers. I wasn't able to finish mine, primarily because stomach problems were kicking in, but I ate enough of it to report that it was good but not excellent. Wines by the glass are available at reasonable prices: I had a glass of Madame Costeau for about $8. Overall, as you can see, the Hudson Cafeteria is a place to eat if you're staying in the hotel, or if you want to try a trendy restaurant in New York; it is not a place to go because of the spectacular cuisine. One final note: the bathrooms are European style (floor to ceiling doors on the stalls), and have minimal design and neat faucet handles. Stop in after your meal, even if you don't need to, just to have a peek. The Hudson Hotel (and Cafeteria) is at 356 West 58th Street, New York, NY; telephone (212) 554-6000.  |
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