Well, it's hardly a surprise, given Donatella Arpaia's success with Michelin-starred chef Michael Psilakis, but the team behind david burke and & donatella -- Arpaia and David Burke (pictured) -- are parting ways, at least professionally. According to the official release, Burke will run the East 61st Street restaurant (whose name will remain until the end of the year) while Arpaia "leaves to focus on her other restaurant projects." Arpaia and Psilakis have been on......

Time Out New York’s current issue has a feature documenting ingredients used in both restaurant kitchens and industrial settings like labs and factories: The chemical methylcellulose, for instance, is not only used by chefs like Sam Mason at Tailor, but is also very closely related to a key ingredient of K-Y. Another peculiar ingredient is mastic (or mastiha), which is often stored next to the tapioca maltodextrin in the kitchens mentioned in the TONY piece.......

On all counts, Michael Psilakis has been on quite a roll. Though his two-starred Dona was shuttered due to a real estate snafu, he went on to earn a Michelin star at Anthos, one of only two Greek restaurants with this honor, his to-die-for gnudi recipe was featured on the cover of Bon Appetit, was named Esquire's chef of the year, and opened up Mia Dona, which just yesterday earned two stars from Frank Bruni.......

Nominees for the 2008 James Beard Foundation Awards, which are kind of like the Academy Awards for chefs, have just been announced. This year’s ceremony will take place on June 8 at Avery Fischer Hall; New York contenders include Gavin Keysen of Café Boulud, up for Rising Star Chef. For the nationwide awards, Gothamist interviewees Dan Barber and Michael Psilakis have been nominated for Outstanding Chef and Best New Restaurant, respectively. Gramercy Tavern, owned by......

Wildly successful young chef and restaurateur Michael Psilakis – whose Anthos is one of only two Greek restaurants in the world with a Michelin star – refined his talent not in culinary school but in the kitchen beside his Greek mother during his childhood on Long Island. After earning a business degree, he found himself drawn back to the food world, where he worked his way up from waiter to owner of the Long Island......

tre dici STEAK: The second floor of Chelsea’s Italian restaurant tre dici has been transformed into an intimate, 50 seat dining room (pictured) designed in the style of a sexy New Orleans speakeasy, circa 1920. Heavy fabrics covering the windows evoke a feeling of timelessness in the candlelit room, which is lined with luxuriant claret leathers and sensual artwork under an antique silver tin ceiling. The food arrives via dumbwaiter from chef Giuseppe Fanelli’s kitchen......

Looking back over the year in food, 2007 was chock full of tasty goodness. The locavore movement was in full swing, truffles were over the top expensive, and Gothamist readers continue to get pissed off about foie gras. There was a lawsuit over lobster rolls, we got a new Whole Foods, the vendors at the Red Hook ball fields were threatened, rats ran crazy at Taco Bell, and the DOH went ballistic. Chumleys fell,......

Once again Taste of New York lived up to its name, with a roster of restaurants serving everything from ‘cue to cevape and some well-crafted cocktails to boot. Gothamist was honored to attend this culinary blowout thrown by New York to benefit City Harvest. One of the evening’s tastiest offerings was Insieme’s tortelli di zucca, or pumpkin filled pasta. We’d love to think that this judgment was based solely on the dish’s fall theme,......

It's Michelin madness! While we gave you the overall rundown yesterday, we wanted to follow up a bit. We noted the loss of a star at Tom Colicchio's Craft. Bruni ponders this change: "Craft’s demotion is more attention-getting. Has it really gone downhill? I hear mixed reports from regulars, and while my most recent meal there, perhaps a year ago, wasn’t as memorable as a meal I had eaten there about two years before that,......

This week ">Bruni goes to Anthos, Michael Psilakis and Donatella Arpaia's new Greek restaurant, and awards the restaurant two stars. "Much of the cooking is inspired," he says, "and much of it is excellent." Bruni finds the décor dreary, and the pacing of the meal a bit off, but overall thinks the restaurant is on its way to good places (and more stars in future). Also in the Times, ">Peter Meehan visits Super Taco, the......

This week Bruni visits Keith McNally's Morandi, which has been getting creamed by critics of late. He awards the restaurant one star, says "the food has been getting a worse rap than it deserves," but also that it's erratic. He doesn't love the desserts, but doesn't hate them; same goes for the wine list. Overall, McNally has "miscalculated with this restaurant," says Bruni, "which doesn't have enough atmospheric magic to distract you from the insane......

We were fortunate enough to be at the Time Out New York Eat Out Awards last night to watch the winners of both the Readers' Choice awards, chosen by readers who made over 14,000 submissions, and the Critics' Picks awards, selected by the TONY staff. The coveted plates hang on restaurant and bar walls throughout the city. Four gold plate awards went to those who won some of the top honors -- A Voce, for......

This week, Bruni visits Rosanjin in Tribeca for kaseiki, finds it "strange and sometimes wonderful" and awards the restaurant two stars. The meal of many small courses is supposed to provide spiritual uplift in its ceremony. For Bruni, "the glory is in the details," like the uni wrapped in a shiso leaf, then battered and fried. The later courses were letdowns, however, and sometimes the small courses left him hungry two hours later. Also in......

Bruni goes to Varietal, calls it "an epicurean Advanced Placement exam" and awards the restaurant one star. He says, "Varietal can become so entraced with the unusual ingredients it's deploying, the unconventional ideas it's hatching and the uncommon pose it's striking that it seems not to ponder the off-kilter or underwhelming results." He does love the wine selection, and, when combined with the best dishes, says eating there can be an exciting experience. Just order......

The foie gras battle rages on sparked by a sign at Fairway on the Upper West Side. Jacques Torres is in a hot chocolate war in DUMBO (his use of exclamation points is also noted). Michael Psilakis and Donatella Arpaia find a new home at Anthos, in the former Acqua Pazza space on 52nd Street. Restaurant Girl gets an early peek. And with Japanese Restaurant Week starting today, we find Grub Street's guide very......

Bruni goes to the Penthouse Strip Executive Club to try the steaks at its restaurant, Robert's Steakhouse. He receives offers from the staff to get naked for him, but--more to the point--also finds "some of the very best steaks in New York City," and gives the restaurant one star. Eater is on the money again this week, having bet that Robert's would receive one star (and thereby cause Jeffrey Chodorow's head to explode). Also in......

Bruni starts off the new year by two-starring Drew Nieoporent's Vietnamese/Asian-influenced Mai House. He finds the menu "rife with surprises and out-and-out delights." Chef and co-partner is Michael Huynh, formerly of Bao 111. Bruni doesn't like the sides or desserts, but finds most appetizers and entrees pleasing. And Eater starts the year by putting the money on one star, but taking two themselves. Well, they got half of it right. In $25 and Under, Peter......

Gothamist received some very distressing news in our inbox moments ago -- it appears that Dona is closing. The building in which Dona is currently located is being sold to a real estate developer and Donatella Arpaia is actively searching for a new spot in which to showcase Chef Michael Psilakis' cooking. Dona received two stars from the Times and has been regarded by many critics as one of the best newcomers of 2006, with......

Adam Platt has started of 2007 with a bang -- New York magazine has released his "Where to Eat 2007" lists, a compendium of his picks for the year, divided into categories. "Haute Barnyard," a phrase that Platt coined a while back, is his term for restaurants focused on suppliers and the origins of the food, with countrified leanings. Cookshop, Peasant, Hearth, and Blue Hill qualify, among others. He takes us on two rambles, one......

Okay, so slaving in the kitchen for hours on end isn't for everyone. If you want to leave the entire Thanksgiving planning, shopping, prep, cooking, and cleanup to someone else, or if the thought of eating aunt Irma's dried out excuse for a bird throws you right over the edge, dining out might be for you. Grab the family and a few friends for good measure and instead of making a turkey or a pumpkin......

Where can you taste dishes from Bobby Flay, Lidia Bastianich, Dan Barber, Tom Valenti, Joey Campanaro and Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto all under one roof? At New York Magazine's annual Taste of New York, a fundraiser for City Harvest. The cocktails (from some of the city's best: Pegu Club, Flatiron Lounge, and Little Branch) were flowing and the crowd was on a mission to taste everything these chefs could dish out. One of the......

Today in the Times, Frank Bruni gives Greek-Italian Dona two stars, says it reaches high and far--too high at times. As predicted by the oddsmakers at Eater. Elsewhere, Dona got three stars from New York magazine's Adam Platt, who said that the food is "always arresting, and often excellent," and had some love for female restauranteur Donatella Arpaia, who collaborates on Dona with chef Michael Psilakis. But according to another New York-er, Gael Greene, Psilakis......