The reopened Waldorf-Astoria deserved a great new Waldorf salad.
Michael Anthony, chef at the hotel’s Lex Yard restaurant, goes one better. His re-invention of the 100-year-old recipe not only improves on the country-clubby original, it lives up to the entire hotel’s spectacular, oft-delayed, $2 billion transformation.
Like its Art Deco surroundings, Anthony’s salad is lightened, brightened and reconstituted for a new generation. Just as the hotel retains its landmarked Peacock Alley lounge and other interior pleasures, the salad builds on the original salad’s basics — celery, apples and grapes.
First devised by hotel chef Oscar Tschirky in 1896, the Waldorf salad has never been a favorite of mine. Too often a cloying, mayonnaise-slathered affair whether in diners or fancy restaurants, the old warhorse was sometimes propped up with corn or raspberries. No matter, the result was the same: a bland heap of unrelated items tossed with cheap green lettuces and weighted down by gobs of mayo.
Anthony, who’s also the chef of well-loved Gramercy Tavern, said his aim was to “keep it simple, visually appealing and memorable.” His boldest stroke was to replace mayo with a tingling, lemon-tinted aioli that flatters all the elements, which are fine-chopped into a chiffonade that’s like a picnic on a plate.
The salad tosses little gem lettuce, frisee, candied walnuts, fresh tomatoes, grapes and toasted sunflower seeds, beneath a cloud of grated cheddar cheese.
All the bitter and sweet flavors, and crunchy and soft textures, come through cleanly and clearly defined. It’s a great summer dish that will surely shine year-round as elements are changed with the seasons.
It’s the must-have item on the menu, and it’s offered both as part of $140, four-course prix-fixe and for $26 a la carte.
It will take weeks to experience the menu’s full depth, but Anthony was at the top of his game on opening night with dishes such as pan-roasted black bass in a dark-hued, pleasantly sweet bouillabaisse sauce ($48), a sparkling Maine lobster roll ($53) that lived up to the waiter’s description as “fully loaded”; and a dangerously delicious, fresh-made red velvet souffle tart ($22) that laughed at the old dessert list’s supposedly iconic but commercial-tasting red velvet cake.
It was a thrill dining at Lex Yard on Wednesday, when the reborn hotel got its first heartbeat in nearly eight years. (A handful of guest rooms are open with the full-scale opening to include the grand ballroom planned for September.)
Japanese restaurant Yoshoku, off the main lobby, was already near-full, while Peacock Alley buzzed with the sound of lounge-goers delighted to find the fabled venue looking better than it has in several generations.
The two-level Lex Yard is more casual on the ground floor where voices from a lively bar permeate the scene. The more plush second level, where I sat, is more luxurious with richly upholstered booths and carpeted floors. It also unfortunately comes with a view through mullioned windows of floors-full of styrofoam boxes inside a building that seems under eternal renovation.
July’s quiet and hot summer days are springtime for Lex Yard. Catch them before autumn brings cooler nights — and the hordes who wondered for eight years if they’d ever set foot in the Waldorf-Astoria again.
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