Dave Chang Not Cool with Jay Rayner's Ma Peche Review

What had Momofuku's David Chang in a 2 AM twitter frenzy last night? Jay Rayner, chief restaurant critic at The Guardian in the UK, and onetime Top Chef Masters judge, published a review of Chang's Midtown restaurant Ma Peche. And it was not 100% positive (it was about 85% positive). He writes that he loves Chang's food downtown, and loves almost all of it at Ma Peche. He adores the room; the brussels sprouts are a revelation.

Rayner pans the snails and, more surprisingly, the steak frites, but the sticking point for Chang is probably Rayner's complaint that Ma Peche does not serve dessert. In fact it does! But they started a month ago, 10 months after their opening and just days after Rayner stopped in to review. He complained about the dessert situation then too.

So here's the Twitter thread, starting at around 1 AM EST:



(In case you're wondering why they're tweeting at Bloomberg's Ryan Sutton)

And here's the offending graf:

And then to dessert. Oh hang on. They don't do dessert. As their waiter says "we prefer to spotlight artisan cheeses". Really? Do you? Why? Courtesy of a rule banning all unpasteurised cheeses unless over 90 days old, America is where cheese goes to die. What's weirder is that, as you enter Má Pêche, there is a huge dessert bar, bulging with cakes and cookies. But it's only for take away. You're not allowed to order from it in the restaurant. I have to beg our waitress to slip us some cookies and she agrees, though with little enthusiasm. This is very silly. It's very irritating. And utterly New York.

Of course, Rayner's previous statement about Chang probably didn't help things, "I'm not sure why everyone has gotten so overheated about Chang. I may be missing something."
· Restaurant Review: Ma Peche [The Guardian]
· @DavidChang [Twitter]
· Jay Rayner on Leaving Top Chef: Masters, David Chang, Saveur, and Anonymity [~E~]

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Má Pêche

15 West 56th Street, New York, NY 10019 Visit Website

Ma Peche

15 West 56th St., New York, NY