That Peter Luger Review and Other Restaurants That Got Zero Stars – The New York Times

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It’s Wednesday.

Weather: Be prepared for showers. The high should reach the mid-60s.

Alternate-side parking: In effect until Friday (All Saints Day).

Like the city it inhabits, Peter Luger Steak House is not just a location but a way of being.

At Peter Luger, an “instinctive avoidance of anything fancy and an immensely attractive self-assurance came together to produce something that felt less like a restaurant than an affirmation of life, or at least life as it is lived in New York City,” Peter Wells, The Times’s restaurant critic, recently wrote.

In the 1990s, “a Peter Luger steak made me feel alive in a way that few other things did,” he continued.

But times have changed. In 2007, the steakhouse got a two-star review in The Times. Yesterday, Mr. Wells gave Peter Luger zero stars.

[Read Mr. Wells’s new review: Peter Luger used to sizzle. Now it sputters. See our readers’ responses to the review here.]

Loyalists may dismiss criticisms of the restaurant. Mr. Wells imagines them saying that “nobody goes to Luger for the wine, nobody goes to Luger for the salad, nobody goes to Luger for the service.” That list, he wrote, “goes on, and gets harder to swallow, until you start to wonder who really needs to go to Peter Luger, and start to think the answer is nobody.”

David Berson, the general manager of the restaurant, said in a statement, “The NY Times has reviewed Peter Luger numerous times over the years,” and “their whims have changed.”

The biting review put Peter Luger in the company of subjects of other memorable Times restaurant reviews, including these three:

Javelina

Reviewed by Mr. Wells in 2015: “Fresh or frozen, the margaritas have a slight chemical taste that I was thankful for because it tended to keep my own alcohol intake to near-Mormon levels.”

One of Javelina’s calling cards, queso, “arrives lukewarm, which prevents trips to the emergency room. The cooler temperature offers the added benefit of allowing a latex-like film to congeal on top, which provides an interesting contrast in texture with the liquefied cheese below.”

Guy’s American Kitchen & Bar

Reviewed by Mr. Wells in 2012: “Guy Fieri, have you eaten at your new restaurant in Times Square? Have you pulled up one of the 500 seats at Guy’s American Kitchen & Bar and ordered a meal? Did you eat the food?”

“Why is one of the few things on your menu that can be eaten without fear or regret — a lunch-only sandwich of chopped soy-glazed pork with coleslaw and cucumbers — called a Roasted Pork Bahn Mi, when it resembles that item about as much as you resemble Emily Dickinson?”

Nello

Reviewed by Sam Sifton in 2010: “Nello, which opened in 1992, is an ecosystem that is almost incomprehensible to those not a part of it. The food is not very good. Yet the restaurant’s customer base is built of the richest and most coddled people in the city.”

Guests “ate crisp artichokes offered as carciofi alla giudia. These tasted of shirt cardboard. They ate sawdusty chicken livers lashed with balsamic.”

“Only an arugula salad with fontina and pears could have been mistaken for something good to eat.”

Want more news? Check out our full coverage.

The Mini Crossword: Here is today’s puzzle.

A lot of pre-K centers in New York are not diverse, according to a recent study. [Daily News]

Kanye West performed inside the Oculus at the World Trade Center. [Gothamist]

Is Hudson Yards “Little Dubai”? [Wall Street Journal]

The documentary “Mama Africa” screens at the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute in Manhattan. 6 p.m. [Free]

Carve a pumpkin for the Central Park Conservancy’s Halloween Pumpkin Flotilla at the Charles A. Dana Discovery Center in Manhattan. 4 p.m. [Free]

Heartbeat Opera’s climate benefit, “Hot Mama: Singing Gays Saving Gaia,” is a night of drag, opera and pastiche at Roulette in Brooklyn. 8 p.m. [$25]

— Julia Carmel

Coming up on Saturday: The day before the New York City Marathon, The Times’s Lindsay Crouse will talk with two runners who have transformed their sport: Lauren Fleshman, one of the most decorated collegiate distance runners ever, and the Olympian Alysia Montaño, who won a national title six months after childbirth. New York Today readers can save $5 on the ticket price ($10-$15) by entering the code RUN at checkout.

Events are subject to change, so double-check before heading out. For more events, see the going-out guides from The Times’s culture pages.

Janet Morrissey reports:

Math buffs and art fans, prepare to rub elbows.

“We believe that math and art are actually two sides of the same coin,” said Cindy Lawrence, the executive director of the National Museum of Mathematics in Manhattan.

The museum’s exhibition “Math Unfolded: An Exhibit of Mathematical Origami Art” shows how geometry, algorithms and formulas can create works of art — often a 3-D sculpture. The exhibit, in a back room on the museum’s first floor, features 66 pieces of origami art made by 24 artists from around the world. It runs through Jan. 5.

The display features wildlife sculptures, including a horse, jellyfish, squirrel, lobster and dragonfly, as well as masks, flowers and stars. The artists used carefully calculated folds, pleats and color to create the art.

Robert Lang has six pieces in the exhibit, including a giant dragonfly on top of a vine and a large insect crawling over rocks. Uyen Nguyen, an engineer turned artist, used origami designs to create skirts and a handbag. Instead of paper, she used vinyl, polyester, satin ribbon and cotton.

“It can fold down to be a very tiny purse or it can expand up to be a very large bag — all using the techniques of origami and folding,” Ms. Lawrence said.

It’s Wednesday — you’re almost there.

Dear Diary:

One spring day, my neighbor and I were walking past a red car parked at the corner of 80th Street and Second Avenue. As we passed, the window rolled down and out came a banana peel.

Without giving it a thought, I turned toward the driver.

“Really?” I said.

“What,” he said, clearly startled.

“You just threw a banana peel into my living room,” I said.

“It was my brother from another mother,” he said. “What do you want me to do?”

“Pick it up,” I said.

He opened the car door and stepped out. I saw that he was maybe 6-foot-3. He came around the car, bent down, picked up the peel and put it in the trash can.

“Thank you,” I said, and went off down Second Avenue.

— Arlene Diesenhouse

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