You can smell the one paltry star baking in Frank Bruni's kitchen from the first sentence of his take-down of Jean-Georges Vongerichten's V Steakhouse in the Time Warner Center. By the time Bruni starts ranking on the decor — "V Steakhouse is like the nexus of the Best Little Whorehouse in Texas and Tavern on the Green" — you even start to feel a little bad (or super-star chef Jean-Georges, the over-extended restaurateur of Manhattan demi-socialite choice. This is, it turns out, a fairly major assault on the massive Jean-Georges empire.

In other foodie-related news, there's a rebuttal to Giuliani's rodent- and salmonella-full restaurant list for the upcoming Republican Convention. This one features Ulysses S. Grant claiming, "in my campaigns through the South, I grew to admire the cuisine you call 'soul food' today." Uh, excuse me?
Elaborate Dishes, Assembly Required [NYT]
GOP Eats [GOPEats2004]