I miss my Spanx. I outgrew them about fifty pounds ago.
Somewhere between the decadent foie gras at La Grenouille
and the joyfully simple pigs-in-a-blanket at Payard
Patisserie. It was like a seasonal transition: it happened
so gradually I didn\'t even notice it, until one day my
control-top-pantyline-avoiding-God-Bless-America-for-inventing-these-things
Spanx refused to oblige me by fitting comfortably.
No longer gently hugging my curves, respectfully holding
all of me in, they\'d become a boa constrictor and I their
victim. Evidently Spanx are made for far thinner women than
me. And so I graduated up to Flexees. But now, as I ready
myself for yet another meal out by attempting to contain my
expanding girth in my latest girdle of choice, it\'s become
abundantly clear that I\'ve fallen into Flexee disfavor as
well. I heave a sigh of resignation. What\'s a girl to do
when her life revolves around having to eat for a living?
#
\"Jesus, this is a mess,\" my best friend Jess says
as she
trails small heaps of greasy lupini beans across her plate
with a fork, forming them into a smiley face with what
appears to be tears streaming down its cheeks but is
probably just excess oil. Jessie mocks the bean face with
her own broad smile. Her blond hair, the color of
farm-churned butter, softly frames her face in the
flickering light of our table\'s blazing torch. Jess\'
truffle-brown eyes twinkle with mischief: my tasting
assistant caught playing with her food.
I nod in agreement. So far what we\'ve seen at Puka, the
new pan Italian-Hawaiian-Greek restaurant in midtown
Manhattan, doesn\'t look too promising. I\'d held out hope,
what with the luau décor, tiki lamps aglow, and the bouzouki
player plinking out a half-decent version of That\'s Amore.
How often can you get a taste of Hawaii, Greece and Italy in
one sitting? I dip my pita bread into the complementary poi
served in a dugout coconut bowl in the center of the table,
hoping for a miracle. Instead, I choke on the soupy gray
paste and reach for my water glass, which is still empty.
\"Jess, gimme a swig of that!\" I point to her glass of
water, my hand around my throat for emphasis. I can\'t wait
for a reply and instead grab the water and throw it back,
like Zorba tossing down a flaming shot glass of ouzo.
\"Appetizers suck, they can\'t even keep our water
glasses
filled, the signature tiki drinks haven\'t materialized
despite waiting over half an hour, and the freebie poi
appears to be the key ingredient in the fixative that holds
up the wallpaper,\" I mumble as I jot down notes
surreptitiously in my iPhone, mindful to be sure that no one
is paying attention to my musings.
\"Sure, it\'s not exactly Le Bernadin, but seriously,
Abbie, it\'s all relative,\" Jess says. \"At least
it\'s better
than the donor kebab I\'d have been eating had you not called
me at the last minute to come along tonight. But for you,
yeah, I\'d imagine this pretty much bites the big one.\"
\"At this place, I\'m afraid to bite anything here,
big or
small. But seriously, I\'m just looking at the silver lining
in this stormy cloud. Without the bad restaurants, imagine
how much fatter I\'d be. At least here I have no desire to
eat even the smallest of portions. So it\'s a little diet in
disguise.\"
Jess laughs but just barely, and instead squirms in her
seat, clearly hating my fat reference. She\'s lodge pine-thin
and could probably go on a week-long eating bender and still
lose weight. That is if food really even mattered to her
that much, which it doesn\'t. I, on the other hand, seem to
have assumed the uncanny silhouette of a beluga whale, while
cursed with the sluggish metabolism of a three-toed sloth
and blessed with the culinary palate of a Michelin reviewer.
Not always a good combination if you savor your size-tens.
Oh, wait, I\'m in Manhattan. Make that size-twos. And I,
Abbie Jennings, am most definitely not a size two. Maybe
size twenty-two, perhaps, but I\'ve lost count, so who knows?
\"You can\'t help it, Abs,\" she says. \"It\'s
not like
you go
around stuffing your face with donuts.\"
\"Yeah. Instead I ingest a steady diet of the world\'s
richest food.\" I shrug. \"Ah, well, occupational hazard, I
suppose. As are restaurants like this. People are expecting
me to rate this place, so I\'ll review it. Sure, I always
hope for good things from a restaurant, but I\'m totally
prepared to call them on it if it\'s lousy.\"
Our waiter arrives, his vision evidently obscured by the
pile of leis stacked along his neck, and sloshes two martini
glasses filled with something resembling transmission fluid
before us. They\'re on fire. How adventuresome. Jessie dips
her napkin in what\'s left of her water and blots the splash
of alcoholic neon that has landed uninvited across the front
of her white silk shirt. It looks like someone smashed a
firefly on her boob. Lei-Boy returns moments later with our
entrees: cold, congealed grouper for me and seared mahi-mahi
for Jess that looks as if the chef used a blow-torch on it.
A hardened heap of Minute Rice accompanies the entrees, with
beans that in an ideal world would be green, but are instead
a sickly shade of cadaverous ash.
\"Bon appetit, I suppose,\" I say, not at all looking
forward to that first bite. I hate to be disingenuous, but
at thirty bucks a plate, the kitchen could\'ve at least tried.
Jess scoops a bite of fish with her fork and pops it in
her mouth, just as Lei-Boy rushes over and wordlessly grabs
her plate away. Fast on his heels is an angry-looking bald
man in clogs, checkered pants, and a chef\'s toque, hurling
what must be obscenities in Greek, maybe Italian, but
definitely nothing gently Polynesian sounding. He smacks
Lei-Boy up the back of his head, dislodging a few leis onto
my grouper.
An A+ for presentation, I jot down in my phone.
\"What is up with them?\" Jessie asks.
\"Hell if I know.\" I reach for my transmission fluid to
quell the drought in my mouth. As it reluctantly washes down
my throat I can\'t help but elicit a hairball noise.
A swarm of hula dancers closes in on our table as the
bouzouki music gives way to a pulsing luau thunk. If I am
seeing properly beyond the blur of grass skirts--my God, how
do they do that?--there appears to be an extra from South
Pacific pounding a drum back there.
\"Aloha, wahini,\" the Greek chef intones through a
volcanic crater-sized smile. His accent is deceptively
French-sounding. \"E komo mai. Welcome. Buona sera. Good
evening.\"
I expect him to throw in a Phi Beta Kappa just to
incorporate all of the restaurant\'s themes. \"Ladies, zere
has been a slight mistake in zee kitchen.\" No thanks to
Lei-boy, I\'m thinking. \"Pleeze, allow me to present
you vees
more better food.\" Our Greek chef sounds like he must\'ve
apprenticed for a hell of a long time in Paris.
With this, our drinks are rounded up, and in their stead
are placed two smoldering cocktails that appear to contain
dry ice. I peer into the void of my thermally-reinforced cup
(artfully disguised as a small volcano) and see through the
rising steam something somewhat thick and orange-ish red. I
look at the chef--the spitting image of Telly Savalas
without the lollypop--for the go-ahead from him, wondering
if one can actually ingest dry ice. I always thought it was
toxic.
He motions with his hands to drink up. \"Ladeees, ees gud.
Ees a Lava Flow. Really, really good. You drink, no?\" He
rolls his \"r\" with such authority I feel this is an order,
and I comply, placing the drink to my lips with apprehension
and taking a tiny no-thank you sip, trying not to make a
face, in case it\'s disgusting.
I taste a slight dribble, licking my lips to catch the
overflow. Not bad, actually. Sort of cool and warm at the
same time, like Ben Gay on the rocks. I\'ll give them credit:
it\'s certainly different.
Telly is on to the next order of business already, seeing
that our new entrees are properly plated. Lei-boy and his
assistant, Hula-girl bring out two heaping dishes of food,
much of it unidentifiable but at least it\'s piping hot.
Telly Savalas leans forward, so close to me I can smell the
garlic on his breath, and wipes a smudge of sauce from the
edge of my dish with his towel. He adjusts the plate a
quarter-turn and bows while wishing us buon appetito (why he
didn\'t say this in Greek is Greek to me).
\"Whoa!\" Jess stares at me as if she\'d just
witnessed the
shocking conclusion to a weird movie. She takes a bite of
something in front of her. \"I don\'t know what that was all
about, but bring it on, baby. If we\'ve gotta go through that
to get some of this, I\'ll volunteer to be the sacrificial
lamb.\"
I don\'t know where to begin on my plate. Everything looks
so unfamiliar, yet appetizing. I decide to aim for the
starch first, and settle my fork into a generous portion of
what turns out to be risotto with bite-sized pieces of
suckling pig. I\'ll take creamy risotto over that vile poi
any day. The pork, so tender and juicy, has me humming Mele
Kalikimaka, cause it feels like a Hawaiian Merry Christmas gift.
I next try the entrée, a tender, flaky and surprisingly
un-oily mackerel sprinkled with feta cheese and olives and
cloaked in taro leaves. I have to give Telly some credit, I
didn\'t know how this place could pull off merging three such
divergent flavors, but somehow it works despite itself.
\"I can\'t believe how fantastic this food is,\" Jess
mumbles through a bite of her pineapple-balsamic glazed wild
boar spare ribs with tzatziki sauce. \"Who\'d have
thought you
could actually assemble a menu with Italian, Hawaiian and
Greek food? I honestly thought it was a joke.\"
\"Joke\'s on us, cause this stuff is amazing.\"
After dinner ends, Telly returns with a selection of
desserts (including a baklava made with mascarpone cheese,
coconut and pine nuts), a tray with sample shots of grappa,
ouzo and okolehao, and a somewhat excessive appreciation for
his customers.
\"You like, no?\" Telly asks me as he hands me a
leftovers
bag with more in it than we had on our plates, I\'m sure,
then straightens out my napkin in my lap. I really don\'t
like people fondling my linens in restaurants.
\"It was wonderful,\" I tell him, shooing his hands
from my
lap (after all, I don\'t need old Telly to get an up-close
look at my too-tight Flexee-induced bulges.) Despite the
culinary false start. I might even have to give the place
three stars.
\"Meesees Jennings, on behalf of zee entire staff of Puka,
I sank you for dining vees us zees evening,\" Telly says as
he bows repeatedly while backing away from me and
disappearing into the kitchen. \"Zee meal is on zee house,
vees my undying gratitude.\"
I look at Jessie and blanch. Meessees Jennings, he called
me. Missus fucking Jennings. How stupid could I have been? I
should\'ve known! There was no mistake. The only mistake is
that my look has become unmistakable. For the third time
this month, I\'ve been recognized in a restaurant.
\"Son of a bitch,\" I groan under my breath.
\"Mortie\'s
gonna kill me. He\'s going to absolutely kill me.\"