Restaurant Man

April 23, 2012
The restaurateur/wine producer—and rising television (MasterChef) personality, behind Batali et al.—charts his personal and professional journey in this salty, rollicking memoir. Bastianich’s father, Felice, owned an Italian restaurant in Queens where the young author learned the business alongside his mother and now-famous chef, Lidia. The family spent summers on the Italian-Yugoslav border, where local foods, wines, and the people behind them made a deep and lasting impression. Through lessons at home, at the family restaurant, at school, and on the streets, including time on Wall Street during the early 1990s, Bastianich sought his own identity. The strong pull of his heritage and its food and wine, however, soon transformed him into a “restaurant man” like his father. Early lessons came hard, even while his family history helped, and success did, too. His meeting with Mario Batali and the opening of their first joint project, along with his own winemaking and wine-selling ventures rewrote contemporary Italian cuisine. Though the author takes gutsy credit for innovations like the “everything bagel” and bar dining, his forthrightness about the business nitty-gritty and his own failures and mistakes are bonus takeaways along the utterly readable way.

March 1, 2012
A frank and funny memoir of a successful New York restaurateur. Distinctly Italian with a twist of Queens, Bastianich displays a palpable love of good Italian food and wine throughout his humorous reflections on how he became one of the best-known restaurant owners in New York City. From his early days as a dishwasher and busboy in his parents' Italian restaurant (his mother is famed chef Lidia Bastianich), the author learned the basics of restaurant management--e.g., "your margins are three times your cost on everything"; "you have to appear to be generous, but you have to be inherently a cheap fuck to make it work"; "no bottle of wine costs more than five dollars to make." After a stint in Wall Street and a wild time in Italy working in restaurants and vineyards, Bastianich returned to New York, unable to deny his "biological imperative." Using the maxims his father had taught him, he launched his own restaurant, Becco, and from there the direction was only up. He and his business partner, Mario Batali, moved on to open many other prosperous Italian eateries, culminating in his part ownership of Del Posto, the only four-star Italian restaurant in America. Despite his liberal use of the f-bomb, the author's easygoing voice and substantial knowledge of real Italian food (not the spaghetti-and-meatballs kind) will lure booklovers and food lovers alike. Oenophiles will appreciate Bastianich's rich descriptions of the many Italian wines he recommends and his savant-like ability to recall and identify the tens of thousands of wines he has tasted since his childhood. Engrossing details of being the front man in a variety of thriving restaurants.

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April 1, 2012

Bastianich's insider's view of the New York wine and restaurant world is either straightforward, in-your-face, or just plain crude, depending on the reader's tolerance for four-letter words and descriptions like "arrogant douche bag" and "pretentious tool" (and those are the guys he respects). Bastianich, son of cookbook author and restaurateur Lidia Bastianich, is a self-described wine savant, who has opened a generous handful of successful New York eateries, often in partnership with Mario Batali (e.g., Babbo). His darkly humorous and gossipy memoir begins with his philosophy: appear to be generous but keep an eagle eye on the bottom line. This narrative has something to offend everybody, from Jesuit priests (fat) to Irish girls (easy) to professional waiters (bitter), Beverly Hills ("makes me want to barf"), and foodies ("spoiled kids"). VERDICT Whatever readers may think of Bastianich's writing style, he knows food, wine, and the restaurant business. The combative assessment of patrons, chefs, and critics is reminiscent of Anthony Bourdain (Kitchen Confidential; Medium Raw) and covers some of the same territory. Best for those considering work in the restaurant field or who want to sit on the stoop after hours and dish about the inner workings of the high-stakes wine and food industry in New York City. [See Prepub Alert, 11/21/12.]--Maggie Knapp, Trinity Valley Sch. Lib., Fort Worth, TX

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2012
Bastianich has created quite a reputation for himself as restaurateur and wine merchant. Although deeply resenting it at the time, he spent boyhood summers in postwar Italy while his immigrant parents painstakingly researched regional foods and wines in preparation for opening a New York City restaurant. By 14 he was already beginning to recommend wines in his parents' hugely successful Felidia. With their support, he ditched his lucrative Wall Street job and immersed himself in the world of Italian wines, eventually launching his own popular restaurant. Ultimately partnering with chef Mario Batali, he conceived and built a food and wine empire. This unexpurgated memoir speaks in the voice of a street tough, but it offers unparalleled insight into today's world of haute cuisine and the value of managing even the smallest details of both product and service. Anyone needing to learn what it takes to attain real and sustainable success in the restaurant business should read these unique memoirs.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)