Few things cause more of a stir on North America’s restaurant scene than The New York Times changing its dining critic, but the announcement yesterday that Sam Sifton, who held the role for the past two years, was to be the paper’s new national editor seemed to come too soon.
Mr. Sifton, more than nearly any other North American food critic, understood that restaurants and dining are about more than what turns up on the plate, and readers, as well as many restaurateurs, loved him for that.
David Chang, the chef behind the Momofuku chain of restaurants, spoke for many when he took to Twitter a few minutes after the announcement on Tuesday to write, “Congratulations on new job. Now I’m panicking, we just got used to having you around.”
Mr. Sifton understood food and restaurants, and as the paper’s former culture editor he understands the visual arts, architecture, fashion and literature – but he referenced hip hop, too (Jay-Z was a frequent source of inspiration), and the pop cultural idols that readers’ kids would know better than they would.
About one youngish gastropub called The Fat Radish, he wrote, “There was a Scotch egg that played pantywaist to the one April Bloomfield serves at the Breslin, but that was somehow charming for that – a bar snack played by Daniel Radcliffe, say, where usually the role would go to Daniel Craig.”
As a younger generation of diners and restaurateurs began to reshape New York’s food scene, Mr. Sifton knew enough – not only about food and cooking, but also the anthropology of the city – to chronicle the shift, and to bring it all to life for readers, even those who weren’t likely to ever step foot in the places he described.
One of his most memorable columns was about a new place in Harlem, where the food was okay, but the crowd – gays, blacks, Hispanics, white, young, old – was one of the first truly mixed dining rooms he’d ever seen. “In our restaurants, as in our churches and nightclubs, life is often more monochromatic,” he wrote. He gave it two stars. You read him not just to understand restaurants but to understand the most interesting city on Earth.
Late yesterday after the news had sunk in, Sifton tweeted to his 71,000 followers: “People of the Twitter: Thanks for your kind words today. Keep following. National desk is baking hot, fresh news every day. #andimnotdoneyet”
Special to The Globe and Mail
