Brown with his "lady friend" and frequent dining companion Sonya Molodetskaya.Photo: Drew Altizer
New Yorkers know all too well that weekend dining in Manhattan is a contact sport and not for the faint of heart — or the impatient. Enter former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown, who's used to the royal treatment on his home turf, not to mention dining rooms with vast expanses of space between the tables and hundreds of maitre d's who know him well. In his weekly post for the S.F. Chronicle's restaurant blog about his dining exploits, he regales us with the "nightmare experience" of a recent Saturday night on Manhattan's Upper East Side, where clearly his don't-you-know-who-I-am's met several raised eyebrows and the deaf ears of at least one hostess.
Despite having an 8:15 p.m. reservation at the Bloomingdale's-adjacent Scalinatella, Brown and his party waited over an hour and 40 minutes at the bar, polishing off two bottles of wine before finally being seated next to the restroom/kitchen entrance/fire exit. He calls on San Francisco's fire chief to contact her colleagues in New York to report on the place, which he considered a firetrap. And the man S.F. affectionately calls Da Mayor sounds like he hasn't been inside a New York restaurant in a long while as he writes, "It was clear that the table had been designed for two, but they had added two extra seats." Welcome to Manhattan, your honor.
My nightmare experience in New York [Inside Scoop SF]
Earlier: Does Willie Brown Have a Secret Endorsement Deal With Subway?
Willie Brown Demands Large-Typeface Menus, No More Amuse-Bouches
Should Willie Brown Always Get the VIP Treatment?
