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Restaurants & Stores, Boston Area

Milk Street disappoints

By jabbett
Published January, 17 2007 3:35 pm
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If last year’s community kosher survey is any indication, Milk Street Cafe is a fine restaurant. In general, I’ve concurred — their facilities, marketing materials, and catering operations have all been top notch. My lunch today, though, seriously shook my confidence in Milk Street’s abilities.

Strike 1: Asparagus soup. It smelled delicious and looked hearty, but with one spoonful, I frantically grabbed a napkin to spit it out. It was chock full of long, fibrous, gag-inducing strands, showing clearly that the cooked asparagus was never strained before being mixed with the other ingredients.

Strike 2: Napa panini. Completely imbalanced, the slippery contents fell from the sandwich time and again and the goat cheese was too overpowering — and I like goat cheese! What irked me the most was the roasted peppers — used with the skins still on. Yech.

Milk Street is a seasoned operation, celebrating their 25th anniversary this year. Perhaps in all that time, they’ve forgetten these basics of culinary education?

18 comments so far (Post your own)
1.At 9:26 pm on January 17th, 2007, elf wrote:

I’ve eaten at the Milk Street Cafe twice, and I was not impressed. Both times, the vegetables were overcooked and the food was generally too salty. It’s not surprising that it did so well on the Boston kosher food survey, though. The competition isn’t particularly steep.

2.At 11:45 pm on January 17th, 2007, Michael A. Burstein wrote:

We have lunch there every Tuesday, and I’ve never been disappointed. We usually get either the soup and fish or the soup and entree. Perhaps it was just the luck of the draw?

3.At 8:24 am on January 18th, 2007, Jamie wrote:

Having asparagus in January might’ve been the problem! Although with the weather we’re having…

4.At 3:08 pm on January 18th, 2007, velorutionary wrote:

I was also very disappointed with Milk Street cafe when I was there this past summer. The quiche and soup were sub par. In general, Boston lacks a quality dairy restaurant…

5.At 5:22 pm on January 18th, 2007, ESB wrote:

My friend’s husband has taken over as the chef at Milk Street cafe - ooops! Coming to Boston in a couple of months so will review it then. I still maintain Reuben’s is the best kosher restaurant in Boston - the menu is extensive like no other restaurant I know and they make the best fries in the world. Am in agreement that you can’t get decent milky food in Boston. Boston could learn a lot from London’s kosher dairy restaurants.

6.At 5:50 pm on January 18th, 2007, jabbett wrote:

Michael — Certainly luck of the draw. I’m usually very happy with meals from Milk Street. I’ve been a big fan of that wrap with sauteed peppers, onions, cheese, black beans, and hot sauce. Their bean and barley soup is also always very good.

But I say if a dish isn’t perfect, don’t put it on the menu.

ESB — maybe you can put a bug in his ear? Regarding Rubins… I love their burger with sauteed onions, and those fries are good, but Shaw’s-brand frozen seasoned fries are identical (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

Here’s another vote for high-quality dairy food.

7.At 5:51 pm on January 18th, 2007, DeisCane wrote:

I miss Rubin’s.

8.At 6:36 pm on January 18th, 2007, Moshe wrote:

Comment to #3 I am sure hoping that the restaurant is using the bottom part of the asparagus for the upper portion is generally too hard to check for infestation. In Israel because of the warm weather, broccoli that was produced by special farms no longer carries the special kosher symbol on them as these vegetables have been found too heavily infested to kosher clear them. In the U.S. I am sorry to say the kosher public is not too well educated on how to check vegetables. This has been a warm winter so our little friends are thriving.

9.At 10:12 pm on January 18th, 2007, seePea wrote:

I do not even bother with asparagus, broccoli or cauliflower anymore and haven’t for years. Heavy pesticides have their bad side but they did keep bugs away.

10.At 10:05 am on January 25th, 2007, Newtonian wrote:

I eat at Milk Street almost every day, I have for several years, and I contest that the food is consistently very good.

On the rare occasion where I have an issue with something, the management has always been extremely responsive to provide refunds and alternatives.

The restaurant is an absolutely essential piece of working in downtown Boston and observing kashruth.

11.At 2:21 pm on January 30th, 2007, Marc Epstein wrote:

Hello, I am the owner of the Cafe. This is the first time I have visited the site.
I want to apologize to anyone who has not had a wonderful experience at the Cafes. Please feel free to approach anyone in the Cafe if you are not fully satisfied or call me, Marc Epstein, directly at 617 542-3663.
I must be honest and admit that a blog such as this is not the appropriate way to correct a problem.

12.At 2:43 pm on January 30th, 2007, jabbett wrote:

Hi, Marc– Thanks for visiting the blog. I couldn’t predict the firestorm my posting caused, but suggesting that a kosher food blog isn’t the place for open discussion of kosher food is like saying the New York Times shouldn’t do restaurant reviews.

In contrast to the unsubstantiated accusation a couple comments above (which will be removed in the interest of intellectual honesty), your forthrightness is commendable. The Kosher Blog encourages all readers to act likewise, and take advantage of your contact information to resolve any concerns.

13.At 3:39 pm on January 30th, 2007, DeisCane wrote:

Nice use of big words, jabbett. Louis B would be proud.

14.At 7:32 pm on February 21st, 2007, Jenn wrote:

Isn’t this lashon hara? Clearly, if you are keeping kosher your must be religious to some extent. I recommend reviewing the laws of lashon hara to be sure that you aren’t accidentally breaking a halacha. As far as I have learned, speaking (or typing) about a person/school/restaurant/institution is considered lashon hara.
Please consider this.

15.At 10:18 pm on February 21st, 2007, Meredith wrote:

In general, there is no problem of loshon hara(*) with industry/product reviews so long as the critique is limited to le’toeles(**) information that may help someone avoid wasting their money.

For example, if someone asks me if I think that XYZ Clothing Store sells attractive clothing because they are thinking of shopping at XYZ, I can give my honest opinion on the attractiveness of XYZ’s clothing without running the risk of loshon hara. However, if I then proceed to comment on the helpfulness (or lack thereof) of XYZ’s sales staff, I am no longer giving le’toeles information as the questioner did not ask me that specific question. Whatever statements I may make about XYZ’s sales staff (even positive statements, according to the Chofetz Chaim) will qualify as loshon hara.

I am in no position to give a definitive statement on whether any review does/does not qualify as loshon hara, but I’m hard pressed to see how Jabbett’s review of Milk Street could cross the line of prohibited speech. His comments are limited to the specific dishes he sampled and don’t make any sweeping generalizations beyond the scope of his personal experience.

(*) Loshon hara: Derogatory speech, which is religiously prohibited.

(**) Le’toeles: Necessary/pertinent.

16.At 10:20 pm on February 21st, 2007, Meredith wrote:

(To clarify, the above post is merely my take on the rules of loshon hara as they pertain to industry reviews. It should in no way be taken as a reflection of my thoughts on the Milk Street Cafe.)

17.At 12:01 pm on February 22nd, 2007, Kosher Critic wrote:

Meredith, your post raises the issue of whether unsolicited, critical reviews are ok. A restaurant review typically is not written in response to a potential customer’s question and even if it were, what you have written implies that any response should be directed exclusively to the questioner, not published or posted online. I don’t know the answer to this one and would be happy for a license to present my views on subpar kosher restaurants in the hopes of raising community standards.

18.At 1:15 pm on February 22nd, 2007, Meredith wrote:

KC, you raise a valid point.

I do think that the “unsolicited” nature of an industry review, as opposed to the solicitation of a personal recommendation, is the strongest argument one can make that a le’toeles industry review is de facto loshon hara. However, I’m not certain that it’s enough to carry you into the endzone.

I’m hoping to do some research on the loshon hara implications of industry reviews in the next few days. Hopefully, I’ll be able to report back with some further material next week.

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