Lunch at the Newspaper Cafeteria

The new New York Times Building is lovely to encounter – there’s  so much wood going in.   The enormous building, sort of WTC-ish from the outside {cold, geometric, very-clean Corbusier modern} , has textures on the interior that are warm, and organic.  The chosen interior colors are a very lively orange, sponged on, and a deep, solid red.  The bleached wood becomes the third color, making a sort of liason between the orange and red.    

The lobby is empty, like a set for Gattaca or 1984.  The lone ornamental object there is an immaculate but ordinary NY Times vending box.   [I should have pulled it to see if you have to pay a dollar still.]

The cafeteria had 200 people chowing down.  At least three tables had raging chess games going on.  I am a chess moron but I enjoy watching it played to a clock (timed chess has a button and each player runs down a 5 minute clock, victory coming on points, rather than checkmate usually).  My friend is part of the chess culture there so I got to see him beat a coworker in a ten minute game.   Both queens died.

The food was the best cafeteria food I’ve had.   The quality was the same as the AMNH cafeteria.   A dry erase board showed which nearby farms had contributed to today’s meal.   A full-time sushi chef was cutting up yellowfin tuna.  An international table had Afghani and African food.   There was a separate line for Satay.   The greens were good in the salad bar.  The plates were real plates, including the one i took for the salad bar, which was bigger than any dinner plate in my apartment.  I thin a plate this big is called a charger and should just be a pedestal for a real plate to sit atop it.   

I don’t know if I saw anyone famous at lunch today.  I do know that about half [my host’s estimate] of the 200 diners were writers or editors, and hunger is catholic, so, there must have been people from every possible section.    I heard someone say “nice writing today” to a chum.  And I definitely saw the editor of the chess column.   He was taking on anyone who wanted to play.  My friend, a chess nut, explained “he’s a national grandmaster so he always spots you a piece to start, the knight ”.

Comments

[Peter]

Thanks for the sights, tastes, sounds of lunch.

I love the thought of the paper vending box being the only thing in the lobby.

I also liked: ". . . hunger is catholic, so, there must have been people from every possible section."

Nice writing today!

[Denise]

Reminds me of my fond visits to the DIA dining room. ( newly installed a couple of yrs ago)
One of the chefs is the father of Abi's classmate at GPN.
Abi will be in NYC in the late Spring to sing at Carnegie. I'll sned details and include you on her list of people she's allowed to talk to.