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An industry veteran dishes on more than three decades of service in New York City’s hottest restaurants.

“The restaurant industry is not just about truffles and sweetbreads, caviar and cream, a prime fillet of beef or a freshly caught Dover sole. It’s also about sex, drugs, and an array of misbehaviors perpetrated by both staff and guests.” So writes Cecchi-Azzolina in the introduction, highlighting the reality that intertwined with the glamour of fine dining is plenty of bad behavior. The author grew up in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, and started working at a local luncheonette while in high school, where he learned the basics of the business. He moved to Florida and attended college, then back to the city to pursue his master’s degree in theater at NYU. After a stint at La Rousse, the author went to “Michael ‘Buzzy’ O’Keeffe’s soon-to-be-mecca to WASP cuisine and the yacht-club lifestyle, the Water Club.” Then it was on to the River Café, an even hotter venture, where Cecchi-Azzolina was named captain of the front of the house. He eventually became the maître d’hôtel at Le Coucou, which won a James Beard Award during his tenure. The author’s account of life in the restaurant industry is fast-paced, long on the meticulous details of service, unsparing of the salacious tales of sex, drugs, alcohol, run-ins with the mob, “jumpers” within view of the River Café, and much more. Readers interested in the who’s who of the NYC celebrity world will not be disappointed, as the high-profile clientele the author mentions runs the gamut from actors and musicians to international ambassadors to “the absolutely horrid Anna Wintour.” Cecchi-Azzolina’s prose can border on abrasive and overly detailed, but at its best, his tales are entertaining and affecting, as when he describes the toll the AIDS epidemic took on his colleagues in the industry. His honesty in acknowledging the many ills of the industry’s past and its continued long journey to legitimacy is enlightening and refreshing.

An overlong yet vivid, candid account of an admirable restaurant career.