(Yes, it is me again). O.T. - NYT article about peanut butter sandwich restaurant.
June 20, 1999
Paean to Peanut Butter
By MONTE WILLIAMS
Paul Aberasturi, the chief financial officer of a midtown textile
company, and an associate, Matt Pfeufer, recently grabbed a taxi to
lunch downtown. They wore conservative suits, as is their custom on
work days. The men, both from Long Island, were as clean-cut as choirboys
on Christmas Day. Successful, serious, suburban types.
But there they were at Peanut Butter & Company, a new restaurant in the
West Village that serves, with rare exception, peanut butter sandwiches --
creative, innovative peanut butter sandwiches, but peanut butter sandwiches
nonetheless.
Aberasturi devoured a white-chocolate peanut
butter and orange marmalade sandwich, while
Pfeufer wolfed down the Elvis, a grilled
peanut butter sandwich crammed with sliced
bananas and drizzled with honey.
"I had been here once before, and I had such a
good time I had to bring my associate," Aberasturi said unabashedly.
"It seemed like a funky New York kind of place."
Maybe only in New York, where everybody is always looking for something
new, could a restaurant that serves fancy peanut butter sandwiches find a
place in the heart of the public. These days, New Yorkers are flush, and it
seems they will spend, spend, spend on practically anything that seems
trendy -- at least for the moment. Restaurants that focus on a single kind of
food are the latest wrinkle in the apparently boundless food business here;
think pricey soup joints and pommes frites places.
The peanut butter theme, or so say the restaurant's customers, has touched a
chord with adults looking for the comforts of their salad days. (Most of the
diners there tend to be the over-12-year-old type.)
But at what price comfort? Aberasturi, who washed his sandwich down with
apple juice, paid $8 for his lunch ($5.50 for the sandwich and $2.50 for his
juice), and Pfeufer, who also ordered apple juice, plunked down $8.50 for his
midday meal ($6 for the sandwich).
Did they have any qualms about shelling out more than $5 for a peanut butter
sandwich that might cost, say, 20 cents to create at home? "Are you
kidding?" Aberasturi said. "This is Manhattan. This is a bargain."
When Peanut Butter & Company opened in December -- offering its peanuts
ground freshly on the premises and freshly baked bread -- there was a
waiting list to get in on weekends, said Lee Zalben, the restaurant's
26-year-old owner.
"We get celebrities coming in," he added, refusing for privacy's sake to make
their names public.
Just then a waitress walked over to see whether Messrs. Aberasturi and
Pfeufer were happy with their meals, which came with carrot sticks and
potato chips, just like Mom used to pack in lunch bags and boxes. Pfeufer
answered with a hand, making an O with his thumb and index finger,
because his mouth was stuffed.
Dana Raymond, a graduate student at Columbia, stopped in with a friend,
Tanya Chartrand, a former graduate student at New York University, for a
Fluffernutter, made with peanut butter and marshmallow fluff. Asked her
age, Ms. Raymond said 25. "Did I say 25?" she said, laughing. "I meant 5."
The price of her sandwich, $5, was "a little ridiculous," she added. "But so is
everything else in New York."
Zalben said the restaurant is meant to evoke childhood memories: bright
yellow walls are adorned with old advertisements; shelves are full of old tin
cans touting peanut butter; food is served on Fiesta ware, and customers sit
in Windsor chairs.
Zalben, a Vassar graduate who majored in urban studies, sold advertising and
did media analysis for publishing companies and advertising agencies before
he opened the restaurant. "I woke up one morning and I just got
disenchanted," he recalled. "I said, 'Is this what you want to do with your
life?' I always thought that a restaurant devoted to peanut butter would be a
great idea, so I tucked it in the back of my mind."
Why peanut butter, which is high in protein but also laden with fat calories?
"I don't think I chose peanut butter," Zalben said, smiling. "Peanut butter
chose me." He said it was a staple when he was growing up in Philadelphia.
"I'd eat it from the jar, and there'd be this imprint of an index finger left
behind," he recalled.
In college his passion for peanut butter did not dwindle. "My roommates and
I would be up late at night banging out papers and drinking coffee," he said.
"Then we'd have these contests: who could make the craziest but best-tasting
peanut butter sandwich? I always won."
Thus the sandwich offerings include peanut butter and cream cheese; peanut
butter with bacon, lettuce and tomato, and spicy peanut butter with grilled
chicken and pineapple jam. There is also a sampling of different kinds of
peanut butter (smooth, crunchy, chocolate chip, white chocolate, cinnamon
raisin and spicy) with crudités. And, of course, the menu includes the classic
peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
If that's not enough to satisfy a customer's sugar craving, he or she can
choose desserts ranging from peanut butter tiramisu, chocolate peanut butter
pie, yogurt and peanut butter and peanut butter cookies. The truly intrepid
can try a heart stopper aptly labeled "Death by Peanut Butter," which includes
peanut butter Cap'n Crunch, three scoops of ice cream, freshly ground
peanut butter, peanut butter Reese's Pieces and peanut butter chips.
What about the waistline?
"The catch phrase here is selective indulgence and personal nostalgia," Zalben
said.
But since he opened the restaurant, Zalben has grown increasingly
uncomfortable with his own expanding girth. How much weight has he
gained? He is mum on the subject.
The prospect of adding inches does not seem to deter his patrons.
The other day, a muscular singer and musician who goes by the name of
Goat leisurely savored a peanut butter and strawberry jam sandwich, which
cost $5. "I'll eat my spinach tonight," he said. "If I made this at home, I'd eat
two."
Susan Brennan, a slim 33-year-old actress, writer and yoga teacher, made a
peanut butter pit stop last week, ordering takeout: a chocolate-chip peanut
butter and strawberry jam sandwich. "I think peanut butter is good for you,"
she said. "You need protein and some fats in your diet. Plus the caffeine in
chocolate makes you happy."
Jan Mohlman, a 38-year-old research psychologist at Columbia, was looking
for a place to live when she spotted the restaurant. "I'm going to tell everyone
about this," she said. "They care about the details here; the Fiesta ware, the
music all remind me of my childhood." Ms. Mohlman, a (lapsed) vegetarian,
ordered the Elvis -- with bacon.
"I haven't eaten meat in five years until this," she said. "It's thrilling,
absolutely delicious. I think if you're going to blow it, you might as well blow
it big time."
Copyright 1999 The New York Times Company |
