NewYorkFirst.com: El Borracho

Kitchen Confidential, Circa 1950.

The fates must have winked at each other as they hovered over the cradle of infant Niccolo de Quattrociocchi -- "Coco" for short, eventually Americanized as Nicky -- in his native Palermo. With $16,000 raked in at Monte Carlo, he set his course for New York and a stake in a New York restaurant.

Nicky's contributions were ideas, ingenious and tongue-in-cheek decorations, and himself as host. The restaurant's Hispano-bibulo name, El Borracho, was a triumph of tishtosh. Cuisine was fine French and fine Italian (Nicky's Spanish researches had been limited to Tiajuana). A yellow card placed on each table read: "If you have enjoyed the dinner, the service, and the atmosphere of El Borracho, PLEASE DO NOT tell your friends as our seating capacity is limited. -- The Management."

After seven years of operation, Nicky penned a remarkable compendium of his adventures at El Borracho, a book that has become a rare, sought-after collector's item for restaurateurs. In it he tells of anxieties and mishaps enough to have daunted the undauntable. Dishes (culinary speaking) run to nearly two hundred pages of recipes. Even if one doesn't cook, they are stirring reading, each section led off by a sly disquisition. Included are specialities of some forty other restaurants around the corner and abroad, including the forbidden specifications for "Mousse au Chocolat El Borracho" which Nicky, with altruistic abandon, divulges to a greedy world -- along with the secret of his Nicky Finn, revealed to be a side-car plus a dash of Pernod. An incredible book on all counts. Scattered drawings by Roger Duvvoisin add fun and flavor.

We've uncovered a few precious copies of "Love and Dishes," previously-owned 1950 First Editions from legendary Niccolo de Quattrociocchi. Forget "Kitchen Confidential." If you're a restaurateur, do not do ANYTHING else in your life until you've read this book.