Grub Street: It’s hot. It’s mysterious. It’s on the Upper East Side? Chez Fifi is, somehow, the place to be.
Photo credit: Paolo Cruz
I suppose I should know at this point that if you want prime real estate — say, a townhouse on East 74th — you should be prepared for a bidding war. So it goes lately with Chez Fifi, a 1920 townhouse turned pocket-size French bistro on 74th and Lex. Since its opening in January, Fifi has been, by seemingly universal agreement, both unbookable and unmissable. New York does not want for French bistros; cognac-scented au poivre sauce flows like the Seine through these parts. But in the way that sometimes happens through a precise and perverse alchemy of hype, worth, luck, and scarcity, Fifi is the one to visit.
All of that, of course, makes it impossible to get in. I tried for weeks to get a table with no luck. I was prepared to consign it to the hype heap of history, but something annoying happened: People kept asking me about it. So I did what I least like to do, and I reservation-laundered with one of my best-connected friends: Get us a table, and dinner’s on me.