Hello, everyone.

AP-Atlanta --Reports today from the DCDC (Dysfunctional Center for Disease Control) have warned travelers to stay away from upstate New York restaurants until Thursday, Nov. 30.
With flu season in full swing, there is a possibility of a new uncontrolled outbreak. So far it has only been found in the Saratoga, NY, area.
Noted virologist, Dr. No Ti Ping, said: "I do not understand why this strain has only been found in waiters." Restaurants say they are concerned about their staff not showing up to work or finishing their shifts, but vow to press on, no matter what.
Dr. Ping has been quoted as saying: "There seems to be no immediate threat of the virus spreading outside those in the restaurant profession, but everyone should be aware that those who contract the illness and show up to work anyway may be in less than the best of moods."
Due to the current celebration of the founding of Saratoga Springs in 1819, the new strain is being called "The 1819 Flu."

Before this becomes one of those Internet-based urban legends that spreads so rapidly that no one knows where it started, let us just say now that the preceding report was penned by one of our waiters on about the second day of Saratoga Restaurant Week, that special time of year when participating restaurants offer a three-course meal for $18.19. We at Chez Sophie decided to participate this year for the first time, partly as a way of saying thank you to our regular customers for coming to enjoy our food during the rest of the year when a dinner at Chez Sophie costs two to three times as much, and partly to encourage people who have not yet tried us in our new location to leave their cozy nests.

The ploy worked so well that it nearly killed us. Every single night of the seven-day promotion, including Sunday and Monday, we had more than 100 dinner guests, and some days it was more like 150. We were expecting people to be interested, but we didn't realize that we would draw the lion's share of participants. We guess we underestimated the lure of a 70 percent discount.

It's hard to complain about being popular, but it was logistically challenging. Those are August numbers and our staff is sized for November currently. We've had people working seven days a week, morning and night to get us through.

On the third night, we had a customer complain that service was too fast, probably because we were in high gear and the kitchen was turning out the same two dishes over and over. We took a breath and tried to moderate the pace, but that didn't suit the people who were expecting prefab T.G.I. Friday's food to arrive instantly for their $18.19. Frankly, there were times when the service was slow even by fine-dining standards. There were people lined up at the bar hoping for a table, and we did our best to accommodate them, but we should have turned more people away.

Twice during the week, servers slipped on ice and sustained bruises after other servers crashed into each other bearing trays of glassware. Several servers fell prey to maladies that were probably the result of exhaustion and had to beg off their shifts. We begged a summer server to drive in from Connecticut to help out for several days. At the end of night of serving 135 customers Thursday, the day's receipts were equal to a couple of good parties of 20.

Many of the customers were wonderful, both our regulars and the newcomers. We were complimented on the generosity and quality of our
$18.19 specials and the warmth and beauty of our new decor. Many were impressed with the service, even while we felt it was harried and uneven.

There were, however, a select few customers who made us understand afresh why we chose to run a fine dining establishment rather than a McDonald's. Apparently the less some people pay for a meal, the more abuse they feel they can heap upon the staff who serves it. There was the table of four who got rather shrieky when they discovered that all the wine they could drink was not included with the promised three courses. ("I read it somewhere, so you have to give it to us.") There was the table of three that thanked us profusely for the best meal they'd ever had and left a 23 cent tip. (They were rather appalled to learn that their coffee wasn't free, so maybe that's all the money they had left.)

There was the table of two that told their waiter that the new restaurant isn't nearly so "family-oriented" as the old diner location was, then complained when Joseph visited their table that they were being bothered by someone who wasn't even a waiter. They also said, loud enough for Cheryl to hear, that it was bizarre that the hostess walked through the dining room carrying an infant. We're not sure at this point whose family they were hoping the new restaurant would be oriented towards. Certainly not ours. Cheryl was tempted to bring out her rambunctious three-year-old and sic him on them.

Sitting right next to people who complimented us on our generous portions (some even suggested they were too large) were people who complained that the same portions were skimpy. There were quite a few water-only drinkers, and people who came in with coupons from other restaurants looking for additional discounts and people who demanded to have their choice of anything on our menu.

Then there was the supply issue. On Friday, the first day of the promotion, our reservations suddenly swelled from 60 to more than 100, but after about 7:30 p.m. everybody ordered from our regular menu, rather than from the $18.19 specials. We estimated the proportions based on that experience and ordered 30 pounds of Prince Edward Island mussels for Saturday and Sunday's diners. Apparently, there was a run on mussels, and our purveyor called Saturday morning to warn us they could only allocate 10 pounds to us. We got through Saturday night, because less than 50 percent of the 150 diners ordered either the mussels or the other 1819 special, stuffed pork loin, but we started Sunday night with only 23 orders of mussels available. They were gone by 6:30 p.m. Every single person who came in ordered from the Restaurant Week Specials. We replaced the mussels with grilled trout, a more expensive dish, but one we had on hand.
Then we ran out of stuffed pork loin. We replaced that with steak frites, which was even more expensive, but we didn't want to make a bad impression on the people who were trying us for the first time because of the promotion.

Even so, two tables walked out Sunday night around 8 p.m. because they couldn't have pork, and one man inexplicably left (with his wife standing alone dumbfounded) as soon as he read the sign asking for hats to be removed.

There was also some resentment because we said in last week's newsletter there would be a choice of two desserts, but we were doing such volume that we kept having to switch the desserts as we ran out of things, and eventually just limited it to one dessert option so we could keep up (We make all our desserts on premises, including our ice creams and sorbets.) Paul stayed all night in the kitchen Wednesday to catch up on desserts.

Cheryl spoke to another local restaurateur Tuesday night who exemplified the "damned if you do, damned if you don't" nature of this event. He chose not to participate after calculating that even if he was able to perfectly seat every table in his small restaurant twice, he could make less than $1,000 a night. On Saturday night, he served only eight people, because most of the diners in town were trying out Restaurant Week restaurants. He was shocked that we'd joined in, but we explained that we felt we had to because we wanted people to see our new place, especially since the work that is supposed to be done to the front of The Saratoga to make it look more inviting, which includes visible signage for Chez Sophie, has yet to be approved by the multiple permitting authorities. At this late date in the year, that probably means we won't get visible signage on Broadway until after the spring thaw, which made it of paramount importance to get people in and try to make a nice impression.

Most of the impressions were favorable. To the rest, we apologize. We are really tired and really grateful that Restaurant Week ended tonight.

The Pink Plate Special this coming week will be chicken paprikash, based on a special request from one of the customers. One theory on the history of this dish is that the Ottoman Turks discovered chile peppers when they beseiged the Portuguese colony of Diu, near Calicut, in 1538. After the battle, the Turks transported peppers along the trade routes of their vast empire, which stretched from India to Central Europe. Some theories mark the date as much as a dozen years earlier, apparently assuming the Turks bought peppers from Spanish, Greek or Italian traders. Other, historically impossible stories tell of Hungarian warriors fired by hot peppers slashing heads from their victims in the Middle Ages. Other historians mark the introduction of paprika to Hungary as late as the 17th century.

According to Leonhard Fuchs, an early German professor of medicine, chiles were cultivated in Germany by 1542, in England by 1548, and in the Balkans by 1569.

Sometime, probably in the mid- to late-16th century, chiles were introduced into Hungary. The first citizens to accept the fiery pods were the servants and shepherds who had more contact with the Turkish invaders or from refugees from the Balkans fleeing the Turks. Zoltan Halasz wrote: "Hungarian herdsmen started to sprinkle tasty slices of bacon with paprika and season the savoury stews they cooked in cauldrons over an open fire with the red spice. They were followed by the fishermen of the Danube...who would render their fish-dishes more palatable with the red spice, and at last the Hungarian peasantry, consuming with great gusto the meat of fattened oxen and pigs or tender poultry which were prepared in paprika-gravy, professed their irrevocable addiction to paprika, which by then had become a characteristically Hungarian condiment."
After that, the landed gentry, the aristocracy, and the royal courts got hooked on the spice. In the sunny south of Hungary, the brilliant red pods decorated gardens everywhere. In 1569, an aristocrat named Margit Szechy listed the foreign seeds she was planting in her garden in Hungary. On the list was "Turkisch rot Pfeffer" (Turkish red
pepper) seeds, the first recorded instance of chiles in Hungary. Upon Mrs. Szechy's death and the subsequent division of her estate, her Paprika plots were so valuable they were fought over bitterly by her daughters.

An interesting note is that the reddest pepper is not the most fiery.
The brighter the pepper, the more mild and sweet it will be. The real tongue burners are pale or brownish. There are many grades of paprika; from mildest to hottest, they include special quality; delicate; exquisite delicate; pungent exquisite delicate; rose (RÛzsa); noble sweet; half- sweet; and hot.

The Pink Plate is a weekly prix fixe special we offer on MONDAY, TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY. For $30 per person, you get your choice of soup or salad, the featured entree, two selections from our cheese board or one of a couple of featured desserts, plus coffee, tea or espresso.

On Christmas Eve and Christmas Night we will be serving a prix-fixe five-course dinner menu for $75 per person. It will include:
your choice of appetizers; soup; your choice of roasted goose, baked ham or fish; winter salad and your choice of desserts.

On Sunday, December 24, 2006, we will accept dinner reservations from
2 p.m. until 8 p.m.
On Monday, December 25, 2006, we will accept dinner reservations from
2 p.m. until 7 p.m.

Rooms will be available at The Saratoga at a steep discount for Chez Sophie ticket holders. ($79 per night.)

Sunday brunch
Our Sunday Jazz Brunch this week will feature chicken Florentine ($15); pork sausage and cranberry strata ($15); banana-raisin oatmeal pancakes with grilled ham ($13); and smoked mushrooms and tasso ham over fettucine ($14).

The brunch specials run from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. The complete menu.
offered from 7 to 2 includes a Continental assortment of muffins, pastries, fruit, yogurt, quiche etcetera for $9; omelettes ($9 to $11); pancakes du jour ($9); the All in One, which includes 2 eggs any style, homefries, toast and sausage or bacon ($10); waffles with sweet cream butter and local maple syrup ($10); and Irish steel-cut oatmeal ($8).
Jazz pianist Cole Broderick plays from 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.

New Year's Eve at Chez Sophie, 2006
Sunday, December 31, 2006
Our most elegant party of the year

Early seating prix fixe special
Tables available at 5, 5:30, 6 and 6:30 p.m.
Prix fixe five-course menu including options for three of the courses, with a glass of Champagne included
Cost: $75 per person, plus tax and gratuity

New Year's Eve late night party
Tables available at 8, 8:30, 9 and 9:30 p.m.
Prix-fixe eight-course menu, including options for three of the courses, midnight Champagne toast included Jazz Pianist Cole Broderick to play starting at 8 p.m.
Cost: $125 per person, plus tax and gratuity

Special prix fixe wine menu available as well as our full wine list and bar Double rooms at The Saratoga available for $199 per night.
Reservations required with credit card confirmation
518.583.3538

Live Piano Jazz
Jazz pianist Cole Broderick plays the baby grand Tuesday through Friday night, and during Sunday brunch from 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.
(barring special events that preclude live music.)
Cost: No cover charge

Tango Wednesday
December 13
The members of Tango Fusion, a local tango club, gather in our lounge after their Wednesday night class ends at 8:30 for cocktails, snacks and dancing. The public is welcome to come hang out at the bar, join in and pick up a few dance pointers from instructors Diane Lachtrupp and Johnny Martinez. For more information about local classes by Diane and Johnny, see the Saratoga Savoy website at http://www.saratogasavoy.com/files/instructors.html
Cost: No cover charge

Tango Class
January 10th
Johnny and Diane will offer a free tango class to Chez Sophie customers at 8:30, with open dancing afterwards.

Tasting menus
Chef's Choice seven-course tasting menu available each night. The menus are designed based on the best and most creative dishes Chef Paul K. Parker is serving each evening. We will pair wines for you or you can order from our extensive wine list.
Cost: $75 per person, plus tax and tip. Everyone at the table must partake in the tasting menu

If you're feeling less impromptu, you can call ahead to arrange a special tasting menu with the number of courses and wine pairings designed to suit your capacity, dietary restrictions and budget.
Tasting menus arranged in advance will be printed on commemorative vellum scrolls personalized with the name of the host or the reason for the event.
Cost: $50 to $200, depending on the number of courses and the wines selected; available for two to 75 guests Call Cheryl to make arrangements 518.583.3538

The Pink Plate Special
offered Monday, December 4 through Thursday, December 7 $30 per person includes your choice of soup or salad, a special entree, selected desserts or a cheese course and coffee, tea or espresso.

This week's special entree:
chicken paprikash

Notes on Nico and Léo:
Paul brought Léo and Nico into his bed the other night when Cheryl had to stay at the restaurant overnight. He woke the next morning to being pounded by a grinning Léo, who was standing 20 inches over his face and swinging with all her might. As he deflected the blows, he heard his son chirping happily: "Hey Daddy! It's time to wake up!"
Somehow, he found this charming.
"They're working in concert now," Paul said.

Nicholas has adopted the methods of referring to his sister favored by the adults around him. He calls her "My dear" and "My sweet baby girl."