From: Marc Meyer <chef@cookshop.com>
To: The Board <all@chefsofnyc.org>
Subject: Manifesto

Dear Fellow NYC Chefs:

At risk of sounding too Jeffersonian, my wife, Vicki Freeman, and I would like to make a declaration about our finally-open-thank-you-ConEd restaurant, Cookshop.

To start, we’re anti gimmick. No waiters pretending to be martial arts experts. No extreme Indo-Tazmanian fusion. No celebrity aspirations (though I’d love to go five rounds with Iron Chef Kat Kura).

What are we pro? Good cooking, hospitality, and local produce. That means beautiful grass-fed rib-eyes and pasture-raised lambs. Cranberry beans paired with charred Montauk squid and Mediterranean salsa verde.

We splurged on a wood oven and a custom vertical rotisserie for the open kitchen. (Just wait until you try the suckling pig with chorizo and fruit chutney.)

Erin Shilliday designed the space, which has huge windows, a wood-slatted ceiling, and hand-poured plaster tiles. Yes, Erin also did our first place, Five Points. And, yes, Cookshop will be serving brunch. Soon. (We’ll save a smoked sable plate with Gus’s pickles for you.)

So here’s hoping Cookshop persuades you to join the back-to-basics movement, too.

Say “mutzu apple,” if you’re with me.

Cookshop, 159 Tenth Avenue, at 20th Street (212-924-4440).