The Cafe Boulud is a few blocks away from the Metropolitan Museum of Art on the Upper East Side. The ambiance of the place reflects its expensive address. From the street, the door with the canopy looks like many of the other surrounding apartment buildings. Inside, the decor is light-coloured, modern, and pleasing. We went for lunch and immediately noticed that the clientele was very well dressed. There were a number of businessmen and ladies who lunch, and we seemed to be seated next to three women who could have been from "Sex and the City"—10 years later with children. They gossiped incessantly about their friends and fashion while drinking copious amounts of alcohol.

The menu is set up with organized starter, main course, and dessert combinations each built around a theme, such as Asian, seasonal, or French country. You can follow the organized offerings or mix and match.

My companion had salad nicoise and Thai lobster but declined dessert. I had tomato salad and spinach tortelli in an incredibly buttery sauce. The food looked like works of art and was just unusual enough to be memorable. I had a dessert called bittersweet chocolate peanut, which was layers of chocolate, ganache, and peanuts. The women next to us, who had ordered four desserts for the three of them, asked me what I had ordered, then exclaimed that they should have ordered it also.

Our waiter was very talkative and attentive. My companion just asked for a spoon instead of dessert, but when my dessert arrived, the waiter also brought poached plums with ice cream and praline so that my companion would leave my dessert alone. That was a laugh, and there was no charge for the extra dessert.

After dessert, we received small Madeleine cookies. We found that the fine-dining places in NYC are big on lots of extras, and even though the portions are not large, the number of servings make for a lot of food. The total bill was relatively high for lunch, but that is to be expected. The food was impressive enough that some day I would like to try Daniel Boulud's other full-on French restaurant, although I expect its prices would be even higher.

Cafe Boulud was crowded for lunch. I would expect that reservations are recommended at any time.