Did People Go To La Côte Basque To Dine Or To See Truman Capote’s ‘Swans’?

In the TV series “La Côte Basque, 1965” about Truman Capote’s infamous 1975 fictional article published in Esquire that thinly disguised the doyennes of New York society he called “swans” who lunched at the pricey midtown French restaurant La Côte Basque, including Slim Keith, Babe Paley and C.Z. Guest, Keith, played with delicious venom by Diane Lane, vainly declares that the people in the restaurant “come here to see us, not to eat here.”

However snobbish that sounds, Keith was not way off the mark, for in those days the deluxe French restaurants like La Côte Basque, Le Pavillon, Café Chauveron and The Colony and others were so noted for being showcases for such women—paparazzi waited outside to snap their pictures—that many people did indeed go there to see them flutter in, alight at the best tables and, having house accounts, leave without paying a bill they’d never see.

Still, those restaurants—all of them in midtown, where the women lived—were noted for their fine French cuisine and deep wine cellars among those who did go for the food, which widely mimicked the menu items at Le Pavillon that set the standard as early as 1945 with its red banquettes, abundance of roses, tuxedo-clad captains and cowing to the social elite. Chefs trained in France in the strict traditions of classic cooking labored to make the clearest of consommés, the silkiest of reduced sauces and the lightest of soufflés. Yet many of the male guests had a three martini lunch—not least Capote himself—chowing down on lamb chops and steaks,. But to go by the scenes in the TV show, the Swans, ever restrained by dieting, seemed to eat little of anything.

How good was the food at La Côte Basque, which was an offshoot of Le Pavillon, owned by Henri Soulé. Details are sparse because restaurant critics were sparse in 1965, with gossip columnist reporting on who went where with whom. At the time, the New York Times food columnist, Craig Claiborne, gave short reports, without awarding stars, to the restaurants of the day—no one did back then. On June 29 that year he wrote, “A towering superlative, like a little knowledge, is a dangerous thing. But the present temptation is to state without equivocation that Henri Soule's recently reopened La Côte Basque at 5 East 55th Street is the handsomest restaurant in Manhattan.”

He goes on to describe “the physical charms of the restaurant rest in the fact that it is all of a piece – from the [Provençal] murals by Bernard Lamont to the velvet banquettes, and the napery with the green, white and red colors of the Basque flag.” He says the kitchen “has considerable distinction, and yet it lacks the fire that transforms mere excellence into exquisiteness, the noble to the exalted.”

He goes on to praise highly a filet of beef Niçoise and the “gossamer” sole au Champagne, and the grilled pigeon americaine and escalope of liegoise and striped bass Armenonville”—all straight from the classic Escoffier repertoire of haute cuisine. Only one dish he tasted “caused genuine disappointment,” a turbot Basquaise whose texture “lacked the delicate nature that is customary to the finest European restaurants.”

The review seems to indicate he didn’t bother trying the dessert, getting straight to the bottom line: A complete lunch was $7, in the evening $9.50.

By the time of Capote’s publishing his story ten years later, La Côte Basque had maintained its position in the front ranks of French dining salons, and still drew the ladies who lunch, including Jackie Onassis, though by then a newcomer named Le Cirque, led by the suave Sirio Maccioni (formerly maître d at The Colony), began to steal La Côte Basque’s thunder as the place to be seen, attracting royal heads of state, the new fashion designers and actors that included Sophia Loren.

In 1979 La Côte Basque was bought by Chef Jean-Jacques Rachou, formerly at The Colony, who brought fresh ideas to the menu and more gourmet diners to the dining room as interest in gastronomy grew right along with a young food media. By then, the Times was giving out stars, and La Côte Basque earned two (very good) to three (excellent) stars as the years went on. By then, Rachou said he was spending more than $2,200 a week on flowers and more than $3,000 on linen. He was also mentor to some of the most important young chefs like Charlie Palmer, Rick Moonen and Waldy Malouf who would go onto make their own mark in New York.

As a college student with a budget for pizza and burgers I never ate at La Côte Basque in the 1960s, but began to do so in the late 1970s after Rachou took over. Those murals were indeed very beautiful and restful, the timbered ceiling comforting and there was an air of joie de vive rather than Gallic snobisme. My own notes from those years were generally very positive, this at a time when cream and butter still reigned deliciously is most dishes, so I was delighted by dishes like duck foie gras with minced black truffles over a salad of mâche lettuce; quail en croûte came in buttery puff pastry stuffed with more foie gras and truffles; lobster was packed into ravioli with a ruddy shellfish broth. There was a dish of sweet bay scallops in Sauternes-laced beurre blanc, and the dessert cart, joyfully wheeled over at meal’s end, was groaning with sweets too difficult to choose among, so the waiter would serve three or more on a plate.

If there were any Swans left at La Côte Basque in those days, it wasn’t evident. By then the restaurant was clearly an attraction to people who truly loved to eat and drink well. Women like Slim Keith and the anorexic ladies Tom Wolfe called “social x-rays” had by then gone over to Le Cirque, where they were pampered as they were accustomed to be. I recall Barbara Walters once showing up there because she just wanted to show off her new hairdo. Paloma Picasso might dine with the King of Spain, and Woody Allen drank expensive Bordeaux.

As for La Cȏte Basque, which had moved to the West Side of Fifth Avenue, the elderly Rachou, frustrated after failing a health inspection closed the restaurant in March, 2004, described in the Times as “a former high-society temple of French cuisine.” By then, all the Swans—Slim Keith, Babe Paley, C.Z. Guest—had passed away.

And what of Truman Capote? As the TV series and history show, shunned by his swans and often alone, he sank further into alcoholic and drug dissipation, never following up with anything worth reading after “La Côte Basque, 1965.” Which is how I once saw him years later, around 1984, the year he died. He was sitting at midday, all alone, at a restaurant in Amagansett, wearing his usual sunglasses and a large brimmed hat, summoning the waiter to bring him another Martini, “please.”