What If Per Se Served KFC?

In a confluence of dreams coming true, the Red Robin mascot was at Per Se posing with Chrissy Teigen. Teigen, on the other hand, was technically now working with a company that had once refused to hire her as a waitress because of her bowling score, as she told the crowd at a preview of ChainFEST on Aug. 2.

ChainFEST — which is like Coachella if the headliners were chefs reconceptualizing dishes from KFC and Red Lobster — arrives at Randall’s Island Park on Sept. 21. But ahead of the event, a group of content creators, media, and Jonathan Cheban gathered at one of the world’s best restaurants located in a mall to taste-test wee Cheddar Bay Biscuit lobster sandwiches and pickled onion rings.

When I walked in at 11:30 a.m., white negronis were already being passed around Per Se’s thickly carpeted dining room, whose tables had been arranged with glass cloches under which collectibles like a Red Robin mug depicting “the only known rendering of the elusive Jungle Cow” were displayed. Some guests scribbled on the paper placements with crayons, while others perused the laminated menus and the Randall’s Island event map, which showed that the real deal would, mercifully, include a Tums pavilion.

A duo in chef’s jackets soon appeared and began plating single truffle chicken tenders alongside splodges of aerated potato mousseline. Influencers bum-rushed the station, lights ablaze; the Red Robin mascot (government name: Red) waved helplessly as we ate his family. Fried mushroom fragments tossed in chili crisp from Panda Express arrived next, arranged on tiered trays that might have cradled mignardises in another life. Then came the onion rings, resembling caviar-dotted Paris-Brest, and the golf-ball-size lobster biscuits.

When Chef Tim Hollingsworth, who helped open Per Se 20 years ago, took the mic, he recalled emulsifying 30 pounds of beurre monté a day to poach the lobster at The French Laundry, the same technique he used for the preview’s (very tender) crustaceans. The other speeches by various co-founders largely centered around the same theme: how ChainFEST’s celebration of standard-format restaurants provides a Ratatouille-like sense of familiarity and unity in a time when Americans are focused more on our ideological differences than our shared love of all that is breaded and deep-fried.

The audience’s reaction wasn’t exactly a slow clap and chants of “USA,” but I did see a few attendees dig into their chicken tendies with renewed gusto. The line for the bar reformed, and besuited Per Se staff circulated with porcelain bowls to collect the crumpled-up napkins. Before making my way out to Columbus Circle past an H&M and a Lululemon, I was urged to a take a paper carryout box; it contained a tin of hazelnut sandwich cookies, which might have been the best thing I ate all day.