Before Sept. 11, 2001, the restaurant Windows on the World was figuratively and literally at the pinnacle of fine dining in America. It was one of the highest-grossing restaurants in the nation and the loftiest, sitting on the 107th floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Tom Roston’s The Most Spectacular Restaurant in the World (Abrams Press) opens with the inevitable prologue set on the restaurant’s final morning. But the book offers a completely new perspective on the history of the acclaimed establishment, which opened its doors in 1976. This isn’t just an account of the restaurant but also a history of fine dining over the past 150 years, rooted in the emergence of New York’s restaurant culture and following the ebb and flow of the city’s own tumultuous history over the second half of the 20th century.

在2001年9月11日之前，无论在象征意义还是实际意义上，“世界之窗”（Windows on the World）餐厅都可谓是美国精致餐饮的巅峰。它既是美国最卖座的餐厅之一，也是位置最为高耸的餐厅，坐落于世界贸易中心（World Trade Center）北塔的107层。汤姆·罗斯顿在《全球最壮观的餐厅》（The Most Spectacular Restaurant in the World）（艾布拉姆斯出版社）的开场白中以宿命般的口吻描绘了这家餐厅最后的早晨。不过对于这家创立于1976年、好评如潮的餐厅的历史，这部作品提供了一个全新的视角。本书讲述的不仅是这家餐厅的故事，也是过去150年来精致餐饮的发展史，它扎根于纽约涌现的餐厅文化之中，伴随着20世纪后半叶这座城市的兴衰起伏，在纷乱动荡中不断前进。（财富中文网）

A version of this article appears in the September 2019 issue of Fortune with the headline "High Dining."

本文的另一个版本登载于《财富》2019年9月刊，标题为《精致餐饮》。

译者：严匡正