It Cuts Like A Knife

Rocky Aoki, who added the attraction of possible mutilation to the allure of mediocre meals, has died of pneumonia at the age of 69, as Mark’s Eat, Drink and Be Buried misses another golden opportunity. Aoki opened his first Benihana steakhouse in Manhattan in1964, and treated the meal as theater, with chefs as acrobats, sharpening their knives, tossing them in the air, drizzling the grill with oil, sizzling the chicken, shrimp or steak on the grill, and flipping the food onto the plates of diners sitting around a great circular grill.