All of you thinking about this is such a long article with no meat, why he describes food so much, hold off a bit. This is THE format of the column, he does this every week with interesting people (mostly in showbiz), its just relevant to HN due to Sean Parker.
I guessed that from the format of the article and from its original title, which as I pointed out is unusually accurate: the person being interviewed is secondary, after the lunch.
It's a strange argument, though, to say that criticism must be less valid because they do this every week.
