Penelope
Part bar, part café, part bakery, Penelope draws from all the places co-owner Jenny Potenza has worked since she was 17. It’s also a very welcome addition to café-starved Curry Hill, where it’s easier to come by masala dosa than Nutella French toast and a decent egg-salad sandwich. With brightly painted wainscoting and house-baked confections, Penelope feels like a New England country kitchen—save for the Tocai Friulano and Spanish rosé served by the glass.
159 Lexington Avenue, at 30th Street
212-481-3800

Cripplebush Road
Brooklyn’s new Cripplebush Road devotes itself to two distinct and disparate geographic locales: Greece, whence come the owners and every bottle on the wholly Hellenic wine list, and Williamsburg, which is depicted in the vintage maps and prints that decorate the sprawling restaurant and bar. Cripplebush Road, it turns out, was the name of a bygone Williamsburg thoroughfare that once ran all the way up to Astoria—hence the Greek connection. But the amateur interborough historians who run the place take a more inclusive approach to the menu, which features Mediterranean meze like Lebanese hummus, Moroccan beef skewers, and Tunisian tuna-and-egg salad, plus pizza and focaccia baked in a wood-burning oven. — ROBIN RAISFELD
168 Wythe Avenue, Williamsburg, Brooklyn
718-387-5855

Bread Tribeca
Those proliferating panini-bar tenders sure don’t loaf: First ’ino begat the bigger, more ambitious ’inoteca, and now Bread, its Nolita counterpart, has spawned the minimalist 64-seat Bread Tribeca. In the process, owner Luigi Comandatore (left) has acquired a new partner (Bob Giraldi, right) and chef (Anthony Rose, late of Washington Park) and graduated from a panini press to a custom-built wood-burning oven, which comes in handy for dishes like pesto-potato pizza and roasted chicken with beet greens and garlic. An expanded menu reprises a few of Bread’s best-selling sandwiches, supplemented by Ligurian-inspired fare like fritto misto, pansotti with walnut sauce, and stuffed squid with roasted beets. — ROBIN RAISFELD
301 Church Street
212-334-8282

object of desire The Big Apricot Apricot season is upon us, and Gotham Bar & Grill pastry chef Deborah Racicot has quickly gotten into the spirit. Her frozen pistachio sponge cake layered with her own dulce de leche ice cream is topped with apricot sorbet and plump fresh apricots that have been macerated in vin santo and lime juice, then butter-roasted until they are intensely, irresistibly sweet. Gotham Bar & Grill 12 East 12th Street 212-620-4020     roundup Top 5 Onion Rings From buttermilk-battered to cornmeal-crusted, these burger buddies will make you want to hold the fries.   the underground gourmet Kofte-Esque The owners of Williamsburg’s Allioli have the small-plates formula down pat. At Nar, their latest local venture, they effortlessly shift from Spanish tapas to Turkish meze, an equally tasty (and at $4 to $9, affordable) variation on the Mediterranean-appetizer theme. The original thirties wood bar and cozy tin-walled dining room create an ambience that invites lingering over multiple plates, Turkish wine, Efes beer, or the house cocktail made with nar (pomegranate). The kitchen turns out terrific homemade pickles called tursu, voluptuously soft baby eggplant stuffed with tomato and peppers, and char-grilled kofte, or meatballs, served—like many of Nar’s newfangled meze—bruschetta-style, on a slice of bread. Nar 152 Metropolitan Avenue, Williamsburg 718-599-3027     Ask Gael All I want is a light supper before the show. Azalea, just walking distance from curtains-up, has what you crave, in its sublime mozzarella with roasted bell pepper and prosciutto and a half order of mezze maniche—short-sleeved rigatoni stuffed with veal on white truffle cream, a rich-as-Berlusconi notion from Parma. What seems at first like yet another copycat Italian outpost, and a pricey one at that, is actually pleasantly understated with yachtlike wood finishes, Georgia O’Keeffe prints everywhere, a proud host on the floor, and real finesse in the kitchen. Four courses, in the traditional Italian mode, can quickly add up, but garlicky mussels in pesto, half an order of clam-and-tomato-tossed scialatielli noodles (thick and wonderfully al dente), and a glass of red wine make pretheater sense. Overcooked halibut (with luscious mushroom ragout) and the hokey but delicious Parmesan stage set for slivered fennel and grilled shrimp are more than offset by a perfection of Chilean sea bass with favas and tomato, and the roast duck in thick meaty slices with almost fruity sweet-and-sour pearl onions. Azalea 224 West 51st Street 212-262-0105

July 14, 2003
Suenos, Angelina's, Chick-inn; a first taste of New Paradise Cafe; special summer ice creams; Brooklyn's brew gets shelved; Gael goes upstate to Finch Tavern.

July 7, 2003
That Little Cafe, Blue Goose Cafe; luscious lemonade at Dish; Citarella's devilishly delicious dessert; top five beer gardens; The BLT Cookbook; romance and ribs at Hacienda de Argentina.

June 23, 2003
Paradou, Ethos, 'inoteca; the city's top five iced teas; Danny Meyer's peanuts of desire; fresh from the farm veggies; local strawberries; Gael goes back in time at Sarge's Deli.

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Photos: Kenneth Chen (1, 3), Carina Salvi (2, 4, 6), Liz Steger.