Fat Tuesday in Park Slope; Dining Near the TentsPlus: a $38 eight-course meal to celebrate the Chinese New Year, and the best places to go in Park Slope for Mardi Gras, in our daily roundup of neighborhood food news.
Astor Place to Get Slightly Less Life-ThreateningScruffles are playing in the streets in Jackson Heights. Gays are scared for their Vespas in Chelsea. Some other group of people is turning in its Uzis in Clinton Hill. And everybody is reading our daily boroughs report.
neighborhood watch
Michel Gondry Moves to Historic East Williamsburg BlockYou can find libido-enhancing maca in Jackson Heights, aspects of Frenchness in Boerum Hill and, speaking of French things, possibly filmmaker Michel Gondry in East Williamsburg. That and more in our head-choppingly wacky Bastille Day boroughs report.
neighborhood watch
Heather Mills Is Moving to the West VillagePaul McCartney’s ex drops some of his dime on a New York pad, well-meaning yuppie scum set up shop in the East Village, Enrique Norten gets a second chance in downtown Brooklyn, and more, in this week’s kickoff to our daily boroughs wrap-up!
On the Bowery, New Hotel Tower Physically Squeezes Landmarked HomePlus, boos drowning out a Harlem rezone vote and Grand Theft Auto’s uncanny recreation of a certain famous, fun-oriented island (“Johnson’s Famous Hot Dogs”?). All that with mustard and sauerkraut in today’s boroughs report.
NewsFeed
Roosevelt Avenue Enjoys a Moment in the Sun
Roosevelt Avenue in Queens has always been one of our favorite strips: middle-aged-lesbian dance parties at Bum Bum! Baby-doll night at Flamingo! We like to eat there too, and apparently so does Good magazine which, we hear, will name “la Roosie” one of America’s best food streets. Their picks: El Sitio, Unidentified Flying Chicken, Krystal’s, Zabb Queens, and the Arepa Lady. The feature will be found here in the coming week (others, such as a writer’s attempt to bag a deer in suburban L.A., are up now); in the meantime Metromix and AM New York have joint-published a Joshua M. Bernstein piece in which he hits ten places on Roosevelt and spends just ten bucks — culminating in an ill-fated attempt to eat a fertilized duck embryo raw. If you want to try one of these without gagging, hit up Elvie’s Turo-Turo.
Issue 009: All You Can Eat [Good]
Dollar Grub: Roosevelt Ave. [Metromix NY]
Related: Riding the V Line: Guinea Pig on Roosevelt Avenue
neighborhood watch
Take a Walk Down Tin Pan Alley, Er, 28th StreetEast Village: Right across from its iconic 1859 building, Cooper Union wants to build a corrugated, spiky new thing by Japanese architect Fumihiko Maki. Um…yeah, we’ll skip the stupid, vaguely racist sushi joke. [NYO]
Flatiron: The next time you walk down nondescript 28th between Broadway and Sixth, sing out “Won’t You Come Home, Bill Bailey?” or “In the Good Old Summertime” to commemorate that the block was once the famed Tin Pan Alley. There’s no plaque or anything that denotes as much. And that’s a sad song. [Lost NYC]
Gowanus: Take a look at the residential-retail complex the Toll Brothers would like to build along the canal. Nothing like mixed-use magic alongside the miasma! [Gowanus Lounge]
neighborhood watch
The Army Occupies East 103rd Street; Residents DispleasedEast Harlem: There’s outrage over a new Army recruiting center on East 103rd Street, on the heels of Army promo teams here this summer that included gals in camo midriffs and short shorts. [NY Latino Journal]
Jackson Heights: Starbucks is here! Gentrification officially begins! [Curbed]
Northwest Bronx: So many parks are being repaired here that there’s no place for the massive youth baseball league to play this spring! [Norwood News]
neighborhood watch
Bedford-Stuyvesant Not So Sold on the ‘Hope’ and ‘Change’ Parts of This ElectionBedford-Stuyvesant: Some folks are skeptical that anything will change here, no matter who’s elected in November. And they’re employing their mailboxes to say so. [Newyorkshitty]
Greenwich Village: After renovations of Washington Square Park found human remains there, folks will protest there tonight, saying the city should merely “repair” the park and not upset buried bones with a full-scale redo. [Metro]
Jackson Heights: This is the home of the largest of 47 rent-stabilized apartment buildings throughout Queens just purchased for $300 million by Vantage Properties. Housing advocates fear the new owner will systematically push out low-rent-paying tenants in the nearly 2,000 units. [The Real Deal]
Neighborhood Watch
Kellog’s Diner at Risk; the Definitive Banana BookCobble Hill: Trader Joe’s seems to think it’s opening a store on Court Street, even if a bunch of local bloggers don’t. [McBrooklyn]
Dumbo: Finally, the map to area eateries we’ve all been waiting for. [Gridskipper]
East Village: Want to read a book about bananas? Dan Keoppel reads tonight at KGB from Banana: The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World.
Fort Greene: Neighbors are looking for a friendly bar to watch Super Tuesday results. [General Greene]
Gowanus: Vandals have opened up the Whole Foods site on 3rd Street again. [Gowanus Lounge]
Jackson Heights: Sweet tooths rejoice over Cannelle Pâtisserie on 31st Avenue. [Chow]
Park Slope: Komboocha, a fermented tea, hits the co-op, but not everyone is psyched about it: “It’s expensive, tastes like crap, and claims to cure everything. Thus, it appeals to the rich and those addicted to Park Slopish consumer culture.” [Daily Slope]
Williamsburg: According to renderings, Kellog’s Diner will be wrapped up by a heinous new condo at Metropolitan and Union. [Curbed]
neighborhood watch
Flatbush Enters the Food Co-op FrayChelsea: The proliferation of noncontextual glass condos is driving area high schoolers to stab one another in front of the construction sites. [Vanishing New York]
Flatbush: Watch your back, Park Slope Food Co-op. The one here is moving into an old Associated market, and they’ve poached a Trader Joe’s staffer to be their produce czar. [Ditmas Park Blog]
Jackson Heights: Wow, the scrappy hood beat out Manhattan’s newly hot financial district in Curbed’s Best Nabe of ‘07 competition. Now, can it trounce — gulp — Tribeca? [Curbed]
neighborhood watch
You Aren’t the Only Person Who Comes Home to Find Random People Smoking in Your StairwellClinton Hill: Beware of undesirables who sneak into your apartment building to smoke butts, do drugs, copulate, urinate, and drink coffee. Because it’s happening. [Clinton Hill Blog]
East Village: The latest bank branch hopes that if it puts up a big photo of the hood in Ye Olden Days, no one will notice that it’s filled mostly with bank branches now. [Vanishing New York]
Flushing: Local Quaker farmers demand freedom of worship! Well, they did in 1657. But the tatty document in which they listed their demands, called “The religious Magna Carta of the New World,” is on display up in here. [NYT]
The Orange Line
Riding the V Line: Guinea Pig on Roosevelt Avenue
Roosevelt Avenue’s riches are almost impossible to exhaust: It’s a glorious land of tacos, papusas, Colombian hamburgers, Himalayan soups, late-night arepas, and fried chicken. But the last time we looked, there was only one place on “Rosey” to get guinea pig. And that’s Hornado Ecuatoriano.
neighborhood watch
Bed-Stuy Fires Back at the ‘Shwick!Bedford-Stuyvesant: Uh-oh. Bed-Stuy just upped the stakes in the blog battle between it and Bushwick. They even dis ‘shwick homegirl Rosie Perez. This is war, muthaf*ckas. [Bed-Stuy Blog]
Coney Island: So many people showed up last night at the first public meeting on the city’s plans for Coney that it had to be canceled for lack of space. Wow. This should be an epic novel. [Gowanus Lounge]
Jackson Heights: The hood’s got a new bulletin board! Where else will you learn where to get the area’s best pizza, Mexican cocoa power, and $5-or-under eyebrow threading? [Jackson Heights Life]
neighborhood watch
Jackson Heights: The Musical! Wait, That Sounds Familiar…Cobble Hill: Some performance-art weirdos queued up, droidlike, outside of the future Trader Joe’s here. Was this some sort of Marxist semiotic commentary on the store’s long lines to come? [A Brooklyn Life]
Elmhurst: The locals are getting into t’ai chi, which is cool, but they look like they’re doing the Thriller zombie dance in this pic. [Junction Blvd]
Hell’s Kitchen: The flea markets haven’t been doing as well since they moved here from their longtime home in Chelsea, where condo-velopment pushed them out. [Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York via Chelsea Now]
Jackson Heights: Stay tuned for Jackson Heights: The Musical! Hey, wait a minute, that Washington Heights show hasn’t even opened on Broadway yet! [Queens Crap via NYDN]
Morningside Heights: Creatures including a camel, two llamas, some goats, a Chinese goose, a fourteen-pound rabbit, a porcupine, and a hermit crab paraded down the aisle at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine yesterday for a blessing. These pics are so cute! [Gothamist]
Upper East Side: This sticky Indian summer is hardest of all on uptown gals planning the final stages of their wedding, don’t you agree? [Sex and the UES]
Williamsburg: Yuppies moving here and to Greenpoint don’t want to send their kids to the local public schools, leaving some of them half-empty. [Brownstoner]
Neighborhood Watch
Frying Pan Secure for Next Five Years; Whole Foods Selling Flat Beer on the LES?Chelsea: The Frying Pan has signed a five-year lease that will begin next May. [Chelsea Now via Eater]
Clinton Hill: Get your Oktoberfest on with a beer, cider, and sausage fest at 55 Lexington Avenue on September 29. [A Brooklyn Life]
East Harlem: Italian Americans are still mourning the August closure of Morrone & Sons bakery on East 116th Street. Especially the 72-year-old matron who opened the shop in 1956. [NYT]
Fort Greene: Crisp artichokes make a great burger topping at 67, even when the beef is greasy and overcooked. [Eat for Victory/VV]
Jackson Heights: Jackson Diner and Rajbhog Sweets are among some 85 restaurants participating in Queens Restaurant Week running September 17 to 20 and 24 to 27. [About.com]
Lower East Side: Whole Foods should top off beer-container refills with CO2 if they care about customers getting home to find flat beer. [Eat]
Park Slope: Frank Bruni was inundated with responses to his feature on handicapped-accessible restaurants, including one about his “beloved Franny’s” who wouldn’t slice “a pizza for someone who had just undergone neurosurgery on her (writing) hand because ‘the chef doesn’t do that.’” [Diner’s Journal/NYT]
Soho: Barcelona’s artisanal-candy chain Papabubble has settled on a U.S. location at 380 Broome Street and an opening date of October 18. [Papabubble via Down by the Hipster]
Neighborhood Watch
Red Hook Vendors Safe for Season; Fro-Yo Knockoff Welcomed in Jackson HeightsAstoria: Does Joey take a cut of Sicilian slice sales, or is Rose & Joe’s really worth a special trip? Let us know what you think of their square pies at grubstreet@nymag.com. [Joey in Astoria]
Chelsea: Toast Timbo at a Pier 60 fund-raiser tomorrow night offering copious amounts of food and drink in memory of a young victim of Traumatic Brain Injury. [Timbo Fund]
Dumbo: Blanc & Rouge pits Bordeaux against Burgundy in tasting on September 26. [Dumbo NYC]
Greenwich Village: BBQ on University closed without warning last night, but there is hope its greasy treats and fishbowls of fluorescent libations will return to another Eighth Street space. [Eater]
Harlem: There’s interest in pinpointing what’s lacking for restaurants in the nabe. [Uptown Flavor]
Jackson Heights: The next shameless knockoff to touch down in Queens: Yogurberry. [Eat for Victory/VV]
Red Hook: The Parks Department grants ball-field vendors extended permits letting them finish the season ending October 21. And maybe longer; Senator Schumer says that he “looks forward to eating goat tacos, ceviche and spicy corn on the cob at the ball fields for years to come.” [City Room/NYT]
West Village: Centro Vinoteca has a full new lunch menu highlighted by polpette burgers and “cubano toscano” sandwiches.
neighborhood watch
Beware of Moped GangsDumbo: One Brooklyn Bridge Park slightly taller, slightly less yellow. Also, slightly expensive. [DumboNYC]
East River: We wouldn’t normally swim in the East River. But we might do it with art? [Gothamist]
Jackson Heights: New ad campaign: equal opportunity appaller. [Curbed]
Park Slope: Moped gangs in the Slope! If only we were joking. [Daily Slope]
Red Hook: The planned giant IKEA will stomp out a Civil War–era shipyard. Also, taste. [NYDN]
Roosevelt Island: OpenHouseNewYork will allow people into the scary old Smallpox Hospital you can see from the FDR (remember the end of Spider-Man?). And onto the Highline! [NewYorkology]
the morning line
Here We Go Again: Mike to Get His Traffic Money, If Albany Agrees
• The Feds are expected to announce today that, yes indeed, they’ll shell out the big bucks necessary for Bloomberg to execute his congestion-pricing dream plan — if Albany passes it first, that is. [NYT]
Mediavore
The Upper West Side Arrives; Clone Restaurants FlourishThe Upper West Side is “Manhattan’s hottest restaurant neighborhood” with a confluence of good places from name chefs and anonymous but high-quality local eateries. The addition of Daniel Boulud’s new wine bar is just the icing on the cake. [NYP]
If you like Peter Luger, Magnolia Bakery, or Pearl Oyster Bar, know that there are clones all over town. [TONY]
The glories of hidden Queens range from an Argentine steakhouse with “insane” portions to an ancient ice-cream parlor in Jackson Heights. [NYP]
neighborhood watch
Cue the Violins in Park Slope and KensingtonConey Island: The clowns have been sent. Cole Brothers Circus is on the old go-kart tracks through August 5. [Gowanus Lounge]
East Village: Duane Reade finally has Harry Potter. There’s no need to go without. [East Village Idiot]
Jackson Heights: Mayor Bloomberg runs afoul of locals complaining about traffic, noise, and sanitation gripes. [FoxNews via QueensCrap]
Kensington: Talk about a virtual inferiority complex: Locals here lament that their Wikipedia page is not as nice as Park Slope’s. Cue violins, please. [KensingtonBlog]
Park Slope: Whine of the Day from the Slope set? “Why did they reduce driving hours in Central Park and not our park? Whaaa!” [Gowanus Lounge]
Union Square: Beware the hordes of student filmmakers in the park today. [The Weblicist of Manhattan]
Williamsburg: White middle-class preservationists faced off against nonwhite low-income affordable-housing proponents at a hearing over the future use of the Domino sugar factory. [Brownstoner]
VideoFeed
A Toddle Around Jackson Heights With Floyd Cardoz of Tabla
Many are the times that we’ve found ourselves wandering around the Indo-Pak wonderland that is Jackson Heights, wishing we only knew a little more about what was behind the counters in all those sweet shops, restaurants, and grocery stores. So we recruited Tabla’s Floyd Cardoz, arguably the country’s top Indian-American fusion cook, and asked him if he would give us a quick guided tour. Floyd assented, and we headed off to Queens in a 1990 white Coupe DeVille, with empty stomachs and open ears.
neighborhood watch
Nothing Says ‘Small-Town Feel’ Like Community ToiletsThe Bronx: Car-free Sundays return to the Grand Concourse. [Streetsblog]
Clinton Hill: Hollenback Garden invites all the neighbors to soil the soil, but wait until the composting toilet is built on Saturday. [Clinton Hill Blog]
East Village: One Ten 3rd is still not ready for human occupancy, but for now it’s populated by a bunch of Sub-Zero refrigerators. [Curbed]
Jackson Heights: The normally private gardens here are open to the rest of us schlubs for the weekend. [OuterB]
Kensington: Virgin doesn’t even bother giving this underrated neighborhood its own ad. They just get a generic “Brooklyn” one. [Kensington Blog]
Park Slope: Anyone want to buy Seventh Avenue Books? It’s “priced to sell.” [Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn]
