I didn’t think DBGB was my kind of place, but I had one of the best meals I’ve had in a while. The name is a wink at the gentrification that’s been creeping up the Bowery above Houston Street. The shell of CBGB, a block away, has become a marketplace for designer fashion, and the upscale hotels and condos popping up around it are rapidly transforming the strip into a well-heeled playground. DBGB, housed in one of these shiny new monoliths, is chef Daniel Boulud’s take on elevated gastropub fare. (more…)
Update: The Meatball Shop now has six locations.
When I was told there was an hour wait for a table at the Meatball Shop the other night, I was ecstatic. The last two times I tried to go, there was a two-hour wait, and since then Meatball Shop hype only seemed to grow. There were mentions of it everywhere: the Food Network, the Yahoo.com homepage, my Facebook friends’ status updates. Taunting me. (more…)
Coal Yard isn’t yet a place where everybody knows my name, but everyone seems to know the dude at the end of the bar who’s flinging coasters at the bartender, who merely laughs and flings them back. The middle of the bar is occupied by a serious fellow huddled over a book, and the other end is taken by two older guys with horn cases, possibly fueling up for a gig. (more…)
If you have years of catching up to do with someone, you need a bar where you can actually chat, without feeling like a piece of driftwood being tossed around on a sea of revelers. Excellent cocktails never hurt conversation, so Summit Bar fit the bill nicely. I was a little relieved, on walking in, that there were no bartenders in suspenders or tasteful antiques attempting to evoke a 1920s speakeasy, a trend that’s getting a bit tiresome. (more…)
Update: Mars Bars bas been demolished. The space is now a TD Bank.
I’ve been to Mars Bar, but it was a long time ago. The place smells funky. The beer comes in bottles. The bathrooms have an especially bad reputation. Years upon years of hard-won grime coats the carved, hacked-upon bar. The regulars include some seedy types you don’t see downtown much these days. They provide a sort of deranged entertainment, like a living Tom Waits tune. After sitting for a while on the exposed sponge innards of a ripped-up bar stool, I’d feel a compelling need to move along, possibly home to take a shower. (more…)
When it comes to beer I’m not that picky. There’s beer and then there’s good beer, and I drink the good kind. Good beer can be almost anything: a sour lambic, a chocolate stout, even the odd IPA. Something from a local or craft brewery that looks new or different is always worth a try. Just as long as it’s not a watery lager, which is what you’ll find trickling from the taps of most of the bars in America. (more…)
The puppies paraded through Tompkins Square Park in their Halloween finest this past Sunday, and once again I joined the camera clicking hordes eager to record the event. This was my fifth year photographing the event and I enjoyed spotting some perennial favorites, rocking always-awesome costumes. But if I had to narrow down the best costumes I’d go with these: (more…)
Last night I headed over to Brooklyn to shoot some photos at Bring to Light, a free one-night event featuring light installations and music along the Greenpoint waterfront. This was billed as New York City’s first nuit blanche festival, which draw huge crowds in cities like Toronto, Paris and St. Petersburg. They generally go all night, although the Brooklyn event had a midnight end time. (more…)
If you enjoy vistas of deserted industrial streets and dramatic harbor skies, Red Hook is the hood for you. Now that Red Hook Lobster Pound has opened shop, lobster-lovers in particular have been finding the trek worthwhile. (more…)
I believe there’s a therapeutic value to having your water unobtrusively refilled, without needing to ask anyone. The knife you dropped that is swiftly replaced; the napkin that is neatly refolded when you return from the restroom; the single beam of light that misses you and falls instead on your soon-to-be-full plate, all have a similar soothing effect. (more…)