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Air’s Champagne Parlor is All About the Bubbly
Beer, wine and even cider bars abound in NYC, but Air’s Champagne Parlor is one of the few area drinkeries devoted to bubbly. To be fair, the Riddling Widow briefly preceded it, but owner Ariel Arce was actually beverage director during its tenure, as well as Birds & Bubbles before that, and Chicago’s Pops for Champagne (not to mention Grant Achatz’s exclusive, original The Office) before that. Meaning her reputation as queen of Cuvèe absolutely proceeds her.
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Where to Celebrate Oktoberfest 2017
If you’re already mourning the loss of summer, Oktoberfest is a reliable way to get you over the hump. Essentially spanning the duration of fall (kicking off on September 16th this year & extending all the way to October 31st, allowing revelers to seamlessly transition to Halloween), the 16 to 18-day festival is a giddy saturnalia of German culture…
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Spotlight on the Finalists for the 2017 Vendy Awards
As a fun challenge to the James Beard Awards, the Vendy ceremony — now in its 13th year — is dedicated to honoring the very best in street food. So here’s who’s in the running during the September 16th event at Governors Island; from an artisanal twinkie baker to an upstart french toast sandwich maker, to a Chinese meat skewer purveyor, whose been tapped for the Vendy Cup…
Most Recent Dish
Q & A With SHO's Shaun Hergatt
Shaun Hergatt is either brave or crazy. This Australian chef dared open SHO amidst the economic recession, in the heart of Wall Street nonetheless. While critics were busy declaring fine dining dead, he defied the odds, receiving a Michelin star and two stars from the New York Times. Hergatt’s Financial District eatery is still going strong, due in large part to his, innovative French-Asian cooking. “When you fuse the techniques and creaminess found in French cooking to the Asian flavor profile, you get a fusion that just...
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Trend Watch: Gourmet Ice
Chefs are famous for being perfectionists and that includes cocktail chefs. First, bartenders started serving homemade infusions, soon followed by housemade bitters, tonic water and even sodas crafted in-house. The latest fixation among barkeeps is ice. They’re determined to serve your drink chilled not watered-down. Small, square cubes don’t always cut it. Different liquors work best with different sizes and shapes of ice. Hand cut, artisanal, non-melting – this is the verbiage being thrown around in new, and serious,...
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Q & A With Park Avenue Chef Kevin Lasko
Chef Kevin Lasko’s career trajectory is proof that anything is possible in the kitchen. Lasko has come a long way from working as a short order cook at the Jersey Shore to working for Jean-Georges Vongerichten at the Mercer Kitchen in just a few years. “I didn’t even know who Jean-Georges was when I first started,” Lasko admits. “But the food was just so much better than anything I had ever seen.” Lasko is now the executive chef at the...
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Why Men Should Bake
Valentine’s Day got me thinking about just how intimately connected dating and eating are. There’s always seeing a movie or a concert, but the most traveled path to seduction is undoubtedly food and drink. Some men hope to charm a girl with a sit-down dinner and plenty of wine, while others rack their brains for the perfect bar with, if things are going well, the option of small plates or making a move to a table. Most have their go-to roster of...
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New York's Top Tortas
New York is famous for many things, including sandwiches. Think about the possibilities at lunchtime: There’s everything from heroes to pastrami on rye to a banh mi or even a Cubano. But one of our favorites is the Mexican torta, a sandwich that often gets overshadowed by burritos or chicken mole on a menu. What makes tortas so great are the slew of ingredients stuffed inside. There’s often not one, but two types of meat, cheese, veggies, sauce and...
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Q & A with Porter House's & C-CAP Honoree Michael Lomonaco
Chef Michael Lomonaco, a veteran of the New York restaurant scene, helped pioneer New American cooking in this country. He commanded the kitchen at the 21 Club and Windows on the World until 9/11. Nowadays, Lomonaco is the chef/owner of Porter House, a classic American steakhouse, located in the Time Warner Center. More importantly, chef Lomonaco’s accomplishments aren’t confined to the kitchen. He’s also been a mentor with the Careers Through Culinary Arts Program (C-CAP), which awards culinary schools scholarships to high...
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C-CAP HONORS MICHAEL LOMONACO
There are so many worthy causes, but this one means a lot to me because it has raised over 31 million dollars for culinary scholarships for underprivileged children. This Wednesday, February 16th, C-CAP will host its annual benefit at Pier Sixty on Chelsea Piers from 6:30-9:30 where guests can sample the delectable creations of some of the city’s best chefs, including Michael White, Marcus Samuelsson, Dan Barber, John Fraser, and Marc Murphy. This year C-CAP is honoring Michael...
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Jewish Food Redefined
Until just recently, Jewish cooking was far from fashionable or even flavorful, for that matter. In the last year, new restaurants are featuring Jewish cuisine, everything from Montreal deli food to “New Jewish” cooking with a Mediterranean edge. There’s even a rumor that Jeffrey Chodorow is teaming up with Kutschers, the Poconos’ most famous hotel-resorts, known forits Jewish foodstuffs, like borscht, smoked fish and potato latkes. There’s everything from the very un-kosher Traif in Brooklyn to old school steakhouses like Sammy’s Roumanian or Octavia’s Porch in the East Village. Here’s a...
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New York's Best Chocolate Shops
With Valentine’s Day right around the corner, we’ve got one thing on our mind: chocolate. Of course, we’re choco-holics year-round, but the holiday is a great excuse to stop at some of our favorite shops. What we’ve discovered this year is that chocolatiers keep raising the bar with terrifically imaginative flavor combinations, including Kee’s jasmine truffles and Thai-inspired dark chocolate. If you’re feeling exotic, you might want to try La Maison Du Chocolat’s Arneguy truffle, flavored with cardamom and almond paste. You could even make a date out of visiting one of the oldest...
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Best Super Bowl Bars
The Super Bowl is the most anticipated sports event in the year, so why not skip your couch and watch it somewhere with a little more atmosphere and good cocktails? This year, you can watch the Steelers and the Packers go head-to-head in a venue that suits your tastes. For beer geeks, there’s Beer Table in Brooklyn with rare craft brews on tap. For those who wish this year’s game was a repeat of Super Bowl XLIV, Bourbon Street...
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Q & A with Chef Alain Allegretti
Chef Alain Allegretti may have been named Eater’s sexiest chef, but he’s much more than just a pretty face. The French ex-pat debuted on the New York dining scene more than 10 years ago as the co-executive chef at Le Cirque and followed that gig up with his own eponymous restaurant, Allegretti. It was there New Yorkers fell in love with his Provencal cooking, particularly his fish soup. Sadly, the restaurant closed and Alain Allegretti was a chef without...
Read MoreBest of NYC – Valentine's Day Dining
For some, the fourteenth of February brings fear. Either the pressure of setting up the perfect date or the anxiety of not having one can throw the most confident diner into a tizzy. Then, there’s the often dreaded Valentine’s prix fixe menu, which can feel forced. Thankfully, restaurateurs are easing up on the prix-fixe and offering alternative ways for singles and coupled alike to celebrate. Whether you’d like a full, sit-down dinner, a laid-back bite or a rowdy party,...
Read MorePizza Making Set
2010 was a very big year for pizza and we don’t expect it to go out of style anytime soon. Really, what’s not to love about pizza? While we love to recreate our favorite dishes at home, the art of pizza making is something we leave up to the pizzaiolos of the world. Besides, most of us don’t have a pizza oven in our tiny urban kitchens. This pizza stone and peel set (pictured right) is a game changer. ...
Read MoreQ & A With Turks & Frogs' Osman Cakir
Osman Cakir had no intentions of becoming a restaurateur. He began his career as an antique collector. One day, he decided to transform his West Village shop into what maybe believe was New York’s first wine bar, Turks & Frogs. Cakir designed every inch of the Turks and Frogs in the West Village and Tribeca, as well as the interior of his newly opened cocktail bar, Orient Express. This gorgeous spot in the West Village, outfitted with bronze luggage...
Read MorePeanut Butter & Jelly Cocktail
Happy National Peanut Butter Day! This is even better than my birthday. Yes, really. Peanut butter, especially the chunky type, might just be my favorite food. Oh, the velvety texture, the crazy crunch, and the intoxicating roasted peanut butter perfume. I have absolutely no control around anything laced with peanut butter (Le Vain’s chocolate peanut butter chip cookies come to mind), but I’ve never had a peanut butter and jelly cocktail until now! PB & J CocktailCreated By Gianfranco ...
Read MoreTop Ten Peanut Butter Eats
Happy National Peanut Butter Day! (Yes, really.) Today, January 24th, is a national holiday that ranks right up there with Christmas. It’s no secret that I’m obsessed with peanut butter any way I can get it. Hell, I’ll eat it straight from the jar, preferably Skippy Super Chunk, but there’s so many more delicious and creative ways to get it. There’s the peanut butter BLT sandwich at Peanut Butter & Co., the monster-size dark chocolate peanut butter chip cookies...
Read MoreQ & A with RBC NYC's Director Cora Lambert
New York’s not typically late in the game to anything. But places like Seattle and Portland were setting trends in coffee before us. Finally, New Yorkers are taking their coffee more seriously than ever. There’s options far beyond Starbuck’s nowadays, like Stumptown, Intelligentsia and Cafe Grumpy. But for hard-core coffee fanatics, none quite compare to RBC NYC in Tribeca, or more specifically, to its Slayer an$ 18,000 custom made espresso machine. This high-tech piece of equipment needs a...
Read MoreNew Year's Resolution Dishes
We love holiday food, but we’re not too crazy about the consequences. Oops. But we can make up for our December food indiscretions with smarter choices in the New Year. We usually have to lock ourselves at home for a few weeks to eat ho-hum healthy dishes. (There goes our social life.) Not this year. Chefs at some of the city’s new restaurants are serving some deliciously healthy dishes that don’t sacrifice flavor. If you’re in need of lean...
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