Three boro bike ride this morning

This morning I did a nice 40 minute bike ride from Williamsburg to downtown Brooklyn, across the Manhattan bridge, up Allen street and back across the Williamsburg bridge - the map of the ride is here - recommended as a sporty morning ride! http://bit.ly/GI48Yr

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Gossip And Golf With New York's Ad Tech Big Shots

via businessinsider.com

My foursome at this week's Silicon Alley Invitational - thanks to Ross for saving our score, Chris for lowering the level of conversation and Andrew for now bringing the 1,000 carnitas tacos he constantly talked about.

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The Wright on the Upper East Side is a great restaurant discovery

via thewrightrestaurant.com

The Mexican Chef Rodolfo Contreras and his crew served us a delicious meal last night; starting out with fresh Tuna Sashimi, an excellent rock shrimp amuse geule, a briny yet not too oily sardine piquillo and fresh olive rolls. The main courses were equally tasty - branzino, lobster and steak. I wouldn't repeat the deserts necessarily but the service was great and the price (also thanks to http://www.villagevines.com) was fair. The space is very well designed, and blends right into the Guggenheim. It's a shame this restaurant isn't located downtown - if it was, this would be pumping every night. Instead, Upper East Siders get to enjoy fine dining in a modern ambiance, and we'll definitely make the trip back across the Park!

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Name cruelty: Eataly by Mario Batali about to open

By SUMATHI REDDY

Think Whole Foods meets Bloomingdale's, put an Italian spin on it, and you get a sense of the look and feel of Eataly, the gastronomical monster of a marketplace unveiled Tuesday night for its first preview. The 42,500-square-foot market, located in the Flatiron district, will open to the general public on Aug. 31.

Eataly is the baby of Mario Batali, Joe Bastianich and his mother, Lidia, of the Batali-Bastianich Hospitality Group. It is modeled after the original Eataly, which was founded by Oscar Farinetti in Turin, Italy.

Flourishes from that country abound at the new market, from an Italian bank ATM to dual-language signs to iPads displaying news from Italian newspapers.

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Daniella Zalcman for The Wall Street Journal

Mario Batali, right, at the preview of Eataly on Tuesday.

The New York location houses seven restaurants featuring everything from salumi and hand-made mozzarella to a raw bar and Neapolitan-style pizza baked in two ovens imported from Italy. Only one of the restaurants—Il Manzo—has white tablecloths and will take reservations (and also happens to serve carne crudo, or raw beef, a favorite in Italy).

The other restaurants are incorporated into the retail sections, which serves as the heart of the market. One of the most anticipated elements—the 4,500-square-foot rooftop beer garden—won't open until November. Beers will be made unfiltered and unpasteurized, naturally carbonated and hand-pulled through traditional beer engines.

"This isn't a selection of restaurants under one roof," Mr. Batali said. "This is a retail store where we peddle the greatest of Italian gastronomy to people who want to eat it and know how to appreciate it. You ask any Italian and all of the smart Americans where the best meal they ever had in the last ten years was, and it was never in someone's restaurant. It was always in the house."

Still, Mr. Batali and company have brought much of the star power to Eataly from their existing restaurants. David Pasternack, the chef at Esca, will oversee the seafood restaurant; Nancy Silverton, of Mr. Batali's California restaurants, is heading up the bread baking; and Michael Toscano, formerly of Babbo, is the chef at Il Manzo (meat).

Some have wondered if there is a need for such a vast retail of Italian foodstuffs. Ihsan Gurdal, the owner of Formaggio Kitchen, which has a tiny gourmet food shop in Essex Market and two larger shops in Massachusetts, questioned the size of Eataly, though he said he was excited to see it. "My motto is less is more. If you start with this huge thing and products have expiration dates, it's a gamble," Mr. Gurdal said. "The size is definitely an issue. I think it's overwhelming."

Others, like Tim Zagat, the co-founder of the Zagat Survey of restaurants, said he believes there is a strong enough demand for Italian products. "We ask people what their favorite food is," he said. "In New York for the last 20 years, Italian food has always come in number one by far. People like to eat Italian food every day."

Write to Sumathi Reddy at sumathi.reddy@wsj.com

via online.wsj.com

I'm not a huge fan of Batali's very rich Italian food which can only be described as "Americanized Italian"... But if you're into butter and olive oil - definitely worthwhile. Now he adds a new layer of sophistication to his restaurant empire - a "food marketplace" called... Eataly. Let's hope the food is better than the name.

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Shakespeare In The Park at Delacorte Theater: A Winter's Tale

via shakespeareinthepark.org

Last night we scored tickets to this in the virtual ticket line http://www.shakespeareinthepark.org/?nav=vtix - highly recommended. We saw Winter's Tale and it was an enjoyable performance in a beautiful setting in the midst of Central Park. Thanks to the sponsors for enabling this year after year!

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Stecchino in Hell's Kitchen - much better than the average midtown grub

Stecchino Your Hell's Kitchen Tavern

Fine Fare - Small Plates - Classic Cocktails 765 9th Ave (bet. 51st & 52nd), New York, Ny

About »

via stecchinonyc.com

I went to Stecchino last night with two friends and a livingsocial coupon; we had a very good meal, good service, strong cocktails and overall very pleasant experience. Highly recommend the duck and the naked calamari. I hope this place survives as the interior is somewhat bland (reminded me of a mediocre Irish pub) and overall somewhat non-descriptive from the outside. Give it a shot next time you're on 9th Avenue in the 50ies (especially if Caselulla is booked)!

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A food walk on the west side of Chelsea

My friend Shakti and I went for a little impromptu food walk from Chelsea market to Penn Station yesterday. For posterity, here are the results:


View West Chelsea Food Walk in a larger map

I highly recommend the sweet snacks at Three Tarts - try the blood orange goat cheese Panna Cotta. And to wrap it up - make sure you visit the new Highline park for some excellent views of the city and a glimpse into the Equinox Yoga studio at the Caledonia building. This picture shows the view up 10th Avenue from the little "theatre" they've built into the highline park. Nice job, NYC!

What $175,000 in advertising money buys you in New York City

Nice post over at Beyond Madison Avenue. Watch the quick video, it's fun! And did you know that your non-fat double shot latte would buy you about 30 printed sleeves around the cup at Starbucks? Might that be better value?

Chelsea Piers

Beautiful Central Park in fall

I'm starting to get more into mobile blogging. It's quite fun. This is on Saturday in Central Park - probably the most beautiful fall day of the year.

Founder of Peet's coffee & tea dies

I only recently discovered this coffee gem on the West coast - sad to see the founder passed away - but his legacy lives on every morning for happy west coasters! I wish somebody brought Peet's or Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf to New York - especially to Midtown where we have 50 Starbucks

View Larger Map - but no decent gourmet coffee!
Please Peet's successors, consider it - i'll be the first in line!

Conference heaven in New York this week

Advertising week starts tomorrow and I will be heading to Mixx 2.7 tomorrow and Tuesday and stop by OMMA at some point as well. Andrew Chen is speaking about Widgets on a panel tomorrow and I'm looking forward to what he has to say. Lots of great panels and speakers both day, also really curious about Nick Denton. The only party i've heard of so far is Vizy on Monday night, let me know if you come across other mingling events.

Why Tapas bars in New York are ideal for girls

Last night we had dinner with some friends at Degustation, a heavily praised newcomer to the Tapas scene. We were actually seated at adjacent Jewel Bako because we were a rather large group and Degustation has only 15 seats. The service was very attentive (except for the fact that the sushi chef closed down at 11) and the overall food was very good. Now to the title story: the portions are absolutely tiny! The "tortilla" which Frank Bruni so eloquently describes as "poached quail eggs and shallot confit inside pockets of thinly sliced potato. Each of these savory bonbons was best consumed in one bite, which set off a gooey eruption" are indeed quite tasty - the problem is there are two tiny bonbons on a $6 plate and I could easily eat 10 of them just to start. As girls tend to eat less, this kind of place is perfect for them :-)The experience was similar with the minute foie gras and the somewhat terse lamb.
Over the last few years we have eaten Tapas at Tasca, Casa Mono, Tia Pol, Boqueria, Kana, Pintxos, Xunta and Pipa and have almost always had the same experience: artful, varying degree of quality, definitely americanized (my Spanish girlfriend will testify for that) and TOO SMALL.
In Spain you can walk into any Tapas bar, order 3-5 plates and have a great, simple meal - in New York the same will set you back almost as much as the Porterhouse at Keens!
Cry for help: can someone, ideally from the Basque country please come over to NYC and open a great, authentic tapas place? I will spread the word to at least 100 eaters in the first week!
And if you do want to try all of these yourself, here are my top 5 tapas restaurants in NYC:
1) Casa Mono
2) Pipa (not really Tapas focused)
3) Pintxos
4) Degustation
5) Tia Pol

Please send me any hot contestants!

New google street view

Absolutely unbelievable - what Amazon tried a few years ago Google has now nailed - you can check out exactly what each building (at least in NYC) looks like. Here's an example of one of my favorite restaurants: Blue Ribbon Bakery.
Privacy is definitely a concern here but so is the amazing evolution of what used to be simple maps. One day they might feed all this live from yet to come surveillance/CCTV cameras a la London... Don't hold your breath!

No need to starve anymore - find fastfood faster

Great google mashup - find fastfood with this cool mashup (here's the Manhattan example). Too bad they don't have "good fast" places like Chipotle on there yet and there's no InnOut east of the Rockies - but I remain hopeful!

In the meantime I highly recommend Gin Lane for a really good meal in the meatpacking district - go for brunch or dinner and enjoy the classic english/new england gentleman's club atmosphere.

And if you're in the mood for a drink afterwards - find a happy hour quickly with Mappy Hour or another fave - Myopenbar!

Starvation looms for New York's Internet scene

Every weekday between 7:30 and 9:30am this is the place where models, actresses and aspiring and established Internet entrepreneurs meet. The latter as clients, the former as employees - with usually mixed results...

New York Internet scene hangout Coffee Shop in Union Square recently failed its annual health inspection as reported here by Eater - after lying about it the day before!

This is not yet reflected on the city's Health department website but should be shortly.

I usually enjoy Coffee Shop except for the actresses' attitude and morning moods. Let's hope they get it back up and running in time for Monday morning!

Urbandaddy recommends a great new service for all of you out there who tend to lose keys in the Big Apple. It's a company started by two enterprising ex waiters called New Your Key. They lock up a copy of your keys in a secure vault for only $30 a year - and deliver them to you wherever you are for only another $20 when in need. Sounds like a great service to me!

My new favorite after-work bar in Chelsea, New York City

Yesterday a great new speakeasy opened down the street from our office: Tillman's - it's a classy joint with mellow soul music, good-looking staff and attendees and mellow lounge chairs, noguchi tables and dim lighting. Great place for a drink or two. This actual painting hangs above the bar and they therefore hold the copyright. It's located on 26th between 6th and 7th (full disclaimer: I was neither paid or incentivised to rave about this place).