Results tagged “diner”

Recently the Scouting NY scout came across The White Mana Diner in Jersey City, which long ago was touted as the "Diner of Tomorrow!" at the 1939 World's Fair in Flushing, Queens. The Scout says "it was designed so that a waiter never had to walk more than 10 feet to get to the grille, cash register, or counter." The establishment sold 10 cent burgers and had curb service—and at the time, it also bragged about being the "Introduction to Fast Food," so we know who to blame now.

Last night the gorgeous old Cheyenne Diner was unceremoniously carted away on flatbed trucks to its new home in Birmingham, Alabama. Did anyone else mistakenly think it was already gone? Actually, only its signs were removed, back in January, after a push to keep it in NYC by moving it to Red Hook failed. Because that's just what Manhattan so desperately needs. Birmingham businessman Joel Owens bought the 1940s-era streamlined diner for several thousand dollars; he tells CNN, "I think it's the most beautiful diner in the world. If you think about what's wrong with today, in order to fix the problems of today, you've got to look back... [to] when it was better. I think [the diner] is symbolic of the glory days. Technology and more money doesn't necessarily mean progress. We long for simpler times. These types of buildings can be an instrument for our youth to learn from the past. Teenagers need a clean environment for entertainment, a 'hang out.'" Here in New York, we obviously need more condos; naturally that's what the owner of the Cheyenne's midtown site plans to build on the site.

While hustling to turn a 200 lbs. hog into 600 pork tacos at 3rd Ward's Pig Roast and Dance Party Sunday, Brooklyn butcher Tom Mylan cut off the tip of his finger and had to go to the hospital. According to his Facebook page, he's sorry he "bled everywhere. Pig roast 4 Eva." This was later followed by another update: "Stop freaking out. I just cut the tip of my finger off chopping up roasted pig. NBFD." (Knowing Mylan, he probably thinks that acronym stands for No Butcher Fears Death.)

It seems that a passionate petition drive and an eleventh hour overture from the landlord weren't enough to save Joe Jr., the classic greasy spoon that's been a Greenwich Village institution for more than three decades. The coffee shop was packed with diners this weekend; among them was blogger Vanishing New York, who overheard one customer declare, "The landlord is a greedy prick." The petition on the counter read, "Joe's is our kitchen, our meeting place, our hangout, our comfort food. Our neighborhood will lose a treasure should it shut down this weekend." 65-year-old owner Teddy Hondros's lease had expired at the end of June, and it appears that a dispute with the landlord over who should pay the cost of repairs from a basement electrical fire were a major factor in the closure. Lost City was probably the last blogger to dine there yesterday, and reports a line stretching outside the restaurant: "I don't know about you, but I've never seen a line outside a greasy spoon before... That such a quintessentially American business should on July 4th is bitterly ironic." He says the doors were locked for the final time at 3 p.m., and our calls to Joe Jr.'s today are going unanswered.

After more than 35 years in business, quintessential greasy spoon Joe Jr. Restaurant on West 12th Street and Sixth Avenue will close this weekend. Devoted regulars and casual admirers were both dismayed at the news yesterday, and over 1,000 customers signed a petition begging the landlord to renew the lease, which expired June 30th. But 65-year-old owner Teddy Hondros seems resigned to his fate, and says an 11th hour overture from the landlord is too little too late; he's arranged to have the gas turned off and close after one more Saturday night.

The NYT reports that a restaurant space under construction at 570 Vanderbilt Avenue called The Vanderbilt will be 150-seater operated by Num Pang partner Ben Daitz and Smith Street pioneer Saul Bolton, the chef and owner of Saul, one of the original new wave Brooklyn restaurants. We took a quick look at the Prospect Heights space (right) in April, noting that a small section of Vanderbilt Avenue is quickly becoming the home to a bunch of new restaurants and bars. And while The Vanderbilt is scheduled to open this fall, Frank Bruni pays an unrated checkup visit to Diner in Williamsburg, the decade-old wellspring of Brooklyn's New Culinary Movement, and the proving grounds of Tom Mylan and Sasha Davies' UnFancy Food Show. "Diner was doing the Brooklyn tropes before they were Brooklyn tropes," he writes. Opening chef Caroline Fidanza has moved down the street to companion butcher shop Marlow & Daughters, ceding the reigns to Sean Rembold. The food remains consistent but is expensive. Bruni laments that a once $9 chicken dish now costs a steep $22 is par for the course: "That’s inflation, yes," he admits. "But that’s also what happens when a neighborhood itself ascends."

       

Cheryl and Vince Pierce, the Wyoming couple who purchased the Moondance Diner in 2007, have finally opened its restored doors in LaBarge. This all went down on January 12th, but new photos have come out showing the establishment in all its circa-1984 splendor.

     

The Cheyenne Diner, one of New York City's last streamlined railway car-inspired diners, is one step closer to its relocation to Birmingham, Alabama. On Sunday workers removed the Cheyenne's neon signs in preparation for the move, which is to take place within the next few weeks. Last April, owner George Papas (who also owns the nearby Skylight Diner), closed the Cheyenne, which was built in 1940, and prepared to demolish it to make room for a nine story condo.

After a planned relocation to Red Hook fell apart, the beloved old Cheyenne diner will most likely be sold to a buyer in Alabama, after almost 70 years in business near Penn Station. Owner George Papas, who will demolish it if no one buys it so he can build a nine story condo on the property, tells Chelsea Now he's "pretty confident" that an unnamed man will move it to Alabama. Which beats demolition, but you'll recall how the Moondance Diner fared when a Wyoming couple bought it. Of course, there's a certain bitter irony to all this, since newcomers are perpetually drawn to New York in large part due to the distinctive character created by places like these, which are now forced to relocate to the provinces to make way for the same generic eyesores found everywhere. The lesson, perhaps, is that if you live in the Midwest, you may as well just stay down on the farm until a taste of New York comes to you—because there ain't much of it left here, y'all!

Plans to move the old Cheyenne Diner from its current location near Penn Station to a new home in Red Hook have fallen through, as many feared last week. Michael O’Connell, son of Red Hook developer Greg O'Connell, who bought the old prefab gem after it closed last April to make way for a condo, says it's too big to transport over the East River bridges. O'Connell considered moving it by barge, but that "proved 3 times as costly as traditional figures a year ago," according to a press release from Michael Perlman, a New Yorker who's become The Fixer when it comes to relocating doomed diners.

When the vintage factory-built Cheyenne Diner near Penn Station closed last April after 68 years in business, widespread dismay was quickly replaced with hope when a Red Hook man bought it for $5,000 and promised to move the prefab gem across the East River. But it's been almost nine months since the closure, and the diner's gone nowhere because, as it turns out, it's too big to be moved over the Manhattan Bridge, even in two pieces.

The summer of 2007 saw the Moondance Diner get uprooted from 6th Avenue only to be hauled off to LeBarge, Wyoming. After a bit of downtime, the NY Times is reporting that the 1920s-era diner is set to reopen next month. Cheryl Pierce and her husband are the new owners, and have had their fair share of "bumps and glitches" to get over while restoring their purchase, but they are currently aiming for a January 9th grand reopening. The Pierce's also have a blog where they track their progress, it was last updated earlier this month with notes on the Alan Bushbaum "glass block" wall and their own "moon room" addition. The Star-Tribune reports that the menu will include traditional diner fare, "burgers, meatloaf, homemade fries and milkshakes/malts from an antique soda fountain"—you'll just have to travel 2400 miles to get it.

        

A former barbershop on Broadway by the Williamsburg Bridge has become the latest addition to the expanding South Williamsburg culinary corridor, which includes (but is not limited to) Bridge Urban Winery, Marlow & Sons, Diner, Dressler, Miss Favela and La Superior. Now add Marlow & Daughters to the list; and before you get all "die yuppie scum!" please note that the barbershop closed only because the owner passed away over the summer, according to Brooklyn Based. (Of course it's possible he died from a heart broken by gentrification.)

Plated is a new feature that delivers the origin story of a dish, as told by an establishment’s chefs and owners. Maybe even once in a while by its dishwashers.

You'll recall that neighbors living near the revoltingly trendy Delicatessen in Soho are getting really fed up with all the obnoxious tools blathering through the night, with one man going so far as to urinate down onto the roof, which is part glass. Could this be the same scold who led a near-riot last night, according to this priceless email sent to Eater by one witness? "Some young super-angry dude storms up to the bar and starts laying into the bartending staff screaming shit like, 'Fuck you!!! Fuck your restaurant!!! Fuck your hipstery little patrons who think they are so fucking cool!!! People fucking live on this block!!! I can hear these people screaming outside my fucking apartment all fucking night!!!'" The situation escalated "when a bunch of people in the apartments above the sidewalk tables simultaneously dumped buckets of water down on the people dining below." Worse, it wasn't even sparkling water!

        

If you're going to eat meat, it's always good to know where it comes from. Not just how it was raised and if it was humanely slaughtered, which are both important, but where on the animal it came from. Many people (shameful carnivores?) are loathe to make this leap and prefer to think that their chops come straight from a pink styrofoam package, but for those who do, now's your chance to learn.

“You could be a transgendered elephant walking in here and as long as you pay your check, you’re fine,” diner Lars Hoel told the Times yesterday during his last breakfast at Florent, the 24-hour French bistro that’s been a Meatpacking District institution for 23 years. The transgendered elephant refuge closed last night after the gay pride parade and a private party for staff and friends of owner Florent Morellet.

Yesterday morning around 5:30 a.m., someone called 911 about a shooting outside 24-hour diner Cozy Soup 'N' Burger on Broadway, near Astor Place, in Manhattan. Apparently an argument broke out between two groups of people, but by the time the police arrived, the Daily News reports "the crowd dispersed and there was no evidence that anyone had been hit." However, a woman went to Kings County Hospital, claiming she was "standing outside the diner with her boyfriend and was clipped by a bullet." (The Post says she took a cab there.) Between 5 and 10 shell casings were found and surveillance footage is being reviewed by the police.

When we spoke with Florent Morellet on Monday, he assured us that his 23-year-old Meatpacking District bistro – scheduled to close this Sunday at 10 p.m. – would not be occupied by a Bank of America or some similar abomination. But the Parisian restaurateur stopped short of divulging the space’s fate – the landlord had been seeking $35,000 in monthly rent and it was naturally assumed that only the most crass retailers could manage a profit at that rate.

Back in 1985, when the meatpacking district nightlife was all about gay clubs like the Manhole and, as John Waters puts it, not getting mugged after a night of “watching men pay good money to get pissed on,” Frenchman Florent Morellet opened a bistro in an old greasy spoon called the R&L. Open 24/7, the place soon became a magnet for all sorts of soulful misfits drawn by the open-minded spirit cultivated by Florent himself. As the neighborhood grew increasingly obnoxious over the past decade, Florent became even more treasured as a sanctuary amidst what restaurant critic Frank Bruni called the “soul-crushing urban theme park” that is the meatpacking district. With the landlord now seeking $35,000 in monthly rent (up from the current $6,180), Florent will close Sunday, and one imagines the perimeter will be surrounded at once by velvet ropes. Or will it? When we spoke with Morellet earlier in the week he seemed guardedly optimistic.

Florent, the beloved Meatpacking District hangout set to close this summer after almost twenty three years in business, will at least be going out in style, according to Frank Bruni, who spoke with owner Florent Morellet yesterday. The bistro's long goodbye will last five weeks, with each week dedicated to one of the Kubler-Ross stages of grief. Week One, starting Monday, May 26, will be Denial, with the remaining four weeks themed as Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance.

New York has lost another vintage factory built diner: The Cheyenne, a popular all night eatery near Penn Station, will close its doors on Sunday after 68 years of operation. And the owner of a rival diner – the bigger Skylight Diner nearby – is to blame. Skylight owner George Papas also owns the narrow 20-by-100 foot site the Cheyenne currently occupies and he plans to build a nine-story apartment building on the property. Forgotten-NY’s Kevin Walsh tells us the days of the one-story, stand-alone diner are almost over:

Unfortunately the reality is that Manhattan’s becoming so pricey that you just can’t sustain these diners no matter how good business is. I was in the Cheyenne a couple weeks ago at lunchtime and it was packed, but the owner of the property feels he can make a lot more money on that spot by building a multi-story building and having a lot of tenants. I’ve been to the Skylight around the corner a couple times and it’s an inferior diner to the Cheyenne; the food is not as good nor is the atmosphere as good as the Cheyenne.