So you think you're DIYer than thou just because you make smoothies with a bike-powered blender and keep an apiary on your roof? Meet Mark Suppes. The dude built a homemade nuclear reactor in a Brooklyn warehouse. The only way you're going to top this is to grow your beard down to your waist and rig up a flux capacitor to your fixie. more ›

It's nice to see the great recession hasn't snuffed out everyone's ambitions; take, for instance, this triple-decker restaurant and bar opening tomorrow night in the gigantic space formerly occupied by Wild Salmon. Called Zengo, the Latin-Asian fusion restaurant is the work of Mexican chef and restaurateur Richard Sandoval (Maya, Pampano) and Chef de Cuisine Akhtar Nawab (Elettaria RIP). Maestro Placido Domingo is a partner in the project, which also has locations in Denver and D.C., and the design is by big shots AvroKO. That's some serious firepower, which they're hoping will break a streak of failures at this daunting (cursed?) location. more ›

This week Times restaurant critic Frank Bruni re-reviews Momofuku Ssam Bar, part of chef David Chang's New York empire, which you'll recall includes the impossible-to-get-into Momofuku Ko. There's a new chef at Ssam since Bruni awarded the place two stars in '07, and now he bumps it up to a lofty triple. The opening paragraph sums up his case: "If you’ve had just about all of the fawning over David Chang that you can take, think about how those of us dishing out the praise feel. We’d love to move on to a more original object of adoration and would be happy to pronounce him overrated or just plain over...But he won’t let us." more ›

If there was ever a time to open a glamorous new bi-level restaurant in midtown, this ain't it. But you've got to admire restaurateur Rohini Dey for going through with this NYC outpost of her acclaimed Indian-Latin American restaurant, called Vermilion in Chicago and At Vermilion here. If you build "At," they will come—and hopefully they'll still have a line of credit available. Her ambitious new location features a double-height water curtain, a 22-foot metal mesh chandelier, and huge black and white photographs taken by Indian fashion photographer Farrokh Chothia. The lower level is a spacious bar/lounge with communal dining; the upstairs dining room can accommodate 200. more ›

Sycamore: A Flickr user named Finstr took this atmospheric photo at the opening night of Ditmas Park's newest bar. The opening of yet another bar in Brooklyn hardly merits mention, but Sycamore's a bit unique in that it's located within a flower shop. Or rather, one walks through a flower shop on the way in. Or you could also just buy your flowers and leave. Flatbush Vegan went all the way with the thing, though, and notes decent prices, a jukebox, half-moon banquettes, and a spacious back deck with a cast-iron fireplace and ivy climbing up the walls. Your move, Windsor Terrace. 1118 Cortelyou Road (between Westminster and Stratford). more ›

Since he began his fruitful collaboration with Walter Becker back at Bard College in 1968, Grammy award-winning musician Donald Fagen has steadily distinguished himself as one of the smartest and most imaginative contemporary songwriters. As Steely Dan, the innovative duo lays claim to an impressive catalog of hit singles that somehow manage to stay fresh despite their everlasting ubiquity on classic rock stations across America. For whatever reason, people still can't help cranking up the volume when My Old School comes on for the millionth time, to say nothing of indispensable classics like Caves of Altamira, Sign in Stranger, or the soulful Dr. Wu. more ›