Get yourself some popcorn, because this week Times restaurant critic Frank Bruni is taking the hammer to big shot media power-lunch nest Michael's. Turns out dinner there is an overpriced joke: "I thought Michael’s prided itself on produce. Then I had its appetizer of peekytoe crab with spears of white asparagus, which might as well have been spears of white wax for all the flavor they had....[Michael’s] certainly charges like a serious restaurant, levying a tariff of $35 for a lunchtime burger that’s not Kobe and doesn’t ooze foie gras. So it should perform at the level of a serious restaurant. These days, it usually doesn’t." He pauses to lavish some kind words on an omelet, but then it's back to bashing: "Shouldn’t a diner paying $38 for sea scallops get more than two, situated at opposite ends of a long hillock of sautéed snow pea leaves? Maybe that’s enough for a businessperson having a light lunch on a big expense account. For anyone else, it isn’t." Kill the rich! Zero stars! more ›

Ask Gothamist appreciates all the responses we got to yesterday's query about what the sticky substance is that seems to be covering manhole covers around the city. Almost all Ask Gothamist readers agreed that it was a substance applied to manhole covers by Con Ed in response to the women who was burnt by a manhole cover recently. more ›