Jim Leff Maps Out Culinary Touchstones in Jackson HeightsBrooklyn Heights: National chain Five Guys Burgers and Fries in construction on Montague Street. [Brooklyn Heights Blog]
Fort Greene: Next Wednesday, Stonehome Wine Bar will host a four-course wine-tasting dinner as a toast to spring. [Brooklyn Record]
Hell’s Kitchen: Grand Sichuan is closed while the outlet tries to regain its lost lease; loyal diners missing the “We would be two—love birds flying wing to wing on high” dish are distraught. [Mouthing Off/Food & Wine]
Jackson Heights: Chowhound founder Jim Leff finally provides a map of the neighborhood’s culinary touchstones. [Chowhound via Gothamist]
Park Slope: An employee spills that D’Agostino will close at the end of April. [Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn] Whole Foods set to open summer 2008 not giving much relief to neighbors still fearing the property is toxic. [Gowanus Lounge]
Prospect-Lefferts-Gardens: New deli on Washington Avenue opens; wide selection of do-rags already turning heads. [across the park]
Mediavore
Restaurant High Trains Chefs of the Future; Les Halles Takes a BeatingWelcome to Food and Finance High, which trains New York’s future chefs and restaurateurs. They diligently study the work of Dave Thomas, the origins of pizza, and read Fast Food Nation in preparation for the job market. [NYT]
Les Halles is taking a beating: They’ve got a Department of Health closure uptown and construction troubles downtown . [NYP]
The Red Hook ball fields, home to one of the city’s greatest gatherings of Central and South American food vendors, may finally see the trucks roll in this Sunday. [Eat for Victory/VV]
Back of the House
Startling Results of a Franco-American Summit; Queens Restaurant’s MobFrench journalists and top NY chefs and food personalities meet at Franco-American gastronomy summit. The consensus? The world needs fewer haute restaurants, more steakhouses, and to go to war to protect foie gras. [Bloomberg]
Le Binge: Gael Greene’s account of her French Eat-a-Thon [NYM]
The city contracted with the nephew of a former acting Gambino boss to run Caffe on the Green, Bayside’s answer to Tavern on the Green. This on the heels of the news that the Colombo family and the Russian mob together operate a golf course in Brooklyn. [NYP]
There are apparently a number of people who are enthusiastic about food and travel constantly sampling it. Among these are Jane and Michael Stern, Chowhound’s Jim Leff, and a guy who works for a
management and technology consulting firm. Who knew? [NYT]
Chow provides a sorely-needed molecular gastronomy cheat sheet, which not only explains
spherification, but even tells you how to pronounce the names of the movement’s major
exponents. [Chow]
A relatively inexpensive cooking school established in Westchester, boasting a 100% placement rate. Now about those wages … [7online]
The question of what constitutes “true Japanese” food to be settled once and for all, when the Japanese External Trade Organization begins certifying restaurants. [Mainichi Daily News]