Denzel’s Bubbly Problem; Café Gray’s Farewell MenuPlus the Pillsbury Doughboy hands out cake on Park Avenue, eating for free at bars around the city, and more, in our morning roundup of news and gossip.
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Siberia Documentary Premieres; Westmoreland Still SearchingThe third documentary about beloved dive Siberia features nostalgic, alcohol-drenched glory stories from regulars like Michael Imperioli, Jimmy Fallon, Anthony Bourdain, an array of media types, and, of course, owner Tracy Westmoreland.
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Bourdain to Cook at Les Halles, Yearns for Giant Food CourtsTony Bourdain was at the Union Square Barnes & Noble last night to do a joint reading and signing with Michael Ruhlman, author of The Elements of Cooking. Interviewing Bourdain is effortless: The man is a nonstop font of opinions and bons mots, so we just took out our notebook and started writing. What, for instance, did he think of the reopening of his favorite bar, Siberia? (“When Siberia closed my life as an alcoholic ended,” he said wistfully. “Tracey [Westmoreland] is a man of many mysteries. I’m skeptical. Siberia reopening? [Sarcastically] Yeah, I’d like to see that.” Bourdain also told us that, sometime in the next two weeks, he was going to go back for one night to his old job at Les Halles, personally working the sauté station on a crowded night for his TV show, No Reservations. And he would not be alone back in the trenches: A few feet away, Eric Ripert would be working the grill station, cooking meat all night.
Given all of his travels, what does Bourdain think New York needs? A giant food court, of course.
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Siberia, AER Get Second Incarnations; BED Space Donated to CharityThe Observer today claims to have the “exclusive” that Tracey Westmoreland is planning to revive Anthony Bourdain’s — and just about everyone else’s — fave dive, Siberia. Of course we already told you that back in May, but there is the news that Westmoreland has decided to settle in Hell’s Kitchen, possibly in the same space on West 40th Street he vacated to begin with. Westmoreland’s also working as “minister of propaganda” at the club Charity, opening in the former BED space, where clubgoers will be able to allot a portion of their boozing money to a good cause (like elevator safety!). Also in clubland, Guest of a Guest has it that Kiss and Fly will open soon where Aer Lounge used to be. Sounds like it’s going to be an overpriced bottle-service spot, which is why our name for it is going to be Dine and Dash (to Siberia!).
Siberia, Famous Watering Hole of Manhattan Media, to Reopen [NYO]
A Lot of Hot Air(Aer)? [Guest of a Guest]
Earlier: Siberia: Not Banished Yet!
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Siberia: Not Banished Yet!Beloved dive Siberia recently closed its doors at its second location when a long-running feud with the landlord ended in the nonrenewal of its lease, but rest assured owner Tracy Westmoreland isn’t leaving the business for his budding acting career. “We’re running around negotiating for another space,” he tells us. Although he’s been “all over town” looking at spaces such as Martignetti’s Liquors, Westmoreland doesn’t yet know where he’ll end up (“It’s not about where it’s at, it’s about what it is,” he tells us) or whether he’ll end up with enough space to continue to host bands, and he isn’t putting a time frame on the reopening: “It’s like trying to say when you’re going to get a new girlfriend.” When he does get hitched, we’ll be the first to raise our bottles — and smash ‘em against the wall.
The Gobbler
Congratulations: You’re Headed to Siberia!During the course of a recent breakneck tour of restaurants in London, the Gobbler found himself paying Kobe-beef-like prices for taxi rides and eating, among other things, more pig’s head than he ever thought humanly possible. Unlike in New York, the maître d’s of London weren’t lying in wait for the Gobbler, and photos of his giant mug weren’t plastered in every kitchen. So he also found himself dining in that vast restaurant wasteland known as Siberia. He was seated by the great yawning kitchen doors at a hot new restaurant in Piccadilly, among tourists from Singapore at Gordon Ramsay’s newest place, and next to a giant flower pot at the Connaught Hotel. The experience prompted the Gobbler to compose another one of his lists. You know you’re sitting in Siberia when …