Mayahuel

"The Two Faces of Italian Food" is the tagline at this restaurant and wine bar. The perfect blend they are referring to is tradition and innovation. The menu boasts homemade and traditional options - the wine list is not limited to Italian varieties, though the beer is. We stopped in briefly and relaxed with a glass of wine in their quiet back garden and spoke with one of the restaurant's partners as waiters set up for that evening's meal. When we asked him to describe the food that Giano served in a short sentence he told us humbly: "Italian food. No big deal." Can't wait to try it!

The East Village has notoriously been New York’s counterculture epicenter. It has become synonymous with art, music, grit, and grunge: a good place to let your freak flag fly. It comes as no surprise, then, that this beloved East Village dive bar, built in 1835, was a haunt for people like Frank Sinatra, Allen Ginsberg, The Ramones, W. H. Auden, and legend has it, even Leon Trotsky. It closed its doors in 2012, but resurfaced in the spring of 2015, new and improved and ready to welcome a new generation of creatives over its dimly lit threshold.Pirate Booty’s founder Robert Ehrlich and La Palapa owner Barbara Sibley teamed up to restore the old neighborhood staple. They cleaned the place up, but still aimed to keep some of the grungy charm that kept people coming back; A mural dating back to the 1920s still remains, as well as a wooden phone booth and classic horseshoe bar. Holiday Cocktail Lounge has all the eccentricity of the East Village that people have come to expect from time-honored St Marks Place establishments with just a touch of contemporary chic.

Serving an interesting but decadent assortment of coffees, hot cakes, desserts, Japanese tapas, sandwiches, pasta, and more, Hi-Collar functions as many things. In the morning the atmosphere is subdued and relaxed like a coffee shop, as customers come to enjoy “kissaten” – a term to describe Japanese-style coffee shops. The lady we spoke to at Hi-Collar told us their coffee selection is extensive and that there are a variety of beans to choose from. Not only is there the opportunity to select the bean varietal, but one can also choose how the coffee is made as well: pour over, aeropress, or siphon—each method drawing out a distinct flavor. For the non-coffee drinker, there are teas and even a fruit milkshake.As the afternoon wears on and evening approaches, Hi-Collar becomes a bar complete with wine, sake, and beer. Inquiring about the name, we found that Hi-Collar is in fact a term that came to be during the Japanese Jazz Age, when Western culture infiltrated Japan and many men were seen wearing Western style high collars. The only seating available is at the long bar, and the beautiful flowers and lamps that hang from the ceiling add to the allure of this multifaceted nook on 10th.

We had the pleasure of spending time at Joe's Bar in 2011 before Joe passed away and it closed down. Continuously operated for over one hundred years, Joe's even had a bowling alley down stairs in the early 1900's. Now, renamed to Josies, the bar is owned by the guy who also runs Sophie's. This was his favorite place to hang out years ago, and he has every intention of keeping the bar's "small town" feeling exactly the same. "The theme of this bar will be just that - a bar where people can play pool and listen to the juke box," the contractor of Josies told us. Hopefully, the bar still remains as the neighborhood hangout that it was before Joe passed away - a place where moms came in the late afternoon for coffee with friends and babies and the locals drank at night.

Dating back to pre-Civil War days and formerly the St. Mark's Evangelical Lutheran church, this stately red brick structure has been a synagogue since 1940. A devastating piece of New York history happened in 1904 when a boat filled with 1200 German immigrant women and children from the original church perished in a fire on the East River. Today, it has a modern Orthodox congregation that offers services every day of the year.

“I’m not a chef. I am a scholar of nutrition and an idealist who loves health and happiness,” proclaimed Angel Moreno, who left his home in Spain in the 1980s to embark on a voyage of self-discovery and to set up a chiringuito — the Spanish term for a cafe or juice kiosk — in the U.S.Before finding what he calls his “true purpose,” Angel was a pilot. “But this was killing my heart,” Angel said. He reevaluated his life and chose to pursue his aptitude for music. Though untrained, Angel had a good ear, a passion for playing the drums, and a desire to share music, poetry readings, and photography exhibits with the public. He came to open a handful of cafes and bars throughout Spain that were akin to laidback performance venues.Just as Angel planned to start a new venture in London, he met a master of Sufi (a form of Islamic mysticism). “This man was doing everything I wanted to do: yoga, traveling, and music. He was a fun guy.” The guru made such a powerful impression that Angel followed him to the States, where he spent the next decade doing odd jobs, learning to practice Sufism, and waiting for the right time to start his chiringuito.As Angel puts it, the universe eventually led him to the ideal place. It had two rooms — one that would serveas the dining area and a second space that was used to educate others about nutrition, health, and assortedimportant subjects. At first, “I didn’t even know what kind of cuisine I was going to offer.” But the teachingsof Sufi, which focus on purity and wellness, inspired him to avoid anchoring himself to any specific type of cuisine. “Instead, I did international dishes and used my knowledge to adjust any recipe to incorporate organic ingredients and to be vegan or vegetarian."Caravan of Dreams retains some of the elements of Angel’s first Spanish cafes, with daily live music andbright colors on the walls to spark joy in its guests. Yet the key component is the wholesome meals it serves.“Without health, we cannot be happy.”

There is no over-the-top, Tex-Mex red and green here. Instead, string lighting and wire deck chairs give the entire restaurant a patio feel, and the nods to Mexico are subtle and tasteful: tables set with blue-rimmed glasses like the ones I have seen on trips to the country, and a bar at the back with row upon row of tequila and mezcal.Rosie’s is the latest from restaurateurs Marc Meyer and Vicki Freeman, known for their other ventures like Cookshop and Vic’s. When I stopped by in July of 2015, Rosie’s had been open just over three months, though Anna Marie, the General Manager, said “strangely, we feel like we’ve been here longer. It’s a comfortable feeling.” I asked her to tell me about her experience with the new restaurant so far, and she told me how lucky she felt to be in the area. “I love the neighborhood,” she explained, “one of our goals coming here was to become part of the community.”“We’ve really tried to bring Mexico to New York,” Anna Marie continued. Owner Marc Meyer had been travelling to Mexico for years, and so opening Rosie’s was a dream come true for the chef. “He just has such a respect for the cuisine,” Anna Marie added. Of course, in order to bring authentic Mexican to Manhattan, a great deal of research was required. “We all went to Veracruz last August to do more research on the seafood side,” Anna Marie recalled. The research certainly paid off. Members of the Sideways Team were blown away by the Cangrejo al Ajillo, a pan roasted blue crab served with guajillo chile, garlic, lime, and olive oil.Besides such astonishingly fresh seafood, another tradition that Rosie’s brings straight from Mexico is the Comal – the centerpiece of the dining area is a circular, tiled bar where women prepare tortillas by hand. “Our Comal Bar is a tribute to the ladies on the streets in Mexico,” Anna Marie told me. There, the women grind their own corn to make the masa needed for corn tortillas. At Rosie’s, the corn is imported directly from Mexico, and ground downstairs, so that the first thing customers smell when they enter the restaurant is the fresh cornmeal. The women who make the masa into tortillas wear traditional comal aprons sewn from fabric that Marc Meyer and his team brought back from one of their trips. It is just one more touch of authenticity to accompany the restaurant’s delicious food.While the menu at Rosie’s does not focus on a particular region of Mexico, it acts as a travelogue of sorts, a collection of recipes inspired by Marc’s journeys there, and the culinary experiences that the country holds. The enchiladas are served in traditional style, with an aromatic mole sauce, and of course, everything comes with freshly-made tortillas. “The chefs – you get an air of such pride from them,” Anna Marie exclaimed. “They feel celebrated, and that makes me happy.”