Archives

Food

‘Serious Eats’ Sings Praises Of Cobble Hill Intimate Eatery Battersby

April 18, 2012

Foodie website Serious Eats tells it like it is… so when they like what they taste, there’s little higher praise. Last week, the New York site gave a shimmering review to Cobble Hill intimate eatery Bittersby at 255 Smith Street, titled “Good Food Comes in Small Spaces,” heralding co-owners and chefs Joseph Ogrodnek and Walker Stern.

Reviewer Carey Jones writes in an exhaustively detailed piece: “What did our meal at Battersby tell me? That these chefs have dead-on intuition for how people want to be eating. That they seize on an impulse and cook it well—not just rushing vegetables with a 3-week season onto their menu, but preparing them as well as if they did it every day. And that flavor, balance and execution all seem to matter enormously.”

Read the full review at Serious Eats here.

(Photo: Nona Brooklyn)


Source: Cobble Hill Blog
http://cobblehillblog.com/archives/7044

From the Web

Food

New York Mag Cover Story Features Carroll Garden’s ‘By Brooklyn’

April 18, 2012

New York magazine’s April 23, 2012 issue covers “Artisanal Brooklyn,” with a generous 8-page spread about the borough’s movement toward locally made edibles. The subhead: “A step forward for food or a sign of the apocalypse? And does it matter when the stuff tastes so good?” (Read the full story here.)

A secondary piece showcases Brooklyn’s best “brewers, bakers and beef-jerky makers,” and includes Carroll Gardens’ own By Brooklyn, at 261 Smith Street near Degraw. Featured is its Binxgoods Genuine Vanilla, with the descriptor: “How to arrive at vanilla extract as fresh and pure as Binxgoods? First travel to India and befriend a bean farmer. Then let your imported beans steep for six weeks in your South Brooklyn kitchen.” The By Brooklyn website is here.


Source: Cobble Hill Blog
http://cobblehillblog.com/archives/7027

From the Web

Around Brooklyn, History

Next Homer Fink ‘Hidden Brooklyn Heights Walking Tour’: April 21

April 15, 2012

The next jocular, wonderfully educational Homer Fink’s Hidden Walking Tour takes place this coming Saturday, April 21, at 11 a.m. Learn about the odd, weird, controversial and amusing history of America’s First Suburb over a sprawling 90 minutes of fun, led by the faithful kingpin of the Brooklyn Heights Blog, Cobble Hill Blog and Brooklyn Bugle. More info is available by clicking on the black box at the top left of the BHB home page.


Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog » Brooklyn History
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/38866

From the Web

Most Walkable Nabes In NYC: Brooklyn Heights & Cobble Hill

April 14, 2012

No surprise to those of us in the know, but hipster pub The L Magazine notes that Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill are “the most walkable neighborhoods in Brooklyn,” according to a study by Walk Score published on website Slate.

The webbie bases its “walk scores” on the amount and accessibility of amenities, including restaurants, movie theater and schools. New York City is the most walkable out of 50 cities surveyed, with a score of 85.3 out of 100, which The L Word notes was knocked down by “unwalkable” Staten Island.

In Brooklyn, Cobble Hill and Brooklyn Heights had scores of 98. Boerum Hill and Downtown Brooklyn scored 97; DUMBO, Carroll Gardens, Gowanus and Park Slope tied with 96. The least walkable Brooklyn neighborhoods are all in the south: Bergen Beach with a score of 58; Mill Basin with 62; Gerritsen Beach with 71; Canarsie with 74; and Manhattan Beach and West Brighton at 77.

Once again, The L Magazine provides the primary info, with supplemental info linked in the article.

(Photo: Chuck Taylor)


Source: Cobble Hill Blog
http://cobblehillblog.com/archives/7015

From the Web

History

FASCINATING: 1940 Census Data Reveals Who Lived In Your Digs

April 6, 2012

Ever wondered who was cooking pot roast on your antique stove in 1940? Who hid that stamp beneath the floorboards when you were gutting your Pacific Street coop bedroom? How much that Degraw Street apartment cost to rent 70 years ago? Now’s your chance to find out. In partnership with Archives.com, the U.S. National Archives released Census records from 1940 online on April 2—comprising 3.8 million images scanned from some 4,000 rolls of microfilm.

The website offers access to maps and hand-written info about every known address in all 48 states in the Union, allowing you to find census maps and descriptions to locate an enumeration district, browse census images to locate any household interviewed in the 1940 Census and then save and/or download images. The Search page is here.

Warning: The site is slow, if not clunky, as hundreds of thousands are discovering this fascinating window to the past all at once. It’s also a bit unnerving to navigate. The best tutorial I found is at Gawker.com here.

Happy hunting! Be sure to share anything revealing with all your friends here on the Cobble Hill Blog. We’ll also be scouring for tidbits over the next several weeks.

(Image: Gawker.com)


Source: Cobble Hill Blog
http://cobblehillblog.com/archives/7004

From the Web

Food

Cobble Hill Resident Alan Cooper Launches New Restaurant In Fort Greene

April 6, 2012

Two 2001 graduates from Brooklyn Heights’ Packer Collegiate Institute—one of whom grew up in Cobble Hill—are staying true to the borough by opening an American restaurant in nearby Fort Greene. Pals Alan Cooper and Stephen Cohen plan to launch Prospect Restaurant at 773 Fulton Street in July, in the space of recently closed Mediterranean Aqualis Grill.

The pair was interviewed April 5 in the New York Times blog “The Local,” after the eatery’s license was approved by the Community Board 2 Health Committee. The spot will offer 53 seats and a full bar, serving dinner seven days a week and brunch on weekends.

The co-owners told the Times that their venture—the first restaurant for each of them—will offer fresh, seasonal ingredients. “We’ll have a serious menu, but you won’t look at the plate and not know what’s on it,” said Cooper, who was raised in Cobble Hill (on left in photo). The pair added that they chose the location because of their ties to the community: “I live in Fort Greene now and knew this was a great, accessible location. I wanted to be in the kind of brownstone community that I grew up in,” Cooper added.

The Prospect Restaurant at 773 Fulton Street, is between South Portland Avenue and South Oxford Street.

(Photo: Linda Villarosa for The New York Times)


Source: Cobble Hill Blog
http://cobblehillblog.com/archives/7000

From the Web

Events

Bike Bonanza ‘Learn To Ride’ This Saturday, March 31

March 30, 2012

This Saturday, March 31, organization Bike New York will provide a Learn to Ride class for beginning cyclists and a skills clinic for children who already know how to balance and ride, as part of its Bike Bonanza Festival. The event also includes a bike registration drive, a bicycle swap from Recycle-A-Bicycle (exchange an outgrown bike for a refurbished one of the right size) and a helmet giveaway.

The location: Public School 261, 314 Pacific Street, between Hoyt & Smith Streets in Boerum Hill. Hours: 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Registration for the class and the clinic is advised but not required. Free!


Source: Cobble Hill Blog
http://cobblehillblog.com/archives/6977

From the Web

Real Estate

Cobble Hill Has Two Of The 10 Most Expensive Blocks In Brooklyn

March 30, 2012

The Epoch Times has been scouring New York City for its “most expensive blocks,” based on median sale prices with at least three home sales over the last two years. Research covers January 2010 to December 2011. In Brooklyn, the newspaper’s March 27 survey comes up with three Park Slope blocks in the top 10, one each in Midwood, Carroll Gardens, Manhattan Beach, Homecrest and Brooklyn Heights… and two in Cobble Hill.

According to Epoch’s research, based on Property Shark stats, Cobble Hill has the No. 4 priciest block: delimited by Warren St to Baltic Street/Clinton Street to Court Street, with a median price of $2.8 million. And at No. 5 in Cobble Hill is Hicks Street to Henry Street/Baltic Street to Kane Street, with a median of $2.7 million.

Overall, the priciest block in Brooklyn is in Midwood, delimited by Avenue I and Avenue J/Ocean Parkway and 7th Avenue, with a median sale price of $4,350,000. The biggest sale there was a single-family home on 935 Ocean Parkway, on Nov. 11, 2010 for $6,130,000. Less than one year later, on Sept. 20, 2011, it exchanged hands again, for a slightly smaller amount of $6,000,000.

See the full article here.


Source: Cobble Hill Blog
http://cobblehillblog.com/archives/6972

From the Web

Brooklyn Heights, Celebrity Residents, Real Estate

Sarah Jessica Parker & Matthew Broderick Move To Cobble Hill Border?

March 24, 2012

Norah Jones, meet your new neighbors: Sarah Jessica Parker and husband Matthew Broderick are moving into a pair of townhouses in south Brooklyn Heights on the Cobble Hill border on State Street near Sidney Place. The New York Daily News‘ real estate guru Jason Sheftell reported late Friday that the family is closing in on a contract, after purchasing a Manhattan townhouse on East 10th St. townhouse two years ago that they never moved into.

The couple currently resides in a townhome in the West Village on Charles Street, near West Fourth Street, with their son James Wilkie, 9, and twin daughters Marion and Tabitha, almost 3. A source told the Daily News, “They loved the West Village but wanted something more private, laid-back and discreet.”

When construction is completed, the two adjoining State Street townhouses the actors purchased will create “an urban mansion of 7,000-plus square feet with a suburban-size backyard,” the News reports. Both were an “off-market” transaction, meaning the houses weren’t officially for sale, according to Sheftell. City records show both are owned by Mark and Diane Baker.

Parker and Broderick paid $18.995 million for the East 10th Street townhouse two years ago, and fully remodeled the home, which the News says is now on the market.

CORE senior vice president Doug Bowen noted, “Brooklyn Heights is the city’s first official historic landmark district; that’s how beautiful it is and what it means to New York. The price difference between the West Village and Brooklyn Heights is sometimes two, three, four times the amount. That’s why even big names are deciding to live here. It’s an easier financial commitment.”

(Photo: New York Daily News)


Source: Cobble Hill Blog
http://cobblehillblog.com/archives/6954

From the Web

News

Wall Street Journal Offers Profile Of “Charming” Cobble Hill

March 24, 2012

“When it comes to charming brownstone Brooklyn characteristics, Cobble Hill has pretty much got all the key requirements covered.” That’s the opening of an 850-word expose profiling Brooklyn’s Cobble Hill neighborhood that appeared in Saturday’s Wall Street Journal.

The piece by Joseph De Avila offers a complimentary persona of the nabe’s “tree-lined blocks, stately townhomes and highly regarded schools,” while boasting that it’s become “a tough place to buy a home. Over the past decade, Cobble Hill has become one of the most sought-after neighborhoods in Brooklyn. The arrival of new families into the historically Italian-American community has been followed by scores of new restaurants, bars and boutiques.”

In addition, the Journal reports, “More recently, Cobble Hill’s popularity has led it to become one of the most competitive neighborhoods in Brooklyn to buy residential property. When the rare townhome hits the market, it tends to get bought up quickly. Large three-bedroom condos are also quick sellers.” The current median asking price for Cobble Hill homes is $875,000 according to real-estate site StreetEasy. In Boerum Hill to the east it is $968,000 million, and in Brooklyn Heights to the north, it is $825,000.

The story also describes Cobble Hill’s parks, schools, restaurants, bars and entertainment. Read the piece here.

(Photo: Wall Street Journal)


Source: Cobble Hill Blog
http://cobblehillblog.com/archives/6951

From the Web