NY Magazine: Brooklyn Restaurant Openings
DuMont Burger Like most successful enterprises, Williamsburg’s DuMont has evolved from its humble roots, supplementing its basic comfort-food menu with ambitious specials. There are those customers, though, who can’t see past the joint’s justly famous burger and DuMac & Cheese, to the occasional vexation of its co-chefs. It’s for those throwbacks—and the hordes of Bedford…
DuMont Burger Like most successful enterprises, Williamsburg’s DuMont has evolved from its humble roots, supplementing its basic comfort-food menu with ambitious specials. There are those customers, though, who can’t see past the joint’s justly famous burger and DuMac & Cheese, to the occasional vexation of its co-chefs. It’s for those throwbacks—and the hordes of Bedford Avenue barhoppers—that owner Colin Devlin has opened DuMont Burger, a 30-seat spinoff with a full bar and simple menu of burgers, sandwiches, salads, and desserts—plus delivery and takeout. 314 Bedford Ave., nr. S. 1st St., Williamsburg, Brooklyn; 718-384-6127. GMAP
The Plant After making raw food respectable at Pure Food and Wine—and a very public split with his partner—Matthew Kenney has embarked on the second chapter in his life as a vegan chef and raw-foodist. It’s headquartered in a loftlike space in Dumbo, where he’s opened the Plant, a retail shop, classroom, and commissary kitchen for the fleet of Blue/Green juice-bar/cafés he plans to infiltrate the tri-state region with, starting this week on the Upper East Side (203 E. 74th St., nr. Third Ave.; 212-744-0940), and on the premises of the Plant itself. Unlike most industrial kitchens, this one is equipped with a coconut station (with a backsplash for errant splinters), a dehydrator room, and a staff proficient at transforming nuts and fruits into macadamia hummus, nori hand rolls, and an utterly credible chocolate pudding. Next on Kenney’s agenda is Heirloom, a vegetarian restaurant opening later this month at 191 Orchard Street. 25 Jay St., at John St., Dumbo, Brooklyn; 718-722-7541. GMAP
Anthony’s Anthony’s has been Sal Buglione’s dream for years: a restaurant named for and dedicated to his father, a mason from outside Naples. But when Anthony Buglione passed away unexpectedly, his restaurateur son nearly abandoned the plan, focusing instead on his involvement in the burgeoning Nick’s Pizza chainlet. Buglione’s friends encouraged him to persevere, and together they built the sort of homey southern-Italian restaurant and pizzeria he’d always imagined surprising his dad with. “We’d pull up, I’d say, ‘Hey, look, Anthony’s, let’s get a pizza,’ then I’d say, ‘This is for you.’ ” The family spirit is indeed pervasive. Buglione’s brother makes the mozzarella. His mother will step in on Sundays to make “the real ragù” (a.k.a. Sunday sauce). Pizza (whole pies only) is the province of pizzaiolo Bart Agozzino, a veteran of Naples’ legendary Trianon, whose father, Alfredo, built Anthony’s gas-fired brick oven (he’s had a hand in the ones at Lil’ Frankie’s and Blue Ribbon Bakery, too). “Our mothers are gonna be in the kitchen,” says Buglione, who’ll incorporate their specials into a menu of pastas, chicken and veal, and his father’s beloved baked clams. 426A Seventh Ave., nr. 14th St., Park Slope, Brooklyn; 718-369-8315. GMAP
Openings & Buzz [NY Magazine]
Who said anything about rubes — “throwbacks,” maybe, but that doesn’t imply boorish or unsophisticated — and maybe those customers who order the burgers and mac and cheese aren’t too poor for the rest of the menu, maybe they just love those items.
I like DuMont a lot.
I don’t know why the writer felt the need to imply that ordering the Dumont Burger & duMac & cheese is for rubes. While it may be ‘vexing’ to the chefs, the thing that the customers who order them can’t get past is the prices for the other menu items.