The Times Wraps Its Arms Around Fort Greene
“Fort Greene is Brooklyn’s latest culinary mecca, bewitching foodies with hip, minimalist restaurants. Or it’s a bastion of African-American pride and culture, a historic home to a vibrant community of black families. Or the artistic center of the borough, laying claim as it does to the multifaceted Brooklyn Academy of Music (a k a BAM)….
“Fort Greene is Brooklyn’s latest culinary mecca, bewitching foodies with hip, minimalist restaurants. Or it’s a bastion of African-American pride and culture, a historic home to a vibrant community of black families. Or the artistic center of the borough, laying claim as it does to the multifaceted Brooklyn Academy of Music (a k a BAM). Or maybe it’s the new roost of the nouveaux riches, with pricy brownstones and new luxury condominiums dotting its map. What new and old residents have found is that Fort Greene plays all of these roles with grace and aplomb. It is a busy, blooming hybrid whose slate-sidewalk streets somehow retain their serenity. No one is in a hurry — even as newcomers rush in from all corners of the city to live here.” — NY Times
Photo by Tracy Collins
11217 and Snark, stop with that pretending you’re two different people routine that sam got all wise to last week.
😉
Ugh. I hate it when I do that (not reread before posting). I meant 1:100 obviously, considering the tilt of my argument. Though I DO LOVE Blue Marble icecream, in park slope!!
The ratio of great restaurants/bars/vendors to bad ones in Park Slope is about 100:1. So many half-assed, uninteresting places, it’s literally exhausting trying to find a good place to eat — you have to walk blocks and blocks and blocks and wade through a hundred identical Thai and “french” joints. In Fort Greene, pretty much every eating or drinking establishment that’s opened in the past few years is delicious by comparison, I’d say 2 out of 3 are great, and all within a really small radius. It’s just a tighter, higher quality community of vendors with a more personal and interesting take. You might not like General Greene or SMoke Joint or Brooklyn Public House or 67 Burger or Bitter Sweet or Thirst or Smooch or 7 Greene or Havana Outpost or that delicious new Ethiopian (too new to remember the name yet) or Greene Grape or Bonita, but these are all idiosyncratic, all owner-run (often, owner -server’ed), all warm and inventive places that you won’t find elsewhere, each with its own take on food and booze and happy to experiment in the kitchen and marketplace. THe fact that all these places are within literally a ten block radius is just incomparable to anywhere else in the city. I don’t know how ti happened, but I want to congratulate and thank every one of those brave and energetic entrepreneurs who stuck their neck out for what is trully a fun culinary experience. It might be that many of them were chefs at fancy places in Manhattan and could afford to open their own place in FG because the scale is smaller and costs lower, which is something I’ve gathered from talking to some of the owners. Also, many of them know each other and support one another — also very unique, because it’s usually a very competitive business. Anyway, congrats again and thanks again. You deserve the crowds I saw this weekend, and I don’t even mind the drunk yuppie fools spilling onto the sidewalk as long as these places get to continue their great work.
dirty–not too much action of late on the heinous crime front. Hoping it stays that way.
Wow, another perfectly good thread hijacked. Anywho – good for Fort Greene. Really nice neighborhood. I enjoy my visits there. If only I was in a sound financial position when I was in the 3rd Grade, maybe I could have snatched one of those brownstones for a song.
Has that little crime wave they seemed to be having subsided at all? Not trying to be a troll, just curious as it seemed during a month span there was a shooting or something.
Excellent, thanks, time to give it a whirl.
HUGE thumbs up for James!
11217 – Is that a thumb up for James? A friend of mine lives down the block, and we’ve been meaning to try it.
Well, I’m glad they don’t normally serve spoiled food at General Greene. Maybe they’ve dropped their prices or increased portion size.
I think our bill was $50 for two with three dishes and no alcohol. The three dishes combined were barely enough for one person. It would have been $120 if we’d ordered as much as we usually do. We are not big eaters and normally prefer small portions but this was ridiculous. This was back when they’d first opened, so maybe they just had an off night.