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Tags: Stupid Hipsters / Williamsburg / New York City / Travel Trends / → All Tags

Would You Drink Out Of A Coconut, Far From Tropical Climes?

There are exactly two entries in Jaunted's Hipsters category, one about gelato and the other with the word "irritating." Neither are particularly complimentary. This article from the New York Times, which describes how Williamsburg hipsters have taken to ostentatiously sipping juice out of coconuts as they saunter down the street, is an excellent illustration as to why.

Hipsters, it turns out, are prone to eyeroll-inducing trends of "look at me not caring that you're looking at me for being ridiculous" obnoxiousness:

In the last few months, retailers in hipster hot spots like Williamsburg and the Lower East Side say they have sold unprecedented amounts of the fruit for streetside consumption. 'I think it’s stylish, it’s pretty,' said Zarifeh Saleh... 'You feel like you’re on the beach, but you’re not on the beach.' Some say the public ritual is part of the drink’s allure. 'I don’t ever go and buy a bunch of coconuts and stock them and drink them at home,' said Jennifer Verdon.

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Tags: Music Festivals / Music Travel / Brooklyn / Greenpoint / Williamsburg / → All Tags

Brooklyn Gets a Music Festival of Its Own

As the reigning indie music capital of the world, you'd think Brooklyn would have a long-running music festival to rival Austin's SXSW and Manhattan's CMJ, but the ragtag borough has never quite put it together.

But Brooklyn is amping up its game this weekend with the first annual Northside Music and Arts Festival, which will be taking over much of Williamsburg and Greenpoint tonight through Sunday. The blogistas will be out in full force to catch dozens of the borough's up-and-coming bands, along with a couple of A-list indie acts like The Hold Steady, Bishop Allen, and Sunset Rubdown.

The festival has also teamed up with the Williamsburg Gallery Association to offer an evening of music in the galleries tonight, along with a bunch of artsy events throughout the weekend.

All-access badges for the four-day event are a pretty reasonable $45, and shows take place at many of Williamsburg's most popular bars, including Barcade, t.b.d., and the Gutter, with just a few events across the river in—gasp—Manhattan.

Related Stories:
· Northside Festival [Official Site]
· Brooklyn travel coverage [Jaunted]
· Music travel coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: kenyee]

Tags: Pizza / Food / Food Fights / Food Travel / Restaurants / Williamsburg / Brooklyn / → All Tags

Further Reflections on Pizza: Brooklyn's Motorino Pizza Napoletana

It takes coglioni to open a fancy new pizza restaurant in an Italian part of Brooklyn, but Motorino is giving it a go in Williamsburg anyway. Just three blocks from the mostly take-out Sal's Pizza - a longtime favorite of mine - Motorino is looking to attract a more upscale, sit-down clientele, with a handsome wood-accented interior, dim lighting, and downtempo techno tunes piped through the sound system. Motorino's claim to fame is its wood-burning oven, which produces Neapolitan-style pizza with its signature fluffy crust that's ever-so-slightly scorched on the bottom. Since Williamsburg was originally populated by Italians from in and around Naples, particularly the town of Nola, Motorino's version of Neapolitan pizza is sure to receive a curious yet skeptical reception.

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Tags: NYC BBQ / Restaurants / Food Travel / BBQ / Williamsburg / → All Tags

Hipsters Need BBQ Too

The bizarre-but-tasty NYC BBQ trend isn't just for outer borough dives and trendy Manhattan celeb faves. One of the city's most celebrated new-ish BBQ joints is Fette Sau, a giant party scene of a restaurant set in an old factory space on Williamsburg's crowded Metropolitan Avenue.

There's something that screams not-genuine-BBQ when you walk into Fette Sau on a weekend evening and see hundreds of drunk 20-something hipsters spread out on picnic-style benches, downing flights of whiskey and shouting each other down while they impatiently await their orders. Despite the faux-rustic décor, you'd never think you were anywhere but Williamsburg.

But whether this is your kind of scene of not, the grub comes through in a big (and most-definitely-genuine-BBQ) kind of way. Smoked ribs fall off the bone, juicy pork belly melts in your mouth, and meals are finished with perfect pickles trucked in from Lower East Side legend Gus' Pickles.

· Fette Sau [Yelp!]
· NYC BBQ Coverage [Jaunted]
· BBQ coverage [Jaunted]

Photo: [Gandhu & Sarah]

Tags: Bars / Rockabilly / Williamsburg / Brooklyn / → All Tags

Rockabilly in Brooklyn - The Susquehanna Industrial Tool & Die Co.

As is often the case, we started out last night at the Brooklyn Brewery, and when the taps went dry, we made our way east on North 11th Street to the Sound Fix Lounge, a homey pub attached to one of Williamsburg's most well-regarded independent record stores. There were seven of us, and we shuffled in quickly, shaking off the cold and taking our places at the last available table, a bit of good luck that set the tone for the rest of the evening. As our eyes adjusted to the dimly-lit space, we noticed a handful of people dressed in 1940's-style clothing, ladies in flouncy skirts and snug white blouses, gentlemen in brown suits and crisp white dress shirts. They were here to see the Susquehanna Industrial Tool & Die Co., a local rockabilly trio, and they were serious about their swing.

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Tags: Jaunted-On-Location / Williamsburg / Robert Downey Jr / Rachel McAdams / Jude Law / Guy Ritchie / Jaunted on Location / → All Tags

'Sherlock Holmes' Investigates Brooklyn

You may have heard some rumblings about drama on the set of "Sherlock Holmes" late last year. The film, starring Robert Downey Jr., Rachel McAdams, and Jude Law, has had its fair share of mishaps. First, it was announced the film’s director Guy Ritchie and wife Madonna were getting divorced. Then RDJ was injured while filming and to top it off a tanker truck exploded on set. The movie was filming throughout London for most of the fall and early winter with locations including Freemason's Hall, St. Paul’s Cathedral, and Brompton Cemetery.

"Sherlock Holmes" has finally made its way to this side of the pond. Today, they are filming at the Marcy Avenue Armory, 355 Marcy Avenue in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

The armory is a “qualified film production facility”, meaning all state and city tax credits apply when the building is used. Since money talks, it is a popular location. “I Am Legend”, “28 Days Later”, and “Meet the Parents” were all filmed in the Marcy Avenue Armory whose history and architecture make it a perfect backdrop for a period piece like “Sherlock Holmes”. Hopefully, the movie’s “curse” hasn’t followed it’s cast and crew stateside but just in case we’d steer clear of Marcy Ave in Williamsburg for the next few weeks.

If you have any tips about where else movies or TV shows are filming, send them our way at tips@jaunted.com.

Related Stories:
· Sherlock Holmes Does Brooklyn [Celebuzz]
· Romantic Vacations, Madonna-Style [Jaunted]

[Photo: Just Jared]

Tags: Live Arts in Brooklyn / Live-Arts-Brooklyn-Map / Williamsburg / → All Tags

Being A Grownup Is Sweet

Break the bounds of Broadway with our coverage of the Brooklyn arts scene.

The sweet-toothed might be disappointed not to find a sugar emporium at the site of Pete's Candy Store in Williamsburg--and that it is, in fact, a bar. So bring your own Ring Pops and candy beads when you check out this hive of activity during its flagship event, the Williamsburg Spelling Bee.

Held on alternate Mondays, the Bee is one of those hipster-y institutions that's easy to mock but hard not to enjoy. With real grown-up prizes and comedian Jen Dziura at the mic, it's way more fun than the now-closed "25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" on Broadway--not to mention cheaper, even if you run up your bar tab. Pete's also regularly hosts a Euro-style pub quiz not to mention intimate concerts.

This weekend: Seattle folk rockers Whiting Tennis keep their Wimbledon wardrobes clean Thursday at 10. Four local poets read Friday at 7 at Pete's Big Poetry for a mellow start to the weekend. On Sunday, atone by stopping by rebel minister Jay Bakker's Revolution Church at 4 pm. As the son of televangelists Jim and Tammy Faye, he knows a little bit about holding the attentions of a crowd.

Related Stories:
· Exercise Your Mind And Body At The Brooklyn Lyceum [Jaunted]
· Brooklyn Travel coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: karenfoto]

Tags: Live Arts in Brooklyn / Live-Arts-Brooklyn-Map / Live Music / Williamsburg / → All Tags

Give Me That New Old Thing

Break the bounds of Broadway with our coverage of the Brooklyn arts scene.

Despite its old-timey sound, the Music Hall of Williamsburg wasn't around for A Tree Grows In Brooklyn: The combination bar and concert space opened last fall out of the bones of former venue Northsix, which itself found life in a former mayonnaise factory.

With three levels and two bars, it's far from a neighborhood dive, but there are some couches too--in case you prefer your indie rock basement style.

This week at the Music Hall of Williamsburg: It's sold out, but if you're savvy you can still catch nouveau glam rockers MGMT Friday (if you can stand all that glitter); Saturday brings the works of arcane folkie Rachael Yamagata, and not only the lonely will appreciate next Thursday's show by Joseph Arthur and the Lonely Astronauts.

Related Stories:
· Music Hall of Williamsburg [Official Site]
· Neither Arenas Nor Dives, New Clubs Hope to Succeed with More Style [NYT]
· Brooklyn Travel coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: Bryan Bruchman]

Tags: Opera Travel / Williamsburg / Brooklyn / Concert Travel / Culture Travel / → All Tags

Dust Off Your Top Hats and Capes: The Opera is Coming to Brooklyn

Everybody likes to make fun of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, with its insufferably ironic scenesters and their asymmetrical haircuts, but it's still one of the best neighborhoods in New York to find bold new ideas in music and art. Case in point: the 'burg will host the borough's first opera in years this November when OperaOggiNY stages a performance of Franco Leoni's one-act verisimo opera L'Oracolo. The company is renovating the 600-seat McCaddin Memorial Hall Theater on Berry Street between South 2nd and South 3rd Streets, and will welcome city opera buffs to its grand opening performances on November 6, 7, and 8. Admission is only $20, which seems like a bargain for a "real" opera, and there are dozens of great bars and restaurants nearby - Dressler comes to mind - where patrons can discuss the tenor's register over drinks and snacks. It will be interesting to see what kind of crowd is drawn to these classical performances in the midst of hipsterville.

[Photo: nag-brooklyn.org]

Related Stories:
· OperaOggiNY [Official Site]
· OperaOggiNy to re-open McCaddin Memorial Hall Theater on Berry Street [nag-brooklyn.org]
· Opera Comes to the Burg [Gothamist]
· Opera Travel Coverage [Jaunted]

Tags: Breakfast / Breakfast Around the World / Williamsburg / Brooklyn / → All Tags

The Egg: A Symbol of Life. Also: A Great Spot for Brekkie in Brooklyn

We had a day off in the middle of the week not long ago and decided to go out for lunch in the neighborhood. Having heard many rave reviews of Egg, a newish restaurant on N. 5th and Bedford in Williamsburg, we popped in to see if it lived up to the hype.

Egg is a small, modest joint specializing in breakfast, though they now have lunch and dinner menus as well. Their gimmick, if it can be called that, is that they use only free-range eggs, pasture-raised meats, and artisanal everything else. The atmosphere is casual and airy, with wooden tables and chairs that feel like they were taken from a third-grade classroom circa 1965. A cup of crayons lets you doodle on the paper tablecloth as you wait for your meal. Jenn made a quick sketch of the tattoo on the back of a girl at the next table, a skull and crossbones with angel/devil wings and flames, perhaps a tribute to lost love or something. The crayon drawing looked better than the actual tattoo.

Jenn ordered the Eggs Rothko, an egg in a slice of brioche with broiled tomatoes and a side of Col. Bill Newsom's country ham. I had a steak sandwich made from ribeye (my favorite cut) on Italian bread with Roquefort cheese. Both dishes were lovely, delivering the satisfaction derived from diner food with the culinary touch of a real chef using high-end ingredients. The only complaint we had was that the good colonel's ham was ringed with a generous layer of fat which could have been trimmed a little better. No big whoop. My steak sandwich was a perfect medium rare, and the Roquefort was both tangy and complex.

The big surprise at Egg came with the bill. Based on all the fawning praise, I expected the prices to be closer to Balthazar's than the Kellogg Diner, but our check came in at under $30. Egg seems to have found a pleasant middle ground between humble diner  and fancy restaurant. That it breaks new ground in the use of sustainable ingredients - they own their own farm in Upstate New York - makes it all the more worthy of accolades.

[Photo: Victor Ozols]

Related Stories:
· Egg [Official Site]
· Breakfast Coverage [Jaunted]

Tags: Live Music / Williamsburg / Summer Travel / → All Tags

Brooklyn Music: Last Pool Party This Weekend

This weekend marks the end of an era for Brooklyn's awesomely (or insufferably) hip neighborhood of Williamsburg.

For the last three years, one of the neighborhood's undeniable summer highlights has been the pool party concerts at the (waterless) McCarren Park Pool, where indie rock faves like The Hold Steady, Of Montreal and the Black Lips have rocked out at free weekend shows.

But the city has decided to turn McCarren Park Pool back into an actual pool, which, to be fair, could be pretty cool come next summer. So indie vets Yo La Tengo will play the last ever pool party, this Sunday at 2 pm. (The non-free Clear Channel series at the pool continues next week with Sonic Youth.) If you're planning to show up for some nostalgia this weekend, plan to arrive early--lines this summer have been insanely long.

Related Stories:
· McCarren Park Pool Parties [Official Site]
· Brooklyn Travel coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: Penningtron]

Tags: Street Food / Williamsburg / Cheap Eats / → All Tags

Peerless Mexican Street Food in Williamsburg

We remember what it was like to backpack across Europe on a shoestring budget. A couple hundred bucks had to last through multiple countries, which meant that eating in restaurants was out of the question. Hence, the old backpacker cliché of bread and cheese on a park bench was elevated to a mantra, and delicious street food was a rare indulgence.

Penny-pinching visitors to New York who are "tuned in" enough to spend some time in Williamsburg, Brooklyn should make a beeline to the corner of Bedford Avenue and North 12th Street (across from the Turkey's Nest) for some of the finest - and cheapest - Mexican street food in the city. From Thursday through Sunday, a nameless food cart (we asked) turns out fantastic chicken, steak, and chorizo tacos for $2.50 a pop, along with $4 quesadillas and decadent elote (Mexican corn on the cob on a stick) with mayo, lime juice, parmesan cheese, salt, and red pepper. The food is straight-up yummers.

Take your Mexican feast across the street to McCarren Park, find a bench or a patch of grass, and chow down while assorted softball games are played on the diamonds. Plenty of people accompany their meals with draft beers poured into Styrofoam cups from the aforementioned Turkey's Nest, but drinking in public remains illegal in New York, and just because your beverage is in a unmarked container, don't think you can't get busted. I've seen it happen. Better to scrape together your remaining money and belly up to the bar for a digestif.

Related Stories:
· Turkey's Nest Tavern [New York Magazine]
· Street Food Coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: Victor Ozols]