As baseball season gets underway, more and more attention is being drawn to an often overlooked part of the stadium experience: the food. It may take awhile to overcome associations with dry pretzels, standard-issue hot dogs and over-priced beer, but at least a few stadiums are trying to bring fans a better dining experience.
The clearest example is Citi Field, where (beginning April 8th), you can get David Chang’s Fuku fried chicken sandwich. The Fuku stand with have the spicy sandwich, as well as fries, Fuku fingers, and Milk Bar cookies. Yankee’s fan? Not to worry, Yankee stadium has new treats in store as well, including egg creams from Linda’s Brooklyn Style Egg Creams. If you’re into indulging as much as possible at the ball park, they’ve got plenty of artery-clogging specials as well.
This may still not compel non-baseball fans to sit through a full game, but it’s certainly an added bonus for those already heading out to a game.
With the return of Spring comes the return of outdoor markets, and April 2nd/3rd is the first weekend you can catch Smorgasburg and the Brooklyn Flea, now in Fort Greene, Dumbo, Williamsburg and Prospect Park. Smorgasburg, which began as a spin-off of the Brooklyn Flea and now includes 100+ local and regional food vendors, is open Saturdays in East River State Park at Kent Ave. and N. 7 St., and Sundays in Prospect Park at Breeze Hill (both days from 11 to 6). Brooklyn Flea itself has two additional locations. The markets will be open rain or shine, but fingers are crossed that April showers bring May flowers (and sunny days) soon.
In today’s interconnected world, there are more and more ways to decide what’s for dinner (or lunch, or breakfast, or brunch, or a midnight snack, or…you get the idea). There are brick-and-mortar bookstores riddled with cookbooks from seemingly every popular restaurant or bakery, not to mention every food network star and popular blogger. It’s also easier than ever to Google a dish and find countless recipes for it, each with a rating, time estimate, detailed instructions and lengthy comments section. Or you can subscribe to one of the many meal kit companies like Blue Apron, and have the ingredients delivered to your door along with the recipe.
The beloved East Village spot Pommes Frites, which was destroyed last March in the massive Second Avenue explosion, has announced plans to reopen this April in their new storefront at 128 MacDougal. The french fry spot, known for their dozens of homemade sauces, faced some hurdles getting up and running again – including delays from the Department of Buildings and opposition from the local community board to their liquor license.
Midtown staple Sushi Zen first opened its doors in 1983, when sushi was still considered an adventurous choice for Times Square dining. In the years since, more and more upscale sushi restaurants have joined the scene, and raw fish has fully entered the mainstream (arguably ushering in the next-wave poke trend). Sushi Zen, run by head chef Toshio Suzuki, nevertheless remained a favorite, earning some celebrity chef fans like Michael Anthony and training others like Masaharu Morimoto in the traditional Edomae style of sushi making.
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