Alexa Mae Asperin

If a 7-Eleven is indeed coming to Avenue A, it isn’t the only poorly kept secret in Alphabet City: Earlier this month, The Local pointed to city records indicating that mobile sweets vendor Wafels & Dinges may be opening its first brick-and-mortar location at 15 Avenue B.

When we Tweeted about it, the Belgian-wafflemaker, which had declined to comment, coyly responded: “The mystery is killing us!”

The company still hasn’t made it official, but last week it posted a photo to its Facebook page showing construction in a dimly lit mystery space, with the caption: “Right now, it’s a mess. But it’s going to be awesome. We hope.”

The scene inside of 15 Avenue B today sure looked similar to the “mess” in the photo. We’ll let you know when it’s official.

Alexa Mae Asperin

The East Ninth Street storefront where Turkish fast-food joint Cigkoftem opened in February is now for rent, and a vandal who left his mark there in recent days seems worried N.Y.U. or 7-Eleven will replace it.

That’s unlikely, but: Back in September, a construction worker told The Local that 170 Avenue A, the former home of Bar on A, was getting a 7-Eleven. The job applicant listed on the construction permit was an architect of previous 7-Elevens, so it seemed likely to be true. But 7-Eleven didn’t respond to inquiries, and we never got official confirmation (which didn’t stop readers – and writers, and neighboring businesses – from weighing in.)

Today, there’s further evidence: A construction application approved last week confirms that work at 170 Avenue A will involve the “infill of a convenience store.”

Sure, there’s always the chance said “convenience store” will be the city’s first Wawa (as hoagie fans, we wouldn’t be opposed), but it’s looking more and more like 7-Eleven.

Suzanne Rozdeba Richard Cacace at Salon Champu

Suzanne Rozdeba

Last month, the owner of Salon Champu and Body Beautiful on East Seventh Street said he was planning to combine the salon and spa at a new address. Last week, he opened Salon Champu at 199 East Fourth Street, the space previously occupied by body piercer-to-the-stars Maria Tash.

“People still come in here asking if they can get a new piercing,” Richard Cacace laughed as he showed The Local around his new spot, simple and cozy with large, thick-framed mirrors leaning against an exposed brick wall.

Mr. Cacace thought it was a good sign, particularly from an economic perspective, to see other shops like Croissanteria opening up nearby on Avenue A. “Now, there are these unique, specialty businesses opening up, compared to the old Alphabet City, where there were mostly bodegas,” he said. “These new shops uplift the area and give it more credibility.”

The salon offers organic hair coloring, Keratin treatments, Japanese hair-straightening treatments, vegan hair-care
services, and skin care services such as facials and laser and wax treatments.

Salon Champu, 199 East Fourth Street, (212) 529-6925.

Angelina Cafe will reopen this evening across from its former location on Avenue A.

Starting at 5 p.m., you’ll be able to indulge in favorites like the grilled tuna steak or try new dishes such as a Tunisian burger with goat cheese, roasted pepper and harissa mayonnaise. In the next weeks, daily specials will be introduced to the menu of $20-and-under items, which you can see below.

Imen Bouzgarrou, who opened Angelina alongside husband Rafik in 2002, said she was excited to have a “newer, bigger, open space to attract more customers.” As previously reported, the Tunisian natives’ landlord wanted to raise their rent at 36B Avenue A to $7,500 per month – on par with what they’re paying for the larger venue across the street, Mrs. Bouzgarrou confirmed.

In addition to handmade pastas and a more expansive wine selection, the new Angelina boasts a private party area where larger groups can relax behind an orange curtain.

Dinner will be served this week from 5 p.m. to close and brunch is served on the weekends. Lunch will begin next week and breakfast will eventually be incorporated into regular business hours.
See the menu…

Shira LevineSteve Pang

For every East Village business that’s opening or closing, dozens are quietly making it. Here’s one of them: Otto’s Shrunken Head.

Otto’s Shrunken Head turns 10 today, and tomorrow the punk-rock tiki bar and live music venue will celebrate with an overflowing scorpion bowl of bands, DJs, and raucous revelry. The decade hasn’t been all sugar: partners Steve Pang, Nell Mellon and Patricia Lou have survived everything from a devastating fire to rising property taxes. “We came out of the worst year ever for us with that fire and now seeing that we were able to make it to ten years, I feel confident that we will be here a while,” said Mr. Pang. “We are beginning to make our mark on the city.” We grabbed a few words with Mr. Pang to chat about Otto’s’ journey toward becoming an institution, in a city that has lost many of them.

You’re at ten years; how would you say business is doing?

We are doing well. This is our best year yet. Even when it’s slow we tend to have a nice crowd always at the bar. Summer is always a slow time for bars in general, and now that summer is over we’re really busy again. Fall to after Christmas is our busiest time. Read more…

Nicole Guzzardi

Taureau isn’t the only recently closed restaurant making a comeback: I Coppi, which closed in September, will reopen in the former home of Vampire Freaks, under a new name, I Cipressi.

“I just wanted to make a change, to start new and fresh,” Lorella Innocenti, the restaurant’s owner, said of the new monicker.

While the name may have changed, the menu will remain largely the same, with the possible addition of a few new Tuscan dishes. “I am going to keep the dishes that I know people want, and once in a while put in new dishes and specials,” said Ms. Innocenti. Read more…

Suzanne Rozdeba Croissanteria

A couple of French spots are opening this week.

Croissanteria, the café and bakery whose owner David Simon we spoke to last month, will open tomorrow at 7 a.m. Mr. Simon’s partner in the venture is Selmo Ribeiro, 31, who also owns a burger joint in Lagos, Portugal.

As you can see from the menus below, the café will offer a variety of croissants, mini croissants, and croissant sandwiches – plus a loyalty program in which every tenth coffee is free, with funds from the tenth coffee going to a neighborhood charity. The tiled space is decorated with a large wall clock from an antique shop on East Ninth Street and benches with red cushions from a synagogue.

Read more…

For every East Village business that’s opening or closing, dozens are quietly making it. Here’s one of them: Inkstop Tattoo.

Shira Levine

In 1997, when tattoo shops were again legalized in New York City, Eric Rignall was one of the first artists to legitimately sketch on skin in the East Village. His shop, Inkstop Tattoo, at 209 Avenue A wasn’t easy to establish because most landlords refused to house his needlework. “They figured tattoo shops meant trouble, bikers and gangs,” said Rignall. An established tattoo artist from New Jersey, where inking was legal, helped vouch for him. “I also put down a pretty large deposit to really show I was serious and could be trusted. I’m sure at first they kept a pretty watchful eye on me, but they quickly saw that all I was about was doing high-quality tattoos,” he said. Almost 16 years later, Mr. Rignall gave The Local a glimpse into what makes his ink flow.

Read more…

Photos: Noah Fecks

Last night the folks behind Maharlika opened Jeepney, just a handful of blocks up from its sister establishment.

Unlike Maharlika, which serves up relatively standard fare, Jeepney is a Filipino “gastropub,” meaning “a place to hang out with friends, get great comfort food, and have a couple of brews,” said co-owner Nicole Ponseca. So what’s comfort food here? Think meatloaf and kamote (a sweet potato common in the Philippines); a Chori burger with the Pinoy sausage, longanisa; and a unique version of the renowned noodle dish, pansit, that includes oysters, shrimp, calamari, pork, and fried pork rinds.

The large, “family-style” dishes, which are meant to be shared, showcase the Filipino flavors of sweet, sour, and especially salty: the Jeprox salad consists of seasonal greens that are tossed in fermented shrimp paste and topped with crispy fish bones. “This dish is salt on salt, but I think people don’t understand that in the Philippines salt is more than a condiment – it’s the star attraction,” Ms. Ponseca said.

You’ll even find saltiness in the drinks: one cocktail infuses beer with the flavor of bitter melon. Read more…

Suzanne Rozdeba

Suzanne Rozdeba Elsewhere Espresso

A couple of family-run joints are new to the neighborhood. First, Elsewhere Espresso, the coffee shop owned by three siblings, opened this morning, as you can see from the balloons at right. It’ll be open 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., seven days a week.

Just a block north, Tink’s Restaurant, which we first told you about in January, will finally open next Thursday. It, too, is a family affair, as Isabella Aqel will run the spot with the help of four sisters, a brother, and her parents.

“If I didn’t have them, there’s no way I’d be able to do this,” Ms. Aqel, 25, told The Local today at the restaurant on East Seventh Street, where her twin, Sophia, her brother Alex, 23, and her 52-year-old mom, Jenny, who runs a family sheet-metal business in East Harlem with her husband, were helping put some finishing touches on the place. She hopes her restaurant will be “a sit-down place you can bring your boyfriend or girlfriend, a romantic, date spot.” Read more…

In the month since Pouring Ribbons opened, owners Joaquin Simo, Jason Cott, Troy Sidle, and Toby Maloney have been stirring up more than cocktails: they’ve been waging a friendly(?) Twitter war with “the boys” over at the neighborhood’s other recently opened cocktail spot, Evelyn Drinkery. It all seems to have started when Evelyn Drinkery asked whether Pouring Ribbons was a sewing club, and quickly devolved into accusations involving armpit hair, man purses, phosphate drinks and Taylor Swift. Oh, those crazy cocktalians!

Anyway, after all the back and forth (which you can read for yourself below), we just had to stop into Pouring Ribbons and see what the place was all about (sorry, Evelyn Drinkery, but Mr. Simo, formerly of Death & Co., is the American Bartender of the Year). Despite all the tomfoolery on Twitter, they take their cocktails pretty seriously, as you can see in our video above. Read more…

Photos: Nicole Guzzardi

After selling macarons wholesale for three years, Christina Ha and her husband Simon Tung opened the first brick-and-mortar location of Macaron Parlour earlier this afternoon.

The shop offers classic varieties of the French confectionery, like pistachio and lemon, plus unconventional flavors (e.g. honey and cognac), some of which were inspired by junk food. “We really want to stick to things that her and I grew up with, ” Mr. Tung said, citing a s’mores macaron as well as a bacon one with maple cream cheese filling. The store also offers cookies, croissants, and other goodies.

The shop’s story is as sweet as its baked goods. The owners, who got married in April, met at a Halloween party in 2009: she was dressed as Lady Gaga and he, along with his friends, went as a nerd.  “She picked me out of all the nerds,” Mr. Tung said proudly.

Ms. Ha attended pastry school at the Institute of Culinary Education and Mr. Tung also worked in the food industry, so they decided to go into business together. Read more…

Dana Varinsky

To promote the Bike-Friendly Business District, Veselka is giving out complimentary carbs to cyclists. The pierogi promotion goes till 7 p.m., so get to peddling.

Daniel Maurer Half of the neighborhood’s Subways.

Back when we took stock of all the East Village’s chain stores, we discovered that Subway was the most ubiquitous chain in the neighborhood, with eight locations.

Make that seven – at least, for now.

The sliver of a location at 227 First Avenue, between 13th and 14th Streets, was closed today, with UPS delivery notices from last week affixed to the shutter.

We placed a call to the store’s next-door neighbor, Gabay’s, and a man who identified himself as the sub-landlord of the Subway space, who did not want to give his name, said the franchisee closed the store for “personal reasons.” He added, “All I know is that they’re looking for another franchisee.”

Of course, there’s another Subway just six blocks down First Avenue. We also like Russo’s for sandwiches.

Daniel Maurer

Allow us to sprinkle a few nuggets (nibs?) of information on you, fro-yo fiends: the Red Mango that came to Stuyvesant Town last month (the first in the area since the St. Marks store closed a couple of years ago) will celebrate its grand opening next Thursday by doling out free small frozen yogurts. They’ll also give away merch such as t-shirts to the first 100 customers, from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m.

Elsewhere in self-serve land, EV Grieve notices that Only U, a colorful fro-yo joint that opened in July, has already closed. Read more…

Daniel Maurer

Just in time for the 50-degree weather(!), Il Buco Alimentari & Vineria has scored a dozen outdoor seats. You can now enjoy the hefty porchetta sandwich right on Great Jones Street. The sidewalk café will remain open for lunch and dinner as weather permits.

By the way, Il Buco A & V also has a loft space you probably didn’t know about, and this week it’ll be put to use as Renato Brancaleoni presents a series of dinners showcasing his handcrafted cheeses.

Alexa Mae Asperin

Looks like we might have solved the mystery of the dessert shop bound for 15 Avenue B: city records indicate that mobile vendor Wafels & Dinges has secured the space.

When Manny Haimovich, owner of the building on the corner of Second Street, spoke to The Local last month, he revealed only that a sweets spot would serve ice cream there. Maybe he was referring to the popular speculoos ice cream that’s served at the seven carts and trucks that Wafels & Dinges has launched since 2007: the health department’s Web site indicates that the popular Belgian waffle brand is awaiting its first inspection at the address.

Asked whether he will indeed open his first brick-and-mortar store on Avenue B, owner Thomas DeGeest declined to comment. Maybe we should’ve asked in mime language?

Suzanne RozdebaFrom left: Yurij, Gregory and Larissa at Elsewhere Espresso.

Earlier today, Gregory Bohdanowycz, 33, his sister, Larissa, 30, and their younger brother Yurij, 27, put the finishing touches on Elsewhere Espresso, the coffee shop they’ll open on East Sixth Street later this week.

Mr. Bohdanowycz described the project as a “work in progress,” explaining with a laugh, “There’s probably a lot of baggage from just being brothers and sisters for so long.” On the other hand, the siblings don’t pay rent, because their family owns the building. “Once we get going, we’ll be paying rent by the year’s end. But I don’t think we’ll get kicked out,” he quipped.

Ms. Bohdanowycz said she wanted locals to think of Elsewhere as “a neighborhood place,” so the shop will offer free WiFi with coffee purchases as well as tables and chairs made from the refurbished space’s original floor beams. Read more…

Joann Pan

Locals craving East Village Thai’s finger rolls, peanut sauce-drenched chicken satae sticks and the pad thai dish that The Daily News recently declared one of the “best of New York” will have to go elsewhere for now.

The gates of the hole-in-the-wall takeout joint between Second and Third Avenues were down during lunchtime today: a note indicated that a gas shut-off had forced it to close until “the problem is resolved.”

We’ve reached out to Jakobson Properties, the landlord of 32 East Seventh Street, for more information.