Ria Chung

Good morning, East Village.

To kick off your day, dig Joey Ramone’s new posthumous album, currently streaming on Rolling Stone’s site. Pyramid Club and Save the Robots, the legendary after-hours on Avenue B, get shoutouts in a song with the chorus “I’m proud to make my home in New York City.”

Speaking of gritty hangouts, Bowery Boogie has a look at Max Fish’s new Asbury Park outpost. Needless to say, the blog has an opinion about what’s more punk rock, skee ball or pool tables.

Commercial Observer reports that Edward Minskoff, who personally invested over $100 million in equity in his 51 Astor Place office building, is closing in on a deal with its first tenant: “Hult International Business School is in talks to take 51 Astor’s entire second floor, a roughly 55,000-square-foot space. Sources say the school could pay rents that begin in the $60s per square foot but escalate to around $100 per square foot over the life of a long term lease at the roughly 400,000-square-foot property.” Read more…

Photos: Noah Fecks. Cocktails, in order: Friend of the Devil (two photos), Gin and Juice (three photos), Manhattan, Lady of the Night (three photos), and J. Crusteau at Booker and Dax; I Hear Banjos (two photos) at The Wayland; Beetnick, Manhattan on Draught, Bowery Fix, and Yankee Mule at Saxon + Parole; Flor de Jalisco, 1890, Bitter Mule, and Pimm’s Tonic at The Wren; and G.P. Spritz and The Last Cocktail at Prima.

Jason Mendenhall, a partner in the new cocktail bar on Avenue C, The Wayland, knows the East Village has long been a drinks destination. “I’ve heard people refer to the neighborhood as the cocktail ghetto,” he recently told The Local. Lately, mixologists like Mr. Mendenhall have been raising the proverbial bar on tired old speakeasy drinks, with twists that have nothing to do with lemon rinds: we’re talking red-hot pokers, smoke capsules, and centrifuges.

Take Mr. Mendenhall’s most popular creation, I Hear Banjos. The mixologist roasts apples to make bitters for the corn-whiskey and applejack drink (he’s also working on umami bitters, made from various mushrooms). But that isn’t the impressive part. For campfire effect, the drink is capped with an upside-down snifter full of applewood smoke. Mr. Mendenhall is planning an entire line of smoked drinks (and a line of drinks incorporating vegetables like kale and beets, as well), and he also hopes to create smoked ice.

At Booker and Dax, the recently opened bar at Momofuku Ssam, partner Dave Arnold is going one step further than using a smoking gun – he’s wielding a red-hot poker. “It has an internal temperature of 1,500 degrees Farenheit,” he said. “We shove it into the drink to create burnt-caramel flavors that you can’t get by making a hot drink on the stove.” Read more…