12__ The Back Room Tabooze in a teacup
This could be the only bar whose bouncer directs you to the door. “The Back Room? . . . down here!” He points to a metal gate with a Lower East Side Toy Company sign. Stairs take you down to a grimlooking alley. Rusty iron steps at the far end lead to a closed door. Be brave, go inside. It’s dimly lit but sparkly. Smiling, attractive people cluster and dance beside a roaring-twenties mirrored bar running along the front wall. Paintings of saucy ladies leer provocatively from the sidelines. Up some carpeted steps, a posh lounge oozes with period decor – red velvet settees, cocktail tables, and objets d’art elegantly arranged in the warm glow of a fireplace and twinkling chandeliers. With a nod to the days when booze was outlawed and consumed in secret, the Back Room’s potent cocktails are served ‘disguised’ in teacups, bottle beer in brown paper bags, drafts in coffee mugs, and shots in espresso cups. Various trendy bars in the city pretend to be speakeasies. But this tucked-away night spot is the real deal – an authentic, clandestine drinking lounge that flourished during Prohibition. Back then you entered through the rear door of Ratner’s, a famous Lower East Side dairy restaurant. Open round the clock, Ratner’s blintzes and fresh-baked onion rolls drew all-night crowds that included Al Jolson, Fanny Brice, and Groucho Marx, along with notorious gangsters like Bugsy Siegel, Lucky Luciano, and Meyer Lansky. After eating kosher delicacies they’d sneak into the back room. Celebrities are still spotted here. Pearl Jam presided over the club’s 2005 reopening party; star-power patrons reserve bottle-serviceonly tables or throw lavish parties in its hidden Back Of The Back Room room. Toast the twenties into the wee hours. Weekends are wild. Live jazz at Lucky’s Lounge Mondays requires a password at the door, and Poetry Brothels on the last Sunday of the month defy polite description. 32
Address 102 Norfolk Street (near Rivington Street), NY 10002, Phone +1 212.228.5098, www.backroomnyc.com, info@backroomnyc.com | Transit Subway: Essex St ( J, M, Z); Delancey St (F); Grand St (B, D), Bus: M 9, M 14, M 15, M 21 | Hours Sun – Mon 7:30pm – 2am, Tue –Thu 7:30pm – 3am, Fri – Sat 7:30pm – 4am | Tip If you work up a hunger dancing, Schiller’s on Rivington serves late suppers until 3am on Fridays and Saturdays.
12__ The Back Room Tabooze in a teacup
This could be the only bar whose bouncer directs you to the door. “The Back Room? . . . down here!” He points to a metal gate with a Lower East Side Toy Company sign. Stairs take you down to a grimlooking alley. Rusty iron steps at the far end lead to a closed door. Be brave, go inside. It’s dimly lit but sparkly. Smiling, attractive people cluster and dance beside a roaring-twenties mirrored bar running along the front wall. Paintings of saucy ladies leer provocatively from the sidelines. Up some carpeted steps, a posh lounge oozes with period decor – red velvet settees, cocktail tables, and objets d’art elegantly arranged in the warm glow of a fireplace and twinkling chandeliers. With a nod to the days when booze was outlawed and consumed in secret, the Back Room’s potent cocktails are served ‘disguised’ in teacups, bottle beer in brown paper bags, drafts in coffee mugs, and shots in espresso cups. Various trendy bars in the city pretend to be speakeasies. But this tucked-away night spot is the real deal – an authentic, clandestine drinking lounge that flourished during Prohibition. Back then you entered through the rear door of Ratner’s, a famous Lower East Side dairy restaurant. Open round the clock, Ratner’s blintzes and fresh-baked onion rolls drew all-night crowds that included Al Jolson, Fanny Brice, and Groucho Marx, along with notorious gangsters like Bugsy Siegel, Lucky Luciano, and Meyer Lansky. After eating kosher delicacies they’d sneak into the back room. Celebrities are still spotted here. Pearl Jam presided over the club’s 2005 reopening party; star-power patrons reserve bottle-serviceonly tables or throw lavish parties in its hidden Back Of The Back Room room. Toast the twenties into the wee hours. Weekends are wild. Live jazz at Lucky’s Lounge Mondays requires a password at the door, and Poetry Brothels on the last Sunday of the month defy polite description. 32
Address 102 Norfolk Street (near Rivington Street), NY 10002, Phone +1 212.228.5098, www.backroomnyc.com, info@backroomnyc.com | Transit Subway: Essex St ( J, M, Z); Delancey St (F); Grand St (B, D), Bus: M 9, M 14, M 15, M 21 | Hours Sun – Mon 7:30pm – 2am, Tue –Thu 7:30pm – 3am, Fri – Sat 7:30pm – 4am | Tip If you work up a hunger dancing, Schiller’s on Rivington serves late suppers until 3am on Fridays and Saturdays.
13__ The Dinner Party A seat at the table
In a dark and starry space that seems to extend beyond all boundaries sits a monumental, fully-set banquet table forming an open equilateral triangle. It’s firmly grounded yet infinitely reflected. At first it’s dazzling, almost too immense. As your eyes adjust to the darkness and scale of the gallery, the details reveal why this iconic work is a milestone in feminist art. The ceremonial table lays out place settings for thirty-nine mythical and historical women, thirteen on each of its 48-footlong sides. Each setting has a cloth table runner embroidered with the guest-of-honor’s name and patterns or imagery that symbolize her life; a golden chalice and utensils; and most prominent, a sculpted ceramic dinner plate (fashioned in vulvar and butterfly forms) representing her essence. At the room’s center is the glistening, tiled Heritage Floor – gold-inscribed names of 999 women who were left out of history books but whose lives inspired those at the table. Artist Judy Chicago’s original plan was to paint images of great ladies on china plates. It evolved into an elaborate five-year project commemorating significant women in Western civilization through embroidery, weaving, and china-decoration – traditional ‘women’s work’ emblematic of oppression and domestication. Chicago described her mission to reclaim these lost histories as “a reinterpretation of the Last Supper from the point of view of women who, throughout history, prepared the meals and set the table.” Hundreds of volunteer artisans – ceramicists, weavers, calligraphers, r esearchers – collaborated to bring the artist’s vision to life. First exhibited in 1979, it traveled the world. It now has a permanent home at the core of the Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum. From Primordial Goddess to Georgia O’Keeffe, women who command a place at the table nobly challenge you to partake. 34
Address Brooklyn Museum: Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, 200 Eastern Parkway (near Washington Avenue), Brooklyn NY 11238, Phone +1 718.638.5000, www.brooklynmuseum.org | Transit Subway: Eastern Parkway-Brooklyn Museum (2, 3); Franklin Ave (4, 5), Bus: B 41, B 45, B 48, B 69 | Hours Wed, Fri – Sun 11am – 6pm, Thu 11am –10pm, closed Mon, Tues | Tip Powerful female images from antiquity are in the museum’s Egyptian Collection. The terracotta Bird Lady figurine is world famous.
13__ The Dinner Party A seat at the table
In a dark and starry space that seems to extend beyond all boundaries sits a monumental, fully-set banquet table forming an open equilateral triangle. It’s firmly grounded yet infinitely reflected. At first it’s dazzling, almost too immense. As your eyes adjust to the darkness and scale of the gallery, the details reveal why this iconic work is a milestone in feminist art. The ceremonial table lays out place settings for thirty-nine mythical and historical women, thirteen on each of its 48-footlong sides. Each setting has a cloth table runner embroidered with the guest-of-honor’s name and patterns or imagery that symbolize her life; a golden chalice and utensils; and most prominent, a sculpted ceramic dinner plate (fashioned in vulvar and butterfly forms) representing her essence. At the room’s center is the glistening, tiled Heritage Floor – gold-inscribed names of 999 women who were left out of history books but whose lives inspired those at the table. Artist Judy Chicago’s original plan was to paint images of great ladies on china plates. It evolved into an elaborate five-year project commemorating significant women in Western civilization through embroidery, weaving, and china-decoration – traditional ‘women’s work’ emblematic of oppression and domestication. Chicago described her mission to reclaim these lost histories as “a reinterpretation of the Last Supper from the point of view of women who, throughout history, prepared the meals and set the table.” Hundreds of volunteer artisans – ceramicists, weavers, calligraphers, r esearchers – collaborated to bring the artist’s vision to life. First exhibited in 1979, it traveled the world. It now has a permanent home at the core of the Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum. From Primordial Goddess to Georgia O’Keeffe, women who command a place at the table nobly challenge you to partake. 34
Address Brooklyn Museum: Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, 200 Eastern Parkway (near Washington Avenue), Brooklyn NY 11238, Phone +1 718.638.5000, www.brooklynmuseum.org | Transit Subway: Eastern Parkway-Brooklyn Museum (2, 3); Franklin Ave (4, 5), Bus: B 41, B 45, B 48, B 69 | Hours Wed, Fri – Sun 11am – 6pm, Thu 11am –10pm, closed Mon, Tues | Tip Powerful female images from antiquity are in the museum’s Egyptian Collection. The terracotta Bird Lady figurine is world famous.
14__ Oldest Manhole Cover Keeping a lid on it
Could this be a portal to the Ninja Turtles’ secret lair? Not quite. According to urban legend, sewers and tunnels beneath the city’s elaborate manhole covers are the domain of far creepier mutant reptiles – alligators! How is this possible? New Yorkers returning from Florida vacations in the 1950s would bring home a cute baby alli gator as a souvenir. When the critters grew larger, they got flushed down the toilet to sewers where (the legend claims) they ate rubbish and rats, and still prowl through the sewer system. New York’s oldest lid on this underworld is on Jersey Street, a tiny, ungentrified Soho alley. Its time-worn surface reads CROTON AQUEDUCT 1866, marking access to an original conduit of the city’s very first public water supply. Before Croton Aqueduct was built, the city’s supply of fresh water from wells and springs was dwindling. Filthy water was a public health menace. The Aqueduct, completed in 1842, transformed city life. Water was piped down from upstate Croton River to reservoirs that are now the sites of Central Park’s Great Lawn and NY Public Library’s Bryant Park. A network of water mains then brought fresh water to homes and businesses. Raised designs on early manhole covers gave horses better traction and pedestrians a handy way to scrape manure and mud from their boots. The city foundries took great pride in creating marvelous ornamental covers. Glance down as you cross the streets – there’s a fascinating gallery of cast-iron artistry beneath your feet! You’ll see many different intricate patterns of stars, flowers, honeycombs, ships’ wheels, chain links, hexagons, some even with glass inserts. To the delight of urban archaeologists and artists, many have been catalogued and photographed as the subject of art books. Take time to appreciate these extraordinary circular lids that seal off city pipes, cables, tunnels, and critters – both real and imagined. 36
Address Jersey Street (between Mulberry and Crosby Streets), NY 10012 | Transit Subway: Broadway-Lafayette (B, D, F, M); Bleecker St (6); Prince St (N, R), Bus: M 5, M 15, M 21, M 103 | Tip The Lower East Side Tenement Museum gift shop sells a circular floor mat that’s a life-size replica of a NYC manhole cover.
14__ Oldest Manhole Cover Keeping a lid on it
Could this be a portal to the Ninja Turtles’ secret lair? Not quite. According to urban legend, sewers and tunnels beneath the city’s elaborate manhole covers are the domain of far creepier mutant reptiles – alligators! How is this possible? New Yorkers returning from Florida vacations in the 1950s would bring home a cute baby alli gator as a souvenir. When the critters grew larger, they got flushed down the toilet to sewers where (the legend claims) they ate rubbish and rats, and still prowl through the sewer system. New York’s oldest lid on this underworld is on Jersey Street, a tiny, ungentrified Soho alley. Its time-worn surface reads CROTON AQUEDUCT 1866, marking access to an original conduit of the city’s very first public water supply. Before Croton Aqueduct was built, the city’s supply of fresh water from wells and springs was dwindling. Filthy water was a public health menace. The Aqueduct, completed in 1842, transformed city life. Water was piped down from upstate Croton River to reservoirs that are now the sites of Central Park’s Great Lawn and NY Public Library’s Bryant Park. A network of water mains then brought fresh water to homes and businesses. Raised designs on early manhole covers gave horses better traction and pedestrians a handy way to scrape manure and mud from their boots. The city foundries took great pride in creating marvelous ornamental covers. Glance down as you cross the streets – there’s a fascinating gallery of cast-iron artistry beneath your feet! You’ll see many different intricate patterns of stars, flowers, honeycombs, ships’ wheels, chain links, hexagons, some even with glass inserts. To the delight of urban archaeologists and artists, many have been catalogued and photographed as the subject of art books. Take time to appreciate these extraordinary circular lids that seal off city pipes, cables, tunnels, and critters – both real and imagined. 36
Address Jersey Street (between Mulberry and Crosby Streets), NY 10012 | Transit Subway: Broadway-Lafayette (B, D, F, M); Bleecker St (6); Prince St (N, R), Bus: M 5, M 15, M 21, M 103 | Tip The Lower East Side Tenement Museum gift shop sells a circular floor mat that’s a life-size replica of a NYC manhole cover.
15__ Pastrami Queen Love at first bite
It is said that you never forget your first love. And once you’ve tasted authentic New York pastrami you’ll never forget your first bite. You know greatness when you taste it. Just the thought of it could make you stop whatever you’re doing and fixate on the sheer sensual delight of a mouthful of tender, smoky, aromatic meat laced with garlic and crushed peppercorns. Exquisite fatty and lean slices piled high on fragrant rye bread. Ooooh! A sandwich that was once available at every corner deli in Jewish neighborhoods on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, in Brooklyn and the Bronx, classic New York pastrami is now increasingly hard to find. Out-of-towners generally consider all New York pastrami to be excellent since it’s far superior to the processed meat-stuff bearing that name that’s sold everywhere else. So while it’s easy for New York delis to claim they’re the best (and a select group of well-known delis do serve very good pastrami), seasoned New Yorkers can taste the difference and agree that Pastrami Queen really nails it. It’s a nondescript kosher-deli storefront on the upper east side, with a brightly lit counter and five tables that seat just sixteen patrons. It’s small and it’s not pretty, but the menu is expansive and seductive. Stand at the counter and watch the pros deftly slice your order of incomparable pastrami, or other deli delights – corned beef, brisket, tongue, turkey, roast beef, chicken, and chopped liver. They have luscious salads and sides, plus traditional kasha, knishes, potato pancakes, and matzo ball soup; crispy hand-cut fries, franks, and knockwurst. You can phone in an order for local delivery, stop by for take-out, or have Pastrami Queen cater your party. But at least once, arrive early and sit at a table. In a flash, the waiter brings pickles and your hot pastrami sandwich. Grab it with both hands and prepare to fall in love. 38
Address 1125 Lexington Avenue (at 78th Street), NY 10075, Phone +1 212.734.1500, www.pastramiqueen.com | Transit Subway: 77 St (6), Bus: M 1, M 2, M 3, M 4, M 15, M 72, M 79, M 101, M 102, M 103 | Hours Daily 10am –10pm | Tip The lower level of exquisite St. Jean Baptiste Church on 76th and Lexington is home to the DiCapo Opera Theater, a “mini-Met.”
15__ Pastrami Queen Love at first bite
It is said that you never forget your first love. And once you’ve tasted authentic New York pastrami you’ll never forget your first bite. You know greatness when you taste it. Just the thought of it could make you stop whatever you’re doing and fixate on the sheer sensual delight of a mouthful of tender, smoky, aromatic meat laced with garlic and crushed peppercorns. Exquisite fatty and lean slices piled high on fragrant rye bread. Ooooh! A sandwich that was once available at every corner deli in Jewish neighborhoods on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, in Brooklyn and the Bronx, classic New York pastrami is now increasingly hard to find. Out-of-towners generally consider all New York pastrami to be excellent since it’s far superior to the processed meat-stuff bearing that name that’s sold everywhere else. So while it’s easy for New York delis to claim they’re the best (and a select group of well-known delis do serve very good pastrami), seasoned New Yorkers can taste the difference and agree that Pastrami Queen really nails it. It’s a nondescript kosher-deli storefront on the upper east side, with a brightly lit counter and five tables that seat just sixteen patrons. It’s small and it’s not pretty, but the menu is expansive and seductive. Stand at the counter and watch the pros deftly slice your order of incomparable pastrami, or other deli delights – corned beef, brisket, tongue, turkey, roast beef, chicken, and chopped liver. They have luscious salads and sides, plus traditional kasha, knishes, potato pancakes, and matzo ball soup; crispy hand-cut fries, franks, and knockwurst. You can phone in an order for local delivery, stop by for take-out, or have Pastrami Queen cater your party. But at least once, arrive early and sit at a table. In a flash, the waiter brings pickles and your hot pastrami sandwich. Grab it with both hands and prepare to fall in love. 38
Address 1125 Lexington Avenue (at 78th Street), NY 10075, Phone +1 212.734.1500, www.pastramiqueen.com | Transit Subway: 77 St (6), Bus: M 1, M 2, M 3, M 4, M 15, M 72, M 79, M 101, M 102, M 103 | Hours Daily 10am –10pm | Tip The lower level of exquisite St. Jean Baptiste Church on 76th and Lexington is home to the DiCapo Opera Theater, a “mini-Met.”