NY Barfly

Nightlife's a Circus (at least at club Carnival)

We’re sure that you’ve all heard of the new Circus themed club Carnival. We recently went over for a visit. While we expected cheese, we actually had a blast spending all of our money trying to win worthless (but cute!) stuffed animals.

A night at the club brought up one of New York's eternal questions. How does a nightclub that holds bar mitzvahs during the day stack up to New York’s true freak show: the actual Coney Island?

We’ll, we visited both, and you can find our write up for The Onion here. And yes, we came back alive. Although, if someone comes across the limb that went missing on the boardwalk, please let us know. It’s hard to type with one hand!

Gourmet Slider Happy Hour Launches

When a Michelin star rated chef launches a happy hour, you know you're in for a treat. At Tribeca's Marc Forgione, that treat comes in the form of all you can eat sliders. These tasty puppies aren't the typical bar food you'd get at a neighborhood pub. They're put together with suckling pig, one of the restaurant's most drool worthy menu items.

The Chef puts the pig through a 24 hour curing process and then cooks it with a mixture of beer, bacon and butter (can you say yum, yum, and yum). The happy hour runs every Tuesday night from 6 - 9 pm. Patrons assemble their own sliders using the luscious suckling pig meat, pickles, mustard, and buns provided. If you're not sure where the do it yourself counter is, just look for the small pig that they have on display during the deal.

$16 gets you as many sliders as you can eat, and 2 for 1 beers for the duration of happy hour. With multiple trips back to the pig, it's easy to make these sliders into a full meal. You can chow down at a Michelin recognized restaurant for a fraction of the price.

Marc Forgione is located at 134 Reade Street between Hudson and Greenwich.

Balade Restaurant: Rose Water and Lebanese Cuisine

Valentine’s Day is a little far out, but it’s about time to start thinking about cocktails for your sweetheart. On a recent visit to the newly opened Lebanese restaurant Balade (208 First Avenue, pictured), we found something that is perfect for three reasons:

1. It’s simple.
2. It’s pink.
3. It involves roses.

If your honey isn’t charmed by Balade’s Rose Water, well, maybe it’s time to hit the bars and try to pick up a new honey. The restaurant plans to serve their pink concoction for $10 a glass. When you sip, it seems complex. Floral notes under lie the sparkling wine base; we thought we detected hints of St. Germain and maybe even some Cointreau. Nope – it’s just white wine and rose oil. Simple, elegant, maybe even a little sexy.

We’ve listed the recipe below if you want to work out some Rose Water action in your apartment. As always, it’s probably better to let the pros at the restaurant handle it. The space is small and charming, and it’s in a great area if you want a quick bite before bar hopping. The vibe is chill and the prices leave plenty of money for when you’re ready to hit some other drink joints.

For those of you who need a new honey, you might even find something to love at this spot. We suggest the hummus. It’s delicious, and it will never talk to you about how you need direction in life.

Balade’s Rose Water

Yield:  8 Champagne glasses

1 bottle of sparkling wine

1/4 cup of rose water syrup

Mix together, and top with fresh roses

Another Haiti Fundraiser: Rum and Cigars

The Haiti fundraisers continue to come down the pipeline. As we pointed out earlier this week, these things raise actual bucks. When we heard that tonight’s fundraiser involves rum and cigars, so it promises to be an actual good time as well.

The event is being held at Davidoff of Geneva, on Madison Avenue at 54^th Street. The liquid goodies are being provided by the Park Avenue Liquor Shop (one of the city’s poshest liquor stores, pictured) and all proceeds are being donated to the American Red Cross for relief efforts.

The gig is tonight (Jan the 28^th) and lasts from 7:15 – 9pm. Davidoff is located at 535 Madison Avenue, and a ticket will cost you $50. They’ll be selling tickets at the door, so head over and drink for a good cause.

Fist Pump! Jersey Shore Party Madness

Couldn’t make the Jersey Shore party held at Sutton Place this Saturday? Well, we have to say, you missed out on a Mecca of poofy hair, sunglasses, and Pauly D style blow outs. If you want to check out a full write-up, then head to Huffpost where you can see a report filed by yours truly.

If you just want to see some classic Jersey Shore party pics, how about these three.

In other Jersey Shore news, a party in Montclair drew a whopping 2,000 revelers (and the club could only hold 800, yikes). Instead of fist pumping, there were some fist fights as people jockeyed to get into the club. Or, maybe the partiers were just trying to act out their favorite scenes from the show.

 

 

Party Report: A Boozy Brunch for Bloggers

A group of New York bloggers gathered at Clover Club this past weekend to share some cocktails and gorge on Clover’s brunch offerings (family style bacon = still drooling). It brings to mind one of those old time jokes. How many bloggers does it take to make a boozy brunch interesting? In this case it took about 30 to finish a case of Tequila, and that’s plenty interesting for us.

Our favorite libation was the Bloody Mary mixed with a Partida Tequila base.  Seeing this Mexican spirit in brunch cocktails is pretty rare. The bold flavors of the liquor don’t always go well with cocktails in the AM.

Well, this Bloody Mary delivered, mainly because the smooth flavor of the agave balanced nicely with the potent horseradish and tomato kick. Forget vodka, we’re only doing Tequila Marys from now on.

The other spirit of the day was Sombra Mezcal – it might not have been better than the bacon, but it was a close second in Julie Reiner's Oxacan Daisy cocktail. Come to think of it, maybe we should try to dip our bacon IN the smoky spirit next time. Drool.

Thanks to The Dizzy Fizz for organizing and Lush Life for the pics!

Can't. Stop. Writing. About. Jersey. Shore.

Ok – we officially admit, the Jersey Shore Mania is out of control. That’s why we promise that this will be the last post about it for a while (except for the next one, but that will really be it!). We have to stop writing about it, as we have to watch the episodes for the 17^th time.

Eater has a hilarious chart of the rise and fall of the Jersey Shore cast members. Looks like they are going down faster than The Jet Star (bonus points for anyone who knew that The Jet Star is the roller coaster at Seaside Heights). 

In other horrifying train wreck style news, The Situation had a beer named in his honor. Now you can do more than watch him, you can drink him. Enter your own vomit joke here.

Sexy New Schweppes Bottles (Limited Editions!)

Can a bottle of something so mundane as soda water create a lustful reaction? If the newly released bottles of Schweppes mixers are any indication, the answer is hell yes (excuse us while we splash our face with some tonic water to cool down).

The limited edition puppies were designed by Aussie agency Di Donato, and they use classic Schweppes pin-up girl artwork from the early 1900’s. Sexing up these mixers is a great idea, especially if you use them on your home bar. If you have to drink a gin and tonic alone, you’ll have someone to talk to (although the temptress on the bottle won’t talk back).

Take a peek. We’re still trying to confirm if these babes will be available in the States.  Until then, lust away.

Where We're Headed: Hoboken

Perhaps inspired by Jersey Shore mania, we decided to get on the PATH train last Friday evening for a trip to our sister city across the river.

We started at the Hoboken W Hotel. With gorgeous city views, a deck for smokers, and some excellent cocktails The Chandelier Room left us feeling, well, right at home. The spot was crowded with attractive drinkers by around 10 PM. Although ostensibly a hotel bar, it seemed to us that it was mostly locals looking for a more upscale option. Real Housewife of New Jersey Danielle was also spotted sipping beverages at the bar.

After getting our buzz on in a welcoming environment, it was time to have the true Hoboken experience. What is that? Bar hopping among the multitude of Irish no-name pubs that surround the Path station. It’s definitely easy to get caught up in the Jersey Spirit at these spots. People pound shots, scream Billy Joel lyrics to the jukebox, and say lewd things about the blonde girl in the corner.

Much like the MTV show, getting tipsy at these spots is pure Jersey glory. It’s cheesy, it’s shameless, and it’s a hell of a good time.

Swell Sipping at The Noble Rot's Wine Tasting

What is The Noble Rot? According to the folks behind an upcoming wine event, it’s a traveling wine saloon or a place to a place to learn about vino. It can also be used as a verb, and means “to mix socially with others”. For example: “I can’t wait to noble rot with the other charming wine drinkers on an upcoming Sunday evening.”

Naturally, that’s exactly what we plan to do. The Noble Rot folks have snagged food and wine writer Jeff Morgan to share his thoughts about tasting. He’s authored five books about food and wine and was the west coast editor of Wine Spectator. When he promises to have you “tasting like a pro” in about an hour, we think he means business.

As a sneak preview, we hear that Jeff thinks glassware doesn’t matter and that swirling is a bunch of nonsense. Sounds like our type of dude, especially because we’ve been trying to bring back the classic wine container made of goat skin as the drinking vessel of choice. Sadly, this hasn’t caught on, but we’ll be sure to bring it up with him on our visit.

The event promises a cocktail half hour where you’ll get to enjoy some choice sparkling wines, a talk and tasting led by Jeff, and the most exciting part, “mingle time”. You’ll even get to try a chardonnay that’s not yet released to the public – sweet (well, oaky is probably more on point). ‘

This intimate event runs $45 a head, and is being held on Sunday, January 31^st from 7 to 9 PM. If you’re interested in hanging with some top notch winos, email info@thenoblerot.com for reservations.