Food & Drink
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst
Fried food and beer go together: we know it, your old man knows it, the Brits know it, and even the folks down there in Bay Ridge know it.
Reader Allie passed on this great tip about Longbow Pub & Pantry in Bay Ridge which is offering a summer special: every order of fish and chips comes with a pint of any of their 12 draft beers.
The deal lasts through the end of the month and is good every day, all day long. It’s sort of like a reverse of the pizza-and-a-beer deals we’re all used to (which is no longer available at The Charleston, btw. Sad face).
Outings
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst
Since it’s a classic Italian tale that works wherever it’s set, we imagine a South Brooklyn version of Romeo and Juliet should go over especially well. Bensonhurst is where the Genesis Repertory Ensemble calls home, and their season-opening production is set right there on the company’s own turf. Genesis has been setting classic plays in not-so-classic settings since they debuted in 1999 with Hamlet in Kennedy-era Washington D.C. Romeo and Juliet opens this weekend (Fri., May 7 & Sat., May 8) with a Russian-Jewish Romeo and Palestinian Juliet. We’re not sure if Little Italy comes into play—maybe that would have been too easy. 
Outings
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst
When the weather’s nice, there’s nothing like heading to a new neighborhood. Or, if you live in Bay Ridge, then it’s awesome when you have a reason for your friends to come to you. Like this weekend, for the art expo, craft show and live music of the Bay Ridge Festival of the Arts. The fest opens tonight with a reception and live jazz, and events (raffles, plant sale too) run through Sunday. The thing’s been going on since 1968, and the folks behind it provide scholarships to help local high-schoolers pursue a college degree in the arts. Here’s the full schedule:
Services
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst
BEFORE my $10 blow-out
You could pull your hair out looking for cheap beauty services in New York. Take, for example, the blow-out. It’s a basic treatment that runs upward of $45 at popular salons like Beehive and Woodley & Bunny, and Slope Suds is right there at $40+. So, when I heard that there was a Daily News-approved salon in Bath Beach, Brooklyn offering blow-outs for a measly $10, I was more than willing to brave the freezing one-hour subway ride from Williamsburg for the good hair deal. After all, there isn’t a cheap-o hair experiment I’d ever pass up.
Services
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst
In Williamsburg, where I live, it’s hard to find someone to cut your hair for less than $60 who doesn’t make you look like an eastern European club kid circa 1993. And so, when assigned to check out the $10 haircuts at Empire Beauty School in Bensonhurst, I was willing, if not exactly eager. At least it wouldn’t be any worse than what I could give myself.
No styling skills are required for admission to Empire, which is one of the area academies where future hairdressers must toil for seven to 16 months before taking the New York State licensing exam. The school offers the public $10 practice cuts by pupils with little and possibly no experience, which was evident when I checked in for my appointment and was randomly assigned to a student who stared at me with a look of fear. That probably should have been my first clue that things weren’t going to go well.
Food & Drink
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst
Bay Ridge isn’t known for an abundance of self-righteous organicists, kids with food allergies invented by their parents or oddly sour New Agers. So the new food co-op they’re planning over there might not be as… interesting as the Park Slope one. Despite all of its nuttiness and petty annoyances, though, we love the PSFC like a batty old aunt with 17 cats, so another one is a grand idea, especially if about 5,000 current Slopers bolt for that one instead. In less than two years’ time, they may be able to.
Food & Drink,
Outings
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst,
Coney Island/ Brighton Beach/ Sheepshead Bay
Sheepshead Bay pier, by Nimo Photography
Here we are, at the tail-end of summer, September drawing perilously near, and maybe that European jaunt you dreamed of just didn’t pan out this season. We expected as much, and we’ve been doing our best to provide substitutes: exotic home swaps, $500-a-week vacations, a special kind of working holiday and, well, Mexico. But if none of these was the thing for you, it’s not too late for this one last chance for a great almost-getaway: the South Brooklyn staycation. Here are 17 ways to have a (very full) weekend in our own down-under.
Sales & Deals,
Shopping
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst,
Coney Island/ Brighton Beach/ Sheepshead Bay,
Downtown
“Shoes, shoes, omigod, shoes” are the chorus of a YouTube music video making the viral rounds. The Shoes video may be exaggerated take on the stereotype that all women are consumed by footwear, but not in my case. I am obsessed, especially with this year’s bold, colorful, statement-making heels (like these Michael Kors platforms at left). So I went to compare out the end-of-summer selection at Century 21, DSW and Loehmann’s. A shoedown, if you will.
Services
All the way out there,
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst,
Ditmas Park/ Midwood/ Flatbush
Prices at New Hair. Photo by Charna Meyers.
Admit it, venturing as far south as I live (Bensonhurst) only happens once (Mermaid Parade) maybe twice (Siren Festival) a year for most northerners. But would you make the trip if you knew that the subway stops which immediately precede the famed Stillwell Avenue station could save a ton of money on haircuts, blowouts, massages and facials?
I’ve been in this area for most of my 30 years and in that time I’ve found primpatoriums a-plenty. OK, they’re not exactly Bliss, but this is the South, and we aren’t as interested in the calming faux paint technique used on the walls as we are with the small amount of money coming out of our fake-Coach wallets.
Outings
Bay Ridge/ Bensonhurst
Dying over here! So we read in today’s Post that legal scalpers are charging $850 for tee times at the Bethpage Black golf course—host to this week’s U.S. Open—and we got to wondering whether there weren’t cheaper courses in Brooklyn. There are, of course… but Tiger doesn’t really play at them, they’re still kind of expensive, and who are we to say if they’re any good, and plus we found something even more exciting to tell you about: free summer golf lessons for kids at a beautiful new Brooklyn course!
Fried food and beer go together: we know it, your old man knows it, the Brits know it, and even the folks down there in Bay Ridge know it.
RSS
Twitter
Facebook