A History of New York City Told Through its Restaurants

Summary

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Podcast Summary: All Of It (WNYC)

Episode: "A History of New York City Told Through its Restaurants"

Date: April 15, 2024
Host: Koosha Navadar (in for Alison Stewart)
Guest: Alan Sytsma, Food Editor, New York Magazine

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Brief Overview

This episode explores New York City's rich social and cultural history through the lens of its restaurants, focusing on the newly-released "Yesteryear" issue of New York Magazine. The host, Koosha Navadar, and guest, Alan Sytsma, delve into how eateries have shaped the city’s life and identity, centering on personal stories, memories, and the distinctively communal role restaurants play in New Yorkers' lives. Listeners call in to share their own nostalgic tales about beloved establishments, past and present.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

Why Restaurants? – The Editorial Choice

• The annual “Yesteryear” issue reflects on NYC history; this year, the focus is restaurants.
• The quilted giraffe article's success last year inspired the idea.
• The editorial process shifted from covering 'dishes' or 'chefs' to highlighting 'scenes' and guests.
• Alan Sytsma: “It almost became less of a food story, less of a restaurant story, and really just a story about the city's history, which is what we always want the issue to be anyway.” (05:23)

The People Behind the Places

• The concept solidified around a photo of Mark Twain at Delmonico’s, which unlocked the approach of showcasing events and parties, not just establishments.
• Inclusion of writers and culture experts who contributed personal vignettes about iconic nights and regulars.

Subcultures & Scenes: Punk, Artists, Bartenders

• Special focus on the diversity of restaurant-goers, from punks in the East Village (e.g., Lechko’s, The Cauldron) to legendary artist haunts and celebrity regulars.
• Alan Sytsma: “Everybody has to eat somewhere… there’s gonna be so much color and, you know, experience from this that you never even think about.” (07:52)

Call-Ins: Listener Memories [09:44–12:05]

• Katie, Larchmont: Reminisces about Goldberg’s Pizza and their unforgettable "smog pizza."
• Al, New Jersey: Shares family visits to Grotto Azzura in Little Italy—classic Italian fare and peaches in wine.
• Susan, Connecticut: Describes traditions forged at Jean's on 6th Avenue, including uncanny bartender memory and annual reunions.

The "Regular" and the Third Space [12:21–14:08, 17:00–18:21]

• Sitsma highlights Jean’s as a classic “regular’s bar,” emphasizing the unique NYC phenomenon of restaurants as extensions of the home due to small living spaces.
• Explains that restaurants are more than eateries—they’re workplaces, gathering spots, and hubs of neighborhood life.

The Enduring Allure of Disappearing Haunts [14:08–]

• Alan’s personal nostalgia for WD50 (experimental, now-closed), suggesting these places linger in collective and personal memory long after their closure.
• Texts from listeners reveal widespread longing for lost mainstays like Odessa, Angelica’s Kitchen, Florent, and artist bars like Cedar Tavern.

The Unique New York Restaurant Culture [17:00–18:21, 28:59–30:09]

• NYC's “third space” concept is more pronounced because of lifestyle—compact homes make public gathering places vital.
• “We live in tiny spaces. We take restaurants as... more than just places to go eat for us. We work there, we live there.... underneath it all, we’re still sort of that tavern town.” (Alan Sytsma, 17:00)

The Impact of Change – Gentrification and Shifting Cityscapes [28:59–29:49]

• Urban renewal, development, and rent increases cited as common exclamation points on restaurant stories—closure and reinvention are part of the city’s DNA.
• Alan reflects on a photo of a father and son in a now-demolished mall, calling it "the ghost of New York past."

Nostalgia for Eras Never Lived [21:42–22:47]

• The magazine’s approach elicits a collective nostalgia, even for times readers or writers didn't experience directly.
• Alan: “It just sounds like this wild restaurant where you could get a chili dog or frogs’ legs and everyone was... crammed in together… it would have been nice to just spend a night there.” (referring to Maxwell’s Plum, 22:03)

Then & Now – What’s Changed, What’s Improved? [23:08–24:35]

• Alan discusses how apps and media hype push diners to the latest thing, eroding the sense of “regulars” and true scene-building.
• “Restaurants don’t have the time for financial reasons, media reasons… to really build that network of regular customers that creates a scene.” (23:35)
• Today’s food quality is probably higher on average than in the past, despite the lost sense of “home.”

Today’s Third Spaces and Building Connection [25:58–26:55]

• The idea of the “regular” is evolving but persists—establishments like Jean’s maintain tradition, with tight-knit communities and even legendary bartenders.
• Alan emphasizes the importance of giving back to the scene—being a valued patron is a two-way street.

Celebrities, Fame, and Restaurant Culture [30:09–31:21]

• Restaurants as stages for the famous to be seen, with stories from Fat Joe, Julia Fox, and others woven into the narrative.
• Sytsma: “If you’re a celebrity, you want to be seen, right? You want to be out, you want to be where the party is… and you’re going to get treated really well.”

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “It almost became less of a food story, less of a restaurant story, and really just a story about the city's history, which is what we always want the issue to be anyway.”
  — Alan Sytsma (05:23)

• “There’s going to be so much color and, you know, experience from this that you never even think about.”
  — Alan Sytsma (07:52)

• Katie on Goldberg’s Pizza: “25 years later, I still think about that pizza.” (09:44)

• Al on Grotto Azzura: “As little kids, even peaches and wine... These voluptuous peaches in wine, fabulous Italian food, and it was just an event.” (10:34)

• Susan on Jean’s: “Went back [the next year]… the amazing bartender served our drinks without even asking... It’s been magical. We’ve gone every single year.” (11:18)

• “We live in tiny spaces…. underneath it all, we’re still sort of that tavern town…”
  — Alan Sytsma (17:00)

• “The sense of community, it absolutely still exists here. You just have to kind of, you know, know where it is.”
  — Alan Sytsma on today’s restaurant scene (26:55)

• On NYC always changing:
  “New York is always changing and it can't be stuck in the past.... we just got to revisit some of these moments in time.” (29:49)

• On celebrity and restaurants:
  “If you're a celebrity... you want to be where the party is... and you’re going to get treated really well.” (30:24)

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Timestamps of Important Segments

• 03:25 — Alan Sytsma introduces the inspiration behind the restaurant-focused "Yesteryear" issue
• 07:42 — Discussing East Village punk eateries and subculture intersections
• 09:44–12:05 — Listener call-in stories: Goldberg’s Pizza, Grotto Azzura, Jean’s
• 13:15 — Alan shares his own nostalgic memory: WD50 and experimental NY cuisine
• 17:00 — Why restaurants are “third spaces” in NYC
• 18:21 — Callers share family stories from Belmore Cafeteria, Luchow’s, and the Auto Pub
• 21:42 — The nostalgia of eras never lived and the wild energy of dining scenes like Maxwell’s Plum
• 23:08 — The effect of digital reservations/app culture on local regulars and community
• 25:58 — Are third spaces still alive? Alan discusses the shifting sense of communal spots
• 28:59 — The impact of city change, memory, and gentrification on collective nostalgia
• 30:09 — Role of restaurants in celebrity culture in NYC
• 31:23 — Close of the main segment

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Conclusion

The episode is a poignant, vibrant celebration of NYC’s restaurants as sites of communal memory, social change, and cultural continuity. Through Alan Sytsma’s editorial journey and listeners’ emotionally rich stories, the show paints a living tapestry of the city—one that is both perpetually changing and full of longing for “the way it was.”
Restaurants are more than where we eat—they are where New York lives.

Transcript

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This is all of it. I'm Kusha Navadar in for Alison Stewart. Thanks for spending this beautiful Monday with us. It's beautiful, you're beautiful and I'm grateful you're hanging out with us for a couple hours. On today's show, artist Mary Loveless o' Neill has a new solo exhibition and is included in the 2024 Whitney Biennial. She joins us to discuss along with gallery owner Marianne Boesky. Actors Hoa Shondae and Fred Wincon are here. They are starring in the new HBO adaptation of the Sympathizer. And we have author Katie Wen, who joins us. Her new novel, you Know what yout Did. That's the plan. So let's get this started with who ate? A social history of the city told entirely through its restaurants. Most of us in New York, well, we live in small spaces and so instead of staying in, we go out. And often we hang out in our city's restaurants. New Yorkers have been doing it for hundreds of years, and this dynamic has created a restaurant culture that's unique. I mean, is there any better dining experience than meeting people out in New York on a Friday night? You've got your 24 hour spots, the historic institutions downtown, the buzz of eaters in and around Broadway right after the curtain closes, or that hole in the wall around the corner that secretly has the best food in the city. New York magazine's new Y issue is a history of iconic New York restaurants, many of which are now closed. That history is told through the people who frequented those restaurants, either as diners or as servers. And with me now to take your calls is New York Magazine food editor Alan Sitsma. The magazine's latest issue is called who Ate Where? A social history of the city told entirely through its restaurants. Alan, welcome to wnyc.

[A]

Thank you so much for having me. Happy to be here.

[B]

And listeners, give us a call. If you've got a restaurant from a past era of New York that you just loved, you can call or text us now at 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692. Or you can DM us on social, on Instagram, on X. We're at all of it nyc. If you've got a favorite story from when you were in a restaurant, maybe a celebrity sighting or a server you always enjoyed interacting with or a place where you felt really belonged, give us that story. We're at 212-433-9692. Let's talk about the article, Alan. So every year, New York Magazine comes out with what you call a yesteryear issue. Why did you want this year's issue to focus on the restaurants of New York?

[A]

We pick a topic every single year. Last year it was the It Girls, for example. So this issue celebrates our anniversary for the magazine, and it's a chance to just look back on the city's history. A year ago, about 10 months ago, we had done a story about the quilted giraffe. Adam Platt, our former restaurant critic, now features writer, wrote it, talked to the chef, got these amazing photos like Madonna sitting on the pass at the restaurant, talking about kind of the wild nights and the food. We had no reason to do it other than we wanted to just take readers inside a restaurant that doesn't exist anymore that, you know, try to evoke the spirit of being there. And we loved it. So with the yesteryear issue coming up, we sort of said, what if we did a whole issue about old restaurants? And that was kind of as far as we took it until January when we realized that we were going to actually have to do it and put it together. And we thought, okay, what does this look like? Are we going to talk about dishes? Are we going to talk about chefs? Are we going to talk about the restaurants that you've heard about a hundred times? Are we Only going to talk about places you haven't heard about at all. So from there, we really started doing a ton of research. I have, like, 10 spreadsheets that just got wasted, that never got used. And we realized that what we really wanted to focus on was, like you said, the people and the scenes inside of these restaurants. And from there, it almost became less of a food story, less of a restaurant story, and really just a story about the city's history, which is what we always want the issue to be anyway.

[B]

And your point there about including focusing on the people, I think is the real interesting part of the whole article. I mean, it's pages upon pages of different people's perspectives. Why did you want to focus on the people through restaurants?

[A]

You know what it was? We were doing a lot of research. We were looking back at the history of restaurants. At one time, it was going to be like, the hottest restaurant of every year for a century. And we were sort of not getting where we wanted it to be, if that makes sense, which is sort of standard for any one of these big magazine packages. And our photo team had done a ton of research. We were sitting down, looking at everything, and they had found this picture of Mark Twain at Delmonico's celebrating his 70th birthday in 1905. And there was something that grabbed everybody. We wanted to learn more about the night. We wanted to learn more about the party. It's this very stiff photo. If you see it, it's in the magazine, and it's, you know, who knows how long they were sitting there even to get the shot. But once we started to think about, like, oh, yeah, we should learn about that night. We should learn about that party, that's when it really started to take off and click for us that we should do it across the city, and we should really be talking about the scenes. And I said scenes. We should be talking about the nights and the parties and the fun that people were having. And that photo is what unlocked it for us.

[B]

So that was the germ of the idea that actually spread out to make the whole article itself. Is that right?

[A]

Exactly. And then you can open it up. Beyond food writers and restaurant writers, we have obviously a huge network of culture writers and people who are experts in the city's history. So we could ask them. We could say, here's our idea. We don't really want it to be about food. We want it to be just about people. So do you remember special nights? I mean, we got so many contributions to that end of writers who were just there and had lived through it. And just what is a part of the city's history that fascinates you that we should be telling readers about?

[B]

It's really a social history, too. I mean, one of the things that I found super interesting when I was looking through the pages was the focus on the punk scene, where punks would eat, particularly in the East Village. Can you tell us about that a little?

[A]

I mean, that's what's so great, is we were talking about, okay, where were people eating? Let's talk about neighborhoods, let's talk about eras, and we think about, okay, East Village punks. Everybody has to eat somewhere. And so a seven, this huge, you know, Seminole hardcore club had opened. There is a greasy spoon across the street, Lechko's, and there is a macrobiotic, kosher vegan health food restaurant called the Cauldron. And so then these pieces of the puzzle start to come together, and we're like, well, we should talk to people who went to both of these places. We should get the different scenes. Our writer, Chris Crowley, found a source named Willie Luncheonette, who had been a member of the hardcore scene. And you just realize that there's gonna be so much color and, you know, experience from this that you never even think about, you know?

[B]

Yeah, yeah. So we've heard a few of the restaurants that you mentioned in the article. A few of the things. If you're just joining us, we're talking to Alan Sitsma, the New York magazine food editor. And their yesteryear issue just came out, and it's celebrating all of the iconic restaurants of New York's yesteryear, but specifically through the experiences of the people who ate there, the celebrities, the servers, the staff, and just people in the city. If you've got a restaurant that evokes that feeling for you, a place that you used to love, that just isn't open anymore, a place where you felt like a regular. Give us a call and quick shout out to all of our listeners. We love callers, and we need callers who are not drinking. So if you're driving right now and you have an idea, do me a favor, just pull over to the side and give us a call without being in a moving vehicle. But if you have an idea of a restaurant, give us a call. We're at 212-433-9692, and we've got a couple callers right now, Alan. So let's bring them down. Let's hear from Katie in Larchmont. Hey, Katie, what's the restaurant for? You.

[C]

Hi. Goldberg's Pizza. It was on 53rd street and Second Avenue. I think they lost their lease in the first round of kind of high ris that, you know, kind of went up around first Avenue, Second Avenue in that area. They had a pizza called the smog pizza. It was like deep dish, cast iron pan, pepperoni, sausage, green onion and pepperoni. Yeah, green onion, pepperoni, whatever. It was like 20 or 20 something. 25 years later, I still think about that pizza.

[B]

And they specialized in deep dish specifically, you're saying, Katie?

[C]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was awesome. Unfortunately, I didn't get to become a regular because they closed not too long after I started working in the area, but it was. It was amazing.

[B]

Well, shout out to Goldberg's, and thanks so much for that call, Katie. Let's hear from Al in New Jersey. Hey, Al. Welcome to the show.

[C]

Hi. Great. Thank you. When I was about 10 years old, my grandfather, who came from Naples, lived in Cleveland. Every time he came to visit us in New York, we went to the Grotto Azzura, the Blue Grotto, a restaurant in Little Italy where my grandfather never spoke Italian, but spoke Italian to the owner. And we always drank as little kids, even peaches and wine. It was the most amazing. These voluptuous peaches and wine, fabulous Italian food, and it was just an event.

[B]

Oh, that's lovely, Al. Wonderful. Thank you so much for calling. And let's hear from Susan in Connecticut. Hey, Susan, what's the restaurant for you?

[C]

Hey, I love the article, by the way, but I wanted to tell you about a restaurant that I think is a throwback from way back when, called Jean's on 6th Avenue and 11th Street. And we discovered it in 2013 on Halloween night, where we couldn't get close to 6th Avenue to see the parade. And we looked to our right, and there was Jean's. And we went in one of those down, like, three stairs, down below, and sat at the bar. And we ended up having a fabulous evening with all these locals. So the next year, we went back and we went in, we sat at the bar, and the amazing bartender served our drinks without even asking us what we wanted. And we turned left and right, and the same people were sitting at the bar. And it was just. It's been magical. We've gone every single year.

[B]

Oh, Susan, that's a lovely story. Thank you so much for calling. We're getting a lot of calls in. If you wanted to share your story. You can text us or call us. We're at 212-433-96. Nine, two Allen. We just had three callers. Any of the restaurants that they mentioned, were you familiar with them?

[A]

Jean's is still open. Jean's is a favorite. We actually had a writer who was lamenting the loss of Cafe Lou when it closed, because he used to go for Martin and French fries. And so he would scour the city for us looking for a new haunt that he wanted to find for this martini French fry just after work, talking with friends. Jean's was the place that he landed because of this bartender who remembers every order the second you walk in. He said he had been there, like, 10 years earlier, and the bartender immediately remembered him. Served him the same martini, ready to go.

[B]

10 years.

[A]

I might be misremembering, but it's something along there. But I want to go back to what Al from New Jersey said, talking about the restaurant. He started with his grandpa. He started with that scene. And that's the kind of nostalgia that we wanted the whole issue to evoke. This idea of, like, I'm there with these people that I know.

[B]

How about for you? Is there any restaurant in the city that you'd consider yourself a regular at or something that you really miss?

[A]

I really miss WD50, which was on the Lower east side and was a very experimental restaurant, sort of at the height of the modernist gastronomy movement. And I think it sort of got lumped in with a lot of places that maybe weren't as good. But the chef was just so willing to take these huge wild swings with his food. And you'd go in, there was always, like, a cook or a chef from out of town sitting at the bar, checking out, seeing what's happening.

[C]

And.

[A]

And there was such a welcoming feeling of hospitality. And then you would get the foie gras terrine that, like, bled beet juice when you cut it open or something like that. And it was just like, an incredible restaurant. I've probably, you know, I went a hundred times before it closed, and I still wish it were there.

[B]

We're talking to Alan Sitsma, who's a New York magazine food editor, and he's here to speak about the magazine's newest issue, celebrating the social history of New York's restaurants and specifically the people who frequented them. And like Alan said, the article is about evoking the sense of nostalgia, the sense of, like, what New York was and how we ate and how we collected in those spaces. And listeners, we're taking your calls. If you have a restaurant like that for you, a place where you felt like you were a regular, a place that maybe isn't open anymore. If you've got a story for us or a memory, just give us a call or at 212-433-9692 or you can message us on social. We're at all of it. We're going to take a quick break and when we come back, we're going to take more of your calls. We're going to go into more of the stories. We're going to talk a little bit more about the restaurants that we love. This is all of it. We'll be right back. This is all of it on wnyc. I'm Koosha Navadar and we're talking to Alan Sitsma, who's a New York Magazine food editor. And we're talking about the magazine's yesteryear issue, which just came out, and celebrating the social history of New York's restaurants. And we're taking your calls about restaurants that you loved and maybe you felt like you were a regular at. And we're also talking about the stories in the article of those iconic stories from from Mark Twain to many others. So, listeners, we're going to take your calls. We're going to read your texts. If you want to talk to us, give us a shout. We're at 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692. Alan, we are getting so many wonderful texts. I'm just going to ratt. So these are from listeners who are texting us. One says Odessa on Avenue A was everything. I miss it. Another Angelica's kitchen at the 12th street location are my colleague Kate, who's in the control room now, loves Angelica's Kitchen. Just want to give her a shout out. We've got another text that reads, not only did I dine at Florent on Gainesvoort street. Sorry if I messed that up. I worked there for seven years. It was really fun. Full of the amazing people. I worked with Unique plus Laurent himself. The endless flow of drag queens and celebrities, Bette Midler, Johnny Depp, Leo DiCaprio, Whoopi RuPaul and so many more. Those were amazing days. And they ended their historic run with the five stages of grief. Five fabulous shows to mourn the end of Florence fantastic era. It also says, call me for a story that can't be told on air, which I'm very intrigued about. I don't know if that's possible to get. But listeners, as you can see, we're getting a lot of Calls in, a lot of texts in. And Alan, Alan, you know, we're getting all these signals. I just got to say, do you think this is something special about New York City? I mean, not to say that, you know, it can't happen anywhere else, but it seems like it. It's such a trove of stories. What do you think it is about the city that makes that.

[A]

I think you kind of hit the nail on the head when you kicked this off and you said that we live in tiny spaces. We take restaurants as they become more than just places to go eat for us. We work there, we live there. Our kitchens don't work. We want to be seen. And in looking at the history of restaurants, it was really interesting to see that New York was really not the gourmet capital of the world. It was Paris that really focused on the gastronomy. And here it was, you know, taverns. Everybody's eating, you know, bread and beer and beef and getting their jobs done, really. And I think underneath it all, we're still sort of that tavern town where if you. No matter how much you gussy it up, these are still places where we need to live and they become sort of, you know, third space is the phrase. And that's what we found over and over and over with these packages or with these restaurants. Sorry, in this package is that. That's what everybody remembers. They remember that sense of, like, calm and that feeling of just like, knowing that you were in a home, even if you were inside a restaurant. And that, I think, is very unique to New York.

[B]

Which part of it, the calm is unique or the sense of being.

[A]

The feeling that these are extensions of our homes. I mean, you can go to a lot of other cities in America, around the world, and obviously, there are wonderful restaurants everywhere. But this idea that we really live in them feels so unique to New York.

[B]

Absolutely. Well, let's hear from some more. Call Eddie in Manhattan. Hi, Eddie. What's that restaurant for you?

[C]

Hi. Thanks. It's. It was called the Belmore Cafeteria. I think it was on park or Madison, on 28, between 2020 Seventh Street. My family emigrated from Palestine in 1959, and we had to stay at the Prince George Hotel, which was on 28th Street. And it was a very popular hotel with the. With the airlines. So I got to fall in love with the Pan Am stewardesses. And it was. It was a. And, you know, they would go to the Belmore Cafeteria, and I would tell my mother, you know, can we go there? Because I wanted to see the pilots. I Wanted to be a part. I thought it was so romantic and beautiful. And I said, I really do love New York. And that cafeteria style place no longer exists. And then we did find an apartment after a couple of months and we went to Brooklyn and lo and behold, there was one more cafeteria style place that reminded me of Belmore. It was called the Bigfoot, where Atlantic Avenue, where the stadium is now the basketball stadium. And so I think those are of another era. I don't know of any other place like them. And you know, it was just amazing. Especially the Belmore, I think with the clientele of the Pilots and that romance of it. I was, I was a boy and I really.

[B]

That's, that's wonderful. Thank you so much for that call. Shout out to the Belmore. Let's go to Lee and Garrison. Hi Lee, welcome to the show.

[C]

Hi. Thank you so much. I'm just loving listening to everybody's memories. So for me, growing up in queens in the 60s, my grandfather Conrad Lubell was the head waiter at many, many famous places. But I'm going to focus on two Luchow's. Luchow's on 14th Street. When you walked in that bar and had three story high glass ceiling that they knocked that down. It was next to the Palladium is a real crime. But they had something called the Diamond Jim Brady Room. And I would love to hear your speaker talk to that. And the other thing is he also worked at a place called the Auto Pub. You went and you sat in autos or you went in the back and you watched a movie in banquettes like you were in a car. And this was in the GM building underneath where FAO Schwartz is right now. And that is where he met the Beatles.

[B]

Wow, Lee, thank you so much for that, Alan. A lot of wild restaurants. Not wild restaurants, just wild stories, wild memories. Did you recognize any of those?

[A]

Luchows actually came up a lot in conversation as we were putting the issue together. And we just, you know, we would always sort of come back to the same question, which was the who. The like who, like what is like who are the characters that were gonna tell the story? So Luchows was. It was enormous. And there was just so much to talk about that we felt like we couldn't actually pack it into 200 words. And so we obviously couldn't include everywhere. And we just had to sort of focus on the people and the who. It just became self selecting in that way too. You could really identify where the stories were gonna work.

[B]

I was reading this article with my colleague Luke, who's a producer on all of it. And we both kind of walked away with a similar feeling, which was, I miss an era of New York that I never actually lived in. And I wonder if that was an aim, like that sense of nostalgia that you're talking about or even. Did you just feel that yourself when you looked at this when it was finally published?

[A]

Absolutely. We wrote about. I mean, it's a famous restaurant called Maxwell's Plum. And it was just a big restaurant in the 70s when I think people were a little more open about their indiscretions. And it was a big single scene. You know, they would lock the door when there were too many people crowding around the bar so nobody could get in or out. There were stories of streakers and, you know, it was just like lots of sex and lots of energy and lots of partying and places like that just, you know, they don't exist anymore. And it just sounds like this wild restaurant where you could get a chili dog or frogs legs and everyone was just there kind of crammed in together and it seems, I don't know, it's just wild. It's the one place where I was like, you know, it would have been nice to just spend a night there.

[B]

Yeah. You know, looking at the restaurant cultural history written about in this issue and thinking about the restaurant scene in New York today, I'm super curious, from your perspective as a food editor, what's something from this issue that you wish still existed in the restaurant scene? And what's maybe a good change or innovation in today's culture that maybe didn't exist back then?

[A]

I mean, the thing that I think has happened now, obviously, is that with the explosion of digital reservations, there is much more kind of hype around the new place. And from week one to week two to week three, people go from restaurant to restaurant to restaurant, and it's really hard. You talk to these chefs and the owners, and it's really hard for them to generate a community of regulars who are going to stay at the restaurant. They're trying to get the neighbors, trying to get people to stay before their attention wanders to the next place. And I feel like that is just missing. Restaurants don't have the time for financial reasons, media reasons, I'm probably partially to blame for this. But they don't have the year, the two years, the three years to really build that network of regular customers that creates a scene like you have at La Cote Basque or Maxwell's Plum or Maxis Kansas City, which isn't in the magazine, but we wrote about online. You know, just places where people can get together and know that it's always going to be there.

[B]

And what do you think is something that is great about today that you didn't maybe see exist back then?

[A]

I do think the food is probably better. I mean, there isn't a lot of food in this issue, but every time we encountered it, we often thought, well, okay, I think it's probably even restaurants that maybe aren't at the top tier of the gourmet rankings. I think the food is probably still better now than it was back then.

[B]

Absolutely. You know, we're getting a bunch of calls. We're talking to Alan Sitsma, who is the New York magazine food editor. He's here to speak about the magazine's new issue that's celebrating the social history of New York's restaurants. We're taking your calls. We're getting your texts. I'm gonna read out a few more texts because there's just so many. I'm go through all these, and listeners. It's really a delight to hear all of these. So here's one. It's the cedar Bar on 10th Street, University Place in Greenwich Village. At least from the 50s onward, it was a great hangout for every artist you could possibly. You could meet. Kooning, Pollock, John Schuyler, Jack Kerouac. It was a great jazz bar. It's been closed for years. Another one that reads, there was this bar called Klimat. Klimat. I hope I'm pronouncing that right. In the East Village on 7th Street. And at the time, my friends and I would hang out often, eight people deep at a time. And that restaurant had room for us all on these couches. And we drink good beer and have French fries. Another text. Huge shout out to the bartenders at P.J. clark's Lincoln Center. They take care of all of us. From the Metropolitan Opera. Not so much the food, but might Christian, Julie, and Connor know how to take care of their people? Alan, I'm hearing a lot about that third space element that you're talking about. Do you think that third space element exists as strongly as it does, as it did back then? It just kind of looks different, or do you think in New York City we've kind of moved away from restaurants and found more diversity in the places that we hang out?

[A]

I think it definitely still exists. I mean, everybody has these spots in their neighborhood. Everybody gets so excited when, like, a really good place opens near them, because then there's potential, you know, and I've been asked a lot about kind of what it means to be a real regular versus just somebody who shows up a lot. And I think in putting this together, what I realized was that to be there, there's this idea of being a regular, that you're contributing something to the restaurant just by being there. They're happy to have you there. Whether they. That's, you know, maybe you're just a whale and you spend a lot of money and that makes them happy. Or maybe your personality is such that, you know, you light up the dining room when you're there. Whatever it is you as a customer are providing so much of what this restaurant really is, that that is all part of this third space idea as well.

[B]

And you think that still exists, like, if you go into a restaurant and light up a room, it's still possible to make that kind of connection, that community?

[A]

Absolutely. I think there is that connection. There is that community. And, you know, you talk about jeans, Jeans isn't going anywhere. And it's the same people who are sitting at the bar, the same bartender. So this sense of community, it absolutely still exists here. You just have to kind of, you know, know where it is. And it's hard for us. I mean, this magazine was so fun to work on because we are so into here's the new. Here's what you should go try. Here's what we're excited about. That to take a step back and to look at what was not new was almost refreshing in a way for us.

[B]

So you have all of these restaurants. I'm sure there are some that you had already heard about, like Delmonico's probably already knew about it. I'm sure there were some that you learned through making this spread. Do any come to mind where you. Where you think, oh, I really wish that I could go back and visit that restaurant either for the story or for the dynamic that it described for.

[A]

You yourself in the package. Yeah, I mean, certainly Maxwell's Plum, and I think probably there was a restaurant called the form of the twelve Caesars in Midtown that was kind of the early, you know, before the Four Seasons. This was the first, you know, big Roman themed gladiator restaurant that I think that our writer, in pitching it, this wasn't in the piece, but he called it, you know, the. The pinnacle of Midtown madness in the 60s. And I mean, who doesn't want to just spend a day seeing what that feels like?

[B]

Now we've got this New York City of Yesteryear in the article. We've got The New York of today. The only thing you can say about New York is that it's always changing, right? And a lot of the restaurants featured here end with a closure of some kind, either because the rent was raised or the building came into new management and the restaurant was closed. And how do you think the changing landscape of New York? I'm talking, like, the gentrification of its neighborhoods, other elements. How do you think that factors into how we engage in this fun and rich restaurant history of a past New York?

[A]

When we're reading the article itself, there's a spread. There's actually a photo in the. In the issue that it's a father and son just eating French fries at a burger stand in the Albie Square Mall, which is now where City Point stands. And it is such just a regular weekday after school moment that you see it. And I think, oh, there's just a giant condominium and mall complex there where this is happening. That more than anything else in the issue, for some reason, that photo just feels like the ghost of New York past to me, that it evokes a time when this mall existed right in downtown Brooklyn. And you can just see the passage of time most clearly through what was there and what is there now. Does that make sense?

[B]

Yeah, absolutely. How would you describe that ghost of New York past in that case?

[A]

I mean, I don't know if it's good or bad. It just like you said, New York is always changing and it can't be stuck in the past. And, you know, it's just what was fun about working on the issue is that we just got to revisit some of these moments in time and to, you know, hopefully explain to readers why we thought that they were exciting or fascinating or important in some way.

[B]

A big part of that for me was this idea of celebrity that's in New York City's dining culture that I think is probably a bit different than in other cities around the country and around the world. Can you talk about that a little bit? Why celebrities seem to rely so much on restaurants in New York City, how that goes into the article itself.

[A]

Well, if you're a celebrity, you want to be seen, right? You want to be out, you want to be where the party is, you want to be where the action is, and you're going to get treated really well. We actually had a right named Ben, whose only assignment on this whole project was to call as many different celebrities as possible and to ask them about restaurants that they love. And we said, cast as wide a net as possible. And the people that ended up in the issue, you know, we have Fat Joe talking about Jimmy's Bronx Cafe and the time that the Yankees were banned from going there because the team thought that they were spending too much time there. We have Julia Fox talking about the restaurant that she would go to before she went to Max Fish just because she knew the owner. She was 15. She could eat as much as possible without them charging her. And so you do see this really wide net and you know, it all goes back to just being seen. If you're a celebrity in a dining room, here's the public. They're gonna love you. And you know what's better than that?

[B]

The food as well.

[A]

Sometimes. Sometimes.

[B]

Yeah. We've been talking to Alan Sitsma. He's the New York magazine food editor and he was here to talk to us about the magazine's new Yesterday year issue which celebrated the social history of New York's restaurants. We took your calls and thank you so much for all the calls and all the texts. And Alan, thank you so much for this article.

[A]

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