You know those tiny shops on Seventh Avenue between St. Johns and Lincoln? Where Olive Vine is located? Well, there’s a tiny new restaurant that’s got people excited. It’s called Chiles & Chocolate, where they serve "comida mexicana not tex-mex, cal-mex or any other am-mex."  They call it authentic Oxacan cooking. Here’s what they have to say in the menu:

"Chiles and chocolate have been an integral part of the cuisine of southern Mexico for thousands of years. The recipes here are a mix of those passed down from generation to generation as well as new interpretations and popular street food items. The flavors, smells, and textures here are those that we grew up with and we are excited to share them with you!"

Chiles & Chocolate is tiny — there can’t be more than ten tables. They also do take-out and delivery (I think). I ordered a chicken quesadilla and fire roasted corn on the cob. Both were delicious — and decidedly different from your typical Mexican restaurant fare.

The menu looks great. Give it a try — if you can get in. The restaurant, which is owned by the by the owners of the Artisanna furniture and jewelry stores (two locations on Seventh Avenue) has been getting very crowded at dinner time.

While very tiny, the decor is lovely with brown walls with green trim, rust metal mirrors, and ornate, dark wood tables and chairs.

Try their special Hot Mexican Chocolate with essence of chipolte.

They also have Cafe Chiapas — coffee with a hint of cinnamon. 

And for dessert: Pastel tres Leches, the most popular dessert in Mexico, a Mexican Tiramisu. Or how about: Sweet carmelized baby bananas served with chocolate sauce (I am so ordering that next time).

Open Mon. to Thurs: 11 am until 10 pm
Saturday: 10 am – 11 pm
Sunday: 10 am to 10 am

54 Seventh Avenue
718-230-7700

New York magazine and BRIC’s Rotunda Gallery Present
THE STOOP SERIES
with
Writers Jonathan Lethem and Stephen Wright
featuring music by DJ Rekha
Thursday, March 1 at 7 pm
33 Clinton Street in Brooklyn Heights
Guest Moderated by
Boris Kachka, New York magazine contributing editor

New York, NY – New York magazine, in conjunction with BRIC’s Rotunda Gallery, presents the fifth installment of The STOOP Series on March 1 featuring a discussion with writers Jonathan Lethem and Stephen Wright. New York magazine contributing editor Boris Kachka will moderate the free public talk.

Jonathan Lethem, who was raised and still resides in Brooklyn’s Boerum Hill, is the author of several novels, including New York Times bestseller and “Editor’s Choice” pick The Fortress of Solitude and Motherless Brooklyn, for which he received the National Book Critic’s Circle Award. Lethem is also the author of the short story collections Men and Cartoons and The Wall of the Sky, The Wall of the Eye, and an essay collection, The Disappointment Artist. His new novel, entitled You Don’t Love Me Yet will be on sale March 13.

Stephen Wright, a New York City-based novelist, is the author of The Amalgamation Polka, Meditations in Green, and the road novel Going Native. Educated at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Wright has taught writing classes at Princeton, Brown, and The New School and has been called “a bright star in the literary sky” by the San Francisco Chronicle.

The STOOP Series discussion will be followed by the monthly STOOP SLAM, featuring music by DJ Rekha. Complimentary drinks from Brooklyn Brewery and Johnnie Walker Blue Label will be served. DJ Rekha (Rekha Malhotra) was born in London and raised in Queens and Westbury, Long Island, and is one of the pioneers of New York’s South Asian music scene. She founded Basement Bhangra and continues to be instrumental in introducing the sounds of Bhangra and British Asian music to North America. Rekha has been featured in the Village Voice, New York Times, Times of India and Daily News, in addition to magazines like Billboard, New York, and Stress.

Streetsblog says the Department of Transportation has plans to turn Seventh and Sixth Avenues into one-way streets. OMIGOD. That’s big, I mean, BIG Park Slope news.  Streetsblog, Aaron Naparstek’s blog, broke the story yesterday. Here’s a response from the DOT.

DOT has proposed changing 6th and 7th Avenues to one-way streets which
we believe will have many benefits including simplifying the turning
movements at intersections to make it safer for pedestrians crossing
the street and narrowing the travel lanes on 7th Avenue to encourage
vehicles to travel within the existing speed limit. DOT also proposes
making these changes in conjunction with a plan that would remove a
travel lane in each direction on 4th Avenue (between 17th and Dean
Streets) using this space to improve the existing left turn bays.

If you are interested, plan to attend a presentation and discussion of a proposal by the Department of
Transportation for improvements designed to enhance pedestrian
mobility, access and comfort at the Grand Army Plaza.

Presentation
by the Department of Transportation of a plan to install two-way Class
II bicycle lanes and roadway markings for left-turn turning lanes along
9th Street between 3rd Avenue and Prospect Park West.

Presentation by the Department of Transportation of a plan to install Class III bicycle routes in Red Hook

Thursday, March 29, 6:30 pm.
Old First Reformed Church
729 Carroll Street
(Corner of 7th Avenue)

I went to Boston to see my friend, opera singer Amy Burton in a sold-out performance of "The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny" at Opera Boston, a small, edgy, high-quality opera company dedicated to performing innovative repetoire and rarely seen works  This production was directed by the very gifted stage director Sam Helfrich. Burton in the role of Jenny was sublime.

The show seems to be having its moment with productions in Boston, Los Angeles, and Boston. With its libretto by Bertolt Brecht and a score by Kurt Weil, this strange and dark story of a city of pleasure overcome by a hurricane has prescent themes that resonate with our time.

I went with my friend, Pam Katz, who has written a novel published in Germany and yet to be published in the United States called "And Speaking of Love," a fictional account of the life of Lotte Lenya (who was married to Kurt Weil). To imagine this dark vision of humanity being performed in the early 1930’s in Berlin gives me chills. It was a gift to see this deeply striking show performed Boston on Tuesday night

Here’s an accurate eview by Keith Powers in the Boston Herald:

   

What happens in Mahagonny, stays in Mahagonny. Kurt Weill’s tragicomic and ironic opera “The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny,” with its trenchant libretto by Bertolt Brecht, was given a sensational opening performance by Opera Boston under the baton of Gil Rose Friday evening at the Cutler Majestic Theatre.
    Written in the late ’20s, “Mahagonny” tells the story of a city, similar to Vegas, on immoral steroids. Founded by three criminals on the lam, Mahagonny is a haven for decadence, where its residents give themselves over to whoring, gluttony, fighting and drinking.
    Sounds like fun, huh? Through the sardonic lens held up by the Weill/Brecht collaboration, the excesses explored in this mythical city – set in California – bring mostly misery to its residents. One man eats himself to death. A boxing match ends with the loser dying. The biggest crime – seemingly the only crime in Mahagonny – is failing to pay a bar bill, which also ends in death.
    Throughout it all, the music was rapturous, especially the ensemble pieces. And the stars, notably Daniel Snyder as Jimmy MacIntyre, the aforementioned deadbeat who gets executed, and Amy Burton as Jenny Smith, his high-priced hooker/girlfriend, sang with distinction. Boston regulars Stephen Salters (Bank Account Bill) and Frank Kelley (Fatty the Bookkeeper) also gave notable performances.
    But it truly was the scantily clad ensemble (this performance could easily double as a bachelor party) that stole the show. Weill has a gift for setting soloists against chorus, and this opera is full of riveting trios, quartets and even larger groupings.
    Rose had his hands full, with half a dozen soloists, a chorus of 20 and an orchestra that features unusual instrumentation (for an opera, at least) including a trio of saxophones and an accordion. He’s a skilled leader, and the opening-night performance was paced as smoothly as if it were the end of a long run. The single set, featuring Dumpsters and port-o-sans, added a comic flavor to the generally dark themes. Generally the acting and blocking were good, although at times the stage was overcrowded and emphasis was swallowed up by confusion.
    Opera Boston has done fine work in its few short seasons, filling a repertory void by presenting works on the fringes of standard opera. “Mahagonny” continues that fine tradition.

Continue reading OPERA BOSTON: MAHOGONNY →

Ten years ago rocker Amy Rigby released the critically acclaimed CD, Diary of a Mod Housewife, which is now out in a special 10th anniversary edition and available on her website. The former East Villager now lives in France, where she writes a blog called, Little Fugitive In France.  An OTBKB reader gave me a heads up about one of her posts. Very touching.

"Let me take a break from being that guitar totin’ woman of the world
and wallow in sentimental mother-mode for a minute: I miss my daughter
so much sometimes! I walk around feeling a little glum and wonder
what’s wrong with me. Then I look at the clock and it’s about ten to
three and it hits me – I should be dropping everything to pick her up
from school and give her a ride somewhere. But I don’t have to anymore.

I try calling her but of course she’s in class, or out doing
some fun, exciting, young adult thing that perhaps she’ll tell me about
when I do reach her. I find myself checking her myspace page, or even
her friends’ pages, just to get a sense of being around her. I think
"This is really pathetic" but then it occurs to me that I’m doing the
equivalent of going and sitting in her room, looking at her stuff and
and then wistfully shutting the door. But our stuff’s in storage so I
look for her in cyberspace – sometimes modern life is very weird. And I
wonder how other parents deal with this empty feeling that comes and
goes. I hope she doesn’t read this, but I think I’m safe in assuming
that she has better things to do than trawl the internet finding out
what I’m up to."

This from Jeanne Ramirez at New York 1:

A hill in Sunset Park is one of the highest points in Brooklyn —
offering panoramic vistas of Manhattan, the Statue of Liberty, and the
harbor.

But soon the view of Lady Liberty could be obstructed. Digging has
already begun for a high rise planned here, on the site of a former
parking lot.

"We were not consulted. We were not even given any information,”
said Loretta Holmes of the Sunset Park Alliance of Neighbors. “The only
way we realized it was our houses were shaking."

Residents convinced the Buildings Department to issue a stop-work
order for complaints including construction after hours, lack of proper
permits, and structure stability.

And they formed a coalition called Sunset Park Alliance of Neighbors.

"To put up a 12 story and plus monstrosity of this size and this
nature on a block with so many low-rise family buildings is unjust and
unfair," said David Galarza, a member of SPAN.

"We’re not going to let this developer come and develop all of a
sudden,” said another SPAN member, Johnny Trelles. “They have to come
and work with the community because we’ve been here 30, 40 years."

Most homes in the neighborhood are three stories. The tallest
structure, seen for miles, is the tower of Saint Michael’s Church —
but the proposed building would rise higher that that.

Plans filed with the Department of Buildings at this location
include more than 30 units of housing along with a day care center and
medical facility.

Residents say the local community board should have been on top of
this, especially after it helped another part of the district — the
area of Greenwood Heights — get rezoned to limit the height of new
construction just last year.

"We should have been having rezoning done as soon as the other
neighborhoods were done,” said Tom Murphy of SPAN. “They just let it
lag."

But Community Board 7 says it cannot initiate a zoning change, only
support residents who ask for it. The board says the City Planning
Department has to step in for change.

City Planning says it will look at whether a zoning change is
warranted. In the meantime, the developer says he is resolving the
permit issues and plans to resume construction as early as next week.

This from the Daily News:

Nearly half the traffic in Park Slope is created
by drivers cruising around for parking spots due to jam-packed curbs,
according to a new study unveiled yesterday.

"What we have now is the equivalent of a Russian bread line," said Paul
Steely White, executive director of Transportation Alternatives, the
advocacy group that conducted the study.

"Except instead of bread, it’s parking, and instead of peasants
standing in lines, we have cars circling the block," White said.

The study – titled "No Vacancy" – found an average of 95% of the
parking spots on the main commercial drag on Seventh Ave. between Union
and 12th Sts. were occupied. It also found that one in six vehicles in
the neighborhood was parked illegally.

"We need to apply market solutions to our streets, and this is where we
start," said White, who rode away on a bicycle after yesterday’s press
conference to unveil the 21-page report.

Major findings of a new study on the lack of parking spaces in Park Slope by the advocacy group Transportation Alternatives.