Tag Archives: East Harlem

The Catskills come to the border of East Harlem


While most of us will be attending the Harlem Harvest Festival today, let’s all start making plans to head East next weekend…to East Harlem that is. Manhattan Country School brings the Catskills farm to the border of the barrio in their annual Farm Festival on Saturday, October 15th from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. “Parent volunteers turn East 96th Street between Madison and Fifth Avenues into an urban carnival, offering family friendly entertainment including rides, games, crafts, a silent auction, raffles and live music. The MCS Farm Festival offers a variety of homemade baked goods, a wide variety of delicious ethnic cuisine and fresh produce from their farm in Roxbury, N.Y.”

Admission is free and all from the public are invited. Tickets for food, games and rides will be available for purchase. In the event of rain, festivities will take place indoors.

This sounds like a great event for family and friends! Hope to see you there next weekend!

More affordable apartments for rent in East Harlem

According to the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, the East 112 Associates LLC are taking applications for more than 40 affordable housing rental apartments under construction at 1663 Madison Avenue, 169 East 111th Street, 315 East 111th Street, and 155 East 109th Street in the East Harlem. The deadline is November 21, 2011.

Current lottery apartments in Harlem

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New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development recently announced housing lotteries on their website. The Borough of Manhattan has five listed with HPD and they are all in Harlem. If you are looking for a lottery apartment in Harlem, you may want to check out the links below. To see the entire list for the City, click here.

2081 Madison Avenue, East Harlem

2524 Adam Clayton Powell Jr., Blvd., Harlem

200 East 125th Street, East Harlem

654 St. Nicholas Avenue, Harlem

34 West 139th Street, West Harlem

New Middle Eastern Restaurant opening August 15 in East Harlem


There is a new restaurant opening up in East Harlem this coming Monday and the owners are shouting it out on twitter. Habibis, a quick-serve Middle Eastern restaurant, is opening its doors at 52 East 125th Street in Harlem and will be offering a menu of halal food, such as grilled meats, gyro, and falafel, as well as sandwiches, salads and desserts. Vegetarian meals will be offered as well, with options such as falafel, hummus, baba ghanoush, and a variety of salads.

Habibis’ menu is available online. Click here to check it out.

Harlem happy hours happening everywhere: Chocolat, Lido Harlem & Milk Burger

It is hump day and you’re not sure where to go for happy hour in Harlem. Here are a few choices for your consideration and recommended in order!

Those of you who know me on Facebook are a witness to my many execursions to Lido Harlem. I am always there and have more reasons to be there now given their happy hour specials. I recently learned from Susannah that from 5:30 – 7:30 every day, seven days a week, Lido Harlem is offering 1/2 price beer & wine, $5 well drinks and $5 Lido specialty cocktails. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday nights Lido is now offering a late night happy hour starting at 10 p.m. to close. I believe they are offering a late night menu as well! If Lido’s happy hour is anything like their food, it will be consistently good.

Chocolat has the best schedule for happy hour in my view. It starts at 5 p.m. and lasts until 8 p.m. If you can’t make a happy hour that ends at 7:30 rush on over to Chocolat on Frederick Douglass Blvd and 120th. They offer a selection of flavored martinis for $5 and small plates ranging from $5 to $8. I have had all the small plates and they were all quite good.

And last, the much talked about burger joint in East Harlem has a happy hour. If you want to be one of the first to check out Milk Burger’s happy hour, head on over soon and early or on your day off. They start at 3 p.m. Yuck. Clearly, they want people to drink early. I hope they change that time. It’s hard enough to make it to happy hour at 5 p.m. I recommend this place (see details below) because it is on the rise and experience it now while it is still relatively a new place in East Harlem.

Have a great time at happy hour. See you around in Harlem!

Milk Burger in East Harlem one degree separation from Anthony Bourdain

I tell ya! At the moment, there is no such thing as bad PR for East Harlem’s Milk Burger, the new hamburger hot spot at 2056 Second Avenue. After the little viral spat that happened a few weeks ago regarding Milk Burger allegedly burger-izing Shake Shack, who knew where Milk Burger was heading. Actually, I sort of knew its potential from that incident and now DNAInfo is reporting that Anthony Bourdain’s wife has given Milk Burger a thumbs up on twitter…to more than 18,000 followers! I guess this makes Milk Burger one degree separation from the Travel Channel star and Chef. Not bad! I am wondering now who will be next to step forward and so candidly and openly endorse Milk Burger? Any guess?

There could potentially be another ringing endorsement in Milk Burger’s future, but no one will beat this 140 character endorsement by Mrs. Bourdain: “I actually enjoyed my Milk Burger and I love that they deliver. Shake Shack is still my husband but Milk Burger can be my booty call.” Get that women her own TV show…and another burger!

The Money Series examines how East Harlem spends their money

In our Money Series,  it has covered spending habits for the Harlem areas of 10027 and 10030. The Money Series continues with the focus on East Harlem. The zip code used to come with the data for this segment of Harlem is 10029.

The top three household spending areas for the 10029 area of Harlem resulted in shopping ranking first, health & family is second, followed by house & home. If you compare spending for 10029 with 10027 and 10030, 10029 ranks identical to 10027 in the areas of health & family and house & home. Each of these spending categories ranked second and third out of the top three spending categories versus 10030, these categories ranked first and second. The interesting fact out of all three zip codes was that 10027 was the only part of Harlem that had food and drinks in the top three spending categories. Food & drink did not even rank in the top three for 10029 and 10030.

On a 12 month average, household spending for 10029 includes: $461 for shopping. Next is health & family totaling $452. Most of the spending in this area is dedicated to school & child care and insurance. House & home follows with a total of $432 with the majority of this portion going toward utilities.

If 10029, 10027 and 10030 are compared in their shared ranking areas, which are health & family and house & home, 10030 spends the most on health and family at $798 versus 10027 spends $552 and 10029 spends $452. In house & home, 10027 spends the most at $472 followed by 10030 spends $434 and 10029 spends $432.

All figures are created from an online money management tool and based on ages from 18 to 65 years of age and above, all households (married with kids or without, male or female single with kids or without), and income starting at $20,000 to $125k and above.

Stay tuned as the Money Series will look into spending habits of Harlem residents versus other parts of Manhattan.

Burger drama in East Harlem could prove profitable for Milk Burger

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There is a burger-gate happening right now in our own backyard. The owners of East Harlem’s Milk Burger, located at 2056 Second Avenue, are currently fighting off accusations that they cloned their menu and website from the popular and expensive Shake Shack. This all came about when SeriousEats.com blog posted about Milk Burger’s marketing material looking very similar to Shake Shack. The burger drama happened in the last 24 hours.

So where does the burger drama currently stand? Milk Burger has taken all previous material down from their website and has a static page up. The owner has given interviews explaining it was a mistake executed by an intern, and a ton of free press has been given to an East Harlem establishment that most businesses could only dream of!

In summary, this whole burger drama talking place between David (Milk Burger) and Goliath (Shake Shack) could prove profitable for one business here. Milk Burger just opened. They are not the Rupert Murdoch of hamburgers. I believe the owner. It was an honest mistake. He probably just looked at the material that was presented to him for sign off and quickly approved it. Now there is only one place to potentially go from here when you’re starting a business at the bottom…and that’s up!

My advice to the owner of Milk Burger, start drafting the apology letter to Shake Shack and a big fat thank you note to SeriousEats. You are about to get some serious burger business! Who is going with me to eat at Milk Burger in East Harlem?

First East Harlem International Film Festival starts June 1

May 27, 2011 @ 7:00

By HarlemGal
There are several international film festivals that take place throughout New York City. However, how many actually take place uptown in Harlem? Not that many that I am aware of. Now Harlemites do not have to look or go far to see films from all over the world. We have an opportunity to see intelligent films for one week right in our own barrio-thanks to the East Harlem International Film Festival (EHIFF)!

The East Harlem International Film Festival will feature more than 40 films from June 1-5 in Spanish Harlem. The films that have been selected for this year’s festival come from as far away as China, India, Russia, Brazil and more! In addition, EHIFF will pay tribute to the late great Tito Puente, feature educational panels on the business of casting films, film distribution, and the process of filmmaking.

Based on their program, it appears they are offering an insightful agenda as well as recognizing the community. This is the first year for the East Harlem International Film Festival. So let’s get out there and support them! Click here to purchase tickets!

East Harlem’s La Marqueta to hold Open House February 2

Jan 29, 2011 @ 11:14
By HarlemGal
In the photo above, that’s what East Harlem’s La Marqueta looked like a few decades back. The marketplace, located at East 115th Street and Park Avenue, started back in the 1950’s, grew to more than 400 vendors and suffered its own down period. That was then. Now the East Harlem market is having its own rebirth and they’re giving the public an opportunity to see it in an Open House on February 2! All the details are listed below.

Also, watch what vendors are in place at La Marqueta in this news feature on NY1. See you at La Marqueta!