Funny story about $25 bucks, a Bear and Cornell University

With Techion coming, Roosevelt Island will soon be host to many, many Cornell alumni; and while most people recognize that Cornell’s school colors are red (carnelian actually) and white… did you know the mascot was a bear?

 Cornell’s varsity teams …  “the Big Red”

According to Wikipedia: The Cornell Big Red is the informal name of the sports teams, and other competitive teams, at Cornell University. The university sponsors 36 varsity sports, as well as numerous intramural and club teams. Cornell participates in NCAA Division I as part of the Ivy League. A depiction of a bear, and/or the words “Bear” or “Big Red Bear”, often are associated with Cornell activities and services, particularly with varsity athletics.

The name “Big Red Bear” originated in 1916, when the Cornell varsity football team collected $25 to buy a black bear cub, which they named Touchdown, to serve as a mascot.

Over the years, this athletics mascot changed from a live bear to a bear costume, which was worn by Cornell students.

For Homecoming 1988, a costumed female Big Red Bear joined the costumed male Big Red Bear. Cornell’s varsity teams are each nicknamed simply “the Big Red”.

Cornel

End of Summer Shrimptacular at Pier NYC

Heck of a’ Shrimp Boil with Seafood Master Chef David Santos, on the waterfront and under the red umbrellas of Pier NYC!

 Pier NYC’s  Santos Seafood Shack

Shrimp Boil Menu 

Clams
Corn on the Cob
Sausage
Potatoes
Cornbread

(served family style)

Spend the afternoon near the water with friends, beers, and a mountain of seafood. Pier NYC’s Chef David Santos (Um Segredo Supper Club, Per Se, Hotel Griffou) is throwing a New England style End of Summer shrimp boil at the Santos Seafood Shack on Roosevelt Island.

As summer wanes, the September Shrimptacular  is guaranteed to help lift your spirits to enjoy what’s left of the warm weather.

by Underground Eats 

What better way to end the summer than by enjoying a New England style shrimp boil with chef David Santos and endless beers on the waterfront.

Although “Autumn in New York” is known to be the most beautiful time of year, one cannot help but shed a tear when the cool fall breeze comes a creepin’ and those summer days begin disappearing. To help you through this difficult transition, chef David Santos (Um Segredo Supper Club, Per Se, Hotel Griffou) is throwing a one-time-only end of summer shrimp boil at PierNYC.

If you haven’t already visited the Santos Seafood Shack on Roosevelt Island, now is your chance to discover the best new outdoor hangout spot. There is nothing like an afternoon spent sitting back along the water with friends, beers, and a mountain of seafood to help lift your spirits by letting you enjoy what is left of the warm weather in September.

NOTE: Rain date for this event will be September 16th

MENU

Chef Santos will prepare a classic shrimp boil menu (to be served family style) complete with the following:

- Shrimp
- Clams
- Corn on the cob
- Sausage
- Potatoes
- Cornbread

WHY YOU’LL LOVE IT

Killer waterfront views of the city

Drink your end-of-summer sorrows away (the classy way) with endless PBR beers

Chef David Santos is the seafood master, this will be unlike any other shrimp boil you have had

Don’t hold back, for this is an all-you-can eat shrimptacular!

Presented Pier NYC & Stand-Up NY 

For the first time ever (on 8/13), iconic Stand-Up presented a show, with a partner in another venue…

We are that venue, and it’s back!

Roosevelt Island’s first ever comedy show was a huge, diversely-crowded and rollicking success. Join us for round #2! Friday August 30th @ 8pm. A beautiful night with the cool breeze off the water. Very funny comedians and a super-friendly and diverse crowd.

Roosevelt Island’s 2nd live comedy show…

Don’t miss this one!

8:00-HOST

Maddog Mattern  (Howard Stern Show)

8:15- Jared Freid (MTV)

Frat Dude goes to SantaCon

&nbsp:

Brittany’s 22nd Birthday Party Invite  (@ 47 seconds)

8:30- Gina Brillon

(Sex In The City)

8:45- James Goff

(BET)

9:00-Wali Collins

(Comedy Central)

Stand-Up Pier NYC Comedy 8-30 @ 8pm

Host Jonathon Randall Stand-Up NY and Pier NYC

Stand-Up NY on Roosevelt Island @ Pier NYC

Stand-Up NY Comic Kyle Grooms @ Pier NYC

by Serious Eats, Max Falkowitz

AUG 13, 2012

Note: First Looks give previews of new dishes, drinks, and menus we’re curious about. Since they are arranged photo shoots and interviews with restaurants, we do not make critical evaluations or recommendations.

Talk about neighborhoods that get the short end of the stick; when’s the last time you heard someone talking about Roosevelt Island at all, let alone its food scene? So when we learned about Pier NYC, the summer pop-up cafe with on-the-water views of the Manhattan skyline, we hopped on the tramway to check it out.

The cafe space, about a 30-second walk from the Roosevelt Island F stop, is open for the rest of the summer, and is serving a mix of casual seafood—shrimp rolls, crabcakes, oysters, and the like—as well as barbecue from Queens’ John Brown Smokehouse. “It’s a real casual, day-drinking kind of space,” says co-owner Johnathan Hoo. Nothing on the menu climbs above $12; cans of beer (all national brand macrobrews for now) top out at $8, and wine and cocktails at $12.

SLIDESHOW: A Look at Pier NYC, Roosevelt Island’s Riverside Bar and Cafe

So far Pier NYC has been popular with Roosevelt Island locals—whose culinary options so far are along the lines of “the Italian place and the sushi place,” as well as some of the midtown after-work crowd. Hoo wants to serve locals “food they just don’t have here,” but he’s also betting on drawing in the Manhattan crowd—the first food venture to do so on the island in recent memory.

$1 clams, $2 oysters

The menu is all summer beach party, with $1 clams, $2 oysters (three varieties a day, from both coasts), and sandwiches filled with smoked brisket, pastrami, and pulled pork (though not always the burnt ends our barbecue bureau chief raved about last year).

Pier NYC Rock Shrimp Roll

Pier NYC Rock Shrimp Roll

The seafood comes from The Lobster Place in Chelsea, and is cooked by by Chef David Santos, whose prior stints include Bouley and Per Se. Along the expected for NYC casual seafood (such as the shrimp roll—more affordable than lobster, “and just as delicious,” Hoo says), he’s also included brighter items, like a striped bass ceviche and a pimentón-spiked gazpacho. Desserts come by way of Allycakes, and include a mix of brownies, cookies, and whoopie pies.

Despite its Manhattan proximity and skyline views, Roosevelt Island has never drawn in crowds. That may change in a five years or so, when construction is projected to begin on Cornell’s projected research center.

Until then, Pier NYC will be operating through the rest of the summer, until October 31st, weather permitting.

[Photographs by Dave Katz]

PIER NYC- ROOSEVELT ISLAND

NYC Dining Deals with Tony Tantillo ,  CBS News

“Pier NYC Best View in the City!” states Tony Tantillo from CBS News. “This is what feeds the soul” he continues to say between bites of … “good food, good prices… what a fine dining deal!”

Watch the whole interview here and featuring our very own “Chef Alyssa Gangeri” (Ally Cakes NYC)
 

Great job and interview!

Special thanks to Shari Bayer Public Relations @bayerpr

Comedy on the Water @ Pier NYC Stand Up

August 16th @ 8 pm sharp

Images from the last show…

Jonathan Randall

 8:00 - HOST- Jonathan Randall

New York Comedy Festival, MTV

Mike Vecchione

8:15 - Mike Vecchione

NBC’s Last Comic Standing, Tonight Show w/ Jay Leno

Ryan Reiss

8:30 - Ryan Reiss

MTV’s TRL, Spike TV

8:45 - Brian McGuinness

Gotham Comedy Club

Kyle Grooms

9:00 - Kyle Grooms

Chappelle’s Show, Comedy Central Half Hour Special

by New York Journal, Marc Shepherd

Pier NYC offers a bit of summer fun, in a beautiful location with unbeatable Manhattan skyline views. The food isn’t bad, but it’s beside the point.

Oh yeah: it’s on Roosevelt Island, which I’d never been to. It’s one of those spots that sounds a lot farther away than it is. You can get there on the F Train or via a four-minute ride on the Roosevelt Island Tramway, from Second Avenue and 59th Street.

The island wasn’t always so appealing. Formerly known as Welfare Island (and earlier, Blackwell’s Island), it once housed a penitentiary, a lunatic asylum, and a smallpox hospital. If New York had had a leper colony, it probably would have been there.

It was converted to residential use in 1969, but was not reachable from the Manhattan side until the tram opened in 1976 and the subway arrived in 1989. (A bridge to Queens, opened in 1955, is the only vehicular route to the island; before that, there was an elevator to the Queensboro Bridge.) Originally dedicated to lower and mid-priced housing, recent construction on the island is considerably more upscale.

All of which brings us to Pier NYC, new to the island this summer, from owners Jonathan Hoo, Salvatore Hoo, and Alfonso DiCioccio (pictured left), who opened the nearby Riverwalk Bar & Grill in 2009.

I guess they wanted some foodie cred, so they brought in well known names to cater the place: Josh Bowen of John Brown’s Smokehouse for barbecue; David Santos of Um Segredo Supper Club for seafood; and Alyssa Gangeri of AllyCakes for desserts.

Catering, really, is what it is. The menu is short and inexpensive, and most of it is made elsewhere.

We were invited to an opening party at the publicist’s invitation. We were served a few finger-food samples from the regular menu, probably not enough to judge it fairly.

Neither of the two barbecue offerings floated my boat: smoked beef brisket (above left) and smoked turkey (above right), both served on lightly toasted white bread. The regular barbecue menu (pulled pork, lamb sausage, house-made pastrami) sounds more interesting.

A Rock Shrimp Roll (normally $12; above left) was a lot more impressive.

Order this. If you have room for dessert, the Red Velvet Whoopie Pie (normally $3; above right) is well worth a try.

The one thing they don’t have is a first-rate mixologist. The cocktails are strictly beach stuff, like mimosas, screwdrivers, margaritas, and daquiris, along with a basic list of sodas, beers, and wines.

Pier NYC isn’t a dining destination, but it’s the first Roosevelt Island dining venue I can recall to have received any mainstream media attention at all. That’s progress. But the views are really the attraction here.

Pier NYC (Slightly North of the F Train and the Tramway, Roosevelt Island)

By McKenzie Mahoney, MMM Guide

Last week I was invited to attend the opening of Pier NYC, the newest outdoor drinking and dining venue to come to NYC and brought along my girl Lily when I heard BBQ would be involved (she loves loves loves barbecued pork).

Except for playing soccer on Roosevelt Island (which I did for almost four years)….I found no real reason to travel there. But after going to Pier NYC, I’ve change my tune. The venue is steps away from the F train and the Roosevelt Island tram, and is probably easier to get to than other awesome outdoor venues in Manhattan like The Boat Basin and The Frying Pan.

The views from Pier NYC are unbelievable!

The entire place is outdoors so your experience will almost entirely depend on the weather but if its nice outside…. then you are in for a treat. The views from Pier NYC are unbelievable….it’s a side of Manhattan that you rarely see with its best views coming off of Roosevelt Island.

But the only way you can really enjoy the view and experience is with an ice-cold drink (preferably beer) and some tasty eats offered at Pier NYC. The menu is a three team collaboration of savory BBQ from Josh Bowen of John Brown Smokehouse, Seafood-centric fare from Chef David Santos’ Santos Seafood Shack and desserts from Pastry Chef Alyssa Gangeri’s Allycakes. At this opening event we were treated to a smorgasbord of the Chefs favorite or signature dishes that included red velvet whoopie pies, beef brisket sliders, lamb sausage and the best thing I’d ingested all week…. Santos Seafood Shack’s crispy crab cake sliders!

BBQ from Josh Bowen of John Brown Smokehouse, Seafood-centric fare from Chef David Santos’ Santos Seafood Shack and desserts from Pastry Chef Alyssa Gangeri’s Allycakes

It’s a small bite but is absolutely a delight. A fluffy Martin’s potato roll (which is the creme de la creme of sandwich rolls) is slathered with butter and lightly charred and stuffed with a crispy crab cake that is then topped with a generous dollop of spicy mayonnaise. I hunted down our server for more of these because paired with my Brooklyn Summer Ale, I found myself in summer eating and drinking heaven.

We may only have a few months left to enjoy Pier NYC in 2012 but I was told there are big plans for the 2013 season and frankly the place can only get better in my mind. Who would have thought that Roosevelt Island had something to offer other than cheap rents, off the beaten path soccer fields and some of the best views of Manhattan

One subway stop away from Manhattan and Queens (on the F-train)  and one quick tram ride (which is always fun to do once in a while) gets you to a great new venue for outdoor drinking and eating.

Don’t forget the crab cake slider…it’s a MUST!

Pier NYC
West Promenade on Roosevelt Island: steps from F train and tram

mmmguide.com        mckenzie.mahoney@gmail.com        themmmguide@gmail.com

Special Thanks to Bayer Public Relations

by Thrilllist

Voted Top #3 Best of the Best - July in New York

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Finally giving you a reason to go to Roosevelt Island aside from, um… the smallpox hospital ruins?… The underground, vacuum-powered garbage disposal system?… What about FDR? Is he there?… is Pier NYC, a BBQ/seafood haven with ridiculous skyline views that’s just 150ft from the F train, and one of literally 10 Roosevelt Island restaurants, two of which are Subways.

The BBQ: Pit master Josh Bowen of LIC stalwart/ “Brisket King of NYC”-awarded John Brown’s Smokehouse will bust your gut with the KC-style eats he grew up on, like brown sugar-/ coffee-rubbed, pecan-/peach-wood-smoked beef brisket, “meat candy” burnt ends, house-cured pastrami sandwiches, and rib tips, which presumably include “eat as many of these as you possibly can”.

The Seafood: Former Per Se man David Santos is chasing his lifelong dream of working somewhere dinner costs less than $4500, and has equipped the “Santos seafood shack” menu with oysters, tomato & lobster salad w/ smoked paprika oil, plus sandos including the charred-scallion-adorned Rock Shrimp Roll.

The Rest: Allycakes desserts include Mudslide cookies and red velvet whoopie pies, while those with a booze tooth can grab frozen margs and daiquiris, plus wine and beers including an IPA that’s “yet to be determined”, just like other reasons to go to Roosevelt Island.