Café Carmellini Opens and More NYC Italian Food and Drink News

Ciao and Bienvenue to Café Carmellini

Café Carmellini opened in Manhattan's NoMad neighborhood yesterday, and it looks to be a magnum opus from one of NYC’s most accomplished chef-restaurateurs. Andrew Carmellini has created some of the city’s best Italian restaurants (Locanda Verde, Bar Primi) as well as the great French brasserie Lafayette, continental standouts The Dutch and Carne Mare, and the American fast food concept Mister Dips, to name a few. (His NoHo Hospitality Group has also expanded, with restaurants in Nashville, Detroit, and Baltimore.)

Café Carmellini is being billed as his “return to fine dining,” as well as a showcase of his European roots, with “personal, modern interpretations of classic Italian and French dishes, according to a release.

The opulent new restaurant is inside the equally luxurious new Fifth Avenue Hotel, one of several upscale hospitality brands to open recently in the once-gritty NoMad area just above Madison Park.

The menus at Café Carmellini flaunt the chef’s familiarity with upscale Italian and French cuisine, reflecting a career that began in Michelin-starred restaurants in Europe and at several of the French restaurants that helped make Manhattan one of the world’s great dining destinations, including Lespinasse, Le Cirque, and Café Boulud. At his new signature restaurant, Carmellini is serving dishes that evoke Old World tradition with personal and place references, such as Artichoke Florentine, Sole Normande, Rabbit Cacciatore, and Scallops Cardoz, a tribute to his late former colleague, Chef Floyd Cardoz. There’s also an 1,800-bottle wine list overseen by a team of sommeliers, and desserts from an alum of Alain Ducasse.

Café Carmellini, 250 Fifth Ave., NYC 10001, 212-231-9200, cafecarmellini.com, @cafecarmellini.

Mel’s F.O.M.O. Pizza Series Part 2 Announced

Melissa Rodriguez and her Mel’s Pizza is back with another “Friends of Mel’s Oven” series showcasing pizzas from high-profile chefs. Following up on this summer’s premiere of the concept, she is tapping four Michelin-starred women chefs for this round, with limited-edition pizzas from Angie Rito (Don Angie), Ayesha Nurdjaja (Shuka, Shukette), Alex Raij (La Vara, Saint Julivert, Txikito), and Hillary Sterling (Ci Siamo). 

Each chef has designed a pizza that will slot in for limited times with Mel’s Pizza’s usual lineup, starting this weekend. The lineup is below:

• November 4-17 – Chef Angie Rito 

• November 18-December 1 – Chef Ayesha Nurdjaja

• December 2-15 – Chef Alex Raij

• December 16-29 – Chef Hillary Sterling

Mel’s, 85 10th Ave., NYC, 10011, 212-970-2202, mels-nyc.com, @mels_nyc

More Italian Food and Drink News

Fossetta, an Italian wine bar with "cozy Italian fare" is now on the Lower East Side, from owner Julie Park of Williamsburg brunch hot-spot Café Colette, with chefs Charlene Santiago and Joshua Even, both formerly of John Dory and the Breslin, April Bloomfield’s former restaurants at the Ace Hotel in NoMad. >>> Natural wine lovers should plan a visit to June, the charming wine bar on Court St. in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, on Monday, November 6. From 5-10 p.m., June will host the “Living Wine Takeover,” with artisan producers distributed by Living Wine, including several winemakers from Emilia-Romagna, such as Podere Sottoilnoce, who will be on hand to pour and discuss their Italian low-intervention wines.