Impressions of Eataly

It's been open 7 days and I've managed to make 2 trips to Eataly - which is the minimum amount of time you need to wrap your mind around the boldness of such a feat.

Please note the orange crocs

I mistakenly went in with a purpose on my first visit - the day after it opened - to get a bite to eat with some friends in the span of a lunch break.  It went something like this: Scan the area.  Fresh food department.  Note 5 different types of lettuce, a waterfall display of nuts, an Italian market-style stand with shiny red tomatoes and hanging threads of garlic and dried hot peppers. Excited, determined people moving all around me like ants.  Negotiating the aisles with futuristic plastic shopping carts.  Realize people are actually shopping for produce.  Look up. Unhelpful signage pointing me in all different directions. Look down. Smile at the orange crocks on an employee's feet.  Walk left. Huge wheels of Italian cheeses behind a glass counter.  Crane head right. Espresso bar with gargantuan silver coffee canisters and people leaning elbows on the counter, tiny porcelain cups poised indifferently in their free hand. Turn left. A long line of people, waiting...for what? Spot two mosaic domes behind aisles upon aisles of dried imported pasta.  Ah, pizza. A 360 degree turn takes in a mini bookstore, shelves of single bottles of specialty beer, a long wine counter filled with people sipping elegantly on their lunch break.  Another turn and there's an insanely large fish amongst an assortment of other seafood, nestled in ice chips behind a counter.  Loaves of rustic, flour-topped bread behind another.  Attractive people laughing around a table with wooden boards of cheese, prosciutto, olives, and bread, immune to the madness around them.  Exhale.

It was enthralling and overwhelming, like I couldn't open my eyes wide enough to take everything in or even begin to understand how the whole thing operates.  Even more perplexing were all the people around me who apparently did.  Fortunately, I managed to try some food. After a hurried overview of the floor plan I waited in line for 40 minutes for an unexpectedly small funghi Taleggio panini ($7.40 with tax).  The panini was obviously prepared using superior ingredients - crunchy thin foccia baked on the premises; fresh, earthy mushrooms; the cheese soft and just the right amount of stinky.  If I hadn't consumed a small cup of warm chocolate - what tasted like the best chocolate I've ever had - while waiting in line ($1.00), I might have been more put-off by the size (and the waiting in line).  (Serious Eats took issue with the size of the paninis in a great post in which they sample all the different types.)  But it was very tasty and authentic nonetheless.

(The government isn't reading my blog Dad.

The second visit to Eataly was much more enjoyable, not only because I was mentally prepared for what was to come; but also because I was with my parents.  This is significant for the obvious reason that they're happy to buy me things I couldn't otherwise afford (peach preserves, imported olive oil, fresh baby artichoke hearts); but also because they take delight in things that I would normally bypass (in the case of the raw beef counter, with a grimaced look on my face).  My dad's irrepressible urge to speak to people, and my mom's knowledge of Italy and cooking, also came in handy.

Mt parents took to Eataly immediately. My dad's enthusiasm, unrivaled by most six-year-olds, was heightened by the pulsating energy of Eataly - and the espresso he drank within the first 10 minutes of stepping inside.  My mom, undeterred by the obscure differences between jam, preserves, and compote- rows and rows of which greeted her at the entrance - was simply in her element.  She began poring over food labels, stopping only to look for an empty shopping basket to stash her items.

We analyzed the cheese selection, watched a worker form ravioli by hand, watched another worker handle an alarming mound of bread dough, surveyed the beer, got the lowdown on the raw beef from an Italian-American sitting at the bar by himself (he was in Tuscany visiting his parents the day before), learned about pizza from the Neopolitan pizza makers (the pies cook for sixty SECONDS in the oven), spoke to the vegetable butcher about preparing baby artichokes, were amazed by all the pasta shapes we've never seen, tasted the amazing warm chocolate and an even more amazing chilled crema espresso that Gus ordered.

Mario Batali wanted Eataly to be the preeminent culinary destination for New York City - and a place to learn about Italian food and culture.  And he accomplished exactly that.  Yes, it's crazy.  Yes, it's filled with tourists.  But it's also filled with great energy, enthusiastic workers, and a lot of Italians - and people in the know - treating this place like they've been coming for years.  The best part about it is seeing all the stuff you never knew existed - raw beef, pasta shaped like coins, pear and balsamic vinegar spread - and of course getting to try them.  More pictures below.