Monday, September 10th, 2012

UPDATE 9/11: Groupon deal offered for Purple Fig (at least temporarily); phone still disconnected.

Posted at length a couple of weeks ago about the difficulties facing UWS newcomer The Purple Fig (250 W. 72nd, btw. West End & Broadway).

Included in that post was news they were closed “for summer vacation” and would reopen on September 7th.

It’s September 10th today, and, unsurprisingly, the restaurant is still closed.

Looks as though it may be permanent.

I called the restaurant earlier today and their phone has been disconnected.

Actually, the automated recording from the telephone company said it has been “temporarily disconnected,” but I think the writing is on the wall.

I took a stroll over there earlier this evening and peeked through the windows — there are still tables and restaurant-type stuff inside, but it looks as though it hasn’t been touched in a while.

My guess is that The Purple Fig (TPF) has served its last meal. I’ve sent an e-mail to them for comment, but I’d be surprised to hear otherwise.

Long time readers may recall that the transformation from its former incarnation as P.D. O’Hurley’s at West End to the opening of TPF only took a couple of weeks.

Rumor has it that Paul Hurley (of P.D. O’Hurley’s fame) was involved with TPF, which makes sense given how quickly it was able to open. It wouldn’t be surprising to see them do another quick turnaround and have the space reopen as another bar/restaurant in the not-too-distant future.

Just a guess… we’ll have to wait and see.

Elsewhere…

Posted back in July that Thai restaurant Tale Thai had closed (507 Columbus, between 84th & 85th).

Been meaning to post an update about this for a while now, but a new tenant is already in place: Casa Pomona, a Spanish tapas restaurant, will open this fall.

UPDATE 10/2: Casa Pomona scheduled to open this week; Menus posted + additional details

UPDATE 11/2: So it turns out the restaurant hasn’t opened yet. However, they are hosting a benefit dinner for the New York Cares’ Hurricane Sandy relief fund on Monday, 11/5.

Here’s a bit of a press snippet I received about the opening:

Longtime Upper West Side restaurateur Sid Gupta (Pappardella as well as Village Pourhouse, Hudson Terrace, Little Town) and Marion Maur (who most recently ran her own restaurant Marion’s Country Kitchen for 5 years in Woodstock, NY after working with SushiSamba, Rue 57 and Gertrude’s in years past) have teamed up for the opening of Casa Pomona, a Spanish tapas restaurant located at 507 Columbus Avenue between 84th and 85th Streets (right next door to Kefi).  The building itself is titled Pomona which was the inspiration for the name.

The opening of Casa Pomona will mark Chef Jodi Bernhard’s NYC debut.  After 10 years on Wall Street, Jodi traded in her 9-5 job for the crazy world of restaurants.  After studying at Cambridge School of Culinary Arts, she began as the only female on James Beard Award winner Ken Oringer’s line at Clio in Boston.  She ran the kitchen for Chef Patrick O’Connell at The Inn at Little Washington for several years before moving on to Bedford Village in New Hampshire.  Having spent the past few years as executive chef of Barcelona Restaurant in Connecticut, she’s excited to bring her newfound love and passion for Spanish cuisine to hungry Upper West Siders.

The menu is familiar and approachable yet reflects her own French training and farm to table and ingredient driven sensibility.  She’s hoping to win diners over with her Paella, the true Spanish approach to this rice dish enhanced and flavored by just one protein or a blend of either animals or seafood but not combined.  She explains that the contemporary approach to Paella is the ‘everything but the kitchen sink approach’ including clams, chorizo, chicken, lobster, etc. but that in true Spanish form, you would not mix animal protein with seafood.   She’ll offer a few versions each night and has plans for featuring a whole black bass, duck, a whole lobster, etc.  Other inspired dishes will include Albondigas stuffed with oxtail, Morcilla or grilled Spanish black sausage with preserved lemon and chickpeas, and no doubt New Yorkers will swoon for her Patatas Bravas cooked in duck fat.   You can also expect Bouquerones on grilled garlic bread, Duck liver with spicy peach on homemade seeded rye bread, Grilled baby leeks with romesco and Striped Bass a la Plancha with summer vegetable succotash.

Casa Pomona is hoping to open by the end of September, initially just for dinner with brunch service beginning at a later date. The space is slated to have somewhere between 110 and 125 seats inside, as well as additional sidewalk seating outside.

(Belated h/t to MUW reader Angela)

Filed under: Food & Drink, Going Out, Manhattan, New York City, News, NYC, Openings/Closings, Restaurants, Upper West Side, Upper West Side Blog, UWS 6 Comments »
Tags: 250 W 72, 250 West 72, 507 Columbus, Casa Pomona, Chef Jodi Bernhard, Closing, Conrad Gallagher, Jodi Bernhard, Marion Maur, New York City, NYC, Opening, Paul Hurley, Sid Gupta, Spanish restaurant, Tapas, tapas restaurant, The Purple Fig, Upper West Side, UWS