If you think Russian food is all boiled potatoes and sour cream, think again—preferably while sitting in the plush surrounds of midtown’s newly opened Brasserie Pushkin. Here your preconceived notions of dreary carb-heavy Soviet-era fare will be banished by such creative dishes as Telnoye, pan-fried cutlets of pike-perch and salmon served with salmon-mashed potatoes, warm mushroom salad and green pea mash … or the Burger “Pojarksy” a combination of veal and chicken crusted with golden cubes of croutons to make the ‘bun,’ served with lettuce, tomatoes, pickled cucumbers, onions and parmesan sauce between each half.

If this doesn’t sound like standard Russian fare to you, it’s not. There is a generous serving of French haute cuisine woven through the menu, which was designed by Andrey Makhov, the executive chef of the Maison Dellos Group—a powerhouse conglomerate of Russian eateries. Dellos Group founder and owner Andrey Dellos is the son of a French architect and Russian singer, and lived in Paris for a time as a boy. For him, the fusion of French and Russian fare is completely natural. He was quoted in the New York Times as saying: “Russian cuisine was once sophisticated and noble, but it was often interpreted and adapted by French chefs working for aristocratic families … The French chefs made it lighter than traditional Slavic cuisine. Then the Soviets came and ruined Russion food.”

Perhaps the place where the French influence is most clearly noted (except, of course, for the wallpaper artwork inspired by Versailles’ Hall of Hercules) is in the dessert selection. French executive pastry chef Emmanuel Ryon has developed such luscious creations as the Hazelnut Meringue Dome, two meringues filled with cinnamon ice cream, apple-caramel foam and braised apple, covered in apple chips and decorated with vanilla bean, apple-saffron marmalade and edible gold. And there’s nothing dreary about that!

Photo courtesy of Creative Little Garden

Even though, for many New Yorkers, the outdoors is that strange space we must pass through to get from the office to the gym, or from the gym to our apartment, or from our apartment to the restaurant … (OK, you get the idea) … the city does offer some attractive fresh-air spaces that are worth a visit in their own right—especially in Spring. You of course know about the big parks, but here are three smaller spaces that are perfect for catching a quick breath of fresh Spring air …

Paley Park; 53rd Street, between Madison and Fifth Avenues; Google Map
What this small space lacks in grass (there isn’t any) it makes up for with a large wall of water at its far end. Grab a chair, bring a book and pretend you’re deep in the jungle. That is, until a honking horn brings you out of your reverie–at which point you can take in the color graffitti-clad sections of the Berlin wall that call the park home.

Tudor City Greens; 42nd Street, between 1st and 2nd Avenues; Google Map
While Paley Park is right off the street, Tudor City Greens are a little harder to find, as they’re up easy-to-miss staircases on 42nd Street between 1st and 2nd Avenue. Your effort in making the climb is rewarded by glades of trees and pretty paths that give you the feeling of walking through a private garden owned by one of the charming tudor homes that guard the park. The park can be found on both sides of 42nd street so if you can’t find a seat on one side, try the other!

Creative Little Garden; 530 E. 6th Street; Google Map
Since the 1970‘s, New York’s GreenThumb program to turn lots left vacant by the economic downturn of that decade into attractive spaces. Today, the program helps support 500 community gardens in the city and is the largest community gardening program in the nation. One of the most alluring parks in the program (although with 500, it’s hard to pick favorites) is the Creative Little Garden at 530 E. 6th Street. It’s a leafy green fairytale enclave wedged between two drab boxy buildings that gives new meaning to the word “oasis.”

{Lime&Tonic Tip: Another way to get a little peace and quiet in the city is to check out these off-the-beaten-path cemeteries.}

Everyone likes to color eggs for Easter, but how many people really like to eat them? Just witness the leftover eggs that invariably sit on the counter for months after all the much yummier chocolate eggs and jelly beans have been devoured. Now, thanks to Eleni’s Bakery, you can have your colored eggs and enjoy eating them too.

Eleni’s is offering two unique collections of hand-iced cookies for the holiday that come complete with edible-ink markers that let you decorate the bunny-white surfaces with any design you and the kids choose.

The first collection, called (appropriately), “Color Your Own Eggs,” consists of 20 assorted-size egg-shaped sugar cookies covered in white frosting and costs $42.50. The second is entitled “Color Your Own Easter Sunday” which also consists of 20 cookies and adds a few different Easter bunnies into the mix. It retails for $48.50. Both collections come with five edible-ink markers in various colors.

If you’re not feeling creative (or just want to get your sugar fix without the work), there is also a full range of other Easter-themed pre-decorated cookies sure to make any basket special for Sunday morning.

Order online at Eleni’s Website; phone 1.888.435.3674; or visit them at one of their two stores:

Chelsea Market Store
75 9th Ave.
New York, NY 10011
Google Map

Madison Ave. Store
1266 Madison Ave.
New York, NY 10128
Google Map

Was a time when sourcing food locally was just the way things were. You hunted. You gathered. You burned things over an open fire. You ate. And it was all pretty much free, aside from time spent sharpening flint, crouching in prickly bushes, and patching up saber-tooth tiger bites.

These days however, the local food movement is big business. Case in point: the new Acme, where crispy Cajun food (and a somewhat crispy decor) has been replaced by the guys behind Indochine and Boom Boom Room. The makeover has glammed up the space with lots of leather, mirrors, and local art, and it has replaced southern cuisine with northern. Much more northern. Denmark to be exact.

That’s the homeland of celeb chef Mads Refslund who’s responsible for bringing the locavore style he popularized in Coppenhagen into the heart of New York. But unlike locavore darling Noma in Coppenhagen, the food here is actually fairly affordable and just as flavor filled and creative. Surf and turf becomes chopped raw bison mixed with shrimp served in endive and raddichio cups.  Farmer’s eggs features eggshells filled with cauliflower cream wobbling on a piece of chicken wire. The food is hearty, its fresh and it’s the perfect comfort food for winter—an element that will, of course, soon change as we move into the warmer months.

Something we’re hoping doesn’t change soon though are the sugar coated Danish donuts. We’re perfectly happy to eat them all year long.

Acme; 9 Great Jones St between Broadway and Lafayette St; 212.203.2121; Google Map

Fortunately, you won’t need to pay anywhere near that amount to enjoy her photographs, as an exhibition of her work is coming to MoMA from February 26-June 11. Featuring over 170 photographs, the retrospective will document her career from the mid-70s to present day. On display will be selections from her “Untitled Film Stills” which feature Sherman assuming poses and roles inspired by—among other influences—1950s and ’60s film noir. Another highlight of the exhibit will let you see Sherman as she morphs into clergymen, aristocrats and milkmaids a la paintings from the old masters. Then there’s the mural of 18-foot-tall Cindys that you’ll be greeted with as you step out of the elevator. It’s the first time this mural will be introduced to American audiences.

Accompanying the exhibit will be a showing of films from MoMA’s collection chosen by Sherman herself.

Museum of Modern Art; 11 West 53 Street; (212) 708-9400
Google Map

Courtesy Museum of Modern Art. Cindy Sherman. Untitled #466. 2008. Chromogenic color print, 8' 1 1/8 x 63 15/16" (246.7 x 162.4 cm). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Acquired through the generosity of Robert B. Menschel in honor of Jerry I. Speyer. © 2011 Cindy Sherman.

You’d think with all that mating that goes on around them, the folks at the Bronx Zoo would know a thing or two about male/female attraction. Well, maybe not. Their idea of a good valentine’s gift? A piece of dark chocolate shaped like a cockroach. OK, so it’s kind of a stunt to raise money for Wildlife Conservation Society (the zoo’s owner) projects around the world, but still. (Actually, if you want to get really romantic, the zoo is also letting you name one of 58,000 Madagascar hissing roaches after someone you care about.)

Just in case “bugging out” isn’t your idea of a perfect Valentine’s Day, here are some New York chocolate shops (and a chocolate tour) that might make your paramour tingly for a whole different reason …

Martine’s Chocolates
Perfect for: The Impresario
Why: Who stands a chance against your charms when you tell them that the beautiful bonbons you just gave them are made from Belgian Callebaut couverture chocolate?

Jacques Torres Chocolate
Perfect for: The Artiste
Why: Your aesthetic sense will be in evidence when you give the gift of a chocolate “Love Plaque” or heart-shaped chocolate boxes filled with chocolate-covered cheerios—both looking too good to eat. But eat them you will.

Vosges
Perfect for: The Libertine
Why: Their “Game of Chocolate Masquerade” box has carnival-style masks carved out of chocolate along with a guided chocolate tasting, aphrodisiacal recipes, pearl dust for making champagne elixirs and a tickling feather. Need we say more?

Mariebelle
Perfect for: The Traditionalist
Why: Exquisite chocolate bars get a retro wrapping at this Soho sweet spot. Choose from “Moon River Dark,” “Passion Dark,” or “Seduction Milk,” as part of their pinup series, each featuring a vintage colorized print of of the romantic days of yore.

New York Chocolate Tours
Perfect for: The Wanderer
Why: Three different tours will take you throughout various neighborhoods in New York and let you call in at the city’s top chocolatiers. We particularly like the “New Cuisine” tour that brings the taste of “new wave” chocolates to your tongue.

Photo courtesy Booker and Dax

The website for the newly unleashed Booker and Dax cocktail bar and snackery says that their “approach to rethinking cocktails is considered, deliberate, and precision-oriented.” That’s really good. Especially the “precision-oriented” part. Especially since some of the drinks require the bartenders to insert a rod that can reach temps of up to 1500 degrees into their potions.

But that’s just another night at work for the drink slingers at Booker and Dax.

The chilled-out space in which they make like mad scientists is located in the back of David Chang’s Momofuko Ssam Bar (where the Milk Bar used to be). The name of the bar is taken from Mr. Chang’s partner in this venture: the famed cuisine conjurer and director of culinary technology for the French Culinary Institute, Dave Arnold. About his wild concoctions, Arnold told the New York Times: ““I want you to feel happy to be here. I don’t want you to feel like a lab rat we’re testing on.”

Happiness is pretty much guaranteed as you watch the bartenders-cum-chemists chilling glasses with shots of liquid nitrogen, clarifying (removing the solids from) juice in a centrifuge, or carbonating beverages on the spot. And while that’s all entertaining enough, the real joy comes from tasting the fine cocktails all this wizardry produces. Even though there’s a lot of modern-day showmanship going on, it’s never at the cost of the drinks; they remain strong and well-balanced and, oddly enough, taste just the way classic cocktails used to.

Oh yeah, there’s Momofuku-styled snacks too …

Booker and Dax; 207 Second Ave at 13th St (entrance on 13th St); 212.254.3500

Photo courtesy nuchas.com

If you’re like a lot of guys throwing a Super Bowl party, your idea of catering the event will likely consist of heading to the 7-11 for a bag of Tostitos and some canned “cheese” spread about an hour before kick-off. But this year, why not up your game and get something people actually want to eat (we do have a team in this thing after all).

Enter Nuchas. No not nachos. Nuchas. They’re a Times-Square-based outfit that makes super-yummy empanadas that are certainly the right fit for a super sports event (they actually fit great in one hand, so you won’t even have to put down your beer while chowing).

You can get the flaky pastry pockets in a variety of flavours including: short rib (beef braised in red wine with onions peppers, potatoes & fresh herbs); spicy chicken (chipotle, tomatoes, onions, peppers and fresh basil in paprika dough); or pulled pork (rosemary dough filled with pork that’s been cooked with white wine and oranges). For those who prefer their carnage on the gridiron instead of on their plates, there are two veggie empenadas to choose from: spinach dough filled with portabello mushrooms, spinach, mozzarella and fresh herbs, or white Parmesan dough stuffed with assorted cheese and caramelized onions.

And you know what the best part is? They’re starting a delivery service just in time for the big game! Just call in your order by noon on the 5th and you’ll have plenty of dough to keep you going through the day–even if you lose a bunch of it on that football pool at the office.

Nuchas; Broadway Plaza between 44th & 45th St.; 646.477.8274; www.nuchas.com

Original invite to the tunnel's opening. Courtesy brooklynrail.net.

In 1861, a shady NYC contractor known as Electus Litchfield was hired by the city to close up a 17-foot-high, 21-foot-wide, 1,611-foot long tunnel running under Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. The tunnel had been the home to the first-ever underground railway constructed in the world. It had been built by the Long Island Railroad in 1844 as an attempt to alleviate the deaths that were occurring on the streets above, as the train that ran there took about 8 blocks to stop—not the best way to protect the life of a pedestrian who might have stumbled onto the tracks. The tunnel was built entirely with hand tools, took seven months to complete and cost $66,000—a grand sum in those days, but not really for the tunnel’s backer, Cornelius Vanderbilt.

But it is to our advantage that Litchfield was not the most ethical of men, because he only filled in each end of the tunnel, rather than the whole thing (saving himself a good deal of cash).

Fast forward to 1981, when a young engineering student’s search through old moldy papers led him to surmise that the long-forgotten railway tunnel did in fact exist (rumors had circulated for years—including those involving German spies, vampires and John Wilkes Booth’s lost journal, but that’s fodder for another post). He eventually convinced the city to allow him to open a manhole over on Atlantic Avenue and, after clawing through some dirt with his bare hands, then smashing through a shoddily constructed brick wall, the young man—Bob Diamond—found what he had been looking for.

For nearly 30 years, Diamond led tours through the tunnel, regaling visitors with tales of politics, murder and corruption. Now, he may have fallen prey to the same treatment from the city (sans the murder part) as the NYC Department of Transportation shut down the tunnel in 2010 (they claim safety issues, Diamond claims otherwise).

Diamond continues to fight the decision though and you can get updates on his website that’ll tell you everything you’ve ever wanted to know about this hidden part of New York’s past.

BAM (the Brooklyn Academy of Music) is so associated with bringing modern cinema, theater, dance and music into the heart of Fort Greene, that it’s easy to forget that John Wilkes Booth played in Shakespeare’s Richard III here in 1863 or that Mark Twain entertained audiences with his storytelling prowess in 1884.

BAM is, in fact, the nation’s oldest performing arts center and is celebrating its 150th anniversary this year. You can attend part of its 16-month-long birthday party (it’s been in full swing since September) by checking out “From Brooklyn to the World: A History of BAM,” an exhibit broken into to three periods. Until March 30, the collection of rare video, photographs and ephemera focusses on 1864-1967; from April 26 till June 1, the attention turns to 1867-1983; and from June 8 till August 31, the exhibit will spotlight BAM’s history from 1983 to present day.

Not only will the exhibition focus on the various performances held at BAM, it will reveal the icon’s impact on the community that has always embraced it enthusiastically. For example, you’ll be able to see samples of the stamps the center sold in 1864 to help raise $400,000 for the Union Army. You’ll also get to examine other “crazy swag” (as told to Time Out New York by Sharon Lehner, director of the BAM Hamm Archives) as a Viewmaster created for composer Philip Glass and director Robert Wilson’s Einstein on the Beach as well as “wow, I’m getting old” photographs of such stage and screen luminaries as Meryl Streep and Morgan Freeman—when they were much younger.

It’s a true “behind the curtains” look at one of New York’s most defining performing arts centres—and best of all, it’s FREE!

Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM); 30 Lafayette Ave (between Ashland Pl and St. Felix St) Fort Greene, Brooklyn; 718.636.4100; bam.org