Sometimes, in the rush and mundanity of life, it can be easy to forget that we live in one of the world’s cultural capitals. Last month, I went to the Museum of the City of New York for the first time, and visited the Neue Gallerie afterward to check out the “Klimt Landscapes” show. I was excited to take in history and the arts, but even more excited to be taking full advantage of the city.
Depending on where you live, these spots can be a schlep — but I say commit to the schlep, and I’ll make sure you’re eating well along the way. There are surprisingly good dining options at some of our fine cultural institutions, some of them new, most of them old, all of them better than you’d expect to find at a museum.
Aunts et Uncles at the Brooklyn Museum
Did you know that the Brooklyn Museum is currently showing the collection of Swizz Beats and (Tony nominee) Alicia Keys through July 7? The musical couple have been collecting the works of great Black artists, both past and present, including Jean-Michel Basquiat, the photographer Gordon Parks, Toyin Ojih Odutola, Derrick Adams, Lorna Simpson, and some of that work is now on display at the Brooklyn Museum.
And the Museum has tapped another power couple — Nicole and Michael Nicholas of Aunts et Uncles in Flatbush — to sling vegan bites in a food truck outside the museum all summer. I highly recommend ordering the vegan lobster roll, which involves heart of palm dressed in a creamy vegan mayo with crunchy red onions throughout and served in a toasted bun.
The Modern at the Museum of Modern Art
When is the last time you, a local, went to MoMA? I’ll wait. Last summer I found myself standing on 53rd Street and pushing headlong into the Modern to try a very delicious and expensive pig-in-a-blanket. And though I walked in chasing down a gimmick, I walked out as a fan. It’s a first-class restaurant that happens to be in a museum. Eating there feels like a special occasion, and they’re especially good with seafood. (Go for the glazed lobster with snap sugar peas.)
As for the museum itself, my colleague Aodhan Beirne recently highlighted the “Crafting Modernity: Design in Latin America, 1940-1980,” on view through Sept. 22. The show features more than 100 objects of “modern domestic design” from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Venezuela. Or you could just check out the rotating core collection, which never fails to remind me that I can step off the train and see Van Gogh’s “The Starry Night” any time I want.
Café Sabarsky at Neue Galerie
The bad news: By the time you read this newsletter, “Klimt Landscapes” at the Neue Galerie will be in its final days and everyone knows that’s the worst time to go see a show. (Take it from someone who saw both the “Manet/Degas” show at The Metropolitan Museum of Art and “The Girl with the Pearl Earring” at The Frick on their last weekends.) The good news: The teeny-tiny Neue Galerie is by far the most digestible museum in the city, filled with incredible works by Klimt, Egon Schiele and other German and Austrian artists. It also has a beloved Austrian cafe on the ground floor.
Café Sabarsky is fine for lunch or dinner, but beyond excellent for dessert. That menu is 18 items long, with cakes, linzertortes, strudel, tarts and crepes, and it is the closest some of us may ever get to the Vienna of Mozart’s “Eine kleine nachtmusik.” So go for eine kleiner brauner und strudel, mein Herr.
The Dining Room at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Speaking of shows that are going to be absolutely packed on their final weekend, I had the divine pleasure of checking out “The Harlem Renaissance and Transatlantic Modernism,” show at the Met, on display through July 28. The show is extraordinary and I don’t think I’d be able to properly sum it up with my limited word count. Just go see it!
As for food: The closest thing the Met has to fine dining is the Met Dining Room, a low-ceiling restaurant-slash-solarium tucked away on the fourth floor. This is a restaurant-restaurant, in the sense that it is on OpenTable and is surprisingly hard to get into without a reservation. (I checked out the Harlem Renaissance exhibit during my hourlong wait.) The restaurant is, well, fine: It’s clearly seasonally driven thanks to the chef Bill Telepan, and that came across in the extremely decent chilled carrot soup and the excellent crab cakes. Every day — except Wednesday, when it’s closed — the Dining Room is a perfect “take your parents or grandparents to lunch and an art show” restaurant, so consider booking a table the next time you have family in town.
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