Beatrice Inn Founder Goes Latin
In a town full of nightlife impresarios, Matt Abramcyk might be the ultimate downtown scene-setter. Most notable among his creations was the Beatrice Inn, the infamous West Village celebrity hot spot/speakeasy that he opened with Paul Sevigny. (It closed in 2009.) More recently, he’s brought us Smith & Mills, Warren 77, and Tiny’s. And now comes his latest venture, Super Linda, a recently opened Latin grill in Tribeca. We sat down with the former hedge fund manager to talk about his favorite places in the city.
You’re a Tribeca resident. What are your favorite neighborhood spots?
I love to just stay in this neighborhood. I like Steven Alan’s boutique for clothing, Saluggi’s Pizzeria for Grandma Saluggi’s Pie. My favorite coffee shop is La Colombe, on Lispenard and Church.
Do you ever head uptown?
I really like the Grahame Fowler store on West 10th Street; it’s a cool little clothing shop, with English work clothes. They have these fantastic heavy-gauge-wool sailing sweaters.
I can’t believe 10th Street qualifies as uptown.
I also love going to the Eli Zabar deli E.A.T., on Madison Avenue and 80th. They have an egg-white salad that’s pretty amazing. And there’s a café in the Neue Galerie called Cafe Sabarsky. It’s a traditional Viennese restaurant, and it’s just an exceptional place, right there on Central Park and in this museum full of so many special works of art and furniture pieces. That place always gives me inspiration.
Super Linda seems like a bit of a curveball for Tribeca. Why did you think it would make sense here?
Well, the point is to do a concept that was not already here. Tribeca needed a fun Latin restaurant. The neighborhood has a lot of families, and Latin cuisine is very social, created by a people who treat eating as a communal activity. So we’ve tried to design the space with that in mind.
Beatrice Inn was probably my favorite place in NYC. What did you bring from Beatrice to Super Linda?
There are some obvious comparisons with both downstairs areas, because of the wood paneling and the red banquettes that we had in the back room of Beatrice, but that’s actually a chance coincidence. Apart from that, the real key is creating an atmosphere where people are comfortable having drinks after dinner and well into the night. It’s about the sexiness of the room, and the music.
Speaking of cocktails and food, what’s your top recommendation on the new menu?
The croquetas. It’s a Uruguayan dish that my father-in-law told me is the most important dish at a Latin restaurant. It’s not too heavy, and it’s good for nibbles instead of dinner, or before dinner. We’ve got a lot of really fancy cocktails on the menu, but lately I’ve been drinking Campari with a splash of orange juice and soda. When I was younger, I wanted to be like Ernest Hemingway, and he drank Campari.
Super Linda: 109 West Broadway, 212.227.8998
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