Lower Manhattan The New Food Hub

Manhattan is going to be THE destination for many local and foreign visitors.A lot go for the sites , most come for the city's wide variety of eateries and various cuisines. There's a new stop, lower Manhattan. The Wall Street and Tribeca areas are abuzz with all sorts of new restaurants and innovative chefs. Plan to spend a few meals down in this new culinary hub.

Jeff Gordonier not only was able to write about it but also visit some of the up and coming places and sample their best dishes. His article in today's New York Times Food section is a complete guide for navigating the various eateries and watering holes of the lowermost tip of Manhattan Island. For meat and French cuisine lovers there is Le District , the French themed market that offers up rotisserie and charcuterie meats. For those love who love the famed Spotted Pig, its' owners, April Bloomfield and Krn Friedman are planning a mega restaurant that will take up four (!) stories of an apartment complex on Pine Street, around the corner from famed Trinity Church.Odeon ,a staple of lower Manhattan has added breakfast to its' menu , making it vastly popular with the Conde Nast gang who have recently moved into the new World Trade building.The prices are still the same, high but worth it, especially their Croque Monsieur and all natural strip steak.Plus the Odeon has a history , going back four decades to Manhattan's Disco and Eighties Wall Street eras.

The area , once reserved to just handling the world's business and trading, now is a thriving community. Office workers in the area are hanging around instead of heading home. This means a growing need for both bars and eateries. Some eateries get as many as 200 people for lunch alone according to Kevin Richter, general manager at the North End Grill. Weekends can see  as high as 1,300 customers.It does help though to have customers such as the famed Graydon Carter, and a few of Bon Appetit's major editors like Andrew Knowlton (This last helps tremendously since sooner or later the eateries will be featured in the magazine).Hopefully the area doesn't pick up the glitzy and superficial aura of nearby Soho which now feels like Rodeo Drive East. One restaurant , Little Park seems to be picking this up, being a morning roost for local editors as one , Tatiana Boncompagni of Self has noticed. The real test will be when Bobby Flay or Lidia Bastianich discover Wall Street and decided to insinuate their restaurants around Trinity Church and the American Indian Museum. will they survive amongst the trendy crowd or be snubbed in favor of New York's latest restaurant.

If you're visiting Manhattan this summer, stop for a bite at its' lower most tip. Try the French faves at Odeon or head over to Little Park  for breakfast. Enjoy this latest food hub.