Starting tonight (Cinco de Mayo) and continuing through Friday, Crema Restaurante will be offering a special five course prix fixe menu, with tequila drink pairings, that dovetails Mexican and French cuisines. Chef Julieta Ballesteros, from Monterrey, Mexico, calls the menu a “peace offering” of sorts to the French, and most of the dishes draw heavily upon her training at New York's French Culinary Institute. Even if you're not up for dinner, you might want......

Photograph of Mayor Bloomberg proclaiming a counterfeit foods store closed in a raid of counterfeit good sellers by Bebeto Matthews/AP Nothing says press conference like raiding a 32 stores in what the city dubs "Counterfeit Triangle" and hauling away over a $1 million worth of brand-name products. The raid, taking down stores in the area bounded by Canal Street, Walker Street and Centre Street, occurred in the early morning, with cops using bolt-cutters to......

As we mentioned last week, Gothamist is turning 5 years old next month! Come celebrate with us at a special show at Union Hall. Here are the details: Movable Hype 12.0 and Gothamist Turns 5! Friday, February 15th, 9pm Union Hall (702 Union Street, Park Slope) Featuring: The Forms, Pattern is Movement and Special Midnight Guests! Deejay Craig Wedren You can buy tickets here for $10. We're also giving a pair away, so if you......

Tom Brady sure loves New York, huh? Not only does he walk around town wearing a Yankees hat, but he comes here to spend time with his ubermodel girlfriend Gisele Bundchen in the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl. Brady was spotted walking to Bundchen's West Village apartment Monday carrying flowers (how sweet) and wearing a protective boot on his right foot. About the injury, Brady said that it's not a big deal, "Ah,......

Gothamist is turning 5 years old next month, and to celebrate, we're throwing a little party at Union Hall! We wanted to give you plenty of time to think of creative cakes you can bake us (pictured is one a reader whipped up for us on our 3rd birthday). Here are the details: Movable Hype 12.0 and Gothamist Turns 5! Friday, February 15th, 9pm Union Hall (702 Union Street, Park Slope) Featuring: The Forms, Pattern......

Photo of Crosby Connection space by Billy Chasen Photo of the meatball hero and a smoked gouda and ham sandwich (with apples) by Tien Mao On Crosby Street between Bleecker and Houston, there's a literally hole-in-the-wall sandwich shop called The Crosby Connection. Joey Cramarossa, an ex-cop from New Jersey, works out a tiny space to serve up unbelievably fresh, delicious, filling and reasonably priced sandwiches and salads at $5-6 each. The meatball hero (with......

THEATER: Without uttering a single line of dialogue, theater company Parallel Exit has crammed an hour of stage time with an abundance of zany physical comedy. Accompanied by live music provided by various percussion instruments, ukulele and piano, a hapless troupe of vaudevillians stumbles though “a backstage adventure filled with comic chaos and fast-paced action, incorporating music, magic, tap, and slapstick.” Everything that can go wrong does in their little variety show, and Martin Denton......

A look at some of this week's noteworthy television: 60 Minutes (Sunday, 7:00 p.m., WCBS 2) Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez is interviewed by Katie Couric in the wake of the baseball steroids scandal. Extras: The Extra Special Series Finale (Sunday, 9:00 p.m., HBO) The Ricky Gervais series concludes its run with an 80 minute special episode. Duel (Monday-Friday, 8:00 p.m., WABC 7) No, it isn’t Steven Spielberg’s 1971 feature length film debut made for......

Gross! A former assistant principal at I.S. 72 in Staten Island is accused of asking a 12-year-old student for massages - and then trying to buy her and her mother's silence with promises of private school payment! Lawrence Siegel was put in a district office job - not his usual gig at Rocco Laurie Intermediate School - while the Department of Education investigated him after a DOE parent support coordinator, per the Staten Island Advance,......

Architect Robert Scarano, who has been charged with violating city building standards at 32 properties, has an ally at the Department of Buildings. The Daily News is reporting that Patricia Lancaster, the department's commissioner, hid Scarano's mistakes, signing a stipulation in which she promised not to report Scarano to any regulatory agency that could revoke his license. The News article is part of its I-Team Special Investigation unit. Reporter Brian Kates explains that Lancaster promised......

EVENT: Earlier this year Holly Hunter encountered an interesting situation with an interviewer for a news station (we highly recommend watching the YouTube video of this). She discussed her tv series Saving Grace at the time, and she'll be doing the same tonight at the Paley Center (old Museum of TV and Radio). There will be a Q&A; as well as a screening of one of the episodes. 6pm // The Paley Center for Media......

The Gotham Awards gala run by the Independent Feature Project (IFP) will be held in Brooklyn for the first time tonight, after 17 years spent bouncing around between Roseland, Hammerstein Ballroom and Chelsea Piers. This year the independent film awards will take place on the soundstage of Steiner Studios in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Among the thousand-plus guests expected to attend are Javier Bardem, Sean Penn, Laura Linney, Uma Thurman, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Brooklyn’s......

The Sklar Brothers spent years living in New York, working their way through the alternative comedy scene, becoming in demand performers, and eventually getting their own MTV show, Apt 2F, and later a Comedy Central Special. Then, once they had moved to LA and gotten comfortable, they were sent back into New York to film their show Cheap Seats for ESPN Classics. It seems like the Sklars just can't stay away from the city because......

Except for the large banner hanging from the scaffolding outside Pasta Wafu, you would hardly know it was there. It is tucked in the long and narrow space behind the usually packed Ramen Setagaya, and the name on the door still reads "Oriental Spoon," it's former incarnation as a Japanese tapas restaurant, which itself only opened in July. But Pasta Wafu is all new and features Japanese style pasta, and sushi, and Italian food--all......

These ribs feature date molasses, a flavorful sweet syrup you can pick up at Kalustyan's, and mesquite smoke powder, which you can order from Auntie Arwen's Spices (a really wonderful resource, where we also love to stock up on Two Knives Special Curry Blend and Thief in a Jug Garam Masala). We feel like cheaters using smoke powder, but with our tiny apartment, we only like to go through the hassle of setting up the......

The Red Sox has permeated nearly every facet of Bostonist's lives. When they're not live-blogging the games, waxing poetic about the games, thanking Curt Schilling for his splendid work, or telling Dane Cook to watch his hair, they're watching certain presidential candidates hop on the Red Sox bandwagon (sorry, Gothamist). The Sox are so branded on the local brain that people are using the Series to spice up their sex lives. Speaking of spice, Bostonist......

MUSIC: If you see a lot of guitar-toting ladies and gents around the Puck Building right now, that's because CMJ has officially begun. This means there is a ton of music happening (including at our own Gothamist House starting tomorrow). Tonight we suggest hitting up Brooklyn Vegan's show at Bowery Ballroom: Voxtrot, The Rosebuds, Dean & Britta...and so many more. 6pm // Bowery Ballroom [6 Delancey St] // $16, or free with badge THEATER: A.R.......

This week, the NY Times has some suggestions for wedding gifts from stores affiliated to museums, reasoning that those stores have wonderful gifts that are appealing to "people who are tired of shopping in the same old places — and might enjoy spending a couple hours in a museum as well." We wholeheartedly agree - when you know the couple well, that is. If you are wedding gift shopping for a couple you're vaguely acquainted......

EVENTS: Both Open House NY and The New Yorker Festival are upon us. You can check out more of OHNY's event here, and The New Yorker Festival here. Some picks: The New Yorker Festival hosts a conversation with Errol Morris tonight. He'll be talking with staff writer Philip Gourevitch about Abu Ghraib, with clips shown from Standard Operating Procedure -- his new film is a study of the prison-abuse scandal. Friday // 8pm // Directors......

Some neighbors were relieved when the ASPCA arrived in their Carnarsie neighborhood at the home of David and Laraine Spivak. The couple had taken in between 23-31 cats, and the smell of cat feces had become so unbearable that neighbors called 311 to complain. Apparently the Spivaks slept in their cars while the cats lived in their E. 99th Street home. A neighbor told WCBS 2, "Every morning we see them. They take a bottle......

Black Book (directed by Paul Verhoeven) Growing up in Holland during their occupation by the Nazis, it's no surprise that Dutch director Paul Verhoeven would want to revisit that chapter of his country's history on film. But seeing as it is Verhoeven, director of such hilariously trashy and provocative films as Showgirls and Basic Instinct, he's not going to make a tame, reverent movie about the heroic Resistance. Black Book is a sexy, in-your-face Resistance......

Last night the 59th Annual Emmy Awards took place on the left coast, but New Yorkers made out very well. New York productions/creative types that took home the gold: Late Night with Conan O'Brien (writing), The Daily Show (variety-comedy show series), 30 Rock (best comedy), and Dick Wolf (for producing Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee). In the would-have-been arena, America Ferrera won best actress in a comedy, Ugly Betty, which was originally supposed......

The Graduate (directed by Mike Nichols) If you're looking for a cultural touchstone for the '60s, or even one of the first great uses of pop music on a movie soundtrack, you don't need to search much further than The Graduate, Mike Nichols' dark comedy from 1967. A coming-of-age story that's spawned a Broadway adaptation and a poorly conceived movie continuation, The Graduate turns 40 this year (just like the Summer of Love) and in......

A Westchester couple were charged with promoting prostitution from their home. And what's more, the Journal News describes thirty-four-year-old Robert Werner and his 32-year-old wife Heather Mazzenga as "victims of the housing market"! The New Rochelle Police had been doing their rountine monitoring of Craigslist and became suspicious when they saw a few ads, including one that said, "Grand Opening Special! Hot models, soft sensual touch...New Rochelle has Westchester's first and only member's only club......

We’re not going to spend this space waxing poetic about the farewell to summer and how sad we all are to say goodbye. Folks tend to be so negative on Labor Day – it’s not like the summer immediately ends on the 4th of September. But if this “impending doomsday to summer” is enough to get people to party like they mean it, then we fully support the cause. Now we know we are......

The NY Times has a slide show of assorted items that could be perfect wedding gifts for book lovers. Suggestions range from whimsical bookshelves to personalized book plates. We were most intrigued by Levenger's Thai Book Rest - we suppose you could get a pair of two for a wedding couple. Or one, plus some massage oils and a copy of the Kama Sutra as a cheeky bridal/bachelorette party shower gift. Anyway, on with this......

Generally, when one thinks of baseball game food, the usual suspects come to mind -- hot dogs, sausage and pepper sandwiches, Cracker Jacks, maybe some nachos, complete with day-glo cheez -- but tucked away in a corner of Shea stadium lies something that puts them all to shame. Mama's of Corona is squirreled away on the third base side on the Field Level of the stadium, and those of us with the cheap seats have......

A look at some noteworthy television this week: America at a Crossroads: Anti-Americans (A Hate/Love Relationship) (Monday, 10:00 P.M., WNET 13) A look at the Europeans love/hate relationship with the United States. Live From New York: The First 5 Years of Saturday Night Live (Tuesday, 8:00 P.M., WNBC 4) Two hours of classic SNL sketches and interviews with the performers who created them in this rebroadcast of this retrospective. Wide Angle: The Dying Fields (Tuesday,......

Hopefully Monday's season opener of Sesame Street will help in sweepin' these clouds away! The new season will begin how it always does, by determining the educational needs of their tv-watching tot demographic. Recent years focused on healthy eating in an effort to help the younger generation befriend veggies (they even have their own line of healthy foods). This year there are 26 new episodes all focusing on early literacy and language skills. USA......

After the success of our Gothamist-A Hamburger Today QBQ BBQ last year (that's quality before quantity), we've decided to team up with Serious Eats/A Hamburger Today for another burger event at Water Taxi Beach in Long Island City. At last year's event, Chef Harry Hawk served up four regional burgers from around the nation. This year, you get to choose what burgers are served, with the top three vote-getters across Gothamist, Serious Eats, and......