Gotham Gal

Hurricane Sandy

We were here over a year ago during Irene.  It was not pretty.  Water came roaring into our basement and holding it at bay was not going to happen. 

Yesterday as we watched all the tracking of Sandy we knew this was going to be way worse.  Although we are located in Zone B, Zone A is literally next door.  Everyone in Zone A was evacuated.  The water began to lap over the Westside Highway from the Hudson river at high tide in the morning before the big storm even hit.  We could only imagine what was going to happen when Sandy came barreling in that evening.  In the end, we decided around 3pm to leave.

We read all the tweets, we watched the videos, we heard from our building.  Our basement was destroyed, our lobby was destroyed, my office was destroyed....and all of Manhattan from about 39th Street and down had no electricity. 

The picture above was taken from our friend and neighbor of our building last night.  It is the aftermath which is going to just be horrendous.  Two major hurricanes in NYC in just over a years time.  In a town that never sleeps and we consider the epi-center of almost everything, it is eerie and humbling to be so helpless against Mother Nature. 

An ode to Marion, Marvin and Nora

We lost three amazing people recently who definitely made an impact on me, although I did not know any of them personally.  Nora Epron, Marion Cunningham and Marvin Traub. 

Nora Ephron, the glass ceiling breaker.  A writer, chef, mother, director, playwright...a woman that was way ahead of her time and one that all women held in awe....at least I did. 

Marion Cunningham, an advocate for good home cooking.  She championed the dinner table where food was made straight from your kitchen.  She also came to her career later in her life which we can all applaud. One of my first cookbooks was Marions. 

Marvin Traub, he was Bloomingdales.  He was the briliant mind behind the creation of one of the most unique heavily curated exciting department stores in the world.  When I worked at Macys, I wanted to be Marvin Traub.

So after reading the obituaries this morning and reading about Marion and Marvin on the same day, I baked Marion Cunninghams Coffeecake (should have used a bundt pan but didn't have one). I think it is the perfect ode to three pretty amazing people who made their mark on the world or at least in my life. 

Shopify's 3rd Annual Build-A-Business Competition

I was thrilled to be asked to be a guest mentor for Shopify's Build-A Business competition this year. 

Ecommerce has changed the retail environment.  Not only has every brick and mortar store of the past had to figure out how to engage their customers online, the flow of new ecommerce business are emerging daily.  The easiest way to open a shop online is to use Shopify for your backend.  It is easy to use, they can host your site and at this point over 25,000 online shops use their service. 

Having an annual competition that provides mentorship, guidance and a bunch of free products that allows your company to build out its product and compete to be a possible winner by selling the most goods over a two month period is brilliant.  Four companies will win and with that receive a $50K investment valuing the company at $1m. 

All you have to do is open your online company now and start selling products using Shopify.  Companies that launched prior to March 1, 2012 are not eligible for the competition.  On February 28, 2013, which ever four companies that have sold the most products over a two month period win. 

Check out more information here and get going.  This is a great incubator concept for ecommerce businesses.  Let the games begin. 

 

Happy Independence Day

The thing that I have always loved about 4th of July are the fireworks.  I can't remember a year as a kid, teenager or an adult that we have not gone to see the fireworks.  There is something about the beauty of the lights, the noises, the sighs from the audience that I look forward to every year.

This year, in particular, I am thinking about how lucky I am to be born in this country.  There is no doubt that no system or Government is perfect.  You can't please everyone all the time but at least you can please most people some of the time.  Our Government allows us the opportunity to vote and that combined with the freedom of speech gives all of us the ability to create change.  When we make changes they happen for the most part in a peaceful way.  

Today we have the ability to watch photos around the globe of suffering, violence, regimes supressing their people, explosive anger with very little opportunity for change, I can't help but think of how lucky I am to have been born in the USA and the opportunities that this country has given me.

Happy Independence Day.  It is a privelege to have that independence and this is the one day that was set aside for all of us to take at least a brief moment to realize how the system we live here in the US is pretty damn good. 

Ban the plastic bag

There is petition in NYC right now to bag the plastic bag.  I am all for it.  You can sign the petition here

When we lived in Paris for the summer, plastic bags were not available.  Everyone carried their own bags.  Environmentally it makes a huge amount of sense.  It is a no-brainer and doesn't take a lot to change our habits. 

Here is some information from the Change.org site:

Plastic bags cause damage to ocean marine life, street litter, and carbon emissions in their manufacture and shipping.

As Americans we use 102 billion grocery bags a year. They're a product with a useful life measured in hours and a waste life measured in centuries. 

Get the quick facts on plastic or read the Greenpleace report Plastic Debris in the World's Oceans for a more complete understanding.  

The debris that marine life consumes or that entangles them could well be a plastic shopping bag. Maybe one of ours. Maybe one of yours. 

Take a moment to think about that. You'll never look at a one-use plastic bag from the grocery store the same way again. 

This is something we can do. Plastic bag bans are spreading across the country. The city of Rye, New York just passed a ban. If Rye can do it, New York City can do it. 

By banning the bag, New York City can send a powerful signal that this great city can be an environmental leader. 

Please sign the petition to encourage the City Council to take up this issue again. And please share it with every New Yorker, and everyone who cares about the environment, that you know.

 

Googa Mooga

I could start with the name.  There isn't a person that I know who wondered how could you call a festival Googa Mooga?  Also, nobody ever gets it right.  Mooga googa, or that googa thing or is it mooga mooga.  Anyway, enough on that name. This event was food and drink festival.  Think of a musical festival such as Bonaroo but instead food and wine are the primary focus.  Good idea if you can pull it off. 

The event was put on in Prospect Park.  They couldn't have been luckier weather-wise.  It was sunny, 77 and not a cloud in the sky which is probably why people stayed, hung out and there weren't any uprisings. 

The festival was divided into two sections.  The "free" area but you had to get a ticket to get in there which means they knew exactly how many people were attending.  Then there was the "extra mooga" side which cost $250 per ticket per day.  Yes, if you wanted to attend both days (saturday and sunday)it would be $500.  

In the "free" area there was a band shell and then food vendors galore including a beer and wine tasting pavilion and a coffee experience.  The place was packed and the lines for food could go anywhere from an hour or to an hour and a half.  The event lasted until 8pm and by 5pm most of the vendors had run out of food.  There were also a few bands playing at the end of the evening.  It was a beautiful day so my guess is most people got there, decided what the hell, here I am with my friends hanging, enjoying the weather, inside a park and I will just stand in this ridiculous line and buy some food...not so true on the other side.

In the "extra mooga" area there was food events over the course of the day including panels, some DJ's, music at night and food and drinks were free as part of your ticket price.  Unami burger had people waiting in line for over an hour plus at 2pm and they ran out of food at 330.  Not pretty for the people who had stood in line for the two bite burger. 

At Tertulia, where the line was also long but only lasted about 15 minutes, there was one paella pan with a woman literally using a tablespoon to scoop out some rice for your plate where you got 2 tablespoons of paella.

Colicchio & friends gave out a piece of meat with some corn.  They all treated it like a food tasting event which happen all over the city during the year for non-profit organizations but when you pay $250 to go to this event where not a dime is going to a non-profit organization, it isn't okay.  People were hungry and pissed.

Back at the boat house, the restaurant of the moment would bring out plates of food and people would swarm them and in seconds the food would be gone.  It was a tad barbaric.

Inside the Blue Ribbon fried chicken event there wasn't even a regulated line but a swarm of people attempting to shove each others way in to get a piece of fried chicken.

Music festivals work because you put a band up on a stage and 1000 people can circle around.  There is food to get but it isn't the highlight.  People paid $250 a piece to stand in line for a small tidbit of food if they had not run out.  The people who ran this event knew exactly how many people were coming each day because they the sold tickets.  The event was a shit show, to put it bluntly.   It was poorly produced and operated.  Each food vendor should have been told to prepare for the amount of people that were coming and put at least 10 people behind the booths just to serve and another 20 to cook.  They each had just a handful at best.  Jazzfest moves the people through because they have at least 20+ people working at each food vendor. 

For the people inside the "paid" area there should have been buckets of water bottles around.  There weren't even garbage people.  There were piles of empty plates on the picnic tables.  The lines for drinks were ridiculously long too.  Even when you left the festival, taking the Q back into the city took forever. Did anybody have a conversation with the transportation people of NYC and mention that they should not run the trains like a weekend schedule because of the throng of people coming to the festival?  BTW the cell service out there was terrible too.  The operators could have fixed that easily but alas, did not.  Maybe they were saving themselves for the nasty tweeting that would have gone on. 

Beautiful setting, good idea but beyond poorly executed.  I bought tickets for the whole family and my kids bolted after they got their unami burger.  I can't believe that I paid $250 a head for this.  A complete rip-off.  I am not the only person out there yesterday who wanted their money back.  The experience, considering the food amount, was worth about $50 at best.

Can't tell you about the other side but there is nothing fun about standing in line for an hour or more for food that you can get around the city.  It would have been more fun to do a walking tour of all these restaurants or even for $250 a head we could have rented a bus and gone door to door.  Lesson learned, I would have a hard time imaging that they are going to get people out there for year 2 particularly for the "extra mooga". . 

BTW, we left the show starving.  Went back to the city and sat down for dinner at Barbuto where they are always so obnoxious about getting a table.  Empty tables but it will be an hour wait.  Really?  Can you call me on my cell when the table becomes available?  Answer: no, but you can take a card and call us.  Funny enough, less than 5 minutes later we were sitting because they decided to fill the empty tables.  Seriously?  I will say the food is always good there these days and it wasn't a year ago. Does it make up for the snooty attitude when you walk in the door....questionable. 

Here are a few quotes I found this morning on line about Googa Mooga.  Pretty much confirms what I wrote.

» OrangeCrusher • Sat May 19, 2012 08:55 PM

They are refunding the VIP money as we speak.

Ran out of beer, ran out of food.

What a fucking shit show.

jtr210 • Sat May 19, 2012 08:58 PM

Super lame. They knew exactly how many people would be there.

This is from the Gurgling Cod who figured it out and wasn't even there just based on math.  Can the operators add?

Googa Mooga Math #googamooga

Via FOC The Lime Spider, some calculations W/R/T Googa Mooga: 

The organizers say 40,000 per day. Let's agree, generously, that peak will be 30,000. 

I think 35% will be at the concerts, and not on line for food at any given time, but to be polite, let's say 50% to make them feel like people came for the music. Also because it makes the math easier: 15,000 on line for food. 

75 vendors. 2 lines per vendor. 150 lines. 100 people per line. 

Cash transactions. Optimistically, 60 transactions per hour. That means each line will run about an hour and a half, for tasting portions or slightly larger. Even if there are twice as many lines, or half as many people, you're still looking at 45 minute waits.

Street thinkers call it Tight Math. For the sake of the people who are going, I hope these calculations (by someone w/ food festival experience) are off base. The Cod is Pro Prospect Park -- despite the restrictions on fishing. The Cod is a fan of many of the food vendors. Based on past experiences, not sure that putting all of these purveyors in the same place will lead to a better time than having them scattered around NYC.

All and all, a shit show. 

 

change is happening around the globe

I met Nicholas Noe during my days at MOUSE.  Super smart creative person who really was into politics.  Fast forward, Nic moves to Beirut and becomes the co-founder of the Mideastwire, a news translation wire.  Nic was in NYC maybe a few years ago and we caught up.  He was presenting his report, Century Foundation report, 'Re-imaging the Lebanon Track', to a group and I was impressed how he is really trying to create change in an area of the world where we have a hard time creating new ways to imagine peace. 

I got an email from Nic this past week asking me to speak with David Nabti who is involved in the tech community in Lebanon with hopes of getting as many women involved as possible.  I got on Skype with the two of them this past week.  I still find it amazing when 3 people, Nic happened to be in Tunisia, can get together and talk so fluidly when we are across the globe from one other. 

David is working on AltCity and their tag lines is "a community collaboration production start-up space designed to support innovative, creative, high-impact and socially-relevant media and and entrepreneurial initiatives".  They are working on supporting non-profit and profit at the same time.  I love that they are thinking big but my gut is to go with the profit and take it from there. 

The concept is similar to others we have seen here at home from Techstars and YCombinator even with a little bit of 3rd Ward thrown and General Assembly thrown in.  There will be an AltCity where there are collaborative spaces, a multi-media lab including a resource room and a cafe.  Companies will apply, they will get mentors to work with ( could be through Skype ) and there will be a pitchfest.  After the pitchfest there will be a 3-month accelerator program to get companies to the point of pitching to investors.  So they are spending some time honing the companies first before moving into the regular 3-month program that most companies start in once they have applied in most of the incubators you see around the country.

Here are two guys, who both grew up in the US, that have spent almost the last decade in Lebanon trying to help their peerss in a country that they have grown to love try and create new economies, new companies and foster the individuals there that are budding entrepreneurs.  Impressive, exciting and exhilerating.  I hope that I can help.  This is the kind of thing that should be happening around the globe as more countries, particularly those in the Middle East are seeing the youth finally come out to the streets because of the access to social media screaming for change.  This program will provide the education and tools to begin the kind of change we need to see.

 

The White House gets Social Media and Entrepreneurship

I was on a panel yesterday that was put on by the Obama administration and Barnard College.  The conference was to promote small business ownership in urban areas for women, aka enterpreneurs.  A really impressive crowd and informative panels.  I was thrilled to sit on a panel with Janet Hanson of 85 Broads, Gail Harmon of Accion, Marissa Lee who runs the Small Business Administration, Natalia Noguera of the Pipeline Fund and we were moderated by Arianna Huffington. 

Even though we were all coming at the conversation from different angles, our stories were similar, our careers had taken a few turns and we all understood what women needed to do to have successful outcomes. It was streamed live but I can't find the taped version.  Alas.

I am also judging this challenge below.  It would be great if the US Dept of Labor was swamped with fantastic applications.  That alone sends a very strong message to the White House which is technology is where the biggest growth is coming from in this country.  For them to see thousands and thousands of apps where one is more clever than the next is powerful.  Info below.

 

The U.S. Department of Labor just launched the Equal Pay App Challenge on Challenge.gov . The contest calls on developers to use publicly available data and resources to create innovative, easy-to-use apps that educate users about the pay gap and provide tools to combat it. The apps should improve the accessibility of pay data broken down by gender, race and ethnicity, and provide coaching on early career pay, pay negotiation or career mentorship. Below you will find a list of resources that can be shared with potential participants and supporters of the Equal Pay App Challenge.

 

Mission

Each submission should achieve at least one of the following goals: 1. Provide greater access to pay data by gender, race, and ethnicity, 2. Provide tools for early career coaching, 3. Help inform negotiations and 4. Promote online mentoring. Additional information can be found at: http://equalpay.challenge.gov/details/about

  

Prizes

A total of eight (8) prizes will be awarded, including five (5) grand prizes and three (3) goals challenge prizes – winners will be announce at or around April 17^th, 2012. Additional prize information can be found here: http://equalpay.challenge.gov/

 

Judges

There are a total of 13 judges supporting the Equal Pay App Challenge, encompassing government, technology entrepreneurship, and advocacy. A complete list of judges can be found here: http://equalpay.challenge.gov/details/judging#judge_522

 

Resources

• Equal Pay App Challenge Information

o   DOL Equal Pay Press Release: http://www.dol.gov/opa/media/press/opa/OPA20120146.htm

o   Equal Pay Contest on Challenge.gov: http://equalpay.challenge.gov/

• Department of Labor Resources

o   BLS Current Population Survey Information: http://www.bls.gov/cps/

o   BLS Current Population Datasets & API: http://developer.dol.gov/BLS-CPS-DATASET.htm

o   Women’s Bureau Resources: http://www.dol.gov/wb/

• Equal Employment Opportunity Commission Resources

o   Job Patterns for Minorities & Women in State and Local Governments: http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/statistics/employment/jobpat-eeo4/2009/index.cfm

• Supporter Resources

o   Salary.com – Equal Pay App Challenge Page & API: http://www.salary.com/equal-pay-app-challenge

o   The Daily Muse – Equal Pay RSS Feed: http://www.thedailymuse.com/tag/thedailymuseepac/feed/atom/

o   10 Steps to Negotiating a Higher Salary – Courtesy of Dr. Linda Babcock: http://progress.heinz.cmu.edu/Files/Dr%20Babcock%20Negotiation%20Tips.pdf

 

Deadlines

Contestants must register for the contest on Challenge.gov by creating an account between January 31st, 2012, and March 31st, 2012. All entries received after March 31st, 2012 will not be considered for prizes.

 

Social Media

You can support the Equal Pay App Contest via Twitter by following: http://twitter.com/usdol and using the hashtag #EqualPayApps. You can always retweet DOL’s message found here: https://twitter.com/#!/USDOL/status/164445171969302528  or use your own – I have included some suggested language: “Can u create innovative, easy-to-use apps that educate users about pay gap & provide tools to combat it? http://equalpay.challenge.gov/ #equalpayapps”.

 

You can also support the challenge by visiting the Department of Labor’s Facebook account at http://www.facebook.com/departmentoflabor and sharing it with your network.

Peck Slip Pickle Festival

All weekend long we were discussing the return to our roots through local businesses, social responsibility and the generosity of each community.  How entrepreneurs are being funded and yet many of them will become singular lifestyle businesses while others could be $50 million dollars businesses and others might have a billion dollar market cap.   Entrepreneurs are alive and well. 

I wandered down for breakfast (sleeping in as long as possible on Sunday morning is so key) Fred pulled out the Sunday Review of the NYTimes and said, this article is exactly what you have been talking about.  William Deresiewicz calls it Generation Sell.  His article is worth the read.  His theory to how we got here is interesting.  Regardless, I love where we are.  I like what this generation is about from the people who are creating the tools that allow us to live in a virtual global world to the community businesses that make us feel grounded and part of something. 

We couldn't have wrapped up this weekend more perfectly than by going to the Peck Slip Pickle Festival at the New Amsterdam Market with Josh.  This market place that now takes place almost every Sunday completely defines what is happening in the world of small businesses around food.  Everyone is hip, everyone is nice and supportive of each other and the feeling of community is everywhere. 

We basically tasted a bunch of things and I tried to support as many local vendors as possible.  Many people just love to taste and never buy a damn thing. I didn't buy one of these Brooklyn Butcher Blocks but I have the card and I am going to buy one online after I post. 

We began with the Mighty Quinns slow smoked brisket sandwich with pickles and red onions.   Can't seem to find the website to link too but they make the rounds from the Brooklyn Smorgasburg and Flea to other events. 

Next stop was La NewYorkina.  Dried orange peels with cayenne pepper, pumpkin seed brittle and a gruyere cheese empanada with strawberry jelly.  The empanada totally worked and the crust was killer. Their tag line is "handmade with love".  No question about that.

Gotta love Porchetta.  There is nothing like the slow roasted pork chopped in a sandwich mixed with the crispy skin. 

Hot Bread Kitchen that is near and dear to my heart was selling bialys today.  Jessamyn, the brilliant founder, got together with Mimi Sheraton before the market at an event to discuss bialys. Wish I caught that.  Mimi Sheraton is one of the mavens of the food industry, wrote a book about bialys and was the food critic for the New York TImes.

When did everyone become a pickler?  Here are all the entries for the pickle challenge.  There were easily a dozen pickle makers there today.  Ricks Picks is still the leader in this space.  Look for some new products as well as bigger and less expensive products coming to you sometime in the spring from Rick.

The musicians.  Sorry the picture is so blurry.  These guys were singing and crooning like they had just come out of the Appalachians.  You have to see and hear that and immediately think about what is going on in our culture.  We have Occupy Wall street happening only blocks away and this group of hipsters making pickles and crooning.  You can't help but take pause. 

This was great.  P & H Soda.  The guy who was doing this was not a young pup.  He had syrup bottles to sell from ginger to sasparilla.  He was making these amazing soda drinks.  We had a ginger lime which was one of the most refreshing clean drinks I have ever had.

Lamb sausage sandwiches at 18NY.  Brilliant idea of using a blow torch to melt the cheese.  Excellent spicy hot sauce.

Blue Bottle Coffee with sweets to sell and a clever drip system. 

First Field was selling their two wares.  New Jersey tomatoes turned into homemade ketchup and a local Jersey cranberries turned into cranberry sauce.  I bought them both.  The cranberry sauce is delicious although they would need some serious capital to stock up on that product to sell all year.

Peanut Butter & Co is a place we have gone to on Sullivan since they opened. They were certainly pioneers in the artisinal food space. Now selling jars of peanut butter from regular to crunchy to honey to chocolate to cinnamon raisin.  Really good. 

I did not get a chance to taste these but they look so beautiful.  The Dumpling Dutch Diva making profittjeres.  I love the pan she is using. Sweet and savory.

I did pick up some greens, apples and such from the farm stands but our last taste was a grilled gouda sandwich with pieces of pancetta from Morris Truck who you can follow on Twitter because they don't have a website.  Just the browning of the bread alone makes your mouth water.

The market was packed, we bumped into more than a handful of friends taking it all in and making their purchases too.  The New Amsterdam Market which was packed more today than others because of the pickle theme defines the times we live in. Smart people creating businesses that they love.  There is a knee jerk reaction to working in structured businesses like banking and people are embracing their lives and what turns them on by becoming entrepreneurs.  They want to enjoy their lives.  I like these times. 

 

Hamptons Burger Bloodbash, 2011

I hate to sound like a curmudgeon but I missed the Burgerbash of years before.  The event was homegrown and over the years grew but it was always fun because it was more like a bunch of friends and extended friends getting together for a fun afternoon with a little competition thrown in on the side.  This year was a sponsored event that actually sold tickets and was housed at a perfectly groomed pool side home.  I felt a little bit like I was part of a photo shoot for a magazine.  Just not my thing.  Put it this way, there are valet parking by a bunch of kids in uniforms.  This is not my Hamptons. If the tickets helped cover costs, I am sure there is another way. 

The chefs this year were some old favorites and some new entries.  Mo Koyfman, back again with Jim McDuffee from Joseph Leonard ( and one of our favorite chefs in the Wilson household ), Michael White who certainly seemed to be enjoying himself, Wylie Dufresne of WD-50, Zach Chadorow, Cobi Levy, Preston Madison and the Team from Peels, Jesse Gerstein and Marc Vidal.  Many of the judges made a return including the charming Kate Krader from Food and Wine magazine, Marc Murphy, Lee Schrager and one of my faves, Mark Pastore from Pat LaFrieda. 

The grills fired up at 3pm and not a soul was allowed in until that time.  The people at the gate with their walkie talkies took that pretty damn seriously.  Considering Lockhart Steele who had been involved with this event from the get-go and a true leader in the food community was in the car behind me and wasn't allowed in either until 3pm was not a good start for any of us.  Well, particularly me. 

Josh and Emily came with me.  We had an entire house of guests so we couldn't stay through the entire event.  Truth is that after we had tasted a few burgers, none of us even cared if we stayed to try the others.  It just wasn't the Burgerbash we had come to love. 

This was Mo and Jim's burger which is always a classic.

Here was the special sauce in Michael Whites burger.

Wylie Defresne made a classic cheeseburger and I do believe he made the cheese himself.

Here is Lock indulging himself on the Defresne burger.

Unfortunately we didn't taste the rest, we went home.  I heard Mo and Jim were the winners, 3 different years of bringing home the award.  Nice one.