Lindy Promotions is having their annual Greenwich Village Spring Pub Crawl on Saturday, April 14th starting at 1pm.  For more info, see this: http://www.lindypromo.com/fliers/120414_VillageSpring.jpg

Check out these upcoming crawls:

March 16, 17 and 18 in Manhattan, organized by pubcrawls.com: http://pubcrawls.com/saint-pattys-pub-crawl-nyc.php

Saturday, March 17 in Manhattan, organized by barcrawls.com: http://barcrawls.com/newyork#/shamrock-shuffle-nyc

Saturday, March 17 in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, organized by Murphguide.com: http://tickets.murphguide.com/Events/ShowEvent.aspx?eventId=15478

Did I omit a crawl?  If so, send me a comment here and I will gladly add the crawl to this list.

For those looking for Saint Patrick’s Day NYC bar crawls this weekend and next weekend, check out some of these upcoming events:

Saturday, March 10 at the South Street Seaport in Manhattan, organized by Lindy Promotions: http://www.lindypromo.com/fliers/120310_SouthSt12.jpg

March 16, 17 and 18 in Manhattan, organized by pubcrawls.com: http://pubcrawls.com/saint-pattys-pub-crawl-nyc.php

Saturday, March 17 in Manhattan, organized by barcrawls.com: http://barcrawls.com/newyork#/shamrock-shuffle-nyc

Saturday, March 17 in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, organized by Murphguide.com: http://tickets.murphguide.com/Events/ShowEvent.aspx?eventId=15478

Did I omit a crawl?  If so, send me a comment here and I will gladly add the crawl to this list.

Some new spots that have recently opened: Amelie, a wine bar in the Village; Vucciria, a wine bar/restaurant in Hell’s Kitchen (in the old Film Center Cafe space) and New York Beer Company, a beer bar in Hell’s Kitchen (around the corner from Vucciria).  Interestingly, the Beer Authority, another beer bar a few blocks south of New York Beer Company has been slated to open for a while.  A visit to its website indicates that the spot is “opening soon”, but no date has been given.  A telephone call does not provide any additional information.  Do you know the status of Beer Authority?  If so, please share!  Both New York Beer Company and Beer Authority will be welcomed additions to the Hell’s Kitchen NYC beer bar crawl.

I am so excited!

After being otherwise occupied the last couple of weekends, I am ready for a weekend of bar hopping around NYC.  I’m thinking of checking out a few recently-opened spots, such as New York Beer Company in Hell’s Kitchen and the new location of JBird on the Upper East Side.  If you have any suggestions of spots to hit, I’d like to hear from you.  As always, I’ll share with you some of the highlights from this weekend’s NYC bar crawl.

In the past couple of months, the craft-beer focused LES NYC bar crawl has been pared down by two spots.  A recent post on eater.com indicated that Stanton Public will turn into an exclusive lounge/nightclub spot called The Elsinore.   Moreover, I’ve passed by White Slab Palace several times of late to see the windows covered in brown paper (usually not a good sign).  A fairly recent post on grubstreet.com confirms the closure.  It’s unfortunate to lose not one, but two solid craft-beer spots in that nabe.  Here’s hoping some new beer bars open in the LES sooner rather than later.

This is an article I came across recently featuring the top beer bars from around the United States.

http://draftmag.com/features/americas-100-best-beer-bars-2012/#northeast

Five NYC beer bars made it on the list: Beer Table, Blind Tiger, Earl’s Beer & Cheese, Rattle N Hum and Spuyten Duyvil.  I’m happy to report that I have visited all five at least once (some dozens of times, I’m thinking of you Blind Tiger…).  I know it’s always difficult when one compiles these “top” lists; I’m surprised that there were some NYC ones that were left off.  Check back next week and I will briefly discuss a few that I would like to see added to this top 100 list.

According to a recent article in the NY Post (located here: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/hizzoner_sauce_pan_n9AdFlKbp5yniOhUprFt0L), New York City’s Health Department proposes to slash the number of establishments in the city that sell alcohol.  The Health Department, as the Post story reports, is short on specifics of how to implement such proposals.

My thoughts:

As readers of this space know, I love going to bars and doing my New York Bar Crawls.  In short, I’d be disappointed to see such a proposal take hold if it were to reduce radically the number of drinking establishments across the five boroughs.  But, the officials were short on specifics.  Before any of us bar hoppers gets upset and starts a campaign against this proposal, let’s wait for the details.  Whatever the proposals, I doubt too many bars, provided they are not breaking any laws nor being a nuisance to their neighbors, will get shutdown as a result of this proposed policy.  Time will tell.  Either way, stay tuned, this new proposal could have some interesting ramifications for NYC nightlife.

Late afternoon on Saturday, 1/14/12, I did a brief Williamsburg NYC bar crawl, which took place right around the Lorimer Street L train stop in Brooklyn.  Lots of solid spots in that vicinity.  This week, I’ll be providing brief descriptions and photos of some of the spots I visited.  Please check this space often in the coming days!