It’s pretty ballsy to open an upscale pizzeria spitting distance from Lombardi’s, a New York institution. But while the tourists hunker down over checkered tablecloths tasting old-school coal-oven perfection, locals head a block south to L’asso, to browse through newfangled “pizza creations” or to grab a slice and a glass of wine.

It’s easy to miss L’asso–maybe it’s the abstract signage.  I went a few times when it first opened, liked it, and forgot about it. It’s doubly easy to miss the fact that they serve pizza by the slice, something that Lombardi’s and most other “serious” pizzerias don’t do. But in case you think they’re not serious, L’asso prides itself on adhering to the rules for Pizza D.O.C.–guidelines that specify the type of tomatoes (san marzano), the type of mozzarella (buffalo milk), and the type of oven (domed, brick, and heated to 420 degrees), deemed necessary by the maestros Italy to produce a genuine neapolitan pizza. The atmosphere is very laid-back chic-cafe, with a wine list and dubby mood music, and a fairly extensive menu with about eighteen varieties of individual-sized pizzas. The slices ($2) are behind the counter, and since most of their customers are ordering off the menu, yours will have probably been sitting for a little while and warrant reheating. It’s still as decent a slice as you’ll find in the area - just stick to the margherita and steer clear of the blandly cheesy bianco. However on Monday through Friday they have a happy hour special - $1 slices with $3 Brooklyn Lager on tap. They were churning out slices at a good clip so mine was fresh from the oven, with a light, slightly chewy crust, sweet-and-tangy sauce, just a few melty daubs of fresh mozzarella, and drizzled in olive oil. Granted, it was about half the size of a regular slice but it was a freakin’ DOLLAR so I wasn’t complaining. Then again, this is not too far from Chinatown, where bargains are not unheard of.

I am pretty much over the face-sized, cardboard-crusted, sloppy Artichoke slices–this is closer to a slice as it should be.

L’asso 192 Mott Street at Kenmare
Sun-Wed 12pm-12am, Thurs-Sat 12pm-3am

Doughnut Plant is probably the only eating establishment I have visited twice in one day. It’s that good.

First, there are the yeast donuts, in glazed, jelly-filled, and creme-filled varieties. They’re squarish, faced-sized and unbelievably light, with airy, melty dough under a sticky layer of sweet glaze ($2). Perennial faves are vanilla bean, Vahlrona chocolate (messy), and peanut butter and jelly. There’s a rainbow of seasonal flavors too, including fresh strawberry, pomegranate, pumpkin, and banana pecan. Vanilla is simplicity perfected if you usually find donuts too sweet or too fried. Often there’s one fresh from the oven on a baking sheet poking through the kitchen window, and they’ll drop that one in your bag instead of the one on display in the shelves.

Then there are the cake donuts–smaller, round with a hole, with a more condensed, doughier middle; a closer relative to the traditional donut (think Krispy Kreme). Tres Leches ($2) has a ring of sweet custard running through it–a phenomenal improvement over Boston Creme, because you get just a little bit of creme with every bite. If you must try only one donut here, get this one.

There are the cinnamon rolls, huge doughy spirals encased in a crackling glaze, spiked with swollen raisins, and cinnamon-sugary filling growing more concentrated as you eat your way into its sticky heart.

And finally there’s the dude behind the counter, who is pretty much the embodiment of the happy gourmand donut shopping vibe. He’s always smiling. I love buying donuts from that guy.

There’s only a couple of seats, so count on getting your donuts to go, and munching your way down Grand Street. Plan to get an extra one, so you don’t have to make that second trip.

Doughnut Plant, 379 Grand Street (also sold at Dean & Deluca, but best to go to the source)
Tues-Sun 6:30 am - 6:30 pm

I never tasted a bialy before I lived in New York City. Even in New York these cousins to the more-mainstream bagel are hard to come by. Try to find a good one and most likely, you’ll end up standing at a certain spot on Grand Street, where trendy Lower East Side melds with Chinatown and overlooks a grim shoreline of projects. Here stands Kossar’s Bialys, the remaining stronghold of downtown’s vanished bialy-baking industry.

Inside it seems like little has changed since they opened seventy years ago. Behind a simple counter stand a few wire racks piled with warm bialys, bagels and bulkas. Across a powdery floor, trays of dough placed in tall racks await their turn in the brick oven, whose depths are plumbed by a lone baker with a pole. Seating consists of a bench outside, with an old guy already sitting on it.

But atmosphere isn’t the point–this place is all about bialys. While bagels are boiled rior to baking, rendering their crusts hard and shiny and their innards dense, bialys are simply baked, leaving them lighter and airier, but still chewy and delicious. Instead of a center hole they have a dimple filled with sweet chopped onion. Kossar’s doesn’t toast, so if you do some at home you’ll find even more flavor unleashed, especially with a thin layer of cream cheese or butter spread over top. If you haven’t been for a while, steel yourself for sticker shock–the price of a bilay has skyrocketed from sixty to ninety cents since the halcyon days of 2006. Don’t tell them but I’d probably pay more.

Snack spots, even good ones, come and go quickly in this hood, and I don’t tend to get too attached (witness, if you will, the Chase Bank that was once the venerable Second Avenue Deli). Although the reflex sentiment toward gentrification is dismay, I don’t think shrugging off the past is necessarily a bad thing (now scheduled for demolition/cries of protest–the funeral pyre-ish tower of bedraggled toys on Sixth Street and Avenue B–good fucking riddance). But, ye Manhattan gods! Leave us Kossar’s Bialys! Someone make this a designated landmark of snack before it’s too late!

(shot of the Tower of Toys on East Sixth Street)

Kossar’s Bialys 367 Grand Street at Essex Street. Open 24 Hours Sun-Fri. Closes Fri at sundown. Closed Saturday. REPEAT: Closed Saturday!! If you forget and head down on a Saturday, don’t worry. Donut Plant is a couple doors down, and is worth a visit.

The aroma wafting outside this place stopped me in my tracks–warm and slightly nutty. It was like standing downwind from a roasted peanut cart on a cool fall day. I drink so many varieties of bad coffee during the work week (charred Starbucks, bitter Flavia, watery deli) that I’d forgotten this is how fresh-brewed coffee is supposed to smell.

Inside, my inner nerd feels right at home. Roasting Plant is pleasingly sleek and techy, like the Apple store for coffee. Choose one of seven varieties of beans stored in upright cylanders, and an attendant punches your order onto a touchscreen. Instantly, a cup-sized portion of beans rattles upward along the ceiling through a pneumatic tube into the “javabot“–which roasts, grinds, and brews, spitting out a perfectly-portioned cup of coffee topped with a layer of mocha-colored foam ($2 small, $2.50 large). Then it’s off to the milk counter, where you can choose from four different varieties of sugar, stored in salad-dressing bottles that permit no danger of heaping too much into your drink.

The coffee–at least the Ethiopian Harrar and Yirgacheffe–is smooth and the perfect drinking temperature, but not the boldest, most badass blend I’ve had in town (think Joe the Art of Coffee, or Ninth Street Espresso). The attraction here is having my coffee made by a javabot, which runs the entire length of the store. If you like robots and free wi-fi you’ll probably dig this place; if you prefer having your coffee scooped by humans from a burlap bag on the floor, visit the hippies at Porto Rico (like the one who dissed me for accepting a plastic bag for my half pound of coffee beans. Dude, my hands were full.)

Roasting Plant, 81 Orchard Street