HOWM Cocina & Cocktails Opens in Chelsea

Headliner

HOWM Cocina & Cocktails

The name is pronounced “home.” Remembering how it’s spelled is something else. The idea, according to the Gilded Group, which manages the restaurant in partnership with the Selina Chelsea hotel, is to express people coming together with food and drink. Got that? What the name doesn’t reflect is the nature of the food and drink, a focused exploration of Mexico, Central America and South America. (The hotel is part of a chain with a strong presence in Central America and Mexico.) The chef, Byron Peñafiel, a native of Ecuador, takes some liberties with tradition: His small plates include pupusas with curtido (a kind of cabbage slaw), charred octopus with jalapeño hummus, and grilled broccolini in a mole sauce. Large dishes are guava-glazed roasted chicken, aged churrasco (rib-eye for two) with chimichurri, and chaulafan (Ecuadorean fried rice) chicharrone using black rice, seafood, pork rinds and salsa verde. Deep-fried plantains (patacones) are served for the table, complimentary. Gilded Group’s beverage director, Daniel Bedoya, who was raised in Ecuador, has devised an array of cocktails. These are served in the airy ground-floor restaurant with yellow accents that has outdoor terrace seating on two levels, and also at the 10th-floor Rooftop at Selina Chelsea with expansive views and a plunge pool. (Opens Wednesday)

Selina Chelsea, 518 West 27th Street, 347-342-7805, howm.co, selinarooftop.com.

Opening

Little Rebel

This gastropub on two floors with bright, cartoonish décor on the ground floor and a Victorian setting upstairs serves reinvented bar food, like cheese puffs with strawberry bacon foam, buffalo chicken spring rolls, a burger with bacon jam, and pork belly on smoked celery root purée. The consulting chef is James Akins from Le Bernardin Privé, and the cocktails are by Brooke Smith, formerly of the Dead Rabbit. (Wednesday)

219 Second Avenue (14th Street), 646-922-7325, littlerebelnyc.com.

Rib No. 7

Hefty beef ribs star in this new take on the Korean barbecue restaurant. The ribs come charcoal grilled, sliced tableside and presented arrayed on the bone with tangy side dishes, as well as braised. Appetizers include Korean pancakes, japchae glass noodles and spicy radish fried rice. There are several noodle stews on the menu.

32 West 33rd Street, 212-381-0802, ribno7.com.

Simo Pizza

A second location for this pizzeria, well established in the meatpacking district, is opening in Greenwich Village. The owner, Simone Falco, a native of Naples who runs the Rossopomodoro restaurants at Eataly, offers a menu of pizzas, salads, meatballs, gnocchi and desserts.

75 University Place (11th Street), simopizza.com.

Grand Central Oyster Bar & Restaurant

After closing for more than a year (except for nine days last fall), the 108-year-old seafood restaurant will reopen next week. And it will offer a new oyster, the Merasheen Bay from Newfoundland. It’s a saline oyster from Canada’s northernmost farm. (Tuesday)

89 East 42nd Street, 212-490-6650, oysterbarny.com.

Chefs on the Move

Sal Lamboglia

After 15 years of working alongside Andrew Carmellini at Locanda Verde, The Dutch and Lafayette, this steadfast chef is going off on his own. (He was the chef and a partner at Bar Primi, also owned by Mr. Carmellini’s company.) He plans to open Cafe Spaghetti in Brooklyn this fall. He hasn’t confirmed the exact location, but he’s optimistic that it will come through for his Neapolitan restaurant.

Eunjo Park

This highly acclaimed chef, who went from Momofuku Kawi in Hudson Yards (now closed) to become the executive chef at the company’s Ssam Bar on Pier 17 in the seaport district, has left that post. She is being replaced by Kris Brumsted, who was the chef de cuisine at Momofuku Noodle Bar in the Shops at Columbus Circle. She has not revealed future plans. And, in another shuffle, Sean Alex Gray has left the high-end Ko in the East Village. Esther Ha, who was the chef de cuisine, is being promoted to the top slot.

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