Tabernacle of Prayer interior and more in the QNYC Evening Edition for Monday January 28, 2013

Amazing, amazing photos of old movie palace turned church, and beautifully preserved

Today we were turned on to a series of photos by Scouting NY of the Tabernacle of Prayer church in Jamaica. Sure, it is a church now but it was originally a movie palace, the Loew’s Valencia movie palace, “one of five flagship Wonder Theaters opened by the Loew’s chain in and around New York in the late 1920′s.” The exterior is pretty cool looking but it’s the interior that is the most staggeringly beautiful. Definitely worth a look.

Noodles are a 2013 restaurant trend – hello Hinomaru Ramen

In a slideshow of Food & Wine’s Restaurant Trends 2013, Astoria’s own Hinomaru Ramen was featured! Here’s a bowl of their delicious noodles:

Image source: Food & Wine via Keeping It Real Food

Chefs are messing around with the traditional noodle soup. “There’s no one right way,” says Tatsu Aikawa of Austin’s Tatsu-Ya, which offers Mexican flavor “bombs” with chile and lime powders. Hinomaru in Queens, NY, serves ramen with uni and Parmesan cream; and in Manhattan, Ivan Orkin, who has worked in Tokyo, is opening a spot featuring brothless ramen with pickled, raw and roasted garlic.

MTA’s FASTRACK arrives this week, see how it affects you

The MTA’s construction program FASTRACK is coming to the N/Q/R lines this week. Here’s what happens during FASTRACK:

During a FASTRACK shutdown, our employees inspect hundreds of signals and switches, repair and replace track rails and cross ties, clean track floors, perform elevator and escalator repair work, repair water damage, clear drains, and clean stations. We also clear the track-bed of a significant amount of debris. We repaint areas untouched in years, because they are not reachable during normal train operation. We clean lighting fixtures, change bulbs, and repair platform edges. We also perform high-intensity station cleaning providing a visible improvement to the station environment and your commute.

Here’s what’s affected between the hours of 10pm and 5am:

• N trains run in Queens and Brooklyn only (so, in Queens, the N will operate like a shuttle between Ditmars Blvd and Queensboro Plaza – catch the 7 there to get into the city)
• Q trains are rerouted via the D (6th Ave) in Manhattan to/from the 57 St F station
• R service ends early in Manhattan and Queens (so as to accommodate construction in the city)

No Longer Empty’s transformation of the Manhattan Bank building

We love this time-lapse video of the transformation of the Manhattan Bank building for No Longer Empty’s How Much Do I Owe You? exhibit. Have you seen the show yet? It is very cool! Definitely worth checking out.

[vimeo http://vimeo.com/58365355]

New American restaurant from the Butcher Bar people is coming to 30th Avenue

We were happy to learn more about what is coming into the space on 30th Ave and 38th Street – another restaurant from the Butcher Bar folks! More info:

The new restaurant will have a decidedly open-air-café feel, he says, but points out that it will be different from the bevy of frappe hang-outs that line 30th Avenue. The new restaurant “will celebrate Europe and bring people back to the original meaning of a café,” says Byrd.

Nice. Naturally, because of its connection to Butcher Bar, you’ll likely see meats from sustainably and humanely raised animals. They’re going to grow some of their own fresh herbs in the backyard. They’ll start with a dinner menu – with a full bar offering what we bet will be delicious cocktails. They they’ll put together lunch and brunch menus – this is a very common pace for Astoria restaurants as of late.