So last night was the super-double- secret opening of Birreria, the rooftop brewery at Eataly NYC. My brew-buddies Leo and Teo flew in from Rome and Turin respectively. We met on the rooftop and the first thing we celebrated was Teo's prescient design prowess. Dude picked out these sweet red chairs...

Well done Teo! Attention to quality and detail is what makes Italian chairs, food, beers, et al so compelling. A ton of thought went into designing this space. Respect for the kitchen. Respect for the onsite industrial brewery (black tile and copper clad brewing tanks). And respect for the dining room/bar area. Which is well designed with Teo's chairs, and featuring Mario/Alex's food, Teo, Leo, Dogfish, beer.

But the views! My gosh, the views. You sit there drinking a pint of Super or ReAle or Eataly brown. And in one direction... the Empire State Building. And in the other... Flatiron Building. Cinematic. But then again the Italians kinda invented cinema, didnt they? The stained glassed windows in the Catholic churches were like ancient movie stills. Telling stories. And tomorrow we are going to collectively muscle through a batch of beer on a not-perfectly-dialed in rooftop brewing system. Heat vents and steam valves all arms akinbo. Using Italian and American ingredients to tell a liquid story. Floris and Brooks will trouble shoot the technical challenges. Leo and Teo and I are going to graze through the downstairs Eataly market and pick out ingredients that will work well together for our first test batch of the next seasonal Eataly beer. Good karma abounds. Our good pal Nicola, who runs Eataly NYC (with his brothers, Dad, Mario, Joe, and the Saper family) was having dinner with his family in the shadow of the flatiron building while the brewers ate in the shadow of empire state, and he walked up to us and said, "tomorrow, make beer" and then chef Alex came up with a notebook packed with perfect beer/food pairing combinations for tomorrows lunch event and all I could think was how lucky I am.

But from now on pretty much any one can be this lucky. Birreria opens Friday night! Come check it out... (To borrow a line from Guides by Voices)...the club is open! Cmon,cmon the club is open!

Posted 6/1/11