The Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington hosted “Twist of Lemmon,” Chris Lemmon’s live multimedia theatrical tribute to his father, legendary star Jack Lemmon, on July 28. The sold-out show was followed by a special reception featuring two theme sheet cakes — one featuring Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon in the 1968 film “The Odd Couple” and the other featuring Marilyn Monroe and Jack Lemmon in drag from the 1959 comedy “Some Like It Hot.”
The 80-foot schooner, SoundWaters, is offering the public a chance to experience Long Island Sound in a very special way this August. This beautiful and historic three-masted ship will be sailing from Port Jefferson Harbor from Aug. 11 to 14. The public is invited to sail on Thursday, Aug. 11 at 6 p.m. and Friday, Saturday and Sunday, Aug. 12 to 14 at 3 or 6 p.m. Adult tickets are $35 and children (5 to 12 years) are $25 for afternoon sails and $35 for sunset sails.
Guests are invited to bring their favorite food and beverages and relax for a breezy afternoon sail — ideal for families — or a beautiful and romantic sunset sail. All sails last two hours and depart from the Port Jefferson Village Center Dock (just east of Danfords and the Ferry Dock).
SoundWaters, a replica of a historic sharpie schooner, has been sailing Long Island Sound since 1989 as the flagship of Stamford CT-based environmental education nonprofit, SoundWaters. During the week, SoundWaters is a floating classroom, carrying over 5,000 students every year from 64 different towns in the Long Island Sound region. While on board, SoundWaters educators teach the students about the ecology of Long Island Sound.
For more information or to purchase tickets, visit www.soundwaters.org.
The terror in the opening of the horror movie “When a Stranger Calls” comes when the police tell an anxious babysitter that threatening calls are “coming from inside the house.”
With the killer disease cancer, researchers spend considerable energy and time focusing on signals that might be coming from outside the cell. Many of those signals bind to a receptor in the membrane that corrupt a cell’s normal pathways, leading the cell to uncontrolled growth, the production of tumors or other unhealthy consequences.
Working in the laboratory of Nicholas Tonks, a professor at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, postdoctoral researcher Gaofeng Fan has spent over four and a half years studying a particular signal that comes from inside the cell. I
n a recent study published in Genes & Development, Fan demonstrated that a protein called FER, which adds a phosphate group to the inside part of a receptor called MET, plays a role in the ability of ovarian cancer to spread or metastasize. Already the target of drug development, MET is overexpressed in 60 percent of ovarian tumors. Thus far, developing drugs that block MET alone has not been particularly effective. Indeed, a humanized antibody that prevents human growth factor from binding to this receptor has shown “weak anti-tumor effect” in clinical trials, Fan suggested. In his research in cells, cultures and animal models, Fan demonstrated that ovarian cancer doesn’t spread and may have a different prognosis without FER.
“We found that the ligand [the human growth factor] is not necessary for the activation of the MET,” Fan said. “In the presence of FER, without the ligand, MET can be activated.” Understanding the role of FER in ovarian cancer may offer some clues about why only preventing signals from the outside aren’t enough to protect the cell. While Fan worked with ovarian cancer, he explained other scientists have shown that FER activation has been reported in lung, hepatic, prostate, breast and ovarian cancer. FER plays a part in cell motility and invasion, drug resistance and programmed cell death.
Fan’s work with FER started with a genetic experiment. Taking FER out of a cell, through a process called a loss-of-function assay, Fan found that the cell motility, or its ability to move, decreases. Once he took out FER, he also looked closely at MET activation. If the receptor required only human growth factor, which he included in his experiment, the removal of FER shouldn’t have any effect on its activity. “We found the opposite result,” Fan said.
A set of experiments with mice provided stronger evidence to support his belief that FER played a role in the spread of ovarian cancer. One of the mice had normal FER expression, while the other was missing the FER protein. When he compared the ability of cancer to metastasize, he found that cancer spread in a more limited way in the mice without the protein. “This confirmed the in vitro data and all the cell-based assays,” he said.
After six and a half years as a postdoctoral researcher, Fan is now looking for opportunities to teach and, perhaps, start his own lab in his native China. Fan hopes to continue to work on this system and would like to be a part of the discovery process that might find a small molecule inhibitor for FER. Once he and others find a FER inhibitor, they might be able to use it in combination with other drugs, including small molecules that inhibit human growth factor’s effect on the MET receptor.
Fewer than one in four women with Stage 3 ovarian cancer, which is typically the stage at which doctors find the disease, survive for five years.
Fan said he feels driven to help find a way to slow down the progression of this disease. “There’s an urgency to find a good, effective treatment.” To be sure, Fan cautioned that these studies, while encouraging and an important step in learning about ovarian cancer metastasis, require considerable work to become a part of any new treatment.
In his work, Fan was grateful for the support of Peter A. Greer, a principal investigator at the Cancer Research Institute at Queen’s University at Kingston in Ontario, Canada. Greer “is the leading scientist in research of FER proteins and he opened up all his toolbooks to me,” Fan said.
In an email, Greer described Fan as a “very gifted scientist with an outstanding training experience.” He hopes to “continue our collaboration in the area of ovarian cancer after [Fan] establishes his independent research program” in China. Greer, who spoke with Fan regularly through the process, said he is hopeful that the publication of the study in Genes & Development, in addition to other studies he and other labs have published, will “encourage drug development aimed at FER inhibitors suitable for clinical use.”
Fan also appreciated the guidance and flexibility of his CSHL mentor Nicholas Tonks, famous for his work on tyrosine phosphatase in which he studies the effect of removing phosphate groups. Fan’s research, however, involved understanding adding a phosphate group, through a kinase. “I got humongous support” from Tonks. “Without his help, I couldn’t come this far.”
A resident of Port Jefferson, Fan lives with his wife Yan Xu, who is earning her Ph.D. in materials science at Stony Brook. The couple has a six-year old son, Ruihan, who has enjoyed the Summer Sunday opportunities at Brookhaven National Laboratory, where Ruihan spent hours viewing and constructing the structure of DNA. As for his work, Fan sees opportunities to help people battling this disease.“If we can collect more evidence from this story, we can propose” a way to boost the outcome of treatment, he said.
By Heidi Sutton
The Friends of the Huntington Public Library hosted a book signing with author Nomi Dayan last Thursday evening. Dayan, who is the executive director of The Whaling Museum & Education Center in Cold Spring Harbor, gave an informative and evocative pictorial presentation exploring the rise and fall of whaling on Long Island before signing copies of her new book, “Whaling on Long Island” (Arcadia Press). Artifacts from the museum’s collection, including a whale ear bone and scrimshaw items crafted by whalers at sea, were passed around during the event. The book is available for purchase at The Whaling Museum’s gift shop.
Check out next week’s issue of Arts & Lifestyles in Times Beacon Record Newspapers for a book review of “Whaling on Long Island.”
By Kevin Redding
“Lights Out” may appear to just be another entry in the often cheap and soulless things-that-go-bump-in-the-night subgenre that reigns supreme in modern horror, but don’t let its seemingly conventional premise, of an evil entity that shows up to haunt when the room is dark, fool you: This movie is scary, clever and — surprisingly — elevating by addressing mental illness and the effect it could have on a family.
First-time director David F. Sandberg takes on the challenge of stretching his original three-minute short — which was praised for being on a level of terror and suspense that most contemporary horror movies fail to reach — into something that sustains its 80-minute runtime and doesn’t grow stale quickly, which is tough when the concept is as simple as this. It’s creepy and makes for some exceptionally eerie visuals (the freaky silhouette appearing and disappearing with the flick of a switch will undoubtedly stick with you before bed) but how can that work for an entire narrative?
As Sandberg showcases, the answer is with great acting, characters we care about, and real human drama that raises the stakes when the inevitable horror fill the screen.
At the center of the scares is a family in crisis. A young boy named Martin (Gabriel Bateman) is left alone with his mentally unstable mother Sophie after his father dies in a mysterious freak accident at work (which makes for a really intense opening sequence). Sophie, played by an incredible Maria Bello, is way too damaged to be raising a kid; she spends most of her time locked away in her room talking to a dead woman named Diana, with whom she spent time in a mental institution when they were both young.
Diana is like the physical embodiment of Sophie’s psychological problems, which allows the movie, through jump scares and a freaky atmosphere, to talk a little about the dangers of trying to hide these issues and the consequences of harboring them — or unleashing them.
Diana makes herself known by standing in the shadows, aggressively attacking her victims, and doing everything she can to ensure that the lights don’t go on and halt her terrorizing, and the lengths to which she’ll go are really unnerving. Even during the day and when all lights are on, she could be hiding in darkness under the bed, or a corner of the room, or strike when the inevitable power shortage occurs. She can also travel to different locations, so safety is never really guaranteed no matter where you go.
Martin seeks refuge in his older sister Rebecca, played with a realistic chip-on-her-shoulder attitude by Teresa Palmer, who has long since moved out to escape her own dealings with her mother and Diana. Over the course of events, she becomes hell-bent on protecting Martin at all costs — even going as far as wanting to be his legal guardian. Together with her unexpectedly likable and resourceful boyfriend Bret (Alexander DiPersia) Rebecca helps Martin battle the evil that has latched itself onto their mother in an ending that contains plenty of high-tension scares and a big moment that’s sure to be contentious among viewers, in relation to mental illness.
Produced by modern horror master James Wan, who recently gave us a winning horror movie filled with great acting, characters we care about, and real human drama, with last month’s “The Conjuring 2,” “Lights Out” is truly effective and bold, serving as proof that a PG-13 rating slapped on a movie in this genre doesn’t always mean that it won’t deliver.
By Heidi Sutton
Friends and family gathered at the garden at Theatre Three in Port Jefferson to dedicate a bench in memory of the late Ellen Michelmore on July 24. Michelmore, who served as the theater’s resident musical director for more than 25 years, passed away this May at the age of 63 after a five-year courageous battle with leiomyosarcoma, a cancer that infects muscle tissue. “Ellen loved this theater,” said her husband Jeff Lange. “She was the bravest soul I ever knew,” he added.
A gold plate on the bench is inscribed with the lyrics from Joni Mitchell’s “Woodstock”:
Try ‘n’ to get my soul free
We are stardust We are golden
And we got to get ourselves
Back to the garden.
Reached by phone Monday afternoon, Theatre Three’s Artistic Director Jeffrey Sanzel said the lyrics were chosen because “those were the opening lyrics to our ‘Summer ‘69: Return to Woodstock’ that Ellen sang in the very first production. It’s where it all started — it has so many levels in its meanings.”
Jean Sorbera, who had been Theatre Three’s resident choreographer for many years, purchased the bench and donated it. It now sits alongside memorials for two other members of the Theatre Three family gone too soon, Brent Erlanson and Bonnie Vidal.
During the ceremony, Michelle LaPorte and Gerry Saulter performed a moving rendition of “Progressions para Pauline,” a flute and guitar piece by Argentinian composer Luiz José Merlin, in Ellen’s honor.
A reception followed at the theater’s Second Stage. Sanzel gave a toast to Michelmore with her favorite wine, Prosecco, saying, “There are no words,” as he choked back tears. Scanning the packed room, it was incredible to see how many lives Michelmore had touched over the years.
For actors Hans Paul Hendrickson, Steven Uihlein, Sarah E. Bush and TracyLynn Conner, memories of Ellen were practically identical — how she made them feel welcome when they first arrived and helped them perfect their craft. Conner said she and Ellen formed a close personal relationship and would get together often to sing. Conner wore a pair of Ellen’s shoes to the dedication.
“I absolutely adored Ellen and miss her very, very much. She was like family to me,” said actor Steve Ayle. “We worked together at Theatre Three for the last 25 years, most recently playing opposite each other in the [2015] One Act Play Festival’s ‘Quack.’ Ellen was warm and kind beyond compare, her talent immeasurable, and her big, bright eyes reflected her remarkably positive and enduring spirit, even in the face of her illness. She will live on forever in my heart and soul.”
Douglas Quattrock, who has been at the theater full time since 2002 but has been acting there since the mid-80s, was clearly moved by the dedication. “Besides being one of the most caring and genuine people you could ever meet, Ellen was also an inspiration,” said a tearful Quattrock. “Even though I have never had any formal training in composing music, Ellen always encouraged me to do it. ‘Just play what’s in your heart’ is what she would say. I was honored to work on so many shows with her.”
Michelmore was such an integral part of the Theatre Three family that she was honored with a musical tribute “Ellen Michelmore: Notes From The Heart,” in 2014. The evening featured singers, actors and musicians who had been blessed to work with her. “Jeff [Sanzel] asked me to write a song for Ellen [for the tribute],” continued Quattrock. “The opening lyric that immediately came to my mind was ‘You’re The Music, You’re The Song.’ To me, that was Ellen … She was the music.”
Actor and musician Kevin Story also reflected on his time with Michelmore, saying, “Ellen was a unique light. From the moment I set foot inside Theatre Three over ten years ago, she was encouraging and supportive, a great mentor, colleague and friend. There are really no words, as Jeff said.”
Sanzel said that Theatre Three’s Aug. 19 and 20 performances of “Woodstockmania: Woodstock in Concert,” a musical created by Michelmore, will be dedicated to her memory. A portion of the proceeds will go to the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. In addition, Sanzel said a plaque bearing the inscription, “Ellen Michelmore: The Spirit of Music Ever Present” will be placed in the orchestra pit and “a portrait of Michelmore will be commissioned for the lobby.”
Kevin Story surely spoke for all who attended the ceremony that day, saying, “We’ve all been touched by Ellen in an amazing way, and we can only hope her light will continue to shine through us somehow. She will be missed.”
Ryan DeVito
The adage “location, location, location” should be applied beyond the real estate market. Where you choose to learn and intern can have a significant effect on your success. Like it or not, urban environments trump sleepy suburbia every time.
I’m not a sociologist, but it’s hard not to notice certain trends in my peer groups. Those who attended college in urban areas seem to have found post-graduate employment more easily. Their networks tend to be large and diverse, too. On the other hand, those who ventured out into the hinterlands for college seem to have had decidedly less luck when it came to immediate post-graduate employment.
What’s the difference-maker for urban students? It boils down to a few key elements.
First, urban environments multiply the network effect. Students attending urban colleges have more opportunity to network with diverse audiences who, in turn, refer those students to their own networks. This is a big deal when it comes to landing an internship or job. Having someone recognize your name — or, better yet, offer a personal recommendation — goes a long way in the hiring process.
Second, so-called hybrid professors are more likely to reside and teach in urban areas. These are the professors who have vast experience outside of academia. They are the movers and shakers who, for one reason or another, choose to impart their wisdom on a new generation of students.
Third, colleges and companies are connected to their cities. Urban colleges often encourage their students to engage with their city community, whether it be through service or some other outlet. Companies that are invested in the socioeconomic development of their community tend to prefer to hire those who are already a part of that community. Therefore, someone studying at New York University is likely going to have a much easier time landing a position in New York than would someone studying at Indiana University, a cultural world away.
There’s a reason why New York University spent enormous amounts of money to build housing for students in the village. Prior to the late 1980s, NYU had a reputation as a commuter school in the shadow of Columbia University and Fordham University. Giving students the opportunity to live in the city and become a part of its social fabric quickly changed the university’s reputation in the region.
Now, there are always those rising stars who are able to transcend geographic factors. Going to college in the middle of nowhere isn’t a success-killer. Far from it. Some of the most renowned colleges in the world, including Cornell University and Dartmouth College, feature isolated locations.
Location matters. As you plot you future, consider how an urban environment could help you take your education and career to the next level. Urban environments are professional accelerators. Still, it’s up to you to make the most of that grand opportunity.
Ryan DeVito is a Miller Place native who started a college advising company to help Long Island students reach their potential. Learn more at www.TheModernGraduate.com
By Desirée Keegan
Friendship Beach in Rocky Point is next on the list of local beaches receiving renovations.
The Brookhaven Town Board recently adopted a resolution approving a $1,215,000 bond to pay for erosion control and drainage improvements, which will limit pollutants in local ground and drinking water, while also helping to improve the water quality of the Long Island Sound.
Brookhaven Town Highway Superintendent Dan Losquadro (R) secured the Federal Emergency Management Agency funding through a State Hazard Mitigation Assistance Grant, which is given to help reduce or eliminate long-term risk from natural disasters. Friendship Beach, along with others on the North Shore, was heavily affected following Hurricane Irene in 2011 and Hurricane Sandy in 2012.
“This project will help us not only from an erosion standpoint, but also to prevent pollution,” Losquadro said. “The hazard mitigation program allows us to repair or replace, but replace with something much better and stronger. It hardens our infrastructure to leave us less vulnerable to damage from future storms.”
“The hazard mitigation program allows us to repair or replace, but replace with something much better and stronger. It hardens our infrastructure to leave us less vulnerable to damage from future storms.”
—Dan Losquadro
U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-Shirley) recently spoke about the significance of the Sound at press conference at Cedar Beach in Mount Sinai, where he called on the Environmental Protection Agency to keep its commitment to permanently close the Eastern Long Island Sound disposal sites.
“The Long Island Sound, an EPA designated Estuary of National Significance and one of the nation’s most populated watersheds, is a cultural and natural treasure that provides a diverse ecosystem with more than 170 species of fish, over 1,200 invertebrates and many different species of migratory birds,” he said. “The Sound is also essential to the everyday economy and livelihood of millions of Long Islanders. Over the years, water quality on Long Island has suffered severely from issues such as pollution and overdevelopment, but through work between the EPA, state and local governments, and dedicated Long Islanders, progress has been made to improve water quality and ecosystem health in the Sound.”
Improving the local North Shore beaches will help eliminate some of the waste that makes it’s way into the Sound.
According to the highway superintendent, improvements at Friendship Beach include the addition of armoring stone, which are two to three-ton granite boulders that are used to strengthen and fortify the area; over 200 feet of bulkheading; replacing the drainage system with a filtration system that includes catch basins that separate sediments and solids rather than it being discharged into the water; along with replacing the stairs and planting native beach grass.
What Losquadro said is important about armoring stone is that unlike worn down Long Island boulders, the blasted granite the town will be installing is angular, helping the stones lock together to protect beaches. This is unlike the rounded edges of natural existing stone, which is easier for material like sand and debris to slide around the edges. The new uniform surface will stop the sand from migrating or getting sucked out by hydraulic action, to limit erosion. There will also be stone placed above the boulders, to disperse the energy of waves and help prevent water and sand from breaching the wall.
Councilwoman Jane Bonner (C-Rocky Point) said it has been a long time coming.
“I sat in on several meetings with FEMA and was at the beaches with FEMA representatives showing them the magnitude of the problem,” she said. “The areas along the North Shore have become severely compromised, especially because everything around here flows downhill.”
Sills Gully Beach in Shoreham and Amagansett Drive in Sound Beach are two areas that have already received upgrades, although the restoration part of the cleanup at Amagansett Drive will not be covered by FEMA. Currently, the highway department is working on completing Gully Landing improvements in Miller Place, and is close to getting approval to renovate Hallock Landing. Broadway is also on the town’s list.
Losquadro said dealing with FEMA, is unlike the normal process of getting help from the town’s environmental division or the state Department of Environmental Conservation. The Environmental Protection Agency and United States Army Corps of Engineers are involved, which make sure the undertakings are well vetted and that the completed project meets stringent guidelines.
“This is an instance where being persistent and consistence really pays off,” Bonner said. “As a resident of the community I know how vital these structures are to bluff stabilization and water quality. These projects will help the Long Island Sound for fisherman, users, the fish that live in the water — there’s a whole host of reasons why this is a good thing. This is another spoke in the wheel to assure water quality by reducing stormwater runoff and pollutants associated with it.”
A fire in June at a Port Jefferson bar that has been on Main Street for decades forced the establishment to close temporarily, but about 20 village code violations will keep the doors closed longer than initially expected.
Billie’s 1890 Saloon, located on the western side of Main Street near the intersection of East Main Street about a quarter of a mile south of Port Jefferson Harbor, has been an institution in the village since the 1980s. A fire started near the rear of the building, where the kitchen is located, at around 4 p.m. on June 27.
On June 28, Port Jefferson Village officials from the building and planning department cited the watering hole with roughly 20 violations of the village code. The building, which has a bar on the first floor, and is owned by Joey Zangrillo, houses apartments on the second and third floors, and also has a basement that is not supposed to be used as residential space.
According to the department’s report, the litany of violations included, but was not limited to, use of the basement as a habitable space; issues with interior and exterior stairways and handrails; plumbing system hazards; and overcrowding in the apartments.
In addition, some of the rooms did not have smoke or carbon dioxide detectors, according to Tony Bertolotti, Port Jefferson Village senior building inspector. Bertolotti has worked in the village’s building department since 2001, and said when the property had been hit with violations in the past, ownership was cooperative and accommodating in rectifying them. That has also been the case this time around, Bertolotti said.
In November 2012, the building was cited for a violation to the fire suppression system, and in 1992 and 1993, the building was also in violation of maximum occupancy laws, according to village documents.
“We’ll have Billie’s back and running,” Zangrillo said in a phone interview in July. “The violations came as a shock — a total shock to me.”
Craig Clavin owns Billie’s 1890 Saloon, according to Zangrillo. He could not be reached for comment.
Zangrillo offered an explanation for how the building reached the state that has left it vulnerable to the citations.
“You don’t visit your tenants in apartments on a weekly or a monthly basis,” he said. “If everything is OK today, something might not look good tomorrow.”
Zangrillo said the plan is to get the building up to code and reopen as soon as possible, with rebuilding efforts already underway by architecture firm Enspire Design Group and Long Island Creative Contracting, though he called some of the violations “extremely subjective.”
The building’s owner described what it was like being informed of the fire.
“It broke my heart,” he said. “The most important thing and the thing that I thank God for is that no one got hurt. You can always rebuild, but you can’t replace lives. The rebuilding is fine, the loss of lives would have been tragic.”
Port Jefferson Fire Chief Charlie Russo said after the fire that one civilian was taken to John T. Mather Memorial Hospital to be treated for smoke inhalation, though he didn’t believe it was serious.
Two messages were posted on the saloon’s Facebook page on the night of the fire.
“We are temporarily closed for business,” the first message read.
The second message was posted about three hours later.
“If not for the [Port Jefferson Fire Department], Billie’s would have been no more. Thank you for the prompt response! We will be back soon. [We’ll keep you posted].”
Zangrillo echoed a similar sentiment.
“We’re bringing Billie’s back to Port Jefferson.”
By Rebecca Anzel
In an unassuming shopping center on the corner of North Country and Sound Roads in Wading River, across from the duck pond, is one of the area’s best coffee shops. It has only been opened for six weeks, but there is already a stream of locals who stop in to Hudson Market every morning for the proper cup of coffee the sign out front promises.
The space is small and smells deliciously of fresh coffee — a far cry from the accounting office the space once was. Owner Anthony Coates, who was involved in politics in Suffolk County for about 40 years, transformed the yellow-tinged off-white walls and moldy shag carpeting into a quaint, sunny spot to get a cup of coffee and read the day’s newspaper or a book, which he says many come in to do.
Hudson Market is just one of North Brookhaven’s new eateries that has quickly become a community favorite — the Flying Pig Café on 25A in Miller Place and Go Burger on the same route in Mount Sinai are other spots that opened within the past few months and have been embraced by locals. Two other new food businesses to the area are Lemongrass Asian Fusion in Mount Sinai and Burrito Palace and Grill in Miller Place.
The summer season is often the busiest season for restaurants. Aside from supplying other dining options, Councilwoman Jane Bonner (C-Rocky Point) pointed out that with new eateries come new jobs. According to the National Restaurant Association, restaurants in New York are expected to add the highest number of summer jobs of any other state — over 44,400 of them.
“We appreciate the diverse food options that’s opened up in our community,” Bonner said. “It’s a good thing.”
That idea — of opening a restaurant that served something not offered by another place — is what led Marianne Ferrandino to open the Flying Pig Café with her husband Jack Schwartz six months ago. The pair owns another restaurant in Center Moriches, called the Country Cottage, but they live in Miller Place.
“I felt that there was something missing from the area,” Ferrandino said. “There was a need for somewhere nice to go for breakfast where you could have a nicer experience than just going to a diner.”
Modeling the new restaurant’s concept after Sarabeth’s in New York City, the Flying Pig Café serves upscale American comfort food with new specials each week, but offers it in a much different setting, with ceramic pigs and canvas paintings modeling the large spotted pig statue outside. For breakfast, customers can get traditional eggs, omelets and pancakes, but they can also get the Café’s more playful breakfast burger, granola crusted French toast and crab Benedict. Ferrandino recommended the famous cinnamon bun pancakes.
Mario Gambino and Marie Desch said their first experience at the Flying Pig Café was a great one. They described the menu as “extensive,” and after looking it over, settled on omelets. “We would definitely come back,” Desch said, looking over at Gambino as he nodded in agreement. “It is very clean inside and the decor is nice.”
The lunch offerings at the Flying Pig Café are just as creative as the breakfast ones — the cranberry almond chicken salad is a best seller, and the half-pound burger options are popular as well. Ferrandino said the burgers are made with a custom blend of ground beef and served on a big brioche bun. She added that the Flying Pig Café also uses artisanal breads baked especially for them.
Breakfast and lunch are the two most popular meals — breakfast on the weekends and lunch during the week. Both are served seven days per week, with dinner offered Thursday through Saturday. Ferrandino recommended the homemade herbed meatloaf and gravy, braised short ribs and half herb roasted free range chicken.
“Our portions are enormous,” she said. “We want people to feel they’re getting a really good value for their money.”
Prices at the Flying Pig Café range from $4 to $12 for starters and salads at $7 to $18 for entrees. Dinner is a bit more expensive.
Serving good food to customers is also something the owners of Go Burger value. Christine Donofrio, who owns the joint with her husband Philip, said their motto is “fresh, quality and family friendly.” She said the burgers are delivered fresh every day from a top New York meat distributor; the potatoes are the top-grade ones available each season and are fresh cut each day; and the ice cream, the only thing ever frozen, is from a company that specializes in the treat.
“We only use the freshest, best ingredients,” Donofrio said. “We strive to get and provide the very best so families can come out for good food and not spend a million bucks.”
Go Burger started as just a food truck on Middle Country Road in Ridge near a pizzeria the couple owns. The Donofrios were looking to open another truck but realized they would be limited in the amount of food they could serve because any new truck would not be parked as close to one of their other businesses. When an opportunity arose to buy the L.I. Burger brick-and-mortar location in Mount Sinai, they took it.
Customers from their truck come to this location for dinner — Donofrio said they love that they can sit inside and eat. This location allowed for an expanded menu from the one on the food truck. Starters, such as onion rings, sweet potato fries and a cup of chili, were added to the restaurant’s menu, as were salads and desserts.
“There was a need for somewhere nice to go for breakfast where you could have a nicer experience than just going to a diner.”
— Marianne Ferrandino
The real deal ice cream sandwich, made with in-restaurant baked chocolate chip cookies and ice cream, is the most popular of the newly added desserts. A customer favorite that was carried over to this location is Go Burger’s milkshakes, which come in the traditional flavors of vanilla, chocolate and strawberry as well as the weekly specials Donofrio concocts.
“Everything here is customizable — it’s all up to you,” she said. “Build it the way you want it.”
Nothing on Go Burger’s menu is over $9, unless a customer adds a lot of extra toppings to a burger. The restaurant is opened daily, but if you’re in the Ridge area, you can still find the food truck if you’re looking for a quick fix.
For Anthony Coates, opening Hudson Market was a “labor of love.” He was running for Riverhead Town Supervisor in 2015 and jokingly said that if he was not successful, he would open a shop in the strip across from the duck pond.
Hudson Market specializes in coffee — it is the only thing made in-house. Coates said he searched high and low for the best quality coffee beans he could find, and he cycles between the blends he found, such as variety coffee roasters from Brooklyn. He also searched for the best types of coffee prep machines to brew the “hearty” cup of coffee he was after.
Coates organized this business, where prices range anywhere from $2 for a regular cup of coffee to $4 for specialty coffee drinks and is open daily from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m., with few moving parts so it was easier to run.
“Everything here is miniaturized,” he said, smiling.
After looking around at other businesses in the area, he decided Hudson Market would exclusively focus on making excellent coffee beverages as opposed to also preparing bagels or breakfast sandwiches, which customers come in asking for sometimes. “I didn’t want to set up a ‘me too’ business,” he said.
Customers can purchase baked goods, such as muffins, scones, biscotti and cookies, made by D’Latte in Greenport. Hudson Market also carries bottled drinks, New-York-style hot pretzels, cinnamon buns (but only on the weekends) and pies during the holidays. Neighborhood children ride up on bicycles in the afternoons and scrape money out of their pockets for candy he stocks specifically with them in mind.
His inspiration was the many businesses that were community touchstones in the Three Village area where he grew up.
“I wanted to make a little slice of that here by the duck pond,” he said. “Improving the community really starts at the most basic level, and it does my heart good to have a business here.”
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