Owner Fawzy Abdelwahed with a customer during B&H’s reopening. (Photo: Jaime Cone).
Last week on Marc Maron’s WTF podcast, Abbi “Abbo” Jacobson and Ilana Glazer of Broad City asked the former East Villager if he’d seen the St. Marks episode of their show. “That one’ll give you douchechills,” Ilana promised, going on to describe the block as “NYU’s, like, quad.” When Maron, who now lives in LA, asked, “What’s authentic anymore?”, their response was instantaneous: the tomato soup and grilled cheese at B&H Dairy.
For everyone who would’ve answered the same, the East Village Community Coalition is hosting a party to celebrate the “6 monthaversary” of the dairy counter’s reopening in the wake of the Second Avenue gas explosion. Tomorrow, Feb. 23, from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m., there’ll be free blintzes and pierogi, wine, and some B&H trivia, for the chance to win still more freebies.
RSVPs to the free event are currently “sold out,” but Andy Reynolds, a neighbor who managed the crowd-funding campaign for the East Village diner, assures us that the EVCC is adding more this afternoon, and walk-ins are more than welcome. Just get there early if you expect to squeeze in.
The last time B&H threw a party, the 76-year-old vegetarian restaurant was celebrating its reopening four and a half months after it was sidelined by a deadly gas explosion a few doors over, at 121 Second Avenue. A week and a half ago, five people were arrested in connection with the blast, including the owner of the building.