Latest news with #Grimaldi's
USA Today
25-05-2025
- Entertainment
- USA Today
Memorial Day 2025: Score food deals at Carl's Jr, Krispy Kreme, Twin Peaks and more
Memorial Day 2025: Score food deals at Carl's Jr, Krispy Kreme, Twin Peaks and more Show Caption Hide Caption Army soldiers place Memorial Day flags in Arlington National Cemetery The Old Guard placed about 260,000 flags at the gravestones of service members and their families at Arlington National Cemetery for Memorial Day. Memorial Day is almost here, and with it comes the unofficial start of summer. The annual federal holiday recognizing members of the armed forces from any war always falls on the last Monday of May, and this year, Memorial Day is observed on Monday, May 26. Apart from backyard barbecues, road trips, lake trips and the plethora of other activities on many people's day off work, some restaurants are offering deals and specials to observe the holiday. Unless noted, these deals are available for Monday only. Here are some of the Memorial Day deals you can score this year. Memorial Day deals and specials Deals below are for Monday (Memorial Day) only unless noted otherwise. Eight-O-Clock Coffee: Running from May 19 to May 26, customers can use the code DIVEIN for 10% off sitewide. Carl's Jr.: Offered until July 8, Carl Jr's Build Your Own Bag (BYOB) comes with 4-piece Chicken Stars, a choice of a Single Cali Classic or Spicy Chicken Sandwich, and a side including Natural Cut Fries or Onion Rings for only $5.99. Marco's Pizza: Customers can use the code FEED5 to get the Crowd Pleaser Combo for $24.99, which includes 2 medium 1-topping pizzas, CheezyBread and CinnaSquares. Krispy Kreme: With an offer running through all of Memorial Day weekend, Krispy Kreme is offering a dozen of its Original Glazed Doughnuts for only $3.17, with the purchase of any dozen at a regular price. Dunkin': The store is offering medium refreshers for only $3, flavors include Tropical Guava, Strawberry Dragonfruit, Mango Pineapple and Raspberry Watermelon with their choice of Lemonade or Sparkling Water. Dunkin' Rewards members can receive 100 Bonus Points if they order ahead on Memorial Day. Honey Dew: An offer only available for veterans, Honey Dew is offering a free small or medium regular coffee for all veterans on Memorial Day. Grimaldi's: All active duty and retired military personnel can show a valid military ID to receive a 15% discount on Monday, May 26, but also year-round at participating Grimaldi's locations. Offer not eligible to be combined with other discounts or promotions. Checkers & Rally's: The fast food chain is offering a $4 special on Memorial Day, the deal includes a choice of a Cheese Double or Spicy Chicken Sandwich, a side of Famous Seasoned Fries, a 12 oz. drink and a Cinnamon Apple Pie. Newk's Eatery: A deal for the whole family, the eatery is offering its family meal deal with 2 pizzas and 1 salad for only $20. The offer runs from May 23 until Monday, May 26. Sullivan's Steakhouse: Sullivan's is offering Happy Hour bar bites ranging from $10 to $20 on Memorial Day from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m., with options like the Angry Shrimp and Beef Wellington Bites on offer. Twin Peaks: With an offer available only on Memorial Day, Twin Peaks is offering a 'special discount' to all active military members or veterans. Logan's Roadhouse: With multiple deals on offer, Logan's Rewards Members can enjoy 20% off Party Packs for Memorial Day Weekend. Moreover, for active and retired military members, a 10% military discount is available year-round. Krystal: Available for only one day, the fast-food chain is offering its Sackful Deal which includes 12 Original Krystals for just $12 or 12 Cheese Krystals for $15, available online and in-store. Fernando Cervantes Jr. is a trending news reporter for USA TODAY. Reach him at and follow him on X @fern_cerv_.
New York Times
21-02-2025
- General
- New York Times
Patsy Grimaldi, Whose Name Became Synonymous With Pizza, Dies at 93
Patsy Grimaldi, a restaurateur whose coal-oven pizzeria in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge won new fans for New York City's oldest pizza style with carefully made pies that helped start a national movement toward artisan pizza, died on Feb. 13 in Queens. He was 93. His nephew Frederick Grimaldi confirmed the death, at NewYork-Presbyterian Queens hospital. Mr. Grimaldi began selling pies in 1990 under the name Patsy's. In those days, legal skirmishes periodically disturbed the city's pizza landscape, and it wasn't long before threatening letters from the lawyers of another Patsy's led him to rename the place Patsy Grimaldi's, then simply Grimaldi's. Many years later, he reopened his restaurant with a name that pays tribute to his mother. Today that sign reads Juliana's Pizza. Under any name, Mr. Grimaldi's pizzerias attracted long lines of diners outside, on Old Fulton Street, who were hungry for house-roasted peppers, white pools of fresh mozzarella and tender, delicate crusts baked in a matter of minutes by a scorching pile of anthracite coal. Like the cooks he trained, Mr. Grimaldi hewed to the techniques he had learned in his early teens working at Patsy's Pizzeria in East Harlem, owned by his uncle Pasquale Lancieri. Mr. Lancieri was one of a small fraternity of immigrants from Naples, including the founders of Totonno's Pizzeria Napolitana in Brooklyn and John's of Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village, who introduced New Yorkers to pizza in the early 20th century. Mr. Grimaldi reached back to those origins when, after a long career as a waiter, he opened a place of his own with a newly built coal oven. At the same time, the minute attention he brought to his craft — picking up fennel sausage at a pork store in Queens every morning, for instance, while other pizzerias were buying theirs from big distributors — anticipated the legions of ingredient-focused pizzaioli who would follow him. 'It was the first artisan-style pizza' in the city, Anthony Mangieri, the owner of Una Pizza Napoletana in Lower Manhattan, said in an interview. 'He was really the first place that opened up that had that old-school connection but was thinking a little further ahead, a little more food-centric,' he said. Patsy Frederick Grimaldi was born on Aug. 3, 1931, in the Bronx to Federico and Maria Juliana (Lancieri) Grimaldi, immigrants from southern Italy. His father, a music teacher and barber, died when Patsy was 12. To help support his mother and five siblings, Patsy worked at his uncle's pizzeria, first as a busboy, then as an apprentice at the coal oven and eventually as a waiter in the dining room. Apart from a brief leave in the early 1950s to serve in the Army, he stayed until 1974. Patsy's Pizza kept late hours in those days, and Mr. Grimaldi grew adept at taking care of entertainers, mobsters, off-duty chefs and other creatures of the night, including Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, Rodney Dangerfield, Joe DiMaggio and Frank Sinatra. The bond he formed with Mr. Sinatra lasted for decades. Mr. Grimaldi personally made deliveries from Patsy's — two large sausage pies — when Mr. Sinatra stayed in his suite at the Waldorf Astoria. In 1953, they ran into each other in Hawaii, where Mr. Sinatra was filming 'From Here to Eternity.' 'What are you doing here?' the singer asked the waiter. Mr. Grimaldi had been sent by the military to play bugle in an Army band. Mr. Grimaldi met his wife-to-be, Carol, at a New York nightclub and took her to Patsy's Pizza on their first date. They married in 1971. A short time later, Mr. Grimaldi left Patsy's to wait tables at a series of restaurants, including the Copacabana and the jazz club Jimmy Ryan's. He was 57 and working at a Brooklyn waterfront cafe when he noticed an abandoned hardware store on Old Fulton Street with a 'for rent' sign in the window and a pay phone bolted to a wall nearby. He picked up the phone and dialed the number. Not long after, he was showing off the nuanced, elemental pleasures of coal-fired pizza to people who had never tried it. Matthew Grogan, an investment banker, ate at Patsy's just a few weeks after it had opened. Until that moment, he thought he knew what good pizza was. 'I said, 'I've been living a fraud all these years. This is the greatest food I've ever had,'' he recalled in an interview. (He later founded Juliana's with the Grimaldis.) Others seemed to agree, including critics, restaurant guide writers and customers. Some of them were well known, like Warren Beatty, who brought Annette Bening, his wife. ('So, are you in the movies, too?' Mrs. Grimaldi asked her.) Others were obscure until Mr. Grimaldi decided that they resembled someone famous. 'Mel Gibson's here tonight!' he would call out. Or: 'Look, it's Marisa Tomei!' He was more discreet when the actual Marisa Tomei walked in. According to an unpublished history that Mrs. Grimaldi wrote, when the mob boss John Gotti was on trial in 1992 at the federal courthouse in Downtown Brooklyn, his lawyers became frequent takeout customers. 'We would wrap each slice in foil and they would put it in their attaché cases so that John would be able to have our pizza for lunch,' she wrote. In 1998, the Grimaldis decided to sell the pizzeria to Frank Ciolli and try their hand at retirement. It didn't last. Neither did their relationship with Mr. Ciolli, who opened a string of Grimaldi's around the country that they believed failed to uphold the standards they had set in Brooklyn. When they learned that their old restaurant was being evicted, they snapped up the lease. Mr. Ciolli, who moved Grimaldi's to the building next door, sued to stop them from reopening. Mr. and Mrs. Grimaldi, he claimed in an affidavit, were trying to 'steal back the very business they earlier sold to me.' A truce was eventually reached. These days the lines outside Juliana's are often indistinguishable from the lines outside Grimaldi's. Mr. Grimaldi is survived by his sister, Esther Massa; a daughter, Victoria Strickland; and a grandson. His wife died in 2014. A son, Pat, died in 2018. An alcove at Juliana's holds a small Sinatra shrine. The jukebox at its forerunner, Patsy's (a.k.a. Patsy Grimaldi's a.k.a. Grimaldi's), was stocked with Sinatra records, interspersed with a few by Dean Martin. Mr. Grimaldi maintained a strict no-delivery policy with one exception: for Mr. Sinatra.
Yahoo
08-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Iconic NYC eateries are flunking — and sometimes hiding — their health inspections
A slew of New York City's most iconic eateries have been slapped with C ratings — the lowest possible grade — by city health inspectors. The violations ranged from evidence of mice, roaches and flies, to unclean employees and sloppy food prep. But several of the C-listers displayed a notice reading 'grade pending,' an indication the restaurant is contesting the grade, or didn't post the grade at all. One eatery hid their dismal rating behind a trash can, The Post found. Van Leeuwen Ice Cream The upscale Spring Street creamery in Nolita was cited for 'evidence of mice' and lack of a proper hand-washing facility. The creamery, where a pint of ice cream runs $12, artfully obscured their C with an outdoor garbage pail. An employee working the counter told The Post that her manager instructed employees to 'hide it with a trash can.' 'Health and food safety is of utmost importance to Van Leeuwen. Any issues have been promptly remedied and we are awaiting re-inspection,' a spokesman said. Gallaghers The famed midtown steakhouse, where a prime rib costs $78 before the fixings, proudly displayed their C rating after being dinged for posting a fake A in the window last year. The posh eatery had kitchen surfaces that were 'not properly washed' and 'conditions conducive to rodents, insects or other pests.' 'The issues that yielded us a C rating were not a reflection of food handling or sanitation. The issues cited were rectified immediately, yet that rating has still been on our window for six months as we have not been given an opportunity to be re-evaluated in all that time,' a spokesman said of city health inspectors. Grimaldi's The famed Brooklyn pizzeria in DUMBO was briefly shuttered in 2018 by the city over a mouse poop problem which forced a company official to take a food-protection certification class. The restaurant still carries a C grade from the city, records show. During a November review, city inspectors found 'evidence of mice,' contaminated food, and insufficient barriers to prevent 'bare hand contact with food.' A 'grade pending' notice was visible from a window near the door. Anna Shi, a Jersey-based finance professional, took her mother to Grimaldi's for lunch Wednesday and said the food was 'quite tasty' but added she 'probably wouldn't come back' after being informed of the restaurant's' history of sanitation troubles. A restaurant manager declined to comment. Flash Dancers At the iconic jiggle joint in midtown the Health Department found evidence of 'live roaches' during a November visit. The agency also noted 'conditions conducive to rodents, insects or other pests.' The burlesque house serves 'delicious fine dining' according to its website, and features a sprawling menu with sushi, prime ribeye steak, chicken wings and more. But it does not display its grade at all. When The Post asked to see it, a bouncer showed the reporter the door and said, 'Have a nice day.' The Renaissance Hotel Chelsea At the Marriott-owned hotel, a basic room can cost nearly $600 a night. But their restaurant Carne — which offers a $145 bistecca alla Florentina — was cited for 'filth flies,' a catch-all term covering house flies, blow flies, bottle flies, flesh flies and drain flies. The eatery was also dinged for 'food contact surface not properly washed' and keeping food at incorrect temperatures. A 'grade pending' notice hung in the bar just outside main dining room. 'Living here for a long time, I don't really go less than B, just as a personal policy,' said TJ Zafarana, a 35-year-old designer milling around the lobby when The Post visited, saying was 'surprised' by the low grade. A front desk attendant declined to comment. The High Line Hotel The High Line hotel in Chelsea — where customers shell out $500 a night for a regular room — took a C rating for its indoor coffee bar and cafe just off the main lobby. Health authorities zapped the indoor bar with violations for filth flies and evidence of mice over two inspections in 2024. DOH also noted a 'live animal' present in food or non-food areas. 'I come here every day,' said Sara, an artist, sitting next to the bar with dog Rosy, adding she was unbothered by the poor report card. 'I have nothing negative to say.' The hotel did not display their health grade and refused to present it to The Post when asked. 'Our letter grading is pending, we are waiting for a re-inspection … I am not going to discuss this with you,' hotel general manager Abbey Rader said. Max Brenner Chocolate Bar When The Post walked into Max Brenner's sprawling Union Square chocolate-themed restaurant Wednesday afternoon, it found the cavernous space mostly empty. Three older women sat at one table drinking Heineken. Brenner was cited for filth flies and 'inadequate' personal cleanliness of staff. Executive Chef Jorge Paguay, 35, freely admitted to many of the issues. 'It's nothing about food, it was a couple of flies,' Paguay insisted. 'We have already fixed everything.' City Winery The sprawling restaurant and music venue in Hudson Square offering breathtaking views of the Hudson River, was dinged for not having their wipes stored in a 'clean and dry' or 'sanitizing solution' between uses. Past violations have included trouble with 'filth flies' and staff 'personal cleanliness.' Multiple City Winery officials who met The Post duringanunannouncedvisitinsisted all issues had been corrected. One even suggested a kitchen tour — something COO Carl Segal quickly vetoed. A 'grade pending' sign was displayed in a window. New York City restaurants have been required to post sanitary inspection grades since 2010, with the letters doled by DOH inspectors during random visits. A score of 0 to 13 is an A; 14 to 27 points is a B and 28 or more points is a C, according to the DOH. The grades must be posted in a front window, on a door or outside wall where they are easily seen by passersby and failure to post the ratings could result in a $1,000 fine. 'The mice part is the hardest thing for us. They are constantly making new holes,' said Brooklyn restaurateur Ali Ahmed — who owns five eateries in the city, all of which have A ratings. 'Our exterminator comes in once a week and we pay him really well. And I think that's where these restaurants are just failing. Their extermination company is just not doing good by them. And that's the hardest battle.'
