Quick Bites

By Laura Oppenheimer in Food on Jan 24, 2008 3:24PM

The Painted Lady Organic Eatery has closed after only a couple of months in business. Housed in the former space of Bleeding Heart Bakery, the cafe suffered, said owner Valetin Garcia, because he and his wife Michelle, were spending most of their time at the new Bleeding Heart location on Damen and Belmont. "Both places were suffering from us not being at each place 100 percent," he told The Reader. "It was really apparent in other reviews we were getting. Stupid complaints that could have been prevented if we were just there."

Maybe it's just a bad time to be located on Chicago Ave; Fan Si Pan, too, closed. Do not get us started on the awesomeness of that honeydew lemonade, because it's deliciousness exceeds descriptive words. The good news is 312 Dining Diva says they are going to reopen, but sadly for West Towners, not in the same location.

It's the number-one-most-emailed article at the NYT right now, but worth repeating (Ed note: especially since we were aware of it locally two years ago). Step away from the sashimi! Testing of tuna sushi from around New York City revealed high levels of mercury. High enough to make you sick (over one part per million). The experts interviewed for the story say there's no reason to expect bluefin tuna in other cities won't have the same high levels. We suggest sticking with the uni.

There's a lot of economics surrounding this that we don't really want to delve into, but the good news is, for those who like some—but not a ton—of coffee, is that Starbucks will begin to sell a smaller cup of coffee for $1. That same small cup comes with free refills in the store, which leads us to ask the obvious question: why would anyone ever get a larger cup in they are "for here?" As usual, keep up with all the latest on the Starbucks Gossip blog.