Flatbush’s Nostrand Avenue is in need of a new eatery, according to Chef Wesly Jean Simon, who owns Haitian restaurant Zanmi, which sits on the corner Hawthorne Street. There are few good pizza restaurants in the area, according to Jean Simon, and people around the Winthrop Street station, including the staff at Kings County Hospital, have to walk too far for their morning coffee.
In response, he is opening new restaurant Market Bar Brooklyn at 1207 Nostrand Ave. to fill in the blanks, serving coffee and pastries in the morning and transitioning to a restaurant and bar at night that will have a focus on pizza. And it’s going to be good pizza, Jean Simon, who last week was on the hunt for a top-notch pizza chef, said.
“You got to have experts, you can’t come in and throw anybody in there, you want to have good pizza. It’s New York City, if you gonna be in New York City you have to meet the standard of New York,” he said.
Jean Simon said the restaurant will be all about catering to what the community wants to see, including in its pizza and other menus, which he would always take suggestions on. “What do you guys not get in this area, we’re gonna have it,” he said. Already, people have been asking for oxtail pizza, he added.
That same theme of tailoring to local desires will be carried into the beer offerings. Market Bar Brooklyn will brew its own beer in the basement with the help of DaleView brewers (which recently closed its own brick and mortar on Nostrand Avenue). The Flatbush Lager was the first thing on Jean Simon’s mind.
“This is more of what’s missing in the neighborhood. So more ambiance, instead of people going downtown to hang out there [or] go somewhere far like all the way down by the Barclays area or the city, so they can actually walk home. They don’t have to get a ticket for a DUI,” he laughed. Screens behind the bar will show games and a large projector in the main area could become a music video jukebox, he said….
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