Dining 2008: The year in blogs

MARCH

Artichoke hearts NYC: In what is arguably the most thunderous debut of any pizza shop in recent memory, Artichoke starts serving up its trademark artichoke-and-cream pies, much to the delight of Slice. A reader immediately christens the joint "Manhattan's Di Fara."

Momo-F*#@-u! Kicking off one of the most bizarre restaurant-reservation sagas in history, hot-ticket Momofuku Ko launches its online reservation system. Armageddon ensues, leading to a system meltdown, scalpers, identity theft, and a bizarro episode involving Gael Greene and a Craigslister named Tom.

Zak attack! Bemused by the unending stream of new Zak Pelaccio concept restaurants, Eater launches the Zak-o-Matic—a spoof game where you click the "Zak me again!" button for a fresh, crazy Pelaccio collaboration, written by Eater commenters. As in, Zak Pelaccio is teaming with David Archueletta on a minimalistic Classic American burger joint in the Bronx Zoo Gorilla Sanctuary. Pelaccio tells us it'll open on Frank Bruni's birthday

Signs of Soba to come: With hearty denials from Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Grub Street reports that his flagging Chinese restaurant 66 would soon make way for a sushi-and-soba concept. Turns out, it wasn't "just a rumor": Soon enough, JGV opens Matsugen in partnership with the Matsushita brothers from Japan. Too bad New York Mag's Adam Platt "misunderstood" the concept and awarded it only a solitary, disappointing star.

Feeding the Holy Father: Emerging from a veil of papal secrecy, New York's Godmother of Italian cooking, Lidia Bastianich, reveals to Bruni that she'll have the divine honor of cooking for Il Papa on his first visit to New York City. Naturally, her son Joe was in charge of getting him drunk.