The Mermaid Inn

(Credit: Noah Kalina)

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"The Upper West Side has been on the rise, and I just wanted to jump in the water up there," chides Danny Abrams. Very eloquently said, coming from the man who put seafood on the map in the East Village with the highly acclaimed Mermaid Inn. Now, he’s spinning off an uptown location, which will feature more space and a larger raw bar, as well as popular dishes from the downtown spot like lobster sandwiches and skillet-roasted mussels. "I wanted the next Mermaid Inn to be as far away from the original one as possible," Abrams tells us. "I didn’t want to cannibalize the original one." The bigger space finally gives him and his chef, Laurence Edelman (The Red Cat), the chance to expand the menu, as well as to serve espresso and cappuccino, which he couldn’t do downtown. "My goal was to take the same [downtown] elements and re-create them," he says. "I wanted people to walk uptown and immediately feel at home."

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Upper West Side restaurants, New York restaurants, Seafood restaurants