A caviar bar is coming to 420 Amsterdam Avenue between 80th and 81st streets, the former home of Yogurtland Frozen Yogurt.
Olma Caviar Boutique & Bar, which also operates a location at the Plaza Hotel, has signed a long-term lease for the Amsterdam Avenue spot, according to Crain’s. The store is expected to have about 30 seats, and they’re aiming to open by the end of the year.
“Founded in 2001, Olma is a producer of fine caviar based in Brooklyn, New York. Three of our product lines are sold at gourmet stores nationally. We also import dozens of varieties of both red and black caviars, from Alaska and overseas. We are proud to be a one-stop source for remarkably delicious, first-rate caviars.”
It serves a range of caviar dishes — from a paddlefish caviar dish for $55, to a beluga dish for $410 (for you Russian aristocracy types). The new spot also plans to serve champagne and other drinks. “Mr. Eliachov noted that Olma will bring something different to Upper West Side residents, who already have their choice of Chinese, Italian and Indian restaurants.”
Photo via Olma Caviar.
At least this is unique and maybe fun to visit once in a while.
.. and, at least, it won’t amass messy tourists from the museum.
D.R.:
As you know, I have made posts in the latest Shake Shack thread in which I made it clear that I absolutely do not (as many of those who have commented) dismiss out-of-hand the complaints that have been made concerning the crowds and garbage that SS brings. I defended at least one poster who had been attacked in that thread, challenging the attackers to explain themselves. (Sadly but hardly surprisingly, I got no response.)
Having pointed that out, I must note that I am disturbed by the way you have insulted tourists here. I would like to quote from a comment posted by “PaulRL” to the earlier Shake Shack thread (created on September 9th).
( https://www.westsiderag.com/2015/09/09/local-says-shake-shack-line-is-unacceptable-and-dangerous-meeting-on-cafes-liquor-licenses-wednesday#comment-279843 )
Paul’s words above echo my own sentiment. I truly hope that they do not describe any general, sweeping attitude toward tourists that you may harbor, DR. I would be most disappointed in you if that were the case.
I qualified “tourists” with “messy”. I don’t believe that all tourists are messy. The ones that are create problems.
I understand, though, that I could have worded it a little more clearly, Independent.
Why doesn’t this surprise me?
Just what we need!
Yeah – I keep wishing this story was an April fool’s joke. Good luck to Olma.
At last somewhere for a famished billionaire to eat!
It sounds like they would’ve been better off opening next to the mustard store on Columbus. That way people could ignore both at one time
If you haven’t had the mustard yet, you should try it. Yeah, it’s ridiculous…it’s a mustard store…yada yada. But that’s some damn good mustard.
I have. Some are good, some not my taste, but nothing is ever going to get me to spend $45 on a small chalice of a condiment. Maille’s standard mustards can be found in many regular groceries for far less than $10 per bottle. The addition of dill, horseradish, or truffles isn’t going to make me shell out more than quadruple that, and I’ve yet to see even one person walk out of that store having bought product or seen a shopping bag from there on the street. More importantly, it’s sad that our streets are now hosting these uni-taskers, with stores like these making parts of the avenues resemble a specialty convention rather than a neighborhood.
Bringing caviar in from Alaska is NOT importing! Last I checked, it was still part of the US! 🙂
And you’ve verified this with Sarah Palin?
For all you crusty Upper West Side curmudgeons complaining about this – this is a small specialty shop. It adds character to the neighborhood. Be happy that it’s not another bank, pharmacy, or cell phone store. And I’ll remind the wealthy-people-haters that venerable old UWS institutions like Murray’s Sturgeon Shop and Barney Greengrass also sell caviar. Get over it and welcome these positive changes!
You must be a “newbie” to the neighborhood. Another establishment catering to the seven figure income.
Oh, the horror, Geraldine, the horror! How DARE we allow someone with a 7-figure salary step foot north of Lincoln Center!
Incidentally, if 26 years on the UWS makes me a “newbie,” then I’m guilty as charged.
You still have to walk your posh dinner guests past graffiti and homeless people so I guess we can compromise and let you have a little bit of caviar.
I and my posh dinner guests appreciate that, Gilligan my boy!
Hmmmmm…
They better have a plan to deal with the lines outside and the litter.
How will pedestrians get by all those swinging gucci bags and Rolexes?
Who’s gonna pick up those discarded dom perignon boxes, Mercedes pamplets and One57 condo packages??
Lots of UWS Liberal snark here. Advice: don’t resent your betters. Having less money than the wealthy does not bear on your character, nor should you diminish yourselves by putting down those more fortunate.
maybe we misinterpreted the usage of “betters.” maybe Rodger Lodger is noting that all the rich Wall Street types in essence got their money through the gambling trade.
though he owners of the casinos are generally not considered “betters.”
One who bets is a “bettor”, not “better”.
Rodger Lodger, “our betters”?
Maybe you think people with more money are better than you, that’s sad. They’re no better than anyone else. Twisted. .
Rodger Lodger should listen to a few speeches from the Pope.
Bruce Bernstein should listen to more speeches from Donald Trump
Our “betters”? Take it back to Park Place, Mr. Monopoly.
This just made me chortle quite heartily. Thank you!
Man, you people on this website complain about everything. If you hate everything already here, and complain about everything new coming here, why are you still living here?
YES SPEAK THE TRUTH!!!!! If you don’t have anything constructive to say, let it be. Or complain and waste your words and energy toward being angry at, what, a neighborhood you chose to live. You’re not shackled here, you can leave 🙂
Lots of brand-new commenters here with a taste for $400 caviar.
Laundromats and longtime neighborhood favorite restaurants have closed due to high rents, and the spaces stay unoccupied for months or years – that’s why!
It’s bizarre that Crains is reporting they signed a long-term lease. What landlord would take the long-term risk on a tenant with this business plan? Asking this sincerely. I shop and eat on this block all the time (everyone should try Poulette!) and have seen a lot of great places (Tolani, Cafe con Leche, the newsstand, the barbecue place, Cava – just in the immediate vicinity) close.
Wow! Caviar on Amsterdam, Mustard on Columbus, and…”Way Out West on West End Avenue”* TRUFFLES!
Yes, at 10 West End, a mid-luxury condo (avg. price just $3M), in a huge street-level retail location, is Urbani Truffles, selling all things truffle.
Which, according to a 2014 NY POST story, has caused a huge problem for the mid-level rich, who don’t appreciate that truffles are really “fun-guys” and who claim that the nasty little tubers made their building smell…so bad that even realtors were calling it “The Truffle Building”.
Which might make a New Populism type smile, knowing that, even for the wealthy, it can be said, “Nobody Knows the Truffles They’ve Seen.”
*(actual song title from Rodgers’ and Hart’s 1937’s Babes In Arms)
Cue the cranky outrage…..
I’ll second the mustard store. @Mike, you are giving false information. The cost is not 45 dollars for a jar of mustard, unless you buy the black truffle mustard. And a jar of black truffles costs 45 dollars by itself anyway. If you buy the mustard on tap you pay a little more for the jar on the first go, and then refills are much cheaper. The mustard is really good and better tasting than what you buy at the grocery store. I appreciate it is not budget minded, but making it sound ridiculous does not respect the fact that the shop is far better than an empty storefront or another bank.
I do agree that a caviar bar does seem like a stretch from a business model standpoint on the UWS, but again we should encourage any unique endeavor on the uws that fills a storefront. Zabars, barney greegrass, telepan, murrays are all “expensive” but they are fundamental to the feel and character of the uws.
RE: Caviar – this may be a hard stretch.
RE: High rents. Yes, it’s out of control, and sad that the gentrification that nullified SoHo and the Village of being interesting is taking over.
RE: Maille and specialty shops – I think these do give our ‘hood character and unlike the bottles of Maille you can find at Fairway – they don’t have most of the specialty flavors and it’s usually just the Dijon – which is the Canada version – not the French recipe.
I personally love the Maille store, use the mustards, and gift them to people.
We need some decent and affordable men’s clothing stores, btw. Not just crap, I mean gap, and banana republic.
Well, we were getting a bit overrun with all these Yogurt places. It would be nice, however, to have a really good reasonably priced fish restaurant on the UWS.
Moms and skinny yoga people love froyo.
I believe CRAVE Fishbar is on its way to the UWS
Have you been to The Mermaid Inn?
It would be good to have a “really good reasonably priced” *anything* in the neighborhood. But those days are clearly over.
Those few that are still around will likely close as soon as their rents are inflated to caviar levels.
I have no problem with this store opening. While I likely will not frequent the place, it does add an interesting specialty shop to our neighborhood. The location is rather curious. I feel like it would do better in the high 60’s or low 70’s and on Columbus rather than Amsterdam.
There goes the neighborhood.
Go Sean!
Perhaps WSR could start a poll to see how long readers think the new caviar bar will be around.
Will the caviar bar shrivel and close in under a year, because the traditional neighborhood population finds the idea so silly and the price-point so outrageous?
Or will the caviar bar thrive and endure because the new population in the neighborhood, with money to burn, finds the idea, well, so silly and the price-point so outrageous?
Such a poll would tell us a lot about the neighborhood, not just about caviar bars.
haha. I work in research and assure you that the only thing such a poll would tell you is that someone bitter with an axe to grind dreamed it up and requested it.
If they don’t do very good business, they can always strike a deal with Mamajuana cafe to include fun Dominican drinks at the bar and rename themselves 420 Caviar & Mamajuana for great success.
Maybe they should have opened next to the Mustard shop on Columbus, so we can have more stores selling only one thing while they take up valuable real estate space….. 🙂 All the ladies who lunch on $8 glasses of milk on Amsterdam Ave can then move over there for caviar…..
Seriously, has anyone noticed the incredible amount of empty storefronts on Broadway?? The rents are too damn high!
And yet you are complaining about someone moving into one of those empty storefronts.
I can’t believe the proprietor of this store didn’t consult with the comment writers of West Side Rag.
The nerve!
HAHAHAHA!!!
Just what we need! After banks, Duane Reades and nail salons–
Where did all the liquor stores and pawn shops go?
I just want to point out that Maille mustard would never be considered fancy in France (where I used to live). It’s cheap and ubiquitous. Imagine if Heinz opened a speciality ketchup store in Paris, with a ketchup sommelier. That’s how ridiculous it is. Branding yourself as a “luxury” good is all you need to charge high prices.
But they already have upscale boutiques in France (the place you used to live). So…perhaps it’s not as ridiculous as you’d like to think?
Do they? I never saw them, but I’ll believe you. Surely in touristic areas though.
@Matt, I am not sure why your mustard hate runs so deep but in fact Maille has been making mustard since the 18th century. The house of maille was considered the most premium distillers of vinegars and mustards for the last 265 years. Not really a fair comparison to heinz ketchup. Sure, in the past years the brand has become a little mainstream and the idea of the boutiques was to polish itself back into its history as the premium brand that more aligns with its prior history.
…and your relationship to Maille is?