A Downtown Renovation With a New Flavor

Diner’s Journal – The New York Times Blog on Dining Out

By GLENN COLLINS

A corner of Lower Manhattan that has long been thick with corporate towers but thin on interesting cuisine is about to get a vast new food court filled with the kind of small, idiosyncratic vendors normally found in Brooklyn or on the Lower East Side.

Eight “fast casual” restaurants have signed leases with Brookfield Office Properties to occupy a $40 million second-level gallery adjacent to the glass atrium and palm trees of the Winter Garden, in the World Financial Center. To be called the Dining Terrace, it will extend the length of a football field — 300 feet from north to south — and seat 600 customers in a central court overlooking the Hudson River. Six more tenants are expected to sign on before it opens early next year, as part of a $250 million renovation of the World Financial Center.

The restaurants include an outlet of Umami Burger, a Los Angeles-based chain that offers house-ground patties infused with a savory flavor-enhancer that includes dried shiitake mushrooms and ground seaweed; Num Pang, a Cambodian-inspired shop for made-to-order sandwiches, which already has three outlets in Manhattan; and Little Muenster, which offers what it calls “super-fancy grilled-cheese sandwiches” in its two stores in Brooklyn and Manhattan.

Also arriving will be Dos Toros Taqueria — inspired by the Gordo Taqueria chain in the Bay Area — selling house-made hot sauces and upscale ingredients for its Mexican tacos, burritos and quesadillas; Chop’t, part of a salad chain that offers 60 fresh ingredients and 25 homemade dressings; and Sprinkles, an outlet of the influential Beverly Hills-based bakery chain with 20 varieties of cupcakes.

The terrace will include the third shop of Skinny Pizza, a Long Island-based chain that sells thin-crust pizza in standard, whole-wheat or gluten-free varieties, with antibiotic- and-hormone-free meats, and Dig Inn, a health-food restaurant that also features hormone- and antibiotic-free ingredients.

“These restaurants are not just your usual suspects,” said Edward P. Hogan, national director of retail leasing for Brookfield, Lower Manhattan’s largest office landlord, which owns the four towers of the World Financial Center, including the Winter Garden. “We see this as a destination dining location for downtown Manhattan. We want to be the heart and soul of this new neighborhood that is beginning to emerge down here.”

The area, in the shadow of the 1 World Trade Center building now under construction, is populated by corporate workers, tourists and a growing number of residents, particularly in Battery Park City, where restaurant options are few.

Clark Wolf, an independent restaurant consultant based in New York, said the Dining Terrace would break new culinary ground. “The old food-court idea was to go after concepts in tried-and-true categories, usually past their prime,” he said, referring to burgers, pizza and sandwiches. “But this is by no means the traditional food court. All of the new restaurants are nonstandard choices that are at the higher end of their category. You are not going to see them on every corner.”

Mr. Hogan said it was a challenge for Brookfield “to find creative chefs who can handle a large volume of people,” while cooking unusual fare.

One of those chefs is Adam Fleischman, the founder and chief executive of the four-year-old Umami Burger, which has 13 outlets in Los Angeles, Orange County and San Francisco. “We wanted to support the redevelopment of Lower Manhattan,” he said, adding: “We looked at 10 locations in the area, and this seemed the best one. We wanted to be part of a neighborhood.”

Each operator will have a 10-year lease and pay to create its own space, but the overall design of the terrace area, with its 20-foot ceilings, is being created by Brookfield and the restaurant-design firm AvroKO, with luxe marble tables, walnut furniture and leather-covered chairs.

The food court, in the 225 Liberty Street office tower, will be visible from the Winter Garden and reachable by escalators and elevators. It will sit directly above a 25,000-square-foot street-level marketplace — selling produce, coffee, meats and desserts — to be run by the downtown restaurateur Peter Poulakakos. The entire food court, market and retail complex at the World Financial Center will be renamed Brookfield Place.