Good food with a Hudson River view

BY DAVE MARCUS | dave.marcus@newsday.com

October 21, 2007

Soon after moving to Long Island last year, I found myself searching for great restaurants with water views. I found a few on the bluffs overlooking the Atlantic, the Sound, the Peconic River and assorted inlets and tidal basins.

During my search, I kept thinking about the Hudson River Valley, where I've been a frequent visitor during the past three decades. Places such as Hastings, Tarrytown and Nyack are home to some of my favorite restaurants. Not only do they have views of sailboats and the occasional kayak, but they're also located in genuine downtowns. That means visitors can hop off a train or park a car, then spend hours walking among museums, galleries and shops.

Along the way are parks and mansions once owned by the Rockefellers, the Vanderbilts and others who made the Hudson River Valley their playground. The beauty is so intense, the light so memorable, that the region inspired its own school of art. It's also known as "America's Rhine," after the river that winds through Germany.

In the years after World War II, as industries decamped for the Sun Belt, the cities and towns along the Hudson suffered. They had the bedraggled look of people who wake up after an afternoon nap outdoors and can't figure out why everyone else has gone away.

Maybe that's why I grew up thinking that Rip Van Winkle's story was set here, but I later learned that Ichabod Crane of "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" made his home in North Tarrytown (which changed its name to Sleepy Hollow a decade ago).

Anyway, the Hudson communities are alive again, energized by the residents and tourists surging north from Manhattan. The region has been helped by an unusual assortment of allies, ranging from business executives to folksinger Pete Seeger. Some places, such as Peekskill, are charming more for their potential than for their reality.

A few weeks ago, a friend and I spent a weekend exploring part of the Hudson River Valley, from Yonkers to Beacon, a 60-mile stretch of some of the Hudson's best views and iconic towns. This itinerary was an arbitrary swath of the Hudson, chosen because it's not far from Long Island. From friends, we knew we'd find funky gift shops and an occasional independent bookstore. By limiting ourselves to a manageable area, we had time to linger, but we had to rule out trips to gorgeous spots such as Rhinebeck and New Paltz.

The weekend was memorable; we had a couple of fine meals with good views in between some pretty good meals with spectacular views. At stop after stop, we came across stores selling everything from yarn to antique trains, and we were reminded there is life in the Northeast after industries move away.

Yonkers

Any visit of the region should start with a stop at the Hudson River Museum in Yonkers, an easy-to-navigate institution that offers photos, documents and a three-dimensional "riverama." Built at the base of a riverfront Victorian mansion, it relates the history of the area, starting with the explorations in 1609 by an English chap named Henry Hudson, who was on the payroll of the Dutch East India Co. (For the record, my children visited the museum two years ago and still believe a security guard's assertion that ghosts dwell under the stairs.)

Next, backtrack and head downstream a bit to nearby X20 Xaviars on the Hudson for quite possibly your best meal - and certainly the most in-your-face river views - of the trip. Lunch, dinner and Sunday brunch are served at this three-story glass box that boasts bookend views of the George Washington and Tappen Zee bridges owing to its location out over the water. Peter Kelly, one of the northern suburbs' few four-star chefs, opened his latest dining spot in June, after working six years to convert the Hudson's last Victorian-era pier into a restaurant. Demand for reservations is such (it's only 18 minutes from Grand Central on MetroNorth's Hudson Line to the newly redone Yonkers train station across the street) that weekend dinner should be booked three to four weeks out. Your other option is to take a chance on getting a table in the restaurant's bar and casual dining room or a spot at the sushi bar.

Hastings-on-Hudson

The easiest thing to do after making the rounds in Yonkers is to start swinging north up Route 9 toward Hastings-on-Hudson.

Hastings is a strange place that's emblematic of the Hudson River Valley. It has a downtown with a performing arts center and a wonderfully cluttered, two-story antiques store, Suburban Renewal. And yet, right in the middle of Main Street is a laundry with coin-operated machines where locals gather.

In Hastings, we stumbled on the next best restaurant of our trip; it happened to be in the most unlikely location. It's Blu (not to be confused with Blue in nearby White Plains). To get there, you cross over the railroad tracks and pass by a warehouse. You then see an ugly parking lot for the train station.

There, at the end of a complex of brick buildings, perched on top of a tennis club, is what appears to be the kind of place that sells overpriced BLTs. Instead, it's an intimate restaurant that calls itself "a New American bistro," with a fantastic curried-chicken sandwich and salad topped with shrimp. Relaxing on the balcony on a warm afternoon, surveying the water, diners feel as if they are floating on a barge.

A block away is Harvest-on- Hudson, a former oil depot that has been spruced up with an ochre-and-yellow Mediterranean look and a two-story stone fireplace. The food, with Greek and Turkish flavors, often includes tomatoes and herbs grown in the gardens out front. I loved the sautéed halibut with shaved fennel, but next time I'll probably just sit for a drink outside, staring across at the Palisades. On chilly nights, the waiters light the chimeneas, the wood-burning outdoor stoves that keep diners warm. (One of the best treats I've had came during a visit early in the summer, when I ate the wild strawberries that grow in MacEachron Park, next to the restaurant.) Everywhere we wandered, we found Long Island ties: The restaurant has the same owners as North by Northeast and Harvest on Fort Pond, both in Montauk.

Tarrytown

Tarrytown is a surprising place - it's a bit frayed, but at the heart of downtown is the Queen Ann-style Tarrytown Music Hall, which hosts visiting bands. Next door is Flying Fingers, a yarn store that attracts a steady stream of knitters, and next to that is my favorite gallery in the area, Gallery du Soleil. Drenched with sunlight, it displays contemporary paintings with bold colors.

The Hudson has long been the home of talented artists and big-bucks industrialists. For evidence, take a tour of Sunnyside, the estate of author Washington Irving, and Lyndhurst, the 19th-century mansion of railroad baron Jay Gould. One of my favorite spots is the farmers' market in Patriot Park. When we went, the stands were bursting with raspberries, tomatoes, corn and pies. (For some reason, the $3.50-a-pint blueberries were much better than the ones 10 feet away that cost a dollar more.) Open on Saturdays from 8:30 a.m. to 2 p.m., it runs until the week before Thanksgiving.