J. emailed a very fun tip: Friedmans, the bagel purveyors who have a location in the Goldman Breezeway as well as six others in the city AND also have Wei West at that same BPC location, have taken the Caliza space on Greenwich and N. Moore. (Very cute: J. said they were giving out bagels as they collected signatures for their liquor license application.)

I may get more details from the source soon on this location, but since I have eaten at Friedman’s / Wei West several times and never wrote it up, I’ll do it here. In short: it’s great, especially if you are gluten free and like Chinese food. The menu is a fusion of both their old-school New York deli concept and a Chinese restaurant, but they also have a robust sushi menu. “It was intended to be bagels by day, dumplings by night,” said Jonah Phillips, a managing partner at Friedmans Restaurant Group. “Inadvertently it became a fusion of both menus.”

Their Friedmans location on West End Avenue has similarly fused concepts with one location in their chain of dumpling shops — La Salle Dumpling Room — and the response has been overwhelmingly positive, Phillips said.

They have been in the gluten free business for a while: Phillips’ sister, Vanessa, has celiac disease and their chef developed gluten free dumplings and Asian appetizers with her in mind. She then founded Feel Good Foods, which makes frozen GF appetizers that are sold at Whole Foods, Target and other grocery stores.

We are regular takeout customers for the Chinese side of the menu — the Asian Chicken Salad and the Chicken and Broccoli are the standards. They never disappoint. The few times we’ve been in to the restaurant there’s always a post-work crowd at the bar. Staff is great too. NB: Happy hour is 3 to 6:30p.

And since a large plate runs around $25 and a glass of wine is $14, this qualifies for the list of moderately priced restaurants!

Friedmans | Wei West
245 Murray at North End Avenue
Monday – Friday, 10a to 10p
Saturday & Sunday, 9a to 10p