"greenwich village" news and stories

Former President Clinton and President Obama. Photo: Charles Dharapak/Getty Images.

Two presidents known for their shared love of greasy foods chose a healthier choice for a meeting in New York.

After giving a speech to Wall Street on Monday, President Obama met up with former President Clinton at Greenwich Village's upscale Il Mulino, whose cuisine from Italy's Abruzzi region features dishes like Scaloppini Capriccio (veal sauteed in wine with prosciutto, fontina and mushrooms) and Red Snapper Sauteed with Seafood Sauce.

While the White House would not give Slashfood any information on the presidential menu, Clinton told reporters gathered outside that the two had "fish, pasta and salad," the Christian Science Monitor reports.

"It was very healthy. Even I was healthy," said Clinton, whose notorious taste for fast food -- the defunct McDonald's McRib sandwich in particular -- was a target of "Saturday Night Live" humor during his presidency.

No, it's not the latest genetic modification by KFC (thank God, right?). It's a display by British conceptual artist Banksy at his project The Village Pet Store and Charcoal Grill in New York City's Greenwich Village.

As Joe DiStefano reported a few weeks ago, the display, which just closed on Halloween, featured chicken nuggets like the above, as well as "living" fish sticks, and sausages wriggling toward water. The idea was to challenge our perception of the foods we eat. According to io9.com, children thought the creations in the cages were real and tapped on the glass.

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The playful antics of the rats at a Taco Bell-KFC restaurant in New York City's Greenwich Village have probably seen more ink than Taco Bell's recent E. coli outbreak. Their performance has certainly garnered tons of local TV news coverage and as of this writing has more than 800 hits on YouTube.

The good folks over at The Scoop over on the NRN Foodservice Blog reported on the story behind the story the other day via an exclusive interview with the leader of the Taco Bell rats. And quite a scoop it was. They managed to catch the leader before his appearance on Conan later that night. Among the revelations from the interview is the fact that the rats' celebrity like that of most stars was no easy task. They'd been practicing their dance moves for more than two months starting with when they were discovered by the city's Health Department in December.

As one might imagine, the leader describes living in the restaurant as a paradise chock-full of tacos and fried chicken. And he offers up a theory as to why the Health Department allowed the fast-food joint to continue to operate even though a troupe of performing rats had set up shop. They're just too busy with important matters like protecting the public from the trans-fat menace. Never let it be said that New York City doesn't support the arts.

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