Wash Heights Restaurant Openings: Lobster Steakhouse, 888 Hudson Thai

WASHINGTON HEIGHTS, NY — An Upper Manhattan Community Board 12 meeting last month gave insight into a collection of new restaurants opening in Washington Heights, including a steak house and a longtime Thai food favorite with a new name.

Each month, Community Board 12's Licensing Committee votes on a variety of liquor license requests for restaurants in Upper Manhattan.

Here's what Patch learned about new eateries recently opened or soon to open in the neighborhood.

Tung Thong 181 Reopens With A New Name

Tung Thong 181, a longtime popular Thai eatery in Washington Heights, appears to be closed if you search for it online.

What's actually happened, though, is the establishment has reopened with a new name after one of its owners died.

The eatery at the same 812 W. 181st St. storefront is now called 888 Hudson Thai.

Its previous liquor license expired in February, and it reapplied in front of the uptown board in March.

The menu is the same for the eatery that holds 74 people, with 13 tables and 32 seats indoors, and another seven tables outside.

The application for its new license was passed by the committee unanimously.

Lobster Steakhouse: 701 W. 179th St.

It certainly is an eye-catching name. A new restaurant called Lobster Steakhouse will open soon at the corner of West 179th Street and Broadway.

The owner Ovidia Peralta also runs the Dominican eatery Tierra Y Mar near West 181st Street, and previously oversaw a restaurant in the Bronx.

The committee had a variety of questions and concerns over the incoming restaurant, including the possible double-parking issues on 179th Street with the buses that travel through the corridor, and recommending that the eatery should close at 2 a.m. instead of 4 a.m.

Patch could not find a website or menu for the incoming restaurant, but the space will be able to hold up to 75 patrons.

The committee also recommended that the restaurant purchases a sound limiter.

Lobster Steakhouses liquor license application passed with a vote of four to two.

Other News

The Bonnefont, which will open in Fort Tryon Park at 1 Margaret Corbin Drive, also had its liquor license application unanimously approved.

The eatery opening this summer will be run by the same people that operated the Pandering Pig for close to a decade at 209 Pinehurst Ave., as Patch previously first reported in February.

It is replacing the shuttered New Leaf restaurant in the uptown park.

In more news, it appears that the United Palace Theater at 4140 Broadway has a new organization running its events.

United Palace Events went in front of the committee explaining that it will begin overseeing all the commercial activity at the iconic uptown venue.

The change comes just months before the United Palace Theatre will host the Tony Awards.

The liquor license application was passed.