Nialls Fallon, a proprietor of Maiden Lane— America’s only tinned-seafood bar—grew up eating canned tuna and oysters, which he would heap with cream cheese on saltines. Working late nights as a general manager at Torrisi Italian Specialties, Fallon found himself repurposing the childhood snack as the perfect post-work bite: nutritious, inexpensive, exceptionally storage-friendly. “It makes sense that it’s sailor food,” Nialls said, explaining that the establishment’s name is a nod to the congregational hub of sailors in port cities around the world. On a recent wintry Friday, the concrete wraparound bar filled up with a leather-jacketed thirty-something set while a d.j. spun Teddy Pendergrass next to a parked pram. The baby, a three-month-old who did not object to old-school R. & B., gazed contentedly at the pineplanked ceiling while her…
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The New Yorker (Digital) - 1 Issue, March 7, 2016