Eataly, Mario Batali and Joe Bastianich's palatial Italian food destination in the Flatiron, gets its Nutella Bar back today. The counter devoted entirely to chocolate hazelnut spread and things you can put it on was open for a brief, sweet time last year, while Eataly's wine shop was on an SLA-enforced hiatus. When the wine shop returned, Nutella was relegated to a tiny mobile cart. But now the wine shop has moved, Nutella Bar has returned for good, and that tiny cart is being used as a coffee station.
Now that things are serious, the operation has gotten more elaborate. The small wooden counter at the back has been replaced with a commanding marble one to the side, and the back now has shelves well-stocked with cute cake pans and Nutella jars emblazoned with cuter messages. The menu is bigger too – new this time around are waffles, mini Nutella-filled cones, and bombolone stuffed with Nutella (those are only available on Tuesdays), plus Nutella-flavored coffee drinks. The counter is outfitted with crepe griddles and machines to churn out six different flavors of gelato soft serve-style, plus a Nutella fountain which is really more like a Nutella faucet. Unfortunately, only staff have access to this font of free-flowing chocolate, but that's probably for the best.
Nutella Bar opens to the public at 5 p.m., and is giving out free mini cones to the first 300 people. Last time this happened, people went totally bananas over the prospect of free Nutella toast, so if teeny Nutella-filled cones sound good, go get in line now.
