B & H's Triumphant Return, Cuozzo Obliterates Times Square, and More A.M. Intel

— Glory, glory hallelujah: B & H Dairy is back in action after a four-month break. The restaurant has been closed since the Second Avenue explosion in March, but now the owners have made the necessary upgrades to the space and the kitchen is open. It's a real, bona fide New York classic and unlike many 73-year-old institutions in this city, the food is actually great. Here was the scene at 9 a.m. on the dot this morning:

[Nick Solares]

— Steve Cuozzo, arguably New York's bravest critic, visits three Times Square theme restaurants this week: Dave & Buster's, Bubba Gump Shrimp Co., and Bucca di Beppo. Everything about this review is pure fire, but here's one standout, about the fried chicken at D & B's.

Beer-bucket chicken ($17.79) was less tolerable than Popeyes, the skin gelatinous and the meat clay-like.   Nothing I’ve encountered in 16 years of covering restaurants compared to "crunchy apple slaw" (included with chicken) — a mélange of substances I could not identify except for the overpowering stench of day-old vinegar.

There might have been apples. There might have been noodles. Willing to take no chances, I got out of there as fast as I could. I was even ready to kiss the Elmos.

This photo is priceless.

— Upper West Side favorite Telepan is approaching its 10 year anniversary. To celebrate, Bill Telepan and his team will be serving their three-course tasting menu for $45, and the four-course option for $55 for one month starting next Monday, August 17. These are the same prices the restaurant opened with in 2005. Check out the throwback menu here.

— Jonathan Waxman just can't stop opening new restaurants. The Barbuto chef is now planning a new Italian restaurant in Atlanta's Ponce City Market. At some point over the next few weeks, Johnny Wax will open a new iteration of his 80s hit Jams in the 1 Central Park Hotel. Word on the street is that the restaurant is ready to roll, but the team is waiting for a green light from the hotel.

— Hell's Kitchen residents have filed 20 noise complaints about Ninth Avenue stalwart Rudy's Bar & Grill this summer. At a community board meeting this week, the lawyer for Rudy's defended the bar by arguing that the complainers were newbies who didn't understand the neighborhood. The lawyer remarked: "To have somebody come in from suburbia and say that we want to change this neighborhood because they paid an exorbitant amount for a co-op is not fair to the people in the community." Rudy's liquor license is up for review next year.

— The owners of East Village gay bar The Cock want to move their operation from 29 Second Avenue to the old Lit Lounge space at 93 Second Avenue. The team has filed a liquor license application, but the East Fifth Street Block Association has already started a campaign against the new project. The bar owners will go before the Community Board 3's SLA licensing committee next week.

— A judge ruled that the owner of Midtown's Village 38 Delicatessen has to pay $300,000 in back wages to her employees. The restaurateur allegedly underpaid some staff members and violated overtime laws.

— St. Mark's Place newsstand/egg cream shop Gem Spa has now been in business for 75 years. And for the last three decades, the same operator, Ray Patel, has run the shop. Patel tells Gothamist: "We have survived for all these years because of loyal customers. Our main goal is to make customers happy." He has no plans of closing Gem Spa any time soon.

— And finally, here's how the team from Peter Luger selects the restaurant's beef: