Abrams and Ainsworth Team Scrap Plans for White Street, Taylor Swift Hits the Town, and More Intel

— Dan Abrams and his team are no longer planning to partner with the proprietors of The Ainsworth on a revamp of two-year-old Tribeca restaurant White Street. Last month, a rep for Paige Hospitality went to the CB1 meeting to pitch a potential plan to turn White Street into a new location of the group’s upscale sports bar mini-chain, The Ainsworth. Now Abrams tells Tribeca Citizen: "Together with the Ainsworth team, we have now decided that its best for us to forego this potential partnership." White Street is still open for business as usual.

— A sad story out of Maspeth, Queens: Two men beat up the elderly owners of Good Fella’s Diner earlier this month when the restaurateurs tried to stop them from dining and dashing. 83-year-old diner operator Michael Diamantis tells the Post: "They ate here at the counter; I served them myself....After, my wife gave them the check for $31, one guy went the the ATM and took out money. Then they said, to me, ‘$31 for breakfast?’ They said, ‘No, we’ll give you $20.'" When his wife, Denise Diamantis, went out to the lot to try and write down their license plate number, one of the men got out of the car and threw her down a flight of stairs. When Michael tried to intervene, one of the guys punched him in the jaw. The police have surveillance video of the footage, but no arrests have been made yet.

— Ligaya Mishan loves Claus Meyer’s Great Northern Food Hall in Grand Central Terminal: "One of the most comforting dishes I’ve eaten all year is a near-risotto, a textural collage of pearl and black barley, freekeh, sprouted wheat and rye, that tastes profoundly of roast chicken drippings — chicken soup revamped as porridge. It gains further richness from havgus cheese, its saline tinge drawn from the milk of cows that graze in the marshlands of southwest Denmark, breathing in the salt air."

— On Wednesday, night, Taylor Swift and her squad met up with Aziz Ansari for drinks at The Bowery Hotel before popping into Cabin Down Below. At the East Village bar, Swift and her crew were entertained by foodie magician Josh Beckerman who correctly guessed that Balthazar was Sienna Miller’s favorite restaurant.

— He’s not old enough to drink yet, but Flynn McGarry is a big fan of Lower East Side wine bar/neo bistro Wildair. From the teen chef’s Grub Street Diet: "I brought my general manager to Wildair (he just moved back to New York and hadn’t been there before) for my regular weekly visit. We ordered almost the entire menu: bread, beef tartare, fluke, fried squid, and the couple next to us decided to share their Wagyu for two with us."

— The owners of Park Slope Italian restaurant Broccolino are planning to open a second location at 213 Smith Street, which is the space that previously housed Hunter’s. It’s slated to make its debut at the end of November with a dining room that will be twice the size of the original.

— And speaking of Smith Street, a new arepa restaurant called White Maize is moving into the storefront at 277 Smith. This is the space that was home to Savoia and Ravioli Wine Bar.

— Celebrity favorite Mr. Chow is expanding to Mexico City. This will be the eighth location of the clubby Chinese restaurant.

— And finally, here’s a look at Mile End’s mighty brisket poutine: