LES Bites: Cider Week, An Inside Look at Yopparai & Azasu, Jewish Food

In our weekly roundup: Cider Week NYC takes over taps, Jewish food in the U.K. and speakeasies, the stories behind Yopparai and Azasu.

• Cider Week NYC kicks off tomorrow at locations throughout the city. Delancey Street’s One Mile House kicks off the fun tomorrow night with a series of draft options. Also among those celebrating New York State’s booming apple beverage industry are Stanton Street newcomer Balvanera and three East Village restaurants: L’Apicio, Jimmy’s No. 43 and Northern Spy Food Co. (Coming in early 2015: the city’s first cider bar, Wassail, at 162 Orchard St.)

• The UK Independent tours the LES’ Jewish food scene and finds it alive and kicking.

• Bloomberg critic Tejal Rao joins the clamor on Dirty French, digging the lemon tart and hating the music.

• Gaku Shibata, the chef behind Yopparai and Azasu, shares stories of selling Oscar Meyer hot dogs at Japan’s Tokyo Dome as a young man, and talks in-depth about his two LES restaurants.

• New York magazine checks in with Prune’s Gabrielle Hamilton on the occasion of her restaurant’s 15th birthday and the release of her cookbook, due out Nov. 4.

• As part of the Marco Polo Festival, the Museum of Chinese in America hosts a conversation with the proprietors of Chinatown Ice Cream Factory and Ferrara’s tonight at 7 p.m.

• Fork in the Road visits “Jewish soul-food speakeasy” Kitty’s Canteen on Stanton Street.