More to Love at Chelsea Market: Chelsea Local

Signature cocktail at Chelsea Local opening

Chelsea Market keeps growing its food presence. From more sit down restaurants to the headquarters of the Food Network upstairs, this former National Biscuit Company factory is like a lab for both food start ups and established food vendors.

Now Chelsea Market has expanded down. Chelsea Local is a downstairs retail space. It was mostly a food storage area, but now there are two large markets and a couple of counters.

The staircase down to Chelsea Local

And, importantly, a ton of [gorgeous] bathrooms. We visited this summer with out of town guests and their son needed the restroom. He waited over half an hour. So the large, and, for now, exceedingly pristine bathrooms are particularly welcome.

I got to attend the grand opening with Food52, where there were food samples, a cocktail with Hudson Baby Bourbon and apple slices, a marching band and a DJ.

Manhattan Fruit Exchange is in Chelsea Local, with a huge salad bar and a smoothie station. I tasted a smoothie with almond milk, bananas and strawberries that was delicious.

The Italian market Buon' Italia has specialty olive oils, jarred tuna and excellent artichoke and olive paste, both of which were tasty on crackers.

I passed on Dicksons' Farmstead Meats but I could spend a weekend sampling all the cheese from Saxelby Cheesemongers. If you like spice with your dairy, right next door, Heatonist has tons of hot sauce to sample.

And if the spicy sauce upsets your stomach, you can coat it with fresh milk. Donnybrook Farm Dairy is next door to that.