A Restaurant To Remember

I don't think there is a single New Yorker or former New Yorker who doesn't miss the World Trade Center.  I, for one, can't still believe those towers are gone forever.  Every time I fly back to New York, whether it's from the air or from the streets of Manhattan, somehow the memory of those two imposing towers seldom leaves my mind..  Most of all, I miss them when I'm downtown.  They were such a point of reference...all you had to do was look up and you knew exactly where you were.  Now there is nothing, nothing to guide you back to where you came from.

More than New York, New York The Twin Towers were the symbol of New York City, The Big Apple.

One of the best restaurants in the city was at the World Trade Center.  It was appropriately named Windows On The World and it occupied the 106th and 107th Floor of the North Tower.  It offered majestic views of the New York City skyline and boasted one of the best wine lists in the city. Every month they sold 10,000 bottles of wine as accompaniments to their dinners. Attached to the main restaurant was a popular wine bar called Cellar in the Sky and at the time of the attack the restaurants $37,000,000 in annual revenues made it the top grossing restaurant in America.

O the morning of September 11, 2001, there were 78 employees serving breakfasts on the two floors to approximately 100 guests. When the plane struck the North Tower, all of them perished in either the initial crash or within the hour when the tower crumbled.

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Kevin Zraly, Wine Director for Windows On The World. Zraly conducted classes at the restaurant for those interested in learning more about wine. He now publishes the immensely popular Windows On The World Complete Wine Course which has sold over 3 million copies. Andrea Immer, noted wine critic and author Great Tastes Made Simple had been a sommelier at the restaurant.   I highly recommend their books and should you find yourself with some time on your hands, go take the course.

                                   

As a food and sometime wine blogger I wanted to use this day to remember those who perished at the restaurant and the towers, as well as those in the Pentagon and the fields in Pennsylvania.  May you rest in peace.

Schwartz Project - my favorite!

All photos Getty Images