Cafe Habana Malibu in the La Times

Soon you can get a Cafe Habana Cuban on the West coast !!

Malibu Lumber Yard-home of Sean Meenan's first West Coast Cafe Habana

For those of you who haven’t heard, Cafe Habana is opening on the West Coast in the Malibu Lumber Yard early 2010.

The LA times recently featured an interview with Cafe Habana owner Sean Meenan about the new addition and how he came to chose the location with the help of  bar impresario, Rande Gerber. Check out the full post here

Letitia James Peddled a Healthy Message

Letitia James peddles a healthy message

This past Saturday we attended the first annual Fort Greene Food Conference sponsored by Letitia James.  Our own Xiomara Morgan was there with our famous bike blender to show people how easy and fun it can be to whip up a healthy smoothie right at home. The event had a great turn-out and Letitia even got in on the action by peddling a smoothie on our bike blender.

Last Call for 2009 !!! And Halloween Party !!

Halloween at Habana Outpost

This Saturday is our last day of the 2009 season at Habana Outpost and we’ll be celebrating all day with 2 rounds of Haloween parties.

The first party for the 12 and under crowd starts at 12 and goes till 5pm. There will be games, arts and crafts, a dance party , costume contest and of course plenty of candy. It’s all free, so bring your little ghouls and goblins down this Saturday.

The Adult party starts off at 9pm and will continue until 4am – don’t worry about the weather because we’re throwing the party downstairs in the Lowpost where we will have a full bar and Habana’s own DJ Juice E.  Awards for the best costume will be given out at Midnight.

We hope we’ll see you there – if not, thanks making it  another great season at Habana Outpost !!

Promise Christian Academy Visit Habana Outpost

Yesterday, we got a visit from Promise Christian Academy school! Marjorie Purdee and Assistant Director Luz Sora brought their 5th grade Spanish class for an Eco Tour of the Outpost. Led by our manager Xiomara “ZeeZee” Morgan, kids learned about the eco-friendly innovations of Habana Outpost and learned about ways to be more Eco-conscious while having fun. Hurry and bring your friends and/or family for a free eco-tour this month before the end of the season!

The Official Halloween Party 2009!

Yup, it’s almost that time of the year again and this summer Habana Outpost is going out with a blast! Our Halloween/Last Call Party will be the place to be the 31st, so make sure you’re there wearing the fly-est costume imaginable for prizes, fun (and drinkin’ after the kiddies go home)!

Smoothie Bike hits the town for Parking Day ‘09

Yes, the Habana Outpost Smoothie Bike left its home to visit Manhattan for Park(ing) Day ‘09! It was September 18th, on 80th and Broadway where the 6th graders from the Calhoun School, a progressive K-12 independent school on the Upper West Side,  organized a “Park(ing) Day” spot providing passers by with free smoothies from blender bike. Our recycled corn cups were there too, so it was a true green experience for the UES pedestrians. To learn more about Parking Day you can visit the Transportation Alernatives website, who organized this citywide even.

Note: All photos are courtesy of “Beth Kreiger/The Calhoun School”

Help Keep Brooklyn Green & Clean

Thanks to Brownstoner.com, we thought we would re-post this article about a cleanup day scheduled for September 19th for Prospect Park Lake.  Read on for deets:

Cleaning Prospect Park Lake

A reader kindly sent us a link to a clean-up project for Prospect Park Lake. We spoke to Tami, the organizer, who has set up a donation site at Ioby as well as a Facebook page. Tami, who has lived in Brooklyn for eight years, hopes to raise at least $400 in order to rent paddle boats and buy supplies to pick up litter in and around the lake on September 19, which is International Coastal Clean-up Day. She has received the support of the Prospect Park Alliance, and any extra funds she receives will go to the Alliance for future park preservation. The impetus for the project came when Tami took a tour of the lake last spring on the Independence, an electric boat, and she saw birds’ nests, babies hatching, aquatic life such as turtles and bass, and trash. Plenty of trash. Her tour guide said there used to be a green team for the lake, but it has since dissolved. “As I was walking around the lake to take pictures,” Tami said, “couples on the boats would say ‘Oh my god, it’s so gross in here.’” Tami has at least 20 volunteers so far for the September 19 event, and is still accepting volunteers or donations.

Look who we found hanging out in our garden.

Swallowtail Larvae at Habana Outpost Aug. 09

This morning  our fabulous gardener Neive Tierney  found this guy munching on our parsley plant – at first sight it looks like a Monarch Larvae but after  a little research, I have discovered that it is the larvae of a Swallowtail butterfly. The Swallowtail mimics the appearance of the Monarch since most birds know that Monarch larvae are poisonous. (Sorry – I just had to geek out a little)  Anyway… we plan to build a cage for this guy so we can watch his transformation into a butterfly.

Next time you’re at Habana Outpost, check out the Kids Corner to see what kind of butterfly action we have going on, and I’ll continue to keep you updated here.

Click here to see photos of the Monarch Butterfly Larvae we found in our garden last year

-Darcy

Back to School Bash 2009

Do you remember that looming feeling that accompanied the end of summer and the approaching beginning of school?  Well, so do we.   To help kids forget (and parents celebrate!) the impending start of the school year, we’re throwing a kickin’ party here at Habana Outpost!  Here are the deets:

Habana Outpost’s Back to School Bash
Monday, September 7^th 2009 – Labor Day
12 noon – 5 pm          FREE!

Schedule of Events

All Day (12-5 pm):
-Face Painting
-Recycled Arts & Crafts
-Coloring Pages & Crayons
-Joey the Clown
-Free Habana Spiral Notebooks
-Live kid-friendly DJs
-Beanbag Toss, Bubbles, and Games! 

Kid’s Corner brought to you by Habana Works and Leadership Learning Lab – Join Marivi as she creates, inspires, and turns recycled materials into fun, usable “new” items!  www.cafehabana.com/planet

The Scrap Kins - Kids will make crafts like bookmarks and memo pads from recycled goods and decorate them for the upcoming school year!  www.thescrapkins.com

Brooklyn Public Library – Librarians will be on site signing kids up for library cards … and the best part is – anyone who signs up for a library card at the event gets a free piece of corn!  www.brooklynpubliclibrary.org

1:30-2:30 pm:  Storytime with Brownstone Books – Join storytellers for books out loud (geared toward the under 6 crowd).  Titles will include:  “Llama, Llama Misses Mama,” “Jazz Baby,” “A Fine, Fine School,” and “Miss Bindergarten.”  www.brownstonebooks.com

2:30-3:30 pm:  John Howe, The Bee Man – Join John in a hands-on, kid-friendly workshop called “Pollinators: Honeybees Make a Difference,” where children will learn how bees pollinate flowers in an interactive way.  www.thebrooklynbee.com

3:00-5:00 pm:  Cherub Rock: Dance Party for Kids – Join DJ Juice E for a kid-friendly dance party in the Lowpost (downstairs in Habana Outpost).  www.djjuicee.com

 Directions: G to Fulton, C to Lafayette, B/D/N/R/Q/2/3/4/5 to Atlantic/Pacific. 

Many thanks to our friends at:  Habana Works, Brownstone Book, Brooklyn Public Library, Scrap Kins, Leadership Learning Lab, DJ Juice E, and The Brooklyn Bee.

Check out some pics from last year’s event on the next page!

Addressing The Biker Issue …

As I’m sure you all know, we here at Habana Outpost have had a little bit of a problem with the biker “gangs” trolloping around our green gates and we’ve been taking a lot of flack, mostly from those who think we are encouraging the bikers to hang out here.  After noticing a few inquiries on various blogs about our “connection” with these guys, we need to address this issue for everyone’s appeasement!  The Local Fort Greene/Clinton Hill blog recently did a story on the bikers in front of our place.  Find the video they posted here. 

We just want to clarify that we have been working with the 88th Precinct since before May and in no way condone the noisy groups of bikers that for some reason tend to hang out here.  So please understand that we’re making moves to keep Fort Greene a reasonably quiet ‘hood.  Thanks