Scoop: The New Owner of Shelter Island’s Most Expensive House
More mischievous local news by Rory Satran: Mindy Gray on Sagaponack General Store’s viral breakfast burrito, a miniature pony stops traffic, and Rory takes the bus.
Welcome to my new subscribers! I’m overwhelmed with the response to the first newsletter, and am so excited to keep braving Hamptons traffic in my geriatric Volvo to report on stories for you all. A brief tangent: As a teenager I failed the California road test twice, and you can only take it three times before you have to do the whole process over again. So I went to a very Berkeley hypnotist up the road who helped me visualize all my driving anxieties floating away in a hot air balloon. I got 100% on the third test.
The Hamptons is similar to California in that it’s a driving culture. I’ve always wondered about the #92 Suffolk County bus, which goes all the way from Orient Point to East Hampton, spanning the entire north and south forks, and back again. So, like a psycho, I asked my husband to drop me off in Orient and pick me up four hours later in East Hampton (he’s a good sport). The driver told me his riders included teenagers and people going to work, but also European tourists, and one man that regularly took the ferry over from New London, CT by foot to go golfing in Southampton (He lost his license after a DUI). In Riverhead, a woman transferred from a Patchogue bus, making her commute to her night job as a senior home aide in Sag Harbor over two hours long. It’s a good reminder that for every mansion you see, there are ten stories of the people that keep it running.
Mark your calendars: I am going to start doing regular “office hours” in the mornings at Hamptons coffee shops. I’ll be at Bridgehampton Candy Kitchen at 9am on Monday, June 1. I’d love to see you there! If you can’t make it but would like to send a tip, email me at rory@thehamptonschronicle.com.
Reed Krakoff—the man who made pre-LVMH Tiffany cool—and his wife interior designer Delphine Krakoff were the buyers of the much-publicized historic Norman Jaffe house at 4 Dawn Lane on Shelter Island. The sale set a record for the island at $15.9 million, beating previous records by a couple million. Krakoff, who’s currently creative chairman for jewelry brand John Hardy, has world-class taste in real estate. He once owned Lasata, the East Hampton childhood estate of Jackie Kennedy, which was later bought by Tom Ford for $52 million during his post-Estée sale shopping spree. Presumably the Krakoffs will bring their Lalanne sheep from their Amagansett place.
Jaffe, who designed some of the most desirable modern beach houses on the East End, lived in the Hamptons for most of his life but didn’t learn to swim until he was in his 50s. He drowned while swimming off the beach in Bridgehampton in 1993.
Okay, This Is Officially the Best Breakfast Burrito in the Hamptons
Last spring, Mindy Gray reopened the Sagaponack General Store after a painstaking 5-year renovation. Gray, along with her husband Blackstone CEO Jon Gray, have long owned a home nearby and were committing to restoring the charming local store—and then some. Gray hired Frank Greenwald, the architect who famously designed Ina Garten’s Barn, to let in the light of the 1800s building. Many of the store’s products go deservedly viral, from the rotisserie chicken to the frozen yogurt, but none more so than the TikTok-famous $14 biscuit-and-soufflé egg breakfast sandwich. The store’s culinary consultant is Daniel Eddy of Brooklyn’s Winner Bakery, who gave me a tour of the impressive basement kitchen last year—everything is made from scratch! This week, a breakfast burrito joined the lineup. Gray and her general manager Gaby Green share what makes it so special:
Gray: We had gotten a lot of requests for the burrito last season and we knew we wanted to wait and do lots of taste testing and validate the ingredients. We did that with a lot of different demographics. We have one that’s vegetarian that has potato in it which was very divisive in the tasting because you were either pro potato or not. A younger demographic likes potatoes. We also have one with chorizo.
Green: They both have the same soufflé egg that we use in the breakfast sandwich, roasted poblano peppers, black beans, Oaxacan cheese. The wraps come from Vato in Brooklyn—they drive them out. They come with either a green sauce or a red sauce.
Gray: We had five sauces that we developed and it was hard to limit it to two.
Green: We started selling them on Monday and there’s been a very positive response. They’ve been selling out by 9:30.
Gray: We want to serve everyone.
Learn more about the Sagaponack General Store in the upcoming print issue of THC.
The South Fork is feeling very “Chicken Soup for the Soul” this week. A little petting zoo’s worth of tiny animals was spotted on the loose in the middle of Route 114 last Thursday, headed toward Sag Harbor. Two local goats, Ozzy and Binky Bob, and one miniature pony, Blackie, escaped from a nearby private home and were returned safely within a couple of hours. The animals’ owner, who keeps them as pets, has confirmed to me that there are now six master locks on their gate. Blackie is shown above.
On Tuesday, the police force swore in its most recent recruit: a therapy dog named Gillie. Gillie’s handler is Sergeant Kelly Anderson, who has great hair. Gillie seems to be very well trained with the help of Pup-Peroni treats.
If you know someone who would like The Hamptons Chronicle, please share it with them! Support local news 💙
OK, I love this newsletter so much! As someone who used to live in Bridge and is married to a private chef who spends all summer out east, I am obsessed with the real people who live there and really make it a community (not just the summer folk who are all the same and kind of trashy and boring tbh). Keep the stories of therapy dogs, lobster trappers etc. coming! I've got a great tip on one of the last remaining farriers (horseshoe blacksmith) if you're interested... he used to be my son's Little League coach.
Tell my friends at Candy Kitchen I say hi!
I always assumed that Norman Jaffe lived to a ripe old age continuing to design houses. I'm stunned he died so young, 61, in a drowning accident. Wikipedia says he was a poor and overconfident swimmer.