This is a week or so old, but the brunch kerfuffle has now received the New Yorker treatment.
At the Swinging 60s Senior Citizens Center in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, in a room filled with cafeteria tables veiled in plastic, a sign hanging from the wall says, “Old ladies never die. They just play bingo,” and another below it reads, “LUNCH will be served 12 noon to 12:30 P.M.” When the local community board gathered there for a meeting the other night, concerned citizens chimed in on a dispute over exactly when Sunday brunch is served. Certainly, it’s meant to come before lunchtime—though they may overlap—and ideally, if rarely, brunch belongs in the sweet spot of a late, lazy weekend afternoon. But the timing is a hotly contested issue, among sleepy relatives and New York bureaucrats alike. The official answer, according to a rarely enforced city law for sidewalk cafés, is not before noon. But this week, three New York City Council members set out to legislate in favor of morning brunching.