The Inside Press

Magazines serving the communities of Northern Westchester

Inside Press

Leslie’s Latest Triumph

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by Michall Jeffers

Leslie Lampert is a dynamo. It’s impossible to spend any time with this lovely, soft spoken woman, and not be impressed by all she accomplishes. Tavern on the Green Featuring Ladle of Love is her newest achievement. Beginning in October, four mobile upscale restaurants are set up daily at the site of the legendary former eatery.

They operate seven days a week, all year round. Lampert , a longtime Chappaqua resident now living in White Plains, worked hard to be selected, and took very seriously the proposal she had to write and present. She managed to put the whole thing together in eight weeks, and get a liquor license. She’s excited about expanding her restaurant empire, even though “dealing with the City means mountains of paperwork.” When Ladle of Love closes for the day in Mount Kisco, cooks who’ve been specially selected by Lampert start to work on the food for Manhattan. The products are picked up at 7 a.m. and trucked into New York.
Lampert has long been ahead of the curve when it comes to caring about the environment.

She buys and uses the freshest food possible in her establishments, and is dedicated to patronizing local farmers. She calls her new venture “farm to truck” cooking, and explains that she’s actually bought an Electric Hybrid Mobile Food Truck.
“I have to plug it in at night,” she explains. “It’s great, even though it only goes 25 miles an hour; it leaves half the carbon footprint. I’m passionate about the environment.”

Her cognac colored eyes sparkle at the idea that “the cups, dishes, cutlery, everything we’re using is completely compostable. It can all go back into the soil.” Lampert also believe in giving back to the community. She donates a portion of her profits each month to local charities and efforts to improve the quality of living.

With her spectacularly successful French-American restaurant Café Of Love; the go-to spot for luscious soups, Ladle of Love; and her innovative new delivery service Love on the Run, how does Lampert manage to maintain the high quality food and service her customers expect?

She’s quick to credit the first class team she’s assembled over the years. “I do expect the very best, and I have that in the people around me.” Michael Cutney is the Executive Chef at Café Of Love, and Mena Popolis is the manager; KC Playford is the manager at Ladle in Mount Kisco; Alexander Kirk manages the New York location. They’re all just phenomenal.”

Michall Jeffers is a well-respected cultural journalist, and an unrepentant Foodie. She and her husband, John Warner, are longtime Chappaqua residents.

The Fashionista’s Friend

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by Sarah Ellen Berman

Babette, elegance personified, reigns at her boutique. When crossing the threshold of Elegance II, one is instantly surrounded by beauty and its infinite possibilities. Whether the motivation is a quest for a new accessory or the desire for a radically different look, the recognition that this is the perfect place is felt immediately.

What is it that keeps customers coming back in droves season after season? Babette’s sense of style is certainly an integral part of the draw. She honed her fashion sense at an early age while accompanying her mother–a stylist to the elite in France–on buying expeditions. Babette returns to the city of light twice a year to stay in tune with the latest in fashion trends. Stop by any day and check out what she’s wearing for the answer to what is chic.

Babette’s friendly demeanor and effervescent personality contribute greatly to the attractiveness of her shop. An inquiry about a pair of Manolos or a Louis Vuitton purse brings a smile to her face and a twinkle to her eye. The advice she offers and the style she imparts are welcomed by all.

Glance at the window display when entering the store. Here are Babette’s treasures: Chanel bags. This is the showcase for the latest model from Paris as well as the classics. “If you start wearing Chanel, you’ll never wear anything else,” Babette affirmed.

Her collection of distinctive dresses contains gems from the world of haute couture. From Yves Saint Laurent, Versace, and Chanel to Dolce and Gabbana, Babette has it all. For those seeking the ultimate in luxurious coats, she has an extensive array of mink coats. For casual dressing, try on a pair of Theory jeans with a cardigan by Three Dots.

Babette attributes part of her success to the rise in popularity of consignment venues. In the past, many people harbored the misconception that the quality of the products was not of paramount importance. When Hollywood stars including Demi Moore were sighted at shops, consignment’s reputation soared.

Whether it’s a gift certificate or an outfit, a present from Elegance II is destined to delight the fashionista in your life. Babette’s exquisite taste pervades her collection. For those who think that the present of an Hermes scarf is too extravagant in this parlous economic climate, a trip to Elegance II will be pleasantly enlightening in every way except on the wallet. Recent finds included a violet dress by Alexander McQueen and a multi-colored coat by Jean Paul Gauthier.

The clientele are unanimous in their affinity for Elegance II. Eileen Josefs, a very frequent shopper, enjoys each and every visit. “It’s fun. It’s an adventure,” she said. When comparing the prices charged on Madison Avenue to those of Elegance II, customer Rosemarie Bedenson said, “You think you’re crazy for paying retail!”

Holiday Spectacular and More Planned by the Chappaqua Singers

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by Michael Kohn

For over 30 years, the Chappaqua Singers have been delighting audiences with their upbeat repertoires, choreography and stage attire. A northern Westchester County performing arts treasure, the group was founded by musical director Marie Terotta Roche, a critically-acclaimed singer
dancer, actor and radio personality.

Accompanied by Broadway pianist Sue Anderson, the 15 women have
performed as far away as Romania while primarily sharing their talents locally.

Currently, they are in rehearsal for their “holiday spectacular” which will be performed at various venues throughout the area, culminating in a performance at the Met Life Building, adjacent to Grand Central Station in New York City on Thursday, December 16, from 5 to 6 pm.

According to Marie Terotta Roche, “our holiday program has something for everyone–from sacred church music to the
classics, including “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” “Sleigh Ride,” a beautiful medley of Hanukah songs, all the way to “Santa Baby” and “Jingle Bell
Rock.” The professional-caliber entertainers seamlessly mix their music and choreography into a wonderful show which includes soloists and four-part harmonies.

Member Marvel Griepp is especially excited about the show at the Met Life building where busy commuters stop on their way to work to soak up some holiday
cheer. She loves the workday rush contributing to a “wonderful ebb and flow.” Once, Broadway sensation Audra McDonald graced the group with her presence.

In addition to their holiday shows, the Chappaqua Singers have performed each year at the city-wide 9/11 observance. This past year, they performed in the high-traffic lobby of an office building
at 40 Worth Street in New York City.

Said Roche, “the program wove a rich musical tapestry that paid tribute to those who perished in the events of September 11. I lost a son-in-law that day, so being able to lift the spirits of people who work in New York has deep significance to me personally and to my singers.”

You can catch the Chappaqua Singers at the following places and times: Saturday, December 4 at 3:30 p.m. as part of the New Castle Community Sing followed by a
tree lighting; the Robert E. Bell School, 50 Senter St., Chappaqua on Friday, December 10, 1:30-2:30 p.m.; Chappaqua Seniors, Community Center, Senter St.,
Chappaqua on Thursday, December 16, from 5-6 p.m.. For further information, email Griepp at mgriepp@optonline.com.
And, they are always interested in new members.

Michael Kohn is a contributing editor and writer to Inside Chappaqua.

The Better Half

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by Rick Reynolds

Back when I first started writing for Inside Chappaqua, my daughter was still drawing with chalk on the cul de sac outside our Chappaqua home. All grown up now, she’s majoring in art and riding for a collegiate equestrian team in the central valley of New Hampshire. It’s been a long while.

Anyway, during that time and within these pages I’ve written about such dark and sordid subjects as puppies, parenthood, holidays, sharing, gardening, knitting, and cookies, to name just a few. And I hope I’ve made not merely a few lives a little more tolerable in the process. I’m here to tell you, all the above are survivable!

It’s not that I’m overly critical.
I just have little patience for the “glass-half-full” people–or their “glass-half-empty” counterparts. Call me literal, but I just see the half glass. (Not literally, of course: not a half glass filled to the gunwales, but a whole glass half full.) So, in a world of “halfs” and “half nots,” I’m a “half,” deadlocked precisely midway between unvarnished reality and gauzy optimism.

And what’s wrong with a half a glass anyway? It whets your whistle, and it’s enough to get your pills down. Moreover, with our latest market meltdown, I’d like to think “half” is the new “black.” Half is better than none and more sustainable than “all.” And promoting “half” avoids platitudes. For instance, for those who say, “When one door closes, another one opens,” I was the one who wanted to pick the lock on the closed one–seeing the new door as a trap.

As a Bell School student, I dreamt of becoming either a theoretical physicist or a bank robber. Having little talent for either, I re-imagined myself a theoretical bank robber with a hankering for art. Thankfully, Stanley Tucci, the renown art teacher at Greeley (and father of the famous actor by the same name), fanned the embers of my artistic half, wisely telling me I could always become a bank robber later on if I really wanted it badly enough. What a difference one teacher can make in your life!

With Mr. Tucci’s encouragement, I went on to study fine art, minoring in communication design as a lifeline. This armed me with the skills to try and make the unsightly half of the world half attractive. After college I moved back to Chappaqua and ran a marketing communications/corporate events firm for 25 years out of NYC and Armonk.

And then with, yes, a new door opening–one I picked–I took a position as a marketing director at a thriving national timber frame homebuilding firm. Bucking the downward trend in new home construction, I’ve used print advertising to great effect, and while many of our competitors have hunkered down and gone under, our shops are busy turning out beautiful, energy efficient, heirloom quality homes–knock on wood. The patient is still alive! Customers want to buy, especially locally, if they can find you.

But I’m digressing. Where was I? Oh yes. Writing for Inside Chappaqua.

Sure, the good publisher and editor had scratched her head at some of my submissions, wondering if one can make half sense, or half nonsense, and still have any validity whatsoever–and I credit her with hanging in there. I certainly hope that, with this “economy of half” in which we find ourselves, advertisers will see that a small town print magazine is worth much more than the paper it’s printed on. It’s imprinted on our fabric. It’s community. When we lose that, we’ve lost half the battle–the only half worth writing about.

Chappaqua alumnus and 35-year resident of Chappaqua, humorist Rick Reynolds resides in southern New Hampshire with his wife, daughter,
and 2 dogs.

How Bal Agrawal’s Life “Worx” and How He Can Add Peace and Calm to Yours

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by Jean Sheff

Near the intersection of Routes 117 and 120, just opposite the New Castle Firehouse, sits a stately brick building. Perched above the fray, those inside can watch as daily life whizzes by in Chappaqua.

The building is occupied by LifeWorx, a firm established six years ago by Bal Agrawal, a former Fortune 500 executive who has come to realize the sanctity of “home.” The offices are clean and sleek. Only a half wall separates employees, who appear to enjoy the transparency of the layout. The space is a perfect mix of business meets life. There’s a well-appointed kitchen, a white couch and white side-chairs, life-size white boards for meetings and walls lined with modern portraits by Venture Photography. Touches of black and brown ground the 1,000-square-foot space and healthy granola bars fill a silver serving-dish. The atmosphere is calm and organized.

What Came Before
Bal, 60, who was born in India, has spent more than half his life in the States. Meeting him, one is set immediately at ease. It would be hard to imagine his life as anything but streamlined and orderly. Yet this erudite gentleman, who has a Ph.D. (from M.I.T.) in material science, has seen his share of upheaval.

Bal says he was “somewhat naïve” when he fell in love with a young woman in India, who presented what he calls a “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” situation. Bal was raised in a traditional Hindu family and Candida was a Catholic Portuguese girl. The only way he could see the relationship working was to come to America. So, he applied to an American college and left India when he was accepted. They set up home in Michigan, which wound up to be a poor choice, and crisscrossed the country studying, living or working before finally settling with their young son Neel, in Briarcliff.

Bal was enjoying his work at Praxair, Inc. when his wife took ill. She was diagnosed with breast cancer and after fighting for two years she succumbed to the illness at age 42. Bal remembers coming home from one of their first medical appointments. “It was autumn. There was a beautiful moon out and I could see the leaves falling slowly to the ground just as our tears fell like raindrops down our face,” he says.

Not everyone can express their feelings as poetically and naturally as Bal. Even a cynic would find it difficult to take him to task. After only a few minutes it becomes clear that his expressiveness is a large part of his being. That’s not to say he is always serious. He has a lively smile and a hearty laugh. He enjoys his fun as much as he enjoys his work. “At the end of a stressful week, I look forward to my Saturday workout, a yoga class, maybe a massage, a good lunch, and then I am back to new.”
Although he doesn’t claim to be religious, if pushed, he does admit to being somewhat spiritual. Those who work with him are more forthcoming. Brian Martin, director of client relations for LifeWorx, readily uses the word spiritual to describe his boss.

Other Challenges
Losing a beloved spouse is one thing. Picking up the pieces is quite another, especially when a child is involved. Neel was 11 when his mother was first diagnosed. He lived with her illness through his tweens and entered his teenage years without her. Bal makes it clear that Candida was a caring woman who not only worked as an administrator for Ossining’s Open Door, but also established a home that was a haven to her husband and son.

Bal clearly appreciates the value women bring both to the home and to the workforce. He shared his passionate views on the subject recently when he gave a talk at the Women’s Empowerment Conference at the Hyatt Regency in Greenwich.

In many ways, the seeds of LifeWorx were planted as Bal tried to deal with his shattered life after his wife’s death. “My son was in bed depressed, the roof was leaking, my household help had just stolen the silverware and left,” he says. He knew he needed help, but didn’t know where to turn. Eventually he found a wonderful new household assistant but the thought that there wasn’t a centralized organization which could disseminate this information quickly and professionally would stay with him.
Neel, who is now 30, eventually moved west to attend the University of Southern California. While there, he became increasingly ill and required several hospitalizations. “It’s something I wasn’t comfortable talking about before, but now I can say that my son suffers from mental illness,” says Bal. It was at this time that Bal says he hit bottom. “It was like a one-two punch,” he says. Yet, it was also the time when Bal, who doesn’t belabor the point, says he felt “the presence of God and faith.”

Rebuilding
Bal brought Neel home, moved to Chappaqua and began the task of remodeling his new home and rebuilding his life. “It was the first time I had done any work like this,” says Bal, who became a regular Home Depot shopper. It’s clear that the work of creating a home appealed to him.

It was also the time to make a bold move. “I had a wonderful job, but I had always wanted to develop my own business,” he says. He took about six months to develop his thoughts and then committed himself to the challenge of building LifeWorx.

He opened the doors in 2004, and when a positive article in The New York Times ran in January of 2005, the phone started ringing and hasn’t stopped. At first, the firm focused primarily on pet care together with chef and organizing services. In dealing with clients, Bal found that once he got to the core of their issue, there were other services they really needed. Streamlining lifestyles by incorporating the right assistance in the home developed into a focus. Bal says he’s pleased that so many of his clients say, “You get it! You understand my issues and the challenges.”

Bal and his team (he has four employees in the Chappaqua location and two in a new location in Westport) have expanded to provide nannies, childcare, eldercare, personal assistants and housekeeping experts. “We see ourselves as a solution provider rather than a staff provider,” he says. At any given time, they have about 100 “experts” who can be assigned to a client’s need within 24 to 48 hours. Yet, Lifeworx does more than assign – they make matches.

Quality
Martin, who has been in the hospitality and service industry since his teens, says Bal runs a “top notch organization.” There are “reports, accountability and weekly meetings,” he says. LifeWorx takes what’s best from the corporate world, adds high-end customer service and superior experts to solve the daily challenges many households face. Martin says that while the staff is extremely professional, they are also down to earth. “We are not robots; we are people and encourage clients to just talk to us so we can understand their needs and help solve them,” Martin says.

LifeWorx has an extensive interview process. Barbara Bogart of Harrison is a LifeWorx eldercare expert. She’s worked with the company for four years and respects their procedures. “All experts are screened, go through a full background check and a detailed personal interview,” she says. LifeWorx seeks to know everything about an expert’s skills. Can they swim? Do they know CPR? So, should you want a housekeeping expert who can clean limestone, decant wine and tend an herb garden, they can supply you with the right person.

When Chappaqua resident Sherry Blockinger needed childcare for her daughter, she turned to LifeWorx to help her find just the right person. “They made it easy for me by taking a lot of the background work out of the equation, which gave me great peace of mind. They understood my needs, offered support and provided the help when I needed it,” she says.

LifeWorx sets their standards very high. “We never send someone out there with our fingers crossed,” Martin says. Their due diligence is a huge part of their success. “Our success rate is huge,” says Martin.

Serenity
Bal says his home can run on autopilot and that gives him a sense of ease and calm. It also gives him the time and energy to do what he needs and wants to do. He cooks about four hours a week and works to live a balanced lifestyle. “Health is such a gift,” he says. He’s been a devoted yoga student for the past five years. He brings his personal quest for a peaceful home to work with him everyday. “Life can be stressful, helping people create a functioning home that can be their respite is very rewarding,” he says. As for his own respite, Bal hopes to walk across America with his son and his girlfriend within the next five years.

Jean Sheff is a Chappaqua resident who would love to have a peaceful, organized home.