CRAFT SHOP Whole Foods is opening a craft beer store next to its Bowery location (95 E. Houston St. at Bowery, 212-420-1320) in September. The shop will be one of just a half-dozen places in New York City where Brooklyn Brewery’s “Brewmaster’s Reserve” is available. That beer, which changes half a dozen times a year, will be sold on tap, to be poured into halfgallon, sealable, to-go “growlers.”

NEW YORK-BOUND Los Angeles chef Govind Armstrong of Table 8, which has locations in Los Angeles and Miami Beach, Fla., is looking to open a restaurant in New York.

“Eventually it’ll happen, probably within the next year or so,” a spokeswoman for Mr. Armstrong, said. “More to come on that.”

The chef is a protégé of Wolfgang Puck, and he also worked at Campanile in Los Angeles.

FARE GROUNDS Centro Vinoteca (74 Seventh Ave. South at Barrow Street, 212-367-7470) opened Sunday. The casual West Village eatery with free Wi-Fi is the brainchild of Sasha Muniak, who also owns Gusto and Mangia.

The chef is Anne Burrell, who studied Italian cuisine in northern Italy and also worked at Felidia. She is serving up piccolini, or nibbles, such as marinated white anchovies, mortadella pâté, and fried cipollini onions. Also on the menu are stuffed zucchini blossoms, and scallops with watermelon and dandelion greens. Main courses range from red snapper with cauliflower ragu to ribeye with potato-prosciutto-fontina cake and broccoli raab.

TRES BIENTÔT Simon Oren, whose restaurant empire includes about a dozen French eateries, in addition to Sushi Samba and Barbounia, has opened his latest French restaurant Côte d’Or (225 Varick St. at ClarksonStreet, 212-727-2775), which features the food of Burgundy prepared by chef Philippe Roussel. Mr. Roussel hails from Brittany, in northwestern France, but that did not stop him from cooking the food of northeastern France when he was chef at Café D’Alsace.

In his new job he is dishing up traditional escargots and oeufs meurette as well as Burgundy charcuterie, boeuf bourguignon, and coq au vin.

A VIBRANT PARTY Colors (417 Lafayette St., between 4th Street and Astor Place 212-777-8443) is kicking off a monthlong Caribbean festival with a fund-raiser tomorrow, starting at 6 p.m., to benefit the food rescue organization City Harvest. For $10, guests can watch a demonstration by the restaurant’s chef, Jean Emy Pierre, and wine and cocktail expert Alan Katz, and enjoy two drinks and food samples.

GIVING BACK Benjamin Steakhouse (52 E. 41st St., between Park and Madison avenues, 212-297-9177) is giving people who live or work near last week’s steam pipe explosion in Midtown a 20% discount through this Saturday. Proof is required that you reside or work between 39th and 44th streets, and between Madison and Third avenues.

Mr. Thorn is food editor of Nation’s Restaurant News. He maintains nrnfoodwriter.blogspot.com.