Ariana Grande<\/a> . . . That\u2019s the most paparazzi we\u2019ve ever had,\u201d he told The Post.<\/p>\nAriana Grande attracted the most paparazzi to Tavern on the Green. \/ SplashNews.com<\/p>\n
\u201cShe had to leave out of the kitchen. It was the only time we\u2019ve ever had camera lenses coming through the bushes everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n
She\u2019s still apt to make a grande entrance.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow, she just pops in with a couple of friends of hers. Maybe she has better security now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another A-lister leaves staff \u201cMoonstruck.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had Nicolas Cage three times last week,\u201d said Chef Bill Peet.<\/p>\n
Caiola, who has run Tavern with his business partner, David Salama, since it reopened in 2014, feels it\u2019s important to keep a record of all the famous faces who visit the Upper West Side institution.<\/p>\n
Aaron Judge was at the VIP tent the restaurant caters for the NYC Marathon, whose finish line is at Tavern. \u201cHe came over and he asked if I wanted a picture,\u201d Chef Bill Peet recalled. Courtesy of Tavern on the Green<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve tried to maintain a little bit of at least the documentation of who\u2019s been there, because I think it\u2019s such a relevant part of Tavern and its history,\u201d co-owner Jim Caiola told The Post. Helayne Seidman for the NY Post<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s always somebody in the dining room,\u201d added Peet, whose \u201cTavern on the Green Cookbook: Seasonal Recipes and Historical Treasures from New York City\u2019s Iconic Restaurant,\u201d is out on April 7.<\/p>\n
The restaurant is home to many star-studded shindigs, like the Tony Awards afterparty for \u201cHamilton\u201d in 2016, where the guest list included Barbra Streisand and Aretha Franklin.<\/p>\n
\u201cAretha Franklin actually asked me to come out. . . . She was sitting with Clive Davis, and she asked me to make mac and cheese for her,\u201d recalled Peet.<\/p>\n
Nick Jonas, who did an interview with Willie Geist at Tavern, has visited the restaurant with his wife, Priyanka Chopra. Willie Geist\/ Instagram<\/p>\n
One Upper West Side actor asked to sit down with the chef to go over the menu ahead of his Thanksgiving Day reservation.<\/p>\n
\u201cBryan Cranston, he\u2019s a good friend of Tavern,\u201d he said. \u201cHe liked everything, thank God.\u201d<\/p>\n
Some stars bond with staff over their shared restaurant experiences.<\/p>\n
Jackie Onassis and Pete Hamill attended the afterparty for the NYC premiere of the 1977 Al Pacino film \u201cBobby Deerfield,\u201d which was held at Tavern. Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images<\/p>\n
\u201cJon Hamm would talk to the waiters and runners about being a waiter and a runner,\u201d Caiola said.<\/p>\n
The restaurateur still mourns the loss of legendary patron Robert Redford, who visited in the months before his death in 2025, and always ordered trout.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause he had done \u2018A River Runs Through It,\u2019 and I think he could really handle that trout,\u201d Peet said. \u201cHe was very nice to the kitchen.\u201d<\/p>\n
The \u201cTavern on the Green Cookbook: Seasonal Recipes and Historical Treasures from New York City\u2019s Iconic Restaurant,\u201d is out on April 7. Artisan<\/p>\n
The most memorable celeb request came from Rihanna.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe wanted fries. So everybody\u2019s scurrying around to get her fries. But she wanted sweet potato fries. It wasn\u2019t odd, but it was not what everybody thought she wanted.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for future dream guests, Peet hopes to cook for Streisand again.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou would think that she would never really use her real name, so we all kind of laugh when there\u2019s a reservation for her,\u201d Caiola said. \u201cAnd then she never shows up. So it\u2019s just somebody pranking, I think.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Of all the notable names who have wined and dined at Tavern on the Green \u2014 one caused…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375286,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[163288,15409,3050,38946,412,11189,458,67677,146,6947,15406,1240,85,46,152650,29705,44268,7206,189,22251,35667,19571,180054,226],"class_list":{"0":"post-375285","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-aaron-judge","9":"tag-aretha-franklin","10":"tag-ariana-grande","11":"tag-barbra-streisand","12":"tag-books","13":"tag-bryan-cranston","14":"tag-celebrities","15":"tag-celebrity-chefs","16":"tag-entertainment","17":"tag-exclusive","18":"tag-fran-drescher","19":"tag-hamilton","20":"tag-il","21":"tag-israel","22":"tag-jackie-kennedy","23":"tag-jon-hamm","24":"tag-metro","25":"tag-nicolas-cage","26":"tag-restaurants","27":"tag-rihanna","28":"tag-ringo-starr","29":"tag-robert-redford","30":"tag-tavern-on-the-green","31":"tag-us-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375285\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}