Best of Queens 2009

It's a tie! Pio Pio and Manetta’s Fine Foods received an equal number of votes. They have this in common: both are local restaurants loved by families, where the food is delicious and uncomplicated, and when you pay the bill, you're happily surprised by the price.

Pio Pio in Jackson Heights is the master of Peruvian roasted chicken. Though the menu is humble (yet very delicious), the restaurant is fine, and perfect for a celebration.

Manetta’s Fine Foods in Long Island City serves up familiar, tasty Italian specialties. Folks come again and again for the food and the service.

Long Island City voted in force for this small, beloved coffee specialist on Jackson Avenue. Sweetleaf fans outvoted perennial favorites like the Bohemian Hall and Beer Garden in a decisive win for Best Drinks in Queens 2009.

And what's not to love? Sweetleaf brings excellence to the art of coffee, serving Stumptown brew, one of the best. They love their customers, and even spent a week in December 2009 giving free cups of coffee to anyone who swung by the cafe.

Fans of the museum with the moon rockets went to the moon in voting. The NY Hall of Science dseerves this win. It has picked up its programming, its facilities, and definitely its humor in the last couple years. Big in my book was the museum's catapult demonstration this Halloween, in which jack o' lanterns were hurled.

LICBDC is the Long Island City Business Development Corporation. Yes, it's a little unusual to find a non-profit, business development group win a Best of title, but the LICBDC has a far-reaching network and a lot of goodwill on its side. Kudos!

At long, long last the historic Bowne House in Flushing will get the funding it needs for rehabilitation. NYC took ownership of the 17th-century structure in September 2009, becoming part of the Historic House Trust. A $3 million renovation is planned, with the house reopening in 2012.

The Bowne House is significant in the history of religious freedom. John Bowne, an Englishman in what was then a Dutch colony, was arrested in 1662 for letting Quakers worship at his home. He protested to the Dutch West India Company, and his conviction was overturned. (This decision followed the Flushing Remonstrance, a petition from Flushing colonists about freedom to worship, a precursor to the U.S. Constitution's Bill of Rights.)

Weiner represents the 9th district -- parts of Queens and Brooklyn -- in Washington, and in a year when the politicians in the City Council and up in Albany all lost their way, it wasn't too hard for him to win the best of Queens.

Can you really be worse than the closing of two local hospitals (Mary Immaculate and St. John's Queens)? Apparently. Readers voted State Senator Hiram Monserrate the Worst of Queens 2009. Was it for his role in the June 8 "coup" in Albany or for assaulting his girlfriend?

Monserrate along with Pedro Espada (D-Bronx) sided with the State Senate Republicans to grab the majority from the Democrats. A week later he rejoined the Democrats.

In December 2008, Monserrate was caught on security camera video dragging his bleeding girlfriend. Although they both claimed that her injuries were accidental, Monserrate was convicted in 2009 of a misdemeanor in the assault. In December 2009 he was sentenced to three years probation.