Mario Batali's Passport to Eataly

Manhattan's sprawling new Eataly—Mario Batali and Joe Bastianich's most ambitious project yet—is both a spectacular place to buy Italian ingredients and the ultimate food court for foodies.

Anchovy and Roasted-Pepper Salad with Goat Cheese

Mixed Vegetable and Farro Soup

Grilled Skirt Steak with Salsa Verde

Mortadella and Cheese Panini

Sautéed Veal Kidneys alla Diavola

Butcher's Ragù with Fusilli

Juniper Grissini

Any time Mario Batali comes up with a new slogan, I get inspired. When the chef says, "Spaghetti is love," I put on a pot of water to boil. His most recent motto, "Shop hard, shop often," will surely be my most motivational one yet.

That's because Batali's newest project, Eataly, an artisanal-food-and-wine market and restaurant complex, promises to change the way New Yorkers shop. All of Eataly's details are impressively big and cool—the $18 million project occupies some 50,000 square feet in Manhattan's newly hip Madison Square Park neighborhood; it's based on a store of the same name in Turin, Italy, that has food lovers going crazy for things like raw milk on tap. But those aren't the main reasons I'm excited about Eataly. The city's green-markets notwithstanding, it's been a while—since the early days of Dean & DeLuca in the 1980s—that a food market has given New Yorkers something to obsess about. And then there's Batali's ability to create dishes that are so good they become buzzwords: I'm thinking specifically of the beef-cheek ravioli at his 12-year-old Manhattan flagship, Babbo.

I'm not sure what my favorite thing will be at Eataly, but I know I'll have a lot of choices. Batali—along with longtime business partner Joe Bastianich, chef Lidia Bastianich (Joe's mother) and Eataly's Italy-based founder, Oscar Farinetti—offers a zillion options for eating and drinking. Everything reflects the philosophy that food should be artisanal and sustainable, a combination of Dean & DeLuca and the green-markets: "You'll always know what season you're in," says Batali.

The vast market sells impossible-to-find Italian ingredients like linguine from Afeltra, a venerable pasta producer in Campania, and supernutty Parmigiano Reggiano delle Vacche Rosse, made with milk from heritage-breed red cows. But a good number of the 10,000 or so products are local ingredients ("New Yorkchese" is how Batali describes it), like pheasants, ducks and eggs from Quattro's Game Farm in Pleasant Valley, New York, and luxurious marbled beef tenderloin from Piedmontese cows that graze in Pennsylvania.

Alongside the food store, Joe Bastianich stocks an astonishing collection of Italian wines, from the 2009 Bolla Soave ($10) to the obscure 1961 Giacomo Borgogno Barolo ($1,010). Bastianich has also created a wine library to educate customers about lesser-known varietals, like Malvasia. "There's a lot of action in Italy's wine world. And there's going to be a lot of Italian action at Eataly," he says.

Since I'm a restaurant fanatic, I'm especially obsessed with Eataly's full-on restaurant Manzo, and assorted food counters. Each of the counters, from a seafood spot to a panini bar, has a concise menu dedicated to a single kind of food ("Don't even try to order a cappuccino at the fish counter," warns Batali). Plus, "Each little place has its own wine list that speaks to that food," Bastianich says. In the pasta section, there's a choice of sauces—the first time Batali will let customers make that decision. (Having tried it in F&W's Test Kitchen, I would recommend fusilli with the luscious, chunky butcher's ragù paired with a glass of the 2007 Scarbolo Campo del Viotto Merlot.) The rooftop birreria (beer garden) features brews made by Dogfish Head's Sam Calagione, accompanied by house-made sausages, cheeses and dishes like succulent grilled skirt steak with a tart salsa verde.

But the two words that have convinced me Eataly is my new hangout are vegetable butcher. Batali and his performance artist friend Jennifer Rubell have set up a cook next to the vegetable counter who will answer any vegetable-related questions ("What is puntarella and how do I cook it?") and also, for free, prep ingredients customers have bought—for instance, chopping the vegetables for a terrific farro soup. Will he or she really wear a necklace made with the vegetable of the day? Maybe Batali was kidding, but there's only one way for me to find out.

Mario Batali Demonstrates How to Make These Recipes

		Mortadella and Cheese Panini To make these sandwiches, use 6-by-4-inch slices of dense white bread from a peasant loaf to accommodate the hearty filling.
		Mixed Vegetable and Farro Soup Eataly's vegetable counter specializes in vegan dishes—specifically, vegan dishes that people might not suspect are vegan. One is this thick, hearty soup made with a colorful mix of carrots, peas, leek and onion. Batali also adds borlotti beans and farro, which make the soup hearty enough to be a main course. The crunchy grissini on the side aren't vegan; they're sweetened with honey.
		Butcher's Ragù with Fusilli At Eataly's pasta and pizza counter, Batali's team serves three different pasta shapes with a choice of about five different sauces ("made by some crazy dudes," says Batali). For the first time ever, he's going to let his customers match the sauce with the pasta shape. This sauce, an ever-so-slightly creamy ragù made with ground beef, pancetta and ham, is flavored with tomato paste instead of canned tomatoes.
		Grilled Skirt Steak with Salsa Verde Skirt steak, nicely marbled with fat, takes well to marinades, like this simple mix of herbs and garlic. Batali accents the grilled meat with a sauce made with more herbs and garlic, plus capers and anchovies; he likes to make his salsa verde superthick.