Brown and Bloggin It

Sunday Supper

2011-07-31T16:10:00.001-07:00

After a fun day of swimming with my parents at their house today, we came home and wanted to grill out for dinner.

At our house,the first step of the dinner process is to have a drink while planning/preparing.
Scott made us these delicious drinks- blackberry vodka lemonade with mint:

While we were enjoying our cocktails on the deck, this alien bug tried to land on me:

I don't know what this is, but it definitely came from another planet! So scary! Ick!!!

After the almost attack, we grilled out wild caught salmon filets, along with skewers of yellow tomatoes, mushrooms, eggplant, and zucchini. The tomatoes were finished first, so we had them for an appetizer:

Scott also had some left over risotto with his:

Veggies with feta cheese

A good ending to a good weekend!

Canning

2011-07-28T09:03:00.001-07:00

I've been putting this off as long as I can, but with the abundance of tomatoes that I am daily accruing, I can't put it off any longer..

It's time to learn how to can!
I googled: "how do you can fresh tomatoes" and found a nice step by step tutorial with pictures.
To start, you first need cans, a big pot, and a can lifter thingy (thats the technical word for it)

Krogers had cans and this cool kit:

It contained the much needed can lifter thingy.

To start, the tutorial said to sterilize the jars, either in the dishwasher or by boiling them. Since my dishwasher was full, I decided to boil them:

The tutorial said to also boil the tomatoes for 45 seconds to 1 minute. This loosens their skins so that they slide right off.

After 45 seconds, you dunk them in an ice water bath:

See, the skins just slide right off!

I didn't think that they would come off so easily but I was pleasantly surprised!

I sat a pot under a strainer in order to catch some of that delicious tomato juice that squeezed out as I was peeling and chopping up the 'maters.

I used two strainers as I needed one to work with and one to put chopped up tomatoes in. After about 20 tomatoes, I had enough to make 3 pints.
I used my can lifter thingy to get my sterilized cans out of the boiling pot. Here they are all clean and shiny and ready to go:

I filled up 3 of them with the chopped tomatoes. The tutorial said to boil either water or the collected tomato juice to add to the pints. I boiled that delicious tomato juice (who would choose water over this, I have no idea!) and poured it into the jars until they were 1/4 inch from the top. The tutorial also said to add 2 Tbl (or whatever the abbreviation for tablespoons is- since I rarely measure anything I cant remember what it is!) of lemon juice. It said this helps to preserve the color. Then you just screw on the lids and they are ready for the next step

Boiling for 40 minutes

After 40 minutes, use the can lifter thingy to extract the jars from the boiling pot.
Ta-da!

This was a lot easier than I thought it would be. Good thing, because I'm sure I will be doing a lot of canning this summer.

Y'all will be thanking me this winter when you get a hankering for some fresh summertime 'maters to cook with. Apparently canning brings out the country girl in me. Y'all come back now, ya hear!

Julie, Julia, Jenn, and Scott

2011-07-24T19:06:00.001-07:00

Tonight we watched one of my favorite movies, Julie and Julia. I love this movie because it incorporates 3 of my favorite things: cooking, celebrity chefs, and NYC!
I loved Julia Child's book, "My Life in Paris". This movie is based on that book, and also on the blog of Julie Powell, who lives in NYC, and blogged about Julia Child's cookbook masterpiece, "Mastering the Art of French Cooking". In her blog, she cooks the 524 recipes in MAFC in 365 days. The movie is inspiring for me as both a home cook and a food blogger, so this movie definitely hits home for me in both aspects!
What I really wanted to blog about though, is my sweet, thoughtful husband. When I suggested watching this movie, he immediately said "we should drink French wine while we watch it, and then I'll make us some French appetizers when watching all the cooking makes us hungry!"
Could I have married a more perfect person for me? A man who loves themes, just like me! :)
Here is the French snack he made for us:

Champagne, with Brie, French bread crostinis, Parrano cheese, figs, strawberries, and fig spread. All artfully prepared, and served to me during the movie. Sweet and cute- the perfect pairing!
Bon Appetite!

Harry Potter Mania! Part 2

2011-07-24T13:57:00.000-07:00

Since I have transformed my dining room into Hogwarts, I wanted to get another use out of it from someone else who would appreciate it... my sister in law Holly! She is a HP freak like me, so I knew she would enjoy a visit to Hogwarts. Her and her hubby Jon came down from Cinci on Friday night to spend the night with us, so here is what awaited her:

I made her a letter from Hogwarts, inviting her to dinner:

The red spot is a wax seal

Since it's a little hard to read, here is what it says:

Hogwarts School

of Witchcraft and Wizardry

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc, Chf. Worlock,

Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)

Dear Mrs. Paul,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been invited to dinner at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed the menu.

Dinner begins at 8:30 pm. We await your owl no later than July 22.

Yours sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall

Deputy Headmistress

Here is the dinner menu:

Again, since it is hard to read, here is what it says:

Salazar Slytherin’s Serpent Pie

(Beef Short Rib Pizza with Root Vegetable Ragu)

Godric Griffindor’s Baked Bludger Pie

(Lamb Pizza with Rosemary, Feta, and Capers)

Helga Hufflepuff’s Goblet of Fire Pie

(Roasted tomato Pizza with Olive Oil, Mozzarella, and Basil)

Ravena Ravenclaw’s Diadem Dessert

(Brandy soaked figs with cantaloupe, Maytag blue cheese, and honey)

Here is the Slytherin (left) and Hufflepuff (right) Pie:

Here is the Gryffindor Pie:

Ravenclaw's Dessert:

We had fun pretending to be eating at the Great Feast at the beginning of the school year term at Hogwarts. Holly is currently re-reading the 7th book. I may start over from book 1 again....

Harry Potter Mania lives on!

Harry Potter Mania! Part 1

2011-07-24T12:15:00.000-07:00

Megan, Ben, Mom and I went to see Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows, Part 2 at the movies last Sunday night. I invited them over for appetizers and drinks a couple hours before the movie started. This is what awaited them when they arrived at my house:

Hogwarts! Or at least, my attempt of recreating it.

Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows Part 1 played in the background:

To go along with the Hogwarts theme, I also made Harry Potter inspired fancy cocktails:

Scott helped out and made us one of each drink. We each shared the drinks and tried to pick which was our favorite. I also made some warm pumpkin butter toasts and a spinach spanakopita. We watched some of Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows part 1, and then we went to the movies. I made the 4 of us each a M&M snack pack, with each of the 4 Hogwarts houses represented on the packs. Megan chose Gryffindor, Mom was Hufflepuff, Ben was Slytherin, and I was Ravenclaw. I also printed out a Gryffindor house crest logo and wore it to the movies. Yes, I am nerdy like that!

We all had a great time, and the movie was absolutely FANTASTIC! I want to see it in theaters again, so I am available if anyone wants to go! :)

Elderberry Moijitos

2011-07-23T11:35:00.001-07:00

Elderberry Moijitos:
The only way to beat the heat!

Fancy Schmancy Dinner

2011-07-21T18:13:00.001-07:00

Today I went to a farmers market, and also Whole Foods, and bought a bunch of fresh produce. So, since I had some fabulous ingredients, I decided I needed to make a fabulous dinner. Here is what I made:

For the appetizer course, I made a tomato gaspacho. I puréed fresh vine ripened tomatoes, coconut milk, ginger, curry, paprika, salt and pepper. I topped the chilled soup with homemade croutons:

For the pasta course, or first course, as the Italians say, I made an eggplant, shitake mushroom, tomato fusilli in white wine sauce:

To make this, I first tossed the eggplant, mushrooms, and tomatoes in olive oil, kosher salt, and pepper. Then I roasted the veggies at 400 degrees for 25 min. They came out caramelized, savory and delicious! After cooking the pasta, I made a sauce of white wine, butter, garlic, and some of the reserved pasta water. When the sauce had boiled for a couple minutes, I added in the al dente pasta and the roasted veggies. Mmm!

Next came the entree, or the second course. I made roasted chicken with a beet, blackberry, and mint puree:

Yeah, buddy!

The puree and the roasted garlic made this chicken so good!

As we are now totally full, we are going to go on a late night walk :)

Bon Appetite!

Sushi!

2011-07-21T08:30:00.001-07:00

Scott and I have decided that the best sushi place in our area is this little hole in the wall sushi place in Prospect called Hanabi. We've been there a handful of times, but every time we go the sushi chef, Ten, remembers us! We've been the past 2 times with Megan and Ben, and when we walked in last night by ourselves, the first thing Ten asked us is where the other couple was! He then asked me how my sister was doing. How he remembers all that from the few times we've been just amazes me! He makes the experience truly fun. We always sit at the sushi bar and usually don't even order off the menu- we just tell him what we like and he makes stuff up for us. He is awesome like that!
Last night we had a sashimi platter

Salmon, Tuna, Yellowtail, and Red Snapper. Isn't that pretty?

We also had a Buffalo Roll, which was spicy tuna with avocado and buffalo sauce on top. Scott had the spicy tuna hand roll- it was giant!

This is why the Japanese aren't fat- this is their idea of dessert. Pineapple, banana pieces with chocolate syrup, and pears. Refreshing and delicious!

I highly recommend Hanabi, and you must sit at the sushi bar and talk to Ten. I guarantee he will remember you if you go back again! The great food and the friendly service make this place a Ten in my book! Pun intended :)

Easy Meal #3

2011-07-16T11:25:00.001-07:00

More fresh produce means more new recipe ideas! Here is what I made for breakfast today:

It's a twist on huevos rancheros. I used the same poached egg on tortilla concept, but made it have more of a Mediterranean flair. I'll call this "Greek Huevos"

:)

Here are the ingredients:

Avocado, capers, lime, fresh tomato, mushrooms, zucchini, basil,

Eggs, vinegar, ramekin, pan of boiling water
And one halibut filet (forgot to take a pict)

I should also mention that I just got new pans. They are ceramic, as I am trying to quit using non-stick pans and quit cooking with that toxic Teflon

First I sauteed olive oil and garlic in a pan, then added in the halibut filet

I let the fish cook on both sides and took it out of the pan when it was just slightly undercooked to keep it from being dry

Next, I added white wine to the pan, and let that simmer with the garlic and olive oil, and added in the zucchini

While that was cooking I poached some eggs.
This is slightly tricky and the first one never comes out perfect, but they still taste good regardless of what they look like.
To start, you boil a pan full of water, then add a few tablespoons of vinegar. This helps the egg to coagulate.

Crack the egg into the ramekin and slowly pour into the steaming pan

Ideally you want to let a little of the water come into the ramekin to start to congeal the egg as you pour it, but this pan was a little too small so I couldn't get water to go into the ramekin. So the eggs turned out not so pretty

But they tasted great, so who cares, right? :)

I added in the other veggies to the now softened zucchini

Cut up the fish

And then added it in to the pan

I also added capers, and a splash of red wine vinegar, covered it and let the flavors simmer and meld together.

After a couple of minutes, I took the pan off the heat, sprinkled on the basil, and built my plate:

Lastly, I added the poached eggs, avocado, and a squeeze of lime juice. I added cilantro to Scotts as he loves it. No cilantro for me!

Voila! Breakfast is served!

Easy Meal #2

2011-07-16T10:15:00.001-07:00

Here is another meal idea for some of that fresh summer produce. This is a breakfast idea, or it could also go for brunch or lunch. I call it a Summer Omelette.
Ingredients:

Eggs, salt, garlic, mushrooms, basil, yellow squash, broccoli

I started with melting some butter in a pan

Next I minced up the garlic clove and let that sauté for about a minute, then I added chicken broth

I chopped up the veggies, and added the squash and broccoli in as they need to cook a little longer than the mushrooms do to get soft

While I was waiting for the squash and broccoli to soften, I decided to throw in some turkey bacon. Just cuz.

After about 4 min, I added in the mushrooms

While that was simmering, I julienned some fresh basil. In my opinion this is the best way to cut basil

Pull off the leaves and then stack them together

Then roll them up

Then just cut it from tip to end

Isn't that cute?
Next I cracked an egg into a bowl and scrambled it

Then I poured it into the vegetable and turkey bacon mixture

Same thing with second egg

I scooted the veggies and first egg mixture into the half of the pan that had the second egg

I just watched for it to look cooked and then I flipped it over

I added my cute curly basil strips

Plated it

Then ate it!

Yeah buddy!

I highly recommend making this for yourself! In the words of Cousin Eddie, it is gooo-ood!

Easy Meal

2011-07-14T20:27:00.001-07:00

Fresh, delicious produce is in high abundance because of wonderful summertime, so I plan on taking full advantage!

My father in law brought me some homegrown broccoli, and my coworker brought me some homegrown yellow squash, so I wanted to make something fresh and light and healthy with those vegetables.

I had some left over grilled tomatoes from my fajita night a few nights ago

I sauteed a little butter and a big clove of garlic in a pan, then added in the broccoli, squash, and some chicken broth. Once the veggies got soft, I added in the grilled tomatoes and let that simmer for about 1 minute. Then I poured it all in a bowl, grated a little Parmasean cheese over it, and ta-da! A quick delicious meal!

Yum o!

2011-07-13T14:45:00.001-07:00

I can't wait much longer!!!!! I need delicious summer tomatoes!

Faijita Night!

2011-07-11T19:50:00.001-07:00

I'm trying to cook healthy since our 10 days of feasting in NYC. So, tonight's meal was faijitas, made from all organic produce, and our organic grass fed beef we buy from our friend.

I marinated a flat iron steak in a mixture of beer, lime juice, chipotles in adobo sauce, chili powder, and salt, and let that marinade for about 30 minutes.

Next, I chopped up organic red and green peppers, garlic, jalepenos, and an avocado.

I sauteed the garlic in some coconut oil, then added the peppers along with a little bit of beer:

I also cut some organic roma tomatoes half wise, sprinkled olive oil and kosher salt on them, and put them cut side up on the grill to char them and give them a smokey flavor:

Scott grilled the steak for 5 minutes and then let it rest for another 5 to maintain it's juices:

Meanwhile, I made up a couple different sauces for the faijitas. I made a sweet corn, jalepeno, chipotle pepper, black bean, tomato relish and sauteed it in a little coconut oil to just get it melty and warm

Beans and corn do not look pretty in pictures! But it tasted dang good!

I also made a sauce using chipotles in adobo sauce, fresh cilantro (just a small bunch as this I feel this brightens the dish but I don't love the taste of cilantro), beer, chili powder, garlic powder, kosher salt, and lime juice

Here is the chipotle sauce, avocado, sour cream, fresh cilantro, ready to be used for toppings:

I then chopped up the steak and added it to the pan with the peppers to let the flavors meld a little:

When the whole wheat tortillas were warm, we took them out of the oven, and then it was time to assemble:

Tortilla, sour cream, corn and bean mixture:

Topped by the Faijita meat, peppers, chipotle sauce, and grilled tomatoes:

Avocados topped it off

Now for the best part- eating it!

Mmm! Muy bueno!

Home again!

2011-07-10T18:02:00.001-07:00

Sunday July 10

Well, we are back home to Louisville, safe and sound. While I do love NYC, I am always glad to be back to our house, which feels like a mansion after the tiny Cupboard we have lived in the past 10 days.

To celebrate being home, I decided to cook a healthy dinner.

Amy picked us up from the airport this morning, and brought me 2 yellow squash from her aunts garden. That was my inspiration to make a light summer pasta dish with yellow squash, fresh basil, tomatoes, ground beef, and parmesan.
To honor the fabulous Pioneer Woman, I'm posting this blog in her famous step by step picture style.
First, I browned 1 lb of ground beef:

Then I drained it, even though it was hardly necessary as the beef is so lean

After wiping any residual oil out of the pan, I then added olive oil and sauteed garlic

Next I got my pasta water boiling and cooked the pasta

While that was cooking, I chopped up my 2 yellow squash

And then when the garlic started to brown, I added the squash to
the pan

I then added about a cup of white wine, and half a cup of chicken broth to the squash

I let that simmer for about 5 minutes, then added diced tomatoes (from a can, because sadly the ones I'm growing are not ripe yet)
I also in added the beef:

I let all that simmer for about 5 minutes more, then I added the al dente cooked pasta

Here is a secret ingredient I've finally started using when cooking pasta dishes- a reserved cup of the pasta water

Adding this really gives the dish an Umami texture; very comforting!
Also, another secret I've recently picked up is to add a couple pats of cold butter to the dish after the pasta and water have been added

If you are not using any milk, adding the butter will give the dish that creaminess that dairy always adds
Speaking of dairy, I then added some fresh Parmasean cheese

And some fresh basil

And then add a little extra Parmasean to your plate :)

Yum o!

This dish turned out light and fresh tasting, yet very flavorful and comforting.
Mmm! Make it yourself- it's delish!

Day #10

2011-07-10T10:50:00.001-07:00

Saturday- our last day!
Brunch at Corsino

Olive tapenade crostini, and cauliflower, parmesan and pine nut crostini

Baked eggs with tomatoes, basil and parmesan

Dude. This was seriously amazing!

Truffled egg toast with cheese and asparagus

Each got a free Bellini for checking in on foursquare!

Free ones taste the best!

After brunch, we packed, and took all our purchases to the UPS store to ship home for us. We have started doing this in the past couple years since we never check bags when we travel. It's still cheaper to ship home a 50 lb box by UPS than it is to check 2 bags 4 times at the airport. And UPS will not lose your stuff like the airlines can. So, this option is a no brainer for us!

Later on, we went to a free wine tasting at Union Sq Wine Shop. In honor of Bastille day, they had all French wine to taste.

We were shocked at the crowd- it was absolutely packed! We realized why it was so crazy there when we got in the tasting room- there were over 30 wines to taste! All for free! I've never heard of such a huge wine tasting!

Since that is an insane amount of wine to taste, we chose about half that amount. It was fun despite the crowd.

Next we decided we needed a snack, so we went to one of our favorite places, Terrior. They have the best tapas; we have never had a dish there we didn't like!
Scott got his favorite, Beet Risotto balls with Gorgonzola cheese:

Yeah, buddy!

I usually get the veal and ricotta meatballs or the sage leaf wrapped lamb sausage, but decided to try something new this time, Tonnato and Celery Brushetta

Tonnato is a Sicilian tuna fish dish, and it was delicious!

The menu here is great; so eclectic with the most interesting foods.

We walked home and finished packing, then got ready for dinner

We walked a few blocks to dinner to this restaurant called Takashi, a Yakiniku restaurant. This is Japanese for "cooking grilled meat" that is cooked by the diners at the table. The only thing they serve is sustainably raised beef from a few select farms- perfect!

There are 2 types of beef you could get: raw, or to be grilled tableside. We had both kinds. For an appetizer, we had raw beef achilles tendon in ponzu sauce:

Even though the thought of this was a little gross, the taste definitely was not! It was slightly chewy and had a delicious light beefy flavor. Very good!

Oh, and before the tendon, they gave us complimentary snacks to enjoy:

From left to right: garlicky bean sprouts, spicy kimchi, and cabbage with a white miso sauce. This is a classic example of why the Japanese are not fat. This is their type of appetizer, pickled vegetables, while us Americans graze on rolls and bread baskets with a processed margarine spread. We could learn a lot from them!
So here is what we ordered to grill:
Scott got a plate of offal, which was beef heart, liver, 1st stomach, 4th stomach, and sweetbreads (thymus gland)
Yep, pretty gross! But he loved it all except the stomachs- said they were too chewy.

I am not quite as adventurous, so I got the Kobe beef short rib

And also the beef belly

We cooked each piece 1-2 minutes per side. I really liked the belly, but the short ribs were a little too fatty. My favorite of all were the sweetbreads- they are so tender and flavorful.
All in all we had a fun time grilling our own food and trying new adventurous foods, but neither of us felt the meal was outstanding. But a vey fun experience and a fun ending to a wonderful trip!

Good bye New York, we'll see you again soon!

Day # 9

2011-07-09T09:47:00.001-07:00

Friday already! The days are really flying by quickly! Today and tomorrow are our last full days here, so we decided to step it up and actually get out of bed before 10:30.
We got up around 8 and decided we needed some exercise. But first we needed coffee, so we went to a cute little place called Mojo Coffee

We walked back down to the Hudson River Park, and walked all the way to Battery Park, which is the southern tip of the island. Here are some pictures of the Statue of Liberty as we walked down towards Battery Park:
Way, way off in the distance (in the center)

A little closer- see it just to the right of my head

View from very tip of Battery Park, the closest we could get without actually taking the ferry over

Some sights along the way:

This is the new Freedom Tower- there in the back, center. When it's finished it will be twice as high as it is here!

Next we walked through the financial district and down Wall St

Me and Harry :)

After walking for 3 hours we decided it was time for breakfast tacos at Tacombi

This space just had tables set up, and a retro food truck to order lunch tacos.

On the left is a ticket counter where you buy one ticket per taco...

And hand it to this guy who makes the tacos.

Eggs, avocado, jalepeno, and potatoes- yum!

The new friends we met at the wine bar the other night called us and invited us to their apartment for a party they were having. So we went for a couple hours and made other new friends and had so much fun!

We left there and went to Murrays Cheese Shop, where we had bought tickets to take a tour of their cheese caves. It was awesome!

We all got name tags when we got there. Scott was "Lingering"

I was "Tart"

After the caves, we had all we could eat cheese! So much fun!

We had the best time!

Day #8

2011-07-08T04:58:00.001-07:00

Thursday already? My how the days just fly by! I don't have many pictures from the day as we spent most of the day shopping. Here is what we did:

Breakfast/Brunch at Shake Shack (yes, we love it!)

Walked around Madison Sq park. How beautiful are these hydrangeas? I've never seen any that have this much color variation from the same bush. So pretty!

Back to the nightmare of Century 21. The store motto is "Fashion worth fighting for". They got that right! It's always a crowded fight in that madhouse.

It wasn't quite as crowded as Monday was, so we were able to get a lot of items this time. This is my favorite purchase:

So cute- and only cost $27.99! This is why we torture ourselves and put up with the crowds.

We also shopped at H&M, French Connection, and a few more places.

As it was 6:30 by the time we were finished shopping, we decided to go back to the Cupboard and get ready for dinner. I wore my new dress (forgot to take a picture) and Scott wore a new shirt.

We went to a new trendy restaurant called The Dutch. As it was 8:00, it was absolutely packed, and they told us the wait list was so long they weren't even taking names anymore. They said we could try again in a couple hours. We went to a place across the street called the Soho Room to discuss what to do next. We had a glass of wine there, then went next door to Blue Ribbon Brasserie for an appetizer. We had bone marrow and oxtail marmalade on toast points- O.M.G! This was one of the richest, most decadent, delicious meals we've ever had. Wow.

It was too dark to get a good picture, but trust me, it was phenomenal! I'm sure this sounds disgusting to some, but bone marrow is delicious. It has a rich, buttery, beefy flavor, and has the consistency of gelatin. The oxtail marmalade was made from braised oxtail, and had a savory flavor very similar to a roast that's been cooked in the crock pot all day. Very earthy and rich, totally a comfort food! Mmm!

Since it was 9:30 at this point, we decided to try The Dutch again. This time we were able to get in and had a wonderful meal there. I had pecan crusted duck with organic dirty rice, and Scott had roasted squab.
After our feast we walked home to go to bed. A great night!

Day #7

2011-07-08T04:25:00.001-07:00

Wednesday:

Pre-fix lunch at Kin Shop
Garam Marsala and Tomato Basil soup

Scott had braised goat stew with purple yams

Mmm!
I had wonton noodles and broccoli rabe in a mushroom broth:

Chewy, salty noodles- my favorite!
Thai Chi ice cream and Chocolate Cappuccino ice cream:

What a fabulous and delicious lunch!
Next stop- Harry Potter Exhibit!

This was a huge exhibit that took us through the world of HP! The costumes and props that were worn in the movies were here on display. It was so awesome! The only disappointing part was that the staff there were picture Nazis and told us over and over again that photography was strictly forbidden. They told us they knew cell phones had cameras so we weren't even allowed to have phones out! Meanies!

After the wonderful world of Harry Potter, we toured the other exhibit, "Pompeii in the shadow of Mt Vesuvius". It was really neat to learn that Pompeii was a thriving, cultural town. It was crazy to see the similarities in their world in 79 AD and ours now.There were artifacts on display depicting their lifestyles (arts, entertainment, restaurants- even fast food restaurants!) Make up, jewelry, hair styles, all very similar to ours today! And then, Mt Vesuvius erupted, and in 24 hours the entire town was burned and buried in ashes. Insane! We saw casts of people who were killed and perfectly preserved in the ashes. It was very sobering to think about. There was a video playing of people who currently live there- 3.5 million around the base of Mt Vesuvius. One girl was on camera saying that they all knew it would erupt again, and after the destruction they would just rebuild.
Hello! You live on an active volcano!!!
To quote Bill Murray from the movie Groundhogs Day: "Morons, your bus is leaving!"

After the exhibits we got a snack at a new trendy food hall called Food Park.

Duck Pastrami Egg Rolls

Next we went to Hudson River Park to watch a free movie outside on the lawn. We bought straw mats at Walgreens for $4 each, and watched about half of the movie "The Social Network".

We had never seen it before and it was really good, but we were hungry and wanted to go out to dinner.
We went to dinner at Blue Ribbon Sushi, which is always good and open late. Then home to bed!

Day #6

2011-07-07T08:08:00.001-07:00

Tuesday in pictures:
Chocolate Croissants

Chocolate Mustache

Walking down the Hudson River Park

Mini Golf!

I won!

Boo-yah!

Public veggie and herb gardens

Walking to dinner at A Voce:

Fabulous spread!
From left to right: radishes with anchovy and olive oil (anchovies are salty and delicious and deserve a chance- try them!), air cured beef (similar to beef carpaccio), roasted beets, ricotta spread with grilled bread. And that was just our appetizers!
Yes we are fatties!

And this appetizer: pulled mozzarella with fava beans, cauliflower, mint, and olive oil... Yum o!

My entree: Ravioli stuffed with eggplant and ricotta in a tomato sauce with pine nuts, raisins, and basil- yum!!

Scotts entree: fresh pasta with oven dried tomatoes, anchovy (I'm telling you, they are so good!) and parsley

After our feast we went to see a Broadway show, "How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying"- staring Harry Potter!!! Ok, I know his name is Daniel Radcliffe, but he is always Harry Potter to me!

OMG, this show was absolutely phenomenal! John Larroquette also played supporting actor- remember him from that 80s show Night Court? He played Dan Fielding in that show. He was excellent in this play- but not as excellent as Harry Potter!! He did an amazing job, and has a great singing voice! I highly recommend seeing this if any of you come to NYC!

Illegal picture but I took it anyway! In the front on the left wearing the suit is Harry Potter, with John Larroquette next to him on right:

Me and Harry! :)

Times Square at night:

We can never come to NYC without visiting our favorite piano bar:

It is very cheesy, but they always sing Broadway showtunes and we love it! Don't Tell Mama never disappoints!

Since we had a super early dinner at 5:00 in order to see the show, we were hungry again (naturally!) Went to the Meatballl Shop and had fabulous meatballs.

They had beef, chicken, and lamb meatballs, but they were all cooked in pork fat. All but the vegetarian meatballs, which were made of lentils. Poo.

Scott said screw it, and ordered one beef meatball slider. He also had one Veggie meatball slider:

I had vegetarian "meat"balls on spaghetti with red sauce- mmmm! Very good!

Also shared creamy cheesy risotto:

We Succeeded at NYC without really trying!

Day #5 Monday

2011-07-05T15:25:00.001-07:00

Independence Day started out with a delicious brunch at Cafe Cosmopolitan:
Chocolate croissant

Mushroom and chicken crepe

Scrambled egg and turkey croissant

Afterwards it was on to exploring the city on foot:
TriBeCa

Mark Forgione (the newest Iron Chef) restaurant:

Random city shot:

World Trade Center site. This is the new Freedom Building that is still under construction:

Completed future look (on left):

Next, shopping at Century 21..aka the 9th level of Hell. But, the prices are good enough that it's worth a couple hours of crowded torture.

Chaos!!!!

After the Century 21 beat down, we needed a little break. We went to this Dutch restaurant called Vandaag. We each had a fancy cocktail

And also a fabulous snack of Bitterballen, which is an oxtail croquette:

Yum o!
Afterwards, we went to the Cupboard to change for the nights activities.
We had dinner at Keste, which is a pizza place in the village. We got the Margherita pizza:

Action shots:

Mmm!
Next we walked over to view the firework show, which is the largest one in the nation!

YouTube Video

After the show we decided to go have a glass of wine. We went to a wine bar in the village called Entwine. We met a very nice married couple there (also insurance brokers, coincidentally!) and had a nice time visiting and making new friends.
After wine, we went to Cielo, which is a place we've been to that plays electronic music. We stayed there for about an hour, then decided we were hungry again. We went to Cafeteria, our favorite late, late night spot. Scott had short rib tacos, and I had chicken fried steak and mashed potatoes. We left there full and happy and went straight to bed!

July 4th

2011-07-04T15:38:00.000-07:00

While the rest of the nation remembers our Independence Day, July 4th now holds a different memory for me and my family. It was July 4th, 2009 that my beloved aunt Sharon was tragically killed in an accident. Scott and I were in NYC, and every detail of that day is categorized in my mind as "before" and "after" the call from my mom with the horrible news.

So today, I think of Sharon's family who is left behind. My uncle Gary, my cousins Missy and Alison, and Alison's family, Dan, Katelyn, and new baby Brayden. I think of my grandmother, who lived longer than her daughter. I think of my dad, who lost his only sister, and is now an only child.

Yet even in this sad time, I find comfort in knowing that Sharon was a Christian, and that her short 60 years on this earth are not the end for her. The Bible says that "the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 6:23) "If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead, you shall be saved;" (Romans 10:9)

I know Sharon believed this, so I can find peace in knowing that I will be able to be with her again in heaven. This is why Jesus is called the Prince of Peace- knowing Him gives us believers the ultimate sense of peace, because we know that this life is not the end for us. 1 Corinthians 2:9 says "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him."

How awesome, how amazing, that we can live and enjoy this life, but our life in heaven after this one will be one that "no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him." Wow.

So in that, I say, thank you, Lord, for giving us hope, for giving us peace, and for comforting us in our time of grief. I love this life, but I am also looking forward to the one beyond!

Day #5 Sunday

2011-07-04T07:57:00.001-07:00

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, I'll skip a bunch of words and go straight to the pictures :)
Went to brunch at David Burke Kitchen.

Started off the brunch with this fancy cocktail! This is a vodka tea mint lemonade, and it was delicious!

Pastrami salmon "pops" on cheese straws- yum o!

Chicken and Cheese Waffle!

Mmmm... Waffles should always be made with cheddar cheese!

Cinnamon raisin brioche French toast stuffed with Marscapone cheese and maple syrup:

Made in house chicken sausage:

This meal was seriously phenomenal!
We decided to walk 60 blocks after that to try to walk some of that feast off!

In front of Washington Square Arch, which is where Sally drops Harry off for college in my favorite movie of all time, When Harry met Sally

We made it about 40 blocks, and then the drizzly rain got to us so we decided to get in for cover for a bit. As we were right next to Eataly, we decided to go here again. I didn't take many pictures from the first trip, so here are a few:

Eataly was insanely crowded, so we decided being in the rain was better than being constantly bumped around inside. So we just walked around and looked at things, which is usually what we do when we don't have any specific plans.

Art Instillation at Madison Sq park

Walked 35 blocks or so to Elsa's, which is a prohibition era style cocktail bar. It was so cute inside- check out this old sewing machine that was used on the bar as a resting place for measuring cups (jiggers)

Look at these fancy drinks! I had a "Vino Verano"which was mint lemonade topped with a sweet Spanish red wine. Scott had "The Black Book", which was bourbon with honey, lemon, nutmeg, cinnamon, and cardamom.

Very refreshing!
Here is Scott looking annoyed at my constant picture taking of him:

Lol! :)

After this, we went to a free comedy show at a place called Pianos

There were 7 or 8 comedians that performed, but only 5 of them were really funny. However, for a free show, it was great!

We've decided to make each night a progressive dinner, and get appetizers only at one place, and go somewhere else for dinner. We want to try so many places, this is the only way we'll be able to see half of what we want. After Pianos, we went for appetizers at Daniel Boulud's new restaurant, called DBGB Kitchen and Bar. We split the crispy lamb ribs:

OMG they were amazing!
Next we walked to a new noodle restaurant called Hung Ry, where the chef made hand pulled organic noodles.
Here is a short video of a shot I took of him making the noodles:

YouTube Video

We each had delicious noodle bowls and walked back to the Cupboard. Another great night in NYC!

Day 4

2011-07-03T08:53:00.001-07:00

Saturday:
In case I wore anyone out with my lengthy 2 part blog post on Friday, today's blog post will be a picture procession of Saturday's events:
Farmers Market

Coffee shop

Apartment from last summer

Shake Shack- our favorite!

Shack Burger (aka Crack Burger)

Action Shot

Line wasn't too bad for once!

YouTube Video

Next stop: Shopping!
H&M

Shoe Shopping

New Shoes! I love the little spider!

The Guggenheim

One room was covered wall to
wall with $1 bills! There were 100,000 dollar bills in here! So cool!

Fancy cocktails at Bar Plaides in the Upper East Side

One solid hand carved brick of ice through the glass- very fancy!

Appetizer at The John Dorey called Kedgeree, which is a rice dish with smoked haddock and way too much cilantro for me! Scott liked it.

The John Dorey is the newest restaurant in the trendy Ace Hotel. We came here last year with Amy and went to the other restaurant in the hotel, The Breslin. Very hip place to be! There was a photo booth in the hotel lobby so we got our pictures made- so funny! Took me back to high school movie days :)

Couldn't get our timing quite right!

Too funny!

Dinner at Artichoke Basille's:
Pizza with Spinach, artichoke, Alfredo, Parmesan- super creamy, garlicky and delicious!

Margherita Pizza- salty, basil goodness! Mmm!

Home to bed! Such a fun day!

Day 3- Part 2

2011-07-02T07:42:00.001-07:00

Friday was was by far the best day we've had here yet! After we left Central Park, we took the subway back downtown and went home to the Cupbard.

A couple weeks ago we bought tickets to go one of the Summer Concert Series at Governors Island, which is a tiny 2 mile island right off the south end of Manhattan. The concert was Paul Van Dyk, who is the number one Electronic Dance Music DJ in the WORLD!
For my readers who don't keep up on electronic music, you all would best think of this as a techno concert. FYI, the term "techno" stopped being used about a decade ago, and now it is described in different genres. Paul Van Dyk plays Trance music. Other DJs play different styles, such as House, Drum Base (Tribal), Progressive, to name a few. Then there are all different types within each genre; House can be Deep House, Acid House, Electro House, etc, which is how those of us who are into electronic music decide which genre and DJ we like. Paul Van Dyk (commonly called just PVD) plays kind of a combo of Trance and Progressive House.
There is your Electronic Music lesson for the day!
So anyway, we took the ferry over to the concert, and it was amazing! Here are some pictures:
In line for the ferry

On the ferry to Governors Island

View from the Island looking back to Manhattan- so beautiful!

We had VIP tickets so we were able to stand in an area elevated away from the main crowd (thank goodness! I'm getting to old to be in that mess!) so we were very close and had a great view!

PVD played a 6 hour set, but we only stayed for about 4 1/2 hours. I guess I'm getting old because I started to get tired after standing and dancing for that long, and we were both hungry. After the concert we went to a late 12:30 am dinner at a nice upscale Mexican restaurant, which is another great thing about NYC! At home the only options to eat at that time of night is fast food-gross!
We shared:
-Beer Braised beef tongue taco (yes, I said tongue!)
-Fried Cod taco
-Short Rib Burger
And it was all delicious! After a great night we went to bed.
I'll end this post with a PVD video (I took 19 videos- no wonder my phone died!)
Hope you enjoy!

YouTube Video

Day #3- Part 1

2011-07-01T14:17:00.001-07:00

I need to retract my earlier comment from my Day 1 post. I said that this blog vacation would not be as detailed as last summers, but that seems to not be exactly true. Since Day 1, I have discovered this awesome iPhone app called BlogPress which lets me blog on the go. This drastically decreases the blogging time it took last year, so it is much easier to blog as we do things. Thus, forget about short blogs- this will more than likely be a play by play all day long. Some of you may be groaning now- this is your chance to pull out of this reader commitment before you are too sucked in :)
Having said that, I'll break Day 3 into 2 segments, as I am documenting more, and this app doesn't seem to be able to handle very lengthy posts.
Part 1:
Friday began with a leisurely stroll a few blocks to get some breakfast.

We chose to go to Morandi, which is an Italian Cafe. (For any of you who read my NYC blog from last summer, this is the place we came to with Amy and Ernest and saw the celebrity stars from "Promises, Promises", Kristin Chenoweth and Sean Hayes.)
We began the meal with coffee and lattes:

Chocolate brioche:

Look at that chocolate smear inside! Yeah buddy!
I had poached eggs with country bread and grilled tomatoes:

Scott had poached eggs over a bed of sunchokes, fava beans, and peas:

Our meals were very good, the only disappointment I had was that there was only one grilled tomato in my dish, where as the menu said "tomatoes", plural. The one I had was unbelievably delish, so one more would have been even better! Yes, I am a tomato freak- the more the better! Yum o!
After breakfast we walked over to the High Line, the once abandoned railway track that has now been converted to an elevated park spanning 18 or so city blocks. Section 2 has now been completed, so we walked around and took pictures. Here are some High Line shots:

This is Section 3 which has not been completed yet. It shows what a huge change this park is from the previous dilapidated condition.
At the base of the High Line is a picnic area in a parking lot where food trucks and beers on tap serve thirsty and hungry High Line walkers:

Even though we just at breakfast a couple hours ago, we had to get something from the Tiam Food Truck, since Food Trucks are all the rage right now. We split a Falafel pita with Harissa (spicy) sauce. In the immortal words of Cousin Eddie, "Clark, that is goo-ood!"

Action shots:

Scott summarized the situation with this comment: "that is exactly why NYC is so awesome; you can sit in a random parking lot and have the best damn falafel of your life."

Amen!

Afterwards, we walked 30 blocks uptown to visit one of our favorite NYC spots, Central Park. Coincidentally, 5 years ago today Scott proposed to me in this very park! It seemed only fitting to come back to where it all began!
"The Question" was asked right over there in one of those row boats...

5 years since I said "Yes!" :)

As my phone battery is almost dead (I wonder why...lol) I will say goodbye to Part 1. Day 3 Part 2 to be continued....

Day 2

2011-06-30T21:05:00.001-07:00

Thursday came and went so fast! Here are the things we did today:
-had a leisurely morning and didn't leave the Cupboard until 11 am.
-went to Kate Spade as I had received an email that both the stores and online were having a 25% off sale!

I needed this bag like I need a hole in my head! But it was marked down 30% off, plus an additional 25% off, so really it was too good a price to let go!
-walked around town

-ad for the next and last Harry Potter movie- can't wait to see it!
-went to Eataly, Mario Batali's newest venue. It's a huge food hall/gourmet dining/boutique grocery store all in one. You can sample cheeses, charcuteries, pastas, pizzas, and any type of meat. You can also have lunch, dinner, and drinks. We had lunch, which consisted of a fabulous cheese plate of 5 Italian cheeses.
-walked around through Eataly, and noticed a display case of a variety of caviar. Almost decided on this one, but decided it was too pricey:

Somehow paying almost $700 for a few ounces of caviar didn't seem like a very good deal.. Lol!
-After lunch, we went upstairs to the Biergairtin (Beer Garden) which was located on the rooftop. It was a beautiful atmosphere, and we had great views of both the Empire State Building and the Flat Iron Building

See the Empire State building up to the right? I should have focused the shot more on that instead of the wine barrels at the bar :)
-went back to the Cupboard to change clothes and plan our night
-went to Turks and Frogs, which was a wine bar, and each had of course, a glass of wine
-went to dinner at Bills Burger Bar and each had a delicious cheeseburger! Mmmm! Another satisfying day in the Big Apple!

NYC- 2011!

2011-06-30T12:27:00.001-07:00

I'm baaa-ck!
After a long blogging hiatus, I am back to blog about our current vacation, where else but NYC of course!
This trip will not be as detailed as the 2010 NYC trip, but I do want to keep an account of what we're doing, and most importantly, what we're eating! :)

We arrived last night to our apartment we've rented for the next 10 days. We are again in Greenwich Village, which is in our opinion, the best location in NYC to stay and hang out in.

This apartment, while in a fabulous location, is not nearly as fabulous as our wonderful apartment last summer. It's not horrible, but I will say that the lady we are renting it from is quite skilled at photography and made the apartment seem much more spacious than it actually is. Our 400 sq ft apartment last summer looks like a sprawling resort compared to our accommodations this year.The room itself is fine, complete with a bed, tiny kitchen, and 2 airy windows. However, the bathroom is the smallest bathroom I have ever been in (except airplane bathrooms). I can literally stand in the middle of the bathroom floor (if you call 4 inches between the toilet and sink a "floor") and touch all four walls with my arms outreached. I have a newfound appreciation for Harry Potter's "cupboard under the stairs" in which he lived at his Aunt and Uncle's home. We are living in a "Cupboard in the Village" but at least we are in NYC so I shouldn't complain too much.

We left the Cupboard last night and went to a phenomenal restaurant down the street called "Buvette". It was a quaint little French restaurant, where we enjoyed a couple glasses of wine and the best "boeuf bourguignon" we've ever tasted. The deliciousness of the meal
helped me come to terms about staying in the tiny apartment, and we returned to the Cupboard full and happy.

Cooking at Home

2010-10-08T18:43:00.000-07:00

Well, we've officially been home from NYC for a month and a half. In the meantime, we went to Napa Valley, but I'll blog about that later. For now, I want to blog about the fabulous dinner we cooked at home tonight.

I'm starting to feel the slightest twinge of a sore throat/cough coming on, so I was craving some good ol comfort food for dinner tonight. I couldn't find a recipe of exactly what I wanted, so I just decided to make something up. I'll call this dish "Roasted turkey breast on fettuccine with a sage and parmasean cream sauce".

I decided it had been too long since I'd made homemade pasta, so I wanted to get out my trusty Kitchen Aid mixer with pasta attachments. I followed the recipe that came with the attachment for basic egg noodle pasta. After making the dough and letting it rest, I began the noodle making process.

First you stretch the dough slightly and then put it through the pasta sheet roller.

After the dough has ran through, then you fold it over and run it through again. You do this a few times until the dough is thin and long.

Then you change the attachment from pasta roller to pasta cutter. I used the fettuccine cutter as these are my favorite type of noodles.

Once the noodles are cut, I cut them in half as they are really long and difficult to work with. The dough was a little sticky in some batches, so I had to pull the cut noodles apart and drop them in boiling water one at a time:

After cooking for just 2 minutes, I took the noodles out and let them drain. Since the dough stretches so long, cutting and boiling the noodles takes several batches. After 6 batches of rolling, cutting, boiling, and draining the noodles, I was finally finished.

In between the pasta making/rolling/cutting, I also made a creamy white wine sauce to accompany the noodles. I used butter, garlic, white wine, and chicken broth to make the body of the sauce, and I thickened it with a roux (flour and butter). I added peas, fresh sage, paprika, parmesan, and salt and pepper to taste, and then let the sauce thicken while I tended to the noodles.

My sweet little helper Scott helped me with the turkey breast. The noodles and sauce were too much work to have time to get the turkey in the oven, so he helped make that. He coated the turkey breast with paprika, garlic powder, oregano, and poultry seasoning, and baked in a 400 degree oven for 50 minutes. It came out looking perfect!

When the turkey was finished, so were the noodles and sauce.

Here is the finished product:

The turkey turned out moist and delicious (mainly because Scott made it- I have a tendency for drying out poultry in the oven). The noodles were little piles of chewy heaven. Mmmm! So dang good. The sauce was light yet creamy.... Yum O! This was a fabulous way to spend a Friday night. The best part of all, my sweet little helper cleaned up all the dishes!

Good night!

Day #31- Friday

2010-08-31T18:54:00.000-07:00

OUR VERY LAST DAY!!!!!!!!!!

Wah!

Packing sucks. I can't believe how much stuff we bought!

But, we did get some fabulous deals! So it was totally worth it! :-)

We have had a wonderful, once in a lifetime opportunity. We loved every minute of it, and are so blessed to have been able to experience something like this. We look forward to returning home to family and friends, but still have a heavy heart in leaving our "NYC Home". Even if it was "home" for just a short while.

Goodbye, 290 W. 12th St, apt 4E. We'll miss you!

Day # 30- Thursday

2010-08-31T16:51:00.000-07:00

Our last full day in NYC.

Where does the time go? Since it was our last day, we decided to make it count. We went to lunch at this restaurant that I'd had my eye on since our first day there. It was called Risottoria. Yes, as in a Risotto restaurant! Along with noodles and tomatoes, my 3rd greatest food love is risotto. I love love love risotto, so OF COURSE we had to go here! The risotto list was huge, with tons of variations on different additions to risotto dishes. It took about 15 minutes to decide (no joke!), but I finally decided on risotto with shitake mushrooms, arugula, and gouda.

Look at that creamy, cheesy, mushroomy pile of deliciousness! Mmm!!!

Scott got the special of the day, which was risotto with chicken, zucchini, kalamata olives, and parmasean:

While this place was very good, I guess I had extremely high expectations due to my burning love for risotto. I'll have to say, I'd probably only give this place a 7/10. It was good, but I've definitely had better. My friend Brandy makes THE BEST RISOTTO EVER! I tell her this all the time, because it is absolutely true.

The Risotto Force is strong with her. She is the Risotto Master.

My risotto is pretty good as well (not Brandy good, but good still), and I think it's better than this place. But, I was glad that we went here, and I love the concept of a risotto restaurant. Maybe I can convince Brandy to open one of these! I'd be her #1 patron!

After our somewhat disappointing lunch, we decided to go to the MET. Yes, this makes our 3rd time! Scott had read about a rooftop exhibit called Big Bamboo that he wanted us to see. And since today it had finally quit raining, and the temperature was back in the low 80's, we wanted to check it out.

We took the subway to the Central Park, and walked through the park to the MET. This was a really neat exhibit. It's a work in progress, and has been all summer. There are a few "bamboo artists" (for lack of a better word) who are constantly adding new bamboo shoots to the structure:

You can see the person at the top working on the structure.

There is a stairway throughout the bamboo where people can take guided tours. They only allow so many per day, and we had missed the sign up so couldn't do it

See the staircase? Pretty cool!

Scott hanging out under the stairs

There was also an awesome view of the city from the MET rooftop as well:

We walked through the art gallery on the way out so Scott could get one last look at some favorite paintings:

This is one of his favorites. It's VanGough, Wheat field with Cypruses.

Whatever.

:-)

Later that night, we went to dinner at Bill's Burger Bar. We've already been here one other time this trip, but it is so dang good. So similar to Shake Shack, but without the long line.

Cooking is art to me. Look at how perfectly that burger was grilled, with just the right amount of pink peeking through. See how vibrant the color of the melted cheese, the rich red of the tomato, and the bright green hue of lettuce contrast against each other. Isn't this pretty? This is a work of art.

And even better, because this is art you can EAT! :-)

We had a great experience here, and even better, it only cost $34. Just as fabulous as some of the gourmet places, but at a fraction of the cost!

We had a wonderful last day in our favorite city.

Day #29- Wednesday

2010-08-29T17:37:00.001-07:00

Wednesday Scott woke up and announced that we had to go get Ethiopian food for lunch. He had been saying since day 1 that he wanted to try Ethiopian food, and we were running out of time to try it! So after working for a little bit, we went to a place called Meskerem. Here is what we got:

We got a combo of vegetables, with lamb, peppers, and tomatoes in the center.

The way you eat Ethiopian food is with your hands- no utensils. You rip off a piece of spongy bread:

And you form a little pocket with it. Then you scoop up whatever you want, the veggies or the lamb (or both!) and pop it in your mouth:

This was so much fun! It looks kind of messy, but it really wasn't. It was a unique experience, and the food was flavorful and healthy. We thoroughly enjoyed this meal!

After our delicious lunch, we walked around the Village. In the rain, as usual. It was getting really old- it had been raining since Sunday!

Despite the crappy weather, we wandered around all day, just walking around and going here and there. That is our favorite thing to do here; just walk around aimlessly and soak in all the excitement and energy of the city :-)

Later that evening for dinner, we went to another Jean George restaurant, called The Spice Market. When Lindsay was here, she told us that she had been here before and that it was one of the best meals of her life. So obviously we HAD to go here! She was right- the food was fantastic! We split the spicy Thai fried chicken wings with mango and mint:

These were totally fabulous! Very saucy, and the breading was oatmeal, I think! It was delish.

We also split a spiced chicken samosa (which is like an empanada) with a cilantro yogurt dipping sauce:

This was also pure bliss!

I had the grilled strip steak with garlic, corriander, and cumin:

This was moist, juicy, and perfectly cooked. Very good decision on my part :-)

Scott got the Vietnamese chicken curry:

As Rachael Ray would say, "Yum-O!"

Thanks Lindsay, for telling us how much you loved it here! We are with ya- this place was wonderful!

We had a fabulous 2nd to last day in NYC!

Day #28- Tuesday

2010-08-29T12:19:00.001-07:00

Here we are, the last Tuesday of the trip. Only 3 more full days of NYC left! Wah!!!

That Collodial Silver worked, because Tuesday morning I woke up feeing much better. Still not 100%, but a definite noticeable difference. Thanks, Mom, for reminding me to get this!

Scott and I went to a late lunch at 3:00. We went to this noodle bar, called Momufuku. As I have a deep burning love for noodles, this was right up my alley. Scott and I split the prefix lunch menu, which consisted of a beef brisket bun, a bowl of duck ramen noodles with red miso broth, and chocolate truffle balls for dessert. We also ordered a side of shitake buns, and a bowl of heirloom tomatoes, because I also have a deep burning love for tomatoes.

OH. MY. GOODNESS.

This lunch was one of the best meals we'd eaten in the whole trip! Check it out:

These tomatoes were peeled, and accompanied with thin carpaccio beef slices, melon balls, and a savory chili vinaigrette. This is possibly the best tomato dish I have ever eaten. Complete deliciousness!

This is the beef brisket bun. The "bun" was actually a soft, chewy, wrap; it had the texture and thickness of a pancake. It was a delicious little chewy pillow, stuffed with fall apart tender brisket, bibb lettuce, and a tangy barbecue-like sauce. So delicate yet so much flavor!

Somehow, these shitake buns were even better than the brisket. Look at how fluffy those buns are!The shitakes were sautéed until crispy, which gave them a perfect chewy (but not rubbery, like mushrooms can sometimes be) texture. This was to die for!!!! Well, not literally, but they were little buns of heaven!

This is a duck egg, on top of a bowl of chewy, perfect ramen noodles, swimming in a salty red miso broth, and a few pieces of seared duck on top. I think that description alone should be enough to describe how incredible this dish was. Absolutely scrumptious! I could eat this every day and be happy :-)

Dessert was chocolate chip truffle balls.

This tasted like a ball of cookie dough. Which is good, because I love cookie dough! I can eat it by the spoonfuls out of the mixing bowl before I even get them into little balls and into the oven.

This lunch was absolute heaven. We'd both give it a 10/10. I would eat here again and again!

After this feast, we went back to the apartment to wrap up a few things at work. As it was raining again, and just a cold, yucky day in general, we stayed in until about 7:30. We then went to a little wine bar in the East Village that sold half price bottles of wine all night! It was called the Bourgeois Pig. We split a bottle of white wine, and it only cost $20! That is a steal in this city. The night before when we went to PDT, we each had one drink, and they cost $14 each. We spent more on 2 drinks at PDT than we did on a whole bottle of wine at the Pig.

After the wine, it was around 10:00 so we decided we should grab something for dinner. We had considered eating at the Pig... they had some awesome looking fondue trays. But after the bottle of wine, we decided we wanted something a little more substantial than a bowl of melted cheese. We went to Butter, which I had been wanting to go to since I always see the chef, Alexandra Guarnashcchelli on cooking shows on Food Network. She is one of the usual judges on Chopped, and has been on Iron Chef quite a number of times as well. Plus, the restaurant's name is Butter, so come on, we had to go here!

Well, the name of the restaurant turned out to be the best part about eating here. The food was average. I didn't even take pictures of it, so that should say something about it right there. I honestly can't even remember what we got- I guess the main point is that it wasn't memorable.

However, since we'd had such a fabulous lunch at Momofuku, and a nice bottle of wine for $20 at the Bourgeois Pig, we'd had a great day overall.

Day #27- Monday

2010-08-28T16:19:00.001-07:00

Monday. It's official... our last week is here. I can't believe how quickly it has flown by! Of course with it being Monday, and with me being sick, and with it raining all day, we stayed in the apartment until 5:00. Well, I stayed in. Scott got restless around 3 and went to Bill's Burgers for lunch, and then went and got a haircut. I stayed home and worked, drank hot tea, and some of the vitamin C Emergency packs Scott had bought me at Whole Foods. I was intent on not wasting any more of the day, so I forced myself to get showered and ready for the night.

Scott had read about this place called PDT, which stands for Please Don't Tell. It is a "secret" speakeasy (bar) that you can only get by going through a front restaurant called Crif Dogs.

You walk into Crif Dogs, and on the left hand side of the restaurant is a "phone booth". You walk into the phone booth, shut the door, and press a button, which rings a bell inside of PDT.

A voice then projects into the phone booth, and asks "how many?" Scott said "two", and then a few seconds later the back door of the phone booth opened up to reveal a doorway into the speakeasy.

Seriously, how cool is this?!?!

I felt like I was Harry Potter, going into the Ministry of Magic via the street entrance. (Sorry, only you HP fans can relate to this!)

Once inside, the bar was very dimly lit. The bartenders were all dressed in period clothing, so they had circa 1920's outfits on... very cool! Also, I should specify, these aren't just bartenders, they are mixologists, and specialize in complicated, fabulous cocktails. All the drinks there are made the old fashioned way, with freshly muddled fruit, fresh herbs, and hand chipped ice cubes. Yes, I said hand chipped! How awesome is that? I got a Madame Bouregaurde, which was supposed to represent Violet Bouregaurde from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (the girl that turned into a giant blueberry). This drink was made with a half cup fresh blueberries, muddled (which basically means smashed) with vodka, club soda, egg whites, and topped with fresh mint. OMG- this was absolutely delicious, and beautiful! (On the right)

Scott got the Mezcal Mule, which was Mezcal, Ginger beer, hot peppers, and fresh squeezed fruit juice (either orange or pineapple, I think....). It was equally fancy and delicious!

This was mainly a bar, but if you wanted food, you could order from the Crif Dogs menu (which was gourmet hot dogs) and they would pass it through a tiny little window through the PDT bar. So sneaky!

This place was so neat- it was like something from an old gangster movie! I am so glad that we got to experience something so unique like this!

Afterwards, we took a cab to Union Square to go back to Whole Foods. I had talked to mom earlier, and she suggested that I get some Collodial Silver, which is a natural remedy for sore throats/colds/infections. She said that every time she goes somewhere where it's really polluted, she gets the same thing I had (sore throat, slight cough, loss of voice) and that the Collodial Silver knocks it right out. I have taken this in the past and know it works, I had just forgotten about it. So we went to Whole Foods to get some.

Next, we walked a couple blocks (it had quit raining, but was now 65 degrees- cold and windy!) to our dinner destination. We went to a Jean George restaurant called ABC Kitchen. The restaurant was really beautiful:

We started off with appetizers. I got the heirloom tomato dish, which was tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, jalapeños, basil, and a delicious, savory vinegrette:

Scott got the chicken liver pate on toast:

For dinner, Scott got the morel mushroom pizza with truffle oil, Parmesan, oregano and farm egg:

I had the kasha and bowtie pasta with lamb meatballs:

As expected, our meal was incredible, and we loved every bite!

Day #26- Sunday

2010-08-28T15:06:00.000-07:00

Sunday morning we went to brunch at this trendy hot spot called 5 Points. It was totally packed with people. After we got our food, we understood why! Megan got the blueberry pancakes- they were phenomenal! Very light and fluffy, with blueberries both in the batter and on top of the pancakes. Mmm- so good!

(Side note- these pictures are all slightly on the dark side- the restaurant was dimly lit, so I tried to avoid using a flash because I didn't want to draw attention to the fact that I'm taking pictures of all our food! LOL!)

Scott got the chipotle chicken dish, which was stewed, shredded chicken on a flat tortilla. He liked it ok, nothing to write home about (or nothing to blog about, I should say).

I got the roasted tomatoes and eggs dish, and oh my, was it heavenly! This time of year, I just can’t get enough tomatoes, and this dish did not disappoint. It was baked in a crock, with a few poached eggs in between the tomatoes, and a sprinkling of melted cheese on top. It was fantastic!

For dessert (yes, we somehow squeezed this in) Megan and I split the Churros and Hot Chocolate. Churros are a type of Mexican donut. They are long, thin, and almost hollow inside. They are lightly fried, and rolled in cinnamon and sugar. The hot chocolate (which was NOT from a mix- this was the real deal!) was for dipping the Churros in and then for drinking afterwards. This was the perfect ending to a scrumptious breakfast!

Next, we walked to SOHO and Chinatown. We wandered along the streets of SOHO for a while, browsing through some of the shops. As soon as we got into Chinatown, however, it started pouring down rain. Thankfully we had all brought umbrellas in anticipation of this. This wasn’t a light drizzle- it was a steady downpour, plus it was windy, so the rain was blowing in all over us under our umbrellas. Outdoor activities were not high on the list at this point, so we took the subway to the Museum of Natural History. This is a pretty neat museum; that movie “Night at the Museum” is based on this. Since the weather was so crappy, a lot of people had the same idea that we did, so it was crowded. We wandered from room to room for a couple hours.

Megan being "attacked" by a tiger

As several hours had passed since brunch, we wanted to take Megan to dinner before she had to get on the MegaBus. We chose Carnegie Deli, which is a famous and historic NYC deli.

Megan and I split a Rueben sandwich.

As you can tell by the pictures, these sandwiches are GINORMOUS! There is probably 3 lbs of meat on each sandwich. For as delicious as it was, we still had a ton left over.

Scott got the tongue sandwich. Yes, I said tongue. E! He loves to try different foods. I don’t know how much meat a tongue has on it, but this was either a giant tongue or two tongues- there was at least 2 lbs of meat on his sandwich as well. It was served cold. He put mustard on it. Yuck! He only ate about half of this monster as well.

After dinner, we trudged through the rain back to the subway. We stopped along the way to get our picture taken with Chef Duff from Charm City Cakes:

The sore throat that I had been getting over the past couple days was definitely worsened by as all this cold, wet weather. When we got back to the apartment, Megan packed, and Scott took her to the bus stop. I stayed back as I was not feeling the best. Thank goodness I did, because he texted me an hour later and said that she was just now boarding. Due to the weather, the bus was delayed 45 minutes, so they had to stand there in the rain all that time. Poo! Scott went to Whole Foods after Megan boarded, and picked up some cough drops, oranges, tea, and vitamin C for me. He brought all that home, along with a flower he bought for me at a nearby flower stand (isn’t he sweet?). I popped a cough drop in my mouth and called it an early night. Stupid summer colds.

Day #25- Saturday

2010-08-25T06:59:00.000-07:00

Saturday morning we got up and had brunch at our next door restaurant, Cafe Cluny. As always, it was F-A-B-A-L-O-U-S! Lindsay got the brioche french toast... YUM!

Megan got the sandwich, which had a fried egg, avocado, bacon, and tomato:

Scott got corned beef hash with poached eggs:

And I got the eggs florentine:

This was a highly satisfying brunch. And also a highly humorous one. First of all, our waiter was from England, and could not understand a word I was saying, him with his highly proper British accent, and me with my southern hick accent. And, I am getting sick and have a sore throat/raspy voice, so that added to the situation. When he came by to take our order, he asked if we were ready, and I said "I can't decide!" He thought I said "I want a salad". So he said, "ok, the salad", and then to clarify, said again "you'll have the salad?" Then I said "no, I can't decide" and then he said "no, you hate salad?" and then I said "No, I can't decide- I can't decide on what to order!"

He still looked confused, so Lindsay, in her non-KY accent, had to translate and tell him that I couldn't decide on what to order yet, and to come back in a few minutes. The whole thing was pretty funny actually. Then, when we finally ordered and got our food, all us girls whipped out our iphones and started taking pictures of all our food, and passing our phones around so we could get pictures of everyone else's food. Between the communication difficulties and the frenzied photo session over our food, the waiter probably all thought we were crazy!

And he would be right in assuming that :-)

After brunch, Lindsay had to leave, so we walked her to the MegaBus stop. We had so much fun

with her and were sad to see her go. But, she had to get home to her babies, so we said our goodbyes and left.

The 3 of us walked over to Herald Square, which is where the world's largest Macy's is located. It's on 34th street (yes, thus the movie Miracle on 34th Street) and takes up an entire city block. It is also the world's largest department store- so you can just imagine how massive this place is. We just walked past it as it would surely have taken the entire rest of the day to browse through here.

As we walked along, Scott (aka Mr. Tour Guide) pointed out all the points of interest/famous landmarks to Megan.

In front of the Waldorf Astoria

In front of Rockefeller Center

In front of Central Park

We stopped at Patsy's for lunch

It was saucy and delicious! This is by far my #1 favorite NYC pizza place. Megan loved it too!

We decided to go to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MET). Scott split up from us because he wanted to look at paintings, and Megan and I wanted to look at ancient Egyptian and Roman artifacts. I think I've finally figured out why I don't love museums- because we always look at paintings. They are ok, but I get bored with them. I really like looking at ancient artifacts, figurines, dishes.. all the little tools and devices that were made by hand thousands of years ago. That is really interesting to me!

For example, look at this:

These are dice, with a little barrel to roll them with. Does this not look just like our dice today? This is an ancient Yahtzee game, created B.C.! Isn't that neat?

Here are some other shots of things we thought were interesting:

Ornate and carefully created vases and bowls

Cute little figurines. So precise! To think, these were carved out of stone, by hand!

These little figurine heads- so detailed!

Ancient Egyptian jewelry- so neat! I always love looking at joo-rey!

How cute and ornate is this little knife and spoon!?!

Megan in front of a medieval troop of knights and horses

After a long day of walking around we went back to the apartment, exhausted. But, there is never any downtime in NYC, so we got ready for dinner. We had reservations for Morimoto, which is a fabulous restaurant owned by one of my favorite Iron Chefs. Scott and I have been here a few years ago, so we knew this place had good food and a really cool atmosphere. We had an amazing dinner and loved the experience.

I have to add this in- check out the bathrooms at Morimoto:

Isn't that too cool? It looks like a long, flowered hallway behind the toilet. Pretty neat optical illusion! And, the seats are heated. Can't beat that!

After our delicious dinner, we walked back home and went to bed. Another exhausting yet fulfilling day in NYC!

Day #24- Friday

2010-08-24T10:29:00.001-07:00

Friday morning was great- my sister Megan and her sister in law Lindsay came to stay with us for the weekend, so I went to meet them at the Mega Bus stop at 10:15. I was so excited to see them, and looking forward to our fun weekend ahead!

Megan and Lindsay

Me and Megan in front of the Flat Iron Building

We started off by going to Shake Shack. After all this blogging and raving on and on about how delicious the burgers are here, we had to take them here to try it out for themselves. As expected, the burgers did not disappoint!

Lindsay enjoying her burger!

After our fabulous lunch, we decided to take the Staten Island Ferry to look at the Statue of Liberty. You can ride the ferry to Staten Island and then back again, free! The views were great:

After the ferry, we went to the Financial District to walk around Wall Street.

Here is the giant Wall Street Bull

This was a sphere in the plaza of the World Trade Center Towers. It is put here as memorial.

After walking around for a while, Megan and Lindsay wanted to check out Century 21. After a bit of shopping, we went back to our end of town so the girls could check out the Chelsea Market.

Chelsea Market Hot Chocolate Bar

Bakery in the Market... how cute are these cupcakes!

After the Market, we walked back home to get ready for dinner. We had reservations at a place called L'Artusi. It was an Italian restaurant, and it was incredible! The food and the service were absolutely amazing. This was a small plates place, so we had fun ordering a bunch of small plates and sharing them. Here is what we got:

This was a crudo of escolar (raw fish) with a mixture of avocados, basil, and chiles. It was divine!

This was a fried egg on top of roasted mushrooms and ricotta salata. This was delish as well!

Megan and Lindsay each got this Chickories dish, which was a salad with parmasean, lemon, and anchovy dressing. Yum!

Megan got the gnocchi with tomato and basil. It was so good- you can't go wrong with a gnocchi dish!

Scott ordered the sweetbreads, which came with a raspberry compote. For those of you who haven't had sweetbreads, they are actually pretty good. The name is deceiving though- sweetbreads are actually fried glands of a veal calf. I know, more weird food for Scott. But they really are good- everyone tried them and seemed to like them ok.

We all also shared this heirloom tomato salad with watermelon. Mmmmm! This unusual pairing is totally fabulous! The tomatoes and the watermelon really compliment each other.

Lindsay had the Branzino with roasted lemon, olives and honey. It was light, buttery and delicious!

I got the ricotta ravioli, with housemade ricotta, black pepper, and pecorino. Oh my, this was sooooooooo good! I loved it!

Our waiter turned out to be from Floyd Knobs, Indiana, of all places! So we made friends with him as we were from Louisville. He brought us this delicious zucchini with garlic, basil, and chilies.... for free! What a great server! And, he brought us all a free half glass of wine to start out meal off! We loved him! We asked him to surprise us with whatever dessert he liked the best, and he brought out this panna cotta with vanilla bean.. it was fab!

After a wonderfully satisfying dinner, we went to Broadway to see Mary Poppins. We, as in us girls. Scott went to see Chicago, as he had no desire to see Mary Poppins.

The show was really cute, and pretty similar to the movie. Neither Megan nor Lindsay had seen a Broadway show before in NYC, so they both really liked it.

Afterwards, we walked around Times Square to admire all the lights...

Afterwards, we stopped in this little jazz bar to hear some live jazz music. The band was really, really good! We stayed for one set, then left for home. We had a great night out with the girls, and were so glad they could come to visit us in our "NYC home" :-)

Day #23- Thursday

2010-08-23T12:22:00.000-07:00

Thursday we got up early and went to the Bronx to the New York Botanical Garden. They have a huge conservatory there that I wanted to go to. As it was all the way up in the Bronx, it took us about an hour via subway to get there. Then we had to walk about 10 blocks from the subway station to the garden. When we finally got there, I was so excited to see the Conservatory. We had gone to the Washington DC National Conservatory in April, and I absolutely LOVED that, so I had high hopes for this one.

When we walked up to the steps of the Conservatory, I noticed tons of potted plants all around, so many that the doors to the entrance were covered up. Then I saw a sign that said "Closed for Renovations until Nov 19th."

POO! What a let down! All that way up there for nothing!

But as luck would have it, there was a cooking demonstration that was just getting ready to start. So we got a front row seat, and watched the executive chef from the Braeburn restaurant show us how to make an heirloom tomato salad.

I learned some neat tricks. For example, he taught us how to make tomato water.

He said to slice up some heirloom tomatoes. Then put them in a food processor, add a couple tablespoons of water, and blend them just enough so that they are still chunky. then you take this mixture and put it in a cheesecloth and strain it over a bowl for a whole day. Then on the next day, take all the water that has strained out into the bowl and put it in a canister with a lid. He said that this can be frozen, so if you want to make something later in the year that calls for tomatoes, you can use some of this tomato water, and it will have that fresh summer heirloom tomato taste. Isn't that awesome? Winter tomatoes at the grocery are a joke. I'm not even sure you can call them tomatoes, they are so mealy and flavorless. So I am definitely going to do this when I get home! I can't wait to add tomato water to my pasta dishes and chili this fall and winter! Mmm!

After the awesome demonstration, we walked around the Botanical Gardens. Here is the closed Conservatory:

Next to this were several gardens. One was Martha Stewart's herb garden, which was very cool!

We also saw Michael Psilakis (another famous Chef) herb garden:

We read on this sign that he owns a Greek restaurant in Manhattan called Kefi. So we called Kefi right then and made reservations for that night.

Here is one of our favorites, Mario Batali. His herb garden was very cool also. We read about how to make a raised bed garden... I think we will attempt to do this at home next year.

Here are some more photos of our day at the Botanical Garden:

After a couple hours there, we got back on the subway for our hour long commute back to the city. We went straight to our dinner at Kefi. It was phenomenal!We started off with an appetizer of warm pita bread with a spread of olives, feta, tomatoes, anchovies, capers, and peppers.

The feta and olive mixture was warm as well as the pita bread. This would have been amazing, had they not thrown in a handful of tiny chopped red onions. YUCK! I hate when restaurants do that. If onions are in the mixture, then the menu needs to say that. Since the onions were chopped so finely, it was too hard to pick them all out, so I only ate a teeny bit of this. Stupid onions, ruining everything! Yuck yuck yuck.

Scott's entree was very good. He got the sheep's milk dumplings with tomato, pine nuts, and spicy lamb sausage:

The dumplings were warm, chewy and cheesy (very similar to gnocchi), the sauce was rich and tomatoey, and the lamb had just the right amount of spiciness... delicious!

I had the Branzino, which is Mediterranean Sea Bass:

This was some of the most delicious, buttery, flavorful fish I have ever eaten. It was lightly grilled, and served with small potatoes, olives, and tomatoes.

Overall, I'd give this restaurant a 9/10 (the only reason it wasn't a 10/10 is because of the onions in the pita dish). It was absolutely fantastic. Greek food is our favorite, so this restaurant was one of the best we'd been to so far in our trip. Good job, Michael Psilakis!

After dinner, we had tickets to see South Pacific.

The show was ok. I had really high expectations though as this show has been sold out every single night for the past 3 times we've been to NYC. So I thought that it would be absolutely unbelievable. But, it was ok. I'd give it a 6/10. In hindsight, I wish we'd seen Wicked or Phantom again. We've seen those and they were both wonderful. Oh well! All in all, we had a fabulous day!

Day #22- Wednesday

2010-08-23T10:41:00.000-07:00

We got another late start on Wednesday because we worked most of the day. We left the apartment around 3, and went to the Original Patsy's in East Harlem (also known as Spanish Harlem). Whatever images come to your mind when you think of Harlem- well, that's exactly what it was like. A very rough neighborhood, with sketchy people all hanging out on the sidewalks. Apparently no one works here as they all seem to be just standing around out on the street, in the middle of the afternoon. Thankfully it was the middle of the afternoon, otherwise it would probably have not been very safe to come here. But, Scott wanted to try the Original Patsy's to compare it to all the other Patsy's. This Patsy's uses a coal fired oven, where as all the others use a wood fired oven. Also, they have different ownership, therefore having different recipes. And this one was close to where we were going, the Central Park Botanical Garden, so we were in the vicinity for trying this one out.

Every time we go to a pizza place, we always get the Margarita pizza, which is just sauce, mozzarella, and basil. I wanted to add a little something extra to this one though (I need variety!) so we added meatballs.

The meatballs turned out to be a mistake- they definitely were not that good. Neither was this Patsy's. In our list of NYC pizza places, this one came in last place for me. The crust wasn't as good, the sauce needed salt, and the neighborhood was definitely not an inviting one. Needless to say, we will NOT be coming back to the Original Patsy's.

After that disappointing experience, we walked to the Conservatory, which was about 7 blocks from Patsy's. The Conservatory is at the very top of Central Park, at 110th st. (Central Park runs from 59th st-110 st; we always go in around 59th street). The Conservatory was pretty. Here are some pictures from the day:

After the Conservatory, we walked back alongside the park. We walked past the Guggenheim museum. This is one museum we haven't been to, but it was closed.

We also walked past the Reservoir for the first time. This was a HUGE body of water in the park.

We decided to walk through the Upper West Side to go to Zabars (a local grocery store). I love walking through the Upper West Side streets. It always reminds me of one of my favorite movies, "You've Got Mail" with Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks. In the movie, they both live in the UWS and a lot of the movie is filmed here.

Doesn't this look like Meg Ryan's house in the movie? So cute!

We then went to Zabars and got some staples for our apartment: olives and tea.

This place is awesome. They have tons of variety of our favorite things. Look at all those olives!

All these yummy desserts! And even yummier CHEESE! Mmmmm!

Scott had an overwhelming selection of tea to choose from.

Around 10:00, we decided it was dinnertime, so we walked over to this little Mexican place Amy's friend Ernest had told us about, called Mexicana Mama. As usual, Ernest knew what he was talking about- this place was so dang good! We both got a burrito, Scott got chicken, I got shredded beef. Mmmmm......

Hot, spicy, and delicious! Another end to another long day (of walking!)

Day #21- Tuesday

2010-08-18T11:00:00.001-07:00

Tuesday. Oh my, where does the time go? Today was Amy's last day with us.

We knew we had better make it a good one as she had to leave at 1:00. We walked over to a place she had been wanting to go to, the Chelsea Market. This is a neat little building- it used to be an old Nabisco factory. It was turned into a cool shopping and eating mecca, full of fabulous deli's, kitchen stores, specialty items and gourmet foods. And to make it even cooler, the top floor of this building is where Food Network has their studios! FOOD NETWORK!!! So we went with high hopes of spotting a Food Network celebrity.

Sadly, we never did see one. But we did have a yummy breakfast while we were there. We went to a place called Sarabeth's, and we all had omelettes.

Amy had the veggie omelette with mushrooms, spinach, red peppers, and cheddar:

Scott had an omelette with apple butter and cheddar cheese inside (sounds weird, right?)

Well, it was. First bite or two were good, then it was too sweet.

I had the spinach and goat cheese omelette. It was pretty good.

I guess this is as close as I'll get to any Food Network stars:

Poo.

We finally gave up on any star sightings, and went shopping for the remainder of Amy's time. She said that the only regret she had was that we didn't get to go to Bagatelle Brunch, which we tried to make reservations for but we couldn't get in.

She left at 1:00, and then Scott and I worked until 5:00.

After work, we walked around and did some more shopping. As it's the end of summer, everything is on sale, so it's hard not to take advantage! I got these shoes for $27!

We decided then that it was dinner time, so we walked home to change.

And I wore my new shoes. Ok, the dress was new too. And the bracelet :-)

Scott wore new jeans, new shoes, and a new shirt:

(Needless to say, we've done a lot of shopping here!)

We went to Blue Ribbon Sushi as we haven't been here yet this trip. The sushi here is so good. We started off with an appetizer of tempura vegetables:

These were just lightly fried in a thin, crispy batter. Very light! We had okra, eggplant, squash, mushroom, and that green leaf is some type of Japanese vegetable that I'm not sure of the name.

Check out our sushi tray:

From top left to right: Blue Fin Tuna sashimi, Hamachi sashimi, Quail egg shooters, Hamachi and mushroom straw roll, and Tuna, Salmon, and Hamachi roll. Mmm!

We also had sake, which came in these cute little wooden boxes:

After a nice light meal, we walked home and called it a night.

Day #20- Monday

2010-08-18T10:01:00.000-07:00

Monday we got a late start. Scott and I had to work a little, while poor Amy sat around and watched us. She helped out and cleaned up the apartment for us (she's good like that!) until we could get out the door. We finally left the apartment around 3:00, and as it was lunchtime, went to a place we've been wanting to try called Toto Ramen. This is a Ramen Noodle place, and I was SO excited to eat here as I am in love with noodles :-)

We each got different types of ramen noodles. I wanted just a bowl of plain noodles.... nothing but noodles and broth:

Mmm! The red part is a spicy thai chili sauce that I added. Very satisfying!

Amy kicked it up a notch, and wanted chicken, scallions, garlic, and Nori (seaweed) added to hers:

It was very good; had a nice chicken-y flavor.

Scott wanted to kick his up a higher notch, so he got the vegetarian ramen bowl:

As you can see, this was chock full of big vegetables, sitting on some ramen noodles and broth. He liked his as it was more of a filling meal. At $10 a bowl for noodley goodness, we all loved this place!

As it was another rainy and gloomy day, we decided to take Amy to Century 21, the designer discount store where we have found some great deals the 2 other times we've been here this trip. We did some shopping, but only for a couple hours. Amy said she couldn't take any more of this place than that- it is RIDICULOUSLY crowded. Stressfully crowded. Annoyingly crowded. There was a long line for the bathroom. A longer line for the dressing room. And the longest line of all for the cashier. I got several dresses, some jewelry, and a belt. Scott got some more shoes and a pair of sunglasses. Amy only got one dress, and I pretty much had to talk her into buying that. While there are some awesome deals to be found, I don't think she enjoyed the pushing/rummaging/waiting that this place requires. As we were leaving, I noticed the store's motto written on the door: Century 21. Fashion worth fighting for.

Yep, that pretty much sums it up.

When we left at 6:00, it was a monsoon outside. Buckets of rain were just pouring down. We ran for the subway and high tailed it home.

Amy's friend Ernest had called earlier and told us he made dinner reservations for the 4 of us. How nice! So at 8:00, we walked over to a place in the Village called Morandi. Scott had been wanting to go here, so this was perfect. Scott, Amy, and I all got the same dish- saffron malloreddus (a type of pasta that tasted just like gnocchi) with spicy lamb. This was absolutely AH- MA- ZING!!!!!!!!!!

Ernest got the veal pasta. It looked scrumptious as well!

While the food was some of THE best Italian we have EVER eaten (dude, seriously, this was totally fab!), the food paled in comparison to the other treat we got in the restaurant.

Ok, remember this actress from the Promises, Promises Broadway show we saw the other

night, Kristin Chenoweth?

Well, she happened to be sitting at the table RIGHT NEXT TO US!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That's her, behind Amy!

And, to make this even more exciting, Sean Hayes was sitting there with her!

I couldn't get his picture as he was sitting opposite Kristin. But, oh my goodness! Could this BE any more exciting! Real life celebrities, an arm length away! So close we could hear their conversations! Amy and I about choked on our food the whole time we were so freaking excited we couldn't stand it! Meanwhile, Scott and Ernest laughed at us silly star struck girls. What a wonderful night! Thank you, Ernest! He picked the absolute best place for us to have dinner that night!

Day #19-Sunday

2010-08-17T20:07:00.001-07:00

Sunday morning, we got up and went to brunch. We walked over to this little place called Cafe Gitane in the Jane Hotel. It was a cute, eccentric looking place. Very French, but in a casual, funky kind of way. Amy and I both got the orange blossom waffle:

YUM-O!

Scott got the couscous and lamb sausages:

This was absolutely divine, and I immediately regretted not getting it after I tasted how good his was. We will definitely be going back there for another plate of that! Our waffles were good too though, so we were happy with our yummy brunch.

Afterwards, we set out to do some sight seeing.

We saw the Chrysler Building:

Walked inside the Grand Central Terminal:

Went to Rockefellar Center:

Then we walked down 5th Ave to do some window shopping. A lot of big name designers have stores on this street:

We walked inside the beautiful Plaza Hotel:

And the Waldorf Astoria hotel. So many movies have been filmed in both of these famous hotels. We were then at Central Park, and went to the Sheep's Meadow to rest from all our walking.

Amy and I had put our towels in our purses so we had them to sit on in the park. We pulled them out and made a little spot in the grass to relax.

We hadn't sat there but 10 minutes, and of course it started to rain. So we packed up and went over to the Boathouse, where we knew we could sit under cover and have a glass of wine.

Scott and I especially love this place because it is where we got engaged!

4 years ago, he proposed to me in a rowboat in the lake right there behind us.

We had a light snack of cheese, fruit, and wine.

Then we left the park. In the rain. With no umbrellas. Luckily, Amy and I had our towels from the park to keep us dry. Or at least our hair from getting wet:

We managed to make it fun, despite the crappy weather. We walked around in the rain for a while, trying to decide what to do. We finally took a cab to the East Village to try to find somewhere to get in out of the rain and listen to some music. After 45 minutes of walking around in drizzle, we gave up on finding the music we wanted, and finally went into a little restaurant and shared a couple of appetizers. We shared the lamb sliders, and the macaroni and cheese with truffles.

How good does that look?!?!! Wow, it was! The perfect small plates for the 3 of us to split.

We took a subway home after that and as it was still early, decided to go to this new little place that we read about that played house and trance music. We got there around 10:00 and had a great time listening to our favorite music. A nice, low key lounge where you can sit and relax and listen to a DJ spin house music doesn't exist in KY. Just another reason why NYC is so much fun!

Day #18- Saturday

2010-08-16T22:57:00.000-07:00

The next morning we all slept in as we had a late night on Friday. While I was getting ready, Scott and Amy went down to go to the coffee shop across the street. Instead of coffee, they came home with yummy treats from a Farmer's Market that was set up on the street. They bought a spinach, jalapeño, and feta quiche, heirloom cherry tomatoes, and cheese. A delicious and inexpensive brunch, right here in the apartment. Very nice!

When we finally left the apartment, we took Amy past Magnolia Bakery. When we got there, we saw this:

Look at that line. For a cupcake! So crazy. We then walked over to SOHO and Little Italy. After browsing around for a couple hours in different shops, we decided that we needed to eat as we had a show that night and wouldn't be eating until 11 or 11:30. We went to Little Italy and stopped at this place:

Talk about authentic Italian! Scott had the gnocchi:

Amy and I both had a plate of spaghetti and meatballs:

This Italian food was so good. Homemade pasta, homemade gnocchi, slow simmered tomato sauce, fresh basil, sharp pecorino cheese- Mmmm! So fab! We all loved it.

Afterwards, we walked over to Chinatown so Amy could get some knockoff purses. We literally hadn't stepped 5 steps onto the street than a little Chinese man walked up to us and whispered, "Gucchi. Channel. Handbags. Watches." We looked at him and said yes, then he told us to follow him. He took us to another girl standing on the sidewalk with a walkie talkie. She asked us what handbags we wanted, and we told her we weren't sure, we just wanted to look. She then pointed across the street, and told us to go to the store with the yellow sign. We walked over there, and another lady was standing there with an earpiece in her ear. She told us to stand there for a minute, and then when she got the ok from her earpiece, she told us to go inside the store. It was just your basic souvenir shop, but as we went inside, another guy stopped us and told us to wait. After a few minutes, he motioned for us to go to the back of the store, where he then pulled on the back shelves of the store, which was actually a hidden door that opened up and led outside. We went through the door, and then down a set of steps, where another guy was standing inside a doorway. He waved us through, and then we were inside a large room, chocked full of "designer" handbags from the floor to the ceiling. Jackpot! Amy looked for a while, and then decided on 3 "Prada" purses. We left there satisfied and excited about our super secretive shopping trip.

We then went home to change for our Broadway show. We had bought tickets for a show called "Promises, Promises". It starred Kristin Chenoweth and Sean Hayes. Kristin has been in many movies and other Broadway shows (including Wicked, one of my favorites!). Sean was Jack in that tv series "Will and Grace"

We all liked the show, it was really cute. I love seeing real life celebrities star in Broadway shows- they're right there! On stage in front of us! I love it!

When the show was over, we were hungry, so went back to our end of the city. We went to the Meat Packing District to find an outdoor cafe with prime people watching. This district is the hot spot of the city- everyone is out and about, dressed up, having fun. We went to a Mexican placed called Dos Caminos.

Scott got the steak tacos, and Amy and I got the fish tacos. It was just ok. Mine had a bunch of red onions (which I asked to leave off but I guess they forgot), so I couldn't really eat mine. Yuck. Amy liked hers ok, Scott didn't care for his much either. But the people watching was FANTASTIC! We had the perfect table set on the sidewalk, and had a great time watching all the young and hip crowd walk past. We were home by 1:15, full and happy.