Last Week’s Top Five

by Emily

There has been a lot of excitement since last Saturday. We had three days of weather so warm I could hold my iced coffee in bare hands while I walked in my sandals.

Last Sunday I comfortably walked the dog in shorts and a t-shirt!

And Adam celebrated a birthday.

His parents came for a birthday visit and we had a great time showing them the tree at Rockefeller Center and the fantastic holiday lights all around Manhattan.

Here are some of the food highlights…

{1} Pineapple Turkey Chili

By Tuesday the weather was back to normal* again and it was cold enough for Chili. *global warming winter normal, it’s still 50 in December

I made my pineapple turkey recipe.

We gobbled it up topped with shredded cheese, sour cream, and pickled jalapeño.

{2} Holiday Fails

It was bound to happen sooner or later, I had not one, but two, holiday themed food flops.

This years soy nog has way too much soy milk aftertaste for me and the candy cane flavor (in spite of the adorable chips of candy cane) was the first Adagio tea I thought tasted like dirty water. You win a lot, you lose some.

{3} Restaurant Burgers

Any time we have Long Island visitors we take them to Bare Burger. Adam’s parents loved it.

I got a Wiki Wiki on a turkey patty – gouda, duck bacon, fried onions, and pineapple relish.

The burger was great, and they had a very exciting local brew – chocolate egg cream stout!

We also took them to Thistle Hill. I got a falafel burger.

With tzatziki and hot sauce and salt and pepper fries.

{4} Dinner at The Gander

We are both obsessed with duck, so The Gander quickly made it to the top of our dinner date list.

The space was gorgeously done up for Christmas – with lights and a giant gingerbread house – but too dark for me to take a passable picture. Ignore my bad photography though, the food was on point.

We started with local burrata with butternut squash and toast.

And I ordered the Glasgow Punch, which came from a tap; scotch with citrus and clarified milk. This was one of the best drinks I’ve ever had, it smelled smoky in an amazing way.

We split two pastas for dinner. Gnocchi with shishito peppers and cheddar.

And tubetti with duck confit and a duck egg yolk. <– best dish of the night

Plus cauliflower with capers and anchovies.

Dessert was salted cajeta cake with maple lace tuiles and pistachio gelato.

Everything was delicious and you could taste the care that went into each dish.

{5} Birthday Ice Cream Cake

This was my first attempt at an ice cream cake and I was a little nervous but it came out great. Whenever Adam and I go to a Cold Stone-style ice cream place we always get coffee with Oreos and peanut butter, so that’s what I put together for his birthday.

An Oreo crust / with a peanut butter layer (I basically make flattened buckeye candy) / a coffee ice cream layer / and a bunch of Oreos, mini Reese’s cups, and sprinkles for topping.

Yum! It was gone by the end of the weekend!

7Dec2015

“Weekend” Top Three

by Emily

I can’t really call it the weekend because it was my turn to work Saturday and Sunday and I go in today as well (boo). But I then I have Tuesday off (yay). Every 4-6 weeks I will be working S/S in exchange for two free weekdays. It was a little strange to be in the diet office all by myself but I got a ton of work done and saw some really interesting patients.

Here are the top three food highlights, I enjoyed the weekend work but it certainly was tiring, you can safely assume that I ate chips in bed for dinner on Saturday…

{1} Sweet breakfasts to lure myself out of bed.

Not only did I work on the weekend, I went in an hour earlier than usual! <– because the thought of being at work until 5 on a Sunday was just too much. I had to bribe myself out the door. Nonfat iced eggnog latte.

Fried dough for Hanukkah.

My marzipan doughnut and roasty coffee were both delicious and were fantastic together. FYI, Brooklyn people – Doughnut Plant also has a few Hanukkah special doughseeds this week.

{2} Fresh tamarind.

My coworker brought us in tamarind last week. I haven’t eaten it fresh in years.

Enough time had passed that I forgot how obnoxiously stringy it is.

I think I will stew the rest of my share.

{3} 1st night of Hanukkah dinner at Mile End.

ME is quickly becoming one of our favorite spots. I love how inventive the menu is (modern takes on traditional Jewish dishes all made on a tiny grill and fryer behind an open counter) and the meats and vegetables are expertly prepared.

We started with blintzes with apple maple crumble on top. The chef whipped these up from scratch a foot in front of us! They were outstanding, obviously.

And we didn’t do latkes but we did have French fries in chicken gravy poutine.

I got the sprouts kugel for dinner. Egg noodles with steamed and fried brussels sprouts, cottage cheese, and a soft egg on top.

I grew up eating sweet kugel with raisins and this savory iteration is the best I’ve ever had. In fact, this was simply one of the best (top 5) dishes I’ve had all year!

Happy 2nd night of Hanukkah to my readers who celebrate!

29Nov2015

Turkey Week Eats

by Emily

I hope that all of my American readers had a wonderful Thanksgiving! We didn’t do anything fancy to celebrate, but I sure was thankful for the four-day workweek! My million-point list of things I’m thankful for also includes this gorgeous city…

Random Thoughts

I made the toffee candy for a work birthday party, this time following the original recipe.

I think my version with graham crackers and pretzels is better, the saltines got a bit soggy.

I reread To Kill a Mockingbird this week in anticipation of starting Go Catch a Watchman and cried on the train at least ten times.

TKM is one of my favorite books but I had forgotten what a fabulous writer Harper Lee is in the few years since I had last reread it. Atticus is my all-time favorite character. I love him even more than Ghosh from Cutting for Stone.

“They’re certainly entitled to think that, and they’re entitled to full respect for their opinions,” said Atticus, “but before I can live with other folks I’ve got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience.”

Daytime Eats

This week’s tea – Adagio’s Pumpkin Spice (former freebie).

With treats from the birthday party… including pie made with fresh coconut

Or with pumpkin applesauce and biscotti.

This week’s coffee – Community Coffee’s Breakfast Blend with skim milk and sugar.

Cafeteria lunch salads. Romaine, blue cheese dressing, carrot, cucumber, tomato, olive, pickle, black eyed peas, and pasta salad.

Romaine, ranch, carrot, cucumber, tomato, olive, pickle, corn salsa, cheddar, and chickpeas.

Romaine, blue cheese dressing, carrot, olive, tomato, cucumber, corn, cheddar, and cole slaw.

And home on Turkey Day I was thankful for yogurt bowls.

Plain Greek yogurt topped with cranberry sauce, pomegranate, chia seeds, and praline pecan maple granola. Best bowl of the year.

Nighttime Eats

I met up with girlfriends for drinks early in the week. Pork Slope never disappoints. They had Sorachi Ace, Adam’s favorite beer which is now my favorite beer. It just goes down so easily!

I also had a ridiculous fall shandy – gin, maple bitters, simple syrup, lemon juice, and cider.

Dinners were all about the bird! We cooked turkey breasts in the crock pot on Sunday and then shredded them into meals all week.

Turkey tossed with TJ’s whole-wheat butternut squash goyza on top of sautéed shredded Brussels sprouts with pecans.

Topped with gruyere cheese and cranberry sauce.

Turkey tossed with bbq sauce on a brioche bun (toasted with Smart Balance) with cranberry sauce and goat’s milk brie.

With roasted green beans on the side. Year’s best sandwich!

For Thanksgiving dinner we decided to go super traditional – nachos. TJ’s stuffing flavored kettle chips topped with turkey, gruyere, smoked paprika, and cranberry sauce.

With hericot verts roasted with shallots. So much better than the usual meal! Plus pumpkin pie,

aka Rogue’s Pumpkin Patch Ale.

Friday night, once the turkey celebration was over, Adam and I went on a dinner date in the Lower East Side. Coffee while we walked around Chinatown.

Ice cream at Ice & Vice. Milk Money = toasted milk, sea salt, and chocolate ganache and Shade = smoked dark chocolate with caramelized white chocolate ganache. I’m usually not one for chocolate ice cream but this was fantastic.

Then dinner at Mission Chinese Food. With complimentary dumplings to start.

I ordered the Tea Ceremony – matcha, melon, and fizzy wine.

We shared the green papaya salad with smoked chicken, green tomato, peanuts, and pickled tea leaves.

And I ordered the spicy peanut noodles, with cucumber, mint, and numbing oil.

They were chewy, savory, and beyond tingly; numbing oil is good but intense! The mint was really wonderful with the spice. All in all a good meal, though not as epic as the thousand-plus articles I’d read about the restaurant would have had me believe.

4Nov2015

Last Week’s Top Five

by Emily

{1} Date night in Chelsea.

Last Friday we went on a fabulous Manhattan date after work. The High Line at sunset.

Gansevoort Market for an Oreo whoopie pie(at The Bruffin).

Chelsea Market for Ramen (at Mok Bar). Vegan miso ramen – Kombu shiitake doenjang broth / tofu / triple seasonal vegetable / crispy potato. Made un-vegan with a poached egg on top.

And finally a trip through the Whitney Museum.

The 6th floor was my favorite.

{2} City desserts.

The Fat Witch is making sparkly green Emerald City Witches, aka mint chip brownies.

And Brooklyn Cupcake‘s cakes are on point.

We tried french toast, tres leches, and guava cheese!!

{3} Pota-topia potato bowls.

I got waffle fries with all of the veggies, smoked gouda, and truffle aioli.

We were very impressed. Our mall’s food court has gotten downright fancy.

{4} Pumpkin yogurt bowl lunch.

Whole Foods pumpkin spice yogurt, chia seeds, maple pumpkin seeds, and TJ’s pumpkin o’s.

Fun, but I pretty much hate the texture of regular (not Greek) yogurt.

{5} Pumpkin beer on Halloween.

We spent Halloween afternoon in Williamsburg checking out the fantastic hipster costumes. We enjoyed mead and a Chelsea Brewing Company pumpkin pie beer while playing games at Barcade.

Plus we had a very taste lunch at Sugarburg. <– we will be back!

9Oct2015

This Week’s Top Five…

by Emily

Eats

{1} My coffee combo.

Grady’s is the best.

{2} This yogurt bowl.

Siggi’s pumpkin / giant red grapes / TJ’s pumpkin o’s, chia seeds, and maple sea salt pumpkin seeds. With a persimmon on the side.

{3} An old-school turkey sandwich. Applegate Farms smoked turkey with mayo, sharp cheddar, and caramelized onions on a brioche bun.

Plus chips and grapes.

{4} Pumpkin pie smoothie.

Pumpkin puree, plain Fage, almond milk, pumpkin pie spice, and maple syrup. We both loved these!

{5} Nacho night.

Chips with low-fat Mexican cheese blend, roasted broccoli, and ground turkey sautéed with onions and red pepper.

Obsessions

{1} Movie I’m oddly excited for: The Krampus.

I am really not a horror movie girl but something about a Christmas horror movie appeals to me, probably the fact that Adam Scott is in it!

{2} TV show I can’t wait to start: Supernatural.

Season 11 started the same day that season 10 finally released on Netflix so our entire plan for this weekend is season 10. If we catch up we can watch the latest season as it airs.

{3} TV shows that continue to rock our world: our line up from last year is still solid.

Chicago PD, Rick and Morty, Fresh off the Boat, and The Middle all started off their seasons quite strongly. We’re also loving Longmire’s Netflix debut. Rosewood, on the other hand, was un-freaking-watchable.

{4} Book I need to buy: Mindy Kaling’s Why Not Me?

I read Is Everyone Hanging out without Me? in about a day and reread it a day later so I know I’m going to love her newest book.

{5} Song I’m playing on repeat:” Jump Into the Fog” – The Wombats.

Bonus: I’ve had ODB’s “Shimmy Shimmy Ya” stuck in my head all week. <– don’t play it if you’re at work!

5Oct2015

Hello, Pumpkin Month!!

by Emily

It’s possible that I have a pumpkin purchasing problem…

Just maybe, though the pumpkin spice chap stick does make it seem pretty likely! Also I’ve eaten something pumpkin flavored at least once a day for the past four days. And October First I had something pumpkin at every single meal.

breakfast

Pumpkin spice latte.

I kind of hated it. I thought the spice was really overwhelming and I ordered my drink with 1/2 of the flavor pumps (plus an extra espresso shot and caramel drizzle on top) so I can’t even imagine a full-strength PSL.

Iced coffee with chocolate milk.

With a yummy GoMacro bar.

Pumpkin cheesecake doughnut from Dunkin.

Yuck city. These beverages were more my jam.

Sometimes we get a fountain soda when we go to the store. Sometimes we got to Starbucks for clover brews. And some magical days I get diet soda and an iced coffee and basically float through the grocery store in excitement.

Café Grumpy makes us anything but grumpy.

Adam’s flat white was better than my macchiato, especially once I clumsily oversugared it.

lunch

Chobani Flip with my last orchard apple and a TJ’s pumpkin cereal bar.

Plus dessert from the giant bag of Russian candies a (now former) coworker delivered me to say thank you for her retirement gift.

Plus I scarfed roasted broccoli with TJ’s Sriracha ranch the minute I got home because apparently this lunch didn’t fill me up at all.

The next day I ate practically the same meal and was full all afternoon.

Thank you 14 grams of protein in my Siggi.

With TJ’s pumpkin o’s and a honeycrisp.

Dinner leftovers – pasta and veggies. This photo is of Adam’s plate because I ate my (smaller) serving out of the Tupperware.

With TJ’s chocolate pumpkins for dessert.

We liked the orange ones and were lukewarm on the rest. Washed down with an alcoholic root beer that was freaking life changing.

Best root beer (boozy or not) either of us have ever tasted.

We had a phenomenal brunch at LIC Market.

I had the duck hash! Crisp potatoes, red onion, peppers, dried cherries, and pine nuts with two fried eggs.

I love duck so flipping much. And this was the best iteration of the meat I’ve had yet. We gave the meal as a whole a 9.5/10.

We got up and out of the house to make it to brunch crazy early and then we had the entire afternoon for fun stuff, mostly more eating and lots of drinking. Grand Central Terminal is Adam’s favorite spot in the city so we spent the morning window shopping there while sipping iced coffee with homemade chocolate syrup from Irving Farms.

Plus Jacques Torres Chocolate handed us samples of fantastic hot chocolate.

I will be back for a full-size cup once the weather gets a bit colder.

Then we wandered down Lexington Ave to Ginger Man to check out their seventy draft beer options.

Clearly flights were the only way to go. Our sour line-up was amazing. The pub had a great vibe, we will definitely be bringing all city visitors there.

dinner

Pumpkin pasta for the first night of October.

Rachael Ray’s recipe with whole wheat shells for penne, basil for sage, chicken breakfast sausage for sweet Italian sausage, and swiss/gruyere for parmesan.

It was tasty, even the dog got a little bowl with extra pumpkin puree.

The humans had roasted veggies on the side.

Trader Joe’s seasoned brussels sprouts and broccoli and cauliflower with smoked paprika.

We drove to Queens in the rain for dinner at Burnside Biscuit.

Worth it. Check how fancy my julep was.

Dinner was pimento mac and cheese with a side of shaved collards.

We went to Gossip Coffee for a “nightcap.”

Gorgeous space serving delicious, roasty cold-brew. And they had rice pudding.

We shared Oreo and cheesecake, both of which were fantastic.

Crab fried rice.

Yum! Adam would say that stir-frying is the cooking technique I’m best at. This dish was wonderful. Leftover brown jasmine rice with garlic, ginger, rice vinegar and fish sauce / peas, mini heirloom tomatoes, sweet red pepper, onion, and basil / eggs and canned crab meat.

This was the first time I’ve used tomato or basil in fried rice at home and both were welcome additions.

Burger night to finish the weekend.

Spinach salad with Sriracha ranch, maple rosemary roasted sunflower seeds, and roasted baby zucchini.

Turkey burgers on TJ’s brioche buns with mayo, sharp cheddar, turkey bacon, and tons of caramelized onions.

These were the best burgers I’ve ever made/eaten. The crunchy bacon and sweet onions totally made this. We got our pumpkin in for dessert.

Pumpkin pie and cookies and cream yogurt with Nutella, sprinkles, and chocolate candy toppings. A sweet way to end the weekend.

Are you going ga-ga orange gourd this month? Any pumpkin must-haves I haven’t done yet?

19Sep2015

This Week’s Top Five

by Emily

{1} Coffee.

I know this gets repetitive but coffee is just so freaking good!

The winner this week was the double espresso with ice and cream from a coffee shop near my hospital.

{2} Chocolate with pretzels.

I brought the toffee candy to work and my co-workers lost their minds over it. We did too; it was a good thing I got it out of the house or I think Adam and I could have finished the tray in a day or two.

Also yummy pretzel chocolate from Lindt.

Yes, I had dessert every evening this week.

{3} Apple month stuff.

Apple-pear pouch. I sprinkled the SuperSeedz on a pretty killer salad from the cafeteria salad bar.

Salted caramel apple granola (with chia seeds) on my yogurt.

And this apple explosion lunch.

Caramel apple oatmeal, TJ’s freeze-dried apples, and Salty Road caramel apple taffy.

{4} Loaded baked potatoes.

These bowls were fantastic.

Baked potato / roasted broccoli with green onions / homemade baked beans / topped with plain yogurt, sharp cheddar, and green Tabasco.

For the baked beans: Sauté tons of white and yellow chopped onions. Add sliced turkey hot dogs, pinto beans, and tomato sauce and let things cook for awhile. Then season with brown sugar and Gochujang.

They were so yummy I ate the leftovers cold.

{5} Dinner at Mile End.

Mile End Delicatessen is my new favorite deli, which is a big deal because the place I grew up going to had a pickle bar! MED did have tasty hibiscus beer…

And poutine made with smoked chicken gravy.

And roasted cauliflower with caraway honey, harissa paste, and toasted pistachios. This had the best texture, crunchy on the outside and silky soft in the middle.

I ordered the turkey reuben for dinner.

Did not disappoint.

{Bonus} New CDs.

My parents are amazing, and they send us mixed tapes all of the time. They both made new ones recently so this is how my mother labeled them –

Lol!

12Sep2015

This Week’s Top Five

by Emily

{1} My coffee combo.

Community Coffee with cocoa powder, maple cinnamon, cream, and milk.

The cocoa doesn’t really mix in with the cold coffee but it’s still good.

Now I want to do a coconut-cocoa coffee next.

{2} Bars.

Most nights this week I was soooo hungry when I got home and having these to grab saved me from some major hangry fits. Not that we still didn’t go get Chipotle instead of cooking two nights in a row.

{3} This lunch. Trimona plain yogurt with Heritage Flakes, chia seeds, and chopped emerald beauty and honey punch pluots. <– how great are those names??!

Plus a bourbon brown butter caramel and a salty caramel apple taffy for dessert.

{4} This fancy Thursday night dinner.

I sautéed spinach with minced ginger, garlic aioli, and evoo, then tossed in gnocchi and roasted zucchini.

Topped with this hot smoked sockeye from Trader Joe’s.

Best meal of the week! The salmon was wonderful; I love hot smoked because it has a similar flavor to lox but not the slimy texture.

{5} Caramel apple Peeps. OMG.

These were seriously delicious; are all Peeps this yummy?? They were puffy and not too chewy and they had a perfect balance of sour dust to sweet caramel fudge. I’m awarding this best purchase yet for Apple Month.

Eating Chalk

Tag Archives: potato

Last Week’s Top Five

“Weekend” Top Three

Turkey Week Eats

Random Thoughts

Daytime Eats

Nighttime Eats

Last Week’s Top Five

This Week’s Top Five…

Eats

Obsessions

Hello, Pumpkin Month!!

breakfast

lunch

dinner

This Week’s Top Five

This Week’s Top Five