Eating Madison Square

by Emily

This week’s flavor themes: coffee (always), cheese (almost always), lavender, yogurt, fresh herbs, and tahini granola (<– my newest, greatest recipe!).

We work all weekend – actually we work every day straight until next Friday – and we made the most of our shared Thursday off. And we went on a dinner date on Tuesday! Good times.

My seasonal allergies hit hard this week and I was a sneezy, disoriented mess so dinners were basically a disaster but my lunches were on point. And dinners were fun, just lacking in greens; the “healthiest” meal of the week was veggie-packed nachos!

foods that were good

This week’s coffee – Black Hand with lavender sugar. Very yummy with fat-free milk and half & half.

Also with the last of the Nutchello.

And paired alongside a lavender kombucha.

Important note – this pomegranate sangria seltzer tastes and smells exactly like Pez candy!

The serenity now blend from David’s Tea also deserves a mention, the spearmint is lovely.

Bonus – maple iced latte from Brooklyn Roasting Company.

My packed lunches were all about the tahini granola. With plain yogurt and berries.

Though one day I did have Chobani watermelon with fresh watermelon. If you haven’t had watermelon in a yogurt bowl yet, go for it, the combo is fantastic.

And yesterday we did a lunch date at Madison Square Eats. <– a food tent situation similar to Smorgasburg

It was great to sit outside and eat in the sun. We shared a salmon belly dosa waffle from Inday.

And a green papaya salad with lemongrass chicken from Hong Kong Kitchen. Served on a giant bed of lettuce.

But our true raison d’être was the Ice & Vice ice cream and Squish marshmallow collaboration. We had a scoop of Detention (malted vanilla with brownie and fruity pebble dust) with a toasted Birthday Party (sprinkles) marshmallow. Yummmm! Best marshmallow we’ve ever tasted.

The days I didn’t eat granola at lunch I had it as an evening snack! I’m a woman obsessed; that stuff is delicious. This was caramel Noosa with granola, melty cookie butter, and blackberries.

Speaking of evening snacks, the cookie butter is a very tempting thing to have open.

Take-out Pad Thai for dinner. This wasn’t even my weak take-out, this was Adam’s leftovers from a night shift. Like I said, dinners weren’t fantastic.

Pizza pizza.

Our dinner date at Pok Pok was a win.

That’s a tamarind whiskey sour. Enjoyed with complimentary chili lime peanuts.

The food is served family-style and the waitress recommended sharing three dishes so that’s what we did. Khao Soi Kai – Northern Thai mild curry noodle soup made with a secret curry paste recipe and coconut milk. With chicken on the bone and crispy noodles. Served with house pickled mustard greens, shallots, and roasted chili paste.

Cha Ca “La Vong” – Vietnamese catfish marinated in turmeric and sour sticky rice, fried in turmeric oil with scallions and dill, served on rice vermicelli with peanuts, mint, cilantro, and mam nem (fish sauce). The fresh herbs took this over the top! I have been loving the use of mint in our restaurant dishes lately.

Finally, Hoi Thawt – crispy broken crepe with steamed fresh mussels, eggs, garlic, chives and bean sprouts. This was my favorite dish, you can’t go wrong with fried eggs. I only recently started eating mussels but I really enjoyed them served this way.

We also had an amazing dessert. A clever play on Thai iced coffee, this was a condensed milk ice cream affagato in Stumptown espresso. With Thai doughnuts on the side.

Our homecooked dinner for the week was loaded nachos. Corn chips, shredded cheese, shredded chicken, pinto beans, roasted broccoli, sautéed orange bell pepper and onion, avocado, and tons of fresh cilantro.

The dog was pretty pleased with this too, because he got several bites of chicken and avocado during the assembly stage.

three exciting non-food things

{1} How long the dog is in this photo Adam snapped of us in bed.

{2} The Egg and the Spoon. I’m halfway done and loving it. All of Gregory Maguire’s books are enchanting but this story is particularly so. I’m going back and rereading every other page because the wording is just so beautiful.

{3} I convinced one of my friends to start watching Hart of Dixie and now she texts me regular updates about how great it is! I’m way too excited to have someone sharing my shame.

9May2016

Spring In The City

by Emily

As of this morning our spring vacation comes to a close. We did St. Thomas, DC, and a few wonderful days in the best city on Earth (aka our hometown, NYC). After a month apart while Adam was in Texas the past two weeks have been fantastic. I’m going to miss him a lot this workweek.

In spite of the rain and bitter cold over the past few days we managed to pack a lot of fun into our Friday/Saturday/Sunday. We walked more than 10 miles around Manhattan on Friday, most of them in the downpour! We had enough reprieves from the weather to appreciate how insanely gorgeous our city is in the spring.

Here were our top five eats from the end of vacation…

{1} Breakfast at Back Room

Breakfast in a fancy hotel with a view of the city? Yes, please! And it was one of the best meals of the weekend. Adam got an amazing fish platter with herring and smoked sturgeon, smoked salmon, belly lox, pastrami salmon, fingerling potatoes, eggplant salad, and cream cheese with trout roe. I’m usually a bit too squeamish for lox but I happily stole bites of everything from this plate.

I had duck confit hash topped with a duck egg! With a cheddar biscuit with honey and butter.

You really can’t go wrong with duck on duck; my meal was almost too rich.

{2} Brunch at Du Jour Bakery

It was so good the last time that I had to go back and take Adam. I ordered an iced latte (made with Brooklyn Roasting Company) immediately.

And I went savory with an egg and cheese croissant sandwich. My meal came with a tasty side salad and Adam’s came with fries so we were in business!

{3} Donuts from Underwest

A Hells Kitchen spot inside of a car wash. We tried halvah and vanilla-lavender.

They were a bit cakey for my preferences (Adam disagrees) but the glaze was top-notch.

Plus coffee from Laughing Man, Hugh Jackman’s Tribeca shop that donates all of it’s proceeds to the Laughing Man Foundation.

That’s a honey lavender latte to fit with our donuts.

{4} Ice cream from I CE NY

Smashed and rolled ice cream! They spread your base flavor and mix-ins on a giant frozen metal plate.

I got Thai iced tea ice cream with sprinkles mixed in and popping boba, mochi, and condensed milk on top.

It was fun, and also some of the best ice cream I’ve ever eaten. The base ended up being amazingly chewy! <– here is some info on why “chewy” is a compliment

{5} Dinner at Ten Ichi Ramen, a newish spot in Park Slope

We started with duck bao.

I got the veggie ramen, with an aged egg on top.

Not as good as Chuko but still pretty darn good. The broth was so creamy! Plus their chili garlic oil was wonderful, which is good for me because I add it to my ramen by the scoop.

4Apr2016

Last Week’s Top Ten

by Emily

{1} Swapping out my wardrobe to welcome in the spring-ish weather.

So today and tomorrow are supposed to be pretty darn cold, but the rest of the month is looking so nice that I went ahead and traded my summer and winter gear. Scarves and boots are still available but if we get a freak snowstorm I’m out of luck because all my coats are at the cleaners. It felt good to get that big project done.

{2} Enjoying coffee again.

Extra espresso in my giant iced latte? My health is officially back to 100%.

This upcoming week I did brew a batch so I won’t have an excuse to buy coffee out every day.

{3} Berry smoothie.

Maple kefir, dates, and frozen mixed berries.

Kefir was the perfect smoothie liquid.

{4} Dessert-y oatmeal bowls for lunch.

Oats with chia, freeze-dried raspberries, pecans, and strawberry shortcake M&Ms.

Oats with chia, freeze-dried raspberries, and a big scoop of Biscoff.

I bought a jar of Biscoff last Saturday and it is practically empty now – – I am the only member of the household who eats Biscoff.

{5} National Pecan Day is April 14th and Nonni’s sent* me some Turtle Pecan Biscotti to celebrate.

*Free sample alert – no additional compensation was provided for this post, all opinions are my own.

The biscotti was quite good next to my coffee – crunchy but not toothbreakingly so and a good balance of salty and sweet.

But even better crushed into my all-time best yogurt combo. Turtle pecan yogurt bowl: maple yogurt, toasted pecans, chocolate-covered cocoa nibs, biscotti, and chopped plucot.

Or check out Nonni’s Pinterest page for some other pairing ideas.

{6} Binge-watching “Hart of Dixie” on instantwatch.

Yes, the show where Rachel Bilson plays a doctor in the deep south. And yes, it is totally a soap opera. But it is completely addictive! I am a woman obsessed, or I should say I was a women obsessed – I may have already finished watching all four seasons!

{7} Kombucha.

The Master Brew line from Kevita has been knocking my socks off.

Grapefruit was perfectly sweet and tart.

{8} Healthy sticks to scoop up less-healthy dips.

Baby carrots and green pepper in spinach and artichoke dip.

Apple slices in melted Biscoff and dark chocolate peanut butter.

Apple dippers in cookie butter are even more satisfying than licking it off of a spoon like I usually do.

{9} Taco brinner.

We loved our fish tacos so much the week before that I knew we needed a repeat.

This time our hard shells were stuffed with sautéed onions and peppers, shredded cheese, roasted tomatillo salsa, and scrambled eggs. This was practically the only meal I cooked all week, the other nights I mostly ate chips with cheese and salsa so I’d have time to watch my stories!

{10} Chuko Ramen.

I introduced a girlfriend to the joy that is their veggie miso with a soft egg and chili garlic oil on top.

It is the perfect dinner spot because Ample Hill’s ice cream is just a short walk down the block!

What are you looking forward to this week?

22Feb2016

Wonderful Weekend Walking Weather

by Emily

Oh my gosh, thank you so much, New York, for the gorgeous weekend weather! We took full advantage and fit a long walk into our fun on both Saturday and Sunday.

Daytime Eats

My new favorite ridiculous coffee.

Butterscotch latte with an extra shot.

Oatmeal bowl. Rolled oats, chia seeds, freeze-dried blueberries, and toasted walnuts.

Topped with a chocolate coconut peanut butter packet. The pb gets so gooey good on the hot oats.

Drinks in my carts while I did a giant shopping trip.

Green juice with spinach, kale, cucumber, and pineapple.

Sunday was our Brooklyn date. We saw Deadpool (<– loved it! loved that it was just funny, hilariously, and not sad at all) and took another long walk, including some exciting food stops. Iced Vietnamese latte.

It was so warm out that I enjoyed my iced drink whilst walking along in only a tank top and cardigan!!

A “hot dog” at the Smorgasburg Industry City location. Pan con queso is a grilled chunk of marinated white Latin cheese on a hot dog bun, topped with onions, cabbage, crushed potato chips, ketchup, mustard, and guasacaca (cilantro and parsley). It was scrumptious.

Amazing, freshly-made cheese and potato pierogis at Baba’s. These were out of this world, they had the best pierogi dough I’ve ever tasted.

And an ice cream cone to top it all off.

Ample Hills’ salted crack caramel (smoky caramel ice cream with hunks of crack candy) and It Came From Gowanus (salty dark chocolate ice cream with hazelnut crack candy, white chocolate pearls, and orange-scented brownies) in a cookie cone.

Nighttime Eats

I hit up my grocery’s deli for a quick meal on Adam’s overnight shift.

Tortellini salad and crunchy broccoli salad.

Plus lemon rosemary focaccia hummus with baked garlic pita chips and baby carrots.

Best store-bought hummus of all time.

A fancy dinner date at Upland. We really enjoyed our meal here, the menu changes seasonally and we will definitely be back in the summer.

They brought us a potato bread loaf with chive and lemon zest butter.

And we started with the whole crispy hen of the woods mushroom, with cloumage cheese and meyer lemon. This was fantastically meaty and loaded with umami.

Plus a greatcocktail, Bill Pay Buck – Tito’s, Aperol, ginger, and lime. I think that I hate ginger in drinks but somehow this felt very balanced.

And I got the cioppino for my meal, clams, red shrimp, mussels, striped bass, jumbo lump crab, and gochujang. I have been so brave with my seafood consumption lately, this was my first ever clam! (<– I hated it, but at least I tried)

My soup came with a thick slice of butter bread and I ordered a can of Genny Cream Ale that just felt right.

Dessert was the only part of the meal that didn’t blow us away. Devil’s food cake, milk chocolate ganache, and hazelnut praline, sounded good in theory but was just meh.

But we ran into a Woop’s so we had our sugar fix covered.

Good timing too, we found it just before we crossed the bridge back to Queens.

Burger night to end the weekend.

TJ’s brioche rolls are wonderful. We made our burgers with ground turkey, whole-wheat panko, eggs, spices, and browned shallots, cooked in a pan with evoo. Topped with pickle slices, raw milk cheddar, and Sir Kensington’s special sauce. So delicious we had to go back and split a second one!

With an easy salad of baby kale, pomegranate, pecans, chai seeds, and lavender salt / lavender honey / evoo / balsamic.

If the upcoming week is half as good as my dinner I’m in for a good time!

19Feb2016

Raisins, Ramen, Ready For The Weekend

by Emily

This week’s food themes were…

—Coffee

Always. TJ’s cold brew (<– super strong and bold) with skim milk and vanilla almond milk.

Starbuck’s new smoked butterscotch latte is fantastic. I’m a total sucker for any limited-edition release and a butterscotch fanatic in general.

Iced latte from Milk Bar that was unexpectedly the best latte I’ve had all year. Usually I have to request an extra shot of espresso to feel like I’m having coffee with milk instead of milk with coffee, but this was perfect even untampered with.

The compost cookie didn’t suck either!

—Old-school turkey sandwiches

Old-school = white bread with cheese and mayo and mustard, i.e. super unhealthy with no redeeming nutrition qualities. From the cafeteria with tons of pickles and banana peppers.

And at home on a raisin roll with carrots on the side.

Speaking of dehydrated grapes, I also had this raisin brown sugar Chobani.

The yogurt was meh, I don’t care for the texture of the oat line, but the mix-ins were great – yellow raisins, walnuts, chia seeds, and fresh blueberries.

—Ramen

I went out on two ramen dates this week, thankfully it’s been good weather for soup! Chuko (<– my favorite ramen in the city) with work friends for veggie miso with a soft egg.

And Ramen Yebisu in Williamsburg with girlfriend. I was adventurous and got the seafood special, with seafood broth, prawn, snow crab, mussel, scallop, scallion, and seaweed.

I was super brave (the scallops were a different variety than the diver scallops you usually see and we didn’t even know what they were until we tasted them) and it paid off in the form of a giant crab leg in the middle of my bowl.

One more day and then I’m free for weekend fun!

12Feb2016

Top Ten Loves Before Valentine’s

by Emily

Here are the past week’s top ten eats –

{1} This breakfast.

Cashew date granola bar, grapes, and string cheese.

{2} And also this breakfast. Cold brew.

Plus a Ruby Frost apple (<– crisp and juicy!).

And rice cakes.

My co-worker brought in rice cakes and candy for the Chinese new year.

{3} Raspberry cinnamon lassi and a pretzel roll.

An unconventional snack combo but a good one.

{4} Strawberry vanilla smoothie. Adam and I shared, I didn’t actually finish a Big Gulp of smoothie.

Inspired by my lassi, I added a big shake of cinnamon.

{5} Killer yogurt bowl.

Fage pineapple yogurt topped with chia seeds, toasted walnuts, blueberries, and Luxardo cherries.

Why am I not putting cherries on top of everything I eat??

{6} Cafeteria salad bar. Toppings included cheese, olives, and white beans. With a side of tortellini salad.

I totally ate pizza the other 3 days.

{7} Super leftovers soup.

Whenever we make extras of a dish that would go well in soup, we toss them into the freezer for an easy dinner at a later date.

The bag included bok choy, shallots, red pepper, and shredded chicken, the broth was TJ’s miso ginger, and we had a Tupperware of orecchiette pasta in the fridge from the night before.

{8} Sandwich #1, Bareburger date. Plus fries.

My turkey burger was loaded with pimento cheese, spinach, tomato, pickles, mayo, and mustard.

{9} Sandwich #2, Thai chicken crunch.

Toasted bread with tons of melty peanut butter, Sriracha-mayo chicken salad, and pickled cucumber and carrot.

Served with roasted green beans.

The sandwiches were quick to assemble and very tasty and fun.

{10} Valentine’s-themed love, because I’m a sucker for anything limited edition.

I bought a Starbucks molten chocolate latte the first day they came out, because of course I did (only available until February 14th). It was freaking delicious.

{bonus} A mid-week date with Adam! We both had Thursday off and we spent the day in Manhattan. We ate giant sundaes at Serendipity 3 and took a frigid but fabulous 4 mile walk in the 17 degree weather.

Aaaaand now I work all weekend. Think warm thoughts for me, please!

29Jan2016

Salads, Berries, And Chocolate – Post Blizzard Eats

by Emily

Fun fact about how old I feel – I spent an hour digging out my car on Sunday and it took until midweek before I could get up from my chair without audibly groaning. This was my first year (ever! I grew up on an island) having to do it and now I totally understand why so many people have heart attacks each winter.

daytime eats

The LIRR was still closed on Monday but thankfully Adam was around to drive me to work. Silver lining – I spent extra time with the husband and we got to eat doughnuts for breakfast.

I got an iced latte and a black sesame cream doughseed.

Tuesday was much less exciting, coffee with vanilla almond milk and a piñata apple (Let’s be real though, I’m always excited about coffee!).

And coffee with fat-free sweetened condensed milk in it is downright thrilling. Plus a protein bar and a pear.

More SCM love and more strawberry seltzer.

Speaking of strawberry, this week’s tea – white strawberry. This was a particularly pretty blend.

The most exciting breakfast of all involved halo halo. Plus cereal and chia seeds. I’m still not sure if my Filipino coworker was impressed or horrified that I was putting it on plain Greek yogurt!

I packed a couple homemade “instant” oatmeal bowls this week. Rolled oats, nonfat milk powder, brown sugar, chia seeds, and pecans, mixed with hot water at work. One day was freeze-dried raspberries with a peach on the side.

The other was strawberries with a tangelo.

I also brought in brownies! I made a double batch of milk crumbs (from Milk Bar) and dumped them in my favorite brownie batter along with some caramel chocolate chips. They got rave reviews from my coworkers.

And apparently I missed them when they were gone because one day I bought chocolate cookies and an iced coffee for a train-ride snack.

Lunches also included a slice of ridiculously overcooked veggie pizza.

And a delicious salad topped with falafel and giant scoops of tzatziki and tabbouleh.

nighttime eats

Adam had to take me home from work on Monday too – my train didn’t start running until the absolute last second on Tuesday morning – which meant we got to do a dinner date as well. The streets were still crazy so we decided to eat wherever we could park. We found a spot next to… Ramen Yebisu.

I got the veggie miso ramen with shitake mushroom, scallion, onion, bamboo shoots, bean sprouts, and kelp. With an egg on top. It was good, but just couldn’t compare with the epic ramen they serve up the road at Chuko.

I went out on Thursday too. I met up with friends for drinks and dinner after work. Drinks were bourbon, lemonade, and iced tea slushies at Pork Slope. Dinner was obscenely cheesy sandwiches at Melt Kraft.

I got the Melter Skelter (<– ha!), raclette cheese, pickled green tomatoes, jalapeño, bbq chips, and watercress.

So good. The pickled tomatoes were a really nice contrast to the rich cheese and chips are always a good sandwich topping.

Another night, Adam ate leftovers and I ate a guava cheese empanada on the train. We sat together for our salad course though.

Arugula with sweet and spicy pecans, chia seeds, and golden raisins, dressed with lavender honey, evoo, balsamic, and lavender salt.

Plus we shared new gummies.

My salad was spicy sweet and these were sour sweet.

I did manage to cook one real meal. I put chicken breasts in the crockpot in the morning along with a jar of salsa and tons of chopped bell peppers and onion – plus a little bit of salt and evoo – and came home to this –

Served with TJ’s Cuban black beans and tons of cheese on top.

We have really been loving the crockpot this winter, all of our best chicken has come out of it.

One more day of work and then I’m spending my weekend being low-key and boring, running errands and catching up on tv.

25Jan2016

Last Week’s Top Five

by Emily

{1} Coffee, always.

Highlights include Starbucks while I grocery shopped last Monday. The coffee was only ok, but getting to leisurely sip and shop on a weekday? Fabulous.

Even better – a triple nonfat iced latte from the Stumptown in the Ace Hotel.

It’s a neat spot and the espresso is fabulous, I highly recommend making a stop if you’re near Penn Station.

{2} Ramen with some of my favorite people

My Maryland aunt and cousin came into town for a quick visit and I met them at the train and needed to provide food, warmth, and NYC awesomeness – enter Chelsea Market for Ramen at Mok Bar.

I got the ginger chicken ramen (Roasted ginger chicken broth, pulled chicken, cucumber and garlic chive kimchi) with an egg on top and we shared a few varieties of kimchi on the side.

They are used to the cold, and are a walking family too, so they were totally down with a chilly 2+ mile stroll through Chelsea/LES to meet Adam.

Including a stop at Sokerbit!

{3} Dinner at The Vandal

The Vandal is a new (ginormous) restaurant in the Bowery. The menu is a mix of “street food” from a myriad of cultures and the décor is graffiti-style art on every wall. There’s a coffee cart in the dining room and a bar in the basement. It’s a fun spot. My aunt has a family friend who is involved in the opening.

Highlight of the night – my cousin was trying to describe who Chris Santos was to Adam just as Chris Santos walked up to our table to say hello. It was hilarious and he was very sweet and friendly.

We shared everything so we could all taste lots of drinks and dishes. The drinks menu is divided into Bright, Spiced, and Barrel-Aged and we ordered one from each section plus a yummy bottle of Spanish wine.

My drink was the best, The Intervention = Gentleman Jack whiskey, plum, Aperol, lemon, and Spanish bitters.

We ordered a few meat dishes that I didn’t eat. Plus shrimp arepas with purple slaw and chipotle cream and cauliflower with picada sauce, olives, and hazelnuts.

Wild mushroom pizza with caramelized onion.

And brussels sprouts elote.

All of the dishes were fantastic but the pizza (recommended by Chris Santos himself!) and cauliflower were everyone’s favorite. It was a wonderful night.

{4} Americanized Halo Halo

My sweet Filipino coworker knows I’m in love with palm seeds and she brought me in giant jars of palm seeds and halo halo topping (boiled, sweetened mix of beans, coconut, jackfruit, etc).

I’ve been putting it on pretty much everything, including this ridiculous sundae.

Toasted almond gelato, halo halo, sweetened condensed milk, frosted flakes, and rainbow sprinkles. I didn’t have shaved ice but otherwise it was pretty close to the real deal!

{5} Blizzard bowls

I didn’t do the best job of stocking up on food before the storm and we spent most of the weekend eating chicken nuggets. I did manage to get it together for one healthy (yummy) meal.

Steam/sautéed shredded green cabbage and shredded chicken cooked in peanut sauce, topped with fried shallots and fresh cilantro. Shredded cabbage is so quick and easy, I need to remember to use it more often.

I hope all my East Coast readers are staying warm and safe!

Eating Chalk

Tag Archives: soup

Eating Madison Square

foods that were good

three exciting non-food things

Spring In The City

Last Week’s Top Ten

Wonderful Weekend Walking Weather

Daytime Eats

Nighttime Eats

Raisins, Ramen, Ready For The Weekend

Top Ten Loves Before Valentine’s

Salads, Berries, And Chocolate – Post Blizzard Eats

daytime eats

nighttime eats

Last Week’s Top Five