Another day, another restaurant

My tales of Restaurant Week continue with the Mercer Kitchen. I picked it because I'd heard of Jean-Georges Vongerichten (the executive chef and famous restaurateur), but never been to one of his restaurants. It had the added bonus of being really easy to get to from both Astoria and Zack's work - right off the N/W train at Prince Street! You know what they say - location, location, location.

I didn't feel like a cocktail, so I started off with a homemade cherry-yuzu soda. It was lovely! It was fruity and light, with an interesting kick at the end. I didn't miss the alcohol at all. We also got some bread, which was wonderful and olive oil for dipping, which was not. The olive oil had this bizarre bitter taste that I just plain hated. I was so disappointed in it.

Our first courses were Figs, Prosciutto and Fresh Mozzarella with Green and Purple Basil (me) and Raw Tuna with Wasabi Cheese (Zack). My figs were great, except that they were drizzled in the horrible olive oil! Aaaaah! It was so frustrating. Zack's pizza was completely amazing. Wasabi cheese? Craziest thing ever. It was creamy and had an incredible bite. The tuna was fresh and delicious and the crust was doughy and warm. I wish I'd ordered it.

We moved on to Slowly Baked Salmon over Corn Pudding and Cherry Tomato Vinaigrette (me) and Roast Chicken with French Beans, Baby Carrots and Mashed Potatoes (Zack). Both main courses were really good. The salmon was nice and pink and moist, over creamy corn. The tomatoes added a little acidic bite, which was wonderful. Zack's chicken was tasty, with some crisp green beans and buttery potatoes. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.

We finished with Strawberry Pie and Lemon Lavender Ice Cream. I'm trying this new thing where I don't just pick the chocolate desserts all the time. It's going pretty well. The fruit was so sweet (but in a good way), and the crust was flaky like phyllo dough.

Overall, I loved it! I'd skip the olive oil next time, but I couldn't complain about anything else. I want to go back there immediately.

Restaurant Week Continues....

Hey all, I'm back from the wilderness and ready to eat! My tales of Restaurant Week continue with Frankie and Johnny's Steakhouse.

I headed over there on Tuesday night with my friend Jaclyn. We've been planning to have a nice dinner for a while, and this presented a perfect opportunity. We're both big fans of red meat (probably from abstaining from it for a combined total of 14 years), so we headed to the steakhouse!

We started off with house-made smoked salmon (me) and a "classic" salad (her). Here's my salmon.


It was surprisingly good. I'm a huge smoked salmon fan, so I tend to be picky, but this was nice. There were little bits of capers and some lemon juice which brightened up the dish. Jaclyn's salad was not as good.


I mean, come on, iceberg lettuce? But what can you do. I'd skip that one for sure.

We moved onto Petite Filet Mignon. It came with a sprinkling of parsley and a roasted mushroom cap on top.


It had nice flavor and a good crust. However, I had one big complaint. It was much too neat. When I eat steak, I like the juices to gush out everywhere. I want it to be a big bloody mess. This just was not that. It made me a little sad.

The creamed spinach almost made up for it. It was so delicious. It arrived brilliantly green (the picture really doesn't do it justice). The flavors were melded so well. It wasn't cream and spinach separately, it was a perfect mix. I could have eaten ten bowls of it.


We finished with key lime pie. It was good, but I have one question. What's with the mint garnish?


Are you supposed to eat it? Throw it away? What's the point? Oh well - I liked the pie. The crust was crumbly and the filling was nice and not too sweet.

Here's Jaclyn, awkwardly chewing (her words, not mine).


We had a nice time! I love steak. Maybe I'll make one for dinner tonight and make it super bloody......(my parents both just cringed) Yum.

I'm getting away....

If you need me in the next two days, you're out of luck. I'll be here.


I'm being paid to sit on a lakeside, climb rope ladders and do other silly things in Connecticut with a camp full of children.

When I return, there will be more posts about Restaurant Week, recipes and show reviews. I hope you can stand the suspense.

I'm too tired to do a real post

If you're not watching this, you should be.



Dr Horrible's Sing Along Blog. Made by Joss Whedon. Quite possibly the first musical made exclusively for the internet.....starring Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion. Watch it or we probably can't be friends any more.

And so it begins.....

Yes, folks, it's that magical time of year. The time where New York restaurants open their doors to the poor, the tired, the soon to be unemployed (like me), or at least those of us who have at least $35 to spare (plus tip). If you don't know, it's New York City Summer Restaurant Week! That means that lots of restaurants (ones that would usually be pricey) put out a pre fix lunch for $24.07 and dinner for $35. You get an appetizer, entree and dessert.

I started off the week (ok, it's two weeks, mon-fri of this week and next) by having dinner with Zack at Butter. Butter is a place that is known more for Lindsay Lohan sightings than the food, but I'd never been there, so I decided to check it out (okay, and it was also on Gossip Girl. I'm pathetic, I know).

We got seated downstairs in the Birch Room, the "more casual" room. Not quite as fancy as the upstairs which I'll show you now:


I started off with a passion fruit bellini. I'm a sucker for anything with champagne. It was very nice - light and bubbly. The waiter recommended the warm goat cheese salad, so that's what I got. I was a little disappointed - there was nothing wrong with it, but it was basically like every other breaded goat cheese salad that you can get anywhere. Oh well. Zack had a clam chowder that was very creamy and tasted faintly of curry. He liked it a lot.

We moved on to Braised Short Ribs (him) and Grilled Pork Tenderloin (me). The pork came with delicious potatoes and handmade pancetta - there also were some crispy mustard greens that I liked quite a bit. Zack's short ribs also tasted of curry - weird coincidence? Maybe.

We both had Dark Chocolate and Creme Fraiche "Sandwiches" with Vanilla Bean ice cream. The ice cream was nice and reminded me of a marshmallow. The sandwich was a bit much - neither of us could finish it.

Overall, it was a perfectly nice evening, but nothing overly spectacular. The ambiance is better than the food, but the food is solid. I felt very trendy, which can be fun every once in a while.

[post about self referential musical]

Last night, Ana and Sarah took me to see [title of show] for my birthday. For those of you who don't know, [title of show] is a musical by two guys (Hunter Bell and Jeff Bowen) who decided to write a musical about two guys writing a musical. The names, places and characters have not been changed. They are literally recording exactly what they said at the time and repeating it in the show (or at least I assume they are). "Wait, so everything I say from now on could actually be in our show?" "Yeah." "Like this?" "Like this." "And this?" "And this." It's all very meta.

This is the kind of musical that's written for people like me - giant musical theatre dorks. There's a reference to "Henry, Sweet Henry" in the first five minutes of the play. (I assume that most of you have no idea what that is, and so, I recommend that you watch this. But back to the point.)

I enjoyed the show, especially the first half. The second half veered off into a fairly typical "showbiz drama" plot line, which was a little predictable, but what can you do. The whole "will we compromise our ideals to get to Broadway?" thing was a little silly. I mean, they're already on Broadway. They left in all the swearing and nakedness and insider jokes. Obviously, it all was fine.

A lot of the show really resonated with me - especially the song "Nine People's Favorite Things." The lyric goes "I'd rather be nine people's favorite thing than a hundred people's ninth favorite thing." If only the rest of the song had touched me so much. But I couldn't help but see this show, just two ex-temps who dreamed of making a Broadway show, finally doing their Broadway show, and think, "maybe that will be me some day." And then I felt very naive.

I would really like it if someone who doesn't like musicals (or at least, doesn't have an insane fan's knowledge of it) would see this show and tell me what they think of it. I'm so curious to see if it really is a universal story or if I just think that it could be since I'm so close to it. That's your homework for the evening. Go see it and let me know.

How to make a really good salad in 5 easy steps

1. Buy really good produce.

2. Wash said produce. Hopefully, some of it will be lettuce. Rip it up and put it in a bowl.

3. Chop some vegetables - I used cucumber. Throw it in the bowl.

4. Add whatever else you like - I added blueberries and goat cheese. Delish!

5. Add some dressing. I just mixed together olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt and pepper with a fork and threw it over.

Voila! Easy-peasy.