Where did we leave off? Ahh right, cats and tequila.

After happy hour, I migrated uptown and met my friend Deena at Popover Cafe. Popover has been around forever and I distinctly remember going there 15 years ago after seeing Cirque du Soleil.

Though primarily a brunch spot, Popover offers a wonderful dinner deal of three courses for $25.00. Take that $35 restaurant week!

Each diner is presented with the restaurant’s monikered pastry. Check out that beauty. Perfectly crisp exterior with flaky innards, smeared with a pat of strawberry butter.

Deena opted for the three course pris-fixe and began with some corn chowder. The soup had a lovely, comforting taste without the density of cream.

For her entree she selected the Healthy Salmon, encrusted with sesame seeds and served with sweet potatoes and green beans. The fish,while nothing relevatory, possessed a nice orange flavor that complimented the sesame well.

I did not select the pris-fixe (too many chips and salsa earlier) and instead selected the Grilled Salmon Riviera Salad. First of all, dressing on the side is a HUGE dining pet-peeve of mine. I want my dressing mixed in, yo! The amount of greens was also disapproportionately small compared to the colossol hunk of salmon. Overall I enjoyed the simplicity of this dish, however, and would happily order it again.

For dessert, Deena kindly shared her chocolate mousse with me. No complaints here!

I would definitely recommend Popover to budget/health conscious individuals or simply to those who long for a retreat from the currently-over-gentrified Upper West Side.

For our traditional Friday lunch, my supervisor/co-workers and I headed to Brother Jimmy’s.

The Historian ordered a lunch platter, which came with a generously-portioned starter salad

After an extended wait-time (at least 30 minutes), our food finally arrived.

The Historian selected BBQ chicken with sides of green beans and mac ‘n cheese.

Hot in Hurr went with the pulled pork sandwich

Beaver Dam went with a burger, per usual.

I went with the Wright Salad, a melange of wild rice, apples, pecans, and dried cherries.

The salad tasted rather bland, so I doctored it up with some BBQ sauce. Much better.

I also requested a side of pickles which further enhanced the salad’s flavor.

Overall, rather mediocre food, but a fun environment.

After work I resigned my puritanical ways and headed out to happy hour.

1.5 margaritas and a shot of tequila later, I  miraculously made it uptown to meet my friend Deena for dinner. When I got to the restaurant, I realized I had been walking through the streets holding Sir Edwin Thaddeus the Third:

I’ve decided that after graduation I will simply become a Mother Theresa of cats, bringing joy to the people of the world with my dancing gansta feline.

Be back soon with a recap of Friday night’s dinner! Hope everyone had a nice weekend:)

Hello Everyone! I’m pleased to announce the new series New York City for. . .XYZ. This series will provide suggestions for various activities and eats for specific groups of individuals visiting the big apple. Hope you enjoy!

Recently you pushed a large conglomerate of cells out of your uterus and into the world’s harsh light. You spend your days pushing strollers and changing malodorous diapers. You wear high-waisted mom jeans that make your nether region resemble Mount Hood.

Your family decided to venture to the concrete jungle and bring along little Suzy and Jimmy boy. After surviving a tumultous airplane ride filled with screaming demons (aka children) you finally make it. What now? (and, fyi, i’m being melodramatic. kids are cute. occasionally).

Below are my suggestions for family-friendly NYC activities

1. Breakfast at Absolute Bagels

Native New Yorkers constantly debate the best bagel in town. After subsisting off bagels since childhood, I can confidently deem Absolute’s as the city’s finest. Warm, doughy, and lathered with cream cheese, your children will love them. The reasonable price tag doesn’t hurt either.

source:http://images1.citysearch.net/assets/imgdb/guide/2010/7/26/0/jfZOVcKD55.jpeg

2. Columbia University Campus

After carbo-loading on baked dough, your kids can roam like unfettered feral dogs through the lawns of Columbia’s campus while you absorb the stunning architecture. And subliminally program your children to achieve good grades and eventually reach the ivy league.

source:http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ul567Hf0PKA/Tm_HGJ1vx6I/AAAAAAAALUU/14GnHVmBJzI/s1600/ColumbiaUniversity.jpg

3. American Museum of Natural History

source:http://zirkel.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2006/11/amnh-blue-whale-2663.jpg

Once you’ve had your fill of academia, you can migrate downtown towards the Museum of Natural History. Your kids will “ooh!” and “ahh” over the paleolithic exhibits and the giant whale preceding over the Milstein Hall of Ocean Life. Your kids might even learn a thing or two, exponentially increasing their probability of reaching the ivy league! (see point #2).

Alternate 3: Children’s Museum of Manhattan

source:http://www.nypi.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/Children’s-Museum-of-Manhattan.jpg

Kids not into dinosaur bones or stuffed homosapiens (can’t say I blame ‘em there. . .)? Try taking them instead to the under-the-radar Children’s Museum. The interactive exhibits will simultaneously educate and entertain your children.

4. Shake Shack

source:http://aht.seriouseats.com/images/20091123-shakeshack.jpg

Uh oh, is the stuffed lion in exhibit number four coming back to life? No, that would actually be the sound of your vacant stomach rumbling. Bring your brood across the street to Shake Shack for some burgers and fries. Be sure to also share the Natural History Crunch-Stellation Concrete, a divine combination of frozen custard, malt, valrhona chocolate, crunchies, caramel and hot fudge.

5. Central Park

That concrete from Shake Shack will inevitably lead to an intense sugar high. Allow your kids to burn off the energy with a jaunt through Central Park. Some particularly kid-centric activities include puppet shows at the Swedish Cottage Marionette Theater, a row-boat ride through the Central Park lake, a ride on the carousel, and a visit to the famed (and climb-able) Alison and Wonderland statue.

source:http://www.nycgovparks.org/sub_your_park/historical_signs/monument_pics/manhattan/2/alice_in_wonderland_central_park_manhattan.jpg

6. Dinner at Patsy’s

source: http://www.thingstoseenyc.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/patsys.jpg

Take the crosstown bus (an adventure in itself!) east and head to the iconic pizzeria Patsy’s. The food isn’t great, but the eatery is extremely family-friendly and will permit you to sample New York’s famous cuisine.

7. Dylan’s Candy Bar

One block from Patsy’s lies the famed Dylan’s Candy Bar, a utopia for children and adults of all ages. Allow your children to fill up a small bag of candy for the next adventure.

source: http://www.sephora.com/assets/dyn/brand/5924/5924_hero.jpg

8. Roosevelt Island Tram

Candy in tow, it’s time to ride the tram! A highly underrated NYC adventure, this tram takes you high above the city and onto the secluded Roosevelt Island. Once on the island you can stroll along the water for a bit before heading back. A ride on the tram costs a single metrocard swipe.

source:http://www.manhattanstyle.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Roosevelt-Island-Tram.jpg

Alrighty, those are my main suggestions for a fun day in NYC with the family. Any readers out there have any additional suggestions? I’d love to hear them!

Last night I was invited to sample the cuisine at the newly opened Prince Street Pizza. I brought along my friend Deena, pizza connoisseur extraordinaire.

We braved the freezing cold and equally capricious MTA conditions and eventually reached this quaint little eatery.

As a born and bred New Yorker, pizza runs in my blood. I can say with great confidence that I consumed pizza at least four times per week during my childhood. I was, therefore, excited to sample Prince Street Pizza’s offerings.

We were greeted by the warm and friendly owner, Frank, who immediately made us feel welcome. I also really liked that he referred to Mozzarella as “Mutz”.

We pulled up a stool at a counter and Frank immediately brought us nicely warmed squares of Prince Perfection, Sicilian-style slices. The pizza contains their “secret sauce”, which Frank kindly identified for me. I promise I won’t spill the secret though;) You guys should definitely go try the sauce for yourselves. I liked the slight sweetness and chunky texture, which complemented the fresh mozzarella well.

We then sampled the Neapolitan style pizza that contained fresh pieces of basil. This tasted more reminiscent of my childhood pizza and had a lovely char.

At this point I was bursting at the seems, but forged ahead to sample the Mercer Margherita, thin-crusted Sicilian style pizza. This was hands down my favorite slice of the evening. The sauce possessed so much vibrancy, yet did not overpower the Mutz. The crust also retained the perfect crunch and a comforting flavor.

I really enjoyed the pizza at Prince Street and would definitely return. Highly recommended if you find yourself in Soho craving pizza.

After rolling ourselves out, we meandered around Soho. We happened upon an adorable bakery and intuitively entered.

Though I’m not a huge baked goods fan (ice cream all the way!), many of the creations sounded great. I exhibited great restraint, however, and walked away with a sole slice of cake.

This, my friends, would be Nutella Chocolate Chip Cake, aka all that is good in the world.

I’m going to make a bold statement and proclaim this the best cake I’ve had in recent memory. It blew Magnolia out of the water. The actual portion was super moist and combined perfectly with the nutella frosting.

On a totally different note, I realized I haven’t done a “These are a few of my Favorite Things” post recently. Here we go!

Bib Boards

For the past few years I’ve been hoarding bibs from all my races. Each race contains such unique memories that I truly treasure. I, therefore, decided to actually get a cork board and hang them all up. I also included random items, such as a copy of a Letter to the Editor that I got published in the NY Times, and an article printed right after Obama’s inauguration.

Judy Blume Books

For my adolescent psych class I had to read a Judy Blume book. Man do those bring back memories! I used to spend days huddled under my covers reading them. What were your favorite childhood books? Other favorites include anything by Ronald Dahl.

Winnie Ille Pu

Sifting through my books I also discovered Winne the Poo. Written in Latin! Can’t believe I used to be able to semi-read that.

Beanie Babies

I am finally relinquishing my hoarder tendencies and cleaning out my closet. I have well over 100 Beanie Babies to donate, including the special edition Princess Diana one.  You know you’ve made it big in the world when you’re memorialized in Beanie-baby form.

Hunter Boots

I always swore I would never purchase the over-priced wellies, but the recent snowstorm made me quickly change my mind. Now that I took the plunge, I absolutely love them! Paired with my lumberjack scarf for the perfect winter-wear.

Chapstick

My cold weather damaged lips have been really digging this Rice Krispie flavored lipbalm lately. I actually bought that particular stick in the late ’90s, but it still works fine!

Vintage Watches

This watch only cost five dollars, but I absolutely love it. So simple and classy. I enjoy envisioning the previous owner using it to keep time.

What items have you been digging lately?

Please note that I was contacted directly by a PR representative for Prince Street Pizza and that my meal was provided gratis. All opinions expressed on this blog, however, always conform to my honest beliefs.

Today the office took a brief respite and headed to Riverpark for a restaurant week lunch. Riverpark is located mere steps from the ED’s ambulance bay, rendering it the optimal location for a quick lunch.

Situated on the East River, the restaurant offers sprawling views of Greenpoint, Brooklyn. The serene view really removes you from the hectic urbanity, providing much needed relaxation.

For restaurant week, you get three courses for $24.07 (the seven cents is super important). The normal lunch special at Riverpark actually costs 28 dollars, a pretty good deal for three courses.

Upon being seated we were served individual pieces of warm bread. The miniature baguette had a lovely crust freckled with specks of sea salt.

Both Master Michalaeous Shakespeare Bunny Froo Froo Bibby Navajo Jim Mickey Moo Rogers (thus forth abbreviated as M) and Hot in Hurr selected the eggplant bruschetta for their appetizers.

First of all, this was a HUGE slice of bread, almost like a miniature pizza. This probably constituted my favorite dish of the meal. The wonderfully charred eggplant was drizzled with honey, lending an understated element of umami.

Cally-G and Beaver Dam selected the braised chicken soup.

I did not taste the soup, but loved the presentation and variance of ingredients.

For my appetizer I selected the baby lettuce salad containing marinated vegetables in a champagne vinaigrette.

I was very pleasantly surprised by the large portion size and the freshness of the vegetables. My favorite part was the marinated beets which felt vibrant on the palate.

For his entree M selected the pork steak.

I did not try this dish, but he seemed to enjoy it.

Both Cally-G and Hot in Hurr selected the oyster tacos.

Both reported good things! I am actually allergic to all mollusks, but tasted some of the pickled onions and absolutely loved them.

For my entree, I selected the roasted arctic char with sweet peppers and fingerling potatoes.

The very generous portion of fish tasted freshly caught and retained a rich texture. The sweet peppers lightened up the dish and the charred skin added a nice crunch.

Beaver Dam selected the cheeseburger, but I didn’t get a picture.

For dessert we shared beignets, accompanied by a wonderful chocolate sauce and espresso custard

I have never experienced beignets before and found them quite analagous to funnel cake. Though not a huge fan of fried dough, I did go gaga for the espresso custard.

For my dessert I selected the black forrest sundae.

Oh baby. So many different components (cake, cherry sauce, pistachios, ice cream) and all combined harmoniously. I could seriously solely subsist off of sundaes like this.

Not saccharine fans, Hot in Hurr and M selected the cheese plate.

The fresh honey comb combined very nicely with the variety of fromage.

Overall I really enjoyed Riverpark and would definitely return for lunch or to watch the sunset at night. I would highly reccomend the restaurant for a romantic date or for dining with family.

As an extra bonus the building offers wooden benches to sleep off the inevitable food coma that will follow!

Hope everyone had a nice day:)

This morning, after a challenging swim practice, I grabbed breakfast from the newly opened Chocobolo. This nutritional powerhouse consisted of a double chocolate cookie

and an amazing iced coffee, made with high quality espresso.

This morning was not only significant because of the awesome cookie, but because it was the last first day of classes of my collegiate career. Hard to believe that I started this blog as an unassuming freshman and am now preparing to graduate. Re-reading my initial posts makes me seriously cringe. Let’s just say lots of personal growth occured during college.

This semester I am taking some extremely depressing interesting courses including:

Trauma

World War II in History and Memory

Adolescent Psych

Film and Culture

Emergency Medicine Research

This will certainly be a challenging semester (I already know I have two 20 page papers due the same week), but I am excited to just savor my final days on campus and fully devote my self to learning. I mean, when else can I include a phrase like “siphoning out the comestibles” in a paper without getting committed to a psychiatric ward?

So, in summary, my goals for this semester are:

1. Not become clinically depressed (see above)

2. Go on dates and reduce my high probability of becoming a future cat lady (though my current feline companion, Sir Edwin Thaddeus III, is quite the charmer)

3. Not resort to the famous migraine-inducing cocktail of redbull mixed with diet coke and espresso shots. Yum.

Hooray for second semester senior year!

Speaking of graduation, I wanted to share this cute Life after College Roadmap infograph from Mint.com and Quicken. In case you don’t already know, Mint.com is a very helpful site for tracking spending and monitoring your finances. I highly recommend it to all of my fellow college students.

Cute, no?

Alrighty, I hope everyone had a great day!

Please note that I was contacted directly by mint.com but was not compensated financially.

This evening I met my friend Sarah at our new neighborhood creperie for some dinner. I had just completed a challenging swim set (10x500s) and my depleted body definitely needed food asap.

Sarah selected the chicken, pesto, and gruyere cheese crepe, which she seemed to enjoy

while I went with a spinach, mushroom, and tomato sauce one. As a crepe virgin, I don’t have a baseline comparison, but I certainly did enjoy this and loved the crispy bits around the edges.

During our meal one of the staff came up to us and requested we download the restaurant’s app, which I found a bit off-putting. We are certainly in the year 2012!  Per usual, it was so nice to catch up with Sarah:)

Yesterday I returned home from a difficult swim practice feeling rather ill (still catching up after last week’s terrible stomach virus) and decided to spend the evening at home. I quickly assembled a lamb stew containing onions, garlic, shallots, tomatoes, turnips, and squash, which I left simmering on the stove for two hours.

Served with red wine, the perfect winter meal.

Alrighty, I’m off the investigate the strange sound emanating from my bedroom wall. I can’t decide if my neighbor is birthing an oversized fetus or if a bloodhound is howling. Actually, maybe I don’t want to know.

(For the record, we visited the Upper West Side location, not the one listed below)

It’s only January 12th and I’ve already failed at one of my resolutions: Blog more. I attribute the decline in posts to a malicious stomach flu that waged war on my immune system. Vomitting. Body aches. 103 degree fever. Yeh, not so fun. Luckily, after 2.5 days of fluids and rest, the malady withdrew.

Given the lackluster diet of chicken broth and lemonade, my food pics are minimal. I did, however, enjoy a meal at Whole Earth before the illness struck.

My dining companion and I shared the stuffed cabbage

and portabello ‘shroom wrap.

To be perfectly honest, I wasn’t a fan of either. The stuffed cabbage tasted bland and the wrap contained a melange of mis-matched herbs.

I wanted to end this post with an awesome giveaway from Mohegan Sun.

From January 27th- 29th Mohegan Sun is hosting a Sun Wine Festival that includes special talks, tastings, and celebrity appearances. Some of the celebrity chefs attending include Bobby Flay,Robert Irvine, and Jacques Torres, how cool!

One of you lucky readers can win a 50 dollar gift card to Mohegan Sun by leaving a comment telling me your favorite type of wine (or type of drink in general if you don’t like wine). The winner will be announced on Tuesday. Good luck!

Thursday my supervisors/co-workers and I put on our cowboy hats and headed to Rodeo for a New Year’s lunch. Any restaurant with a giant mounted water buffalo earns extra points from me.

Upon being seated a waitress brought us the standard chips and salsa. They also provide baskets of unshelled peanuts that you can eat.  Or inconspicuously chuck at people.

Two people selected the steak pita, accompanied by a side salad. I tried a bite and loved the charred meat combined with the creamy guacamole.

Cally-G selected the Chicken al Carbon, a heaping plate of poultry served with rice.

I went with the grilled shrimp salad. This was ok, but rather small in portion. I also don’t understand the point of serving a salad in a deep fried shell. It’s like ordering a diet Coke while devouring a Big Mac.

Friday I met my high school friend Katie Ida at Amber, an Asian-fusion restaurant. We both ordered lunch specials which came with miso soup

and a salad served in a nicely tangy ginger vinaigrette.

I went with the sushi entree, a california roll served with assorted nigiri.

This platter was surprisingly tasty, particularly the char-grilled piece of white tuna.

Katie Ida selected three rolls: tuna, salmon-avocado, and yellotail jalapeno. She seemed to enjoy all of them!

It’s always so nice to catch-up with people you haven’t seen in awhile:)

Quick question: Do you guys prefer this smaller photo size or the larger size I have previously used? Your response would be greatly appreciated:) Also, don’t forget to enter the Sneak Peeq giveaway! I’ve extended the entry until January 9th.

Finally, I am concluding this post with a Furby. Because Furbies are awesome.

Hope everyone had a great start to 2012!