HappyTummy              

I know… it seems like I did a lot of traveling this summer. Because of the nature of my job, I’m really only allowed to take my vacation days during the summer months (with exceptions here and there, for short three-day weekend trips and such), so I generally try to do the big vacations in the summer.

About a month after we returned from our Mediterranean cruise, I flew to the Big Apple to visit my sister. You may remember the last time I wrote about such a trip—it was basically a weekend of non-stop eating. It was pretty much the same this time.

This post actually starts about two-weeks before the trip to visit my sister, when I headed to NYC on business. It was there for only one night, and thankfully there was no business dinner. So my sister and I headed to Market Table in the West Village, where we started off with Marinated Heirloom Tomatoes with Basil Vinaigrette and some wine. Market Table focuses on Seasonal American food, and our dinner was simply delicious. We also had a fantastic server, which made our meal that much better. For the entree, she had the Grilled Pork Porterhouse with Summer Squash Succotash and Fried Onions and I had the Grilled Arctic Char with Red Flannel Hash, Bacon and Fennel Salad.

When I headed back to NYC two weeks later for a four-day vacation, my sister and I were ready to hit the ground running. We’re both huge morning coffee addicts, and as soon as we roll out of bed, we head out to a nearby grocer/deli, the Garden of Eden Gourmet. Besides the little coffee bar they have, they sell all kinds of produce, shelved goods, pastries and breads. I had to take a shot of this—don’t the breads look so tasty?

For lunch, we made our way to Cafe Habana, a hole-in-the-wall dive specializing in the best Cuban food ever. Actually, I’m not really even sure I could call it a “hole-in-the-wall” or a dive because it’s pretty darned popular and it’s always packed to the gills. Anyway, between the two of us, we shared the restaurant’s Grilled Corn Mexican Style (served with chili powder lime and cheese), Rice, Beans and Spinach Plate and a Cuban Sandwich. Can you see the roast pork, ham and swiss cheese in between the crispy, chewy toasted baguette?

Neither my sister nor I can leave a meal without having something sweet. We headed to Balthazaar Bakery, where we ordered a sliced Pecan Sticky Bun, and munched on it as we window shopped in SoHo. On a totally unrelated note, we are now officially addicted to Sabon, a fabulous soap shop where you can give your hands a mini-spa treatment—exfoliate them with delicious-smelling sugar scrubs, then slather them with thick, creamy lotions, all for free! (They’re of course hoping you’ll buy something you like.)

The great thing about visiting my sister in New York is that we walk everywhere. We rarely take cabs or the metro, so we feel that we’re burning off a lot of the calories that we consume. Which is good, because later that evening, we had plans to visit family in the Jersey suburbs for a BBQ. Of course when you’re with family, you’re always going to OD on good food!

I probably ate a little too much that day, because when I woke up the next morning, I wasn’t feeling too hot. My sister and I walked to Morandi, where we sat outside and she had a yummy-looking poached egg dish. I passed on brunch and instead got a big fat raspberry bran muffin at Birdbath Neighborhood Green Bakery, an eco-frienly, all-organic offshoot of the famed City Bakery.

Right around the corner from Birdbath, we stumbled upon the most precious little cookbook store—a tiny little nook of a place, filled from top to bottom with cookbooks of every kind. Bonnie Slotnik Cookbooks is just what you’d imagine an old-fashioned indepenent bookstore to be. Antique cookbooks from the 1800s, ethnic cookbooks from every corner of the world, etiquette books, housekeeping manuals, little novelty kitchen knick-knacks—things were just spilling from the shelves. But don’t let me give you the wrong picture—it was in no way messy. In fact, Bonnie herself was organizing everything meticulously the morning we walked in. She asked if we needed any help, and we said no, we were just browsing through her wonderful collection of used cookbooks. She was never pushy in any way, even though we stayed in her store thumbing through cookbooks for the better part of an hour. It was just the loveliest way to spend a Saturday morning.

And what about a great way to spend a Saturday evening? We were so excited for our reservations to the famous Momofuku Ssam Bar! Now if you haven’t heard of David Chang’s four-restaurant Momofuku empire… well, you should! He’s been hailed as one of the city’s most innovative chefs, perfecting the art of noodles and elevating pork to whole new level. And yes (as I’m sure you noticed with the Cuban sandwich I ate earlier), I pushed aside the worries meat would have on my sensitive tummy, and dived into deliciousness. If you ever get the chance to dine at Momofuku Ssam Bar, don’t miss the Spicy Pork Sausage and Rice Cakes (with chinese broccoli and crispy shallots). They have the crispiest outer shell, but the chewiest, tender insides. And they pack a kick! It was by far my favorite dish of the night. Others will say the Steamed Pork Buns (with pork belly, hoisin, cucumbers and scallions) are a must—I enjoyed them enough, but to be honest, they were a little too fatty for my tastes.

We also had the Snap Peas (with mint, egg and XO sauce), and the Hawthorne Valley Buttermilk (with fuji apple dashi, honey locust herbs and pine nuts). Both were so innovative and magically delicious. I’ve never had food like what we had at Momofuku, and I’m so glad we went.

Day three started out somewhat dreary, and we were worried it was going to rain. Instead, it was incredibly humid, which wasn’t the best condition for what we had in store. We decided to walk all the way down to the Brooklyn Bridge, walk all the way across it, and head to the Brooklyn Flea market, at its DUMBO location (Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass for those of you who were wondering). We love rummaging around flea markets, antique stores, thrift shops and the like, and we had a blast digging through vintage clothing and jewelry. Our mom would have loved to have been there with us—she is the queen of finding great deals and then flipping them on eBay!

The flea market wasn’t our only stop though. Just a hop, skip and jump away is Jacques Torres Chocolate. If you love chocolate (are there people out there who don’t?), you must visit Jacques Torres. It’s a little pricey, but it’s so worth it. Chocolate covered corn flakes, cheerios, marshmallows and more; thick and creamy hot chocolate; and of course, the famous flat chocolate disks for the famous Chocolate Chip Cookies, which I’m sure will go down in history.

My sister and I dilly dallied in the shop, browsing the goodies and breathing in the delicious chocolate air. But we couldn’t leave without spliting a chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwich. What makes these ice cream sandwiches so delicious is definitely the cookie—it’s flat and crispy on the edges, but chewy in the middle. And because the chips in the cookies are really disks, when they bake and melt, the disks create layers of chocolate instead of chunks. Can you see chocolate strata in the picture?

That ends my blog entry about the NYC trip of 2009. The next day we laid low, and had dinner at Cafe Mogador, a fantastic Moroccan restaurant in the East Village. We completely overdosed on hummus, baba ghanoush, falafel and a chicken tagine. It was the perfect ending to a perfect weekend!