NYC Tastes

NYC is a wonderful and magical place to visit around the holiday season. The Rockefeller Center tree is gorgeous, all the hotels are decked out in red and gold, holiday pop-up shops fill the parks- what could be better? Unfortunately you have to be prepared for what I can only describe as controlled chaos. You will be wrangled like cattle to see the tree, stand in line at a Starbucks for 30 minutes, not for a caffeine fix but to use the single smelly bathroom and you’ll probably be so pooped out from all of your shopping and touring that you’ll see a TGI Friday’s or Olive Garden and think it’s an oasis in the storm. Two hours later (because you’ll have to wait for a table like all of the other tourists who thought the line at McDonald’s and Subway were too long) you’ll wonder why the food and service were so crappy and suddenly your wallet is empty as well. It’s the holidays in NYC folks and one must be prepared to weather the season. If you’re from the city you should know thi...

Finally! The past 3 years I’ve been trying to get a RW reservation at the Modern and with no luck. I always waited until the restaurant list was revealed and reservations “officially” were available. Somehow they were already booked by then! This year I got smart and made the reservation 30 days in advance in hopes that the Bar Room would again participate. My advanced booking paid off and Wednesday night we met some friends and sat down for dinner. Looking over the wine list I was surprised and happy to see so many affordable bottles. We opted for a very inexpensive Chardonnay and us ladies were happy with the choice.  The men were not into wine that night so both of them ordered a special Sixpoint beer the Dr. Klankenstein. I won’t go into the whole process but this beer is basically brewed by heating large rocks until red hot and then throwing them into a cauldron with the beer and continue heating over a log fire. You can read more about it here . I have to say I thought ...

We had some friends come to visit last week and we ended up in Midtown doing some of the obligatory tourist things. We walked around Tiffany's and stopped by Central Park to enjoy the nice weather. After a few hours we decided we needed to stop and grab a drink. We were right near the Museum of Modern Art so we decided to stop in at the bar for a cocktail. We figured we could kill two birds with one stone- they could say they were at the museum (kind of!) and we could have a break from walking. Upon entering the Modern I loved the open and airy decor. There really isn't much as far as decoration is concerned is just very well....modern looking. We sat down and looked at the cocktail list and the Coming up Roses cocktail caught my eye. The cocktail was described as having Rose Petals, Lime, Rosewater, Bacardi razz and Champagne . Fantastic I thought. We ordered our drinks and as we talked the bartenders got to work in front of us. They brought out the beers and my friends d...