NYC Tastes

I woke up Saturday morning and had one thought in my mind- Doughnuts!! Seriously I think I must have been dreaming about them because my craving was beyond ridiculous. I was going to try and ignore the craving but then I heard the news that my Grandmother passed away. I was feeling pretty down and decided that a good long walk and a sugary treat was maybe just what I needed. So I took a long walk from my apartment all the way down to Doughnut Plant in the Lower East Side. It was a beautiful day outside and with the sun on my back and crisp air in my face I felt about a hundred times better. It’s amazing what a good walk can do for your soul! Anyway I got to Doughnut Plant and the line was out the door. Luckily they move pretty quick here and it only took about 20 minutes for me to reach the front. I had one doughnut in mind to order but the same thing ended up happening to me that always happens to me at Doughnut Plant…I go Doughnut Insane. The next thing I know I’m ordering everyt...

We checked out the Artichoke guys newest shop this past weekend- This Little Piggy. I’ll admit, when it comes to Roast beef sandwiches the bar is set pretty high. Growing up in Buffalo you get a real appreciation to all thing beef- especially the quintessential Western New York favorite Beef on Weck. However I know there’s no weck in this city so regular roast beef sandwiches have to fill the void. This Little piggy makes two kinds of sandwiches called This Way and That Way. This Way is Roast Beef with Cheez Whiz and au jus. That way is Roast Beef with fresh mozzarella and gravy. Neither of us were in a gravy mood so we went for That Way. Upon opening up this large sandwich it was evident that they used a lot of us jus…I mean a lot! The bottom of the roll was so soaked through it proved to be no match for the weight of the beef and completely fell apart. This might upset some people but I love au jus so it was just fine with me. Unfortunately the meat itself wasn’t great. The b...

In addition to Mr. T’s regular Valentines Day present I picked him up a bag of Chocolate Covered potato Chips. I figured everyone needs something sweet on Valentines Day so why not try something different. This is a bag of Asher's Chocolate Covered Chips that I picked up at Macy’s. I was pretty excited about the prospect of having salty, sweet and crunchy all together in one package. Unfortunately it didn’t quite live up to the expectations I had for these sweets going in. The potato chips were huge first of all- which I wasn’t really expecting and they were covered in a thick layer of chocolate that out layered the chip itself about 3:1. The chocolate itself was seriously rich and unfortunately it just too much for the perfect salty, sweet, crunchy combo I was looking for. I couldn’t really get a good salty chip taste. However the more I ate, the closer I got to the chocolate potato chip perfection I was looking for. I realized that the curled chips had less ch...

After our wonderful brunch at Perilla Sunday we walked around the block to our favorite beer bar- The Blind Tiger. As usual they had a bunch of beers we’ve never tried before- the first of which was Brooklyn Brewery’s newest release the Cookie Jar Porter. This beer is insanely dark in color, almost black and pours with no head at all. The smell was strong like toffee and cider.  At first I tasted a mix of Kaluha and coffee but then it mellowed out on the end and was almost chewy with a hint of raisins and chocolate. Once again Brooklyn Brewery has created something completely original and very tasty. I don’t think I could drink more than one of these beers since it’s quite sweet but I’d love to pair it with some Snicker Doodles or Oatmeal Cookies for dessert.  Another stand out beer we enjoyed that afternoon was a bottle of Sophie from Goose Island. Goose Island has long been one of my favorite breweries and this beer was delightful. It poured a light gold with a p...

Valentines Day fell on a Sunday this year and although Mr. T and I usually stay home on this stupid holiday we decided to go out and enjoy a meal. I knew places would be crazy for dinner but I assumed brunch would be somewhat subdued. When Harold Dieterle opened his NYC restaurant after Top Chef it was on the top of my list to try. Somehow I just never got around to it. So this past Sunday, Valentines Day, it finally seemed like the right time. I got a reservation for brunch at 1:15 and the restaurant was certainly doing a good business. All of the tables were full and most of the bar seats were filled as well. I’m not sure if it was Valentines Day or if this place is just always packed for brunch. Since this was kind of a holiday I decided to celebrate a little with a glass of Cava Rose and Mr. T tried out the Harpoon Levitation IPA. They started us off with some wonderful little cranberry muffins. I’m not sure what they did to the cranberries but they tasted like candy...

After a wonderful Friday night out with our newly married friends, I awoke to a cold and gray Saturday. It was one of those days when you look outside you just don’t feel like doing anything. It had already been quite a crazy week for us with the snow storm on Wednesday. I ended up having the day off and spent it enjoying some beers and watching the snow fall outside McSorleys. Needless to say my midweek drinking binge and a night out with friends before had completely zapped me of energy. We decided to cancel our usual weekend events of errands and went to a movie instead. We trekked up to Times Square and saw Avatar at Empire 25. I had low expectations for the movie and ended up really enjoying it. It was the perfect way for us to relax for a few hours. Since we were already in the area, we stopped over at one of my favorite bars in the world Jimmy’s Corner for a drink and some jazz music. I had been craving a burger all day and when I realized we were only one block away from HB...

On our way back from our "psych up the Saints" Louisiana style brunch at Acme we were feeling something a little sweet. We had another hour or two before the Superbowl was going to start so we decided to walk home and stop by Black Hound bakery. They had their regular line of cakes in the window as well as some special ones just for Valentines day. We decided to buy two- Valentine Busy Bee Cake and the regular Almond Apricot. The Busy Bee cake is one of their most popular items. It has three layers of chocolate cake, two layers of almond cake, two layers of chocolate mousse and a layer of marzipan. I probably wouldn't have ordered this cake on my own because of the marzipan but it really wasn't too bad. The marzipan was mostly on the bottom so I just avoided it and enjoyed the deep chocolaty deliciousness of the rest of the cake. Yum! The Almond Apricot cake was wonderful as well but it too had marzipan! The cake itself was an almond marzipan cake! I can't b...