concrete jungle

Last week at this time Seth and I were in a row boat in Central Park having the time of our lives. Time flies when you're with people you adore in a city you love.

We ate oodles of good food and drinks:
Roebling Tea Room
Pies-n-Thighs
Oak Wine Bar
Taco Chulo
Frankie's Spuntino
Brooklyn Star
Pinkerton. A Wine Bar.
The Kitchen of Elliott Walker
Cafe Habana
Tortilla Flats
The Rusty Knot
The Standard Grill
Egg
Best Pizza
Beechwood

Pies-n-thighs...believe it or not is also known for their donuts. scrumptious! Seth ate the Rob Evans which was a homemade biscuit with egg, cheese and a healthy dose of sausage gravy.  I had the chicken biscuit, typical chicken biscuit only with some sort of awesome hot sauce. Great way to start the first morning of the trip.

Oak Wine Bar.  We were here celebrating the upcoming marriage of Kristin [pretty lady in the veil] and had some great fun while we were at it.  The food was delish, we drank pomspritzers, all the while it was pouring rain outside.  This was a great night full of lovely ladies, lots of laughter, and yummy drinks.  Before dinner Katie [or was this Elliott?!] made some crazy awesome sangria...I didn't even know I liked sangria and now I can't stop thinking about it. 

Frankie's Spuntino.  My mouth is watering just thinking about this.  The atmosphere combined with the apetizers, the meals, and the wine makes for a perfect date night.  I ordered the sweet potato ravioli in a parmesean broth and Seth ordered what else other than the gnocchi [his favorite].  Owned by two guys named Frankie.  Love it.  They have a cookbook out that I need to own!

Well.  Tortilla flats.  Great food, margaritas, and BINGO.  Also where Seth and I drank too much tequila before our first kiss.  This was like a walk down memory lane.  No one at our table was getting close to Bingo but at some point they pushed pause on the game and Seth got a free shot for having the most of something drawn on the back of his Bingo board...something unmentionable.  We were also so lucky to eat a birthday dinner with Rachel Slaton. Great night of course!

This is an amazing drink they custom made for me at The Rusty Knot.  This place is so cool.  Down by the river, has a sort of beach vibe with glass buoys, tiki dolls, and rattan furniture.  Micheal, Seth and I all ventured on after Tortilla Flats.  I ordered my standard tequila lemonade with salt, they don't have lemonade so they made me a fancy homemade lemonade on the spot.  It was delish.  Doesn't it look like that little mermaid is relaxing in a hot tub.  Seth and Michael both ordered 'a rusty knot' which was a frozen mojito. yums.

We tried to go to the Boom Boom Room [top of the The Standard Hotel] but as luck would have it they are closed on Monday nights.  We ended up at The Standard Grill drinking wine and eating dessert.  Milk and cookies and a brownie with a scoop of ice cream, almonds and what I think was caramel.  So great.  We had great converstation and allowed ourselves to get uncomfortably full.

We were so happy we ate here.  Even though we had eaten a rather large breakfast at Egg only hours before, with our luggage in tow we rolled into Best Pizza and shared a slice.  It was so satisfying.  The walls are adorned with paper plates all the walls that people have drawn, written or scribbled on.  We actually barely talked because we were so caught up in reading all the plates [and of course pointing out our favorites]. We decided we couldn't leave NY without eating some pizza.  We were very full but very very happy. 

Oh Beechwood.  How I love[d] Beechwood.  When we lived in Jersey City this was our go-to restaurant.  They have a great brunch and an even better dinner menu of classics and it is BYO.  We used to get a couple bottles of wine and hang out here for hours.  Penne al Pesto is my favorite.  Actually if you want to know this is where my love of pesto began.  Now I eat it on everything!  [This made me really sad, my stomach was almost instantly upset after eating this. sigh.] Also where we realized how amazing hummus is.  Seth always orders a bowl of their chili which is the biggest bowl of chili ever.  We sat outside and got to take in all the Jersey City happenings.  Something I sort of didn't realize I missed.

 Our trip mostly revolved around what food we were eating and the people we were so lucky to spend time with.  But we did make it into some amazing shops, and I mean uh-mazing!  I'll tell you my favorites at another time.