Last night Rick and I went in to the city for dinner. We’ve long wanted to go to Sue Torres’s Sueños in Chelsea ever since we saw her battle it out with Bobbie Flay on Iron Chef and also when she competed in Top Chef Masters, Season 4. We love Mexican food and we were intrigued by her style. But, like everything else we never seemed to get around to actually going.

Then a really good deal came up on Rue La La: a three course prix-fixe dinner for two for $60.00! It was not the normal prix-fixe menu as a part of their usual menu, but an upscale menu just for Bloomspot and Rue La La customers. I purchased the deal and we had two months in which to use it. Since our coupon expired this week we knew we had to use it or lose it (like they say).

We left ourselves more time than usual for the drive in since we didn’t know how the traffic would be. Traffic turned out to be unusually light and one hour and eight minutes after leaving our house we were parked and walking towards our destination. Only thing was that we were also 45 minutes too early. It never ceases to amaze me that we can drive in to New York City faster than we could drive to Denver back in Colorado from our house!

We had booked the first seating of the night which is a little bit earlier than most people eat (5:00 p.m.) and that is exactly when they open their door. We did it early so we could sandwich ourselves between the evening rush and still get home at a decent hour.

So, we roamed up and down 8th Avenue to kill time. It was downright cold! And damp. I always forget how just the littlest of breezes gets funneled straight down those city streets and becomes a much bigger, and chillier wind! Brrrrrr!

A few minutes before 5:00 we finally gave up walking and tried the door to the restaurant. It was open, so we stepped in. Clearly they were not ready for customers as employee jackets and backpacks were strewn in the bar seats. A waiter came up to us and told us they were not quite open and could we please come back in a few minutes? Not looking forward to going back out into the cold again, we complied.

We opted to stay in the little passageway between two buildings that leads back to the restaurant’s entrance which is tucked away from the street. At least we were blocked from the chill wind that way. We waited.

One minute after 5:00 the door opened and an unassuming woman with her hair pulled back in a ponytail wearing a sweatshirt hoodie and jeans popped her head out and asked us in. It was Sue Torres herself! I think the look on my face was one of surprise and recognition but I forced myself not to be a groupie and didn’t gush something silly like oh it’s you, Sue! We joked about being early as she grabbed a few menus up and went to seat us, but then she asked if we might not want to sit in the bar and take advantage of Happy Hour 2-for-1’s. So that’s just what we did.

Imagine a chef/owner seating customers! She was so cute about it. She went back to the kitchen and that was the last we saw of her. A celebrity appearance just for us!

Rick had a straight-up margarita (which they are known for) and I had what they called a Paloma which was silver tequila, mexican grapefruit soda and lime. Very refreshing and two was definitely enough given the amount of tequila the bartender put into both our drinks. We opted to drink the second one with our meal.

They started us out with a complimentary appetizer of extremely thin cornbread with a bean and crema dip. For appetizers we chose shrimp in a coconut-habanero sauce and chicken chilaquiles. It was hard to say which one we liked better. (We shared!) For mains we chose Chicken Enchiladas with mole sauce and a Poblano Chile Relleno stuffed with quinoa, mushrooms and spinach. Again, they were both very good. Desserts were a dense bittersweet chocolate cake with crema de Mezcal whipped cream and an apple galette which was made with very thin slices of apple and cinnamon toasted tortilla “chips.”

All in all a delicious dinner for $60.00 (Plus a tip based on the real value of the meal and our drinks.) And let’s not leave out the ridiculously expensive parking! Oh well, it is New York City after all!

Sunflowers at the Warwick Farmer’s Market on Sunday.

My sister left on Saturday. We had a good visit and I think we did everything she was hoping to do. Time went by so quickly that her visit was over before we knew it!

Cirque in the city was wonderful! Such skilled performers. Death-defying acts! Lightning fast set changes! Non-stop entertainment! If you’ve never seen Cirque perform I highly recommend them to anyone. This is the third one I have seen. On Las Vegas trips I’ve seen Mystere and LOVE (the Beatle one). All of them well worth the price of a seat.

On Saturday after dropping my sister at the train station we took the dogs for a walk before it got too hot. Poor things have been inside with no exercise because of the heat. We did a little grocery shopping, then took Mia for a short drive around Greenwood Lake. We ate lunch at the Emerald Point restaurant (which I always refer to as the biker place because all the motorcycle folks hang out here). We sat outside in the shade with a view of the lake and had a cool beer and a sandwich. It was nice.

When we got home we pooled it for a few hours. And then again after dinner. I did about 30 laps or so of the side-stroke and it felt good to get the exercise.

Outside house lights reflecting in the pool.

We are having a marvelous pool year this year with very consistent temperatures in the low 80’s and clear sparkling water. Sheer heaven with all the hot weather and humidity we’ve been having.

The cicadas are slowly starting up. I hope they reach symphonic heights this year as I love to hear them singing away. We have a few fireflies left but I think they are a different species than the ones earlier in the summer. These fly high amongst the tree tops with a different light pattern. The other day there was a bug inside on the sliding glass door. I grabbed it, opened the door and tossed it outside and as it flew off it lit up! It didn’t look like a firefly to me, jut another beetle. And we’ve had some strange beetles around this year.

The bee balm is nearly spent. The hummingbirds enjoy it now (must be the concentration of nectar?) but it’s not as pretty.

I got a surprise when I looked closer at the garden. The bee balm that I got when I traded with Maggie was blooming! Last year it did not come up, but this year even with the lack of rain it’s making a strong showing. I LOVE the color!! Maggie, did mine bloom in your garden??

On Sunday we made a new recipe: Tomatillo Gazpacho. It was perfect on a hot and humid day.
Tomatillos, cucumbers, green pepper, jalapeños, and avocado all blended, then topped with a cucumber/avocado/shrimp/green olive salsa. It was delicious!

Hopefully I am back into the swing of blogging again instead of the hit (and mostly miss) of the past week!

Just in case you were wondering! With my sister visiting this week my time for blogging and taking photos has been pretty much nil. But that’s okay. That’s the way it should be.

Tonight we are going in to the city to see Cirque du Soleil’s Zarkana at Radio City Music Hall. Should be fun! It’s always so hard to find a place to eat in the city when you don’t know the area well, so we’ll take the stress out of finding a place to eat and stop at Bobby Flay’s Burger Palace in Paramus.

We finally got a little rain last night when we least expected it. It was not predicted by our fair weather people. It poured and when it was over it had dropped 1/4 inch. Not bad considering we haven’t seen any rain at all for a couple of weeks. A welcome sight and sound indeed!

I’ve got some thoughts running around in my head and when I get the time to sit down and sort through them I’ll be sharing them here.

In the meantime, have a great week!

On Wednesday Rick took some time off work and we drove in to the city a little earlier than our dinner reservation to view the tree in Rockefeller Plaza.

A few months back I had purchased vouchers on Rue NYC to the restaurant Butter. (Rue La La is an online discounted designer site. They recently added Rue NYC and about four times per week or so I get discounted offers to restaurants, spas, etc. in New York City.)
The executive chef at Butter is one that Rick and I both are acquainted with from both our private screening of Chopped being filmed, and from watching the Food Network: Alex Guarnaschelli.

The vouchers were for a prix-fixe three course menu with wine pairings:

Cured Wild Salmon, Meyer Lemon Confit, Red Thumb Potatoes and Caviar :
Foxglove Chardonnay, 2010

Coq au Vin with All Natural Chicken or Seared Filet of Beef with Baby Carrots, Pancetta and truffled Sherry Dressing : Slingshot Cabernet Sauvignon

Dark Chocolate Cake, Creme Fraiche Ice Cream and Spiced Almond Brittle : Eilo Perrone Moscato D’Asti

I was so excited to tell you about the food that I am getting ahead of myself! First on to what we did before we ate.

We drove in to the city, leaving our house at around 2:30 p.m. The traffic was heavy and we finally arrived at the parking garage across the street from Butter at close to 4:00 p.m. We found the Subway and got on the B train uptown to Rockefeller Center, a ride of about 15 minutes. We walked out from all the subterranean shopping right next to the tree.

To us it looked smaller than the previous time we’ve seen it. It was very crowded in the plaza! Here are some scenes.

The ice skating rink (which had a line a mile long waiting to skate). Sorry for the blurry skaters but it’s hard taking photos at night when people are in motion.

A toy soldier.

Angels you have heard on high and the Rockefeller building.

Everyone was watching the ticking down of this clock projected on this building.

No one seemed to know what was going to happen. When time ran out a little movie began to play on the side of the building with bubbles floating up to pop against snowflakes. Okay, it was fun to watch but what was the point? We soon found out.

That building happened to be Saks Fifth Avenue and the little movie tied in with their window displays. A very odd little story played out window by window about different people and methods of making bubbles. The bubbles once made were routed up and out to the side of the building and let loose. Here are a few of the windows.

Not your normal Christmas fare! If we hadn’t walked over to look at the window displays the little movie would never had made any sense, or for that matter, the window displays would not have made sense either!

We then found our way back to our restaurant and arrived ahead of schedule. They were able to seat us anyway. The seating was intimate and by that I don’t mean we were off in a corner by ourselves. Other than the larger parties seated at booths around the sides of the dining room, most two person tables were placed within a few inches of each other. This led to interesting conversations with the people seated around us and also for delicate eavesdropping and observations.

The people across the way were doing a full tasting menu and were collecting glasses of wine quicker than they could drink them. There table was nothing but wine glasses! When their third course arrived and it was foie gras, I oohed and ahhhed. One man offered to trade me his foie gras for my steak. Who ever said New Yorkers were snobs?

The meal was delicious. Before our first course they brought out another course “compliments of the chef” that was a cream of butternut squash soup with a tiny bowl of popcorn on the side. I put some in as croutons, but the popcorn was better eaten on the side. It added a nice saltiness to the cream of the soup. Rick and I both decided to have the steak and I think we made a good choice. The steak was so huge I had to bring most of mine home. It was on a bed of braised baby carrots and what we think was bok choy. The steak had an almost-but-not-quite-burnt crust on it—delicious!! A glass of wine with each coarse was perfect and they matched the food well.

I asked our waiter if Chef Guarnaschelli was in the house and he said she was not. I wanted to know if the food we were eating had been overseen by her, but such was not the case that night. Probably off filming more Food Network segments!

We were home by 10:00 p.m. after a very enjoyable evening. Lucky girl, aren’t I to live so close to NYC?

I have more exciting events coming up that I can’t wait to share with you (one that requires me to go shopping for a “gown” for a black tie event in Beverly Hills!!) but that will have to wait until another day. Stay tuned ...

 

 

 

Last Saturday we drove into the city for the Chinatown Food & Culture Tour. This makes the third tour that we have taken with Foods of New York Tours. We did the Greenwich Village tour last year around this same time, and when my sister was here visiting in June we did the Chelsea Market tour. This time we invited neighbor Kim’s mom, Bea, to join us as she loves Chinese food and Kim does not! Of course, it was one of the hottest days in the heat wave that we’d been having.

We left early since our tickets said they did not recommend driving because the area was very busy and congested. It took us exactly one hour from our door to pulling into the parking garage. So much for leaving plenty of time! I think going on a Saturday was helpful because we encountered no problems.

Right from the start it was obvious we were in Chinatown. Everything was in Chinese! Of course it was in English as well, but the English was very tiny.

We were to meet our guide in Chatham Square (now also known as Kimlau Square) which turned out to be a short walk from our parking garage. It’s a very busy intersection with roads branching off from every aspect.

This statue of Lin Zexu stands in the square.

photo by Rick

Our first stop was Dim Sum Go Go just off the square.

At first look it appeared to be a fast food place as the name sort of implies. When I walked up to the window to look at the menu I saw lots of Michelin awards—one from every year for excellence. Once inside our guide directed upstairs to a large table overlooking the street and square. Air conditioning, yes!

I didn’t know that literally translated Dim Sum means “from the heart.” I also didn’t know that the first Dim Sum were created as a packet to hold medicinal remedies by a village doctor as an easy way to dispense medication to the sick. It later became popular in tea houses as a way to serve food to bring more people in.

Here was our first round: steamed Dim Sum. The white one that is crimped on top like a clutch purse is a duck dumpling; the pink one is a chicken dumpling (and my favorite of this group!); the round white one was a chive and shrimp dumpling and eaten last as a palette cleanser—very fresh and bright.

Are they not tiny works of art? Everything here is made to order. Nothing is ever frozen.

Our second round was a fried pork dumpling (in the back) and the very delicious steamed roast pork bun (the very white one). Yummy! (The dumpling in front half eaten is my chive and shrimp from the last round. I was slow eating.) Our guide described the wrapper for the roast pork bun as being a kind of extremely dense Wonder bread, so it was not a dough like the others were.

After this I was pretty full but I knew there was quite a bit more food to come. From here we did a short walking tour to help digest our food.

Chinatown was apparently a very seedy area of town at one time. Gang wars, opium dens, bordellos, gaming dens, saloons, etc. Doyers Street was famous for gang wars because of it’s abrupt turn. Anyone hiding around the bend could not be seen from the street creating a great place for an ambush. I love the streetlights here—they are shaped like lanterns.

There are also lots of underground tunnels in this part of town, now most of them blocked off and unused, that were used as quick and dirty exits from all the nefarious activities that once took place. We went down in one that is now taken over by businesses and shops in what is pretty cheap real estate.

Nom Wah Tea Parlor has been around since the 1920’s. Our guide told us that Woody Allen loves to come here every Wednesday.

We also learned that not everything is as it appears to be in Chinatown. This “restaurant,” The Gold Flower, is right next door to the tea parlor. However, it is not a restaurant at all. Behind those doors lies one of the trendiest bars in New York City: Apotheke!

According to our guide who has been there, all the staff members wear white lab coats and they claim to “serve prescriptions daily.” Prescriptions in this case being cocktails to match the mood you want to be in. The drink menu is creative and varied and the cocktails are listed under these categories: Health & Beauty, Stimulants, Stress Relievers, Pain Killers, Aphrodisiacs, Pharmaceuticals, Euphoric Enhancers, Therapeutic Treatments and House Remedies. Sounds like a fun time to me!

Another building masquerading as something it is not is this one at 37 Mott Street, “Mei Dick Barber Shop.” Don’t go here to get your hair cut. This is really a poker den.

Our next stop was Elite Health Products, a shop selling all kinds of Chinese herbs, teas,  and a colorful array of all things ceramic for tea. There were many strange things in large clear glass jars. Abalone, dried sea cucumbers, swallow nest, ginseng from Wisconsin (of all places). It turns out that Wisconsin has better ginseng than China does! Imagine that!

 

 

Now that we had digested our dim sum we were ready for our next food stop:

Once we were seated in this lovely little restaurant our guide proceeded to tell us the behind the scenes story of how they prepare the duck from start to finish. I won’t go into the whole thing here, but I was unaware of all the special preparation that went into making Peking Duck, Peking Duck. The quick and dirty explanation is: “First, air is first pumped into the duck to stretch and loosen the skin, and then boiled water is repeatedly spread over the bird, which is then carefully dried. The dried skin is rubbed all over with maltose and the duck is then roasted in a hot oven for a period of time until the meat is tender and the skin crispy.” I think there is a lot of controversy about how the birds are raised, like there is with foie gras. If you want to know more about what happens before it arrives at your table looking like the photo below of ours, follow this link.

Don’t be put off by the head and neck still being on the bird. As it turns out there was some sort of law in New York years ago that fowl could not be frozen with the head on, so leaving the head and neck on the bird was one way to prove your bird was fresh. The law is no longer in place but the tradition goes on.

It was carved table-side. First the crispy prized skin, then the meat.

 

He then folded the duck (crispy skin on top) along with cucumbers, scallions and a hoisin-based sauce into homemade pancakes. Delicious! I am getting hungry just telling you about it!

Then it was a walk around the streets to just look and observe.

 

 

 

 

Next stop was the ABC Restaurant where once again we sat down in a lovely air-conditioned dining room and more delicious food: a traditional Cantonese Roasted Eggplant dish and the yummiest fried rice I have ever had. By this time I was getting very full and wishing I could have eaten more but space was limited!

We sampled some iced plum tea at Ten Ren’s Tea Time and browsed the tea selection. Some were very pricey!

 

Our one and only sidewalk tasting was dessert. While our guide Burt ran across the road to Hon Cafe to pick up our Tiger Roll, we stayed in the shade under the awning of Ten Ren’s.

And so, with the consumption of our final tasting, our delightful tour of Chinatown was complete.

I hope I’ve inspired you to visit on your own or take the tour yourselves some day! I know we are going back very soon!