Jesus is everywhere

Can you see Jesus in the Kit Kat bar? (I can! well..maybe if i squint real hard)

Article here.

For the wino (or alcoholic) in all of us

Wine glass with a convenient reservoir — so you never have to pour for yourself!

Gravity defying! get more info on how this works here.

Brunch on a beautiful spring day

Cafe Colonial

Saturday was the first really warm day in the city and so Strawberry and I waited patiently for the outdoor seat at one of my favorite brunch spots, Cafe Colonial.

The warm weather was so nice after days of cold and rain. Unfortunately, my brunch was not as great. Strawberry had the cowboy rice at my recommendation while I had the grilled chicken sandwich with cheese.

Chicken was a bit dry and tough so I smothered it with the basil mayonnaise sauce and fresh salsa that came on the side just to add some moisture to each bite. The fries are a mixture of sweet potato and regular and were fine fries, nothing to marvel over.

The sandwich is a healthy alternative to eggs benedict or bacon and definitely does the job of filling you up, just not raveworthy. I, of course, ate everything

Cafe Colonial, 276 Elizabeth Street, New York, NY

For you Scrabble afficianados out there

Scrabble Cheez-It!

image taken by katebornstein

Not a joke but something really launched by Cheez it! See product details here.

Kingswood

Kingswood

Friday night there was a mini reunion of some good girl friends for good food and some fun. Kingswood was our destination. Owned by expat Aussies, the restaurant serves up American/Southeast Asian fare in a trendy beautiful space. It was very very crowded and the restaurant literally spilled out into the street. The most noticeable thing was that the decibel level in the place is ridiculously high and it is impossible to hear your friend without shouting. Additionally, the bar is so crowded, takes up the main center area of the restaurant and is jammed four people deep with trendy New Yorkers. Sadly, if you are one of the unfortunate ones to sit with your back to the bar, you WILL be pushed and shoved by the bar patrons.

The food was not as irritating as I expected from a trendy NY restaurant where often times taste takes a back burner to the trendy appeal and scene.

I started with the tuna belly appetizer.

Incredibly soft perfectly seasoned pieces of sliced tuna belly sat on a bed of wonderfully dressed watercress. The tuna was so velvety smooth and rich I couldn’t believe it was tuna as tuna is typically a lean fish. I suppose the fact that it was tuna belly contributed to the decadent consistency of the fish. The richness of the fish was well cut by the acidity of the watercress salad. The plate was very well balanced.

I had the scallops for my main course.

Three succulent scallops sat above baby bock choy and were garnished with a thinly slice crouton. The scallops were plump and perfectly cooked. Again, they were perfectly seasoned.

Some other plates that appeared on our table was the mushroom risotto (cheesy, smooth and earthy) and curry coconut mussels (strong curry taste, good but not my favorite as it was garnished with alot of cilantro and I hate anything cilantro).

The meal was very good. Not only was I surprised but I would even go so far as to say this was one of the better meals I’ve had in New York City.

I hear the hamburger and the braised lamb shank is amazing at Kingswood, along with their mac and cheese and truffled fries. I will be back — most likely on an off night and NOT a Friday night however.

Kingswood, 121 West 10th Street, New York, NY

This is kinda cool!

Juice boxes that look like the fruit they contain!  They have realistic skin textures — feels and looks like the actual fruit. Check out the kiwi one.

Created by Japanese industrial designer Naoto Fukasawa, the juice box’s packaging is supposed to be more appealing to the eye by imitating the actual fruit they contain.

As Naoto puts it; “I imagined that if the surface of the package imitated the colour and texture of the fruit skin, then the object would reproduce the feeling of the real skin.”

See more pics here.

Flatbread heaven

The Orchard

My friend Chicken’s loft is currently being renovated and so she is staying three blocks away from me in a suite at the Hotel Rivington for a month.  This is so great because we hang out often and eat out alot together so the convenience of having her around the corner is a real treat.  We met for dinner last night and decided to try out The Orchard restaurant.

When you walk in, the first thing you notice is EVERYTHING is washed in this orange light. It’s somewhat warm and comforting and strange and bizarre all at the same time.  With that said all the pictures I took came out muted and orange….not the most appetizing of colors.  So the pictures in this post have been grabbed from the Internet.

We were feeling extremely gluttonous last night so we decided to share three appetizers.  We had the steak tartare flatbread which was very good. It sat on a thinly sliced potato, layered on top by a delicious steak tartare, shaved parmesan and garnished with flat leaf parsley.  The potato was surprising to the both of us as we’ve never been served steak tartare with potato but it actually worked.  It added a nice warmth and substance to the raw meat.

We also had the braised short ribs flatbread.

image taken from isitonthelist.wordpress.com

Sweet braised short ribs sat on crispy flatbread and topped with diced tomatoes tossed in a mayonnaise vinegar sauce which did well to cut the smokey sweetness in the meat.  I thought it worked very well and was my favorite of the two flatbread apps.

The last appetizer to round out our trio was the tuna tartare.

image taken from NYCnosh on Flickr

The tartare was served with a side of creamy guacamole and chive infused sour cream.  The unique aspect of this dish is it was served with these deliciously mealy fried plaintains sprinkled with sea salt.  You add a little bit of this, a little bit of that and you have a crunchy, creamy, salty experience. The tuna tartare here is quite good…one of the best I must say.

For main courses we opted to have the same pasta dish, the cavatelli with crispy pancetta, tomatoes and avocado (!!!!!) in a light cream sauce.

image taken from isitonthelist.wordpress.com

Chicken LOVED this dish. She especially liked the avocado.  I would have liked this plate a lot more minus the avocado.  The pasta was cooked al dente and the tomatoes were deliciously garlicky but the combination of the cooked tomatoes plus the cream sauce plus the warm avocado was too much for me to handle all together.  It all melded together to create a sort of mush.  Everything on the plate minus the crispy pancetta garnish had the same texture to it.  I would not have this dish again.

I would however come back to The Orchard and share a bunch of appetizers and flatbreads.  We were concerned at first because the restaurant was quite empty when we walked in but the food was surprisingly delicious.  I will be back for sure, esp since it’s 2 blocks from home.

The Orchard, 162 Orchard Street, New York, NY

A delicious AND healthy meal

Soba Totto

Friday night I went to dinner with SFAM at Soba Totto in Midtown. Soba Totto has several sisters in the neighborhood, one of which I loved: Aburiya Kinnosuke. Soba Totto has a wide variety of yakitori cooked over charcoal but specializes in its soba flown in from Japan and made fresh daily.

We started with the homemade tofu. It comes with sea salt, fresh ginger, chopped chives and bonito flakes (dry fish) as toppings.

The tofu tastes like flavorless cream. It’s incredibly velvety and smooth with a mild soybean flavor. It’s bland and yet tasty at the same time, if that makes sense. I am not a fan of bonito flakes as I find the flavor a bit too smokey so I opted to eat my tofu with the chives and sea salt.

Next we had the salad with chicken breast.

The salad is your basic mixed greens with sliced chicken breast but what made this salad so delicious was the dressing. It tasted like it was made of sesame oil, miso and avocado. I would buy bottle of this dressing if they sold it on the premises.

Since Soba Totto has a wide variety of yakitori (including very Japanese skewers like chicken knee bone and chicken heart), we opted to share the steak, asparagus wrapped in bacon and chicken breast.

The skewers are cooked over charcoal and were good but nothing extraordinary. They taste as you would expect: smokey chicken, smokey grilled steak and asparagus wrapped in bacon. As you know I do enjoy offal and have an adventurous palate so I wanted to try the chicken knee bone and heart but surprisingly they were out of them!

We also each had the chicken meatball. I had the chicken meatball with sauce and SFAM had it with just a dressing of sea salt.

The chicken meatballs were my favorite at Aburiya and they were my favorite at Soba Totto. The meat is moist and tender. The dressing is a a sweet teriyaki that is well complimented by the smokey aftertaste. I could eat 5 more of these things.

A good thing about these skewers is that they are only about $2-3 each so one can try a variety without worrying about breaking the bank.

Finally we had the homemade soba served cold in the most basic way of eating soba: dipped in a cold broth with grated radish.

OH MY GOD, I wish I got the large portion. The soba is so good — it has the right bite you need with soba and it has a very clean light taste to it. The radish and scallions clung to the strands and brightened up the flavors with each bite.

After my empty soba bowl was taken away, the waitress brings you a small cup of the water that the soba was cooked in. You are supposed to then pour the soba water into the dipping sauce thus creating a nice light soup to end the meal.

I was full but not overly full and not in the “I just ate an entire McDonald’s meal and feel sick to my stomach” full. It was a healthy light and tasty meal. Everything tasted clean and fresh AND this entire meal believe it or not only cost $55 total!!

So which sister do I prefer, Aburiya or Soba Totto? Although Soba Totto was good, I did enjoy the food at Aburiya more.  They both serve homemade tofu and yakitori but I just like the menu options at Aburiya more — like the noodles cooked in clay pot and the slow braised pork belly.

Soba Totto, 211 E. 43rd Street, New York, NY

Cutest spoon I’ve ever seen

I thought this was so adorable! It’s a children’s book about an insecure spoon who thinks his life is less exciting than his friends Fork, Chopstick or Knife but later realizes that he has his own unique strengths.

Here’s his family

Self realization that it’s great to be a spoon

Buy your copy of Spoon.

Oh my goodness…Bacon CAN really be put on everything

These are the same ppl that brought you Baconnaise and Bacon Salt.  It’s not on the shelves yet but read more about it here.