portugal: eating

Eating in Portugal is easy - all fish, all the time. Yes, you could have meat, but you are on the ocean! Enjoy it, I say. If it swam, we ate it - octopus (above), shrimp (below), clams, lobster, and a variety of local fish. Some culinary highlights included a fantastic lunch at Tasquinha do Oliviera in Evora, a delicious dinner at Agua na Boca in Salema, and super good bar food at Sol e Pesca in Lisbon.

Another speciality I should call out is a flaky egg custard called pastel de nata (below). We got ours from Pastèis de Belèm. As you can imagine, it was delicious.

©top and bottom photo by me. middle photo by Jeff via Instagram (@drinkeatlove)

pizza on the brain

Considering New York is known for pizza, I actually don't eat it very often (not for lack of wanting to though). But when Jeff was asked by Eater about his favorite pizza in the city, it seemed only right to make absolutely sure that he thought Keste was one of the best (along with Motorino, Roberta's and Franny's). See his complete feature here.

©photos by me

waffle time

Your eyes do not deceive you - that is indeed a waffle used as bread on a chicken, tomato and feta sandwich. Brooklyn, you think of everything.

the flushing food adventure

Inspired by this article, it became apparent that a trip to Flushing was in the future and it didn't take much to convince Jeff of the same. We started out at the Flushing Mall food court for noodles (below). To be honest, these weren't that exciting, so we hightailed to our next stop.

Along a window on Main St (at 40th) we had a delicious peking duck sandwich for $1 (below).

Further along Main (at 41st) is AA Plaza. The first window sold scallion pancakes ($1 each)...

 ...while the second sold pork bao (4 for $1.25). I made the mistake of not eating quickly enough, and lost my second bao to Jeff. Doh!

After a little confusion we found the food court of the Golden Mall and watched in awe as "Peter" proceeded to hand pull noodles at Lanzhou Handmade Noodles. He said it would take six months to teach us how to do it. Instead, we decided to enjoy a bowl of beef noodle soup ($5):

 All photos by me.

foods this weekend

Cooked: two pumpkin pies (above), crackers, edamame, red pepper and spiced carrots dips.

Enjoyed: cheese picnic in the park (above), classic nyc dinner, and dim sum.

What do you eat?

argentina: day seven and eight

Photo from here.
After our early flight from Neuquén, we arrived back in Buenos Aires and headed straight to San Telmo, a historic neighborhood full of antique shops and trendy boutiques. From the little I saw of Buenos Aires, this was by far my favorite neighborhood. There were so many beautiful passages, indoor markets and colonial buildings to gawk at.

Photo from here.

After lunch, we headed to my other favorite place in Buenos Aires - the Recoleta Cemetery. Recoleta is where Argentina's richest and most established patrons are buried and it's truly a beautiful place (seriously, I probably took two hundred photos, alas).

Photo from here.

We also visited El Ateneo (above), a bookstore housed in a former theater - incredible. For dinner, we went a great parilla out in Belgrano, Buenos Aires' Chinatown, which was culturally fascinating - doesn't matter where you go in the world, Chinatown is Chinatown.

Photo from here.

We returned to San Telmo for our last day. I could have easily spent all day wandering around the antique stalls. I bought two small paintings that I'll photograph once I'm able to again. We had a great lunch at Aldo's (below), saw a bit of the Bolivian parade, walked around Palermo and then it was time to head to the airport.

Photo from here.

Argentina - I'll see you again!

argentina: day five & six

Photo from here.
It warmed up a bit toward the end of our time in Bariloche, which made for a nice hike around Lago Gutiérrez. I spent the rest of the afternoon finishing up my book, taking advantage of the hotels' hot tub and going for a walk on the beach. We re-visited our favorite parilla for a dinner of lomo (filet), chorizo, morcilla (blood sausage), cerdo (pork) and of course, french fries.

The following day we packed up and travelled back to Neuquén only to discover that our flight to Buenos Aires had been cancelled, so we spent the night at an airport hotel and woke up at 4:30am to catch the first flight out.

staten island ferry

Took a sunset cruise on the Staten Island Ferry to get some killer Italian food.

All photos by me.

blue hill at stone barns

If you read this blog regularly (hi mom) you know that I love to eat, so Jeff and I were beyond excited to visit Blue Hill at Stone Barns, a culinary mecca about 45 minutes north of the city. We showed up early to explore the grounds, which were so so lovely. I don't have any pictures of the meal (it was pretty dark in the dining room - there is a nice flickr set here if you are curious), but I can assure you that it was one of the best I've ever had; everything was truly exceptional - from the food to the presentation to the wine to the service. I took a ton of pictures of the property - so there is a bit of a photo overload here. Enjoy!

All photos by me.

west 125th street

Met some friends for dinner at Dinosaur BBQ (not as good as Fette Sau, but still really good) and took a couple pictures at the intersection of West 125th and 12th Avenue - isn't the light nice?

All photos by me.

birth-date, day 2

Day 2 of the birth-date weekend couldn't have been more opposite than day 1. We spent the day seeing free art in Manhattan - in stores, office lobbies, restaurants and public spaces. Some of my favorites were the Ruan Hoffmann exhibit at the Anthropologie gallery at Rockefeller Center (above). We also visited the David LaChapelle piece at Lever House (these kinda look like the chains I have in my office....except with naked ladies..ha!).

 We ogled the mid-century beauty of the Four Seasons restaurant in the Seagram building:

 Another stop was to see Moveable Type in the New York Times building:

Additionally, we looked at the James Turrell installation at 505 5th Avenue and Jenny Holzer's work at 7 World Trade Center. I so recommended visiting some of these places - such a fun way to discover New York!

w.burg

Loving this map of my hood from they draw & travel...I've already been to a bunch of these places!
Check out their sister site they draw & cook.
Via NotVentures.

bombolino and james beard

My friend Dahlia is a nominee for a James Beard award for Best Pastry Chef. Besides being super friendly and awesome, she makes the best gelato I've ever tasted. Congrats Dahlia!

display only

You know, in case you were tempted.

what happens when

I can't remember where I originally read about What Happens When (New York, maybe?) but I was immediately intrigued by the concept - every thirty days, the menu, decor and sound change thematically. We were out on Sunday and happened to walk by (I guess that must happen pretty often in New York) and they happened to have an open table and we just so happened to have a lovely dinner. The current theme or "movement" as they called it was inspired by Renoir, specifically, the above painting. The food was French "garden party" inspired (I had the roasted chicken) and was truly delicious. Find out more here.

los angeles favorites: food (fancier edition)

Obviously, this is somewhat biased, but I really think that Mozza is the best restaurant that I have been to in LA (granted I get treated pretty well since my husband works there) - it's a bold statement, but I'm sticking to it. I've been pretty lucky to eat at a ton of amazing places this year and I also count Animal, Tasting Kitchen and Lou among my favorites.
Image from here.

los angeles favorites: food (cheaper edition)

Another easy category: food! For cheap eats, I love Tinga for slightly fancier Mexican and the El Chato truck for bargain basement $1 tacos. Another favorite is the tofu soup from So Kong Dong, and burgers from Golden State. As for farmer's markets, you really can't beat the selection at Hollywood, but due to the annoying factor of going there, I'm partial to my CSA.

tinga

Relatively new Tinga is pretty delicious, although I am somewhat swayed because it's both walkable from my apartment and reminds me of Nopalito. On a plus side, I really enjoyed the watermelon lemonade....

...their extremely spicy pibil tacos...

and the exterior Wooly Pockets!

The downside? No booze! And I didn't love the chicken taco, so don't get that one if you go.