High Line - Smart Tree

There are a few things I love about The High Line: 1) its proximity to Chelsea Market (and therefore a good picnic spot when weather's nice), 2) the greenery, and 3) art installations.

I decided to take advantage of the nice weather this Labor Day weekend to take a stroll along the High Line, and I was not disappointed.  There was a cute Smart car, or "Smart Tree," by Nari Ward -- a smart car refinished with tire treads and sprouting an apple tree from the roof.  This will be on display through March 2017.

            

NYC Poké Bowls Review

Poké bowls have finally made it to the east coast and have gotten quite popular over the past year.  I've been on a quest to try as many places as possible, so I figured I should share my favorites.

Chikarashi
In my opinion, Chikarashi has the best poké bowls.  Simple, but flavorful.  Fresh fish.  Sushi rice.  We tried the Sichuan chili salmon and the seared toro suji.  The salmon bowl was terrific, although the seared toro wasn't as amazing as I had hoped.  My friend also tried the goma shoyu tuna and really enjoyed that one.  Portion size is on the smaller side for the regular bowl.  They also have Dole whip for dessert, which is exciting for many, but I'm personally not a huge fan so didn't try.

Sichuan chili salmon: Scottish salmon, sichuan/sansho mayo, furikake, kyuri, shoyu daikon, katsuo panko

Seared toro suji: seared bluefin toro suji, shoyu, negi, lime zest, garlic chips

Pokéworks
I think second place goes to Pokéworks.  What's great about Pokéworks is the amount of customization you can do.  You can pick two types of fish for a regular bowl, or three for a large, and they have a large assortment of mix-ins, sauces, and toppings to choose from, which allows you to make it as simple or complex as you like.  Slight minus for normal rice and not sushi rice.

   


Sons of Thunder
Third place.  The fish is good quality, but they all come with standard salad greens (a bit weird, in my opinion), large chunks of cucumbers (as opposed to thinly sliced), seaweed salad, and tobiko.  There are a few other topping options, but not many.  Also slight minus for regular rice and not sushi rice.

Nikai (Treehaus, 2nd Fl)
This is my go-to poké bowl place during work.  They don't mix it for you, but it's a healthy portion of fish and mix-ins (avocado, seaweed salad, onions, shredded carrot, scallions, sesame), and once you add the sauce and mix on your own, it's pretty good.  No special toppings and only one sauce though.  But it is sushi rice!  That said, I actually prefer their sushi burrito, specifically the spicy tuna burrito, which has crab salad in it.  (P.S. The tuna bowl is good, but the salmon is not.)

NYC Babka Review

I love bread, and I love chocolate.  Put the two together, and obviously I love babka.  Here are the babkas I've tried and how they rank.

Breads Bakery
This is my personal favorite.  Not a traditional babka, as the dough here is laminated, but perhaps that's why I like it so much.  The dough is chewy and dense on the inside, slightly crispy on the outside, and deliciously buttery.  I'm not sure what secret sauce they put in it (extra butter?), but even after a few days, it's still good and not stale.  Breads only sells babka by the loaf (can't buy individual slices).



Russ and Daughters
A more traditional take on babka.  (I believe the babka here is actually from Greens, the "classic" NYC babka spot.)  The big winner here?  Babka ice cream sandwiches (even the ice cream has babka bits)!  That item alone is enough reason for me to go to Russ and Daughters.  (Of course I like the fish too, but this post is not about fish.)  Babka is offered either by the slice or loaf.



Sadelle's
Their babka is extra chocolately.  For a chocolate lover, that's usually a good thing (no such thing as too much chocolate), but I'm not sure the extra layer of chocolate on top actually benefits the babka in this instance.  The chocolate doesn't seem well-integrated into the rest of the pastry and feels caked on (and peels off easily).  Still tasty, but I personally prefer Breads or R&D.  Available by the slice or loaf.


Dough
Yes, Dough, the doughnut shop.  I recently learned that Dough sells "doughka," babka made with Dough's signature doughnut dough.  I was so excited to try it, I ordered one the day after I read about it.  Verdict?  This was probably the "lightest" that I've tried.  It was a good pastry and worth a try, but I think you should stick to the others if you are craving babka.  The doughka was not as well layered, and the dough was a bit crunchier and drier, possibly because I got it at the end of the day and it was no longer fresh.

Manila Social Club

Manila Social Club has been on my list for a while, and I finally got a chance to go for brunch.  We tried 4 things: French Toast Espesyal, Torta Talong (eggplant omelette), Short Rib Hash, and a special fried pork belly dish.

The French toast was delicious and crispy (it's deep-fried...), and you can't go wrong with ice cream on top.  Our favorite was probably the torta talong, the flavor was good, and the eggplant was perfectly cooked.  Unfortunately the two meat dishes were a bit of a disappointment though; decent, but nothing special.  Oh and the ube butter was delicious.  It was so good we ate all the bread.

look at that ube butter...

Special fried pork belly w/garlic rice and eggs

Torta talong - fire roasted eggplant omelette, garlic fried rice, tomatoes

Short Rib Hash w/pea shoot and radish salad

French Toast Espesyal w/macapuno ice cream, seasonal fruits

And here's some very Brooklyn street art we saw on the way there:

New Zealand

Despite the amount of time and effort required to travel to New Zealand (from the U.S.), it's become quite a popular tourist destination amongst my friends recently, and now having finally made the trip myself, I completely understand why.

My friends, husband, and I trekked out to New Zealand for about two weeks this past February.  We were only able to squeeze in the South Island this trip, but even then, it was barely enough time.  NZ looks so small on the map, but I was quite impressed by the vast and diverse landscapes -- we saw everything from beaches to glaciers.  The best way to see the country is probably to drive from city to city in order to fully appreciate the scenery.  There's also a wide range of activities to enjoy, ranging from extreme sports and adventures to leisurely strolls and scenic cruises.

Here are the spots we hit.

• Day 1: Arrived in Christchurch.  The city still hasn't really been rebuilt post-2011 earthquake, so there was not much to see.  It's still a major transportation hub though, and not a bad place to begin your journey and just take it easy for the first day.
• Day 2: We took the famous TranzAlpine Rail for a scenic train ride from Christchurch to Greymouth, then picked up our rental car and drove to Punakaiki.  The views along train ride were nice, but I wasn't blown away.  Perhaps part of the reason was because there were only a couple of open air trains to take pictures, but those got crowded very quickly.  It might have been nicer to just sit back and relax in our seats the whole time without worrying about getting good photos.  In Punakaiki, we saw the Pancake Rocks and Blowholes, and I was blown away by those views.  The rocks are eroded limestone, and they appear to have many thin, stacked layers, hence the "pancake" name.

• Day 3: We explored the Charleston GlowWorm Cave in Paparoa National Park.  We chose to walk through the cave, but the cave rafting option also sounded fun.  The upper level of the cave showcased impressive stalactites and stalagmites, and then we made it to a dark cavern to see the glowworms.  In order to really see the glowworms, it of course had to be pitch black, but that meant pictures don't really turn out.  I ended up with lots of black photos with white dots -- nothing at all like the neon green galaxies I saw on Google Images.  That said, our guide informed us that those cool photos you find online are all photoshopped, so it's clearly not my photography skills (or lack thereof)...

    

• Day 4: We bundled up and did a heli hike on Franz Josef Glacier.  This was my most anticipated activity, and it did not disappoint.  We had a bit of a scare in the morning, as it was quite foggy and there was a chance the trip would get cancelled, but fortunately the skies cleared in time for us to hop on the helicopter up.  It was beautiful on the glacier, and we had a lot of fun hiking around.  I wouldn't have minded some extra hiking though.  

view from helicopter

  

• Days 5-6: Queenstown, the adventure capital.  Up until this point, we'd been on the go to a new city everyday, so Queenstown felt like the first breather where we could relax and walk around town aimlessly.  Of course we had to have our fair share of adventure too though, and we all went whitewater rafting the first day.  This was only my second time whitewater rafting (first time was in Poconos), and I have to say, this was much more fun.  We somehow ended up with the honor of being the lead raft (no pressure at all!), and it was pretty fun(ny) watching all the other rafts attempt to make their way down/over/around particularly tough spots.  The next day some of us went for a bike ride around a pretty lake, (Lake Wakatipu?), while others played a round of golf.  Food was also great in Queenstown.  We had a nice dinner out at Botswana Butchery and got to compare and contrast two burger places for lunch (Fergburger and Devil Burger; Fergburger better, in case you're curious, but not sure it's worth the wait).

• Day 7: Fiordland, specifically Milford Sound.  Our tour included a drive through the Hollyford Valley, with scenic stops along  the way, including Mirror Lakes.  Then we hopped on a cruise through Milford Sound.  One of the first things I learned was that Milford Sound is not really a sound; it's a fjord.  (A fjord is created by a glacier, whereas a sound is created by a river.)  Cruising through Milford Sound (...I mean Fjord) was a very different experience than going through the Norwegian fjords.  The Norwegian fjords are larger and perhaps more majestic, but we were able to get much closer to the fjords in Milford; at one point, we even went (almost) right up to a waterfall.  And animal sightings (dolphins, seals) are always a plus!

           

• Day 8: We had a quiet next day in Lake Wanaka.  The drive over was beautiful, and after arriving, we stopped by a winery (with spectacular views, of course).  But there was pretty much nothing else to do; just take in the scenery and enjoy.

  

• Day 9: This was a bit of a failure.  We were supposed to do a glacier boat trip at Tasman/Mount Cook, but it was pouring so everything got cancelled.  We didn't stay in Tasman and went straight to Lake Hawea and Lake Tekapo next, where we had booked an observatory tour in the evening at Mt. John, but the skies were not clear, and that also got cancelled.  

• Day 10: We made a detour to Oamaru because I really wanted to see penguins.  On the way there, we stopped by the Moeraki Boulders for some pictures.  I have to say, the Moeraki Boulders look really cool in pictures, but the actual place was pretty smelly, and the sand along the beach was rather sticky and what I imagine quicksand to feel like.  But Oamaru turned out to be a pleasant surprise.  Before our evening viewing of the penguins, we stumbled across a New Zealand whiskey shop and enjoyed a nice flight and left with some tasty souvenirs.  Dinner at Riverstone Kitchen was also one of the best meals we had.  We were so excited by the menu that we literally ordered everything on the menu except for a soup and chicken dish, and then added the special too.  As for the actual penguins, they were adorable.  Oamaru is home to a colony of blue penguins, the smallest penguin species.  We watched them return home from work (aka fishing) in small groups, and they would make their way up the beach, climb the rocks, and return to their burrows.  The tide gradually rose and the waves got stronger, and when one of the last penguins got washed back out to sea (they're so small!), its fellow penguin friends all jumped back into the water to make sure they all safely made it back to shore together -- talk about camaraderie!  Unfortunately we weren't allowed to take any photos, as the light and sound from cameras and phones would disturb the penguins.  Cuteness overload!

  

• Day 11: This was our last full day in NZ, and we stopped by Akaroa for a harbor cruise to swim with Hector dolphins (smallest dolphin species with Mickey Mouse-looking fins) before returning to Christchurch.  While we did spot some dolphins, they were not in the mood for play and disappeared as soon as we went into the water.  By the way, that water was coooolld.  Wetsuits were not enough to keep us warm.  Could've used a down feather blanket or something.

So as you can see, we had a jam-packed itinerary, as our goal was to see as much as possible since we traveled so far already.  I would definitely love to make another trip some time to revisit some of our favorites and explore North Island as well as different places on South Island.

Molten Chocolate Cake Recipe

Recipe from Jean-Georges with instructional video here.

Ingredients (makes 4):

1/2 cup unsalted butter, plus more for buttering the molds
1/2 cup (4 ounces) bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped into small pieces
4 large eggs
1/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons flour, plus more for dusting the molds

Instructions

Melt butter in microwave.  Add chocolate and stir until melted.  Crack 2 eggs into a bowl, and add 2 more yolks (discard extra whites).  Add sugar and beat until light and thick, about 1 min.  Add egg mixture and 2 tsp flour to melted chocolate; beat until combined.  Butter and lightly flour 4 4-oz molds or ramekins.  Tap out excess flour.  Divide batter among molds.  Can refrigerate mixture up to 3 hours; just bring back to room temperature before baking.  When ready to bake, preheat oven to 450F.  Bake for 6-8min (better to undercook than overcook).  Let sit for 1 min.  Put a plate on top of ramekin and invert cake onto plate.  

Tiramisu Recipe

Ingredients

6 eggs, separated

6 tablespoons sugar

16 ounces mascarpone cheese

4 cups espresso coffee

Optional: ¼ cup Marsala wine (rum or amaretto can be substituted)

¼ cup cocoa powder

½ pint heavy cream, whipped

1 package Savoiardi (sugar coated Italian “lady fingers”)

Instructions

Separate egg yolks and whites.  Beat egg whites to a cloud, making a light meringue.  Add sugar to yolks and beat about 3 min to make a zambaglione (light yellow).  Add mascarpone to zambaglione and beat.  Fold in egg whites into mixture.  Fold whipped cream into mixture. Wet lady fingers in coffee, but be careful not to soak.  Layer biscuits to cover bottom of pan, spread cream over biscuits, sprinkle a layer of cocoa powder over the cream.  Repeat to make 2 layers.  Refrigerate at least 2 hours and up to 12 for maximum freshness.