Our normally low-key weekend routine got a burst of excitement when a friend of mine from college came to town for a wedding. Since she lived in New York for a few years, we dispensed with any touristy stuff and focused on food:
1. Did a macaron tasting on Saturday morning: La Maison du Chocolat versus Laduree. The winner: Laduree, hands down. You can barely taste the cookie at M du C--it's completely overpowered by the chocolate filling. (Also: passionfruit filling + chocolate filling = extreme disappointment.)
2. The visiting friend introduced me to a very good Thai place near Union Square (which I had previously thought was populated only by totally unaffordable places).
3. Sunday brunch at the Museum of Art and Design was very good, except that my omelet looked like something that you'd be served on a Delta flight. It had a suspiciously uniform shape, and Jakub and my friend suggested that it had been formed in a MECHANICAL OMELET MAKER. Outrageous. (Why do these exist? More importantly, why is an upscale place using them to turn out omelets?) It tasted fine, but looked like a silicone potholder.
4. I made the cinnamon shortbread posted in the epic T&T cookie thread--very, very good! The thinner you roll it out, the better it tastes.
5. Am otherwise completely behind on holiday baking. Friends of ours declined to get together this weekend, because they were doing lots of holiday baking, which means that I need to get cracking.
6. We still have a lot of turkey in the freezer, but I've learned to take the long-tail view on turkey--you can eat it with nostalgia for the first week or so after Thanksgiving, and then you need to start introducing longer and longer intervals in between leftover concoctions, lest your household mutiny and order takeout without consulting you. I violated this rule and debuted Turkey Quiche too soon last week.
1. Did a macaron tasting on Saturday morning: La Maison du Chocolat versus Laduree. The winner: Laduree, hands down. You can barely taste the cookie at M du C--it's completely overpowered by the chocolate filling. (Also: passionfruit filling + chocolate filling = extreme disappointment.)
2. The visiting friend introduced me to a very good Thai place near Union Square (which I had previously thought was populated only by totally unaffordable places).
3. Sunday brunch at the Museum of Art and Design was very good, except that my omelet looked like something that you'd be served on a Delta flight. It had a suspiciously uniform shape, and Jakub and my friend suggested that it had been formed in a MECHANICAL OMELET MAKER. Outrageous. (Why do these exist? More importantly, why is an upscale place using them to turn out omelets?) It tasted fine, but looked like a silicone potholder.
4. I made the cinnamon shortbread posted in the epic T&T cookie thread--very, very good! The thinner you roll it out, the better it tastes.
5. Am otherwise completely behind on holiday baking. Friends of ours declined to get together this weekend, because they were doing lots of holiday baking, which means that I need to get cracking.
6. We still have a lot of turkey in the freezer, but I've learned to take the long-tail view on turkey--you can eat it with nostalgia for the first week or so after Thanksgiving, and then you need to start introducing longer and longer intervals in between leftover concoctions, lest your household mutiny and order takeout without consulting you. I violated this rule and debuted Turkey Quiche too soon last week.