Food n Love

"Good food ends with good talk." -Geoffrey Neighbor

Tag Archives: #nyc


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Opps I Spilled It Again

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Anyone who really knows me, yet still agrees to meet up with me for a bite to eat, really loves me. Why? Well because I’m a disaster when it comes to food. Like the time my when my parents took me out my senior year in college to a classy high end restaurant for a pre-graduation celebration. That particular evening out I accidentally upset the decadent perfectly arranged silver polished dessert tray leaving all of the cake frostings smudged. I still remember my father shaking his head over that one. Or another time, just a month ago when one would think I would be older & wiser about making a mess, but I accidentally sloshed my Starbucks hot chocolate across the front of my new mint green blouse just prior to heading over to a friend’s engagement party. Of course no one bothered to mention this eye sore which means I was walking around the entire evening blissfully ignorant of the stain in the center of my chest. I mean who actually bothers to walk around looking down at their shirt front? Someone could have said something….. Imagine my chagrin & displeasure when I arrived home & took off my blouse to discover the hot chocolate stain, which thank God, did wash out – yay!

 

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All this to tell what brings me to the point of this whole story. Kate. Now Kate is one of the most beautiful souls I know, a true friend who proved her friendship once again when we met up for lunch the other Saturday. Originally the plan was to go to Alice’s Tea Cup on East 64th Street & enjoy a nice afternoon tea, sandwiches & scones. Clearly neither of us thought our plan through because it was a beautiful warm & sunny Saturday which meant every New Yorker who had spring fever was out & about with about half of the city’s population deciding they wanted to visit Alice’s too. Since my stomach was practically eating itself with hunger, a two hour wait for a table was totally unacceptable. We ended up walking down to Mon Petit Cafe at East 62nd. Even though the cafe was buzzing, we were quickly seated at a table with a pastel colored flower arrangement decorating it next to a fresh white lace curtain.

Part way through our girl talk, the inevitable happened. Yup. I made a mess. A leaf of salad decided to be rebellious & fall off my fork & land salad dressing side down on my shirt leaving three small, yet noticeable oily green smudges. About 10 minutes later I heard Kate say “uh oh” as she sadly looked down at her pretty white with black polkadot blouse.

“Now we really are friends,” she laughed as she dabbed at the tiny Beef Bourguignon stains speckling it.

“Awww thanks Kate. Only a true friend would stain her shirt so I wouldn’t feel bad about my shirt.” I winked. We laugh, but I feel sorry about her lovely blouse. However, in the grand scheme of life, food stains are minor & a good friend & conversation over a yummy brunch is really what matters! That & of course a post lunch girl’s window shopping adventure through Bloomingdale’s shoe department.

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Eat – Walk – Talk

Anyone who has ever visited me will tell you our city adventures consist of two things.  One – lots of walking.  Two – all that walking leads to a meal or at least something tasty to snack on.  Now you would think when my 77 year old father, stiff with arthritis, limped his way off the bus at Port Authority on a Friday evening for a weekend visit, that I would modify the usual routine.  But alas, it was my father’s fate to move his aching hips around NYC while eating delectable meals in between sight seeing.

Since we were practically right there, we started his weekend off with a quick spin through Times Square.  Well, technically we moved as quickly as one can through a mob of gawking tourists packed like sardines on a tiny radius of cement.  From there we hopped onto the R train & headed down to SoHo.  Now my father couldn’t have cared less about seeing the stores in SoHo, but he was hungry & there is this yummy place in that neighborhood called Spring Street Natural.  It serves food that tastes too good to be healthy, but believe it or not it is.  They advertise as being “Gluten-free friendly, Vegan friendly & kid friendly” not to mention they served me up a spiced cajun snapper fish that I’m still dreaming about at night!  Dad & I split a bottle of organic ginger soda & chowed down.  Of course because the food was yum, we talked.

The next morning we were up early, walked a ways to the train station & took the Q line into downtown Brooklyn where we did more walking.  Now I don’t eat red meat that often, but I do have a thing for a slightly salty Shake Shack burger on one of their fresh tasty buns every now & then.  So after a meeting at my church we headed there to get take out.  It was a 10 minute walk from Shake Shack to the Brooklyn Promenade, but by this point my father had accepted the fact that he was expected to move it, move it around town.  He finally stopped asking how many more blocks to our destination.  And because the burgers & fries were good, we did some more leisurely talking on a park bench.

 

Another walk & another train ride took us to MOMA.  Since looking at art made us thirsty, I decided dad needed to experience the papaya juice at Papaya King near West 4th.

Sitting on a park bench in Washington Square Park while listening to jazz & doing more talking worked up our appetites.  The only logical thing to do of course was eat dinner at a nearby restaurant called Cuba.  It also happens to be my favorite restaurant in the whole city.  I’ve taken everyone from family to dates to my girls to this spot simply because every meal I’ve ever had there has been way too good.  Plus what’s not to like about listening to happy Spanish music while you eat?  Yup, you guessed it.  The rice & beans that accompanied my fish dinner were out of this world.  Naturally, dad & I kept our conversation going.

 

You would think we’d be finished pigging out after dinner, but nope.  On our walk up University Place to Union Square, the Italian ice cream spot we strolled past pretty much dragged us kicking & screaming inside & forced us to buy ice cream cones.

Now what kind of daughter would I be if I didn’t make my father walk to get a slice of NYC pizza before driving him back to Port Authority & sending him home to my mother?  Not a very good one.  By lunch time on Sunday, dad had walked his hip joints so much they’d loosened up & he hustled to get that pizza like he was 20 years young.

When I think back on his visit a year later, it wasn’t the sights or food that made our time together so much fun.  It was all the talking we did.  Now if I’m a grown woman & I love spending time talking with my father, how much more do children & teenagers need fathers who they can talk to?  It sure is hard to beat a good conversation & a father’s love.  Good times 🙂