Food, Festivals, Fireflies...

On Saturday, we decided to try a few food carts that Scott's been wanting to try.  We headed down to Madison Square Park to try the "Calexico" cart.  Calexico is Mexican food with a California influence.  We got off the subway stop and Scott says, "We may have to change our plans..."  I said, "Why is there a big line?"  Then I look to see a big street festival with food stands, etc.  We decide to check out the festival and taste some of the food.  We are of course drawn to the BBQ corn on the cob, fresh squeezed lemonade, and beef skewers.  We share everything just to get a taste of the festival.  One of the things I love about the city are the fun things you find along the way to where you are going. 

After the festival we found Calexico and it was very good.  They had a little seating area to eat your food which was nice.  After Calexico Scott wanted to try the "Waffles & Dinges" cart in Central Park.  So we headed up to central park so we could make it to the cart before it closed.  Scott ordered his waffle "the Belgian way" plain with no toppings.  Since he didn't use his free topping, I used his too and had mine with bananas and Belgian hot fudge.  They were both very good, though mine was very rich! 

We sat for a while on a bench and just people watched - one of my favorite things to do.  It was a nice night in the parks.  We had our first experience with fireflies which were so fun to see.  I could have watched them all night - they are very entertaining.  On our way to the subway station we were walking through the park  and watched a goose for a bit in the water. 

After the goose, we ran into the little carnival rides that they have there.  We didn't spend money to get in and ride, but just watched.  They had mostly kid rights so I think it would be more fun for the younger crowd. 

We made it to the train and were headed home and I thought, this is one of those nights where I love living in New York City:)

The Wariner's Came to Visit!

Our friends, Tarin and Danny graced us with their presence this past week!  It was a lot of fun!  We are sad to see them go...

I had to work and Scott had school but we were able to catch up with them most evenings.

Some of the highlights when we joined up, and just a warning most of these are restaurants: 

-Malecon (a Dominican restaurant by our apartment that serves rice, beans, and yummy rotisserie chicken)
-Eating seafood down at South Street Seaport right by the water.  The shrimp I had was so good:)
-Grimaldi's (a famous pizza place in Brooklyn)
-Walking across the Brooklyn Bridge towards Manhattan
-Rowboats at Central Park
-Seeing a million people dressed up in costumes in Central Park
-Shake Shack (hamburger place, good hamburger for New York)
-Levain Bakery (amazing cookies, featured on the Food Network multiple times)
-Yummy soup and rolls Scott made us on Sunday
-Jimmy Fallon on Monday (it was a lot of fun, cool to see how it is all put together)
-Another trip to Malecon, mmmmmm

Thanks Tarin and Danny it was fun to have you come stay with us!

Real Sandwich

It's called, "Bacon, lettuce, vine-ripened tomato, avocado double-decker on lightly toasted white bread, with mayo, salt, and pepper." Sorry, the recipe is a secret, and I can't give it away no matter how much you want it.

Family Visit!

My family went on a trip to visit my brother's mission in Canada. At the end of their trip they took some time to come to visit us! They came 2 weekends ago, and were here for about 4 days. It was so fun to see them! I may insert pictures stolen from their facebook pages later, or maybe not.

Some things we did:

Thursday- I met my family at their hotel in Times Square after I got off of work. We decided by request of my sister to head up near our apartment to go to Malecon (a Dominican restaurant in Washington Heights. Scott met up with us at the restaurant. We ate lots of chicken, rice and beans, beef, bread, flan, and tres leches cake. My dad was amazed at how cheap it was there! Scott and I can eat there for under $10.00 for the two of us. We then went to our apartment so my brother Cam could see where we lived.

Friday-Met at Central park by the Bethesda fountain. My brother Cody was amused by the saxophone performer. We rented rowboats and rode around in them for a while. It was really fun! We raced each other a bit, and just relaxed. After the rowboats as we were walking through the park, we ran into an area where there were a lot of tents set up. We soon realized that we had come upon a Korean festival. We heard some Korean music, and sampled Korean food. Most of it was good. We joked with Scott that he had planned going to it all along, and made it seem like an accident when we stumbled upon it. It really was an accident though which made it all the more fun. We walked by the Manhattan Temple and ate lunch nearby. We went to the MOMA which was fun. I love to see all the art, and also the crazy pieces people come up with. We then went to Times Square where my family was staying. We decided to get Ice Cream, so we picked up some custard from Shake Shack, yum. That night we went to "In the Heights," which is one of my favorite shows! If you don't live around here, and haven't heard of this broadway show... it's about Washington Heights which is the neighborhood we live in. It's a show about community, and has amazing music, dancing, and is very all around entertaining and funny. I was nervous about what they were going to think of the show. I really wanted them to like it since I did so much. It was a success! They loved it! I'm so glad. If you are ever in NYC and have a chance to see it, get tickets.

Saturday-We met down at Battery Park. We just walked around and watched performers. There was this one guy that was doing some sort of ritual before his show. Then he did all weird sorts of contortions with his body and eventually put himself into a small box. I thought it was disturbing, but he had a lot of spectators. We then walked through the financial district. We eventually rode the subway to the West Village where we went to "A Salt and Battery" which is an amazing fish and chips place. We bought the food and then ate at a park nearby. After that we walked to where there was shopping. We went to Macy's and just wandered around the store, going up each level to show my family how large it was. We found the furniture level which was nice because we were able to rest by "testing" out a lot of couches and chairs. My brothers split off to go to other stores and back to the hotel while me, Court, Mom, Dad and Scott walked around some more. We went to H&M and found some cute things there. Scott and Dad were good sports while waiting for us to be done shopping. We were then wandering back to the hotel where we ran into another street festival! This one was just a bunch of random stuff. We found yummy smoothies, and kettle corn. Later we tried to take my brothers back to the festival but it was already closing down. We found somewhere to sit, and hung out until dinner. That night we went to Virgil's BBQ, which was really good, and a lot of meat! It was my brother David's birthday so they brought out a dessert and sang to him.

Sunday-My family came over to our apartment in the morning for Crepes. We filled them with all sorts of things. We rode the subway to church. Then, we came home and had dinner. We enjoyed talking to each other and hanging out until my family had to go back to their hotel for the night.

Monday-I had to work on Monday, so I didn't get to hang out with my family the morning before they left.

It was very fun having them here! I love when family visits, come again soon!

A few pounds of potatoes...

I went to Target last night with a friend while she went to Costco and was excited to find that the new Target has more of a selection of food than the one I usually go to. I was shopping, and walked past where they had potatoes, and I thought, "Oh we need some red potatoes, I'll buy a 5 pound bag." I was excited when I got home that I was able to buy potatoes at Target. When Scott got home I showed him all of the stuff I bought, and showed him the potatoes. He looks at me and says,"but we already have potatoes." Then I said, "No we don't, remember we were at Costco and decided that the 10 pound bag of potatoes was too much...." Then Scott opened up the pantry and there was the 10 pound bag of red potatoes... I came to a realization that now we had 15 pounds of potatoes. I was not so excited about my find anymore... What are we going to do with 15 pounds of potatoes? Do you need any?

Taste of Chinatown!

Scott came up a fun date for Friday night. He put together a food tour of Chinatown for us to do. He planned 4 different places where we would go and try a little of something to eat at each place.

The first place was not in Chinatown but on the outskirts. Scott's been wanting to go to Donut Plant, and I've been there once before so we decided to make that our first stop. They close as soon as they are out of donuts, so we went there quick after I got off of work. We got a strawberry cake donut and a crème brûlée donut. We ate the strawberry donut on the way to the next place, and saved the crème brûlée for later when we got home. Picture further down on this post.

The next place we went to was a dumpling place. Dumplings are the same as potstickers, gyoza, etc. As we were walking toward the little store there was a line out the door, so we knew we were at a great place - Prosperity Dumpling! They sell their dumplings 5 for a dollar, what a deal! We took the dumplings to a little park to eat, and they did not disappoint!After dumplings we went to a Chinese restaurant, Big Wing Wong! They had the meat roasting so you could see it walking in. Scott loves the meat you can get with crispy skin. This was our main course stop so Scott got pork and rice, and I got a pork lo mein. It was really good, and way too much food! Each entree was very cheap but we could have gotten away with getting just one meal. Here's a picture of the hanging meat:

When we got home we ate our crème brûlée donut. It was really good! It was a small donut because it's very rich, mmmm...

It was a really fun night! We'll have to have a taste of every neighborhood in New York before we leave. Food is a great way to experience each unique part of the city:)

Our last stop was for ice cream at Chinatown Ice Cream Factory. They had interesting flavors like Black Sesame Seed, Taro Root, Lychee, etc. Scott tried some of the unique ones but we played it safe with Scott getting Mango, and me getting Coconut. I loved the coconut! It was so creamy with chunks of coconut throughout. Here are some pictures of the store and us with our ice cream:

Mandoo, Knicks Game, and a Lung Transplant...makes for an exciting night!

We had tickets to the Knicks vs. Jazz game Monday Night at Madison Square Garden. We decided on our way to the game that we should try out a Korean restaurant called Mandoo. Mandoo is the Korean version of potstickers, or Gyoza. Here's the sign, you can't see it very well.The front of the restaurant. It was a small little place but nicer than what I was expecting.Here's Scott eating a side dish of turnips while waiting for our mandoo. We ordered the pork and vegetable Mandoo--it was really good!

We ordered Bulgogi Bi Bim Bop for our main course. I think that's what it was called or something like that--Scott would know but he's not here to correct me right now :) It's rice with a bunch of vegetables a little meat, some egg, and some red pepper sauce. It came to our table sizzling and our server mixed it all up for us. He asked how spicy we wanted it, Scott said medium so it wouldn't be too hot for me but it still was pretty spicy, but good!
Then... off to the Knicks game! When we got to the game we had to keep going up all these escalators because our seats were at the very top. I thought we were going to be so high up but we really weren't. It's not like the delta center (ESA now) where it's pretty steep, it's just wider. So we actually had better seats than we thought---yay for cheap seats that you can still see from! We were excited to see the Jazz play! (no we didn't go to see the Knicks)
A picture of us in our seats

Right before the game

Scott with his binoculars---it was cool to look through them it was like you were sitting right on the court:)
A Canadian Flag was hanging right by the US Flag. I took a picture for my brother Cam on his mission in Canada--it made me think of him:) Yay Canada!On the way to the game I told Scott, I hope we see someone famous at the game... and we did! During a break in the game. The theme song to The Office started playing and there was a picture on the big screen of Kevin from the office and then it changed to a video of him in his seat at the game! I was excited! We looked through the binoculars until we found him. Sure enough we found him--and I took a picture from our seats. See it below, he's the guy with the bald head. We didn't get to meet him because he was seated in the special section and we weren't but I still think it was pretty cool!

So about the game---The Jazz were ahead by a good lead the whole time until the last quarter. At the end it was tied up and stressful... but... the Jazz ended up winning by 2 points! Yay! Good ending!

After the game we wanted to get out as fast as we could to avoid the crowds. As soon as the game ended we opened the door to the stairwell and ran down the stairs instead of taking the escalators. We got out so fast! A piece of advice--the stairs are quicker, most people won't use them. We got to the subway stop and we hear beeping coming from Scott's pocket.

Side Story: Scott's been holding a pager that the medical students rotate through carrying. It's a transplant pager so if a transplant needs to happen at the hospital whoever has the pager will get paged and get to go watch the transplant.

Back to the story....

Scott pulls out the pager and it's going off. We have to stop before going through the Subway gates for him to call the hospital. He talked to them and found out he needed to be at the hospital in an hour and he'd be watching a lung transplant. We rushed home, he changed into scrubs and he left to go. This was about 11:00 pm so I went to bed. At 6:00 am I get a call from Scott asking me to open the door. Needless to say, Scott didn't get much sleep last night:) I'll have him write all about it when he has some time.

Yeah...last night was a crazy night!

Family Visit

My parents and three of my siblings came out to visit us in NYC this past weekend! It was so fun to have them here! It was nice to be able to have something to do during the day. We did a lot of fun things, some things that I haven't done yet. We went to Lombardi's one night which is the original New York pizza place. It is really good! I got to go with my family on a shuttle tour while Scott was in class. It was fun to see a lot of the sights since I haven't seen some of them yet. My family got to see our apartment and neighborhood in Washington Heights. I'm sure if you ask any of them the will tell you that our neighborhood is quite different than Utah. We were able to go to a Dominican restaurant with them which they all enjoyed. The restaurant is called El Malecon which is just a short walk away. We also walked across the Brooklyn Bridge which was really cool! I'll have to go do it sometime at night. We went in the morning which was cool, but I think it would be fun with all of the lights. We went to Mary Poppins which was really good! The sets were cool! My brothers were also able to go to the Priesthood Session with Scott which they watched in the same building that the Manhatten temple is in. We did all of this in just a couple days along with a few more things I'm sure I missed! It was so good to see them! This weekend definitely wore me out---not used to doing that much in a short period of time. Now it is already getting boring around here. I miss them already! Come again soon!