I Heart New York

My birthday present was...tada...a trip to NYC with my husband. This is my 4th trip to NY, and those who know me well, know it is my favorite place. We left Saturday and are having a fabulous time! Our flight was fine and uneventful (besides my constant gasps at every little change in movement or sound - I don't like being in the air) and flew by with constant, uninterrupted conversation, a competitive round of the dot game, and the perusing of Sky Mall magazine. Might I recommend (my wish list) the chewy edges brownie pan, inflatable movie screen, portable microwave, nut butter maker, portable exercise bike, head spa massager, digital receipt scanner, and portable laptop table perfect for when I am on my back in bed.
After checking into our hotel at 10:30ish p.m., we headed down to Curly's Vegetarian Diner. If you get tired of me posting pictures of the meals I get excited about...STOP READING NOW. In fact, you might not want to read the rest of the week. Or just be really happy for me because I live in a state with NO vegetarian restaurants, and I'm commonly faced with having only iceberg lettuce salad to choose. We were really hungry and shared the tofu scrambler with spinach, salad, toast...
and curly fries with gravy - which, I think, is Ryan's new favorite food. He may frame this picture he loved them so much...

and a stack of pancakes with fruit plus "bacon" and sham. I LOVE breakfast food.

We enjoyed a leisurely walk back to our hotel, stopping through all the action at Union Square Park.

We are very happy with our hotel and our room on the 27th floor.

view from our floor - Central Park in the background

The next morning, after sleeping in as late as we wanted (about 9:30), we went to babycakes bakery in the lower east side, then walked around the area.

I chose the chocolate brownie cupcake, and Ryan chose lemon. We also shared a berry/cream biscuit. It was all yummy but a little too expensive.

We next headed to the Tompkins Square Park area, where we checked out Sustainable NYC, a really fun store, full of organic, local, fair trade, re-purposed/recycled, and biodegradable products and gifts. One of the things I bought was this wallet. I definitely loved this store.

Ryan, walking by farmers' market area at Tompkins Square Park

Lunch at Kate's Joint, where I've eaten several times before...we ordered the TLT (tofu, lettuce, tomato) and Southern Fried Cutlet sandwiches - both very similar but so good. The really fun thing about going to these restaurants with Ryan is ordering two things and always splitting them. It helps with having to narrow down such a difficult decision.

Accidentally wandered upon Washington Square Park, on our way to the "icecream" shop
The first all vegan icecream shop I've ever seen - Lulu's Sweet Apothecary. It was really cute with a broad choice of icecream flavors (which we got to sample!) to choose from. Just like Baskin Robbins. Complete with tiny little icecream spoons. :) No, I didn't eat both of those cones, even though that would have been a fair assessment. Ryan got rum raisin, and I got (SOFT-SERVE!!) cake batter/chocolate nut twist. It was REALLY good. Twist cones were always my favorite (dairy) thing, growing up. I was so excited about being in Lulu's, I remember I said, "They even have flurries!" Ryan asked, "What's a flurry?" "...it's...(as I start laughing) I don't know! But they have them!"
I just realized I got these pictures out of order, with good reason. I naturally would have assumed we ate the icecream AFTER lunch...not right before supper, as it actually happened...oops. After lunch, we went to see God of Carnage, starring James Gandolfini, Marcia Gay Harden, Hope Davis, and Jeff Daniels (you know, from Dumb and Dumber) on Broadway. I LOVE going to shows, and this one was very entertaining. It was Ryan's first Broadway show, and he really enjoyed it, as well.

We ate supper at Candle 79, an elegant, romantic, organic/vegan spot. We sat upstairs by the window, which was really nice. I must stress how nice it has been to just sit, talk, and take our time eating at a nice restaurant. Nachos for an appetizer. It's blurry, yes, but I didn't want to retake it. I wasn't going to even take the pictures in this restaurant, but by the time our food came, there weren't many people around us. Mostly just one young couple (weird how we're not a "young couple" anymore) who appeared to be on a date and smiled when I took the picture. Ryan apologetically said, "She really likes vegan food."

I got a seared seitan caesar salad, and Ryan ordered the Spring Harvest paella.

For dessert, Ryan ate the mixed berry crumble with chamomile "icecream." I had the chocolate peanut butter bliss. Clearly, I would pick whatever has chocolate and bliss in the title. When they brought it out, I thought it was the tiniest dessert I'd ever seen (but cute!). I think it was the BEST dessert I've ever put in my mouth.

Had another great day today (minus one new cardigan left in a taxi), which I'll write about tomorrow.