Saturday, November 15, 2008

Fun night out in NY (Friday)

Wow, another awesome weekend in NY! It never gets old. I do miss it a lot (I lived there for 3 years after graduating from college) and visiting it brings up a lot of fun memories. Being a tourist, however, does have a lot of positives too. I went to bakeries and restaurants this weekend I've never been to despite living minutes away from them, just because I thought I could go there any day... Anyways, I have a lot to share about this wonderful weekend of fun and food (!), so I'll spread my recap over a few posts just to not overwhelm you too much :D So I'll start with Friday night...

After blogging on Friday evening from my sister's apartment, we headed straight to dinner. We were craving nothing in particular so when my sister and her boyfriend suggested a tapas place down the street, it sounded like fun! We ended up at Paladar, a Pan-latino restaurant and immediately ordered some drinks :)



My first (of 2) sangria:



While we were waiting for the drinks and our order to be taken, the waiter served us some yummy tortilla chips with a black bean and a cheakpea dips. I had about 5 chips... they were awesome and I was a little hungry...



For dinner we decided to go with some tapas over large entrees. I started with a seasonal salad that sounded just way too good to pass up: Ensalada de Calabaza - Roasted pumpkin, walnuts and Cabrales cheese over bitter greens with pomegranate vinaigrette.



The salad was very salty and the Cabrales cheese I've never heard of before, but it was basically a blue cheese (which I don't like). I picked off all the roasted pumpkin (best ever!), walnuts and some pomegranate seeds... and ate some of the greens. It was still a nice starter :)

We also got 4 tapas to share. We were afraid it was maybe a little too much food (apparently the waiter gave my husband a look when he was ordering, like "Are you crazy ordering that much food?" I didn't see it, and with my super onion hatred, I knew some of the dishes may be uneatable, so it was ok to have some variety. Here is the spread:

Marinero - Fish, habanero, lemon & citrus segments:



I didn't even touch this because my husband said it was extremely onion-tasting. It's ok, we had 3 other dishes to choose from, no biggie...

Next up, Costillas 'LES' Pork spare ribs with guava BBQ sauce, served with mango, jicama & cabbage slaw



This was the best dish! I had one of the smaller ribs and a bunch of the slaw. Very flavorful and onion free :)

Arepas Venezuelan corn cakes topped with caramelized onions and roasted duck (I'm making up this description because it's not online but that's basically what it was... except it didn't mention the onions in the description otherwise of course I wouldn't have ordered it).



I ate one of the cakes (dry) after discovering the onions (and removing them) + a little chunk of the duck that was over it. No bad.

Lastly, Tacos de Pescado Marinated swordfish with chipotle-lime glaze, avocado & mango salsa



Not a bad dish. I picked at the fish and ate one of the tortillas.

And then I was going to have dessert but my husband needed an energy drink asap! (We're getting old, I think!). So we took the check, got him a Monster and then went for a search of dessert for me. I can't finish a meal without dessert. It's kind of a problem.

After a lot walking around, looking for a place that would "speak to me" (yeah, I'm weird) we ended up going to a little deli/bakery and ordered a pain au chocolat (it was still warm out of the oven).



It did the trick and I finally was ready to go to the club my sister's boyfriend was spinning at (Citric).

I had a vodka tonic there, one of my stand-by drinks.



This was followed by a bottle of water. I was planning to alternate between alcoholic drinks and water, but we actually ended up heading home after this round. It was a little after 1am and since we were up since 6am, we were beat. I told you I'm getting old! :D

That's that for our Friday night. Another post coming up on Saturday activities, which included an awesome brunch, a self-guided cookie tour, a fancy dinner + drinks with friends... a perfect day, really :) And then the recap of Sunday's brunch and dinner. Thanks for all your comments while I was gone!

2 comments:

Anon said...

that pain au chocolat looks amazing. chocolate filled croissants are my favvvvorite pastries. looks like you have a blast. i hope to live in nyc some day..

Anonymous said...

that sangria looks faaaabulous!