New York was lovely for eating this time around, even though a steady rain couldn’t help but creep down and try to dampen everyone’s Independence Day celebrations. For my part, I skipped the fireworks and instead headed to Chikalicious, where the line starts outside the door and winds down the sidewalk on busy nights. Once admitted, you sit at a sushi-style bar, watching Chika and her assistants prepare a multi-course dessert for you. A fixed prix of $12 buys an amuse (coconut ice cream in watermelon soup), a main dessert (honey semifreddo in strawberry soup with a crackly sugar lace crisp) and petit fours (coconut marshmallows, chocolate-lavender truffles, and mango-lime paté de fruit). It was very fun to get such a unique tasting, and really made me wish I could open my own little dessert bar! The only slightly strange bit was that Chika and her assistants did not encourage conversation, which seemed odd to me, given they were all nearly within touching distance. I suppose a sushi chef doesn’t normally converse with his patrons either, but one expects dessert to be a somewhat more lively affair. Still, it didn’t affect my enjoyment of the place, and I definitely plan to go back. There’s also a Chikalicious “dessert club” across the street that sells ice cream, pudding, cupcakes, and other small bites, including an outstanding green apple sorbet.
We walked around quite a bit in and about Union Square where the market was in full swing. So many delicious things to see there! The bright stacks of carrots and radishes everywhere were particularly thrilling to the eye. We bought some sour cherry “stomp”, a sort of ciderlike drink from Red Jacket Orchards, which was wildly tart and refreshing.
In the Union Square area, City Bakery is a perfect pit-stop place for a lunch under $10. It has a winning combination of build-your-own-plate from a gorgeous breakfast/salad/hot bar along with a beautiful selection of cookies, scones, croissants, and other freshly baked comfort foods. I noticed that the tall, lean yoga ladies strode past this section of luscious goodies without even a cursory glance, while I myself could hardly look away.
On another day, an even longer walk past Chinatown to the Lower East Side led us to an extremely dangerous place called Il Laboratorio del Gelato, where they serve wickedly good flavors such as red grape, nectarine, mascarpone, pistachio, honey lavender, and others, among them the most diabolical of them all: salted caramel. This concoction was so powerful that, immediately after eating my modest cup, I was forced…forced I tell you, to go back and order more, eating all they had left. I think maybe it should be illegal; the stuff was just phenomenally good. Of course I now want to try making it at home, but then I may never leave the house.
Once again, I didn’t make it to Payard (must it always be closed when I’m there? I’m starting to wonder about conspiracies), but all was forgiven with the help of Korean BBQ, moules frites, 25 pounds of books from Strand, and a fun, voyeuristic dinner at Hearth (the kitchen is open so you can watch everything).
I think my palate is fully recovered now, which is fortunate: my flat of sour cherries came in while I was away. I now have 7 pounds of cherries that need to be made into something good, pronto. Tomorrow is the jam session, updates to follow!
Looks like you had a lot of food. Those photos you took look delicious, all that food…yum! Thankfully, I’ll be living on the East Coast in just a few weeks…so I might be able to check out some of these spots :D.
July 13th, 2008 at 8:46 pm