popular demand

Ok, so after some deliberation and the encouragement of a few people (Will, Sari, Robyn), I finally got around to starting a blog. I used to blog quite regularly on livejournal but that was mainly a diary of my personal life and I got out of the habit of posting there when facebook came along. But in the last few months, I've come to realize that there are 2 things that I'm really passionate about, and if I had to tell anyone about myself (what I'm about, what my interests are, what defines me) it would be these 2 things: food & bellydance. So that's what this blog will be about - my adventures in eating and raqs sharqi, in other words, filling my belly, then dancing with it.

So after the past weekend, I gathered some good material for my debut entry! My family and I spent the Thanksgiving long weekend by shopping in New Jersey on Saturday, and seeing the sights in New York City on Sunday. In preparation for our day in NYC, I hit up all my go-to blogs to map out some good places to eat.

Our first stop on Sunday morning was some deli for brunch. I knew it had to be either Carnegie or Katz's. Despite A.Bourdain's reco for Katz's in The Nasty Bits, David Lebovitz's latest NYC post indicated he felt that the quality had faltered as per his recent patronage. So it was just as well that where we parked in the city was closer to Carnegie. From various accounts I knew that we had to get the corned beef and pastrami sandwiches, and that the portions were huge, so we ordered one of each to share between me, my parents and my brother. Our server asked if we wanted anything else, and we were about to get fries but she told us "onion rings are best here" so that's what we got!

pastrami meat mountain!

corned beef meat mountain (and pickles)

Our sandwiches came and as you can see, they were indeed huge! They came with extra slices of rye bread and pickles. Dijon mustard and ketchup bottles were on the table, and we dug in making ourselves sammies. Both corned beef and pastrami were served warm, and it was good to have both to alternate between. I can't decide which I liked better, the corned beef was a bit greasier (in a good way), but they were both really good! We ate til we were crazy full and still had enough leftovers to make 2 sandwiches which we had wrapped up.

nomming

Then we walked over to Momofuku Milk Bar (midtown location). We asked them to reserve some of their infamous Crack Pie for us to pick up later, then bought a half dozen cookies for us to snack on for the day. Based again on a David Lebovitz review, I chose to get 3 Compost Cookies and a Corn Cookie for my parents who love corn. I also took a chance on 2 Chocolate Chip/Cornflake/Marshmallow Cookies.

My parents ate the Corn Cookie right away - my mom always needs dessert, no matter what meal, and usually the same goes for me and my brother but we were still way too full from Carnegie. I did have a bite of the Corn Cookie and it was surprisingly delightful. It was like eating a soft shortbread cookie that sort of tastes bland when you first put it in your mouth, but then explodes with buttered sweet corn flavour (Robyn was spot on later when she said it tasted like Corn Pops - more on that below).

My brother and I didn't dig into the Compost Cookies til we worked up an appetite walking around Central Park. But when we did, ohhh baby. It was chewy, a lot like many bar cookie recipes, and packed with salty/sweet yumminess: chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, pretzels, potato chips, graham crumbs, and coffee grounds. The coffee grounds really make it, adding a really good round depth to the cookie. As soon as I had a bite, I turned to Chris and said, "Oh god. We need to go back and get more" and he nodded with his mouth full, even though we still had 4 cookies to go, LOL. So at the end of the day, before we headed back to our car and back to our hotel in New Jersey, we stopped by Milk Bar again to pick up my Crack Pie order and got a full dozen more of Compost & Corn Cookies. Yay!

in Central Park, about to eat my first Compost Cookie

The next day on the drive back home, we ate our leftover sandwiches from Carnegie, and I think they might have been even better after their overnight stint in the hotel fridge and then our cooler. I kinda wish we'd overdone ourselves and ordered another sandwich just so we'd have had more leftovers! Also on the drive home, my brother and I dove into the Chocolate Chip/Cornflake/Marshmallow Cookies. I guess I was a little apprehensive cuz I don't particularly like marshmallow, but these were awesome!! After my first bite I was like "Damn. We should have gotten more of these too!" It was very reminiscent of a Rice Krispie square and had a bit of a salty kick to it too (though not as overtly as the Compost Cookies).

As for the infamous Crack Pie, I didn't dig into that until tonight. I brought it over to Robyn's to share with her and my cousin Kristine, as well as the Compost and Corn Cookies! After a yummy dinner Robyn made for us (tacos and Spanish rice - so satisfying!) we each had a slice of The Pie. I can understand why they call it Crack... I can see myself mindlessly shoving forkfuls of it into my mouth and not realizing I'd eaten like half the pie. It was indeed a lot like a butter tart, as I'd read from several places, but a little smoother/silkier, enough so that Ate gave it a legitimate comparison to leche flan (or just "flan" if you're not Filipino). And the crushed oatmeal cookie crust gave it a nice contrast with its' crunchy texture and slightly salty flavour (again winning me over with the salty/sweet thing).

Crack Pie!

Ate & Robyn then tried the cookies, and Robyn made the very accurate Corn Cookie/Corn Pops observation. Great! I was so glad to share my Momofuku experience with them :)

momofuku = "lucky peach"

To make things even better, Robyn sent me off with a loot bag of gluten-free beer, peanut butter cookie dough, honey & raisin granola, and a book! LOL! I think I should visit more often!

So, that's my debut entry covering our visit to Carnegie Deli and Momofuku Milk Bar, but I think our dinner spot deserves its' own post. Next time!