Taking a bite of the Big Apple

Let´s see if I can remember with it being so long ago!! When my boyfriend´s parents visited us, we also went to New York for four days. It was our first time there and everything was amazing. We did the usual tourist attractions, going up the Empire State building around dusk to see all the city lit up, the Rockefellar Centre, Times Square with all the neon lights flashing. It´s definitely an unforgettable sight. Unfortunately, we didn´t make it to a Broadway show (all the more reason to go again!) but for a slice of real Americana and the next best thing, is the Stardust Diner. It´s a typical diner from the 1950's, evoking memories of Grease and Happy Days. The food is all American comfort food and family favourites, from hamburgers, meatloaf, reubens to milkshakes, pies and ice cream sundaes and floats. I think my boyfriend and I had hamburgers and fries and shared a slice of cherry pie with ice cream (my new fav pie/dessert). The food is hearty and homemade and certainly fits the bill if you are looking for a real American experience. Throughout the meal, the waiting staff put on a good show, constantly bursting into popular songs, such as Man I Feel Like A Woman, in between serving, and creating a feel-good vibe.

We also took the ferry to the Statue of Liberty and walked the grounds of the Statue of Liberty, then boarded the ferry to Ellis Island and visited the Museum of Immigrants, which was very interesting. We then walked round the Financial District and Wall St, and paid our respects at Ground Zero. We also visited Chinatown and saw a strange-looking fruit, a Jack fruit, which I´ve never seen before (pictured below).

I didn´t get round to trying it though. Chinatown is also home to the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory and I couldn´t resist trying one. Among the many exotic flavours were green tea, black sesame and lychee and after a difficult decision, I finally settled on the lychee flavoured ice cream. It was delicious although I couldn´t really taste the lychees, it tasted just like vanilla ice cream to me! We also passed through Little Italy, apparently very reminiscent of scenes from the Godfather.

We had our evening meal in an Italian restaurant called Pasta Lovers or something similar, which was quite close to our hotel (We were very near Times Square, which was very handy!). I had pasta (of course) with Italian sausage and a tomato based sauce. I can´t remember what everyone else had but everything was pretty tasty.

In my opinion, the best meal of all was a little French-style bistro(I think it was called Balthazar ) in SoHo we came across. It was a very popular place as it was crowded and we had to wait to be seated. The worst thing about it was the noise, it was far too noisy. You could hardly hear yourself think. We had snails to start (well, I couldn´t quite bring myself to eat more than one, so I just mopped up the garlicy juices with the French style breads they brought to accompany it!), I had duck confit with potatoes and my boyfriend had halibut en papilotte (if I remember correctly!) We shared a tarte tatin between us. Everything was absolutely delicious and definitely has my thumbs up, just try to go on a less busy night!