Eating and Shopping in NYC

For Presidents' Day, Raisin Bread and I spent the long weekend in NYC for a combined Christmas and Valentine's Day present. Since moving to DC two and a half years ago, I have not purchased much in the way of clothing, mostly due to a lack of time, so my sweet husband decided to give me a shopping trip as a gift. Thank you, honey!

We arrived early Saturday morning and made our way to downtown Manhattan, where we checked into the Andaz Wall Street. Now, I've spent the night in my fair share of NYC hotels and this hotel rates very highly in my book. The rooms are huge (!) and comfortable! Plus, the staff is amazing.

We were able to get our room before check-in time so we dropped off our bags and then headed out for breakfast at Made Fresh Daily.

My stomach wasn't feeling great, so I just had a fruit salad.

Raisin Bread ordered the Farmstand scrambled eggs with broccoli, corn, avocado and feta. We both found it to be super salty. 

After breakfast, we went to our first shopping stop: the madhouse that is known as Century 21. Even though this place is always a complete zoo, I am still usually able to snag some good pieces here. Next, we headed to Little Italy for lunch at Banh Mi Saigon. While we were enjoying our sandwiches, a lion came inside to pay a visit.

Chinese New Year lion at Banh Mi Saigon

We hit up a couple of sample sales before heading back to the hotel for a break and to change for dinner at Vitae before a night at the theatre!

I started with a "Northern Lights," which was kind of a twist on the French 75 with vodka, lemon juice, blueberry puree and prosecco.  

The bread with duck fat and sea salt was so delicious and fluffy. I wanted to fall asleep on them.

Next, we received a risotto ball amuse bouche. I'm not a fan of the risotto ball, so I wasn't impressed by this little bite.

Raisin Bread ordered the beet salad for his appetizer. I particularly liked the pistachio-crusted goat cheese. Yum!

I had the squid ink papparedelle with lobster for my main course. No complaints here! I don't understand how this dish can not be good.

We decided to forgo dessert since we were planning to get dessert after the show. After dinner, we got a little citrus palette cleanser in a tiny Coke bottle.

Finally, our meal ended with chocolate strawberries!

Then we were off to the Richard Rodgers Theatre to see Cat on a Hot Tin Roof featuring Scarlett Johansson. This was the second time we've seen ScarJo on Broadway. We had previously seen her in A View from the Bridge a few years ago. I wasn't expecting great things from this play because the few reviews that I read were mostly mediocre. Despite my low expectations, I was quite happy with the play.

After the show, we headed to Kyotofu for dessert. There was quite a line and I remembered that the last time we went there, they had already run out of the desserts that we wanted. We decided to check to see if they even had what we wanted before we waited half an hour to be seated. It turned out that they did run out of what we wanted for dine in but they still had some for take out. So we settled on taking our desserts to go. 

Back at the Andaz, I enjoyed my black sesame panna cotta with hoji-cha syrup while watching Bridesmaids.



The next morning we headed to Chelsea Market for brunch at Friedman's Lunch and shopping at a pop-up shop.

Latte at Friedman's Lunch

I ordered chilaquiles, a dish I ordered quite frequently in Los Angeles but don't often find on menus in DC. These were amazing! Just look at that egg and those avocados.

We had another fruit bowl.

And Raisin Bread had some gluten free pancakes with berry compote.

The majority of the day was spent shopping again. For dinner, we went to Beyond Sushi...a vegan...sushi...place. Huh? Yes, that was my reaction as well when we first got there. To be quite honest, I was slightly unhappy about the prospect of eating vegan sushi but I shouldn't have poo-pooed it so much. It was quite tasty and filling even if the mushroom sauce did look like little dookies.

From back: Mighty Mushroom, Pickle Me, and Crunch N Munch rolls

We stopped by Tu-Lu's to pick up some dessert for later before heading to the Anthology Film Archives to see Modern Romance.

Andaz Wall Street                                                     Kyotofu (CLOSED)
75 Wall Street                                                          705 Ninth Avenue
New York, NY 10005                                                  New York, NY 10019

Made Fresh Daily                                                     Friedman's Lunch
226 Front Street                                                       Chelsea Market
New York, NY 10038                                                  New York, NY 10011

Century 21                                                               Beyond Sushi
22 Cortlandt Street                                                    229 E 14th Street
New York, NY 10007                                                   New York, NY 10003

Banh Mi Saigon                                                        Tu-Lu's Gluten Free Bakery
198 Grand Street                                                      338 East 11th Street
New York, NY 10003                                                   New York, NY 10003

Vitae                                                                        Anthology Film Archives
4 East 46th Street                                                       32 Second Avenue
New York, NY                                                             New York, NY 10003                                  

I did it!

Full race and trip report coming soon (still need to collect photos from my sister and official race photos!). It was a blast and I am so glad I did it!

Weeks 15 and 16 Training Update

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The week has finally arrived! Happy to report that I feel ready! I'm anxious, nervous and excited to finish my first half marathon in a few short days. I'm also looking forward to warm weather, exploring some of the Disney parks and hanging out with my sister.

Raisin Bread and I spent the long weekend in NYC. More on that later!  

Week 15
Sunday - 5.2 miles
Wednesday - 2.9 miles
Friday - 1 hour Reformer class

Week 16
Sunday - 13 miles
Tuesday - 2.9 miles
Thursday - 1 hour Pilates Circuit class

Week 14 Training Update

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Week 14

Sunday: ran 9.62 miles and 20 mins of Pilates
Tuesday: 30 minutes on the elliptical
Wednesday: personal training session 
Saturday: 6 hour self-defense course

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It's time to check back in on my goals progress now that January is over. I'm pretty proud that I've been doing quite well on the majority of my goals! Woohoo!

Goals Progress

1. Finish my MBA - three weeks down! 
2. Finish my first 10 miler - N/A
3. Finish my first half marathon - N/A
4. Exercise three times a week - I've only gone one week so far this year without working out at least three times. 
5. Participate in Meatless Mondays regularly - I haven't been keeping good track of this, so I can't say for sure if I've been doing well. 
6. Eat out less = save money - I've let myself eat out for lunch only once a week in January. I'm hoping to keep this up or improve on it. 
7. Run 700 miles this year - Total Mileage To Date (TMTD): 52.3 miles (647.7 miles to go). 
8. Try out two new workout classes - My self-defense course wasn't technically a workout class but it did include a bit of physical activity. I encourage all the ladies to take one! 
9. Post once a week - Yes!