Vacation -- Part 2

Part 2 -- New York and Columbus! 


In New York, we had dinner at several delicious and unique restaurants. The first night we were in town, our friends took us to Pravda, which is a Russian vodka bar. 

We couldn't figure out which bathroom to use because it was in Russian, but it's cool. I like adventure.

I was a little scared at first, but it ended up being really cool. We started off with some delicious cocktails (I had a rosemary martini which was amazing), and a zakouski platter - which included potato pancakes with smoked salmon, roasted eggplant dip, scrambled eggs with caviar, and spinach and cheese pirozhki. I like caviar. It's official. Didn't know it -- now I do, so watch out, people.

We also tried the homemade potato chips with crème fraîche and caviar (noticing a pattern here), potato and caramelized onion pizza, ham and cheese croquettes, a couple more potato pancakes with salmon (they were super delicious) and crispy oysters with fresh horseradish and salmon roe. Yum. 


I also got a little ambitious with the drink ordering, and convinced myself that I wanted THE GOGOL (I leave it in caps on purpose so it sounds extra intimidating), which was horseradish vodka with a pickled quail egg. Yup. I don't know what I was thinking, other than that I like horseradish a lot and that I would rarely get this opportunity again to have something like this. Lesson learned. It was really interesting and unique...and tasted like eating a mouthful of horseradish. Which is fine for a couple sips, but then I ordered some tomato juice and ended up concocting some sort of version of a bloody mary. The quail egg was good (yes, I ate it).



The infamous bagel shot of the previous post was from Russ and Daughters, which is an amazing deli/shop where we had some delicious bagels with fresh smoked salmon the following morning.

I chose something a little different, but you get the idea.

I am still having dreams about this meal two weeks later. We grabbed coffee and the bagels, and sat in the park eating them on a beautiful morning -- a pretty cool experience. I also completely skipped lunch that day because I was so full and happy from the bagel.

Taken from the rooftop of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. You can have a cocktail and check out the skyline. Yes, it's as cool as it sounds.

Mid-afternoon on our second day, we walked the High Line -- which is a park that was created on an old train line. We made a couple stops along the way and before we headed to dinner. My favorite stop was at The Standard Bar -- I enjoyed a delicious drink there that included gin, lemon, raspberry puree and was topped with champagne. I am encouraging Paul to have champagne on hand to make me delicious drinks like this in the future. 

A photo taken on the High Line.

Our last meal in NYC was at Chinatown Brasserie, which was another tasty stop. We had two different kinds of dumplings, delicious chicken lettuce wraps, Crispy Orange Beef, Sweet and Soup Shrimp, Chicken in a Black Bean Sauce, and Pork Fried Rice -- all of which was really good with a couple Kirins. 

I did a horrible job of taking photos of places we ate or the food we enjoyed. Thank goodness for the internet.

While our stop in Morgantown consisted of some sort of deep friend pepper jack cheese balls and a Jimmy Dean breakfast sandwich (neither of which I am complaining about -- they both served their purpose), we ramped things up when we got to Columbus.


In Columbus, we went to Basi for dinner with Paul's cousin Meredith. We camped out on the patio and started with a bottle of wine. Mere ordered the mozzarella caprese with sun-dried tomato jam and basil, and Paul and I started with the grilled endive with roasted pear, taleggio cheese and smoked almonds. As many of you may know, I had a bad experience with taleggio (which consisted of me buying it, being horrified by the smell, trying to eat it while plugging my nose and eventually throwing it out), so this was very adventurous of me. It was really tasty, and I didn't event have to plug my nose (ask Paul). The bitterness of the endive was paired well with the creamy cheese and pear. For mains, Mere got mussels (one of the many delicious specials), Paul ordered the potato gnocchi with roasted mushrooms, butternut squash, tomato and truffle butter, and I ordered the lobster pasta with wilted spinach, lemon and vodka-tomato sauce. Absolutely delicious. It was made all the better by great company (clearly), tasty red wine, and an awesome ambiance sitting out on the patio of the restaurant. 

I didn't take this photo, but you can imagine us sitting at that communal table on the right side. Desperately trying to stop ourselves from bragging to everyone that what we ordered was the best.

On our way to dinner, we swung by the North Market. We picked up some awesome looking handmade butternut squash ravioli (and some veal/truffle ones which I'm beyond excited to eat) from Pastaria Seconda, and Meredith grabbed us some rosemary walnuts, which she insisted would make this delicious. Man, was Meredith on target with the walnuts! They added something really special to the dish. 

Once we got back to Chicago on Sunday, Paul made a quick brown butter sauce, added in the walnuts, and stirred in the cooked ravioli.

Eating light after our road trip? Maybe next week.

Holy. Moly. It was awesome. The rosemary walnuts flavored the brown butter sauce, so you needed nothing else to eat it with. The ravioli were delicious and had just the right balance of sweetness in the filling. 

Paul couldn't believe how much I ate. Seriously. I think he was hoping there would be leftovers. Nope.

Now that we're home and back to somewhat of a normal schedule, we'll pick up where we left off cooking at home more regularly. I am going to try to hunt down a deli that has fresh smoked salmon -- that I'm not sure I can live without.