Louropa

Le Bernar-din-din

2009-06-09T21:50:00.005-04:00

It's anniversary time again for us. 5 years! Time goes by very quickly, eh? Although our tradition for going to Babbo for our anniversary died out after only 3 years (unfortunately, we became less and less impressed with each passing year) we continue to make a point of going out for a good (hopefully great) meal. This year we decided to go to Le Bernardin. We weren't exactly sure what we were in for, except that we expected some really good food (and that I was required to wear a jacket).
At first, it felt a little stuffy inside to me. Perhaps it was all the French accents, or maybe I was just nervous - but that all went away with our friendly staff of servers. I toyed with the tasting menu idea, but then felt it would be safer (on my wasteline) to stick with the four course meal. This was all decided under a prelude to dinner - a little amuse bouche of salmon tartar. To begin (the almost raw course), I chose the layers of tuna pounded thin over fois gras and a parmesan crisp. My wife started with the Scottish and smoked salmon over apple, celery and watercress with jalapeno emulsion. For the second course (barely touched) I had the seared Spanish mackerel with parmesan crisp, sundried tomato and black olive oil, while my wife had the white tuna poached in olive oil with sea beans, potato crisps and light red wine bearnaise. For our main courses (lightly cooked), I had the baked langoustine and striped bass with confit tomato agnolotti with bouillabaisse consomme and curry emulsion while my wife had the crispy black bass with celery and parsnip custard and iberico ham-green pepper sauce. Throughout the meal, we shared a bottle of Pascal Cotat Sancerre, 2007, Loire France. This was a great wine, which went down very easily, however it did not have that green apple taste I usually associate with most Sancerre wines.
Finally, there was dessert. I had the dark chocolate and peanut caramel tart with meyer lemon puree, peanut powder and praline-citrus sorbet (with a cappuccino), while my wife had the Gianduja cream, Oregon hazelnuts, honey, banana, and brown butter ice cream.
Oh - there were some petit fours as well, which were amazing, but all we can remember was the tiny cream filled bignet.
This was an amazing dinner with not a single bad note throughout. Although a quick return would be too damaging to my poor wallet, I would love to go back again.

NP: Fringe (on the DVR)

Butter and Free Parking

2009-04-06T01:34:00.000-04:00

This weekend, my wife and I decided we needed a night out, so we got a couple of babysitters (the grandparents) and scoured through OpenTable.com looking for a place to eat. I saw that Butter had some openings, and I've wanted to taste Alex Guarnaschelli's food myself after seeing her dish out comments to the competitors on shows like Iron Chef and Chopped. Also, since Butter is always a hot-spot for the celebrities, we thought it would be fun.
When we arrived, we were seated right away in the Birch Room downstairs - at first it was a little odd, because we were the only people there. Our sense of loneliness was easy to overcome, and soon we got down to business. The waiter came over and explained the night's specials, but we had already figured out what we were going to have for dinner - we were giving the Tasting Menu a shot (mine with with wine parings).
One thing I found a little odd about Butter's tasting menu was that it wasn't the same for the entire table. My wife and I were served a completely different meal each. Luckily, we don't mind sharing, so we tasted a lot of great food last night.
Before the meal arrived, we were served some bread with butter - not a strange concept at all. It was one, however, that we were trying to avoid. With the meal we were expecting before us, neither wanted to fill up on bread. But how, may I ask, do you go to Butter and not try the butter? Some of the best butter I've ever had.
Our first course began with some soup. I was served the lentil bacon soup (it was one of the specials that evening) and my wife was served a potato leak soup with crispy onion rings in it (interestingly, this wasn't on the menu at all). Interesting side note: at the end of the meal, I asked for a list of the wines I had - they gave me a copy of our entire menu - and it appears we were given the wrong soups. Anyway, both were fantastic. I actually enjoyed the lentil bacon more than the potato leak (and my wife, the other way around), so we were happy with the serving snafu. The lentil soup was sweeter than I had expected, but those bites of bacon were awesome. As for the potato leek, it was great as well, mainly because of the crispy onion rings waiting to be found. For this course, I was given a glass of the Cleto Chiarli Sparkling Rosè Wine Rose Brut NV (Modena, Italy). It was nice, light and a little sweet. A clean way to kick off the drinking.
The next course consisted of a split of the special appetizer of the night. I received 2 deep fried crispy sardines and my wife received 2 deep fried crispy shrimp with a brown butter sauce. This was the only downer of the night for me. The shrimp were fantastic - warm, crispy and the brown butter sauce was fantastic. The sardines suffered a little because we shared the shrimp first. It was very cold in the dining room at that time, and by the time we moved over to the little guys, they had cooled down significantly. Fried food is always better hot. I imagine they would have been much better if I had gotten into them right away. This was paired with Moutard Brut Grande Cuvée NV (Buxeil, France) This was fantastic. I was a little surprised to get two glasses of the "sparkling" variety, but I was happy with the choices. This was obviously much more "champagne-y" than the first round. It had a deeper flavor and was much drier than the Cleto. I remember drinking this one pretty quickly.
After the first two courses, we began moving on to some more serious eating. Next up: pasta. I was given the Cavatappi pasta with homemade lamb sausage in a yellow tomato sauce, while my wife was given angel hair pasta with American caviar in a lemon butter sauce (I think - too much wine has clouded my memory a bit). At first my wife was scared of the caviar, but I convinced her to conquer her fears. Soon, she was enjoying it as much as I was. It had a nice, creamy texture, which went very well with the pasta. It didn't have the usual "popping" that I normally associate with caviar. My pasta dish was fantastic. The sausage was slightly overcooked and dry, but the taste was so good that I really didn't care. I could have had this for my entire meal and gone home happy. This was paired with Gruner Veltliner Fritsch “Windspiel” (Donauland, Austria) ’06. This wine was light, crisp and fantastic. I would buy this for my house - great summer wine. Mmmm.
Our next selections were more of the seafood variety - fish to be exact. My wife was served the olive oil poached striped bass with Tuscan kale, celery hearts and olives. This fish was fantastic. Buttery and light. I received the special fish dish - a nice piece of snapper encrusted with slices of purple potatoes. Again, this was fantastic. The potatoes provided the perfect crispy element to this dish. With this I was given the Albarino Burgans (Rias Baixis, Spain) - unclear on the vintage. This was a really nice Spanish white. I haven't been to crazy about most of the Spanish whites I've found in the States - although I really enjoyed a bunch in Spain. This one was one I'd have again.
At this point, we began to get a little confused. The tasting menu includes dessert, and we thought it was a 5 course meal. We had gone through 4 courses at this point, and assumed dessert would be next. I was a little disappointed to finish out the meal with a piece of fish - only because I was hoping for some meat, not because it was anything less than great. Then, to our surprise, we were brought two more plates, filled with the good stuff. My wife was given the seared Colorado rack of lamb and I was given a pork tenderloin. I can't even remember how it was cooked, but it was my favorite part of the meal. It was fantastic and it made me happy. The lamb was also great - and that was my wife's favorite on her side. This course was paired with Pavilion Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon. This was good, and I was happy to finally get some red wine. However, I think it was my least favorite of the entire night. Probably wouldn't go out and buy it, but would get it if it was on a wines by the glass list, and that's what I was looking for.
Now it was time for some dessert. When they brought us the plates, my wife asked what they were. Throughout the evening, we were given enourmous details on every dish and how it was prepared. For the desserts, were were told "This one is strawberry. This one is chocolate." Short and to the point. Neither are on the menu. My wife was given strawberries in a Zabaglione. Mine - well, it was some sort of warm chocolate cake. Both were rich and terrific. My dessert was paired with a glass of Mission Hill Riesling Ice Wine. I was very happy with this because that is my favorite type of dessert wine.
And then it was done. We were there for hours and I enjoyed every minute of it.

Ready For A Throwdown?

2009-02-20T10:45:00.005-05:00

This past weekend, my wife and I took a needed break from the kids and spent the day in the city by ourselves. We decided to head downtown and grab some lunch at Caracas - an arepa bar/restaurant in the East Village. This place was featured on Throwdown with Bobby Flay on the Food Network and remains one of two places on that show that I've eaten from (the other being Donut Plant). We love this place but hadn't been there in a couple of years. We had no idea that they had opened a second, larger (although still tiny) place a couple of doors down the street. We decided to start with some Yoyos - which are fried sweet plantain balls stuffed with
white cheese (mmmm...). Then we moved on to the arepas. We both had de pabellón which is filled with shredded beef, black beans, white salty cheese and sweet plantains (probably the best of the bunch). Next, I had la de pernil filled with roasted pork shoulder, tomato slices and spicy mango sauce. Finally, I had a breakfast arepa (mainly because I had never had one before and wanted to try one) filled with eggs, onions, peppers and chorizo. Although this was good it was missing some seasoning and either a dash of salt or a nice helping of their salty white cheese would have made it perfect. I washed mine down with a banana-cinammon shake, which was honestly not that great (the bananas were not nearly ripe enough).
Although I thought there were a couple of misses with this meal, I still love this place and want to go back already (we would be regulars if we lived on the LES).

Like No Other Market?

2009-01-26T09:36:00.003-05:00

I was driving around the other day getting some last minute shopping done for my wife's birthday when I saw a sign for Fairway that I had never noticed before. It looks like they are opening one up right near my house. I'm very excited about this. Hopefully I'm going to be able to get some of the things I've been missing since moving out of Manhattan.

NP: King Of The Ladies, Extreme

Morimoto!

2009-01-25T09:56:00.011-05:00

Last night I took my wife to Morimoto for dinner (personally I like the trifecta of Morimoto, Del Posto and Craft Steak taking up 3 of the possible 4 corners - and basically the entire block - of that section of 10th avenue. A lot of great eating can happen there). It's my wife's birthday, so we braved the freezing weather (maybe Greenland is colder at this time of year) and headed on out.
When we got there, we were lucky enough to meet the man himself. Although I'm not really sure what he thought of my wife telling him that she was "a big fan" of his. (A big fan of what? His battles on Iron Chef? - btw I can't imagine why they still feel the need to overdub his voice on the Food Network - the man speaks perfect English.) Anyway, it was nice to meet Morimoto and he thanked us for coming, so that was a very cool way to start the evening.
We got there a little early, so we went down to the bar to have some drinks before sitting down. I had a glass of Square One Sake (I had never had Sake before and figured this would be a great time to try it) and my wife had a mixed drink (can't remember what it was - but it was citrus-y and served in a martini glass). While we were sitting at the bar, we were able to look over the menu and plan out our attack. In the end, we decided to split everything and try as much as we could.
We started out sharing a couple of appetizers. First up was the kakuni - a ten hour pork with congee and soy-scallion jus. This was easily the best thing we ate all night. So, I guess it was technically all downhill from here - luckily it wasn't that far down. After the kakuni we had spicy king crab - with tobanjan anoli and micro cilantro. This was at the recommendation of a friend of mine. We liked it, but it was the least memorable part of the meal. Next time I'd be more likely to try the Japanese lobster fritters or beef curry bread.
For the next course we split the roasted ocean trout, which was served with miso, truffles, a turnip puree and a nice fat crispy prosciutto chip on top. This was awesome. After all this cooked food, it was time ot move on to some sushi. Hell, we were at Morimoto after all. We both had some spicy tuna roll (which I had just seen Morimoto show Bobby Flay how to make on an episode of Throwdown) and a shrimp tempura roll. They were both excellent, but I enjoyed the spicy tuna best (it's my favorite roll). I also had a couple of pieces of sushi - nothing too out there - just some tuna and salmon, but both were terrific. It was probably the best sushi I've had yet. What was especially nice was that on the salmon, there was a tiny slice of lime, which made it taste really damn good (you took the lime off before eating it).
Oh yeah - with all of this, I was drinking Grüner Veltiner, Forstreiter, "Grande reserve", Kremstal, Austria 2006. I loved this wine and would definitely buy it if I could find it. It was desribed to be as along the same lines as a Viogner. I was looking for something white, and it was either the Grüner, a Riesling, a Pinot Gris, a Chardonnay or a Savignon Blanc. I figured I would try something new. It was nice and crisp, but also very fruity without a lot of acidity or minerality. I liked it. Mmmm.
Finally we got some dessert. It was a birthday dinner afterall. We had the white chocolate semfreddo, which came topped with green tea sponge cake cubes and also came with some burnt orange ice cream, candied kumkwat rind and a nice stripe of chocolate down the center of the plate.
My only regrets were: 1.) Not realizing I could have gotten a glass of the Morimoto Aged Sake (and didn't need to buy an entire bottle) when I got my drink. The descriptions of them just sounded really nice. 2.) Not going for the special blowfish sashimi appetizer. I was actually going to go for it, but when I found out it was $50.00 for 3 pieces of sashimi, I felt my money would be best spent elsewhere. We are in a recession after all, aren't we?

NP: Spoonman, Soundgarden

Another One Bites It

2009-01-16T22:25:00.005-05:00

Although it's been spoken about for months, today it was officially announced that Circuit City would be shutting its doors forever. Bankrupt with no bailout on the horizon, so they're going out of business. 30,000 jobs lost and no one to back the 2 year extended warranty I got on my newest digital camera. Ah well. It's all very sad. Soon, all we're going to have will be Wal-Mart, Starbucks and McDonalds.

A Brand New Year

2009-01-02T23:47:00.006-05:00

The past year has brought about many changes in my household. A new child. A new house. A new State. Everything seems to take more time and little things (like writing on this blog) have taken a back seat. I'm sure I'm going to lapse again into a non-writing state, but for a bit, I'm going to try and catch up. I've got a whole bunch of wines to write about. If I actually remembered most of the ones I've drank over the past year, I'd never catch up. Hopefully I can pick up the highlights.
Since we've just started a new year, I figure I'd go for a champagne first. Specifically a bottle of Jacques Selosse Grand Cru Blanc de Blancs Champagne. We picked up this bottle on our trip to Paris a couple of years back on the recommendation of a friend. We decided to save it for a special occasion, but months of breast-feeding, pregnancy, and breast-feeding (again) made it difficult to enjoy. This year, we bit the bullet and popped the cork on the sucker for New Year's Eve. My friend warned us that it would be unlike any champagne we've had before, but it would be great. He was completely on the money.
As I poured it, I knew it was different. The color was a deep amber, unlike the yellow shades of most other champagnes I have had. My wife felt like it tasted like peaches, but I'm not so sure of that. It had a mild creaminess to it, but still a little bite. Overall, I think it may have made it's way up to my favorite champagne list. That would make total sense, since it's virtually impossible to find in the United States. We finished off the bottle that night, and we enjoyed every minute of it. As do most champagnes, it went very well with our Chinese meal that night.
I may need to take a trip back to Paris to pick up a few bottles.

NP: Demolition Man

At Least There Was This

2008-09-28T20:58:00.005-04:00

Today, Mike Mussina notched his first 20 win season in his 18 year career by beating the Red Sox 6-3. It doesn't really make up for the fact that the Yankees are not going to the playoffs this year and the Sox are, but I get to be happy today. I really wanted Mussina to get to 20 wins this year because no one expected him to pitch like this coming into the season. It's too bad the Yankees finally got around to playing their best baseball of the season when it was too late.

NP: New York, New York, Frank Sinatra

That's All She Wrote

2008-09-22T05:46:00.004-04:00

Last night, I watched the last game to ever be played in Yankee Stadium. Too bad the Yanks couldn't make it to the post-season this year. We could have extended the building's run for a few more weeks. That wasn't the case, and last night was it. I really wish I could have gone to the game, but with tickets going for around $500.00 each, it wasn't really in my budget anymore (2 kids will do that to you). Instead, I watched it on television.
I know some people out there will think of all the goings-on as Yankee fans and New Yorkers feeling too self-important and too Yankee/New York-centric. That's not the case at all. Popes have given mass there. Concerts have been played. Some of the greatest boxing matches and football games have taken place in Yankee Stadium. It's not only about the Yankees - they just provided most of the memories.
I've been there too many times to count over my lifetime, but I never got to go this year. In fact, it's the only year I haven't been to at least one game out of the past nine. Regardless, I'll miss the place. I've been to many different stadiums and arenas, and nothing beats coming out of the dark underground tunnel to the seating area - it's usually so bright - with the green and brown of the field and the blue of the seats with the white of the facade in center field. I loved it every time.
I've watched the new stadium grow ever bigger from across the river during my commutes to and from work, and it looks beautiful. I'm sure it will be a great place to watch a game. However, all of my memories with Donnie, Bernie, Jeter, Righetti, Willie, O'Neill, Tino, and the rest will be across the street.

Taking A Stake in Omaha

2008-08-27T11:10:00.003-04:00

Yesterday afternoon, my wife and I were walking around our town with our two kids trying to enjoy the nice weather when we realized that we had nothing for dinner. We thought about going out to eat since we were already out of the house, but sitting our 2 week old daughter in a crowded restaurant filled with people infected with who-knows-what didn't really sit at the top of our list. So... we needed to find an alternative. Chinese? Not really in the mood. Italian? We just had that the night before. Thai or Indian? There are no good Thai or Indian places in our town. However, there is an Omaha Steaks Store. I've never been in there before and we've never had their food. In fact, I always found it a little odd. But our car was parked right in front of the store, so we went in. Luckily, they were having an in-store sale yesterday, so we grabbed a box of bacon-wrapped filet mignon and some stuffed baked potatoes. I have to say that the steaks were awesome. Sure, a part of that was due to my grilling ability - but most of it came from the steak. I was lucky enough to get the box of 4 steaks for only $15.99 but they usually cost way more than that. Now I'm going to be wanting to get steaks from there all the time. Especially with the places around here - I've purchased spoiled meat at almost all of the major supermarkets around here - Stop and Shop, Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, and A&P. Only Kings and Shopright haven't disappointed yet.

NP: Comfortably Dumb, Extreme

Eating Inn Ho-Ho-Kus

2008-08-24T10:15:00.005-04:00

Right before our baby we born (1 day before) we decided to go out for dinner and a movie. While we usually like to go into NYC for our dinner, this time we decided that we wouldn't travel so far. My wife was supposed to deliver our daughter in a little more than a day and we felt it was probably better to stay closer to home. Also I don't think my wife was really up for walking around the city streets. So... we decided to check out the Ho-Ho-Kus Inn for dinner. This place is in my sister's town and we had read a few good things about it.
The place is very quaint, but also very old inside. There was an area of outside seating set up, but it was still very warm out so we opted to sit inside. Unfortunately, that meant we were the only people sitting down for dinner who didn't have hair a shade of gray, silver, blue or white (this may have been due to our choice of an early dinner so we could make a showing of The Dark Knight later in the evening). Anyway - the staff were very attentive and nice. although it still amazes me the number of waiters/waitresses we've encountered who do not know what the word "pasteurized" means.
We both had some appetizers to start out the meal. I had a special - it was an avocado and corn chowder with king crab meat. It was actually very good, but our waiter failed to tell me that it was to be served cold and I wasn't expecting it. After mulling it over for a minute, I felt that I should have realized it was cold - but I still think the waiter should have told us. My wife decided to have the warm goat cheese over mixed greens, candied walnuts, granny smith apples with lemon herb vinaigrette. This was excellent.
For dinner, I had the crispy Long Island duck breast and leg with wild berry sauce, while my wife had the Canadian farm raised salmon with horseradish crust in a grainy dijon mustard glaze. I paired my entire meal with a couple of glasses of Barton & Guestier Cabernet Sauvignon 2005 Pays d'Oc, France. I really enjoyed this wine and our meals were very good. It was a little expensive considering the fact that I was sitting in Ho-Ho-Kus, New Jersey, but that's the general feeling I get whenever we go out to eat in Jersey. Too expensive for what you get.
Would I go back? It was definitely good enough for a second try. Is it likely to happen? With 2 kids and limited going out time - probably not.

Kugelhopf!

2008-08-22T23:15:00.006-04:00

Every once in a while, I get in the mood to try and make something good to eat. The other day it was breakfast time and I wanted to make something good for my wife and myself (we are both off of work this week). I was perusing through the Joy of Cooking when I came across something called a Kugelhopf. The Joy describes it as similar to a brioche with less of a buttery-goodness. Even with that basic description, I really wanted to try it. It wasn't something I could make for breakfast - it takes way too long - so we made pancakes. However I began crafting my latest achievement in baking later that evening.
The kugelhopf is either from the Alsace region of France or somewhere in Germany or Austria. I've read sources that point to all different regions. Some feel it is more of a holiday bread, but it is great for breakfast. This is one of those bread recipes that needs to be started the day before you want to bake it because it's technically a 3-rise bread. The first is about 1 hour, then there's a 4-12 hour proofing time in the fridge, then another hour of rising before you finally bake it. This thing takes commitment.
Anyway, besides for substiuting dried cranberries for the currants called for in the recipe, I stayed pretty close to the cookbook's instructions. You know what? This is a great breakfast bread. Especially warm out of the oven with some butter on it.

Complaining Is So Easy To Do

2008-08-16T18:43:00.006-04:00

Even though this is supposed to be a very happy time in my life (it is) - we have been welcoming our new daughter into this world this week - my drive into work tonight has made me finally want to complain about the drivers in New Jersey. We moved a little less than a year ago, and I've been trying to see if I was just being a stuck-up New Yorker having problems with transitioning to the suburbs. However, I really don't think that's it. Why, does it seem, that no one understands the concept of "the passing lane" in New Jersey? People mosey along in the left lane driving at 40 mph in a 55 mph zone. Then, they get mad if you want them to move over so you can keep going. Driving slow is what the right lane is for. These people need to move over. Another thing that really bugs me is that no one seems to know how to merge. I've seen people come to a complete stop in the center lane so that they could merge into either the right or left lanes. Screw the flow of traffic - they just stop. And it's not a gradual slowing down - it's 40 mph to zero in no time flat. On my route home, you could not imagine the number of rear end collisions due to this phenomenon. I could keep going on but I have to get to work.
All I know is that I've lived in New York City and Boston (owning a car in both) and have driven in Italy, Spain, Puerto Rico and Mexico and New Jersey has had some of the worst driving I have ever seen. I always thought it was a stereotype created by New Yorkers, but now I'm really not too sure about that.

Exploration Leads to Nice Discoveries

2008-07-25T09:50:00.004-04:00

Yesterday afternoon, I woke up from my post-working-overnight slumber and ran to do some shopping before I had to retrieve my son from his grandmother's house. I decided to go and check out this place called Market Basket here in New Jersey. I've been missing my gourmet supermarkets that I had become very used to shopping at while living in Manhattan and I still haven't found anywhere around here that I like as much. I've heard good things about this place, so I plugged it into my GPS and away I went. Although it's not that far away, you have to take the streets there from my house, and it's a winding way - which ended up taking too long. The store itself is nice, and there were some great deals on fresh fish and steaks. However, I didn't like the vibe of this place. It's in a very rich neighborhood, where the local "houses" are about 6 times the size of my little hovel. It's the first grocery store I've ever been to where I felt like I was out of place. They did carry Cacio di Roma, which is a very important component of Cacio e Pepe - a pasta dish which is basically pasta noodles covered in this cheese and fresh black pepper - it's really good. And since I found it in this store, it's what we had for dinner last night.
I also went into the new Stew Leonard's Wine Store which just opened about 1 week ago near my house. I haven't been too happy with the wine shops around here, but in the past month this store opened and a new Best Cellars. So prospects are looking up.
I was happy to see that they had the wine I was looking for - Villa Sparina Gavi di Gavi 2006. I've had this wine before, although the last bottle I had was a 2002, and I really enjoy it. So, I was thinking of something to drink with my Cacio e Pepe, and I wanted a nice Italian white. I don't know if this is the best wine to go with this meal, but I wanted it, so I found it and bought it. This bottle seemed creamier with more of a melon taste than I remember the last bottle having. Overall, I was very happy with it.
I was also happy with the wine store. I was a little skeptical going in - it is a chain store, but it wasn't bad. It's not the best store I've been in, but their sales were good and although it had its share of Little Penguin wines, they had a nice selection of more upscale wines as well.
I'd go back. Pretty soon I'll check out the new Best Cellars...

NP: Benigno and Roberts, WFAN

Otter Pops!

2008-07-16T00:06:00.003-04:00

The other day I took my son to Rite Aid to pick up his vitamins, and what did I see when I entered the store? Otter Pops! I had to buy them. So now I've got Alexander the Grape, Sir Isaac Lime and the crew freezing away in the ice box. Perfect timing too. It's going to be in the upper 90's this week, so some nice cold ice treats will be just what the doctor ordered.

I Needed A Drink

2008-07-05T20:33:00.010-04:00

If you read my previous post, you'll understand the title of this one. Tonight, I needed some wine.
Recently, we had a barbecue and I went out to the wine shop to grab some bottles for that day. While I was there, I grabbed a couple of new wines (to me) for myself. Tonight I opened up the Step Road Blackwing Shiraz 2005, Australia (screw cap). To be honest, I picked up this bottle because I liked the label. Not the best way to pick out a wine, but I thought it looked nice and wanted to try it. I wasn't disappointed. Tonight, I drank this with some spicy grilled lamb and roasted potatoes. I felt it went really well. To me, this wine started off with some red cherries, then hit me with a hint of tar and finished off with cranberries. Overall, I enjoyed this wine and went through 3 glasses with dinner. Perhaps it went better with my meal, but I think I enjoyed it a lot more than those who wrote the reviews of it I read on the web (which I read tonight while searching for the pic of the label). To me, this was a nice smooth wine, which went great with my meal and gave me what I really needed - a drink.
Another bottle of wine I bought during that same trip was Washington Hills Riesling 2005, Washington. I opened this about 1 week ago while we were eating some Indian take-out. I had really wanted a Gewürztraminer, but there were none in my house, so I opened this. It actually went very well with the meal because the food was really spicy and this was very sweet. The only thought I had while drinking this was "apple juice." I enjoyed drinking this with Indian, but it really did taste like apple juice to me. With a nice alcoholic twist.
On the day of the barbecue, I had bought a few different bottles on wine to drink. A couple different whites and some red. The first bottle of white we opened up was the La Delizia Pinot Grigio 2006, Italy. I don't really remember exact things about this wine, but I do remember really liking it. As did my mom and my wife's grandmother. It went pretty fast, so I'm assuming it was pretty good. Also, we didn't enjoy the next bottle of wine nearly as much (I don't remember what that was - I didn't buy that one).
The other type of white wine I bought for the barbecue was Kris Pinot Grigio 2006, Friuli-Venezia Italy (screw cap). I love this wine. It's never disappointed me and I've never bought a bad bottle. Of course it's not the best bottle of wine, but it's light, crisp and tastes as good as a Pinot Grigio is going to taste (I'm not a big fan of the Santa Margherita, which has somehow become some sort of standard for Pinot Grigio). Also, this wine is cheap. Always an added plus!
I also bought a couple of bottles of Rancho Zabaco Heritage Vines Zinfandel 2006, Sonoma, but this was heat-damaged and tasted like crap.

NP: Exit, Population 1

"What Happened This Time?"

2008-07-04T22:31:00.006-04:00

Initially, I had a different title for this blog entry, and I had started writing it with a totally different beginning. However, when I went outside to grill some dinner on the barbecue (some nice lamb) my neighbor approached me with that horrible question: "What happened this time?"
For those not in the know, we recently renovated our basement. It was already a "finished basement," but we hated the way it was, so we just paid a construction company a lot of money to renovate it. New foor, ceiling, sheet-rock and a new storage closet. I had even started moving some things down there - the computer (not this one) and my flat-screen television. This was going to be a playroom for the kids/media room/office space. It was all planned out, with the current office to be converted to the new baby room/nursery (she's due in a couple of months).
Anyway... it was all finished about 9 days ago and then we went away to Martha's Vineyard for a family get-together (I was hoping my next blog entry was going to be about that trip, but it's going to have to wait). We got home last night and my wife threw some laundry in the machine to get ahead on the chores we had set for ourselves for the rest of the weekend. A couple of hours later, I decided to head to the basement to start setting up the desktop computer in the new office-space. That's when I saw it. Water. Everywhere. Somehow during my freakout, I threw on some rubber boots and headed into the mess. The water was at least 4 inches deep. My first instinct was to check the boiler, but it was fine. No... it was the washer. Somehow it was still running 2 hours after the load had started and there was water pouring out the back.
I was able to stop the flow and headed off to Home Depot to rent a pump. 3 hours later, my father, mother and I were able to get it down to a distinct dampness in the basement.
Today, the professional cleaners showed up at the request of our home-owners insurance company. They had to rip up the floor, take off all the molding and spray some anti-mold stuff in the basement as well as pump out the rest of the water. Now we've got what feels like 30 industrial strength fans running until at least Monday to dry out the basement.
Seeing the trucks outside our house is what prompted my neighbor's query. Unfortunately, we've already replaced our roof and dealt with a rodent problem (if you count one mouse as a problem), so our home is looking more and more like a money pit as the months pass.
We're currently accepting all donations to help with the current problem.

NP: Virtual Insanity, Jamiriquai

Iron Chef Birthday

2008-06-19T07:47:00.006-04:00

Last week was my birthday (they just keep coming), and my wife took me out to dinner for a little celebration. After a long discussion of where we should go, I decided on Bar Americain, which is one of Bobby Flay's restaurants. We had gone to Mesa Grill once a few years ago and were pretty disappointed, but I wanted to give Bobby another try. Overall, we had a very nice time. Unfortunately, our waiter was a spazz, and there were no tomatoes due to the NYC tomato-salmonella scare - but we overcame.
In general, the place was a lot louder than I had expected. It's very open inside with high ceilings and a large bar. All of these contributed to the noise-factor. Also, there's a very distinct touristy feel to the place. More so than I felt at Babbo (another Iron Chef's restaurant). Anyway, on to the meal.
To begin, I went with the Gulf Shrimp and Grits with Green Onions (and a lot of bacon), while my wife got the Shrimp Tomatillo Cocktail. She had wanted to get the Fried Green Tomato with Crispy Duck and Sweet and Sour Dressing, but no tomatoes... With my appetizer I had a glass of a nice Spanish red blend to drink (but I can't remember the name). For our main courses, I had the Porterhouse Lamb Chops with Mustard Barbeque and the Corn & Collard Green Tart while my wife had the Cioppino with Sour Dough Toast. I decided to pair my dinner with a glass of Pinot Noir Cloudline 2006, Oregon. It was good, but the Spanish wine I had first was better. Finally, we decided to split the Chocolate Praline Layer Cake with Caramel Rice Krispi Crunch. Fantastic dessert. This was paired with a fine cappuccino.
We both found our dinner at Bar Americain to be much better than what we had experienced at Mesa Grill. Where we decided we wouldn't go back to Mesa Grill again, I'd be happy to go back to Bar Americain. It wasn't my favorite restaurant, but it was a fine meal never the less.

Holy Dinner Batman!

2008-06-06T12:12:00.005-04:00

Yesterday was our anniversary (4 years already), so my wife and I got a babysitter and headed into the city for dinner. It was initially going to be a movie followed by dinner, but work got in the way and we missed the movies (if we went to a later film, we would miss our dinner reservations). So... it became walking around the city a bit, then dinner.
Unlike our past 3 anniversaries, we didn't go to Babbo this year. Unfortunately, we forgot to make our reservation at the appropriate time (10:00am; 30 days prior to your reservation date - for those thinking of going) so we were stuck. We decided to try the Gotham Bar and Grill. This is a place we've been wanting to try for a while since everyone tells us how good it is.
The place is actually very nice inside, and the staff was very friendly and helpful. In fact, our waiter seemed like the nicest guy in the world (so nice, in fact, that it made me a little suspicious of what he did when he wasn't at work). Initially, he seemed a little disappointed when we only asked for water to drink after being seated, but he perked up after I asked for the wine list a little later on. Anyway, our meal mapped out like this: We shared the Rigatoni with Braised Duck Ragu and Broccoli Rabe for our appetizer. My main course was the Grilled New York Steak with marrow mustard custard and vidalia onion rings and a bordelaise sauce while my wife tried the Porcini Crusted Halibut with roasted cauliflower, fingerling potatoes, and hazelnut oil white verjus emulsion. Unfortunately, this was so salty she couldn't eat it and needed to send it back (not something we like to do, but what can you do?). They were really nice about taking it back and let her choose something different. This time she went with the Roasted Maine Lobster with spaghetti squash, potato puree, brussels sprouts and red wine lobster reduction (there was also some type of white foam on the dish). This was much better, although the claw meat was undercooked... For my wine, I got a half-bottle of the Chateau Larose-Trintaudon Haut-Medoc Bordeaux, 2005. I've had this before and thought it would go well with my steak without breaking my wallet. I was right. It was very good and easy to drink.
Finally, we moved on to dessert. We split the Gotham Chocolate Peanut Butter Bar, which is basically two bars of a chocolate fudge-like substance with a peanut crust, topped with roasted candied peanuts and peanut butter ice cream. It was pretty damn good. The cappuccino was excellent as well.
As far as anniversary dinners go, it didn't beat the first time we went to Babbo, but we ate a damn good meal and had a really great time.

Making The Switch (sort of)

2008-06-04T16:40:00.003-04:00

Today I ordered myself a new computer. It is a laptop. And it is an Apple. I haven't owned an Apple computer since college so I did hesitate a little bit, but in the end it was the best decision. Basically, I can get this computer for free through work - we get money each academic year for different educational pursuits and I didn't spend much of mine this year. Our academic year ends June 30th, and if you don't spend the money it goes away (it's not additive with each year). I recently found out that you can use it to purchase a computer if you'd like, so I decided to look into it. You have to go through our Apple or Dell reps and get the "approved" computers. I initially went to Dell, but they only had 2 laptops available without much room for upgrading. Neither were ones I would have purchased on my own. Therefore, I figured I might as well take a look at the Apple Notebooks. Lucky for me, Apple doesn't have the variety that many PC manufacturers do. Basically, the laptops that I could choose from are the same ones that everyone can choose from (minus our educational discount). So... I chose a MacBook Black. It will be an odd transition back to the Mac, but I'll still have my Dell Desktop at home, so it won't be too bad. Who knows? Maybe when that one goes it will be time for an iMac.

NP: Scars, Rush

BEER!

2008-05-31T23:18:00.002-04:00

A friend of mine just brought me a nice 4 pack of Caffrey's Irish Ale. She was going home to visit her family in London and I finally remembered to ask her to bring me back some. I've missed it since they stopped importing it to the USA. Tomorrow, it's beer time!

Coffee Smells Good!

2008-05-12T14:23:00.006-04:00

Out of all the culinary wonders out there, a good cup of coffee is near the top of my list. I've always enjoyed my coffee, but back in the day, Dunkin' Donuts was the epitome of a good cup. Then I went to Italy. Everything changed after that. I have had my Breville espresso machine for about 2 years now and I could not imagine living without it. I actually thought it broke once, and I was crushed. Luckily, it had just over-heated during it's de-calcification cycle, and was good as new after cooling off a bit.
I'm writing this now as I brew a nice latte to go with my lunch dessert. Today, I'm having some Miscela D'Oro Ciald'Oro espresso. This is a nice espresso. It does have a little more bitterness than I usually go for, but it is good. My favorite lately has been Lucaffe Caffe del'Ospite. This has a nice chocolately taste and makes a nice crema. Generally, I really like all of the coffees from Lucaffe. Apart from their somewhat racist packaging (see image below), I like this company.
Another great coffee is Segafredo, which may be my overall favorite.

Lost!

2008-05-09T08:34:00.004-04:00

We just got back from Miami (where we had to cut our trip short - more on that might be explained later) and the airline lost my luggage. This is the second time in a row - the only things that stopped me from going ape$hit were: 1. It was two separate airlines (the first time it was Continental, and this time it was JetBlue), and 2. It was midnight and I was really tired. So, now I have no clothes or toiletries. For some reason, my bag was sent to Buffalo, NY, while the rest of our luggage (3 bags) came through fine to Newark.
Let's see if they come through on their promise to get me my stuff back today.
More pleasant ramblings about our trip will be up here in a little while.

NP: The sound of my son playing with his breakfast.

Getting Back Into The Swing

2008-04-28T16:05:00.004-04:00

You know... I was looking over this blog, and I realize that my life was more interesting before we moved out to the Garden State. At least we went out to dinner at some cool places. Now, the best places to go are either The Cheesecake Factory or some other chain place like Legal Seafoods. Of course, the main reason we moved out here was to get a better home for our kids, and in that we succeeded. But, I miss the food and fun of the city...

Now on to other things...

One night we had some people from work over the house and luckily one of our guests brought a bottle of Jezebel Pinot Noir 2006, Oregon. I had never even heard of this wine before, but I was really glad I was able to try it. I think I had 3 glasses from this bottle that night and I enjoyed every one. It's a very smooth wine that's easy to drink. Light in color, but still with a nice flavor. It's more fruit forward I think... This is a great bottle of wine that I would definitely buy/drink again. I think I had a better time that night because of this wine.
Another wine I had recently was the Col d'Orcia Spezieri 2005, Tuscany Italy. This bottle, I received from my cousin for Christmas. Most things have been sitting in the wine fridge because my wife is once again unable to drink with me. So, until August (at the earliest), I'm drinking alone. Anyway, this is a really nice red blend (mostly Sangiovese, which is probably why I liked it) - basically a table wine. It went well with my pasta bolognese, which is all I can ask in an Italian table wine.

NP: Ice 9, Joe Satriani

Shiraz-y

2008-04-24T10:41:00.005-04:00

This other day, my sister had a barbecue and I decided to bring over a bottle of wine. My sister and mom are big fans of white wine (mainly Pinot Grigio) so I decided to bring a red. I didn't really feel like going to the store, so I checked out what I had in the house. I would have liked to have brought a Zinfindel, but I was all out. So, I settled on a Shiraz. I've been kind of off Shiraz lately. When I first started getting into wine, it was something that I enjoyed a lot, but now... it's really not my first choice. I think it's usually to tannin-y for me.
Anyway, this isn't something that I bought myself - in fact I don't think I've purchased a Shiraz in about 3 years. But I had it, so I brought it along. Oh yeah - it's Rolling Shiraz 2004, Australia. Basically, my main feeling on this wine is "eh." It wasn't a bad wine, and if I went to someone's place and this is what they were serving, I would drink it without a problem (hmmm... when is that really a problem?), but I wouldn't bring it a long myself. To me, this tasted like Shiraz. That's it. Nothing special or fancy... it's a Shiraz.
The barbecue was good though.

NP: Nothing. Trying to keep my son asleep for his nap.

Cell Phone Miracle

2008-04-20T20:39:00.002-04:00

Okay. So, I've been pretty non-existent on this thing for a couple of months now. It's not that I haven't had things to post. I just haven't had any time to post anything. I'd rather spend time with my son or do some repairs on my house (well... it's not that I'd rather do that - I just have to) than sit down at the computer and write a blog entry. I want to try and do a little better and at least have 1-2 posts per month, but if the past few months are any indication - it's unlikely.
We spent most of today celebrating my parent's 40th wedding anniversary (which is tomorrow). We had a nice time. 40 years is pretty impressive.
Anyway, what got me to finally start typing tonight as we sit on the couch and watch bad Sunday night television is this. About 2 weeks ago, I was carrying my son into the house and my cell phone fell out of my pocket. It landed on the stone entryway and broke. I broke into 2 pieces. I have the MOTOROKR™ Z6, which can be seen here. It landed right on the corner and the face-plate broke right off. I spent days trying to get it back on with no success. I looked inside and couldn't find a way to re-attach it. Finally, I was going to try krazy-gluing it or soldering it together. However, 2 days ago, I stuck the pieces in the back pocket of my jeans while I was running around with my son. When I took the phone out a few hours later, it was fixed! The two pieces were back together and it wasn't even loose. How this happened I have no idea. It was a miracle. That's the only explanation I can fathom.

The Tavern

2008-02-18T08:54:00.003-05:00

Yesterday, my wife's dad and step-mom offered to watch our son for us so we could go out to dinner. Not wanting to waste a chance to have a nice night out, we decided to go into the city instead of heading to one of the many mediocre places here in Jersey (sure, I'll admit there have to be some good places out here - we just haven't found them yet). We didn't have any time to get a reservation at one of the places we wanted to go to (although we did scour the list on opentable.com) so we decided to try our luck at the front room in the Gramercy Tavern.
This is one of the paces I always wanted to go to, but never did get the chance. The place is split up into two parts - the front "tavern" room, and the back restaurant space. To sit in the back, reservations are required (unless you get lucky) and the dress code is a lot nicer. The front, has a cheaper, scaled-down version of the menu, with no reservations required and a more laid-back attitude. Although it appeared crowded when we got there, it only took about 15 minutes of waiting at the bar for us to get our table. Everyone was very friendly and we had really good service.
We started off with some appetizers. My wife got the carrot soup with spiced cashews, and I got the plate of restaurant-made cured meats. Both were fantastic. For our main courses, my wife got the smoked kielbasa with spaetzle and butternut squash, and I had the stuffed meatball with fontina cheese over a potato puree with onion marmalade. Of note - I decided on my dish based on the fact that our waitress said it was "pretty freakin' good." All of my dishes were paired with many glasses of the Dolcetta d'Alba Ascheri 2005, Piedmont Italy. I had initially intended to change up my wine selection as I went on with the meal. I like to do this when I'm out to try as much as possible. However, I was enjoying this so much, I just kept going with it. It was a light wine, red in color, and it went down very easily. It's a wine I could buy a case or two of and keep drinking it with all my meals.
We finished up with the apple crisp for two with vanilla and cinnamon sour cream ice creams as well as excellent cappuccinos.
Great meal, and a great atmosphere. Would definitely go back again.

NP: The Pretender, Foo Fighters.

Pistachio Cake

2008-01-28T13:16:00.000-05:00

The other day I was in the mood for baking (in case you didn't already realize, I do almost all of the cooking in my family). It was a cold, rainy day, and we couldn't really do much of anything outside. Since I was home-locked, I figured I'd make something. There's this cake in the Babbo Cookbook that I've wanted to make for a while. It's an Italian hazelnut cake. Unfortunately, I've been unable to find all of the ingredients. So, I made my own version using pistachios instead of hazelnuts and changing a few other things around to things that would go better with pistachios. Anyway, the results were really good. It's kind of like pistachio ice cream in cake form (that's what I think, anyway). In case you're interested, here's the recipe:

1 cup shelled pistachios roasted in a 350 degree oven for 5 minutes
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
10 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cups sugar
1/4 pistachio paste
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
powdered sugar for dusting

Preheat oven to 325. Spray 9 inch round cake pan with nonstick cooking spray and line with parchment or wax paper
Pulse the nuts in a food processor with 1/4 cup flour until it becomes finely ground (basically making a pistachio flour). Mix together this mixture with the rest of the flour and the baking powder (set aside).
In a mixer cream the butter and sugar. Beat in the pistachio paste, and then add 1 egg at a time. Scrape down the sides of the bowl. Add vanilla and honey. Mix in the flour mixture, 1/3 at a time.
Spread evenly in the pan and bake for 25-30 minutes (make sure a toothpick or something like it comes out clean). Remove from the pan and place on a cooling rack.
When cool, dust with powdered sugar.

I think it's pretty good, and I haven't gotten a complaint yet. Many are skeptical, but once they have it, they agree it's a good cake.

Top Chef Dinner

2008-01-26T07:14:00.000-05:00

Wow. Last night I took my wife out to dinner for her birthday. We went to Perilla, which is the restaurant opened by the winner of Top Chef - Season 1, Harold Dieterle. We suffered through the real-feel temperature hovering near zero and parked our car somewhat illegally in the West Village and made our way into the small, but very nice restaurant on Jones Street (between Bleecker and West 4th) - not a bad location. Although there was space at the bar where we could hang out and wait, we were lucky and didn't have to wait at all to be seated at our reserved table (this is one of those places that take reservations 1 month from the day you want to go - and they fill up fast).
To start, we split the Grilled Greek Sardines over a baby mesculin salad with golden beets. I paired this with a Treixadura blend from Spain (sorry, I can't remember the exact wine). We decided to go for something different with our appetizer. For main courses, my wife had the "Jerk" Style Black Grouper with plantains and purple yams over a black bean puree, while I had the Roasted Duckling with pomegranate, white grits and mustard greens. I was tossing between the pork loin wrapped in bacon (it IS pork on pork after all) and the duck, but the waiter said the duck was Chef Harold's favorite dish on the menu. Decision made. I paired this course with a glass of Foris Pinot Noir, Oregon 2005.
Dessert included fresh warm vanilla scented donuts with two dipping sauces (chocolate mousse and meyer lemon curd) and a vanilla creme fresh panna cotta with poached pears. Amazing desserts. The other great thing about this restaurant was the coffee. It was terrific, which is always a plus.
Overall, we had a great meal. I would definitely go back.

NP: Inch Worm, John Coltrane

Donut Headache

2008-01-17T08:45:00.000-05:00

Most mornings when I am driving to work, I make my own coffee at home and take it in a travel mug. Every once in a while I can't be bothered (I'm usually too tired) and I figure I'll stop on the road on my way into the city. There's this Dunkin' Donuts on Route 17 that I've gone to once or twice before. Never have I gotten good service there. Also, their coffee isn't that good, which I don't really understand because I assumed all Dunkin' Donuts establishments made their coffee exactly the same way (isn't there a Dunkin' Donuts University out there for prospective franchise owners?). Anyway, my wife has had similar experiences as I have had at this place and we both came to the conclusion to avoid it from now on.
Well, I didn't listen to my own advice and the other morning I stopped in there to get a coffee and a muffin. I clearly asked for 1 large coffee with milk and sugar and a banana nut muffin. The following conversation followed:

Dunkin' Donuts Lady: "Anything else?"
Me: "No, just the coffee and the muffin."
DDL: "Okay. Anything else?"
Me: "Well... the muffin."
DDL: "Yes. Anything else?"
Me: "No. Just a large coffee with milk and sugar and a banana nut muffin."
DDL: "Anything else?"
Me: "No. The coffee and the muffin."
DDL: "Anything else?"
Me: "No."
(a few moments pass...)
DDL: "One large coffee. $2.02." (rings me up in the cash register.)
Me: "Are you f*&king kidding me?!?!?!"

I don't know why this exchange surprised me... this place sucks.

NP: nothing

Rocking Horse

2007-12-24T06:43:00.000-05:00

A couple of nights ago, my wife and I met a couple of good friends out for a pre-Christmas dinner at the Rocking Horse Cafe in Chelsea. I think we first discovered this place by just searching for a place to eat in this neighborhood one evening years ago because we had to be over there for something else. We've been back multiple times since, always enjoying ourselves. I've ever had a bad or disappointing meal here.
This time, I had the Camarones con Papaya (shrimp, caramelized onions, papaya & poblano chiles in chipotle tomato purée with warm organic spelt tortillas) after starting off with some guacamole. It was all really good. A nice blend of sweet and spicy. For dessert we shared the Tarta de Limón (lime custard in ginger graham crust with Myers's rum cream, mango & raspberry purées), which was great, but I recommend the Buñuelos with Ibarra (homemade donuts with chocolate pot au creme & spiced piloncillo syrup) if you're going to be there and saving room for dessert.
I had a great time at this place, and I was really happy that everyone enjoyed their meal. I feel like whenever we take people to a place we really like the chef has an off-night and I feel badly that I dragged people out to this place to spend their hard-earned cash on a sub-par meal. Not this night (whew). The only thing I was a little disappointed in was my wine choice. I got a Rioja (of course I can't remember what it was and the wine list isn't online), and it wasn't as good as I had hoped. Hey, what can you do?

NP: The Backyardigans...

Early Merry Christmas

2007-12-23T16:40:00.000-05:00

Today's a day where everything as been going wrong. I've tried to bake some gifts and they keep coming out badly. It really hasn't been my fault, but either way, they turned out like crap. My son has been really cranky (although in his defense he seems to be not feeling well today), and my wife has been really cranky (because of my son). I would like to go to bed and just have a do-over. Well, that can't happen, so...
I decided I would try to change my luck by wishing everyone a somewhat early Merry Christmas!!!

NP: Christmas Is Coming, John Denver & the Muppets

Not Such A Bastard

2007-12-17T13:55:00.000-05:00

Last night we uncorked a bottle of Il Bastardo Sangiovese Rosso di Toscana 2001, Italy. I've had this wine before in a restaurant in Boston (I can't actually remember the name of that place, but it's on Newbury Street upstairs from Daisy Buchanan's). Anyway, I liked this wine then and I liked it now. It's a simple Italian red with some dark fruit (mainly cherries) and a little harshness to it, but it's good. Especially since it costs less than 10 bucks a bottle it's a great buy. Besides, everyone enjoys seeing the label...

NP: Limelight, Rush

More Proof He's Mine

2007-12-11T14:02:00.001-05:00

Today my son woke up from his nap and was feeling a little cranky. We've got a few tricks to get him out of his post-nap funk. Today I decided to put on his favorite song (No One, by Alicia Keys) and let him sit on my lap on the couch for a bit. (It's really cute because he sings along with her, totally off-key. Of course he doesn't sing the words - he's only 14 months - but he does the melody and he does do a good job with the oh-oh-oh's at the end.)
Anyway, my iPod was on shuffle and after the Alicia Keys song finished, it went to Creeping Death by Metallica. Well, my son jumped off my lap and started bouncing up and down, clapping his hands and squealing with joy. It was awesome. Too bad my wife wasn't around to witness it (I doubt she'll believe me if I tell her). Maybe it's because he got the Metallica Lullaby CD for his birthday or maybe he's just into the metal... only time will tell.
Maybe I need to get him a tiny guitar and get the lessons started early.

Panettone Success!

2007-12-11T11:45:00.001-05:00

Yesterday I decided to try my hand at baking a Panettone. For those who don't know, this is basically an Italian holiday bread. It's usually filled with candied fruit. Personally, I'm not crazy about fruit filled breads. I think I must've had some freak accident with a fruit cake as a child that I blocked out from my memory (my fruit cake hate is no where near the level of my M.A.S.H. hate, in case you were wondering). Whatever the reason, I'm just not into it. So, I made mine with chocolate chips instead (the 60% cacao ones from Ghirardelli). Amazingly, it turned out really well on only my first try (see the pics of it on this post).
Anyway, I got the recipe from the Gourmet Magazine website in case you're interested. I pretty much followed it except for the following changes.: Instead of 1 cup of raisins and 1 cup of candied citrus, I used 2 cups of the chips (it's a good idea to toss the chips in flour first so they don't sink). Instead of the lemon zest and juice I used 1 tbsp vanilla. As for the baking, I ditched the coffee can idea and actually used one of the paper things the Panettone will usually come in (I got mine at Chef Central). It was a large one, so I never divided the bread and only cooked one loaf. The instructions on the paper container says to lower to baking temperature with those, so I baked at 350 instead of 375 for 40 minutes. It worked out great.

NP: Beverly Hills, Weezer

Not Just For Breakfast Anymore

2007-12-08T09:10:00.001-05:00

I love brunch. My wife loves brunch. While we were in NYC we would go all over the place to have brunch on the weekends (or during the week if we were lucky enough to be off from work). One place that we both really enjoy is the Popover Cafe on the Upper West Side. My favorite breakfast there is the Eggs Benedict on Popovers. Mmmm. The popovers at this place are as big as your head (well... I guess it depends on the size of your head) and are full of flaky goodness inside. They also come with home-made strawberry butter which is perfect.
Well, our son's pediatrician is on the Upper West Side, so after his appointment the other day we needed some lunch. I had never been there for lunch before, so we thought we'd give it a chance. We both (well, all three of us really) had the Chicken "Pop" Pie. It's basically a chicken pot pie served in a popover (in case you didn't get it already, basically everything either comes with or in a popover). This was terrific. It was the perfect lunch on a cold, rainy, winter day.

NP: Damage Is Done, Black Label Society

Fakes Are Good Too

2007-12-08T08:36:00.000-05:00

This year I broke tradition and got myself an artificial Christmas Tree. Growing up, my family always had a fake tree and we hated it (well, my sister and I hated it). Sometime during high school we switched over to real trees. I decided at that time I would always get a real tree at Christmas time. Well, that decision, just like many others in my life has been turned over. This year we got a fake tree. This decision was influenced by many factors, but the most compelling were the potential fire and choking hazards a real tree presented to my 1 year old son who can't keep his hands off of anything (do you know how many times I've had to tell him that the oven is bad?). Also, the fact that real tree prices have climbed every year and we've been paying about $100 a year for a tree we thought was nice enough (not even the best tree, just good enough). Of course this was in NYC and not NJ, but the part of Jersey we moved to isn't really that much cheaper than NYC... in fact, in some ways, it's more expensive. Ah well...
To be honest, I wasn't ready for the amazingly inflated prices of artificial trees, but I guess it'll pay for itself over time. Now all trees come with lights already on them. I really do enjoy the ease of these trees, but I would have been happy to have scored a cheaper tree without lights. Unfortunately the only ones I could fine (I think I found 2) were like the tree from Charlie Brown's Christmas. Decorated, they remind me of an old lady trying to look good on a night out - too old and scrawny for a couple of baubles to fool anyone into thinking they are still pretty.
So... I shelled out the big bucks and got a nice tree with 800 lights and over 2100 branch tips. It looks really nice and I'm happy with it. I got it at K-Mart. Not my favorite store in the world - I always leave that place feeling dirty. Also, it's from the Martha Stewart line of trees, and I had to break some of my own moral codes to actually purchase a tree from that lady, but sometimes you've got to sell your soul to get what you want.
Happy Holidays!

NP: Love Like Winter, AFI

I Guess Rats Aren't All Bad

2007-12-02T08:03:00.000-05:00

This weekend I rented the movie Ratatouille from Pixar Studios. For those who don't know what I'm talking about, it's a cartoon (well, computer generated cartoon) about a rat in France who decides he wants to be a chef. I had heard that this was another great movie from Pixar, and I wanted to check it out. It was really good. It's a cute movie with some little jokes that are obviously directed towards the adults in the audience. I also enjoyed the scenes of Paris, which made me want to go back and visit again. I would check this one out if you get a chance.

NP: Little Guitars, Van Halen

I Used To Hate Clowns

2007-12-01T08:19:00.000-05:00

Since moving out of NYC I've actually started buying wine in my local grocery store. This wasn't something I would ever think of doing in the city, but here there's not too many better options. I haven't been too impressed with the wine selection and the quality of wines I've bought in the local wine stores. The grocery stores sell wine, and it's at least stuff I've heard of. It my not be the fanciest of selections, but it is pretty decent with the cheaper stuff.
One day I grabbed a bottle of Beauzeaux Red Wine California 2005 (pronounced Bo-Zo). It was $7.99 and had signs of "Wine of the Year (can't remember the exact organization that named it wine of the year)" around it. I was easily swayed and bought a bottle. It was actually very enjoyable. I've been through three bottles since and have liked every one. It's a red blend of 68% Zinfandel, 21% Syrah, 3% Petite Sirah, 3% Charbono, 2% Lagrein, 1% Valdiguie, 1% Grenache, 1% Tempranillo, so it pretty much goes with everything. It's a smooth wine with some blackberries and other dark fruits.
Another wine I picked up from the grocery store was Robert Mondavi Private Selection Chardonnay California 2005. This one I actually picked up because all Mondavi selections were on sale for $8.99 and usually we have pretty good success with them. I have to say I didn't love this wine. It was good, and I think most of my reservations are due to bad pairings with dinner, but overall it wasn't the best for me. It was a little too fruity and less buttery than I was hoping for in a chardonnay. Still, we bought 2 bottles and it was very consistent.

NP: Exit, Population 1

Let The Holiday Season Begin

2007-11-22T22:47:00.000-05:00

So, it seems that each year Thanksgiving becomes more about when you can really start shopping for Christmas (and decorate your house without your neighbors thinking you are crazy) than what it's really about - giving thanks (and celebrating when some Pilgrims sat down with Native Americans and split a turkey and some corn).
Today I spent the day with my family (well, my wife's family to be exact) and we all had a very nice time. My son only had 1 or 2 short lived meltdowns and a day that for a while seemed like "A Thanksgiving Without A Turkey" turned out to be a very good day (the people bringing the turkey were late - a no no for future reference). Even the drive from New Jersey to Long Island wasn't that bad (the L.I.E. actually moved well for once).

I stuffed my face on turkey, potatoes, stuffing, pork, lasagna, carrots, rice and beans, ham, roasted vegetables, cheese cake, chocolate chip cookies, brownies and candy. Not a bad day.

Now it's time for shopping to begin.

Chuck

2007-11-20T10:30:00.000-05:00

So, it seems that every year there's a new television show that I really get into. Last year it was Heroes (which, by the way, isn't as bad this year as everyone says it is - it's just not great). This year, it's Chuck. The television show by McG about a computer geek who gets sucked into the world of spies and such. It's a comedy, but it's also got some great story writing. Hopefully the writer's strike won't screw this one up. Check it out if you get the chance: Mondays at 8:00pm, NBC.

NP: Best of You, Foo Fighters

First Snow

2007-11-19T06:57:00.000-05:00

This morning I am sick and my son woke us up at 6:00am. I couldn't go back to sleep because I'm coughing too much and the heating guy is supposed to come over between 8 and 12 to fix our heating system (it is only half working). So... already it hasn't been the best day. But when I was making myself a cup of tea, I looked out the kitchen window and saw snow. I'm really not sure if this is the first snow of the season, but it's my first snow of the year and that's what counts. The day's not all bad.

NP: No One, Alicia Keys

More Wine For The Week

2007-11-17T11:35:00.000-05:00

Well, I've got some more wines to write about this week. Trying to catch up with the ones that we've had since the move. Unfortunately, many are lost to the winds. I try to keep the label and things like that, but my wife has a love of throwing things away. So, they went to the trash before I could keep tabs on them. Anyway, the first of the ones I do remember is Rocca Felice Nebbiolo d'Alba Italy. I got this one for somewhere between $6.99 and $8.99 and it was worth every penny. Honestly, this was a great little wine, which we both enjoyed a lot. It's a nice Italian red.
Another one I picked up recently was the Inama Vin Soave Soave Classico 2006, Italy. I've gotten this wine a couple of times before and I really enjoy it. I think I feel like it's a smoother wine that I previously gave it credit for, but overall it's been pretty consistent. Although this was the first bottle I've had of the 2006 vintage (previous bottles were from 2005). A good wine.
Then we've got the Tupun Reserve Chardonnay Argentina, 2006. This bottle I got from the Wine of the Month club I had been a member of. We didn't love this wine. I think we had it with some turkey, which probably wasn't the best pairing, but it said on the label it went with poultry. It was a little too fruity for my tastes. Especially for something that was supposed to go with dinner. The tasting notes say flavors of pineapple, peach and mango, but what we really tasted were apricots.
Finally, I was hoping to enjoy a bottle of Frog's Leap Chardonnay Napa Valley, 2005. Unfortunately it was heat damaged, so we didn't drink that one. By the way, this was the 3rd bottle of wine I've gotten at Total Wine in River Edge, NJ that was heat damaged... Take it for what you will.

It's A Crappy Day... I'm Feeling Winey

2007-11-12T13:37:00.000-05:00

It's a crappy day out today, and I have to go to work in a little while. My son has finally settled down for an afternoon nap, and the work I want/have to do can't get done. For some reason my file is corrupted, so I have to wait until I get into my office to get my backup. So... I'm sitting here on my couch, with nothing better to watch on television but Grease 2, and I figure I should throw something up here.
Since moving into our new house, we've been through a whole lot of wine. Some good and some not-so-good. Luckily, I've been happy with most, but there have been the occasional stinkers.
One of my favorite wines is the Carpineto Dogajolo Tuscany Italy 2005. I used to get this wine a lot at Sherry-Lehman in the city and was excited to find it in my local Stop and Shop Wine Shop. It's not expensive and a great everyday Italian wine. It's a blend of Sangiovese and Carbenet Sauvignon grapes. I have this with pasta (marinara, bolognese or any variety of red sauces) and with meats. I think it's a fun, steady wine. I've had multiple bottles and never have been disappointed.
Another staple Italian red for us is the Ruffino Aziano Chianti Classico Tuscany Italy 2005. To be honest, I thought the 2003 was a much better wine, but I've been happy with the 2004 and 2005 as well (with the 2005 being a better choice over the two). We first had this wine (the 2003) in New Orleans, and we've stuck by it since. It's a great everyday chianti that goes with just about everything. It's got nice acidity, full body and a taste of dark red fruit.
A great white, which I will recommend to anyone is the Groth Sauvignon Blanc Napa Valley 2005. This may be my favorite white wine. This is another wine that we first had while visiting New Orleans. We enjoyed this with dinner at August (which may be one of the best restaurants I've been to in the United States). I can't tell you how many bottles of this wine I've gone through. It's consistently excellent from bottle to bottle and vintage to vintage. It's great with seafood or light pasta dishes. It is crisp, light and has citrus flavors and melon.
Another wine we've had in the recent months was Graffigna Malbec Argentina 2004. I bought this one a very long time ago (while my wife was pregnant) at the recommendation of one of the guys at Murray's Wine Store and it's sat in my wine fridge ever since. My wife is a big fan of Malbec, so we waited until she wasn't pregnant or breast-feeding to enjoy this wine. I liked it. It wasn't terrific, but I've never been blown over by a Malbec. I like them, but they have never been a go-to wine for me. It's got lots of dark cherry and plums. A little spicy, but not too much. We paired it with grilled lamb chops and they went very well together (mmm.... those lamb chops turned out very good. I remember them well).

Oh... the baby's awake. Got to go.

So Much

2007-10-31T22:33:00.000-04:00

Wow. It's been forever since I posted on here. A whole lot has happened since then. We moved out of NYC (I'm still suffering from that - don't know if I'll ever get used to it), we're fixing up our house and my son had his first birthday. We got a new (second) car, and now I must deal with commuting into Manhattan on an all too often basis to get to work. We've seen some decent movies and drank some really good wine. We've had the occasional great meal and some terrific gelato. Hopefully I'll write more about this all later. Right now I've got work to finish...

Oh yeah, HAPPY HALLOWEEN.

NP: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, HBO

Last Post? Happy Labor Day

2007-09-02T00:19:00.000-04:00

Hmm... so Labor Day was actually started back in the 1800's by the Central Labor Union to give its workers a day off. Now it's a National Holiday. Nice. Happy Labor Day to everyone! It's the end of the summer (unofficially) and that's sad. There's cold weather ahead! Unless Al Gore is right and then there's rising sea levels ahead!
This is probably going to be my last post in a while. The Big Move is happening this week and we've been putting things away as best we can. The computer is going to go soon...
I may be on again over the next couple of days, but if not, it'll likely be a couple of weeks until the next post. See ya!
Go Yankees!

In The Club

2007-09-01T23:52:00.000-04:00

I've been pretty absent once again. Work and the Big Move have taken up almost all of my time. At least the Yankees are in playoff contention again. Hopefully they won't continue to have such a see-saw in their playing ability.
The last 3 wines we've opened have all been from the Wine of the Month Club my wife had gotten for me last Christmas. Unfortunately, the club is over for me (it was a 6 month gift), but I've still got some wines.
My favorite of the recent group was a Zinfandel from Puglia, Italy. It was Ill Basso Zinfandel 2005, Puglia (IGT). This wine was terrific, but really very different than an American Zin'. I don't even remember what we ate with this wine, but I remember the wine. We were a little scared when we uncorked it, not knowing what to expect, but we were pleasantly surprised. The wine wasn't really spicy like an American Zin'. My wife thought it tasted like cherries, but I could taste a little bit of tobacco and leather in there as well. Usually, this has been what I've disliked about wines from Puglia. This one, however, had just enough to make it really good and fun. The ones I've had before (Primitivo's, no Zinfandel's) were just too overpowering.
The next one was a white. It was Pasodoble Torrontes 2006, Argentina. I can't remember when this one showed up from the club, but it's been hanging in the 'fridge since then. On the papers from the club it states that it goes great with spicy Thai dishes. Usually, I like a Gewturztraminer or a Riesling with my Thai food, but we figured we'd give it a go. We got some great take-out from Land on the Upper East Side. Friends have told me that the one on Amsterdam is great too. Anyway, my first reaction was forgettable. Mainly because I felt like I was drinking water. It didn't stand up to the food. It was very easy to drink and definitely "went" with the meal (it actually did fair better against the spicier dishes), but it just kind of faded into the distance. My first sips (before the food) tasted of honey and peaches, and it was very smooth. Too bad it didn't hold its own.
Finally I've got a Merlot to speak of. To be honest, but biggest complaint about this Wine of the Month Club has been the predominance of Merlot's in its selections. Half of the reds were Merlot's. Anyway, this one was Tres Valles Merlot 2005, Curico Valley Chile. This was a pretty nice wine. It didn't have a lot of the "mossy-ness" I tend to associate with Merlot. It had some nice red fruits and was pretty easy to drink. However, we didn't finish the bottle, and I never went back to it again. So that has to tell you something.

NP: Some crazy a$$ $h!t by Bjork, Saturday Night Live

Bad Parents

2007-08-19T15:09:00.000-04:00

Apparently, arrogant salesmen know what makes a great parent. Yesterday, my wife, my son and I were going through Home Depot to get some things for the new house. Unfortunately, my wife had just mentioned that she was thirsty... So, when we turned the corner of the aisle and were asked "Would you like a glass of water?" by the strangely fit water pitchman she said okay. This guy was selling ZeroWater.
You might be thinking, what is ZeroWater? According to it's website:

ZeroWater is a revolutionary water filtration system that removes unwanted contaminants, leaving you with clear, great-tasting water. Need proof? Every ZeroWater Starter Kit includes the same tester used in national laboratories to evaluate the presence of contaminants.

The guy then kept going on and on about how great his water system was and that we should cough up the $150 (or somewhere around there) to buy one for our home. When we told him no, he got all upset with us. And I don't mean your common variety salesman trying to make a sale upset. He was visibly angry that we didn't want one. He even went as far as telling us that we were bad parents because we weren't getting one. He then went on to tell us that we weren't doing what is best for our son.
I didn't realize that this guy was the expert on child rearing. Luckily, ZeroWater has a 1-800 number, so I can call them with all my questions about my child. Screw his pediatrician, I've got the ZeroWater guy!

Phil Rizzuto... 1917-2007

2007-08-14T18:13:00.000-04:00

Today, Yankees legend, Phil Rizzuto passed away. I grew up listening to him broadcasting all the Yankees games on WPIX and on the radio, back when they were on AM 770. It's a sad day. So, let's all give a moment of silence for Rizzuto.

BTW: There's a great book with all the Phil Rizzuto quotes. It's fun.

Rosé Is The New Pink

2007-08-08T21:39:00.000-04:00

I went to Boston a few weeks ago to hang out with my wife while she was attending a work conference. While we were there, we went out to dinner to this place called Tapeo on Newbury Street. I hadn't eaten here in about 10 years or so, when we went for a friend's birthday. I didn't like it then, and I sort of liked it now. The food was good, but in the realm of Spanish Tapas outside of Spain, I've had a ton better. Their Sangria (the red one) was excellent, however.
When the pitcher of Sangria went dry, I was the only one who wanted more, so I decided to get a glass of wine. On a whim, I thought I would give the Muga Rosé Rioja, Rioja Spain a try. I've read that this was a good wine and rosé wines are "in" at the moment. Too bad I was disappointed. I can't even give you a flavor profile, because all I remember was "eh." It was cold and little else. Perhaps they had chilled it too much and washed the flavor away. Whatever the reason, I won't be having this one again.
Go to the Muga website here.

Let There Be White! (and a little red)

2007-08-08T10:07:00.000-04:00

I haven't written about any wines here in a long while, but I have been drinking them. I just don't have the time to sit down at the computer and write about them anymore. I guess because it's summer, I've been drinking more whites lately to go with the foods we're making. Who knows? Whatever the reason, I've got a few whites to talk about. First up is Inama Vin Soave Soave Classico 2005, Italy. Apparently, Inama is the leading estate producer of Soave Classico (who knew?). Anyway, I picked this up from one of the local liquor stores one night when I thought a white wine would go well with dinner. I don't remember exactly what we were having, but I'm pretty sure it was something Italian, so I wanted an Italian white to go with it. My choices were kind of slim because I wanted to get something from the cold case so we could drink it right away. I picked this mainly because I didn't like the other choices, and I was very pleasantly surprised. We both really liked it. It's a light/delicate wine, but it still has lots of flavor (not like some of the less memorable Pinot Grigios out there). It has a crisp finish and some minerality to it. We've gotten this one a couple times now, and I've enjoyed each bottle.
The second wine, I'm not so happy with. I actually picked it up as a consolation to the fact that the wine I actually wanted wasn't in stock. The one I did buy was Clos Roche Blanche Touraine Sauvignon 2006, France. It's not a bad wine. In fact, it's pretty good. It's crisp, light, with some citrus and anise flavors. It just wasn't the one I wanted, and I think that colored my feelings towards it. The other one was better. Of course, I can't remember the winery. It was another Touraine Sauvignon, and it was terrific. It had won some award that sounded like The Palme d'Or from the Cannes Film Festival.
The last white wine I have to mention was Willm Vin d'Alsace Gewturztraminer, France. I love this wine. I've had it before and it's a great example of a gewturztraminer. It's not too expensive, and the few bottles I've had have been consistently good. This one I had in my fridge, and we opened it up when we ordered some Indian food from Dakshin in NYC (which, by the way, has great delivery). This wine is on the sweeter side, with tastes of honey, pear, and melon. Not too acidic either.
Finally, I thought I would mention one red that we opened lately. It was the first of my Barolo collection (it's not that big of a collection) to be somewhat ready to be opened, so we went for it. It was Silvio Grasso "Bricco Luciani" Barolo 2000, Piemonte Italy. My excitement in opening this wine was somewhat diminished when I extracted the cork and saw evidence of some heat damage. It smelled okay, however, so I soldiered on. We had actually opened a much less expensive and less interesting wine first, but that wine was very old and very bad. So we moved on. I didn't tell my wife about the wine creeping up the sides of the cork to get an honest opinion on what she thought of this wine. It was still very good. There were tastes of blackberries, licorice, and tobacco. However I think this wine was a little harsher than it should have been. I drank it down anyway.

NP: Rollin' On, Black Stone Cherry

Spa Treatment

2007-08-04T07:15:00.001-04:00

I had decided to give my wife a massage at a spa as one of her presents this past year. Then, when I was about to buy her one, I thought "why don't I go too?" She's been trying to get me to try a message for years, and I figured I would go for it this time. I looked for a place that allowed men (you'd be surprised that most do not - at least here in NYC). So, we ended up at Oasis Day Spa in NYC. I wasn't sure what to expect, but I was along for the ride.
The whole place was about peacefulness and was set up trying to bring some tranquility into your life. They did a nice job - we were at the one on Park Avenue - and after you went downstairs into the spa, you forgot where you were.
We got the couples side-by-side message. I've got to say that it was really nice. Although I think I got so relaxed in there that I fell asleep for a second. I could get used to these...

NP:

This Is The End, My Friend

2007-08-03T23:37:00.000-04:00

Today I finished the 7th and last book in the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I'm a little saddened by completing these books. They were fun, and I enjoyed reading about the characters. Overall, I really enjoyed the book. I thought it started a little slow, but picked up quickly. I guess it played out as I expected, but I can't see it ending any other way.

NP: 5 to 1, The Doors

If Only Mr. Peabody Was Still Around

2007-07-30T21:13:00.001-04:00

While I was away in Salem, MA, my wife and I thought we would look around the Peabody Essex Museum. We like to explore art museums while we are on vacations, and had some time to kill before the wedding we were going to. Unfortunately, the museum had other plans.
We were traveling with our 9 month old son, and naturally, we had a diaper bag with us. Somehow, the museum has decided that diaper bags should be outlawed. They would not let us bring the bag in with us. We explained its purpose to the guards (and showed them that all it contained was some diapers, wipes, diaper cream, some toys and a change of clothes for our son) but they were unimpressed. They said it was museum policy that no bags could be brought inside, and that included diaper bags.
What was really amazing was how they were all shocked when we decided not to go in. Somehow, everything got turned around and we were the unreasonable ones who were acting all crazy by not wanting to pay the $13.00 each to get into this museum and not be able to bring our baby's diaper bag in.

So, during my trip to Salem, I learned that the Peabody Essex Museum sucks and they are unfriendly to children and families. Spread the word.

NP: Available Light, Rush

You've Got Your Banana In My Cola

2007-07-30T21:05:00.000-04:00

I went to Salem, MA this weekend for a good friend's wedding... there will be more on that later. We're still settling into the apartment after being away for more than a few days. I hate going back to work after being away. It sucks.
Right before we left for our trip, I saw a can of this Rola Cola Banana Cola in the store. It sort of grossed me out the second I saw it, but it was only 25 cents a can. Can't really turn that down, can you? So... I got one. I have to say, it wasn't that bad. I don't know if I'm going to be hunting down every store that sells Rola Cola or even saying that I would buy it again, but it wasn't gross. You could definitely taste the banana flavoring, and it didn't make me vomit. In fact, it was okay. I guess it would be like melting a banana Now and Later in your Coke and drinking it up.

NP: Nice To Meet You, Dramagods

Can You Feel The Vibrations?

2007-07-08T23:02:00.000-04:00

I went to the video store the other day looking for something to pass the time. Summer television programming seems to suck harder than I remember, and we haven't had something interesting to watch on our DVR in weeks. Of course, there really wasn't a single thing I was interested in renting (well... I still have this urge to check out Rocky Balboa, but I know my wife won't watch it). Then, the shop owner said, "How about Shooter? Everyone seems to like it."
I am really glad he suggested this movie. It kind of came and went out of the theaters (what movie doesn't these days - it's like the theater is some formality to get out of the way to make room for the DVD cash) and I forgot it even existed. Well, it was really entertaining. And somehow, you can't help but like Marky Mark's character even while he's shooting everyone in the head.
It's a good flick. Check it out.

NP: Richard Hung Himself, D.I.

Did You Say Free?

2007-07-08T22:47:00.000-04:00

I enjoy my coffee. So, I naturally jumped at the chance to get a free pod coffee maker from Senseo. I had read about this freebie online before, but never seemed to be able to get it to work for me. This time, I received an e-mail from the company to see if I qualified for a free machine.
Finally, success!
I got the e-mail asking me to pay for shipping ($15.00), and a free Senseo coffee maker (and some coffee) would be mine. (Okay, so maybe it's not exactly free, but $15 bucks for this machine which goes for $65-$75 in the store isn't too shabby.)
My initial plan was to bring this machine into work, so that I could easily make myself a cup of joe during my overnight shifts. First, however, I needed to try out the machine. If it was crap, what was the point?
That first night, we cracked open the box and set up the machine for some after-dinner coffee. Personally, I'm much more of a fan of the espresso based drinks, and that's usually what I drink at home (and from the coffee-shop). Unfortunately, my Breville machine is too loud to use once the baby is asleep, so we've been using a French-Press as an alternative. Well, the Senseo actually made a nice cup of coffee. And it's quiet, so we can use it at night. Yes, I'm still looking for a way to get a cup of coffee at work once everything else has closed, but I like having this at home.
Besides, everything is better when it's free.

NP: All Right Now, Free

Long Time No Post

2007-07-08T09:51:00.000-04:00

Life really catches up with you sometimes...
As a family, we've been really busy lately. There have been birthdays, anniversaries, conferences, a lot of working, and preparing for the big move (more on that at a later time). Mix that in with trying to get some quality time as a family really leaves you with no time for the little things. So, I haven't posted in a really long time. I've got a bunch of things to catch up on, but first I'll talk about yesterday.
We finally had a weekend day off together, so we packed up the kid and headed downtown to the Lower East Side (Alphabet City to be exact) to have some beers and sausages at Zum Schneider Restaurant & Biergarten. We sat outside, enjoyed the weather and ate some damn good food and enjoyed some beers. I had a couple 0.5L mugs of Hacker Pschorr, while my wife had a 0.3L glass of Aventinus, which is a double bock wheat beer. They were out of our favorite, the Spaten Optimator, but what can you do? This is a terrific place to go hang out with your friends and just relax with some beers. It's also a lot of fun for Oktoberfest. Food-wise, we shared some potato pancakes (Reiberdatschi) and then split the homemade spätzle with cheese, caramelized onions & bacon (Käsespätzle), which, incidentally, is listed as a vegetarian dish on the menu, and the sausage platter, which comes with 3 Bavarian sausages, sauerkraut & potato salad.
After lunch, we walked off the beer by going over to the Laboratorio del Gelato. We never seemed to find ourselves down there when it was a good time for some gelato. But today worked out well, and I was finally able to try this place. I got 2 flavors - Mexican cinnamon and dark chocolate. My wife got milk chocolate malt and dulche de leche. All were terrific.

NP: Eternal Life, Jeff Buckley

Gas Mania

2007-06-26T13:13:00.000-04:00

I like this game:

BP Gas Mania

Keep your customers happy!

Play this free game now!!

Another Year Older

2007-06-13T05:24:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was my birthday. All in all, it wasn't a great day. The baby was really cranky and I was very tired with a lot of stuff that I needed to get done. It did end on a nice note, however.
My wife took me out to Balthazar on Spring Street in NYC. This is one of the places I've wanted to go since I moved back here seven years ago, and I finally made it. I have to say, it didn't disappoint (well... except for the dessert, which is kind of tragic in a dinner/dessert sort of way). I've always been a little wary because this place is labeled a tourist trap, but it's well regarded anyway.
For starters, my wife had the Onion Soup Gratinee and I had the Chicken Liver and Foie Gras Mousse. They were both fantastic, but I think I liked the soup better - it was the best Onion Soup I've had outside of France. We paired our appetizers with a "carafe" of one of the 2 house whites - Pinot Blanc "Reserve" A Seltz, 2005 (by "carafe" they mean a full 750mL bottle). Our main courses consisted of Pan Roasted Chicken "A La Creme" for my wife and Duck Confit for myself (which I paired with a glass of Cote De Beaune Villages "Combottes" d'Ardhuy 2005).
Finally, we rounded out the dinner with some Warm Chocolate Cake with White Chocolate Ice Cream. Unfortunately, this was basically a brownie with a scoop of ice cream. There were other choices that would probably have been better. The cafe au'lait was good though.
Forget about the dessert and I had a great meal. It was a very nice birthday.

NP:

The Tradition Continues

2007-06-06T23:19:00.000-04:00

Yesterday marked my 3rd wedding anniversary, and for the 3rd year in a row we celebrated at Babbo Ristorante in New York. Well... I'm going to finish this later... watch for it.

B Is For Belgian

2007-06-05T16:01:00.000-04:00

The other night we decided to check out a new restaurant in our neighborhood called the B Cafe. This is a new Belgian Beer Cafe that has opened on the Upper East Side. We read that they have a great back yard dining area, which is good for kids. So, we loaded up our son in his stroller and off we went (we were meeting two of our friends there). Unfortunately the backyard was closed for repairs/reports of bad weather, so we had to sit inside where it's louder (which resulted in waking our son up a couple times during the meal). The place is very nice inside, and has the feel of a place that should be downtown and not on the UES. We started with some appetizers - salt and pepper shrimp and bitter ballen - which are deep fried meatballs served with a spicy mustard dipping sauce. Nice.
For dinner, 3 of us had variations on the house specialty - moules frites (mussels and fries). I got the mussels cooked in beer (Hoegarten), parsley and garlic. My wife got them cooked in white wine, vegetables and fresh herbs, and our friend got them cooked in saffron, chicken broth and white wine. All were terrific. And the fries came with ketchup, mayonnaise and mustard for dipping. Our other friend got the beef stew, which was also very good. To wash it all down I had a couple bottles of Leffe Dark, which went very well with my meal. Unfortunately our son got too cranky and we had to leave before dessert. Maybe next time.

Better Butter

2007-06-02T09:06:00.000-04:00

So, I think I finally realized I have turned into a food-snob (or Foodie if you want to use the kinder, less offensive terminology) when I went from getting my butter from the local Gristedes or D'Agostino and now have to go to Agata and Valentina (where I do most of my shopping anyways) or Citarella to get my French, Italian or Danish butter. Land O' Lakes or Breakstone's used to be good enough for me, but one day I decided to try some of the fancy stuff - it was on sale - and it really was a ton better. It's much creamier than the basic American product (which to me, tends to crumble easier) and the taste is so much better on toast or bagels or English muffins. So, now I'm stuck, paying more than I should for butter. But I don't want to go back to regular butter and that's why I've realize I have finally crossed the line... Oh, you can also get the Plugra brand, which is made in the good ol' U S of A (I think it's from Vermont) but in the "European style." It's pretty much the same as the one's from Europe but cheaper (I guess you're saving on the importing costs).

NP: Wish Upon A Dogstar, Satellite Party

Gypsies!

2007-05-23T17:07:00.000-04:00

Today I had to go to Midtown to rent a tuxedo for my friend's wedding. It was such a nice day and I didn't really have much to do, so I decided to walk around the city a bit. Imagine my surprise when I saw a figure hunched over, head covered with a shawl, and her hand stretched out and up holding a can waiting for handouts. You may be thinking "Surprised about beggers in NYC? Is this guy an idiot?" But what really got me was that this was a Gypsy. She looked just like the ones we avoided in Italy and in Spain. The only difference is that I didn't see any Gyspy kids hanging around her waiting to take your money. In Italy, my response of choice was "Get away from me you damn Gypsy." Yes, not very politically correct, but when they follow you and try and touch you and keep trying to get money from you, there's only so much you can take.
Anyway... after getting over my initial surprise of seeing a Gypsy begging in New York, I saw another a few blocks later. They're here and I'm scared...

NP:

Did Heroes Disappoint?

2007-05-23T09:38:00.000-04:00

Don't read this if you haven't watched the show and don't want to know what happens in the end.

Last night I watched the season finale of Heroes (we had it on our DVR since I worked Monday night). All in all, I really enjoyed this series and will be watching for it next year. The end, however, had me a little bummed out and disappointed. I almost feel as though they tried to cram too much into the last episode. Maybe if they made it a 2 hour episode it would have gone over better. A lot of things did get wrapped up, but I felt they happened too quickly. Also, there was no big fight between Sylar and the good guys. Sure they battled it out for like 2 minutes, but I was expecting more. He went down way too fast. Also... if Peter Petrelli can fly, why did his brother need to sacrifice himself to fly him away from NYC. Why didn't Peter just fly away? Who knows?

Here's waiting for next year.

NP: Far Cry, Rush

Hey, We're In Delaware...

2007-05-21T09:17:00.000-04:00

Anyone remember that scene in Wayne's World where they were playing with the blue screen? They were pretending to travel to different places around the country, and when they ended up in Delaware they had nothing to say except "hey... we're in Delaware." Well... I ended up in Delaware this weekend, and discovered that although there's truly not much to do there you can still have a nice time.
We went down to Rehoboth Beach for a long weekend (we both took Friday off) to have a little rest and relaxation. Unfortunately, Friday turned out to be a crappy day with some rain showers and cold temperatures. We roughed it out and looked around the main strip of Rehoboth. We couldn't really walk on the boardwalk that day because it was too cold and windy for the baby. There seems to be a large British influence in this area. The main old hotel on the beach (where we didn't stay) flies the British Flag proudly, and there are a lot of fish and chips places and like three Thrasher's restaurants (I use the term lightly). Of course there are like 50 Grotto Pizza places and I don't think the town is particularly Italian...
One of the fun things we did while we were there was eat at this crab house called Claws. We both went with the all you can eat crabs and corn on the cob special. It's pretty fun getting to eat your dinner with a mallet. Those crabs never stood a chance.
On Saturday, the weather got nicer, although we did have to deal with some showers at night. Sunday, of course was beautiful for the drive back to NYC. (BTW, driving 4 hours with a 7 month old in the car is not easy...)
Today... back to work.

Today's Wines Sponsered By The Letter "L"

2007-05-15T11:17:00.000-04:00

We tried a couple more wines from the Wine-of-the-month club my wife got me for Christmas this year (I've only got 2 more months to go... I'm kind of sad about that). This time, we had another of the reds shipped to me. It was Lara Dao 2005, Portugal. Apparently, this wine goes very well with authentic Portuguese cuisine. Since we didn't have any way to test out that theory, we just had it with some meats (the wine club says it goes well with grilled and/or spicy meats). I loved this wine. My wife liked it a lot, but didn't love it like I did. I would definitely get this again, but my brief search on the internet left me with nothing. This wine was deep red in color and had just enough acidity without being harsh. Some nice dark fruits too with a little chewy-ness to it.
The other wine we had was a chardonnay (one bad thing about this club is that 3 of my 4 white wine selections have been chardonnays... maybe they could get a bit more creative) from Australia. It was Lismore Range Chardonnay 2006, South Eastern Australia. I can't remember what we ate with this wine, but I enjoyed this one too. It was on the fruitier side with little oak. It was crisp and fresh. A good summer wine. I would drink this one again too.

Mail...

2007-05-14T22:56:00.000-04:00

I just read that the United States Postal Service has increased the price of a first class postage stamp to $0.41 today. That sucks.
Yes, in this day and age, most "mail" communication happens via e-mail. And yes, most bills are paid electronically. And I'm assuming that a decrease in overall paper mail volume increases the individual price of mailing a single letter, but it still sucks to pay 41 cents to mail a letter. And why 41? They couldn't make it an even 40?
Ah well... pass the beer nuts...

One Comic-Book Geek's Opinion

2007-05-13T10:29:00.000-04:00

This weekend, we went to see a movie in the theater for the first time since our son was born. We decided to go and see Spiderman 3. Personally, I thought the first two were some of the best comic-book-to-the-big-screen adaptations out there. Maybe my expectations for the third installment were too high. I was definitely entertained by this film, but I left feeling somewhat disappointed. Maybe it's because I read these comics as a kid (I don't think I've bought a comic since college, so it's been a while and maybe I'm not up with all the comic-book-facts), but I wasn't totally happy with how some of the characters were handled. I also felt that they were trying to do way to much with this movie, and some of the plot lines moved so quickly they were a little hard to accept.

Yeah, I know it's a movie about a guy with spider powers and you have to have a certain level of acceptance of the ridiculous...

A big part of my difficulty accepting this movie is because they changed some characters and moved some classic comic story lines around. The first two films didn't do that too much, but this one was full of changes. Gwen Stacy... Eddie Brock... The Alien Space Suit... Venom... The Sandman... Harry Osbourne (The "New" Goblin). Nothing was really faithful to the comic, and that left me feeling a little let down. Maybe it was because they tried to cram so much crap into one film, they had to cut corners and change things around to make it all work. Perhaps if they only had one villain... who knows?
Overall, it's a fun summer flick. We were entertained and enjoyed ourselves during the movie. Looking back on it, I'm disappointed, but you've got to learn to live with life's little disappointments, right?

NP: How Many Times?, Zack Hexum

Back Again

2007-05-06T16:39:00.000-04:00

Today, Roger Clemens announced his return to the New York Yankees. Once again he is coming out of retirement to join his friend Andy Pettite. Hopefully, this will be a good thing. The man is 44 years old. But hey, it's not like the Yankees have a plethora of pitchers at the moment. And they won again today. Nice.

Mr. Smithsonian Goes To Washington

2007-05-06T10:38:00.000-04:00

Although I was in DC for work related reasons (an overall disappointing conference) I decided that during this visit to our nation's capital, I would visit some of the museums. Over the past few years I've been to Washington DC about 6 times and the only time I did anything somewhat tourist-y was the last time, and all I did was walk around The Mall. Anyway, I decided I wanted to check out the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. In some ways it reminded me of the Museum of Natural History in NYC, but in other ways not at all. Mainly, the entire place had a modern sheen that the NYC museum doesn't have. The stuffed animals actually looked like animals to me, unlike the one's in the NYC version. I think that a big part of it is that in NYC, the animals are placed in fake habitats that basically cancel out any form of realism once you've reached the age of eleven. In the Smithsonian, there was just a big stuffed grizzly bear in a plexiglass box. Also on display were the winners (and honorable mentions) in the Smithsonian's 3rd Annual Photo Contest (these were the ones in the "nature" category). This exhibit was awesome. I can't find this exhibit online, but you can see the finalists for the 4th annual contest here.
I also went to the National Gallery of Art after the throngs of school children drove me out of the Smithsonian. I loved this place. First of all, the architecture is awesome, with nods to places like the Prado in Madrid, Museu Nacional d' Art Catalunya in Barcelona, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and other museums like it. It's cool because it has the only Da Vinci painting in the entire United States, as well as tons of paintings by El Greco, Cezanne, Lautrec, etc...

Coffeebucks

2007-05-04T11:00:00.000-04:00

One of my favorite things to be brought into Scrubs lately is the in-hospital Coffeebucks. I love the fact that they didn't even try to hide that they were ripping on Starbucks.
Today, I have the pleasure of sitting in a place called Caribou Coffee. I've never been in one of these before (although I think maybe I've seen one in NYC). The place I went to grab breakfast in yesterday was really sub-par even though it looked like it would be good. It was called Corner Bakery Cafe. My breakfast sandwich was cold (although it took them 20 minutes to make it) and my coffee sucked. This Caribou Coffee place is pretty good. My latte is excellent, and my cinnamon roll is good (not great, but good). The thing that cracks me up about this place is how much it wants to be Starbucks. It should be called Cariboubucks. If you went into a Starbucks and hit it with an odd Montana-living-Canadian-mounty-riding-magic-wand-thingy, you'd get this place. It's laid out like a Starbucks. The food and drinks are like a Starbucks, and they even sell the same crap as a Starbucks. Now, let me tell you that I don't love Starbucks. In fact, I don't think they make great tasting coffee (although if you hide it in a lot of sugar and steamed milk, it turns out pretty good). My main point is that the similarities are amazing. Who knows, maybe this Caribou Coffee place came first and Starbucks rode it's ideas to fame, but somehow I doubt it.

For now, I'm off to the Smithsonian.

NP: Some crappy smooth-jazz, courtesy of Caribou Coffee

Tapas This

2007-05-03T21:38:00.000-04:00

As I said earlier, I'm in DC for a work conference. Actually, my hotel is in this place called Crystal City, which is somewhere between DC proper and Ronald Reagan Airport. It's basically like a fake city that was built specifically for the convention crowd. There's a bunch of hotels on a strip with a bunch of chain restaurants littering the main strip. There are also a couple of underground malls with more restaurants and crappy souvenir stores (can someone tell me why a place with weather as nice as DC feels the need to build so many underground shopping areas?). So, tonight, after being unsuccessful contacting old friends in the area, I went to get dinner by myself. I decided to go to this Tapas place called Jaleo which is a few blocks away from the hotel. I've actually been to another Jaleo last summer when I was in DC for another conference. That was the one downtown, and although I thought it was okay, I didn't love all of the choices the friends I was with picked out for dinner, and was hoping tonight would be different. A couple of my DC-centric friends have vouched for this place as having great Tapas. Unfortunately, I can't say they were correct. Tonight I went with some standard fare - chorizo, a Spanish tortilla, and string beans with garlic and Serrano ham. All were labeled as "traditional" in styling. Unfortunately, neither the chorizo nor the tortilla was like anything I had before. Neither were bad, so I'm not going to complain too much, but overall, it wasn't what I was expecting. I did have some great wine, however. Lorinon Crianza Tempranillo 2003, Rioja Spain and some free cheeses. It was no Tia Pol or even Las Ramblas. But it was okay. It was the Disney version of Spanish Tapas.

And since we're talking about Tapas, I figured I would mention my favorite Tapas bar in Madrid (out of the ones we were able to try): The Alhambra on Calle de Victoria. It may not look like much, but it's always crowded, the bartenders are really friendly, and they serve good, cheap wine. While the Tapas menu may be small, everything we had was excellent. They tend to serve everything either with or on this fantastic toasty bread, which goes great with some chorizo or manchego cheese. We actually went there twice, which says a lot that we'd rather go back there than try somewhere else new.

NP: Vancouver, Jeff Buckley

Batali's Vegas Vacation

2007-05-02T21:02:00.000-04:00

Mario Batali has opened up two new restaurants in Las Vegas' Venetian Hotel. He's opening up the B & B Restaurant (Mario Batali and his partner/ winemaker Joseph Bastianich make up the B & B), which is supposed to be the Vegas version of Babbo (which is my favorite restaurant in the U.S.A.) and Enoteca San Marco (which is supposed to be like NYC's Otto).
On one hand I think this is great. On the other, I'm kind of sad that these are opening over there. I feel like they're a part of New York that has now just become another example of commercialism. Of course, Batali is a "celebrity chef," so commercialism should be expected...

In The District

2007-05-02T20:23:00.000-04:00

This week I've been hanging out in Washington DC for a work conference. It's been okay so far. I think I would have enjoyed it much more if by butt wasn't kicked by this cold I've been fighting since Friday. I'm actually starting to feel a bit better today, which is great.
The weather here has been fantastic, so the few moments I've had to get away and step outside have been really nice. As part of the conference we were taken out to dinner to Ruth Chris Steakhouse last night. I have to say, my steak was excellent and cooked perfectly (the way I like it). Coming from NYC where there are so many great steakhouses to choose from (Sparks is my personal favorite) I've never thought about going to Ruth Chris, but this was terrific. And it was free, which made it even better. It's really difficult to pass up free steak.
Tonight I'm just hanging in my hotel room watching television. I'm trying to give my body an evening in to get some sleep and hopefully finish recovering.

On a totally different note, I read today that the Yankees fired their newly hired conditioning coach. Personally I think it's about time. 3 pitchers in one month suffering hamstring injuries is just plain odd. Also with all of the other injuries the Yankees have suffered this year, something needed to change (I think the only injury that definitely can't be blamed on the conditioning is Karsten's broken leg). Personally I was blown away when I heard that Phil Hughes got hurt last night, especially when he was on pace for a no-hitter. But what can you do? Right?

Movin' On

2007-04-18T23:53:00.000-04:00

Tonight, the New York Rangers beat the Atlanta Thrashers 4-2 to take game 4 of a best of 7 series. In doing so, they wrapped up the sweep and won their first playoff series since 1997. Hopefully this is the start of something good!

Down (the hatch) With Whitey

2007-04-17T15:02:00.000-04:00

More wines today... I haven't posted much for a while, so I feel I'm due for some stuff to go up here. I thought I would start with the wines and move on from there. Firstly, we've got a bottle of Tacora Chardonnay Reserva 2006, Curico Valley Chile. This was a selection from the Wine of the Month Club in February. Out of the 2 bottles of white I've gotten, this is the superior one (more on the other in a bit). When we first opened it, I wasn't too happy with it and it made me get a little disappointed with the club (only 1 good one so far). However, the next night, it tasted fantastic. I think the change had more to do with the food pairing than anything else. Now I'm very happy with this wine. It's pretty devoid of any oaky-ness and is more fruit-forward with more tropical fruit tastes than anything else. Overall, a nice wine.
The other white I got from the Wine Club was Le Causse Sauvignon Blanc Vin de Pays d'Oc 2005, France. I had been really excited to try this one since we loved the first bottle of red we opened from the club (this bottle was the white selection from month 1 - January). Unfortunately this one wasn't all that great. It tasted sandy to me. That's the best way I can describe it. Now it wasn't terrible. It just wasn't great. I've kept it around for cooking purposes, but we could never bring ourselves to have another glass.
I'm going to finish up today's post with a wine that I didn't get from the club. In fact, this is something I bought myself on the recommendation from the wine guy at Cellar 72. I bought this a while ago when we had some friends over for tapas. We never broke into this bottle and it had been sitting in the cellar waiting to be opened. It's Condes de Albarei Albarino 2005, Spain. Overall, it's a nice white with some citrus flavors and an overall "niceness." I feel like saying it has a nice personality. You know.. not a looker, but you could have some fun with it if you gave it a chance.

NP: While My Guitar Gently Weeps, The Beatles

Portman

2007-04-12T14:43:00.000-04:00

The other day I went by work to drop off some paperwork I needed to get done (I actually didn't have to work that day). Since I was taking care of our son, I thought I would swing by my wife's office to say hi (she and I work in the same place of business, but different departments). Anyway, who happened to be there working with the kids? Natalie Portman. She was helping kids paint these huge flower-decal things that are going to get put on cabs in NYC to promote something-or-other.
Anyway, Natalie Portman is one of those celebrities who looks exactly like she does in person as she does on film. I was surprised how tiny she is, but other than that all I have to say is that she's a beautiful woman.

NP: Secrets, Van Halen

Litigation

2007-04-10T12:34:00.000-04:00

I've never been one to love lawsuits. Overall, I find people who sue to be annoying do-nothings who are looking for a quick buck (there are a few exceptions - like the poor family who were undergoing fertility treatments and mom was inseminated with the wrong man's sperm). I just read in the Daily News that this woman is being allowed to sue the New York City Department of Education because she got hit in the eye by another child while they were in kindergarten twenty-three years ago.

"He used to pick on me," Bowles, now 29, told the Daily News. "I learned to forgive, but I'll never forget what he did to me."

The reason why they're going to let her go through with the case is because it was originally filed back in 1985. I just think this is going to open the door for a whole slew of crazy cases. At least she's not suing the man who threw something in her eye all those years ago. Sure, they say he's not remorseful even now, but to make it okay to sue you for something you did when you were 5 would just be insane.
This case revolves around the claim that the Department of Education knew that this boy had "issues" and should have been removed from class to protect the other children, and now the woman has suffered continued and prolonged damage because of the incident. If they win, this is going to cause havoc in the education system. Every child who displays any kind of aggression or laughs the wrong way will be removed from class. Either they'll get lumped into a class for the "mentally distressed" and receive a crappy education, or they'll have to stay at home and get home-schooled (and although I know there are parents out there who are more than qualified to perform home-schooling, the majority of this country is not).
If you want to read the article, go here.

The Great K-Fed Swindle

2007-03-30T14:47:00.000-04:00

So... back in the day, Britney used to be hot. Everyone loved her. Her songs went to Number 1 and her CD's sold millions. Despite the occasional stumble (Crossroads anyone?) she was always able to pick herself up and move along. Then Kevin Federline came along. No one could understand what the hell Brit was thinking. He slid in out of nowhere (I would be completely amazed if anyone out there had ever heard of him before he started dating Britney Spears) and hooked himself up with one of the most popular and wealthy stars around. His future was looking bright. He used up tons of her money to attempt to become a recording artist, and another immense amount partying with his friends in Vegas. All the while, he was fooling around with one of the hottest people in showbiz. Of course, we have all been witness to the decline in Britney's status (all the way down to what some may refer to as "fugly"). But that only made Kevin party more and spend more of her money. Now, after he got her knocked up twice and has basically sent her to the nuthouse, he's out. Kevin Federline and Britney Spears finally had their divorce finalized. Kevin gets $1 million and only partial custody of the kids (who will live with Brit). He's out and he's rich. Sure, some may say that $1 million doesn't get you that far in today's economy. But this guy got to screw around with the girl everyone wanted, and when she got all nasty, used and bald, he got $1 million to leave. It's almost as if he planned it this way all along. Got to hand it to the boy; if it was planned, he's smarter than any of us gave him credit for.

The Sanjaya Paradox

2007-03-30T07:42:00.000-04:00

For those of you who don't watch American Idol, there's this kid, Sanjaya Malakar, who's striking fear into the executives at FOX and the producers of the hit show. Basically, this kid stinks, but he keeps getting enough votes each week to move along in the show. He's not even getting into the "Bottom 3" of vote-getters. He's a rock in this thing. Meanwhile, singers with exponentially better voices are getting the boot. Some feel that his continued success is due to the website votefortheworst.com, while others blame Howard Stern's plea to his viewers to vote for Sanjaya. Whatever the reason, the kid's winning. (Of course, some people out there love him, as witnessed by that little girl who was crying in his presence a couple of weeks ago.)
I guess the big problem is that if this musically challenged kid wins American Idol this year, it basically destroys any credibility the show has developed for being an avenue to find truly talented people in America and turn them into recording artists. However, here's where the paradox lies: If Sanjaya wins, I think it's confirmation that anyone can make it if they try, and this should only encourage more people to audition for American Idol next time around. It would make more people want to be in the show and have a greater interest in the show. This, in turn, could lead to higher ratings and more money for FOX. So... it could very well make the thing more popular while simultaneously destroy all of its credibility (and lose Simon Cowell in the process, who has said if Sanjaya wins he's going to quit). Nice.
The other thing I find interesting about this whole mess is the way the judges (Randy, Simon and Paula) are dealing with it. Every week they have these flabbergasted looks on their faces after he performs and then look dumbfounded when he doesn't get voted off. However, what they never seem to want to remember is that they are the ones who put him in this situation in the first place. They love to remind everyone how it was "America" who voted off Jennifer Hudson and not them. They realized her talent and put her on the show. You don't see any of them taking responsibility for Sanjaya.
(Personally, I can't stand this kid anymore. I used to think he was a nice kid and I wanted him to do well because of that. However, I can't stand listening to him anymore. He's so freakin' bad.)
Go Sanjaya!

NP: The Inch Worm, John Coltrane

Cafe D'Alsace

2007-03-25T22:02:00.000-04:00

This weekend, we decided to treat ourselves by having our nanny work late on Friday night so we could go out for dinner by ourselves. We love our baby, but sometimes you need to get out and remember what it's like to be an adult.
We went to a new French restaurant in our neighborhood called Cafe D'Alsace. We didn't want to go too far on the first night she had to put our son to bed in case there were any problems. This is the newest restaurant by Simon Oren. He owns a bunch of different French restaurants throughout the city that focus on cuisines of specific regions of France.
I liked this place right away because the decor reminded me of actually being in France. However that feeling was somewhat dampened by the music choice in the restaurant. I don't know how often the Bangles are played in France anymore...
Anyway, we opened up our meal with a couple of appetizers. My wife had the Tarte Flambee, which is a white cheese, onions and bacon tart, and I had La Moelle, which is bone marrow served with toast and salt. We also both had a glass of wine at that point. We each had the Chateau L'Ermitage, Listrac-Medoc, Bordeaux 2003.
Our main courses broke down like this: I had the Baeckeofe, which is a traditional Alsatian casserole of lamb, oxtails, bacon & potatoes braised in pinot gris w/ onions & thyme, and my wife had the lamb shank. Both were excellent. With my dinner, I moved on to a glass of Pinot Noir, Cote de Beaune Villages, Roux Pére & Fils, Bourgogne 2004.
From there we moved onto dessert, where we shared a Creme Brulee and I had a Cafe Au Lait to end things out.
It was a very nice meal and we had a good time. But it was nice to come back home and see our son too.

Thirstade Powder

2007-03-23T21:53:00.000-04:00

I remember back in the day, it was commonplace to see Gatorade Powder mix in the grocery store isles. Of course, that was a time when Gatorgum was everywhere and the only three flavors available were Green (lemon-lime), Orange, and Red (fruit punch). Now there are 51 flavors of Gatorade, including weird crap like Gatorade AM and Gatorade XTremo Mango Electrico (which, I assume, is supposed to appeal to the ever-growing Latino population in the U.S.).
Anyway, yesterday I was in my local Gristede's getting a couple of things when I spotted some canisters of Gatorade Powder on the shelves! I know I shouldn't get so excited about such a stupid thing, but I grabbed a cannister of Lemon-Lime before someone else came by and took them all away. I don't think they were left-overs from the 1970's, but even if they are, I don't care. Now I can make myself a cool glass of Gatorade whenever I want.

Bourne Ultimatum

2007-03-22T16:24:00.000-04:00

Today I watched a little of Matt Damon filming a scene for his upcoming movie, The Bourne Ultimatum. They were/are filming in Manhattan (I think they're still filming now, but I was with my son, and he decided it was time to come home) on the East Side. 76th Street and Second Avenue to be exact. Unfortunately, I didn't get to witness any cool action shots or fights. Basically I saw Matt come out of a store and walk very briskly with a concerned/constipated look on his face. So... from what I can tell, it may be a movie about Jason Bourne's search for a bathroom and some laxatives.

NP: Far Cry, Rush

Sciacchetrà!

2007-03-20T15:09:00.000-04:00

I was finally able to locate some Sciacchetrà in the United States. (To be totally honest, I did find a bottle once a couple of years ago, but it was over $150.00 and I wasn't too sure I wanted to spend that much on a bottle of this stuff then.)
I found that K&L Wine Merchants in San Francisco just got a case in of Arrigoni Sciacchetrà 2003, Cinque Terre Italy, so I decided to order a couple of bottles. They came in a week or so ago, and the other night we opened one up to see if it was how we remembered it. Now this isn't the same producer of the one we had while we were in Italy, but beggers can't be choosers I guess.
It was great. It's got a nice amber color, and it's warm and smooth. There are flavors of caramel and orange, and it reminded me a little of a tawny port without the nuttiness. All in all, worth the wait, and it gave us a little reminder of our honeymoon.

NP: Pilots, DramaGods

DramaGods

2007-03-19T00:03:00.000-04:00

The other day, I stumbled across the new band by Nuno Bettencourt while looking for something on YouTube. Nuno used to be the guitarist for the Boston-based band Extreme. After he quit that band, he started a new group called Mourning Widows. Apparently that group didn't work out. So... Nuno moved on to form a "group" called Population 1. The full-length CD by Population 1 features Nuno on all instruments. When he decided to play some live shows, he put a band together which includes Joe Pessia on bass guitar, Steve Ferlazzo on keyboards and back-up vocals, and Kevin Figueiredo on drums and back-up vocals. They put out an EP called Sessions From Room 4. I guess there were some legal issues with their name, so now they're called DramaGods, and they have a CD called Love, which came out last year, available on iTunes.
Watching some of their videos and live clips made me remember what an awesome guitar player Nuno is. I don't think I've ever heard any of these groups before. In fact, I kinda forgot Nuno was making music. I'm kind of digging it.

Something About You

Megaton

Magic Man

2007-03-18T22:51:00.000-04:00

Recently, we've watched both The Illusionist and The Prestige. You know, I can't remember the last time there was a movie out about a magician, never mind two movies. But here we are. Two movies about magicians/illusionists out in the same year. And both had very good casts. I saw The Illusionist first, and if I had to choose, I would probably say that this was the better film. It really had me fooled throughout the entire movie. Edward Norton was fantastic as always, and this movie has Jessica Biel. However, I think I enjoyed The Prestige more. Sure, I had about 90% of the plot and surprise twist ending figured out halfway through the movie. I didn't care. This movie was sicker and more twisted than The Illusionist. Because of that, it was more fun and enjoyable. Better story? Nope. But I guess I don't really care.

NP: Crash Course In Brain Surgery, Metallica

Drunken Holiday

2007-03-17T20:26:00.000-04:00

Today we had to go to see our accountant for our 2007 taxes (our stuff is way too complicated for me to do it by myself anymore). As many out there know, today is St. Patrick's Day. A day to pay honor to one of the Catholic Church's more well known saints. It's also a day where a ton of people decide to get stone cold drunk. Our accountant's office is on 5th Avenue, just south of the parade route. So, after our meeting, we were lucky enough to share the streets with all of the drunken revelers. It was 1:00 in the afternoon and there was a girl literally sliding sideways down the wall of a building as she slurred drunkenly towards me attempting to take my picture (why? don't ask me). Not that I haven't taken part in getting hammered on St. Patty's Day in the past, but now I just find it all sort of one of life's many amusements.
Oh, and by the way, our taxes weren't nearly as bad as I had feared. Irish eyes were smiling on us.

Pinkberry

2007-03-11T16:10:00.000-04:00

My wife had been wanting to try this place since one opened up near our apartment on the Upper East Side. From what she told me, it was a supposedly really good and hip Frozen Yogurt place that had its roots in California. Word was that the stars line up for this place on the West Coast. So, today we tried it. And you know what? It sucked. And it wasn't just me who thought so. My wife decided she never needs to go back there, and I heard more than one "this is crap" uttered from other patrons. It's crappy plain (or green tea) frozen yogurt with a variety of toppings (from fresh fruit to Fruity Pebbles). The thing it reminded me most of were those old frozen yogurt pops by Dannon in the 1970-80's. At least those had Buddy Hackett pitching them. I see no redeeming value of Pinkberry. It just blows.

Oscar Worthy?

2007-03-10T11:17:00.000-05:00

Hmmm... I'm sorry that I have to say this. My wife and I watched The Departed last night on DVD, and although I thought it was a great movie I really don't think it was Scorsese's best. I still haven't seen all of the movies that were up for Best Picture this year, so maybe among the crop, this one stood out as the best. It just sort of makes me sad that Scorsese finally won his Oscar, and it was for this. Raging Bull, GoodFellas, Taxi Driver... all better. I could go on with the list... I'm very happy that Scorsese finally got his Oscar. I think it's great. I just really think he deserved it sooner, because I think this year's win was more a "lifetime achievement award" rather than a true win for this film. Well, that's my opinion anyway.

NP: Pull Me Under, Dream Theater

Waste Of Time And Money

2007-03-10T11:05:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I had to go downtown a bit to do some errands. While I was there, I decided to stop in this wine shop called Vino. It sells only Italian wines from around the old country. Anyway... I decided to get a couple of things. One was at the recommendation of the shop-guy, and the other was something I had wanted to try. The recommended bottle was Tenute del Portale Aglianico del Vulture Riserva 2000, Basilicata Italy. This wine is made from the Aglianico grapes, which are grown in volcanic soil. This supposedly gives the grapes more minerality and spice. Unfortunately, I wouldn't know, because the wine was totally heat-damaged. So... I've got to go back to get a refund/exchange. The second bottle we opened last night was the other one I bought there. It was Conti Zecca Cantalupi Riserva 2002, Pulgia Italy. I guess the "legal" name of this wine is actually Salice Salentino Riserva, and it's made from the Negro Amaro grape. The wine is described as having some leather and spice aromas and flavors. Well... to me it tasted like you were drinking a leather coat. Not enjoyable at all. So... we struck out with the wine last night. After having two crappy bottles, we switched to water instead. What can you do?

Captain America... Dead

2007-03-07T09:01:00.000-05:00

Steve Rogers, aka Captain America, is dead. Killed off in the Marvel Comics Universe by a sniper's bullet (well... 2 bullets). I was never one to get into the whole Captain America thing, but I find it somewhat disturbing that he's dead. Maybe it's because he was a fellow New Yorker (born on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, living in Red Hook, Brooklyn) or maybe because of all the symbolism. He appeared during WWII, when the USA was on top of the world. Now he's gone in 2007. Who's next on Marvel's hit list? Beta Ray Bill?

It's A Cold Day To Be A Millionaire

2007-03-06T20:29:00.000-05:00

Holy crap was it cold today. It's freakin' March and it's still 1°F outside. It looks like it's going to stay cold out in NYC until the weekend, when we'll move on to more reasonable weather.
Tonight's MegaMillions Jackpot is $370 Million. Good luck.

UPDATE: Well, I didn't win the MegaMillions. Too bad, too. Because I could've really used $370 Million. Maybe next time.

Dancing With The Devil

2007-03-06T20:09:00.000-05:00

More wines... more wines... I was really busy this weekend, working 12 hours a day for 4 straight days (finishing on a Monday, which blows) so I didn't get much time to do anything but work. Tonight, however, we relaxed with a nice dinner and some wine. We had Casillero del Diablo Carménère 2004, Chile. This wine is made up of 85% Carménère, 10% Cabernet Sauvignon, 5% Syrah. We've had this in the cellar for a looong time, and I thought we'd bust it out tonight. It had some nice flavors of chocolate, plum and some spice. I also felt it was kind of earthy. It did have some nice acidity at the end - almost too much, but not quite. A very nice wine that my wife enjoyed a lot. You can check out the Casillero del Diablo website here.
Another wine we had somewhat recently was a bottle of Le Causse Vin de Pays D`oc Sauvignon Blanc 2005, France which we received from my wine club in January. We were really excited to try this wine since the first bottle from the club was so good. Unfortunately, this one wasn't up to snuff. It's not bad, it just didn't excite me. To be honest, if almost tasted more like a Chardonnay than a Sauvignon Blanc. It was almost too fruity to be a Sauvignon Blanc.
Finally, there's one more wine we've had recently that I haven't mentioned. It was Blanc Slate Jean de Lupfen Pinot Blanc which I ordered with my groceries through Fresh Direct, but you can also get from Best Cellars. This is a very nice wine, that we really enjoyed. It's a little more fruity and floral than I usually like, but it went well with our meals and is really easy to drink. This is a great wine to have around for those who don't always like to drink wine.

NP: Rollin' On, Black Stone Cherry

Jeter Joke

2007-02-27T11:32:00.000-05:00

This year's Topps' Derek Jeter baseball card has a special touch to it (and it's not a stick of gum you can actually chew.) Someone thought it would be funny to Photoshop a picture of George W. Bush into the stands behind Jeter (and if you look closely, you can see that George's left arm has been hacked off) and Micky Mantle holding a bat in the dugout. Overall I think it's pretty funny that the company let it through.

NP: Turn Up The Radio, Autograph

Rats!

2007-02-24T21:13:00.000-05:00

I don't know if this made news in other parts of the country, but it's big here in NYC. A Taco Bell/KFC in the West Village of NYC has been infested with rats who appear to come out at night to play after the fast-food restaurant chain has closed. The only problem is that everyone walking by can see them frolicking throughout the place. A ton of complaints were made, and it was on the news last night. Here's a clip showing the rats at play.

Tapas Feast

2007-02-23T23:31:00.000-05:00

Tonight we had a couple of friends over for dinner. They wanted to come over, hang out and see our baby. Unfortunately for them, they arrived just as we put our son to sleep. Luckily for them, I had prepared a Spanish tapas feast for dinner. I made chorizo in red wine, string beans with pine nuts, mushrooms sauteed in garlic, tortilla de España, chicken in lemon and garlic and spicy shrimp with chili and garlic. I have to say, they all turned out pretty damn good. We had a fun night, and now I'm really full. We finished it all off with some nice Tiramisu cake our friends brought over.
With the meal I decided to serve both red and white wine, depending on your preference. Interestingly enough, my wife and I both had the red, our guests had the white. In retrospect, I wish I had tried the white. The red was a bottle of Finca Luzon 2005, Jumilla Spain. I've had this bottle for months in my wine fridge after reading some nice reviews of it. The reviews were correct. I thought this was terrific, and went very well with our meal. What's also nice is that I've seen it for as low as $5.98 a bottle in some stores. (I also used this wine to cook my chorizo.) The wine has a dark ruby/purple color with lots of blackberry and cherries. It has some acidity, but also very little harshness. I think this could be a great everyday wine at its price.
Unfortunately, the white didn't fare as well. After our guests had left, I decided to try the white since I hadn't had any with dinner. Well, whatever was left is now down the drain in the sewer system of NYC. I'm assuming the bottle was corked because it was bloody awful. For the record, it was Las Brisas Blanc 2005, Rueda Spain. I went to the wine shop today for some Spanish whites (I have a bunch of reds already) and the wine guy offered up some wines. To be completely fair, this bottle was not his first choice and I did also purchase the one that was. However this was the one we opened. I got a couple of different labels because I think it's fun to try different wines with a meal instead of grabbing a couple of the same thing. Anyway, a review I found on line for this wine says: "Intense, youthful nose of grapefruit, lemon and pepper. Delicious, with medium body and a penetrating finish." All I got from this wine was ass... lot's of ass. Again, my wife and I both think the bottle was corked, but we feel bad because our guests never said anything. They both drank a glass of this crap and said nothing. I guess they were too embarrassed to say anything. Next time, I have to remember to try what I'm serving.

NP: Mexico, Incubus

Seamless...

2007-02-22T12:16:00.000-05:00

Last night, my wife and I had decided we weren't hungry after a late lunch and we weren't going to have dinner. Of course, an hour later we were starving without anything in the house to eat. So... like all good New Yorkers, we decided to order in. However, I hate dealing with people (store people, not people in general), especially on the telephone. So, I decided to try something new. Seamless Web. This is a website where you can order from different restaurants online and they deliver it to your door without ever having to speak to anyone but the dude who brings it over. You can even include the tip online so you don't have to deal with it later.
We ordered from this place Wrap Star on the UES. All in all, everything turned out very nicely. Of course, something had to get screwed up, and my wife didn't get the wrap she had ordered. However, when I looked over the menu this morning, the wrap she got doesn't seem to exist. I'm a little confused about that. I got the barbecue chicken wrap, and my wife got the mystery beef wrap. I don't blame that mix-up on Seamless Web, but on Wrap Star itself.
Seamless web delivers in Manhattan, Hoboken, Jersey City, Boston and Washington DC. (Why am I listing these? Not to sound like and ad, but because I have friends in all those cities and maybe they'd like this too.)

On a totally different subject, I tried to get my friend Mike tickets to see the Police at the Meadowlands in August. I got some e-mail from Best Buy that gave me a code to get pre-sale tickets from Ticketmaster this morning. I figured I would buy them for him, etc... of course when I tried to do it at 10:03 am (tickets went on sale at 10:00 am) there were no tickets available. I'm sure this was just for the alotted presale tickets, but come on...

NP: Hell Yeah, Neil Diamond

Continues To Impress

2007-02-21T13:15:00.000-05:00

I love the show Heroes. I think it has proven itself to be one of the most fun, interesting and compelling shows on television this year. Maybe it's because I was a comic-book-geek growing up and I still enjoy sci-fi, but I feel like I haven't seen an episode that hasn't left me excited for next week's. Hopefully the show will continue to grow like this. Although I wonder how long of a story arc they have written in for this show.
Another show I watched this week which kind of blew was American Idol (the Tuesday night show). Here we got to watch the so-called Top 12 Male Contestants. I have to say that I thought most of them were boring and blah. Hopefully the girls will be more exciting or I can see that number 1 rating dropping down a little bit.

Too Much Drama

2007-02-20T10:14:00.000-05:00

So, let me say that I am a huge Yankees fan. I was very excited that Spring Training is underway and soon we're going to have some more baseball. Actually, I'm still excited. I think the Yankees can do a lot this year. Sure, there are a lot of questions surrounding the pitching staff, but I like our chances.
What I don't like is the drama surrounding this year's training camp. Sure, the Yankees always have drama, but this year it feels more like a soap opera. Where's Bernie Williams? Jeter and A-Rod aren't friends! Just play baseball...

For the record I think the Yanks should have given Bernie a guaranteed contract as their 25th man. I don't think they should be wasting time/space with a first base platoon. I think the Yankees are the only people left out there who truly believe Andy Phillips is going to be a quality major league player.

Anyway, the 2007 lineup should look something like this:

CF: Johnny Damon
SS: Derek Jeter
RF: Bobby Abreu
3B: Alex Rodriguez
DH: Jason Giambi
LF: Hideki Matsui
2B: Robinson Cano
C: Jorge Posada
1B: Doug Mientkiewicz / Andy Phillips

RHP: Chien-Ming Wang
LHP: Andy Pettite
RHP: Mike Mussina
LHP: Kei Igawa
RHP: Carl Pavano

RHP: Mariano Rivera

Not bad... so let's play ball.