Little Italy has been conquered

First and foremost let's get something out of the way. It's official. I hate staying in midtown. I have tried it for at least what? 3 days now? And I hate it. I hate having to potentially fight my way through Times Square each night to come back to this hotel when I'm tired. Granted we haven't had to do that every time, but being this close, each night there's the potential that our path could take us through there. I hate that. I hate that every single morning I have to get my coffee downstairs from Starbucks. It's free thanks to gift cards but I miss going into something owned by a local family. I miss getting to know the owner and getting charged something different each day for the same thing. There's a personal touch there. Now I go downstairs - 18 floors stopping on each one to pick up someone new. I push through the crowded lobby with sterile ambient music. I go out to the street that is already packed and then I go to Starbucks where I ALWAYS have to wait in line. Every single time. A line almost out on the street. and they don't remember that I order the same thing each time. There were moments in the upper west side where most humans weren't outside doing their thing. It was peaceful and residential with some businesses but this is constant city that never sleeps and I'm over it. 

Good I feel better now. I also drank half a grande veranda blend while typing. Things look much better now. 

Yesterday I got lost in Central Park. I was running and then I was on a street and in a tunnel and there was no park, it was just a street. And then I came out on the upper east side. I knew this because it was nothing but nannies with someone else's children hanging out. They were doing a good job being nannies though. 

Gramercy Tavern was a hit. You can see the seasonal tasting menu on their website. I didn't take pictures of everything because when I told Aaron I planned on doing that he looked super annoyed. But when he saw that other people where doing it he relaxed. By the time desserts came out he joined in the fun too. It's fun to take pictures of beautiful food! The most surprising dish that I liked was the artic char. I knew I would like the mushroom tortellini - I'd eat pasta in a pile of dirt. But char? That's like salmon. Not a big fan of the salmon. And I've developed this finned fish allergy thing that pops up every now and then. So I was hesitant and full of Zyrtec, with benedryl on hand if needed. 

The smoked artic char had crispy black rice on top that gave it the smoothest, crunchiness smokiest deliciousness ever. So tasty. And then they brought out the roasted duck breast. This was even better than the last dish. It's like a progressive meal. Here's some killer bread, followed by some scallops and some other fish in a bowl that you may or may not like but it's still the best you've ever had. Then you get some tortellini that makes you want to cry followed by some char that knocks your sock off and boom here's some roasted duck breast and if you think that was good , BECAUSE WE LOVE THAT YOU CAME BACK FOR YOUR ANNVIERSARY WE ARE GOING TO PLY YOU WITH MULTIPLE DESSERT LIKE TREATS THAT MAKE YOU THINK YOU HAVE DIED. 

For example there's something I got called "strawberry". Just "strawberry". Fresh strawberries in simple sugar, next to a pile of whipped cheesecake with crumbles of crispy vanilla angel food cake and basil sorrel ice.

And Aaron got "Chocolate". A chocolate mousse with toasted marshmallow ice cream and Devils food cake hazelnuts and prunes. Prunes, ya'll. You think they are gross, but there's chocolate so they aren't. In fact you can't even find them in that pile of pretty chocolate. 

And they gave us a toasted coconut cake and tiny like chocolate candies. There was more dessert to this meal than there was anything else. That's how every meal should be. 

So naturally we had to take a nap. I think we slept for 3 hours. The meal itself took 2 and a half hours. You have to sleep after all that. 

Then we went back to little Italy. Last year we ate a place that was just like Ginny's and it made me sad. Little Italy is a special little beast that one must approach carefully in stages in order to reap the benefits. It's actually being taken over by China town and may one day succumb to it. Go now before it's gone for ever. 

There's a reason for this. In Chinatown when immigrants come in, there is an actual organization that helps set them up with jobs. They may teach them the restaurant business and set them up in a location. Or they may put them on a bus and send them to another part of the country to set up a restaurant. Seriously - watch in search of general tso on Netflix. it's an actual organization that does this. It's because they come from a collective society. What's good for you in good for me. Italians don't work that way. They are based on family. Which is good, except when it comes to restaurants. 

For example, in little Italy you will find multiple restaurants owned by the same family and they are all the same food and it is all just ok. That family will in turn trash anyone new who comes into the neighborhood and try to steer customers away from new places. Which is why when you walk down the street you have multiple people saying "eat here, you want to, come inside" and practically shoving you in the door. 

So how does one get good Italian food in little Italy? 

1) read reviews before you go. Find a new restaurant or two with good reviews and a real chef from Italy .We found Capri where the chef is from the isle of Capri. Great reviews been open less than a year. 

2) go to little Italy before you eat there. Ask the folks on the street what they think of the new place. We asked the cannoli guy. He said it stinks. It's the worst restaurant there. How does he know? His customers tell him all the time how awful Capri is. He will then suggest multiple places that you should eat. The key here is, all his relatives own those places. "Go to my cousins place - he makes the pasta all day. Go to my sister's place, she makes the gravy."

3) walk by suggested places. Note they are all empty. Walk by Capri, note that it is packed. Keep reservation at Capri.

Capri looks like Capri. Everyone is eating mussels and there's a nun in there in a full habit. White table cloths with beautiful plates - vietri plates - straight from hillsborough ya'll. I have some of the same stuff at home. I got cheese ravioli and it was fresh pasta. Made and stuffed by hand. Aaron got spaghetti with metal balls - made by hand both the pasta and the meatballs. Perfection. 

Did you know there's a Chinese gambling park near little Italy? No kidding. We walked and stumbled on to it. I don't even know the name of it. But it's a tiny park where no one spoke English. There was some Russian but mostly mandarin. There are tables and tables of men smoking and playing mah Jong for money. A crowd will surround a particularly intense game but no sounds will be made. No cheering or anything. Then there's a building and up there they have tables and tables of women and men gambling on cards. There are 4 men that guard the top of the steps. They let us walk through but I think if you want to play you have to talk to them first. Or maybe they just get rid of unruly people. 

We sat on a bench and watched a soccer game and then we saw a young man pulling a very old miserable Asian woman by the arm and taking her from the gambling pagoda through the park to a bench way on the other side where he made her sit. The best we could figure is that she wandered off got to gambling and he had to bring her back like a scolded child. 

We walked to the 9/11 memorial too. I'm really glad that we did this late in the evening when no one was around. It was raining a little bit too so you could really enjoy it with out the tourism factor. Sometimes the tourism takes away from the meaning. Did you realize we were 15 years out from this major terrorist attack on our country? 15 years. Do you remember how much ass we wanted to kick once that happened? 

The buildings around the site are functioning again. The black has been washed off of them from the burning metal. Windows have been replaced. Life has returned. That made me feel better. To see the buildings that I saw abandoned 14 years ago, full again. 

It also made me feel better that they kept the 2 holes in the ground. I'm glad they didn't build anything. I'm glad there are waterfalls surrounding it emphasizing these deep vacant perfectly square holes were two buildings stood. We walked completely around each one, to look at all the names illumated by lights underneath. We found multiple names of women and their unborn children. Which is tough to read when you have been trying to conceive for over a year now. We even found the name of a former student's father. I met this kid my first year at CWS when he was in 6th grade. Every year on 9/11 he would spend some time in my office. While his dad died there when this student was very young, the date signified a major change in his life. They moved to a new state. His sister and mother grieved deeply. His mother remarried. He never told me what his father did. He wouldn't really talk about it at all. The kid was great at avoiding things. Last night, we learned that his father was a firefighter. He looks exactly like his son. He was a first responder in the south tower, where his name will be forever. I told him that I took care of his kid the best I could in middle school and that he still visits me sometimes and that he makes me laugh more than any student that I've ever had.