Ma's Place: Visit from the "travel/dining expert guide"

I ended this week with three days of gustatory delights, visiting some sites I hadn't visited before, and miles of walking. Jim, my son, is my "travel/dining expert guide." He has a list of restaurants and places and foods to try everywhere he goes. We sandwich in sites between eating establishments.

He came early on Thursday. After picking him up at La Guardia, dropping his things off at my apartment and having a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs and ham, we began our 3 day journey. Our destination for the evening was The Red Rooster in Harlem. Between my apartment and The Red Rooster, we visited The Conservatory Gardens in the upper east side of Central Park. From there we walked to The Cloisters passing by St John the Divine Cathedral and through Tryon Park.

I'm in my element when I'm surrounded by Nature's beauty!
It had rained. I love seeing the water droplets on the petals.

The lilac scent permeated the air.

None of these pictures have been edited. True, vibrant colors!

Many turtles in and around the lake on the north and of Central Park. People fish here and
was told they catch wide mouth bass, carp, and another fish I can't remember.

I'll have to call on my knowledgeable ornithology friends to tell me exactly
what this bird is but I like the reflection in the water

Burls

This statue/fountain in the close of the Cathedral of St John the Divine is known as
the Peace fountain, designed in 1985 by Greg Wyatt. The fountain was created to mark
the 200th anniversary of the Diocese of New York. It depicts the Archangel Michael embracing
one of nine giraffes after his defeat of Satan. There's also a lion lying down with a lamb.
The fountain's spiraling base represents a double-helix of DNA.

Cathedral and gardens or close

Wall around the fountain

The Met Cloisters, located on four acres overlooking the Hudson River in northern Manhattan's
Fort Tryon Park, is the branch of the Metropolitan Museum dedicated to the art, architecture,
and gardens of medieval Europe. Deriving its name from the medieval cloisters that form the
core of the building, it presents a harmonious and evocative setting for more than 2,000
exceptional artworks and architectural elements from the medieval West.

This orb is smaller than a racket ball and intricately carved.

Large tapestry

Herbs

Herb garden in the Cloisters

George Washington Bridge across the Hudson seen from the Cloisters

I'm a sucker for flowers. Difficult to see but there is a red cardinal on the ground in the bottom left picture.

Fort Tryon Park is a public park located in the Hudson Heights and Inwood neighborhoods
of the borough of Manhattan in New York City. The park was an ancillary site of the American revolutionary
war battle of Fort Washington fought on November 16, 1776, between 2900 American soldiers
and 8000 invading Hessian troops hired by Great Britain

With all of our walking and sightseeing, we needed a quick pick me up to get us through
until dinner so we stopped for a chocolate chip cookie. It was warm and delicious!

Passed this memorial in Harlem on our way to Red Rooster. "The Harriet Tubman Memorial, also
known as Swing Low, is located in Manhattan, New York City, New York, and honours
the life of abolitionist Harriet Tubman. The intersection at which it stands was previously a barren
traffic island, and is now known as "Harriet Tubman Triangle". As part of its redevelopment,
the traffic island was landscaped with plants native to New York and to Tubman's home state of Maryland,
representing the land which she and her Underground Railroadpassengers travelled across."

The Red Rooster is run by Marcus Samuelson, A James Beard award winning chef. (I don't know what this signifies but it must be highly rated to be on Jim's list.)

Lobster coming out of the kitchen

The kitchen

Our dinner: shrimp with tomatoes, lamb and short ribs with dumplings, waffles and fried chicken
and caramel cheese cake. We were stuffed!!!

Friday, Jim had dinner reservations at Le Bernardin. This restaurant has 3 Michelin stars (Again, I'm not sure what that means) and it is ranked 17th in the world. Since there were 3 pizza spots to hit on this trip, we went for an early lunch at Totonno's in Brooklyn. Totonno's is ranked number 1 on multiple lists, including the food network. I must say the pizza there is award-winning! The pizza at Totonno's has the thinnest crust ever. The white was deliciously garlicky. The red sauce was fresh. The best was when I turned a white piece on top of the red and had a pizza sandwich. The combination was unbelievable!

White garlic

Plain red

After the pizza, we drove back to my apartment to dress for Le Bernadin. Jacket/suit and tie affair. Dinner was at 5:15.

We opted for the Le Bernardin Tasting Menu

This is an appetizer not on the menu. It was a round piece of beet on top of something
I can't remember. Good though. A little bowl of cold fish soup, and layered avocado and mashed potato.
I think that these were the things but I may be wrong in my description.
Don't know the names. (Jim please correct me.)

Waiters came around frequently with trays of gourmet breads. This one is sesame basil.
I also had walnut raisin and pumpernickel.

Butter serving with Jim's pretzel roll in the back ground

Kampachi: Kampachi sashimi; Crushed Niçoise Olives, "Greek Salad"

Calamari: Crab filled calamari a la Plancha, bamboo shoot-wood ear mushroom broth

Seafood truffle pasta: Scallop, shrimp, lobster, tagliatelle black truffle emulsion. I think this was my favorite

Snapper: Crusted red snapper; Spiced Persian cucumbers white balsamic-anticucho sauce.
I liked this one a lot too. The crusted on the snapper was delicate yet crisp.

Black bass "Surf & Turf": crispy black bass and braised veal cheek, parsnip emulsion,
ginger five-spice reduction. The veal cheek was unbelievably tender

Yogurt-citrus: Candied Buddha's hand (Info on Buddha's hand fruit), scorched cheesecake, yogurt sorbet

Banana S'more: caramelized banana, warm chocolate cake, smoked meringue, Coquito sauce

Happy diner

The bonus send-off: spice cake, French macaroon, a small pudding, fruit gelatin,
and a chocolate bonbon. The bonbon was indescribable!

Le Bernardin interior. The waiters and waitresses were all formally dressed in black with
white towels on their arms. After each course the table was cleared of silverware, dishes
and crumbs and a fresh dish of butter was placed before the next course was served.
Everything was beautifully choreographed.

After dinner to give us time to digest some of our dinner, we walked to the financial district.

I have walked a lot in the City but I don't ever remember walking passed
Madison Square Garden. I like the colorful people.

Jim wanted to try the Baked Alaska at Delmonico's. This is information from the Delmonico website:

"In 1837, at the beginning of New York City's evolution as the financial center of the world, the genesis of what would become a world renowned culinary institution, Delmonico's Restaurant, was set. A small shop selling classically prepared pastries, fine coffee and chocolate, bonbons, wines and liquors as well as Havana cigars was operated by the Delmonico brothers. Its success led them to purchase a triangular plot of land at the intersection of Beaver, William and South William Streets where, in 1837, they opened the first fine dining restaurant in the country.

Delmonico's offered an unheard of luxury - the availability of private dining rooms (located on the third floor) where discriminate entertaining was the order of the day. The basement held the restaurateur's treasure, the largest private wine cellar in the city, holding an impressive 1,000 bottles of the world's finest wines. It was during these early years that Chef Alessandro Fellippini began to develop the restaurant's culinary identity with the house special, Delmonico Steak.

Today, we continue to serve a prime cut of beef, prepared to the original specifications. It truly is the only authentic Delmonico Steak served in the United States. In 1862, Charles Ranhofer was named Chef de Cuisine inventing many original dishes during his time at our stoves. He is most noted for his innovative creations, Eggs Benedict, Baked Alaska, Lobster Newburg and Chicken A la Keene. These dishes remain on the Delmonico's menu today."

Since I last visited the Charging bull of Wall Street there has been an addition.
Now there is the statute of a girl having a "stare down" with the bull.

Baked Alaska and Chocolate Mousse.

If you want to read about the statue, you may do that here.

Saturday, we had 3:45 tickets to visit the Tenement Museum. That gave us enough time to go to John's of Bleecker Street for another high on the list pizza. Again, award winning. I had been there several times before but this was Jim's first. I was happy to go there again.

Next door to John's is CONES Ice Cream Artisans. All of the ice cream there is made on site and there are numerous flavors. Corn ice cream is one of the most unusual flavors. Actually tastes like corn. My favorites (I have been there too many time to count.) are white chocolate, coconut, peanut butter/caramel, and almond.

Margherita pizza. Coconut, white chocolate, and peanut butter caramel ice cream

You can only go to the Tenement Museum if you take a tour. There are several tours available. We took the sweatshops tour. It was interesting to learn about the lives of the immigrants and to see places they lived. Here is the description of the sweatshops tour:

"Pay a visit to the Levine family's garment workshop and the Rogarshevskys' Sabbath table at the turn of the 20th century, when the Lower East Side was the most densely populated place in the world. Explore how immigrants balanced work, family and religion at a time of great change."

It was 85 degrees with 60% humidity so it gave a true feel of what life was like on the third floor of 97 Orchard Street in a 3 room apartment with no air conditioning nor electricity and only one room with a window. After the tour Jim wanted to visit a famous deli: Russ & Daughters.

I like the bag with the advertisement for the deli. Notice the phone number in the upper left corner.
Only we old fogies will recognize it as a phone number. You may ask me if you're curious.

The dried fruits in the window were picturesque.

Inside the deli.

Only on the streets of Manhattan. Taking your spinet to work

Cheesecake to give us strength to walk to dinner.

Coconut, caramel, plain

Then we walked 2.7 miles from the lower East side to our dinner destination in mid- Manhattan. It was an interesting walk. We walked through Soho and Greenwich Village with numerous shops and bars and since it was a Saturday evening, the streets were crowded and lively with party goers and festivity.

As we walked farther north, we passed through NYU and into more high rises and business areas. Fewer people were on the streets where we walked along the east side of Manhattan passing by the United Nations Buildings. Each area of the city has its own personality. Midtown Manhattan is not a quiet area if you are in Times Square or the West side however.

In the city if their is a triangle of ground where 3 or more streets intersect, you will find
a park with benches and if big enough, tables and playground equipment.
You don't have to go far to find green space.

Wall across the street from the UN

Some of the UN complex. Too bad the flags weren't flying.

Our dinner destination was Spice Symphony, an Indian & Indo Chinese restaurant.

Spiced chicken "lollipops", chicken Tikka Masala, Lamb Rogan Josh (slow braised lamb morsels
in home ground garam masala and Kashmiri spices), avocado chicken kabab (chicken, avocado
marination, cilantro, chili and yogurt, fired in the tandoori), garlic and cheese pita bread and basmati rice.

After dinner, Jim wanted "good" New York cheesecake. Two Little Red Hens in upper East side Manhattan was advertised as the best place to get the kind of plain cheesecake Jim wanted. We walked about half way and then decided to take a cab the rest of the way. I didn't get a picture of the cheesecake but it was very good: a little tart and not too sweet but delicious.

I was sad to see Jim leave. He promises to come back though before I leave in August as he has a few more places to cross off his lists!!

I promise I didn't leave the missionaries unattended while I ate and played. The good thing about my calling is that I can take calls and offer help no matter where I am or what I am doing. We have had a stomach virus playing tag with the missionaries this week. On Tuesday I went into Manhattan with a missionary to an appointment. Wednesday was another mega-zone conference. I did my reports on Friday night.

I do love my work here. The missionaries are wonderful people. It brings me great blessings to be here with them. I learn from them and grow in my testimony as I hear them share their testimonies and hear their stories of mission work.

Sunday evening I attended a FHE with a ward missionary, a recent convert, our full time missionaries and an investigator. It was a wonderful opportunity. The lesson was about obedience and the blessings that come to each of us as we obey the words of the Lord and prophets. The investigator is trying to stop smoking and is finding it very difficult. He is determined to accomplish this but is really struggling. The recent convert assured him that if he prayed earnestly and read the scriptures he would be able to achieve his goal.

I love this mission and the people of New York. I can't bear to think of leaving but on the other hand I can't wait to be with my family and friends at home. This is a most difficult time for me but I know that the Lord will help me in all I do.

I love you my family and friends.