To start our Sunday we followed M and J to one of J’s favorite restaurants, Pastis, in the meat packing district (which is now quite trendy). We were all surprised by the price of the food. J very generously picked up the tab for us. Everyone but me got to have the eggs benedict over waffles (or something – in Sam’s case I think it was eggs over meat). They looked delicious (and the non-yolk portion that I tried of Sam’s dish certainly was), but I couldn’t order it because the egg yolks were runny. I ordered pancakes instead, and it was abundantly clear that nobody ever orders pancakes at Pastis as they were very dry and plain.
Chelsea is quite a fashionable area, and M and Sam ducked into many clothing shops as we strolled toward our next destination: Highline Park.
Highline park is a decommissioned overhead train track that has been filled in with wood, grass and plants by the Hudson River.
J informed us that the Standard hotel over the park was “scandalous” as the full floor to ceiling windows become quite a peeping tom’s delight after nightfall.
The park is adjacent to the famous Chelsea market.
At the market we all had snacks. Sam and I had frozen fruit popsicles from People’s Pops. My popsicle was “plum and sour cherry” and it instantly brought back memories of my childhood as the taste was EXACTLY like the canned plum and fresh cherry (among many other things in their gardens, my parents have a cherry tree) mix I used to enjoy for dessert as a child (sometimes with ice cream and chocolate, but most times not). The popsicle didn’t appear to be artificially flavored, it was just literally made from the frozen slightly blended canned fruits, so I was eating an only slightly more cold version of the desert I hadn’t eaten in nearly 15 years.
After walking through Chelsea Market we split up with M and J and were on our way to washington square art park. When we reached Washington Square Park we were confused as there were tons of people – but no art anywhere. The website for the show even said “east Washington Square Park,” which confused us even more as the entire east section of the park was closed for renovations. We soon discovered that the art was actually on both sides of the street on the street adjacent to the park – running a few blocks in each direction. Most of the art was the mediocre type you’d expect at an outdoor art fair. The only things interesting were a few talented nature painters and this cool stuff, but they were way too expensive.
Next we hopped another train to Greene Street to visit Arcadia gallery for the Aron Wisenfeld show. Even though we arrived before 4pm and the gallery’s web site says it is open until 6, we were informed that the gallery was closed. We pleaded that we had come all the way from LA – and the owner allowed us to run through.
We headed back to M’s place to join her and J for a late dinner at Shanghai Café in Chinatown.
I snapped the below shot at dusk just before ducking into the subway.
Below is one of NYC’s bad points, their appalling (and stinky) trash collection system. These huge piles of trash were literally right in front of the restaurant door in Chinatown.
After we ate we walked down through the Little Italy street fair we’d seed on our first day.
Sam and I tried one of the “world’s best canollis” from Cafe Palermo and .. having never eaten a canolli before I can say it probably is.
We walked past roasted corn, elephant ears, chocolate covered bananas, candy apples and fried oreos (yes, fried oreos).
In the middle of the street fair on a side street M and Sam were beckoned to one of their favorite dessert shops: Rice to Riches. Sam raved about it after going there when she was in NYC last year and said it would be the true test of whether I liked rice pudding. Apparently I don’t like rice pudding.
We carried on to the lower east side, which we were told by J normally has a vibrant night life, but many bars were closed due to the holiday. Eventually we settled on 10 bells wine bar.
