Providence and NYC Trip- Part 2: NYC

Whoops.  Totally forgot to do Part 2 of this post!  Better late than never. 

This was my 2nd time in NYC.  The first trip was my freshman year in college with Gillian (the bride this time around!).  I had just turned 19 and that was my first real adventure/vacation on my own.  I felt so grown-up.  Little did I know how young we still were and how much growing up we still had to do.  I was a star-struck, doe-eyed youngster who still had a smidgen of hope that someday I would  move to New York and become a Broadway star. 

Then reality set in.  I was in like 4 high school plays.  I can totally sing like Carrie Underwood and Christina Aguilera and Miranda Lambert when I'm in my car.  I can't sing to save my life.  And I started ballet about 10 years too late to have any hope of being a dancer.  So, obviously, Broadway went by the wayside. 

Fast forward 8 years.  Gillian and I are returning to the big city to BUY HER WEDDING DRESS!!!   (With her sisters, mom, and maid of honor Natalie).  Now she's the one who has dreams of moving to NYC (which will hopefully come true for her in a couple of months!).  NYC seemed so different to me through a grown-up's eyes.  It's still such an amazing city, so fun to visit.  So many things to do and see (WAY more than we could even try to see in our three days there).  So much FOOD.  Delicious food.  But growing into myself in the past 8 years, I've realized I could never live there.  It's going to be one of those places I love to visit, but will never live.  Unless life throws a crazy curve-ball my way...you never know. 

This trip was a huge 2 1/2 day whirlwind, but so much fun and so exciting! 
We hopped on a bus in Providence at 6:15am Monday morning.  This was no ordinary bus.  Oh, no.  It was a double decker bus with wi-fi!  We got a front-row seat on the top half, so we had a perfect view coming into the city when we arrived around 9:30am. 

The first thing we did was check into our hotel.  We stayed at The Affinia Shelburne, which I was overall pretty pleased with.  They have Philosophy toiletries, which was lovely!  And there was a pillow menu too.   

We had a full day ahead, so we set out to have breakfast at Scotty's Diner which was about a block from our hotel.  Pretty standard diner fare.  I had some over-medium eggs, bacon, and toast.  Boring, I know.  Good fuel for the day though. 

On our way to our first appointments to try on dresses, we stopped by Rockefeller Center. 

And!  And!  I had my first macaron!  I've been DYING to try one after seeing recipes everywhere, and I held out to try one until I went to NYC.  I've been told Laduree is the best.  They're the original French bakery that imported macarons to the US.  But we didn't have time to swing by there, so we stopped into Bouchon Bakery so I could get my macaron.  They had a variety of flavors, but the Nutella one caught my eye, so that's the one I bought.  Gillian bought a homemade Oreo.  We were pretty darn excited about our cookies. 

So...my first macaron experience?  It was good.  Not awful, not the best thing I've ever eaten.  I think the cookie part was a sweet, light chocolate maracon with a Nutella filling.  Although it just tasted like chocolate to me.  I couldn't really taste the Nutella.  So, yeah, it was good.  I really liked the texture and I will eat anything chocolate, but it was just good.  Not sure how Gillian's Oreo was...we barely had time to eat our sweets!





After that, Gillian had her first dress trying-on appointment, then we had a bridesmaids dress trying-on appointment.  Then we stopped into Dewey's Flatiron for a drink and a snack.  We each ordered a beer (with the exception of Gillian's little sisters) and shared some appetizers.  Mozzarella sticks, buffalo wings, chicken tenders, chicken quesadilla rolls...all pretty standard appetizer fare.  We also shared some sort of flatbread-pizza-like thing with goat cheese on it.  I can't seem to find it on the menu now, but it was tasty and fueled us up for the next dress trying-on appointment and held us over until dinner. 

Little did we know, our next appointment didn't exist.  We got to the place, and they were closed (it was MLK day).  We later figured out that this particular location only carried wedding dresses, not bridesmaid's dresses.  Their bridesmaid's dress location was on Long Island, which is where our appointment REALLY was.  Whoops. 

Monday night, we had dinner at Stanton Social.  Gillian was really excited about having dinner here.  She had been here on a previous trip to NYC and loved it.  They serve comfort-food-inspired tapas.  The food was tasty, but the service sucked.  Our waitress was extremely pushy and kept trying to make us order more food.  Not cool.  The best part about this restaurant, though, was the dessert.  I had a RED VELVET TWINKIE.  Uh, yeah.  Freaking amazing.  We also ordered some big puffy cinnamon-sugar doughnut things to share, and a chocolate tasting plate which consisted of bon bons, spicy chocolate ice cream, a chocolate creme brulee thing, and a bunch of other chocolate stuff.  Awesome.  And then on the way back to our hotel, we saw snow flurries!!!   

Ess-a-Bagel for bagels and coffee to go.  I got an everything bagel with chive cream cheese.  It was still warm from the oven.  And they put a TON of cream cheese on it, which is just how I like my bagel.  As a vessel for cream cheese.  Yes, siree.  In my excitement, I dropped half my bagel on the yucky NYC sidewalk and I was pissed.  But the bagels are so big, I was full from my saved half anyway.  Good thing.

We went to Gillian's dress appointment at Saks, then had to head uptown to J Crew for anther dress appointment for us bridesmaids.  We had some time to kill and stopped at a food cart for a snack.  I had a "meat pie" which seemed pretty much like an empanada to me.  By this time, it had started to rain, and we had to huddle under the awning of a snooty apartment building to eat our snacks.  The door man gave us dirty looks.  The part of NYC I don't like?  People aren't so friendly. 

After J Crew, Gillian had an appointment at Kleinfeld.  Yes, the one on Say Yes to the Dress.  She was so calm and collected, and Natalie and I were jumping up and down in our seats and about to pee our pants.  Gillian's consultant was Keasha (from the show!) and we were seeing all of the consultants from the show in the showroom.  After a very intense battle between two dresses, Gillians said "Yes!" to her dress.  And it's so perfectly her.  And it's top-secret. 

Gillian's mom and little little sister had a flight to catch Tuesday evening, so we escorted them back to the hotel to see them off.  Then we met Gillian's cousins for dinner at Toloache.  They are known for their homemade guacamole, and for good reason.  We tried a sampler of their three guacs:  The Traditional, the Frutas (which had avocado, pomegranate, onion, mango, apple, habanero, and basil), and the Rojo (avocado, onion, tomato, and chipotle).  Wow.  I had died and gone to heaven.  I could've made a meal out of the guacamole alone.  For my entree, I ordered an appetizer-sized order of the Tacos de Pastor (pork, pineapple and salsa) and a side of Avocado Fries.  Natalie had the Carne Asada, which was a piece of meat as big as her plate with amazing mole sauce.  I tried that and it was fabulous as well.  After we ate, the restaurant manager came to our table and said he was buying us each a shot of tequila.  Now, tequila and I don't get along so well, but I held it together.  I do my tequila shots with an orange and sugar.  No salt and lime for me.  Yuck.  We had a great evening hanging out and talking with her cousins, then headed back to our hotel and PASSED OUT.

We really didn't have anything planned for Wednesday.  No appointments, just (half) a free day to kind of do what we wanted.  I REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted to go to Magnolia Bakery while in NYC and try their Vanilla-Vanilla Cupcakes.  This is my go-to vanilla recipe (the one that I made for Gillian's shower!) and I wanted to see how mine held up to theirs.  We didn't get a chance to go to the original Magnolia, but we did swing by the one in Grand Central Station.  Can you tell how super excited I was?

Woohoo!  I have to say, my homemade Vanilla-Vanillas are pretty dang close to the original.  Theirs were a tad drier than mine, but that could be due to carrying it around NYC all day, then home 1000 miles on an airplane before diving into it.  The flavor is dead-on though.  I also got a red velvet cupcake with french buttercream, which was good, but I've had better.  I prefer cream cheese icing on my red velvet, but their french buttercream was pretty exceptional.  The cake was just okay. 

We wanted to do some shopping (the window variety for me), so we headed down to SoHo.  We had brunch at Bubby's Tribeca.  Bubby's pretty much has southern comfort food.  My kind of place.  I had eggs, sausage, cheese grits (2nd best I've ever had- right after a place in Nashville), and toast.  It was kind of pricey, as most restaurants are in NYC, but the food was very good. 

We did some (window) shopping at Scoop NYC, Bloomingdales, CB2 and Madewell.  Anyone who knows me knows I'm a little obsessed with the Kardashians.  Yes, they're crazy, but I love em.  Sorry.  So my friends were nice enough to allow me the indulgence of going to Dash.  Yay! 



The K's obviously weren't there.  And the stuff was really expensive.  I expected the clothes to be pricey, but their Dash logo t-shirts were $60.  Not cool.  I bought a nail polish as a souvenir.  Probably marked up 300% from what I could get it for here.  Oh well.  I'm glad I got to go!

One last top at Dylan's Candy Bar for some treats to take on the plane.  This is one place that I don't see with grown-up eyes.  Walk into this 3 story candy shop, and you will feel like a 5 year old again. 

And then it was time for a scary, nausea-inducing cab ride to the airport to fly home.  It was a whirlwind trip, and I was exhausted but it was a ton of fun.  Hopefully I'll be able to visit more once Gillian moves there. :) 

Hopefully there's still someone out there reading my ramblings.  I have more recipes to share soon!  I've got one cooking up right now, actually.  Adios!



Black Bottom Cupcakes

I'm a messy baker. A very messy baker. Anyone who has baked with me knows this. I think I've met my match.

Sunday, Lil Sis and I were supposed to go fishing. Just the thought of me taking a kid fishing cracks me up. I'm supposed to be the kid in this fishing game. I mean, yes, I can hold my own when I'm fishing with other people. I can bait my own hook. I'm not scared or grossed out to touch the fish. (If you know what I do for a living, you understand it's really really REALLY hard to gross me out). So I thought, "this shouldn't be too big of a deal. I just need to borrow some fishing poles, find a place to fish, and get some bait." Well, the more I thought about it, the more complicated this all became. The poles were covered (a friend very generously let me borrow a couple of his). Getting hooks, sinkers, bait, etc. should be easy. Wal-Mart has all of that. (Right?) There are lots of state parks, rivers, county parks, beaches, etc to fish from here. This is Florida. No shortage of water here. Then I started thinking that I need a fishing license. K- doesn't need one because she's under 16, but I do. They're pretty simple to get online, but simple only goes so far if you're broke till payday next week. Hmm. I was still really looking forward to fishing and spending time with K- but I was afraid she would get bored after awhile, and she has since professed to me her fear of being near bodies of water. Hmm. Kids crack me up. Plus, I'm used to getting on a boat with Dad or Uncle Pete, having all the fishing poles set up for me. All the bait and miscellaneous fishing equipment right there already. I'm not a great fishing-logistics planner. So, alas, it rained on Sunday. All day, actually, and the fishing trip was cancelled. So what did we do instead?

Do you have to ask?

We made a mess of my kitchen. :)

K- called me a few days before our scheduled fishing trip and asked if we could go to my house and bake something after we fished. So baking was on the agenda anyway. She wanted something chocolate, and I found a recipe for Black Bottom Cupcakes on Brown Eyed Baker. Chocolate Cupcakes with Cheesecake inside? Yum.

In my quest to eat a little bit healthier, I decided to lighten these up. I used fat-free cream cheese in place of the full-fat kind. And I replaced the oil with applesauce. My advice? Don't. The cupcakes weren't HORRIBLE, but they were kinda...chewy. They would've been much better with the oil, I think. So just follow what the recipe says.

We made a total disaster of my kitchen, more so than I usually do.  But that's the fun of it, I think.  Anyway, here are some pics of our mess. :) 

Or not.  Because something stupid is going on with my computer and I can't upload them. Sorry.  Just know it was a HUGE mess with flour and cocoa powder and batter EVERYWHERE!  At least you can see the finished product above.  Again, I really recommend just going full-fat if you're going to make these. 

************************************************************************

Black Bottom Cupcakes

from Brown Eyed Baker

Makes 12 cupcakes

Filling:

8 oz. cream cheese, room temp
1/3 cup sugar
1 egg, room temp

2 oz. bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped

Cupcakes:

1 1/2 cup all purpose flour

1 cup brown sugar

5 Tbsp cocoa powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup water

1/3 cup vegetable oil

1 Tbsp cider or white vinegar

1 tsp vanilla

1.  Make the filling.  Beat together cream cheese, egg, and sugar until smooth.  Stir in chopped chocolate pieces.  Set aside.

2.  Preheat oven to 350.  Line muffin tin with papers.

3.  In a medium bowl, sift together flour, brown sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt.  In a separate bowl, mix together water, vegetable oil, vinegar, and vanilla.

4.  Make a well in center of dry ingredients and stir in wet ingredients.  Stir just until smooth.  DO NOT OVERMIX. 

5.  Divide batter evenly among muffin cups.  Spoon a few tablespoons of filling into center of each cupcake.  The cups will be completely full. 

6.  Bake 25 minutes, until tops are slightly golden brown and cupcakes feel springy when pressed. 

**************************************************************************

Yum!  So even though these are a little chewy, I'm going to go eat one now.  Bye! 

P.S.  I found the most amazing costume for Rocky this year.  There is a doggy costume contest on the 22nd.  Stay tuned for pics. 

Baking Day, Part 2

I'm in a fall mood.  Can you tell by my colors?  Yet, it's still a sweltering 90 degrees outside.  Gross. 

So on to part 2 of baking day with my friend A-.  I hinted at a secret ingredient in the (second) best frosting in the world.  Ever.  Any guesses?  Well, my friends, your wait is over.  It's.... 

!!!!!!!!!!!  That's all I can say.  I think Nutella is one of my favorite things in the word.  It's chocolaty, creamy, amazing on a spoon  toast.  It's supposedly healthy (according to the commercials).  What more could you want?  I came across quite a few recipes for Nutella cupcakes.  When I actually read them, I realized the Nutella wasn't in the cupcakes.  It was in the icing.  But there were so many variations!  Chocolate cupcakes w/Nutella icing; peanut butter cupcakes w/Nutella icing....I was overwhelmed (in a good way). 

I personally am a HUGE fan of the peanut-butter-Nutella combination (one of my favorite toast toppings of all time!), but A- isn't too fond of peanut butter, and we figured a chocolate cupcake would be too rich with Nutella icing, so we decided to go with a plain (but delicious) yellow cupcake.  And we found that recipe here: 

Just a basic yellow cupcake recipe.  I do have my old standby that I like a bit better, but these turned out almost as good.  It's a dense, buttery cake that is moist not dry (I hate that word). 

Now, for the icing.  Oh.  My.  God.  I think these cupcakes were meant to have just a teeny smear of icing on them, because we tripled the recipe and still didn't have enough icing.  However, A- and I have a tendency to eat lots of icing while we're making it- and then want a 3-inch pile of icing on top of our cupcakes, so use your best judgment. It is a basic buttercream icing with Nutella added in.   And I have to say, it is my new favorite.  Just look at it: 

Don't you just want to dive into it?  I'm drooling just looking at the pictures.  Good thing I have a few cupcakes leftover!  I will be having one for dessert! 

Then the fun part came: icing the cupcakes!  A- just bought two new decorating tips that she wanted to try out.  One is a round tip and one is a star tip and they're jumbo-sized so you can make the adorable swirl on top of the cupcakes.  So we each grabbed a tip and a bag, loaded up our icing and went to town. 

The star tip made the perfect swirls! 

The round tip: not so much.  We called these poop-cakes.

Gross.  Note: brown icing does not look good coming out of a round tip.  We dumped the icing back in the bowl and started over with the star tip.  And we got these little pieces of heaven:

Thank God A- can take pictures.  Because I sure can't.  She obviously did this one. 

So after piping out 3 batches of icing, we still had 6 naked cupcakes (the recipe made 24).  We couldn't just leave them naked.  In my opinion, cupcakes cannot exist without icing.  And we had used up the whole jar of Nutella (whoops).  And A- wanted to try out her round tip on a different color icing to see if it didn't look so much like poop.  So we made a basic buttercream icing (butter, powdered sugar, vanilla, and milk) and tinted it a lovely shade of lavender.  And the poop round tip squeezed out a much prettier swirl of icing. 

I am definitely making these again.  Although I think next time I'm going to try peanut butter cupcakes.  I can't wait to try that flavor combination!!!  On a side note- after Baking Day, I stopped at my dad's house to give him some treats.  He called me yesterday and just RAVED about the Red Velvet Brownies.  I asked for his thoughts on the Nutella cupcakes, and he said "yeah, they were good, but those RED VELVET BROWNIES!!!!" (he has a tendency to get a little excited and shout).  So please don't take his lack of enthusiasm as a sign that these cupcakes aren't AMAZING.  Because they are.  I just don't think my dad is much of a Nutella fan.  Actually, I don't think even knows what Nutella is.  Whatever.  Just make them. 

*******************************************************************

Yellow Cupcakes

from Betty Crocker's Big Book of Cupcakes

makes 24

2 1/2 cup all purpose flour

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 sticks of butter, softened

1 1/4 cup sugar

3 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

2/3 cup milk

1.  Preheat oven to 350.  Line muffin cups with cupcake papers. 

2.  In medium bowl, mix flour, baking powder, and salt.

3.  In bowl of electric mixer, beat butter for 30 seconds on medium speed.  Gradually add sugar, 1/4 cup at a time, beating well after each addition and scraping sides of bowl.  Beat 2 minutes longer.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.  Beat in vanilla.  On low speed, alternately add flour mixture (1/3 at a time) and milk.  Beat until just blended.

4.  Divide batter evenly into muffin cups (I use an ice-cream scooper). 

5.  Bake 20-25 minutes or until golden brown and toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.  Cool completely before frosting. 

*********************************************************************

Nutella Frosting

from Handle the Heat

(Supposedly makes enough to frost 24 cupcakes.  It doesn't.  It frosted 6 in Jill-land.  Triple or quadruple the recipe.  You won't be sorry).

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, softened

1/2 cup Nutella

1 tsp vanilla

1 tbsp milk

1 cup powdered sugar

1.  Beat butter and Nutella together in bowl of electric mixer until combined. 

2.  Add remaining ingredients and beat on low speed until powdered sugar is incorporated.  

3.  Increase speed to medium-high and beat until frosting is smooth.  

******************************************************************************

Yummm.  Makes me want a cupcake for dinner.  Except my dinner is now ready.  Eggplant parm.  Don't worry- I didn't make it and not share the recipe with you.  I cheated and bought a frozen one.  I didn't have time to cook tonight.  But no worries- I have a really cool project that I'm going to try to start tomorrow night, and my friend S- from work is bringing me a ton of blueberries, so I will find something to do with those.  And I have found a bunch of amazing fall recipes I want to try ASAP.  I don't care if it's 90 degrees outside.