How did you spend the 4th of July? I organized a picnic in Central Park with some friends and Pirate’s Booty sent over a ton of delicious snacks for us to enjoy:
Some of my favorite flavors were the aged cheddar (naturally) and a new favorite – Wisconsin cheddar smart puffs that are absolutely AMAZING. My favorite little girl, Faire, was especially fond of the Pirate’s Booty:
Here she is with my brother, David, discussing their favorite Pirate’s Booty flavors:
David tries to convince Faire that Bermuda Onion is the best flavor, but Faire likes all of them equally:
I love this picture of Faire – she lost her balance but continues to have a tight grip on her new snack:
Faire had a great time at the picnic with David because David kept feeding her Pirate’s Booty and cherries:
This girl has the healthiest appetite:
Want some FREE Pirate’s Booty? I’ll send you a treasure chest filled with 6 different types of booty if you leave a comment and let me know what you did to celebrate the 4th of July. I’ll pick a random winner on July 14th at 5pm!
If you work in midtown west (or you’re in NYC on vacation), head over to the Time Warner Center tomorrow for free food! The event runs from 12 – 2pm and the cast of Hair will perform at 12:45 – sounds like a super fun event (and who doesn’t love free food!):
Guests will receive free gourmet tastings from five top NYC Restaurant Week eateries — db Bistro Moderne, Spice Market, Tribeca Grill, Porter House New York, and Bice Ristorante. The famous chefs behind the dishes will be on hand to greet guests.
The delicious dishes include: grilled Mahi-Mahi and traditional Moroccan couscous; shaved tuna with chili tapioca and coconut lime broth; Manhattan seafood cocktail; Arborio rice pudding with berry whipped cream and assorted petits fours.
Chefs Daniel Boulud and Olivier Muller from db Bistro Moderne, Anthony Ricco and Ellie Rodriguez from Spice Market, Stéphane Motir from Tribeca Grill, Wayne Harley Brachman from Porter House New York and Jose Liriano from Bice Ristorante are expected to attend.
NYC Restaurant Week will run from July 12–31, excluding Saturdays (select restaurants will include Sundays.) The price is $24.07 for three-course prix-fixe lunches and $35 for three-course prix-fixe dinners (excluding beverage, tax and gratuity.) Visit www.nycgo.com/restaurantweek to make reservations.
While I was out of town last weekend, a foodie friend of mine, Athena from Finance Foodie attended the Fancy Food Show. Here’s her recap of the event.
“Spice up your life…”
This past Sunday can only be described in one word: gluttonous. Why gluttonous? Three words: Fancy Food Show. Over 2,000 exhibitors with over 250,000 gourmet food products to sample – enough to make any foodie break down into tears of joy.
Here are a few items that caught my eye.
Diamonds might be a girl’s best friend, but these tasty chocolate gemstones from Choclatique are friendlier to your wallet.
Bacon lovers unite! J&D Food’s bacon flavored mayonnaise, salt and lip balm. Because you can never have too much bacon in your life. Or in your mouth.
Tony Chachere’s Qui-duk-ken (a duck wrapped in pheasant wrapped in quail). What an incestuous but tasty bird!
Three Little Pigs sausage. Made in the House of Bricks (located in Brooklyn). I guess the big bad wolf would be the consumer then?
That’s a lot of cheese….
…And meat…
…And bread. Time for a sandwich. Or Two. Or thousand.
Sweetened wild hibiscus flowers…obviously floral and surprisingly delicious as an ice cream topper or in a cocktail
Orange clogs not included, thankfully
Beware of friends (or enemies) suddenly bearing gifts of Jelly Belly jelly beans. Because Pencil Shavings flavor looks identical to the normal Banana flavor.
Beautiful display for a beautiful drink.
One word: Awesome
Remember how I went to Co and said that their pizza tasted really homemade and hearty? Well, last night, I created THIS:
I recently purchased Michael Ruhlman’s book, Ratio, and have been really excited to try out his recipe for pizza dough (the recipe is also found on his blog) I used half whole wheat flour and half regular flour (just to make it a little healthier) and the crust turned out really well. Josh and I went grocery shopping at Chelsea Market and Whole Foods for all of the vegetables – we bought A LOT so we could figure out the toppings once we started cooking. I used roasted fennel, crushed tomatoes (I crushed them with my OWN HANDS), sausage, and parmesan cheese (to recreate Jim Lahey’s roasted fennel and sausage pizza). I forgot some of the ingredients (red pepper flakes, red onions, and mozzarella cheese) but there’s always next time! The pizza crust was a good basic crust, but I preferred Company’s more (well, Jim Lahey does specialize in bread and it was my first time making pizza dough, so I’ll give myself a break)
Here’s Company’s sausage and fennel pizza had red onions, red pepper flakes, crushed tomatoes, parmesan cheese, mozzarella cheese, roasted fennel, and sausage:
Josh also created a pizza (with a thinner crust):
Josh’s pizza had caramelized onions, crushed tomatoes, sausage, roasted eggplants, and goat cheese:
Both pizzas were really delicious (Josh’s pizza had a thinner crust and didn’t have any huge air bubbles like mine). I can’t wait to experiment with more toppings tomorrow night!
If you’re a Jamba Juice fanatic like me, you’ll LOVE this deal Jamba is doing until July 12th:
Now I just have to find someone to get smoothies with me. Anyone?