- December 3-4: Flew to St. Louis where my Dad received the Cori Award. We had a very nice dinner at Niche which I must say gives the NY/SF restaurants a run for their money. (Kolina said this originally so giving credit where credit’s due).

- Dec 5: Flew to NYC and after dumping bags off at a friend’s apartment in the Upper West Side, we headed immediately to Blue in Green where we promptly spent lots of money on Japanese denim. 24 oz Samurai jeans here we go! We shopped around SoHo (I was very unimpressed with Uniqlo - the thermal stuff they have seems like a joke to me as the fashion will die in a few years). Dinner at Peter Luger. Probably one of the best steaks I’ve ever had. So rich and buttery! And then to top it off, drinks at momofuku ssam bar and then desserts at the momofuku milk bar. Not bad for the first day.

- Dec 6: After dropping off our bags at the Google Chelsea office, we checked out nearby Chelsea Market and decided to dine at Friedman’s Lunch, where I got an Asian style salad to detox from the richness that was yesterday’s dinner. We visited the National September 11th Memorial and made our way to Magnolia Bakery. The Memorial allowed for a somber reflection of the tragic attack – we spent a lot of time recounting where we were when the attacks occurred. I remember sitting in my Calculus class in High School when our Principal came over the loudspeaker to announce the first plane crashing into WTC. After class was over we had a study hall where we ended up watching CNN the whole time. The Memorial still isn’t complete and I would want to come back when it is.

Since we had a late dinner, we killed time at Ivy Bakery and played Connect 4. Dinner was at Lupa, was unfortunately wasn’t as good as I remembered. The prosciutto and pasta with oil and basil was magnificent, but their main courses were mediocre. Our waiter made it for it with some generous pours of Amaro to end the night.

- Dec 7: Jean-Georges for lunch. Probably my favorite meal of the trip. You get two courses for $38 which is well worth the service. My first plate was their “scallop sashimi, chipotle mayo, crispy rice”. Possibly the most unique and delicious four bites I had on the trip. The fresh scallop contrasted well with the crispy rice, as you normally expect sushi rice with sashimi. The chipotle mayo added a small but subtle kick to add a ton of character. I was sad I only got three pieces. The beef was a perfect medium rare and the desserts – well, they brought out a cart with a jar or marshmallows that they cut for you! They also gave us truffles and macaroons. The macaroons definitely give Bouchon a run for their money. This is #1 on places to go back to when I’m in New York again.

We went on the NBC Studio Tour today and walked around Rockefeller Center, which was super-packed. It was my first time on the Studio Tour and definitely thought it was worth the price. Seeing the famed SNL stage and hearing about all of the tricks played on your eyes to make characters/furniture seem larger was interesting. Next time I come back I hope to go to a live taping of a show. It was unfortunately raining so no one was skating but it also meant less people hitting you with their elbows to take photos. We ducked into Grand Central Terminal and grabbed an early dinner at Pearl’s Oyster Bar. Their oysters were comparable to Hog Island Oyster Co and their lobster roll was as delicious as I remembered. We then saw Hugh Jackman on Broadway. He did a solid one-man show and we saw Donald Trump in the audience. At the end he announced he was doing a special fundraiser for charity and was going to have folks bid on his undershirt from the performance. That undershirt (signed and with a photo of him), went for 20K! I left the theater thinking we saw a one-of-a-kind bidding, but it turns out he does that every show! What a liar! Not wanting to head back yet, we walked around Times Square and then ducked into Sake Bar Hagi and shared some good drinks and food to end the night.

- Dec 8: I woke up early and got us some fresh bagels at H&H Midtown Bagels before we walked down to the Apple Store and FAO Schwartz. We spent the afternoon at the Moma (I was very disappointed…ugh modern art…why does a piece of torn paper count as art?) before dinner at Gramercy Tavern. It was a solid dinner but I can’t say their pork loin is something I’d go back for. We checked out a swing club and Times Square again before calling it a night.

- Dec 9: We took a stroll across Central Park to Shake Shack where I had one of the better burgers. I think In-n-Out has it beat though, both in terms of price and the hamburger bun. Of all things, I think that’s what I think distinguishes a burger where the patty and toppings are consistent. To indulge even more, we got some gigantic cookies at Levain Bakery and walked to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The museum was too large to see everything, but the Egyptian and Asian art was definitely a treat. I particularly enjoyed seeing the intricate Chinese scrolls that must have taken years to make. I think I would choose the Met over the Moma, but the Moma probably has a better gift store (if that matters).

Dinner was at Per Se. The service and food was top notch and we were served a lot of food I’m not sure I can recall without the menu at hand (which we now have framed), but I think by this point in the trip we had already eaten ourselves full and it was hard to enjoy the four hour extravaganza. Don’t get me wrong, it was an amazing meal – pashmina scarf for Linda since she was cold, 24+ unique truffles to try, a nice view of Central Park, perfectly synchronized plate service, immaculate plating and presentation, but I think it would have been better to have the meal earlier on in the trip before we were consistently full all of the time.

After Per Se we headed to Rockefeller Center and went up to the Top of the Rock. It was a fairly clear night and not so cold, so we got a nice view of the City. The top story reminded me a lot of one of the scenes from The Adjustment Bureau, and it turns out this is where it was shot!

- Dec 10: B. Cafe for brunch. I had a very good burger but the service was horrendous! We had to ask to order and three groups, two that came in after us, ordered, ate, and left before us. So, after an extended brunch, we decided to do more sightseeing. We checked out the NY Public Library, Bryant Park, the gigantic Macy’s, and Penn Station. As the sun set, it got increasingly colder, and by the time we were in Brooklyn to go eat at Grimaldi’s Pizza it was 34 degrees Farenheit. My hands were freezing as I took photos of the Brooklyn Bridge and we had to stand outside of the pizza place for 45 minutes to get a spot. The pizza was good, but I’m not sure anyone would say it was worth the wait. We were more happy to just get indoors.

After dinner we went for another stop at Momofuku Milk Bar and finally, drinks at Match 65 near our apartment to call it an end to a fabulous trip. After packing my things, the girls headed to bed and Eric and I walked to the Halal Guys at 53rd and 6th at 2am. We passed the Apple Store, which turned out to be open 24 hours a day! We went downstairs and were surprised to see some folks getting computer help while a janitor cleaned half of the store’s floor. Very eerie to see it so empty, compared to the teeming crowds earlier in the day. The Halal Guys definitely lived up to their name, providing a hefty portion of chicken and rice and some ridiculously spicy sauce! I couldn’t finish half of the dish, especially since I had eaten at Per Se earlier, but it was a great late night snack. A few hours later I woke up Kolina and we headed out on the subway for our flight home to San Francisco.

All in all, a great trip! A lot of great restaurants, but I probably would only make a point to go back to Pearl’s, Lupa (just for appetizers), Shake Shack, Jean-Georges, and all of the bakeries we went to. Thankfully NYC has a ton of other fantastic restaurants that would be great to try out. Maybe in a few years…and with a working memory card!

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New York Recap

A couple things to note:

1. I love Singapore Airlines. It was just as nice as my Emirates flight, without the 16 plane ride from SFO to DXB. However, the layover for an hour in Seoul/Hong Kong extended the journey to a similar length. If only it was one of those A380s. I really want to try one of those out.

2. Bad movies make the journey even longer. I watched so many crappy movies on the flight: Green Lantern, Transformers 2, Thor. If there’s one way to make you even more antsy, it’s watching a bad movie and sitting through it because well, there’s nothing else to do.

3. Singapore is hot! I had no idea it was so close to the equator. I really had ambitions at one point of working abroad for a year and Singapore was a top choice. Now, I’m not so sure…

4. Despite hot weather, great food:

Like, Din Tai Fung!

From Singapore

Duck with Rice:

From Singapore

5. I also went to my first F1 Race. After a bunch of standing around, we got to see some incredibly fast (and expensive) cars, drive around the streets of Singapore. The cars are so loud, we had to get ear plugs to protect our hearing. They were really close and apparently where we were standing there was one of the car crashes later that night. $250K worth of damage for hitting the front of the fender. Ridiculous!

From Singapore

6. We also saw the skyline of Singapore. This is from atop the Marina Bay Sands Hotel at night. Gorgeous city:

From Singapore

We also went to the Singapore Zoo for their Night Safari, which was pretty awesome. Hope to be back soon!

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Hyd and Sin

From Baltimore

A majority of the turtles didn’t move at all from the starting circle, but a select few decided it was worth making a mad dash to the grass. I’m convinced the winning turtles were trained, since the winning turtle was sponsored by the local football team. In the afternoon we visited the undergrad campus, which includes the Baltimore Museum of Art, a surprisingly impressive museum with several notable works of art. I’m not really an art person, but I did enjoy the modern works of art and the Thinker from Rodin. Their restaurant, Gertrude’s, also made a fantastic turkey burger.

From Baltimore

That evening we had a great dinner at The Helmund, a fantastic Afghan restaurant. Their Kaddo Borwani – pan-fried and baked baby pumpkin seasoned with sugar and served on yogurt garlic sauce was FANTASTIC. On Saturday, we stopped by the Washington Monument, the much smaller monument for Washington compared to the structure in D.C.

From Baltimore

Harry and Mariana came up – we got pho (of all foods, but still good on the east coast), walked around the inner harbor, and engaged in enough shenanigans to make up for 3 years since we were last all together. The Inner Harbor reminded me a lot of Fisherman’s Wharf, but not as crowded. There were a few nice bars and a good gelato place. For dinner we headed to a nice local crab restaurant, and feasted on 2 dozen local crabs covered in Old Bay spices. I am usually the fastest eater of my friends, but when it comes to crabs, I came in dead last. I’m just too slow with all of the cracking, skewering, poking, and extracting of crab meat. So, I’ve decided I’m not a big fan of crabs. =)

Traveling home was unfortunately the low light of the trip. Our flight into Chicago was delayed due to weather so after circling the runway and then waiting on the runway to get to an open gate, we had missed the last flight to San Francisco. Kolina and I spent the night at the airport, which on the upside, meant McDonad’s twice in 12 hours! We saw the sunrise in Chicago and luckily made it on standby on the first flight out of Chicago to SFO at 7:20AM. Hurray for American Airlines Gold Status as we jumped to # 1 and 4 on the waitlist.

Overall though, it was great to get away for the weekend and even better to see some old friends. It was Kolina’s first time meeting Harry in person and I don’t think she was disappointed. We ate some great food, recalled some hilarious stories from Stanford, and are all pretty excited about getting together in August for our wedding!

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Baltimore

Besides wine purchasing and two quick tastings, we stopped at Bouchon to try out their macaroons. Honestly, a bit overrated but now I can say I’ve been there:

From 2011 Random Photos

We also stopped at SF Japantown to briefly walk around the Cherry Blossom Festival:

From 2011 Random Photos

And found a felt Totoro!

From 2011 Random Photos

And what’s a post without an obligatory food pic? Chicken katsu loco moco from Hukilau:

From 2011 Random Photos

It was an exhausting Saturday but worth it!

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Success in Napa

I would say that foodwise, the shrimp were okay but they’re not a must have in my book. Plus, going to this side of the island is kind of a trek. On the other hand, being able to write on their truck makes it a popular attraction. When I’m back from Tahoe I have plethora of Yelp reviews to take care of.

From Photo of the Week

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Photo of the Week – Giovanni’s Shrimp Truck

From Photo of the Week

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Photo of the Week – Waikiki at Night

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Break!

From Thanksgiving 2010 in St. Louis

Kolina and I were in charge of the mashed potatoes and after finding a recipe online, we scratched everything after watching a recipe on the Food Network. Instead of boiling the potatoes, we slowly cooked them in a whole bunch of butter and cream. This made them a lot softer and folding in garlic and bacon made them a hit!

From Thanksgiving 2010 in St. Louis

Another highlight of the visit was a tasting of Cakebread Chardonnay Reserve wines – we had a bottle from 04, 05, 06, and 07 to taste. I could discern subtle differences among the different years, but to be honest they were all good!

From Thanksgiving 2010 in St. Louis

Besides hanging around the house, Kolina and I headed downtown and went to the St. Louis Courthouse where the Dred Scott Case happened. We walked around the local mall, ate at Steak ‘n Shake, and went to the Butterfly House.

From Thanksgiving 2010 in St. Louis

Thankfully our flight home was a direct flight! Glad to be back home in California for a few weeks – next up is Hawaii!

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Thanksgiving Recap

From Las Vegas 2010

This time we stayed at the new Aria hotel. Very nice. The entire room was controlled by a nifty LCD screen. Jean Philippe Patisserie had a shop downstairs; not sure who he is but he seems wildly popular in Vegas. His crepes were crap but the paninis were delicious. Our itinerary this trip was centered around shows though, which did not disappoint. We saw The Lion King which was a faithful rendition of the cartoon I remember from my childhood. We also saw Mystere, which is probably my favorite Cirque show. Food wise we had meals at Mesa Grill by Bobby Flay, American Fish by Michael Mina, The Buffet (at the Aria), Lupo by Wolfgang Puck, and KGB Burger in Harrah’s. Celebrity chefs are the norm here and I gotta say our selections were decent. If I went back I’d definitely go to Jean Georges in the Aria (or go to New York City). We also went to Gold Lounge and Haze at the Aria and Mix Lounge at Mandalay Bay. And….I think that’s it. This trip was pretty tiring, especially after just coming back from India, so maybe I’ll have to take a break from Vegas for awhile. The Strip doesn’t change all that much so seeing the same places over and over gets a bit old.

From Las Vegas 2010

I think the next trip in store is New York.

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Las Vegas Recap

I lazily awoke on my own accord and checked my phone. CRAP! It was 5:28AM. Why the hell hadn’t I heard my alarm? Did it not go off? No time to think about that. This was bad. Really bad. I was immediately awake. I threw all of my toiletries and the rest of my clothes into my suitcase, all the while muttering expletive upon expletive. I scanned the room and bathroom once more. No time for 2 minutes with my electric toothbrush. I was out in less than 5 minutes. I rushed downstairs and took the elevator down and ran into the open, desperately hoping to see a car waiting for me.

No dice. It was pitch black and no white familiar car was there. I ran to where the cars usually sit and nobody was there. I desperately called out in case anyone was there but was met with silence.

Think, think, I thought. I pulled out my phone, which let me down once again. I was roaming but then suddenly lost it. No service. I needed to call Ismail, the guy who coordinates all of the drivers. But, I didn’t have his number. I took the elevator up again. As I was heading up, I realized this was useful since I didn’t even have a means of making calling him. My heart was beating fast and I had to do something. I needed to call him.

It was around 5:45AM at this point. I took my suitcase and wheeled it to the security guard in the front. I asked if they could help me get a taxi for the airport. They weren’t very helpful and just pointed me towards a team of drivers in front of our building. None of them could help; probably drivers for workers who would be heading to work in a few hours. Then, the guy I had initially called, ran towards a bus that was on its way and jumped on, while it was still moving! So much for relying on him.

My only option was to go to the office. I dragged my bag and luggage down the street to the office, all the while thinking about how my wheels had broken off in the cobbled streets of Krakow a few weeks earlier. Luckily, the Swiss made bag held up. The security guard in the office was probably surprised to see someone there but as I rushed by him I glanced at his screen. YouTube videos. Typical. I rushed into a phone booth to make a call. Not thinking straight or just fumbling around in the darkness, the phone wouldn’t make a call, so I went back to the front desk and asked if he had Ismail’s number. He did! Without too much urgency he dialed the number and handed me the phone. I definitely had woken him up and quickly explained my situation. Helpful as always, Ismail called the driver and sent him to the front of the office. It turns out he had probably been sleeping in one of the cars I had knocked on while I was running around in the dark 30 minutes earlier. As I jumped into his car and headed out around 6:20, I was worried that the 30 minutes would be all the difference.

With no service and no means of contacting British Airways, I throughout through all the scenarios. If I miss my flight, do I pay for the first flight out of Hyderabad? Do I take the next British Airways flight? I would probably arrive around 7pm on Thursday and not Wednesday, meaning I would miss my flight to Vegas. Taking a few deep breaths, I tried to stay calm and was at least happy that the driver understood just how screwed I was and booked it on the open freeway to get to the airport.

I got to the airport at 6:50AM. 30 minutes before the flight leaves. At this point I was resigned to having a miserable experience in the airport waiting for another flight. The driver had accidentally dropped me off at the domestic terminal so I lost another few minutes running over to the international entrance (which turns out to be just a different entrance into the same building, ugh). The lack of a printed boarding pass was also a problem for the guards, who wanted me to then talk to another guard. He pointed me to two men – I interjected to them that I was seriously late for my flight. One of the two understood, so he shooed me away while the other began to prep me to fill out my name and other information in a needless entry ledger book that’s commonplace in India. I ran to the empty gate and then, I read the screen:

BA 276 to London DELAYED. EST: 8:15AM.

Fog in London saved me!!! I was able to check-in and get on my flight. Even though I was assured to make my flight, I jogged to the gate and sat down, to somehow reassure myself that yes, I would be getting to London. After all of the adrenaline during the morning, I slept for a solid 5 hours on the flight. I watched Predators and The Other Guys and an episode of Friends and Simpsons. And I ran through London with a nice express pass since they thought I might miss my connection to San Francisco. I ran past everyone walking to the security line and made it through in under 10 minutes.

I will probably curse my alarm for not going off and am very suspicious that my phone as a bug if you put it in airplane mode, but that will be for later diagnosis. As I sat in the taxi on the way to the airport, I thought about prayer and I thought about why I was in the situation I was in. I felt lucky that I did wake up randomly at 5:28AM – if it were any later I would have had no chance of making my flight. I held on to a glimmer of hope and the situation worked out better than I ever could have imagined. Perhaps the world likes to balance itself – a few weeks ago I stood in line for 9 hours to find out I would spend the night in Frankfurt and then sat in the middle seat between two overweight people on a flight from Frankfurt to San Francisco. Today, I got extremely lucky and made a flight I honestly didn’t deserve to make. Even if I had missed the flight and was writing this in Hyderabad instead of London, I definitely learned a lot about myself. That was one of the most stressful situations I’ve been in recent memory and I was surprised how fast I thought and the logic of my choices. That’s reassuring. Well, I’ve got to head to San Francisco and will be copy/pasting this to my blog later today. This was my Wednesday. Amazing that in one day you can be in 3 cities on 3 different continents in “one” day.

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That almost ended badly