I love New York City.

I blame it on reading A Tree Grows in Brooklyn at an impressionable age. And then rereading it so often the book cleaved into my soul. Which makes me nostalgic for a place and time I never lived in.

Weird, right?

Luckily, I make no claim on normalcy and normalcy makes no claim on me.

We don’t live close enough to NYC that I can often indulge my love of the city. Keith and I took the kids to New York when Gabe was small (he learned to walk at the New York Public Library; a bright and shiny moment in our family narrative), and since then I’ve taken the kids in sets of one, two, and three. This last summer, Keith got a comped hotel room in Times Square since he was presenting at a conference. Siena and I (Gabe was at camp) gladly invited ourselves to tag along. Keith was busy with conference-y things (what do app developers do at a conference? I wish I could tell you. Then again, I suspect you’d move onto greener blog posts), so Siena and I spent endless hours wandering cloudless, breezy streets with iced coffee, feeling perfectly happy and curious about what lay beyond every corner. In other words…bliss.

Then, for Christmas, Keith gave ME a trip to NYC, just the TWO of us. We haven’t been without kids since we were barely old enough to vote. Back when we believed midtown Manhattan summed up NYC, Broadway shows were mandatory, and all food carts were created equal.

Over the years, I’ve developed decided opinions about what constitutes a proper visit, and I couldn’t wait to share that with an adult, namely my husband. Someone I wouldn’t have to tug out of the way of oncoming vehicles. Someone who could order a drink and cheers with me (I never drink when I’m traveling with the kids). Someone who would open a menu and point out interesting items rather than push the menu aside saying, “I’m sure it’s all good, order for me.”

Unlike me, Gabe is all about sophistication. Even for a trip to the Empire State Building

My children are old enough that they make wonderful traveling companions, but still, when I go with them, they are omnipresent in my planning. I like art, but in a gallery way, I wouldn’t go to art museums if not for Siena who likes to settle and sketch in front of paintings. I like buildings, but in a head-cocked back to say “wow” way, I wouldn’t go to the Empire State building if not for Gabe. I love candy, but I wouldn’t think to go to Economy Candy if I didn’t want to blow their little sugar-loving minds. I’ve loved all the pieces of those trips, but I wondered…without children as the focus on a traveling experience, what would Keith and I do?

The tl;dr version is: Still a lot of eating, plus a lot of drinking. But the DETAILS… Ah, the details, make this story.

Me in front of the Leonard Street Public Library

Friday morning, we dropped the kids off at school and hit the road (and I should add here that the kids are now old enough that we left them home ALONE. Do you think the house will be standing when we get back? Read on….), arriving to our hotel around 4 PM.

I had told Keith I wanted to stay on the Lower East Side. The diversity and bustle of the LES reminds me of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. It should be said here that when Siena and I went to NYC this past summer, she obliged my whim for a A Tree Grows in Brooklyn walking tour. Self-designed. I did an embarrassing amount of research to find as many landmarks as possible. It was a dream come true for me, and such a treat to share it with my girl, who not only reveled in my happiness, but then painted me a picture of the book cover (and our experience) for Christmas. The highlight was the library, where Betty Smith (the author) fell in love with reading, and so set as a location for her character, Francie Nolan (who, you should know, shares Betty Smith’s birthday. AND MINE.). In any case, my fan-girl ramble through Williamsburg illuminated for me that current Williamsburg bears little resemblance to the Williamsburg in my head from Tree. The Lower East Side does, though. With its hundred-year old knish bakeries and shops with boxes tumbling out to the sidewalk.

Siena in NYC, right next to LES, in fact where we stayed on Bowery was right between LES and Chinatown

This is all to say, I prefer to stay on the LES. I’ve stayed at PUBLIC before with Siena, which I loved, but I stayed when it first opened so got some crazy deal. Now it’s too much of a splurge and anyway, as much as I’d like to play one on TV, I’m not a trendy person. PUBLIC is for trendy people. This time we stayed at 138 Bowery and it fit my “I’m an adult so I don’t much favor staying in squalor'“ side, along with my “I get my jeans at consignment shops and I’ll never fit in with sophisticated models” side. That is to say, 138 Bowery is clean, and really nice in a simple way. Affordable, yet shockingly had two rooms, so we’ll keep this hotel in our repertoire for when we come with one kid (the sofa bed was small, probably couldn’t fit more than one budget-sized person).

As soon as we arrived, we tore outside to soak up some of that NYC vibe. Along with all that NYC rain. Hungry, we decided to duck out of the rain for a cocktail at Bar Goto, a Japanese inspired bar with notable snacks. I ordered a LES (appropriately enough), a gin based cocktail with shiso (a spice leaf), orange, lemon, cucumber, and a chili. Perfectly balanced, subtly intense.

Keith ordered a Sakura martini which included not only a touch of maraschino (a liquor that tastes of sour cherries and almonds), but also a ghostly cherry blossom. Plus we ordered miso wings and okonomiyaki. The miso wings were transformational and the okonomiyaki (a kind of Japanese pancake with cabbage, this one featured pork belly and rock shrimp and squid) was an insane amount of food for a bar snack.

We wandered and decided to stop by Attaboy, another notable bar on the LES, and in fact the world (it’s regularly listed as one of the world’s best bars). We walked up to the door and got flummoxed. No sign. But it’s a speakeasy right, and don’t they aim to be charmingly discrete? The window read “Tailors and Alterations”. One of those old looking New York signs, though the bar itself could be in the basement or second floor. The door had an AB on it…for apartments A and B? For Attaboy? Eventually, more confused people joined us. A hip guy—bearded, glasses, you know the type—popped out and offered to put our names on the list. But it didn’t bode well when he encouraged everyone to get a drink while we waited.

We wandered through the drizzle, admiring the lights twinkling in the darkness and the glowing shops against the gloomy streets. We met my cousin, Michela, at Attaboy, where we found out that our names had not moved up the list. Moving on, we decided to try The Backroom, one of the only currently operating establishments that’s been around since prohibition (popular with the Mob for its many exits). The gate seemed to indicate the entrance to a toy store, but the wrought iron steps led under the building, up some stairs to a bouncer, which suggested this was no toy store. Plus the thumping beat. Too thumping.

Did I mention Keith and I are old people nowadays?

The space was amazing—super historic, filled with laughing people, but too filled, if you know what I mean. Couldn’t hear a thing, no place to sit, and it would be actual work to reach the bartender.

Again. It cannot be said too often. Keith and I are old people. Though, to be fair, I never liked bars even when I was supposed to like bars. Too noisy. And my husband, the purist, did not like the idea of cocktails served in tea cups. Let me take a moment to yell—Get off my lawn!

Okay, back to our story.

Dan dan noodles at King’s County Imperial

So we went to dinner, Michela’s choice, King’s County Imperial. I can say that King’s County Imperial serves the finest soup dumplings I’ve sampled, and I’ve been to many soup dumpling establishments. If you haven’t had soup dumplings, I recommend giving them a try. They arrive in a steamer basket and you lift the dumpling CAREFULLY onto your spoon to avoid breaking the dumpling. Then nibble a hole in the side (some people nibble the top, I find that destroys the structural integrity of the dumpling, try both and see what you prefer), and sip out the broth. Drizzle it with some black vinegar dumpling sauce, then continue sipping and then bite through to the pork goodness. Joe’s Shanghai, the original soup dumpling purveyor in NYC, serves soup dumplings with wrappers verging on tough. These, like the ones at The Bao, were silky. And the broth was nuanced and delicious. The pork center…perfect.

Along with our soup dumplings, we feasted on excellent long beans, dan dan noodles, and kung pao chicken— so you know we were experiencing extreme heat. Luckily we had pork buns, with pillowy white buns and rich slices of pork, to cut the heat. Michela had to head back to Brooklyn, so we said goodbye and rolled back to the hotel. Actually, we were so full we waddled.

That call from Attaboy? We’re thinking that was the missed call at 1 in the morning.

Our next morning began by walking to Washington Square for donuts. If you think a mile is too far to walk for donuts, I encourage you to find a new food writer to follow. Because for me, a long walk to acquire donuts is the perfect way to begin the day. As long as there is a stop for coffee. And traveling with Keith means many, many stops for coffee. Our children would have been impatient, but I like the occasional coffee myself, and I especially like soaking up cafe life.

Let’s talk donuts now if you don’t mind. My trips to New York always feature Donut Plant right there on the LES. It’s the first artisanal donut shop I ever went to and I love their Valrhona chocolate donuts, their coconut cream, and the square shape that makes even the vanilla bean and homemade jam donuts special with the jam in every bite. MMMM. But, I wanted to break out from my normal patterns, so we hoofed it across town.

On the way, we found an Italian church. With a sign about songs in Italian twice a week, and also language lessons. As we passed the church, I noticed a nun struggling with a heavy door, a cane, and an enormous newspaper. I moved to help right as she asked, “Excuse me?” I brought in her paper and held the door for her to turn around. She stopped and looked me in the eye and said, “God Bless You.” Now, I’m not a religious person, per se, but I hung onto that all day.

Our donut selection from The Donut Project

Pretty much floated into The Donut Project. Like Donut Plant, The Donut Project’s offerings vary by day. I’d been eager to try their bone marrow donut, but that was not on display. So instead, we got a maple cruller ring (which had an almost churro-like texture, crisp exterior yielding to an almost pudding like interior), a creme brulee donut filled with rhubarb and strawberry cream, an olive oil and pepper donut which I was tentative about until the tattooed-donut-lady told me it was her favorite and it indeed became mine (I forgot how close in flavor pepper and vanilla are), and an apple fritter. Which I named the weak link, but Keith loved so go figure.

After almost polishing off all four donuts, we spent the next few hours popping into interesting looking shops—an Italian shop, a cheese shop, an art gallery featuring paintings by Ole Ahlberg of Tin Tin expressing curious awe at a series of scantily clad ladies. We chatted to the gallery owner for awhile, who gave us dining recommendations, and also told us that Doctor Seuss’s entered the world of art via sculptures of what would later become his iconic style of characterization. Fascinating! Also enjoyed their original Dr. Seuss drawing.

Then we headed to the Lower East Side Tenement Museum for our “Shop Life” Tour. This was my fourth visit to the museum (once alone, then once with Siena, and once with Gabe. Gabe and I went on the same day as our Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island experience; fascinating to get a real understanding of immigrants’ journeys). It’s definitely one of my favorite museums anywhere. Tenements (basically, early apartment buildings) are a critical feature of the new America experience. When immigrants disembarked from their ships, they couldn’t go far, and so settled in lower Manhattan, as close as possible to their countrymen, creating communities from the same region (since this predates many countries). Over twenty families filled 97 Orchard Street, where the museum is located. The apartments are tiny, about 300 square feet, and usually included not much more than a tiny kitchen (where overflow children slept, sometimes on chairs put together) and a bedroom. Every tour I’ve taken at the museum has given me different insight into the hardship, creativity, and lifestyle of the the families that resided in the building.

You see, years ago, the landlord of 97 Orchard didn’t want to comply with evolving building codes, so he had the place condemned and abandoned it. It was purchased to create a museum celebrating the life and times of the inhabitants. The museum meticulously researches the residents, and then recreates apartments as they would have been during that time. I always walk out of a tour with my head spinning with fascinating historical details and big questions about what it means to be an immigrant, and what it means to be an American. This time, we did the Shop Life tour, which focused on the shopkeepers who ran the businesses on the bottom floor of 97 Orchard Street. Loving A Tree Grows in Brooklyn as much as I do, I wanted to understand what “saloons” were like at the turn of the century, since they figure into the novel.

LES sure has changed since lager saloon days

I learned that German lager saloons were incredibly popular on the LES for a period of time; in fact there were several on every block! This one thrived, perhaps because of the excellent free lunch. I loved seeing the saloon details and learning about how the saloon benefitted the tenement and how the tenement benefited from the saloon. It was also a compelling look into early aid societies.

A kosher butcher shop and an auction house took up shop later in the building, and we learned that Jewish businesses were exempt from “blue laws” that made other businesses close down on Sundays. So people from all over NYC would come to the increasingly Jewish LES (the cultural make-up of the area has experienced waves of change, just like the rest of the country) since shops were allowed to be open on Sundays. If you’re interested in all this history, but can’t make it to NYC, I heartily recommend 97 Orchard Street: An Edible History of Five Immigrant Families in One New York Tenement. This was literally my beach read one year and I adored it. Never has history been so compulsively readable!

As a bonus, the museum has one of the most intriguing gift shops I’ve ever been in (and I’m not usually a fan). Book after book I want to read, and so much more! We picked up a puzzle with a New Yorker cover of a tenement for Gabe and a pair of earrings for Siena (all my favorite jewelry comes from local vendors that sell at this museum). And Keith got Black Hand, which intertwines Italian-American history, old NYC, and mystery. He’s loving it. For myself, I got a tray with foods of the LES printed on it. Silly, but it makes me happy.

Our heads as filled as our stomachs had been after donuts, Keith and I decided to go Zooba for lunch. We’d passed it on our donut journey and were intrigued. After all, what in the world is Egyptian street food? Delicious! As it turns out. I love asking and answering these kinds of questions in New York. We each got a beef-filled pita-like sandwich, and shared pickles and a bowl of ful medames.

The next few hours are a blur of wandering, popping in and out of anyplace that caught our eye. And stopping for ice cream at Chinatown ice cream factory (family favorites: black sesame, pandan, lychee). And stopping for coffee. Again.

By evening, we decided to try Attaboy again. It opened at 6, we figured only old people would show up at a bar so early in NYC, so if we arrived at 5:45 we would get in no problem. Ha!

We joined the queue, and then only got in because the couple that entered first only popped in for a quick drink. They left at 6:15, which is when we were at the front of the line. Ushered through the heavy door and then the heavy black curtain, we immediately understood that this place deserves its reputation.

Attaboy’s space is narrow, stretching out from that “Tailors and Alterations” window. Music and the burble of conversation are present, but not intrusive. Gorgeous wooden shelves lattice the tall exposed brick wall with shapely bottles of liquor interspersed with candles. The candles offer a subtle scent of melting wax and a flicker against the perfectly dim lighting.

Taking our seats, our bartender, who seemed to constantly be in restrained motion, asked in a mellow voice, “Hey, guys. What are you in the mood for tonight?” Like he really wanted to know.

No menus. No food. No signs.

You tell the bartender what you like, he whips you up something. I said I liked citrusy cocktails, a little floral, with a gin or tequila base. He asked about my sweetness preference and nodded. A few minutes later I was presented with a “water lily cooler”— lemon and violet with gin, served long with a bit of ginger ale. Delicious!

Keith got something rye-based, and then another one (these drinks are STRONG, just one for me), called Warday’s—gin, both green and yellow chartreuse, bitters. The bartender softly offered details about the liquors, and patiently answered our questions.

I’ll be honest—cocooned and happy, I never wanted to leave. Plus, being inside, it was kinda funny to watch on the small monitor people arriving at the door and doing what we did—looking at their phone, and squinting at the door, trying to figure out if this was the right place.

Finally, though, our 8:00 reservations beckoned and we asked for the check. The bartender nodded and spent a few moments with an index card and a felt tip marker. He turned back with a hand drawn receipt, “Three drinks @ 19$” with decorations floating around the words. We paid, then walked to the subway station to head to Williamsburg for dinner.

Something strange about my daughter that’s relevant here—she loves rats. When we went to NYC this summer, we took subways all the time, and she never saw one. Then she went to NYC on a choir trip in January—zilch.

So I looked out for her… and somehow documented the very best rat video ever made. You’ll have to listen to this with the sound ON, to get the full experience. Because it seemed like the subway musician (playing an instrument I couldn’t explain even though I saw it), was creating a soundtrack just for the rat show, He wasn’t, I promise. He was on an whole other platform.

Other than the rat show, Keith isn’t into shows. So rather than see one (like I do with the kids because we love them), we had decided to have a dinner that felt like a show. Namely, we wanted to go someplace with a tasting menu. The problem is, as you know, Keith and I have decided that—20$ per cocktail notwithstanding—we are not fancy people. I don’t like how stiff and awkward I feel when I’m dining with effortlessly elegant people in a sleek environment. You know, tablecloths, hushed voices. Ugh.

“Rude Little Pig” cocktail at Traif, with bacon rim

Chowhound as always been an excellent resource when I have a question about eating in NYC, so I posed the question about where we should go for an excellent tasting menu of thoughtful dishes that was more fun than fancy. Which is how we discovered Traif.

Traif is the yiddish term for non-Kosher foods and the hip Williamsburg eatery specializes in pork and shellfish (to my mind, two great tastes that taste great together; even my cocktail had a yummy bacon rim). The food is innovative, the atmosphere lively, and for $55 you get a 9 course tasting menu of “globally inspired soul food”.

WHAT?!?!?

I KNOW!

Actually, it’s MORE than 9 courses. Because you get a little amuse-bouche (pea soup with enough garlic and bacon flavor that turned a soup I typically despise into my all time favorite) and a little closer of fresh pineapple squares brushed with pomegranate glaze and a dusting of lime zest (exquisite).

What else did we get? Let’s see: spring pea risotto with scallops and pistachios, a salad of cheese and hazelnuts and radicchio with a romesco sauce, pork chops with ricotta butter, foie gras with yellow potatoes and a fried egg, sweetbreads served almost General Tso’s-style (breaded, fried, with a sweet and spicy glaze), fried catfish with a sauce of coriander seeds and cilantro, served with faintly sweet buns and a spicy mayonnaise. Then two desserts: brown sugar budino and bacon donuts served with coffee-rum ice cream.

It was all SPECTACULAR. Every single mouthful. I couldn’t believe it, any of it.

As we took a Lyft over the Williamsburg bridge—quite a glorious view of the city (video at the bottom of this post)—I told Keith I would never eat again. I haven’t been that full since we went to Abruzzo (where we ordered the antipasti of the house and were warned we might want to wait to order anything else, and then watched, dumbfounded, as plate after plate of shockingly delicious foods found their way to our table. And don’t get me started on the trabocco. Apparently, when food appears in front of me, I have no off-switch).

Breakfast courtesy of Russ and Daughters

We woke up shocked to discover that we were perfectly able to enjoy our bagels and lox from Russ and Daughters (a NYC institution, as is Yonnah Schimmel Knish Bakery, just down the block, where Gabe and I enjoyed knishes and cherry sodas after our LES Tenement Museum tour). I’m unreasonably proud of the fact that we only ate half our bagels, saving the other half for the drive home.

We then walked uptown, stopping in interesting looking places, lingering in The Strand (18 miles of books!), where I ran my hands over the covers and, since I’d only launched “The Stillness of Swallows” a few days before, imagined my book resting alongside all these notable titles. Hey, NYC is made for dreaming, right?

We took a break at the Flatiron building, one of my favorites in NYC. Realizing Eataly was right beside us, we popped in. To tell the truth, I can’t ever find anything I want there. But Keith had the best coffee he had in NYC (not a slight against the city, he could tell the quality was good all over, but we’re partial to chocolatey coffee, not green or sour—blame it on Italy, and on the fact that thanks to Keith’s La Pavoni we have excellent espresso daily, even when we’re in the US).

And I found colomba (the easter version of panettone) from Foligno, the city right near where we lived in Italy! As a bonus, it boasts Fabbri cherries, Keith’s fave. We picked one up for our Easter celebration and walked back downtown, stopping in the East Village for excellent sake and ramen at Ippudo. I’ve been to many ramen joints in NYC by now, and Ippudo, with its long cooked pork broth and house made noodles, is a standout.

A quick swing by Russ and Daughters again for a chocolate babka and rugelach cookies and we collected our car, feet totally spent.

I literally slept through Jersey.

We didn’t get home until 8:30, wiped out. We revived though, at seeing our house without any kegs tossed about, no scorch marks, and refreshingly devoid of pot reek (why is NYC suddenly so filled with weed?). And revived still further with hugs from our children. We ate dregs from the refrigerator and tried not to compare it to Traif. It was, it must be said, nice to go to sleep in a house where the ducts didn’t make the sound of someone hitting the jackpot and our children breathed easily, asleep in their beds.

At Traif, Keith found beer from the Dolomiti!

So what did we make of traveling to NYC without children? I mean, this was the first time we traveled without them at all since we left for our scouting trip to Italy. That is, save for those once yearly trips to see Nicolas. Who is, strictly speaking, still our child even though he’s 21.

On the cusp of our leave-taking (theoretically, this virus is nipping at our travel heels), it was nice to realize that Keith and I still enjoy each other’s company. We have similar tastes and share a similar open spirit. It was also, ironically enough, nice to realize how independent our children are. Though we won’t be living in tenements, some of our rentals will be tiny two bedrooms, so it’s gratifying to know that our children have some skills in taking care of themselves. And that they like each other. That’s a bonus. Apparently, they spent one morning picking flowers together and speaking “Victorian-style” whatever that means. They cooked together, cleaned up together, and Gabe even went out to pick up supplies to make monkey bread (his Saturday project, happy to hire him out for events and such).

Oh! We do have one spot that will be smaller than a tenement! The bothy! Though on the Isle of Eigg, I expect the outdoors will be our living room.

Now, there are some places we didn’t go, and I’ll list them here in case they prove interesting for your own trip—

Olio e Piú and Pepolino—Italian restaurants highly lauded by YOU, my readers, as indicated by your suggestions on Facebook. Ultimately we decided that I make Italian food all the time and it would be fun to try something different while we could. Is my food as good as these restaurants? I’M SURE NOT. But it’s in the same family, whereas, when could we ever have Egyptian street food? Charlottesville doesn’t even have ramen, except the packs you get 3 for a dollar.

Arthur Avenue food tour—also recommended by readers, this tour takes guests through Bronx’s Little Italy. Sounds amazing, we just weren’t there long enough.

Museum of the American Gangster—I thought this would be fun with a trip to a bar frequented by the mob, like The Backroom (discussed above) or KGB (currently big for literary types, but during Prohibition Lucky Luciano ran a speakeasy, brother, and casino here).

A collection of French bakeries never got our custom, we were just stuffed from donuts—Dominique Ansel Bakery, FPB, Lafayette, and Mille-Feuille. I wanted to take Keith to my favorite, les merveilleux de fred, for astounding brioche (I always combine it with a trip to the Highline and usually the Whitney for Siena). But again—time.

I wanted to stop into Xi’an Famous Foods, a wonderful (and cheap) introduction to Silk Roads dining, but we decided to focus on places that were new to both of us. And I’ve been there countless times, I love it so so much. Tingly beef. MMMM.

Amor y Amargo—a bitters bar we were going to try out in Williamsburg as it’s close to Traif, but then we got into Attaboy, so… There’s another in the East Village, but we wound up in EV on our way to pick up the car and we wanted to make it home in one piece. So no pre-road bitters.

If you are planning a trip, make sure you check out Time Out so see what’s happening during your stay. It wound up just making me wish we were staying longer—an orchid show! an antiquarian book fair! a group art exhibition! A whiskey festival! But Keith and I decided that we have a clear plan.

make a million dollars
move to NYC for a year

Should be easy, right? If you want more NYC recs from me, then buy some books! (imagine a laughing and a little drunk emoji here, since Squarespace has yet to have that feature).