itsaboutnothing: new york city

2007.8.28, Tuesday

We had to go to the Foods of New York Greenwich Village Tour at 11:00am, so we went straight to Greenwich Village. We first went to Washington Square Park. The park is near NYU. Saw lots of students there. Wish I had gone to NYU. What a cool place to study!!!

Washington Square Park

OK, back to the Food Tour. I first found out about this tour on Fodors. People seems to rave about it. http://www.foodsofny.com/greenwichvillage.php

It's not just a food tour, but with a bit of history and culture thrown in. We visited a cheese shop, 2 pizzerias, an olive oil shop, 2 bakeries and some others that I cannot remember now. We also got to taste the food. Had the best pizzas and italian fried rice ball. We walked around Greenwich Village with tour guide Mike. He told us about the history of the village, the buildings, local legends etc. At one point, we sat on the front steps of the house allegedly bought by Leonardo DiCarpio to then supermodel girlfriend Gisele Bundchen. Oh, we also visited this restaurant Palma. The restaurant has a farm house in the back for private parties. That's a picture of Mick Jagger there, so I took a picture of it.

Tour Guide Mike

Joe's Pizza has very crisp, thin crust. We each had a slice of cheese pizza. It was so good. True New York style pizza. Lots of celebs are big fans, like Ben Affleck and Kevin Bacon.

Mike Jagger's picture at Palma

All in all, a very interesting tour. Highly recommended.

We then did the Brooklyn Bridge walking tour. We took the subway to Brooklyn, and walked on the bridge from Brooklyn back to Manhattan. I made the mistake of looking down through the cracks, and it scared me. I tried not to think about it the whole time. It took us about an hour. Tons of New Yorkers walk the bridge. It won't be a bad walk, probably under 30 minutes. They probably work in Manhattan and live in Brooklyn. What a good way to get some exercise.

On the way to dinner, we saw a 2nd Subway musician. All the street musicians are suprisingly good.

Eats:

Breakfast - Bagel with cream cheese from a cart. Very New York.
Lunch - Food Tour.
Dinner - Mandoo bar in Little Korea. Good value. We had kimchi mandoo and pan fried mandoo.

2007.8.29, Wednesday

We went to the famous Century 21 to shop in the morning. I got a pair of Geox for $50.00. Great find. Hubby got something too. But we didn't stay long.

We went back to Greenwich Village to have lunch as we wanted to try the risotto at this restaurant called Risotteria. They served gluten free food. Not that I am allergic to gluten, but the food looked sooooo good when we were standing outside the restaurant during our tour. We just had to try it. We weren't disappointed. I had the calamari, roasted red peppers & olives risotto. Hubby had the shrimp, hot peppers & argula risotto. They were both good, different, but good. Boy, I wanted to eat the risotto again. Hope I could find something like that in TO.

We then stopped by Battery Park on our way to the New York Public Library. The park is so cool. It's an oasis in an urban jungle. The park has tables and chairs, so you can relax, read, eat or work if you want (tons of people with laptops). They even have a "library" of sort in the park. A quiet area specially for reading. They also have books in the area which you can read.

The public library is very impressive. I have seen the main reading room in movies. It's quite something to be inside though. We didn't stay long. We went to Grand Central Terminal next.

Grand Central is hugh and has a very impressive food court. I remembered watching a program on the History Channel, something about the Secrets of Grand Central. The show talked about a secret entrance in Grand Central that led to an underground train platform. Reportedly, President Roosevelt used the secret platform.