The fun started on Friday, when my two bosses got me these awesome books…I always stare at such things but never buy them because I can’t justify it…they get bonus boss appreciation points for such thoughtfulness:

I had my birthday party on Saturday night. I reserved a room at a bar in the East Village but before the late night festivities, three girl friends took me out to dinner at Westville.

Clearly, this is my kind of place:

We all shared a plate of four sides, which was a great decision. Sweet potato fries:

Beets with goat cheese:

Maple syrup brussel sprouts:

And broccoli rabe:

Amazing. For my entree, I got a salad: watercress, arugula, pears and sweet roasted walnuts with lemon vinaigrette and parmesan reggiano. GREAT.

I was kind of bummed we didn’t get dessert. After all, we were celebrating my bday. But I would soon find out why…

Before heading to the bar, we went to my friend’s apartment for a drink. When I walked in, a bunch of my friends jumped out of the dark yelling SURPRISE! and presented me with this chocolate ganache cake (from heaven, I’m pretty sure). Oh, and they also spelled out my initials using 24 candles.

I was shocked and overwhelmed with joy and love and it was just so amazing. How do I even deserve such wonderful friends?

Then we headed to the bar to meet up with the rest of the crew. That gin and tonic in my blurry hand is contributing to the grin on my face…Apparently, my camera sneaked some drinks too. Blurrrrrrrr.

Somehow, I got home at 5 AM….and was woken up by my family at 11 AM to head to bday brunch at Rosewater.

We waited for a while to get seated…I was very sleep deprived but still found my dad’s socks (what is that, fuchsia, magenta?) and my grandma’s hipster tights really amusing.

Once we finally got a table, I went straight for the spiced mulled wine. It was past noon by then, don’t judge.

We ordered a bread basket for the table, which included pumpkin bread, challah and amazing apple coffee cake which was still hot. Yuuuuuummm

And since it was my birthday, I got the challah french toast with fruit, currants and walnuts…I didn’t even manage to finish half of this! Mostly because it was intensely good and…

…because I also ordered a side of roasted potatoes, which were delicious. Hangover appetite > regular appetite.

After brunch, I fell asleep and woke up just in time for a Super Bowl party (instinctively!)

But that’s for Part 2. But wait:

YES.

Every year, the NYC Department of Homeless Services runs a HOPE: Homeless Outreach Population Estimate survey. Thousands of volunteers spend the night walking through the streets of the five boroughs and surveying the homeless people they see on the street. The results of the survey are used by the agency to provide better services for the homeless NY population.

At the end of the night, we got these cool shirts:

The experience was very cool but you can imagine how rough it was to go to work on so little sleep…I stayed over a friend’s house who lives closer to the office, so I had to buy both breakfast and lunch the next day.

I reallllllyyyyyyy don’t like buying those two meals on weekdays. I eat breakfast at home and always bring my own lunch – something about spending money on food when I can bring it with me really grinds my gears.

But I think I made out pretty well! Those who look can find good food for cheap

For breakfast, I grabbed some oatmeal topped with apples and raisins. This, plus a medium coffee came out to $5.43.

And for lunch, I got a salad, packed with greens, tofu, chickpeas, tomatoes and cucumbers:

And coconut water because I needed mad hydration yo. And they threw in a free bottle of water…a grand total of $9.75

Dinner was way more expensive but it turned out to be one of the best meals of my life! More on that later. Sleep – right now.

On Friday night, my family and I took advantage of Restaurant Week 2012 by going to SHO Shaun Hergatt for dinner. The restaurant is in the middle of the Financial District, which means my brother and I could just walk there from our offices. And it’s fancy.

By fancy, I mean that its two four and five course dinner menus are priced at $85 and $100. It also got two Michelin stars in 2012 and I’ve never been to a Michelin-rated restaurant. Thanks to Restaurant Week, we could take advantage of three courses for $35. What a deal.

At the restaurant, the French-Asian cuisine crafted by Chef Sho Shaun Hergatt is prepared with ingredients from upstate New York subsistence farms. (I’m currently obsessed with farm-to-table cuisine.)

The restaurant itself is beautiful. Everything is clean and crisp – from the white tablecloths to the pretty glass wine-holding walls that diners pass by to get to the main dining room.

I started off with a $12 glass of red wine that was a part of the Restaurant Week menu.

That’s my brother in the back. I can’t tell you much about the wine…I’m not a connoisseur. My preference for red wine is “not dry.” I am not above $4 TJs wines.

A server brought over whole wheat bread and butter once we ordered:

This bread was delicious. And the butter? Creamy and sweet. Can’t go wrong with some good bread and butter.

For the appetizer, I ordered the Potato and Leek Espuma: hot panna cotta, truffle oil:

Served with truffle powder:

First, the good: The texture was fantastic – spoonfuls of frothy and creamy with tastes of both leeks and potatoes. The truffle powder was very interesting. It immediately melted in your mouth and had only a faint truffle taste.

The bad: this could’ve used a hint of salt. And I truly expected “hot panna cotta” but this was just warm. It would’ve been more pleasant if it were in fact hot.

For my entree, I chose the Spice Dusted East Coast Flounder with a carrot- cardamom-citrus emulsion.

The fish was cooked perfectly, very tender. The emulsion was delicious, I coated every bite with it! Again, I felt like this was a bit under-seasoned. Especially since the fish was supposed to be “spice dusted.” Where the spices at?

For dessert, I ordered the Warm Sticky Toffee Sponge: caramel sauce, chantilly and pomegranate.

This was warm and sticky. It was very sweet, so I see the point of the pom seeds – they cut the sweetness and add a much needed textural element. I really liked this dessert.

Our bill came out to $200 and change. (4 people + one martini for $15 + two glasses of wine at $12 + 18% gratuity included by the restaurant)

Overall, dining as SHO Shaun Hergatt was a good experience. It’s worth noting that the items we ate are not on the regular dinner menus, they’re specific to Restaurant Week…which may be good or bad.

Still, I’m glad to have finally dined at a Michelin-rated restaurant. I wasn’t blown away but I also would go back. Who knows, maybe I’ll spend $100 on five courses someday.

I have two more Restaurant Week outings planned!

Tonight, she suggested that we try out a Tibetan restaurant, Tsampa, in the East Village.

We started off with the Lhasa Momo, dumplings with garden vegetables and shiitake mushrooms:

These were delicious. The dough was thicker than on Chinese food dumplings that I’m used to and the filling was warm and fresh.

We ordered two dishes to split. One was the sauteed eggplant with tofu served with brown rice. This dish had some of the most complex flavors I’ve had in a while – spicy, sweet, sour, with a a great smokiness. I would certainly get this again.

The second dish was Gyathuk Ngopa – baked noodle with garlic -ginger and topped with chicken and vegetables:

The flavors of these dish were just OK compared to the eggplant but the noodles were great. They had an amazing texture – soft yet chewy. So cool…can I describe noodles as cool? #nerd

In addition to the interesting food, the restaurant has a super chill vibe. Dining by the candlelight with low Tibetan music in the background made me feel like I was in a yoga studio.

…A yoga studio where I could enjoy a meal? Million.Dollar.Idea.

…Since today, this is what I see:

Vacations always end before you want them to…but my week in the Dominican Republic was as relaxing as ever. I loved the grounds of the resort and the beach.

Of course, there was also plenty of food. Highlights include paella, cooked right on the beach:

Fresh shrimp cooked hibachi style at the Japanese restaurant:

Baked grouper:

Grilled lobster with mushroom risotto, served at the resort’s gourmet-themed restaurant:

And fresh fruit. I could not get enough of sweet mango, papaya and cantaloupe.

The week went by really fast but it was enough to get a tan. I can rival Snookie right now, except mine is all natural, thanks to the DR sun.

Back to reality tomorrow…but I’ll return to the Caribbean as soon as I get another chance…c’mon vacation days, accumulate!

Actually, I spent the entire workday sitting in my coat, sipping jasmine tea out of paper cups. Our building is having some heating issues.

Someone made a joke about the government cutting its budget.

Someone else shook my hand while wearing gloves.

So I needed a warm, comforting meal for dinner to remind me that I live in modern times. And that the heat would be back on tomorrow…maybe.

Given the recent festivities, I was also craving something nutritious. So I assembled some produce items I had and it hit me: roasted vegetables with quinoa on the side. Easy, fairly fast, super simple.

Delicious.

And since temperatures are just planning on dropping tonight, I don’t see a reason why I shouldn’t get into my JETS Snuggie (proud owner, no shame) and watch a couple of episodes of my recent addiction – The Wire. But not before a glass of tomato juice, which is imported from my Ukrainian hometown! No wonder it’s so good

Anyway, these temperatures can suck it, because soon I’ll be on this beach in the Dominican Republic.

And by soon, I mean in just eight workdays…but who’s counting?

And I’ll start right now

While many people have put away their Christmas decorations by the time New Year’s Eve rolls around, for Eastern European families it’s just the beginning. We bought our tree on December 26th and put out our decorations after American Christmas.

But why?

Long story short, during the Soviet regime, religion was outlawed. But to keep the customs alive, people decorated New Year’s trees instead of Christmas trees and opened gifts on New Year’s Day. Because saints were outlawed, Santa, a.k.a., St. Nicholas was also replaced with Grandpa Frost, the “spirit of winter” who brings gifts on New Year’s.

He looks like the American version of Santa, just skinnier:

This is always confusing to explain, since we also celebrate Christmas in January, except there are no gifts or trees, just a traditional dinner. This post is about Ukrainian New Year’s, celebrated with American-Christmas traditions

We hosted a family New Year’s at our house, which is always a festive affair.

I was responsible for a seasonal dessert and I made the executive decision to make gingersnaps, using a recipe courtesy of smitten kitchen. As expected, they came out wonderfully.

There were many dishes to get through before the dessert though. Here are some of the foods.

There was herring fillet in a fur coat. (I shared the recipe for this uber Ukrainian dish here many moons ago).

A simple salad:

A platter of sushi:

Red potatoes with butter and dill:

Lamb shish kebabs:

And a fruit tart for dessert:

And then of course, came the opening of the presents. So fun to watch kids tear through gift wrapping paper:

The highlights of my gifts were a JETS jersey and a beautiful cashmere scarf.

We had a great time. Now only to summon enough energy to make tomorrow’s lunch. Back to work…but at least it’s a 4-day-week.

And meals with family

Add multiple Secret Santas, holiday parties, days off and Christmas jams. Can’t complain about December.

Football season? J E T S JETS JETS JETS!

And of course – food. Like roasted butternut squash:

Vegetarian chili and kale chips:

A roasted salad: broccoli, corn and garlic:

And when in a hurry, mashed sardines with avocado on top of the darkest rye I could find.

Fall also means book club:

A very ambitious book club…

Books that size can only be discussed over potluck brunch. My contribution was a savory bread pudding a la Mark Bittman. I mean, you can’t go wrong with fresh herbs, dark bread and cheese, right? And butter. Don’t forget the butter.

But we also find the time to rest.

Fall is lovely.

My fellowship is going great – I’m learning a lot and having lots of fun at the same time. Some of that fun consists of happy hours after work with the other fellows. As a result, I’ve done very little cooking in the past month or so. I took today as an opportunity to get back into to it.

Because it’s fall, I’ve been craving grains and I zeroed in on two recipes in my bookmarks to hit the spot.

For breakfast grains, I made the Oil-Free Autumn Buckwheat Granola courtesy of small bites.

The recipe asks for raw buckwheat groats, which Russians consume quite regularly. (Technically, they’re seeds but whatevs) and I had no trouble finding this at the Russian supermarket by my house:

The granola before heading into the oven:

And the final product:

I tried this out and it’s great! The buckwheat is crunchy but still has that pleasant nutty taste. Excited to try it out with yogurt tomorrow.

And for quick lunches/dinners,  I made Angela’s Back On Track Wheat Berry and Bean Salad. Here, wheat berries are the stars:

This salad is really easy to throw together and tastes delicious. I had some for dinner, with fresh spinach mixed in.

Love me some grains.