Category Archives: Contemplations on New York Life

Little delicious gems all around us in Manhattan

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On our Saturday adventures out as a family, Chris always seems a bit biased to Manhattan at or below Central Park and tends to prefer to visit the Bronx, Brooklyn, or Queens. I’m happy to go to all three of those boroughs, especially Queens since it was my first New York City borough, but we live in Manhattan, and it’s damn amazing for endless reasons. Even in Manhattan, on streets that you may go up and down every single day, amazing gems can show up right under your nose that you may overlook in your speed walking and desire to catch a train in time.

When I went down to the Koreatown area for a routine doctor’s appointment yesterday, I was walking along a street and suddenly got a strong whiff of ground matcha. Curious, I backed up and walked a few feet back, noticing a tiny little cafe that required a few steps up. I popped my head in, as soon as I opened the door, an extremely strong scent of matcha almost blasted my face. It almost smelled as though they ground the matcha leaves fresh in this little cafe! The place was barely labeled; I later found out that it was called Mika’s Direction. I quickly bookmarked it in my Google Maps saved list, went to my appointment, and came back to sit there and read before heading downtown to pick up Pookster from school. I ordered the favorite drink, the iced strawberry matcha. The same person who rang me up made my drink from scratch in front of me at the open counter, meticulously whisked my matcha, and poured the frothy goodness into my cup. The strawberry syrup was mashed and just sweet enough. The matcha was earthy with a hint of bitter. This was a really well made and delicious treat after my doctor’s visit. I savored my drink as I read my book for a bit.

I love stumbling upon these cute little cafes, bakeries, and restaurants by chance in my own borough. I never had this spot on a list or knew about it before I left home. Even if I didn’t originally set out to find a matcha spot on this outing, I found a delicious and obscure one in an unlikely place. There are many things out there for us to find and taste as long as we are open minded enough to see and try them.

The power of the U.S. dollar

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Every time I travel abroad, I am reminded of a lot of my privileges as an American. Even when you think about disparities between rich and poor, when you think about how people struggle here in the U.S., how people live paycheck-to-paycheck, even the poorest people here still lead richer lives than the poorest people in more developing countries. I will never forget the first time I was in Vietnam in January 2008. There was the moment when my mom’s cousin’s wife in Qui Nhon, Vietnam, came into our 3-star hotel room there. They exchanged a few words. Because I don’t speak Vietnamese, I wasn’t sure what was spoken. When I saw the cousin’s wife undress, I got confused, and I asked my mom what she was doing. My mom looked at me quietly and said, “She asked if she could use our shower, and I said yes. She doesn’t know what it’s like to have a hot shower.” For myself until that point, I had no idea what it was like to not have access to a hot shower.

I recently saw a post in an alumnae career group I am in, where the person posting said she had been living abroad but wanted to move back to the U.S. She wanted to start her job search and was looking for advice. In her post, she wrote that it was “very important for me to earn in U.S. dollars.” And I thought about the shower incident in Vietnam. I thought about the poverty I had seen in Guatemala. I remembered chatting with our Guatemalan driver, who had lived abroad in England for eight years and had an English wife. In his Guatemalan/British accent-tinged English, he lamented how things like a cappuccino or latte at a cafe in Guatemala City seemed affordable or maybe slightly cheaper for Americans, but for local Guatemalans, it was quite the splurge, which I had noted to him. “Sure, it’s affordable when you earn $25 USD an hour,” he said. “But if you earn in Guatemalan Quetzales and only earn the equivalent of $15 USD a day, that $3 USD cappuccino is a lot of money to spend.”

Yes, it’s expensive living in New York City. Yeah, it kind of sucks that coffee drinks here now can cost $6-10+ each. But I am lucky and privileged to enjoy them occasionally. We lead extremely privileged lives to work in white-collar jobs in the U.S., earning our income in U.S. dollars. As our driver noted, “you have money” if you can afford to go on a trip to Guatemala and hire a private driver for a day or so (pretty sure he was referring to us, and not just the previous guests he had driven). Every day, even when I think this country is crumbling down and that democracy is going to shit, I still remember how thankful I am for my life’s privileges, for my health, and everything I have and have access to that makes life so enjoyable and relatively stress free.

Post-trip meal planning: curry in the freezer!

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In the days leading up to our departure for Guatemala, we actually had more food to eat in the fridge than I had originally anticipated. I had planned to make Burmese chicken curry for the Burmese chicken curry noodle dish called nan gyi thoke for dinner during the few days before we left, and I had already marinated and prepared the chicken. So I decided that I would still make the chicken curry and just freeze it so that when we got back, I would quickly defrost it overnight and have delayed nan gyi thoke for dinner once we returned. And it ended up being a great idea. Once I defrosted the curry, all I had to do was add some seasoning (red pepper flakes, fish sauce) and a thickener (Burmese curries are traditionally thickened with a toasted chickpea flour. I already had the chickpea flour, so I just had to toast it lightly over the stove until it turned toasty and brown. Then, I cooked the dried noodles in some boiling water, cut up some lime wedges, took out the fried shallots, and boiled eggs to top it. It was a very flavorful, satisfying dish to welcome us home.

So many different variations of curry exist around the world, but what makes Burmese curries unique is that a) they start with a base of lots and lots of deeply caramelized onions, b) they include coconut milk that is cooked down, c) they are thickened with a toasted chickpea flour. Once you have all this and add a protein like chicken, some seasonings like fish sauce and black pepper, as well as some home blended Madras curry powder (I almost went out and bought a blend, but I realized when I looked at all the spices that make up Madras curry powder that I had all of them already at home, so why not just toast and blend my own?!), it creates a really thick, luscious stew that has layers upon layers of flavor. It’s so good and rich that it almost makes you want to lick your bowl clean. This is definitely a curry that will be on repeat for us.

And although I did not originally plan to make chicken curry in advance as our return-home meals, I’m really happy it worked out this way and that we had a quick yet seemingly complex meal to come home to. I already have things in the freezer like frozen cubes of tomato-onion masala for quick Indian meals, but this would basically be like an easy freezer meal. You would just have to defrost, add seasoning and heat up, then add a carb like rice or noodles, and you’d be set. I will likely do this ahead of future trips we have. No one complains about ready-to-go chicken curry upon arriving home from anywhere!

An underwhelming dinner out on the town tonight, with a babysitting bill on top of it

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One of our friends has been hounding Chris and me for a double date night. He and his wife have his wife’s parents caring for the kids after they finish school, and the grandparents even take them two nights a week to stay at their home just blocks away. So Sunday and Monday are their nights to themselves, when date night out for them is on Monday. Monday is when they splurge and try something fun and pricey. They will make the reservations for dinner up to a month in advance. So while they have free babysitting very, very regularly, Chris and I don’t have that luxury. When I told Chris that I scheduled this meal out, he got a little sour with me and asked why we were accommodating their free babysitting schedule when we don’t get free babysitting. He also said that (even though he doesn’t work) he doesn’t typically want to go out on a Monday night and would prefer a night later in the week. Either way, it’s our first time doing “date night” with these friends after having a kid of our own, so I thought once wouldn’t be any harm.

My friend suggested this new “2D” Japanese omakase restaurant in the East Village, which I will admit did look gimmicky; it’s the kind of place that I probably would have been really excited to try in my 20s, but now that I’m in my late 30s, I just think it’s another restaurant. But the idea of “omakase” did excite me, as I do love sushi and raw fish, but we don’t really eat much of it when Kaia is around. And $90 for 15 courses did sound like a good deal…

…Until the “courses” came to our table. The first three “courses” came to our table on a single tray for each of us, and two out of three of them were borderline terrible. The first “ball” of raw fish looked and tasted like an after-thought, like leftover fish that they didn’t know what to do with, so they rolled it into a ball. The second in a little bowl was trying to be fancy, but it didn’t taste like anything. The third piece was just fine. It was the start to a miserable dining experience.

The rest of the 11 “courses” came on a single plate, all lined up, little nigiri along with one hand roll, which though they said they recommended we eat right away to prevent the seaweed from getting soggy, was already soggy and had zero crisp at all. The fifteenth and final course was a miso soup, which just felt like an after thought.

Our server was also pretty terrible. I couldn’t tell if he was either sleepy, high, or both. Multiple times, he forgot to bring Chris’s drink, give us more napkins, or more ginger as we requested. He also had to be nudged a few times to simply refill our water. Although I tipped 20 percent, in retrospect, I am not totally sure he deserved that.

We spent over $100 per person for what is likely the most subpar omakase experience we’ve ever had. Plus, once you tack on the inevitable babysitting bill of about $80-100, that is a really, really expensive night out. Granted, omakase dining experiences in New York have only gotten more and more expensive. Many of them are over $300+ per person now. While the company was good tonight, and we had a reasonably fun time out with our friends, I promised Chris that if we go out with them again that I’d do a more careful vetting of the chosen restaurant to ensure that it’s something that’s really worth paying for, as well as paying for babysitting on top of that. He was venting about how “not worth it” this meal was. I agreed with him. But alas, we can’t dwell on the past anymore. It’s literally a sunk cost now!

The Chamber Music Society: Beethoven’s Many Hats for Littles, ages 3-6

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Today, along with two friends and their daughter, I took Kaia to the Chamber Music Society at the Lincoln Center for a relaxed performance of Beethoven’s Many Hats, targeted towards kids ages 3-6 along with their families. A trio consisting of a violinist, a cellist, and a pianist played select Beethoven songs while explaining Beethoven’s story and life. A host also came and interacted directly with the kids. All the artists performing were really sweet and engaged directly with the kids, asking them questions, to repeat when they said certain words, and responded to their answers with warmth and kindness. As we entered the theater, they also presented the kids with different options for toys to use during the performance. At the end, they opened up the stage so that the kids could “play” with the different instruments if they wished. It was a really well put together performance.

I was also especially happy because Kaia did so well during the performance. Every time the host or one of the artists asked a question, Kaia answered. Whenever they asked the kids to make a gesture (“thumb’s up!”) or repeat a word, Kaia did it. And for the most part, she sat and watched the performance intently, playing with her toys, watching them perform, or wiggling her butt in my lap. This time last year, I took her to a Hawaiian performance at the Clark Theater, which did not turn out to be the greatest idea, as she barely paid any attention. It’s good to see that her attention span has progressed in the last year!

We’re lucky to live so close to the Lincoln Center, and to have it offer affordable, kid-friendly performances to get kids acquainted with music and the arts at a younger age. I also enjoyed the chamber music performance and hope to see more of them myself!

Indo Java Indonesian Grocery Store in Elmhurst, Queens

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Today, we spent the day exploring Elmhurst, Queens, my original neighborhood that I lived in when I first moved to New York City back in June 2008. Elmhurst has changed quite a lot since then: modern, new rental and condominium buildings have gone up. Fancier restaurants and even bars have opened up. More and more working professionals who work in Manhattan are moving in. And of course, all that means more gentrification and higher rental and buying costs here. The neighborhood has historically been a mix of working class Asian, Hispanic, and various White immigrants. Every time I go back now, it seems to be skewing more and more Asian. And with that, more Chinese, Filipino, Indonesian, and Taiwanese restaurants and businesses seem to be popping up.

Today, we went back to Indo Java Indonesian Grocery Store right on Queens Boulevard, just minutes walk from my old apartment. This time, it was full of all the goodies that made it so loved amongst immigrant Indonesians: an entire table FULL of Indonesian savory and sweet snacks and desserts, all made by the grocery store staff at a nearby offsite location. And as soon as I saw the table, I felt decision paralysis: so many interesting, delicious things to choose from, but what would I buy? They had lots of fried and steamed snacks, entire half pandan chiffon cakes, and a seemingly endless assortment of different kuih, or steamed Indonesian finger-sized cakes and sweets. In the end, I chose the wajik, a jackfruit/palm sugar/glutinous rice mini cake, plus talam ubi, or a two-layered coconut-sweet potato cake infused with pandan. I had a quick chat with the owner, who rung my items up, and she told me that she always gets excited when non-Indonesians (like me) find her store and get into their products. She also told me about their special Indonesian home cooking meals served on select days of the week, announced slightly in advance on their Instagram handle. It looks like they only started this in 2016, so four years after I left the area. It made me sad I didn’t live closer to this deliciousness.

Indonesia is one of the most populous countries on earth, and their cuisine is ultra diverse and so delicious with its endless herbs, spices, and flavors. Sometimes, I forget how delicious it is, especially since Elmhurst seems to be the only area in all of New York City where Indonesian food exists. Now, I feel like I need to go back when they have their chefs do special meals at the grocery store on Tuesdays, Thursdays, or Sundays, just to remember how multifaceted, spicy, and delicious the cuisine is.

Lincoln Center Annual Summer in the City pay-what-you-wish performances – super competitive this year!

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Since I’ve attended a number of Lincoln Center performances over the years, including ones in recent times that are kid-focused, I am on their email list and get notifications about upcoming events and festivals. Last year, I attended two different orchestra performances for their recent annual Summer in the City series of performances, and I knew I wanted to check out the performance line-up for this year and attend a few more. This year, I got the notification they’d be doing it again this summer, and it would be even more varied. This summer, they would have a really interesting mix of orchestra, opera, theater, and dance. I asked a few friends if they’d like to join, and so I was able to get tickets for two different performances so far.

Alas, the pay-what-you-wish performance ticket purchasing wasn’t as simple as it was in 2024. I still remember that I was able to buy tickets a week or so after, and I had my pick of seats to choose from. This time, when I logged into their site just minutes after General Admission opened up, there was already an online queue! When I got in, I was person 367 on the list, and they gave me an estimated wait time of over 40 minutes before I’d be able to go in and choose seats for a specific performance. One of the performance dates I wanted had already sold out by the time I got in, and it asked me to choose a different date. Luckily, the friend who wanted to go with me to see this modern opera was flexible, so we ended up choosing a date two days later.

Free or low-cost events certainly do exist in New York City; they are actually quite plentiful if you know where and how to look. You just have to be ready to deal with the crowds, even if some of those “crowds” can be virtual. I actually prefer the online queue versus waiting hours on end in a real, physical line for admittance or for a performance to start. It’s a lot less hectic this way!

Long weekend with the in-laws to Rhode Island, with an important stop in New Haven on the way

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One of the things I loved about the East Coast when I first moved here was how easy it was to state hop. Depending on where you are, it could take an hour or even less to get to another state. It could take 20 minutes to take the PATH train from Manhattan into Hoboken or Jersey City. It could take a couple hours by car, train, or bus to get from Massachusetts to New Hampshire or Rhode Island. Maine can be done as a day trip from many places in Massachusetts. California is a large and long state; it wasn’t as easy to do that living there. So all these small states in the northeastern part of the U.S. always fascinated me. I tried to take advantage and see as much as I could of the northeast, while also lamenting that so many people who live here have zero curiosity about neighboring states and people.

At this point, Chris’s parents have most likely seen more of New York City than most New Yorkers. They have definitely seen more of the U.S. than most Americans. They take side trips on their own through the U.S. when they come visit us, but they also get taken on side trips, sometime via road, other times via plane, by us. In recent years with Kaia, we’ve always done a road trip and rented a car. This year, Chris decided on Rhode Island. So it will be our first time back in the smallest state of the country since August 2013.

On our way there, we stopped in New Haven, Connecticut, for some apizza. Little do many people outside of Connecticut know, but New Haven is oftentimes thought of as the pizza or “apizza” capital of the United States (New Yorkers and Jersey people most definitely debate this). New Haven style pizza consists of thin-crust, coal-fired Neopolitan pizza. And one of my most favorite pizzas in all the world is most definitely the white clam pizza: it’s pizza with oregano, grated cheese, chopped garlic, fresh littleneck clams. It does not have tomato sauce, which is why it’s called a “white pie,” and it’s just freaking perfect. Littleneck clams with garlic and cheese is like a menage a trois that dreams are made of. Our first time to New Haven was in November 2020 during the pandemic. We did a day trip to New Haven and went to the three most well known New Haven style pizza joints: Frank Pepe, Sally’s Apizza, and Modern Apizza. We went to Modern last in that visit, which meant that we had already had so much pizza that we didn’t quite appreciate it as much, so we went to Modern as our only pizza stop on this visit. We got the white clam pizza with a small margherita, and amongst the five of us, we left satisfied, yet not stuffed. The pizza was even more delicious than I remember it, with a crust so crunchy yet chewy that I could easily have just eaten the pizza topping-less, and I still would have been happy.

We spent the evening in Fox Point in Providence, where we ate at Dune Brothers Seafood, their first location that has indoor seating (though tiny). I had whole scup fish (porgy!) for the first time and enjoyed it – the fattiness and texture almost reminded me of bluefish (though no one on the internet seems to agree with my assessment). Kaia devoured the littleneck clams appetizer all by herself; she’s most definitely a clam loving baby and enjoys the thrill of opening the clams and pulling them out of the shells. But what was the even bigger highlight of dinner was the indulgent lobster roll Chris and I shared. I always prefer Connecticut style lobster roll (always warm, dunked in butter, on a toasted bun) over Maine style (chilled lobster meat, dressed in mayo with crunchy greens). This lobster roll was stuffed to the brim with huge chunks of both claw AND tail meat, warmed in butter along with various tasty spices; it was likely one of my all-time favorite lobster rolls next to Neptune Oyster in Boston. Though Neptune makes what is likely the best lobster roll in all of the US, I will never go back there because to this day, I remember it as of the very worst dining experiences of my life. I still remember being so angry about how rude the service was that I actually tipped them 11 percent (WHICH I NEVER DO).

And if that was not enough eating, down the street from Dune Brothers was this cute Aleppo Sweets Cafe I had on my list. They won a best new restaurants award in Providence in 2019 and look to be family owned. Though they have a full menu for lunch and dinner, we just went for after dinner caffeinated drinks and desserts. This place is clearly popular with locals because almost everyone around us walking down the street behind us also went into this place! We had a good start to our visit when Kaia ran into the florist shop next door (which I think are owned by the same people). The florist there was so kind that he gave her a fresh, long-stemmed iris, which captivated Kaia; she was so obsessed with her new fresh flower! We sat down at a table and enjoyed Arabic coffee, very strong ginger-cardamom-mint tea in a beautiful and large copper tea pot (brought back from Syria, and funnily enough, NOT for sale, as Chris’s dad liked it so much he asked if he could buy one!), and four different types of baklava and Syrian semolina cake. We loved the ambiance, furniture, decor, and the tea and coffee ware a lot, but the sweets were very surprising. They were stuffed to the brim with pistachios, but the shocking thing about them was that they were not too sweet. And I don’t think in my entire life I have ever described any baklava as “not too sweet,” or really, they were “just sweet enough.” They weren’t swimming or soaked to the brim in sugar. They didn’t make my teeth hurt like some of the Greek or Turkish spots we’ve had them from in Astoria or Bay Ridge. I subsequently read that this characteristic of being “not too sweet” is a defining trait of Syrian baklava and desserts. I am tempted to figure out how to recreate this Syrian harisa semolina cake at home and ensure it’s “just sweet enough.” It was so delicious and lightly spiced with cinnamon and vanilla. We shared four different types, so each of us had a bite each of the desserts, and amazingly, I think I could have had more bites and not felt overly sweetened or stuffed. I still cannot believe how long we talked about the copper tea pot…

There’s so much good food and culture all over the U.S. that it would be quite a shame (and loss) to just stay in one part or place forever and not experience all this richness and fun.

The melted microwave cover

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Whenever there are other people over, and when Kaia is around, it’s pretty much inevitable that at some point, accidents are going to happen. When Chris’s parents came back from their side trip to Asheville, North Carolina, yesterday, I had prepared some steamed scallops with glass noodles. I had the steamer setup on the main front right burner and the sauce to pour over the scallops on the left burner. Both burners were on; the sauce was on simmer, while the steamer setup was on medium-high. When I shut the steamer setup off, I took the saucepan with the scallop sauce off the left burner, but I forgot to shut the flame off. I had originally left it on because I wanted to makes sure the sauce was still hot when I poured it over the scallops and noodles. Chris has this habit (which I hate) of resting the silicone and plastic microwave cover on one of the burners whenever he finishes microwaving things. I always either tell him to move it, or more often, I just remove it from the top of the burner. He almost never cooks, and he has little awareness of which burner(s) I may have used, so it’s always a potentially dangerous situation even if the burners are off due to residual heat.

Well, that dangerous situation actually happened on Tuesday evening. The microwave cover was left on the still-on-simmer left side burner, and suddenly, I saw smoke rising into the air and smelled something plasticky burning. Alarmed, I rose and immediately went to the stove to find out that alas, the microwave cover was melting atop the still-on left burner. I shut it off and blasted the fan on. Chris spent some time scraping off the melted plastic/silicone and opened as many windows as he could to get that burning smell out.

Things like this rarely happen with us because we take pretty good care of our things. Before Kaia, we also pretty much never lost any of our items. But at least the microwave cover is cheap and easily and quickly replaced. The moral of the story is: two wrongs never make a right, especially when it comes to fire.

The best of the Buy-Nothing Group hauls

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It’s been just over two years of being a member of my area’s Buy-Nothing group, and it’s been a really great experience. I’ve had, for the most part, very positive encounters with neighbors and great exchanges on different items that we’ve either wanted or been trying to off load. Just this last week, I was able to snag something out of a competitive lottery that I’d been thinking of buying Chris for some time, but I hesitated on it since he seemed pretty satisfied with his current basic version: a Burr coffee grinder. Burr coffee grinders, versus conventional coffee grinders like the one we have (and the one my dad has always used since I was young), are different in that they produce a more consistent grind size. They also generate less heat during grinding, which helps to preserve delicate oils and flavors in coffee beans. Given these factors, they are clearly a lot more expensive than the average coffee grinder, as they tend to go for $80+. The version I was able to get, a Bodum burr grinder, dummy-proofs the process even more for you: there is a guide right on the lid showing you which grind setting to choose depending on the type of coffee drink you are making. Then, it also has a timer built in; you just have to select how long. Thus, there’s less guess work this way! Along with the Burr grinder, with the same bundle, I got a bag of partially used ground beans that I plan to use for cold brew, a brand new one-pound bag of Costa Rican whole beans, a brand-new, still sealed electric milk frother (which I’d also been wanting, but didn’t really want to spend money on… even though it only costs at max $10), and a portable tea kettle, which I am planning to re-give.

Of the things I’ve gotten from of being part of this amazing Buy-Nothing group and community, these are most definitely the best and most useful items I’ve ever scored:

  1. Endless toddler/school-age books for Kaia
  2. Swim floaties in multiple formats (all of which have been regifted, other than the current puddle jumper which Kaia now uses and fits)
  3. Baby Bjorn potty for potty training
  4. The Oh Crap! potty training book
  5. The majority of Kaia’s toys, including a dozen Lovevery toys, a massive collection of cars, trucks, Hot Wheels, a very sturdy and like-new yellow dump truck, and Peppa Pig vehicles. Her favorite right now is the big Peppa ice cream truck she actually sits and rides on. I’m amazed it hasn’t been broken yet…
  6. Toddler training knives
  7. Toddler popsicle molds
  8. Two brand-new, full sized Dr. Bronner castile liquid soap bottles, which I use for multi-purpose cleaning. This stuff lasts forever because a little bit goes a long way! We still have 1.5 bottles left!
  9. Burr grinder and brand new milk frother
  10. Chemex coffee maker, with a near-full box of paper filters
  11. Real Pyrex brand liquid measuring cup
  12. Vintage Pyrex mixing bowls – all of varying sizes and different bright colors
  13. Bundaberg ginger beer – of course, these were for Chris
  14. Farmers market GARLIC – eight super fresh bulbs with fat cloves!
  15. A nearly full bag of organic, culinary grade lavender
  16. Organic mushroom matcha

I’m grateful to be a part of this group; I’m also grateful that I’ve been able to off load so many things that we have that we either do not use or no longer need — I’m all for declutterring, helping others to declutter, and also contributing to the circular economy!