Yesterday I participated in The Nike+ Human Race in New York. The Human Race was was the world's largest one day race, bringing together runners from 5 different continents 26 countries to run a 10K race. The New York race was held on Randall's Island with 10,000 participants and an average race time of 1:02':04". Each race event ended with a celebratory concert, ours was the All American Rejects! Overall the race and the concert were fantastic- tons of people, high energy, great sponsors, nice location outside of the city during sunset along the East River. And no matter where I'm living next year at this time I plan on running this race again. ;) Check out race times from around the world HERE. More about the New York race CLICK HERE. All American Rejects trash talking video- Go New York!
This Sunday, Aug. 31st, Cinderella Falafel (on 2nd Ave. btw. St. Marks & 7th St.) is selling their falafels for only 8 cents from 5pm - 9pm. Plus they're hosting a falafel eating contest at 6pm! Click here to get the coupon. Source.
People will be booking flights with Jet Blue in and out of JFK just to see the new restaurants that make up Terminal 5's new food court. As of October 1st, five new restaurants will be open to the public. Restaurants include Piquillo (tapas), Aeronuova (a trattoria featuring old Italian films), Deep Blue (Asian), The Loft,and La Vie (a French cafe); all designed by the meatpacking firm ICRAVE (also responsible for STK, Tenjune, and One Little West 12). See photos below, in the order as mentioned above.
Mashable had a great post this week featuring 21 different iPhone food apps. Here's a little preview of the only food app that I've actually been able to try. For details on the other apps check out Mashable's post.
Urban Spoon is a free app that's actually fun. It's a slot machine application that lets you choose your price range and what type of food you're craving. Once you've selected your criteria you literally shake the iPhone and it gives you a list of results near you. My mom and I had already decided what restaurant we wanted to go to and wanted to put Urban Spoon to the test. So we entered our critera and it actually selected the restaurant we had just decided on! Perfect!
Radio Rose from Around the Way Girls will be DJing live from this weekend's Backyard Couture event in Brooklyn.
What: Backyard Couture (an evening of non-stop shopping, live art and an open bar!) When: Saturday, August 16th from 5-11pm Where: Brooklyn (293 Flatbush Ave- btw. St. Marks & Prospect Place) Featuring: Micky Factz and Raye6 Music all night long from the hottest DJs including Radio Rose, Linnee Denise and Ahficionados.
I am loving my friend's new blog! If you love Sex and the City and cherish quality time with your girl friends you should definitely read Juls and the City. She's an event planner living in NYC with fabulous humor and has a great perspective of life in the Big Apple.
Tre opened early in 2008 and is located at 173 Ludlow St. in the West Village. I wasn't aware the modern Italian restaurant was so new when I dined there this past February. Even though our food was great, it would also be a great place to just stop in and grab a drink.
I recommend the Insalata Di Spinaci (baby spinach salad, feta cheese, cucumber, tomato and peppers) and the Carpaccio Di Bietola (thinly sliced red beet, fried goat cheese ballas, with mango dressing).
Soho Park is a restaurant inside a space that looks like a greenhouse in the middle of Soho (on Prince St. and Lafayette). It's a perfect little neighborhood spot for any meal of the day- Mon-Saturday they're open from 8:30am until midnight and on Sundays from 10am to 8pm. I recently stopped into the restaurant for lunch on a rainy afternoon while shopping in Soho. Situated inside a greenhouse this spot is perfect for any weather and still lets you feel like you're outside. Not only does their menu offer tasty comfort-type food but it also features wine, beer, and handmade sodas and shakes. On the rainy, chilly spring day I had the bowl of Roasted Tomato Soup without croutons but asked for shredded cheese on the side and it was no problem! Soho Park also has unique events Wednesdays through Saturdays, check them all out here.
Apparently recommended by GQ magazine this authentic noodle house in the heart of Chinatown. With chickens and ducks hanging along side the windows, Great N.Y. Noodletown is a place I would have never gone to by myself but worth the experience in the end. I may never go back but at least I can say I've truly experienced an authentic Chinese restaurant. I ordered the Vegetable Dumpling soup and the Sauteed Bok Choy. The soup was actually really good.
I should also note that we ended up at Great N.Y. Noodletown because our first choice, Barrio Chino (253 Broome St.) was no longer in existance but was also recommended by GQ mag recently. We were standing right in front of the location and it was toally not there! So disappointing and what's even worse is that NYmag.com and Menu Pages haven't updated their posts.
Mercadito Grove is a Mexican tapas restaurant located on 7th Avenue between Grove and Barrow Streets in the West Village. This is a great summer spot with outdoor seating perfect for interesting people watching and a vast list of exciting drinks including various mojitos, margaritas and cervezas.
To start we ordered the Guacamole Sampler which included orange guac, traditional and mango. The fruit in the guacamole made the spicy dishes a little more refreshing. My friend ordered the Pollo Tacos- four small tapas-style tacos topped with a sliver of avocado- and loved them. I had the Ensalada Verde (without jicama and queso). It was spicier than I would have liked and the quesco may have helped with that but I left most of the salad on my plate but made sure all of the chips and guacamole were eaten. = )
Vino is a new wine bar in the Upper East Side perfect for a glass of wine and a small bite. My friends and I ordered the fennel and orange salad and the beef lasagna along with a few glasses of Pinot Grigio and Chianti. Located on 2nd Ave. between 66th and 67th this little wine spot also offers outdoor seating perfect for New York summers.
There's no website yet but their number is 212-744-5370
Wednesday night I placed an order with Fresh Direct for a party I was hosting on Friday (more on that to come later) and saw the Chickpea Masala from Tabla listed as one of the 4-Minute-Meals and thought it sounded like the perfect thing to bring to work for lunch and/or dinner.
I just ate it and I must say, it was really good, not too spicy at all. I was surprised and a bit disappointed though to read the nutritional facts though. The container is about 2.5 servings and each serving is 310 calories, 11 grams of fat and 2.5 grams of saturated fat.
But if taste and convenience is what you're looking for I definitely recommend it!
Last weekend I hosted a Bachelorette Party for my cousin and 7 of her friends (only one of whom I had met before) in NYC. I was thrilled my cousin wanted to celebrate with all her friends in New York but definitely challenged to keep things affordable and enjoyable, especially since this was the first time some of them had been in NY!
The girls arrived on Friday morning ready to shop! First stop: Tiffany's & Co. where each girl bought a special gift for themselves. After a long day of walking around everyone came over to my apartment for hors d'oeuvres and cocktails. Signature drink for the night was champagne with raspberries. I ordered all the food ahead of time from Fresh Direct and had it delivered about 20 minutes before the girls arrived. I ordered a big chickpea salad, grilled chicken strips (delivered ready to serve), artichoke dip, a big fresh fruit bowl and a vegetable platter.
Before going back to the hotel Friday night we wanted one last chance to publicly embarrass the bride-to-be so we headed to a bar near the hotel, Connolly's Pub on W. 54th St.
Saturday morning we all put on our matching T-shirts that said "Buy Her a Drink Before she Takes the Plunge" and headed out for the Sex and The City tour of New York. I definitely recommend going on this 3.5 hour tour that stops at NYC hot-spots made famous by the hit HBO series. Starting at The Plaza we all pile into a chartered (air-conditioned) bus all the way down 5th toward Soho, West Village, Meatpacking District, and more! Not only does our spunky guide, Emily Sproch, reveal a ton of Sex & The City behind-the-scenes info but we make three different stops throughout the tour to walk along the same streets as our favorite characters. The first stop was at the Pleasure Chest, where the SATC girls bought their "Rabbits." (Anything purchased at the Pleasure Chest was discounted for all tour attendees.) Next stop was to the famous Magnolia Bakery on Bleeker Street. The $42 tour ticket also included cupcakes from Magnolia for everyone! The last stop of the tour was at the bar Adian and Steve owned in the show, which is actually called Onieals Grand Street located on Grand between Baxter St & Centre Market Place. (Cosmos were served at a discount for all tour attendees.)
We ended the night at Tony n' Tina's Wedding, an interactive off-Broadway performance where the audience serves as Tony and Tina's wedding guests in their crazy Italian wedding. Tickets are $90 per person and free for the bride-to-be if you're there celebrating a bachelorette party, and include dinner, unlimited champagne and a slice of cake.
Overall, the weekend was a blast and now we just can't wait for the weeding in August!
A few years ago M&M's launched a personalization feature where consumers could order M&M's with customized notes on the candies (I ordered them in my school colors with the school name printed on them when I graduated college.) But now the company is taking customization to a more tech-savvy level. They have just launched M&M Faces where consumers can get their photo printed on to the chocolate candies.
Thinking this will be great for graduations, weddings, and baby announcements!
Thanks to Mashable for the heads up regarding a new Twitter-focused website and contest.
You will be automatically entered to win the $150 raffle just by tweeting about the Tweet2Win.com. Raffle is for a $150 gift card from Amazon, eBay, Victoria's Secret, iTunes, or Overstock.com. You can even increase your chance of winning by blogging about the site.
Apparently there's no catch. The site gets free promotion and traffic while Twitter users play their chances for a prize. A winner is chosen every week and for a different prize. And as Mashable said, "basically it’s a marketing gimmick that attempts to leverage Twitter, make money out of exposure, and essentially create a sort of user-generated advertising spam."
Small Italian spot on the Upper East Side with great outdoor seating is full of real Italians. I had the Perlei salad but there are a lot of other great-sounding dishes like the special entree pear, apple and goat cheese stuffed ravioli and the pumpkin soup topped with pumpkin seeds.Per lei puts a unique spin on traditional Italian fare by being housed in chic location marked by white walls and bright, Andy Whorhall-like paintings and a massive chandelier lit up in the center of the room.
Need to get out of the city and in the mood to gamble some money away?!? A trip to Atlantic City may be exactly what you need. It's nice that such a place exists so close to Manhattan. Although I must admit even though I liked all the lights and loved the people watching, I definitely found out that gambling is not really my thing. However, I did enjoy the fine dining at Wolfgang Puck American Grille at the Borgata Hotel.
We listened to our friend's advice and spent the night gambling at the Borgata Casino Hotel but stayed at the Trump Marina Casino Hotel. It was definitely entertaining to see all the people who stay up all night gambling. Literally, the same people we saw at the tables before going to bed at 1:30am were still at the same tables when we left the hotel at 10am!
I am currently sitting among food and nutrition gurus listening to the speakers at the "What's In Store?" seminar in NYC hosted by Fleishman-Hillard. There are some fabulous speakers who are all discussing the future of food and nutrition- sustainability vs. organic, rising food prices, genomapping, etc. Fleishman is blogging and Tweeting live from the event
OMG! Ellie Krieger from the Food Network's "Healthy Appetite" is sitting a table away from me! Within her question to the panel she included an interesting statistic: currently in the U.S. we waste 27% of available food is wasted, that's 1 pound of food per person per day!
Favorite speakers from today's seminar- Alan Rambam from Fleishman-Hillard's Youth & Mobile Marketing practice and Kathleen Zelman who is the Director of Nutrition at WebMD.
Nero is a fabulous restaurant located at the corner of Gansevoort St. and Greenwich St., right across the street from The Gansevoort Hotel. The decor is romantic, dimly lit and exposed brick. Recommended dishes include Insalata di Rucola (roasted beets, herb goat cheese, honey vinaigrette) and the grilled organic salmon served with garlic whipped potatoes and a variety of Mediterranean vegetables.
After weeks of watching this new Midtown lunch spot under construction it finally opens! What a great day for them to open their doors, the sunshine will definitely help increase their foot traffic. I ordered my Hummus Bowl with Salad. I didn't pair it with a tea, maybe next time, but I was excited to see that a "crisp" (a.k.a. falafel ball) comes with each Hummus Bowl.
Their pita breads are baked from scratch every few hours on premises
Their fresh made teas sound really good (with flavors like lychee, ginger/peach, & apple mango)
Some of the ingredients they use in the sandwiches I could be down with… like mango curry, eggplant, goat cheese, and pomegranate dressing
I won’t eat salads, but a hummus bowl with mango curry or roasted eggplant sounds pretty damn good
Everything they serve is organic, when possible, and always delivered fresh daily. Plus they change their oil every 24 hours, and they only use eco-friendly, recycled materials
The Crisp Sandwiches may make for a good meal but the Hummus Bowls might end up being a better snack for most people. Definitely worth checking out- Crisp-- on 3rd Ave. btw. 43+44th
It's nice that such a place exists so close to Manhattan. Although I must admit even though I liked all the lights and loved the people watching, I definitely found out that gambling is not really my thing. However, I did enjoy the fine dining at 
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