May The Eats Be With You

Greetings all! Mid-April to Mid-May has been a blur. Work has been busy, extra curricular activities are packed in tighter than a rush hour 6 train, and in the middle of it all was my birthday.

My thirtieth birthday. 

As in "thirty, flirty, and fabulous" a la Jennifer Garner. OK, maybe not quite that fabulous. I mean, I didn't go home with Mark Ruffalo at the end, but it was still a fulfilling birthday due to the fact that I have some of the best friends EVER. I really was spoiled. Take a peek below to see what we were up to.

My actual birthday is the one day a year I get to go to my favorite restaurant in Westchester with my favorite people. My family and I met for dinner at Harvest on Hudson on not so May like day. I'd post more pictures of the building and grounds but you're better off checking out the website; the weather made for some pretty bleak backdrops. 

The Mediterranean cuisine highlights local products and is served both traditionally and creatively. The goat cheese and prosciutto pizza and bacon wrapped dates are perennial favorites but my stomach also nudged me toward the list of house made pasta dishes. Steph had joined us and her buckwheat tagliatelle Bolognese was the dish of the night. The rich, meaty sauce was so concentrated with flavor you'd swear your nonna made it. My lamb sausage rigatoni didn't stand a chance (it ended up a bit dry but the rigatoni made up for it). There was tuna, veal, crab legs and, most importantly, a concoction of black cherry mousse on a citrus olive oil cake and a clean scoop of pomegranate sorbetto. Confections like that are a reminder to always, always, always look at the dessert menu.

After a Friday night of girlfriends, LES rooftops and rum and Cokes, Saturday hurt a bit more than expected. When we stumbled into the Euro style Sullivan Street Bakery I was thisclose to ordering a minimum of three dishes but exercised some serious self-control when I remembered I'd be in a bikini the next day. Yikes. 

The clean lines, clusters of wildflowers and a caramel colored wall laden with loaves of bread were enough to momentarily transport me back to my time in Berlin. I went with the most rustic of the egg dishes, hoping it would be hearty enough to banish my hunger pains. My poached eggs were nestled into a gently tossed mix of the butteriest, most toasted and salted bread, delicate asparagus pieces, utterly creamy fingerlings, and a generous yet effortless sprinkle of chives. Simply stunning.

After a few hours of shopping I found myself on the right side of a chocolate and hazelnut filled doughnut from Doughnut Plant. It was a tough decision; the Green Tea and Tres Leches varieties were taunting my taste buds with equal intensity but the line was growing and there were places to be so I shot from the hip.

A walk through The Highline led us to Chelsea Market to stock up on salts from The Filling Station (Black Truffle all day), sample more doughnuts (good, but stick to Doughnut Plant), and inhale the aroma of Los Tacos No. 1 (nopal, anyone?) Eventually, these tired soles (hehehe, see what I did there?) landed at Cowgirl Bar in time for the best deal on frozen margs and guacamole. 

Thankfully my pants still fit the next day. But then this happened,

Of course there was a round 2.

Yacht club brunch on the terrace was the absolute pinnacle of a pampered weekend. I told you I was spoiled. Friends slowly scattered and I was left with nothing but heaping piles of laundry BUT I never felt more connected or happier with the people in my life. As the school year winds down I'm aiming to get more on here, especially some recipes, so keep checking back and in the mean time you should be following @NYGirlCanEat on Twitter and Instagram.  Until the next dish, ciao!