Blogger Meet-up & Other Eats! May 26th

I've been meaning to post for a few days now, but you know how it goes... I'll start with some of my eats from last weekend...

Saturday:

A strawberry-pineapple smoothie from the street fair on my block.

Then later I had brunch at Sacred Chow.

I got their delicious tofu scramble! It was my first time trying it there and I really liked it. It came with hash browned potatoes and your choice of salad or fruit. I opted for the fruit. ;)

Sacred Chow is always slow, being that the restaurant is tiny and they are terribly understaffed. But taking that into account, they have a pretty good attitude there and try their best. They even apologized to me for taking so long (and I didn't even complain!). That's an example of good customer service. For a bad example, see my posts below on Blossom (and they STILL haven't offered me any apology for the "incident").

Sunday:

I had dinner with my parents at I Tre Merli. We go to I Tre Merli Bistro often (in the West Village), but we decided to try the newly renovated, bigger version downtown (in Soho on West Broadway).

Their food was good as usual, but sadly there were some disappointments. One, their penne alla vodka had bacon in it (!!) and it did not say so on the menu (despite their claims). Luckily they did bring the dish out without the bacon pretty quickly. But the second problem was that the portions were TINY. They literally were appetizer sized!! Their "bistro" in the West Village is WAY better than this place. We never should have strayed! LOL

We were still so hungry afterwards that we went to Baskin Robbins!

I got a praline cheesecake ice cream cone. It was okay, but I wasn't that wild about it (which is weird because I usually LOVE anything cheesecake!).

Yesterday I tried the new Spice restaurant that opened up in Chelsea (at 22nd St. & 8th Ave.). What's strange is that they opened up a new one on top of the one they already had on 20th St. & 8th Ave.! None the less, I liked the new location better because it looked more like a restaurant (was more roomy) and wasn't so crowded.

I got my usual though... spring rolls & broad black noodle with tofu.

This afternoon Katharina and I finally got to meet! Coincidentally it was her birthday too! She wanted to try Lula's Sweet Apothecary, which is a vegan ice cream place in the East Village (on East 6th St. b/w Ave. A & B). She picked a great day to go, being that it was miserably hot out here in NYC! (I am not a summer person, in case you couldn't guess! lol). But none the less we had a great time chatting and the ice cream was good too!

I got a cookies & cream cone. Oh, and this tasted like real ice cream! So for your non-dairy ice cream I'd go here instead of Stogo (see my review of Stogo here).

It's funny, Katharina pointed out that it was like we had met before because we almost seemed like old friends, rather than new acquaintances! That's the power of modern technology I guess!

Last but not least, some pictures of my "fatty," (aka "Peanut" ;)!

Don't worry, he's not really fat... his belly just looks that way when it's all flattened out!

That's all for today, my lovelies!

Daily Eats ~ July 4th

Happy Independence Day, everybody! The Macy's fireworks display will be on the west side this year (we say they moved it because of us-- we moved from the east to the west side this year too). I don't know if we'll be able to see them from our building though... Anyways, in honor of the holiday, I decided to make a fancier, red, white, & blue themed breakfast. :)

Breakfast:

I took 2 slices of De Wafelbakkers French Toast (I found this at Whole Foods yesterday), and topped them with strawberries (red), sliced raw almonds (white), and blueberries (blue)! I also got a cute little jug of maple syrup from Whole Foods too that I drizzled on top. I had one of my apple juice boxes with it. Sorry the pic came out a little blurry, but I was trying to get everything in!

As for the french toast, this was good, but I like Trader Joe's better. I wasn't wild about them using orange in the french toast and it having a bit of a citrus flavor. The crusts were also a little too hard to eat, so I mostly just ate the middles of the bread. I have 2 slices left, and I'll probably be fixing them up with Nutella next time! ;)

Lunch:

I had my other Stouffer's french bread cheese pizza along with 2 oranges that I cut up.

Snack:

There was a street fair on our block today, so I got one of my favorites... a strawberry pineapple smoothie! To me this is the only decent option at these street fairs, and they taste great.

Dinner:

I had one of my Morningstar Farms Mushroom Lover's veggie burgers on a Rudi's organic whole wheat bun, with 2 slices of american cheese and mixed veggies (and ketchup) alongside.

Peanut is all tuckered out from the 4th of July festivities!

(He sleeps on top of his carrier during the day, and inside it at night. :)

Snack/Dessert:

I decided to try a recipe that I heard about... you can watch the video of it here. It's a "almond chocolate chip parfait." I tweaked the recipe a little bit, but here's what I used to make mine:

1 6 oz. container of Fage 0% yogurt

1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract

A handful or so of chocolate chips

A handful or so of slivered almonds

A drizzle of maple syrup

And I topped it with a bit of walnut & cinnamon granola that I got from the Organic Grill

This was pretty good, although not earth shattering. I think I like my regular yogurt parfaits better, but the chocolate chips are a nice touch!

I hope everyone had a Happy 4th!! xo