Midnight Chatter

Oh my I'm particularly chatty today aren't I?

Been blogging, twittering and posting all day and now it's past 1 am and I'm back here to crib that my hubby isn't home yet. My poor, hard working baby. It's been a long time since he hadn't reached home this late. Used to happen for a while when we stayed at New York. That's what drove me to beading and deeper internet addiction. As if I wasn't addicted enough to begin with.

New York City with it's - match box sized kitchen, self bathroom cleaning, walks to the subway in the bitter cold, carrying HEAVY Indian grocery bags from queens, people too busy to smile... I hated the goddammned place!!

But ahhhh the good memories it carried... the adventure it brought into our lives...

- Walking in Central Park's 'Adirondaks'... Lying on the grass at Bryant park... Skating at the little Basketball court on the corner of 1st and 46th... Taking the tram to Roosevelt Island... Window shopping on 5th Avenue... Actual shopping at Times Square... Tabling for Veganism outside Grand Central... Thai Rice Wraps and Dumplings at Red Bamboo... Cornbread and Chilli at Angelica Kitchen

... GAWD I LOVE MANHATTAN!!!

The darned place just sneaks up and grows on an unsuspecting soul!!!

I miss all the wonderfulthings about the city now that I'm back home in Bangalore. But what I miss most about New York are the myriad vegan restaurants there. Red Bamboo and Angelica Kitchen, our most favorite places for the food and the service, were a ritual (the former more so than the latter) but there are so many other fantastic places we've dined at too.

Take Kate's Joint for example. We were able to go there just once but we had a very memorable experience. We were there at peak dinner time and the place was very crowded. Soon after we were seated, we were served a complimentary basket of garlic bread and some herbed garlic olive oil to dip the bread in. Mmm it was soooo tasty, just thinking of it makes my mouth water. Well there we were totally famished, with all this delicious bread in front of us, we just wolfed it down super-fast. We had ordered our main course by this time but even after a while there was no sign of it.
So we called our waiter and said that we were really hungry so could we please have more of the bread and oil. I don't know if it was because we hadn't whined or because the guy was sweet by nature he immediately got us a refill of the bread and apologized profusely for the delay. And being the sweetheart that he was he told us to order our desserts right away since they were running out quick and whatever we ordered he could hold for us, then he proceeded to recommend the Banana Tiramisu and another delicious dessert (I thin k it was a chocolate cake of some kind). We placed our orders. The main course came and went. Even though I can't remember what exactly it was we ordered (this was 3 years ago) I do remember it was good and that we polished it off quickly. We were feeling full and satisfied with our tummies bursting when he brought us our heavenly desserts!! Oh gosh, it was pure magic. Overly full tummies ignored, we enjoyed the Tiramisu and Cake till the very last crumb was licked from the plate. When the bill came, our nice guy insisted that the desserts were on the house. We said we couldn't but he wouldn't add the dessert prices to the bill!!

Yes, Kate's Joint was one of our happiest and most satisfying experiences and we will never forget the kind and friendly Tiramisu giver :)