2 Years On In NYC

Two of us two years later.

And that was two. Two whole years in NYC. There are still a few (we're unsure as to how many) to go, but two felt like a lot. This city sure isn't easy. One minute you're in love, the next it's hell. It goes from uplifting, inspiring, and engaging to punishing, stress-inducing, and far too challenging in a matter of seconds.

We bought a plant. We'll be here for a while.

But, for now, it's home. It certainly doesn't always feel that way. I still spend probably too much time reminiscing on our London days, and we definitely won't be here forever, but it's a special place, with certain welcoming hints of magic jumping out to surprise me every now and again. 

An example of magic.

Looking at last year's list of bizarre UK-US differences, some of them don't seem so bizarre anymore. "How are you?" has become a normal greeting, I always tip, and I've got my egg order down. B always laughs at what he calls my "Americanisms," which I've unwittingly picked up along the way. So, in case you're wondering how American I've become, here's a few things that have changed (without me even realizing):

1. It's an apartment. Not a flat. Having said that, I'm still stuck on flatmates. Roommates hasn't entered my regular vocab yet.

2. Oregano is pronounced orAYgeno. But with a British accent.

3. Cilantro. Eggplant. Scallions. Zucchini. Fries. Soda. I work in food; what did you expect?

4. I have learned to sign for everything I buy. My signature is a random squiggle. Okay, a line. But, in my defense, writing on those iPad pay stations with a finger is hard.

5. Walks are hikes. Always.

6. Bagels are a necessary staple. I can't remember what I ate before them.

A typical breakfast.

7. Specialty not speciality. Why bother with an extra syllable when you don't have to.

8. I get the subway. Even when in London.

9. It's nice out. It's hot out. Not outside. Just out. 

It was nice out on this day.

10. No words have a u. All words have a z. 

11. Z is pronounced 'zee.'

12. I have a suitably annoying, particular coffee order.

13. Wearing sports kit to work is totally acceptable.

14. Ice cream is an important part of life.

15. Driving 5 hours for a weekend away is a normal thing to do.

Or 4 hours for a day of skiing...

But don't worry, I still don't know the words to the national anthem and I don't know how American football works. These things continue to puzzle me, let's see how I feel about them next year...:

1. Apparently I look tan. Not tanned. But tan. Is this a color rather than an adjective? I'm unclear.

2. Vacation. The lack of it. Not the word itself.

3. Erbs. What happened to the h? 

4. Pudding vs dessert. These words are not interchangeable. Pudding in the US describes some specific types of dessert, which, confusingly, aren't what would be described as a classic 'pudding' (I'm thinking steamed, seventies-style) in the UK.

5. I still can't write the date.

6. I don't call my trousers pants. I still don't know what to call the underwear definition of pants. 

7. Sneakers. If I think about saying this word I doubt myself and return to trainers. It sounds weird coming out of my mouth.

8. Fahrenheit. Still clueless.

9. How to hold a knife and fork. It seems Americans hold a fork like they might murder you any second. Also, cutlery is not a word. It's flatware. Nobody can explain why.

10. Cinnamon raisin bagels with cream cheese? What the what?

11. Parmigian. Taglatiell. They're not spelled like that but they're pronounced like that. I'm not sure if they get bored before the end of the world or what happens here.

12. If the recipe you're using calls for a red chili, you can give up hope of finding it. You will only be able to find a jalapeño. There is no other chili.

13. How the health service works (or doesn't work) is beyond me. I think my visit to the doctor was free. It may not have been. I may be in crippling debt because of a check-up. I don't know.

14. What is seltzer? Is it just sparkling water? Is it soda water? Is there even a difference?

15. Trump.

The Trump thing isn't just me.

This next year's going to bring a lot of running, a little bit of traveling, lots more coffee, hundreds of bagels, a few visitors, and a lot more unknowns and adventures that will be thrown our way, whether we want them or not.

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Lucali

Naming the best pizza in New York will lead to an argument. It's inevitable. I think even I have named at least three pizza restaurants the best in the city, and now I'm back to add a fourth to that list.

Lucali is famous for its wait, the occasional visits from Beyoncé, the fact that the owner and chef had never actually been to Italy when he opened this place, and, of course, its pizza.

Deep in Carroll Gardens, this restaurant is packed full of locals, Manhattanites who've journeyed here for the (maybe) best pizza in NYC, and a couple of in-the-know tourists, every night of the week. Get there early, and be prepared to disappear for a while to wait. On our first visit the wait was around four hours (I'm not exaggerating). The second, it was closer to two. So make sure you have a pre-dinner drinks option planned before you go. We're fans of August Laura, which is only a couple of blocks away.

You could also use this time to go and select your wine to drink with dinner. Lucali is entirely BYO. If you forget, you'll be having Pepsi. So don't do that.

When you do get inside, it's obvious why everyone is happy to spend so long waiting to walk over the guarded threshold. Tables are spaced out through the front half of the room. The back half is taken up by an expansive kitchen space. The lights are dimmed to that perfect this-is-romantic-but-I-can-still-see-you level, wood furniture adds a hint of traditional Italian trattoria, and everyone is talking, whispering, laughing, sipping, and eating slice after slice of pizza.

There's not really a menu. Someone will recite the toppings to you as they open your wine, and the rest is up to you. Select the toppings and the size of pizza. As a general rule, one large pizza between two fairly hungry people is ideal. I'll let you pick your own toppings. Our favorite has to be simply as it comes, topped with all the basil and garlic the kitchen has on hand.

Start pouring the wine, and sip away until your crisp, thin, sizzling pizza arrives on its pedestal. Fold each slice and eat. I guarantee you'll declare this to be the best pizza you've ever had in the city. It's probably true.

Lucali, 575 Henry Street, Brooklyn, NY 11231.

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Freek's Mill

Freek's Mill isn't the kind of restaurant you stumble across on a Friday evening. While an evening stroll through Gowanus may not have been top of my parents to-do list on their most recent visit, eating at Freek's Mill with them was top of mine.

Pass the disused cars, parking lots, and empty warehouses, and you'll find a glowing haven, with a beautiful logo painted on the side, sitting on the corner of this cobbled Brooklyn road. Inside, tables line the walls, a counter wraps round the front windows, a bar glimmers, and the sounds of an open kitchen travel through from the next room.

This restaurant isn't for the selfish. The menu of sharing plates has to be split amongst you all: the rich, deep flavors of each dish make a few mouthfuls of each perfect, but eating the entire serving of it alone would be a challenge. An umami-party like this one requires good friends, plenty of funky wine, and a couple of hours to really take in the wide range of dishes presented to you.

Tuscan kale with honey crisp apples, Marcona almonds, and Beechers cheddar. Yet another competitor for top kale salad. How are there quite so many spectacular kale salads in this city? It's amazing.

Charred radicchio with straciatella and candied walnuts. Sweet enough to absorb the leaves' bitter flavor, with the creamy fresh cheese bringing rich comfort.

Montauk scallop crudo with pickled persimmon, cilantro, and crème fraîche. Refreshing, zingy, sweet, creamy: balancing magic.

Roasted beets with chickpeas, speck, and soft boiled egg. The prettiest comfort food.

Octopus with peewee potatoes and chorizo vinaigrette. No chewiness on this giant octopus tentacle. Smoky potatoes and paprika-heavy vinaigrette bought a hint of Spain to the table. And alongside that we devoured Brussels sprouts with apple-maple butter and bacon. All sprouts should be eaten like this forever and ever.

Pappardelle with rabbit ragu, guanciale, and wild nettles felt a little strange sitting amongst the other heavily flavored dishes, but in itself was an example of perfect pasta. If you needed proof that the Freek's Mill team can cook, this is is.

We were warned when we ordered roasted pork jowl with smashed cucumbers, cashews, and cilantro, that the joy of this dish was in the fat. This fatty meat was tender, and, drenched in Szechuan-inspired flavors, it was beautifully more-ish. But yes, the joy was in the fat.

We found dessert round the corner at Ample Hills (because you can't be that close to ice cream heaven and not visit). The perfect food-filled Friday night. In Gowanus. Sometimes Brooklyn really does seem magical.

Freek's Mill, 285 Nevins Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217.

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King

When two girls from London's River Café move to New York and open a restaurant with white washed walls and wicker chairs, you book a table for the next celebration opportunity. That celebration just so happened to be my birthday.

Going out in Manhattan is a rarity for us Brooklynites. Now that my office is also based in this outer borough, it's rare I even step foot on that little, chaotic, noisy island, let alone go out there in the evening. But, sometimes it's worth stepping over the Brooklyn Bridge to see what's happening amongst all the bright lights.

Serving seasonal, simple food, with influences from both Italy and Southern France, King's daily changing menu is one you can't help but love. The white brick walls and open, brass light-fittings make you feel like you're in London, the woven chairs and white tablecloths transport you to Paris, and then the diamond-wearing women around you and the beautiful linen shirts sported by the front of house remind you that, this evening, you really are in Manhattan. The space is simple, and understated, but the people, service, and food take it up to the next level. Much like The River Café itself.

The short menu is fresh and seasonal. We began with a beautiful, giant, rosemary, salt, and olive oil-coated carta di musica (see top photo), which was handed to us with our cocktails.

Panisse followed. These are essentially chickpea fries. The polenta-like batter is fried until every piece is super crisp on the outside, slightly soft in the middle, and is then coated in salt and sage. All drinks should be accompanied by these salty treats. Ricotta with shaved fennel came next. Creamy ricotta, crisp, herbal fennel, and a splash of bright olive oil transforms these simple ingredients into an elegant dish.

We fought over every strand of pappardelle with pork ragù. Thick strips of fresh al dente pasta with meaty, smushy (not a word, I know) sauce tangled between the pieces made us very happy. I persuaded B to have fish (it was my birthday after all), so we shared the most giant piece of skate. Charred and dark on the outside, the white flesh was almost delicate as it fell off its thick bones.  The greens tossed with mashed anchovies added salty, iron-rich flavors to this stunning fish.

A beautiful slice of walnut tart with a pot of thick cream then came flying towards us. These few bites of sweet, nutty filling, surrounded by the thinnest pastry, and doused in a puddle of cream made the most beautiful ending to a beautiful evening. It was worth the trip over to the other side of the bridge.

King, 18 King Street, New York, NY 10014.

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B&H Kosher Dairy

Returning to New York life after a week away is alway a challenge. Especially when it's January and the temptation to coop up inside with endless cups of tea, a never-ending stream of Netflix, and a torrent of emails often overwhelms. But last weekend it was time to break out of that negative rut, and get out into this amazing city we're lucky enough to temporarily call home. It was time to throw ourselves back into the fun, inspiring, thought-provoking places, moments, and people you can find in the Big Apple. So, with that in mind, at 12pm last Saturday we cycled over Manhattan Bridge in search of some blintzes at B&H Kosher Dairy.

I must have walked past B&H multiple times without even turning to look inside. But when you do make it past the bright green exterior, you walk straight into an old New York movie scene. This 400 square foot space is filled with one bar down one side, and a few tables down the other. You have to turn sideways to fit down the gap in between. The kitchen is a cubby hole at the back, next to the bathroom. You order from the tables by shouting over the heads of the people at the bar. If you do sit at the bar, be prepared to act as go-between by passing plates of challah and cups of coffee to the people sitting behind you.

B&H opened in 1938, and, despite a short closure in 2015 due to the 2nd Avenue gas explosion, has been serving Jewish comfort food ever since. However, the Jewish immigrants it once catered for are long gone, the kosher certification has expired, and it is now managed by a Polish Catholic and an Egyptian Muslim. The fact that this story is true, and that this deli is still open and serving up classic Yiddish fare, is just one reason why New York is such a magical city.

So we ordered a taste of everything. Coffee of course. Home fries (potatoes mixed with onions, veggies and other goodness and cooked on the griddle) with two fried eggs; super sweet, crispy on the outside cheese blintzes; a mix of fried pierogis, as recommended by everybody there; plus the freshly made, fluffy challah schmeared with soft butter, which is passed to you with a cup of iced water almost as soon as you walk in.

It's places like B&H Dairy which really bring New York to life. That make living in this city like living your life in a Woody Allen movie. That mean that despite all its many, hard, intense challenges, you discover these shiny gems, and suddenly your faith in this place and its people are restored.

B&H Dairy, 127 2nd Avenue, New York, NY 10003

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The City Bakery's Hot Chocolate

As soon as the temperature drops in NYC, the line at City Bakery grows. All for one very good reason: the hot chocolate. Often voted the best in the city (I haven't tried enough other places to confirm this), on a cold, snowy December day, the queue snakes round the counter, and the man whizzing up the hot chocolate to order is getting messier and more hectic as the bundled up customers continue to stream in.

Never order anything bigger than a small — you really won't be able to finish it. And always pay the extra dollars for the marshmallow. It may seem excessive to pay that much for some spongey sugar to sit on top of your liquid chocolate, but it's totally not. The chocolate is rich, sweet, thick, and luxuriously smooth. The icing sugar coated marshmallow floats like the lightest, fluffiest snowball on the dense drink. It melts slowly, quickly covering you in a light dusting of sugar, and testing your hot chocolate drinking abilities as you try to eat it and drink the molten chocolate on the New York streets. On a cold East Coast winter day, this hot chocolate really is the best medicine.

The City Bakery, 3 W 18th Street, New York, NY 10011

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1 Year On in NYC

Brooklyn Bride Park Summer 2015

On this day last year, we finally finished packing our bags, B's parents drove us to the airport, and we nervously boarded our flight to JFK. Just before midnight, we had landed, waited anxiously in line for security, quadruple-checking we really did have all the right papers and they were going to let us through. Finally we got in a taxi, drove through New York's outer neighborhoods, and arrived at a fairly grotty hotel in Gowanus.

One year on and this city feels less intimidating, overwhelming, and confusing than it did on our first week, although I am still surprised or taken aback by at least one event or conversation or discovery every day. New York feels a little more like home (but the UK is still what we refer to as home), we have some friends, jobs, an adorable apartment, and plenty of local food-related knowledge. However, I still can't discuss the temperature in fahrenheit, people regularly don't understand what I'm saying, and this humid, hot summer is simultaneous a novelty and impossible to survive in.

Brooklyn Bride Park Summer 2016

So, to celebrate, our New York-iversary, I'm not going to provide you with a list of my favorite New York places (that's what this blog does the rest of the year), but instead with a list of the weirdest, most confusing, and most basic American-NYC vs UK-London differences, which we never ever thought about before we arrived:

1. When you're asked 'How's it going?' or 'How are you?' when you walk into a café, restaurant, or shop, they're not actually just looking for a response, it's just their way of saying 'hello'.

2. New Yorkers have asbestos hands, and drink huge coffees, all day, every day.

3. Everybody uses the subway, but this doesn't mean it's an efficient way to get around. It's old, slow, smelly, there's no information anywhere, and it is regularly delayed.

4. New Yorkers are totally dog-obsessed. Until you have a dog, even if you live in a tiny apartment, you're not really one of them.

5. Iced coffee isn't just for summer.

6. Paying the 'check' in a restaurant will take many, many, meals out to get used to. And if you try explaining the efficient British method to your server they will be overwhelmed.

7. You have to tip. There's no point trying to play the 'I'm British card' - they don't care. People in tipping jobs are paid a minimum wage of next to nothing, so tips are the only way they can survive.

8. Apartments generally don't have washing machines. Welcome to the world of the laundromat.

9. This is a city with real seasons. The winter is cold and snowy and icy, the summer is hot, humid, and sweaty.

10. It's impossible to hear an American say croissant, niche, cassoulet, or lychee without laughing.

11. New Yorkers love giving directions. Generally, they don't acknowledge or communicate with strangers in public, but stop and ask for directions and you'll think you've found your new best friend.

12. If you're going to work in a restaurant, make sure you can speak Spanish first.

13. You could probably furnish and decorate your whole room with furniture and odd bits and bobs found on stoops. Everybody loves leaving things they would otherwise throw away on their stoop for passersby to adopt.

14. New Yorkers don't toast their bagels.

15. You probably won't get arrested if you jaywalk.

16. Doughnuts are definitely an acceptable breakfast.

17. Don't try and be ironic. It doesn't go down well.

18. Europe is thought of as essentially one country. And European is pronounced Eurpn.

19. Squirrel is pronounced squrl. Don't even try to talk about Eurpn squrls.

20. Unless you're a millionaire, you will have problems with bugs in your apartments, whether it's ants, cockroaches, or mice.

21. They think the first floor is the ground floor. We live in what would be called a basement flat in the UK and don't even know how to refer to it here.

22. As a Brit, it is assumed you know everything about the royal family. Everything.

23. There are 'commercials' everywhere at every possible opportunity: on TV every 2 minutes, at sports matches, on the radio, you can't get away from them.

24. New Yorkers don't fit the stereotype of Americans who eat early. Nobody sleeps in this city. Sleep is frowned upon.

25. Ordering eggs is its own language: over easy, sunny side up, hard scrambled, soft scrambled, coddled... It goes on.

26. Be careful when you cross the street on a go sign, cars still can run you over, they're allowed to if they're turning the corner.

27. Pizza is also called pie. Pie is also pie. It's confusing.

28. Cider is apple juice - normally posh apple juice. It can also be alcoholic, and they sometimes make this clearer by calling the alcoholic version hard cider, but not always. And apple juice is still a thing, but tends to refer to rubbish apple juice. But not always.

29. Writing the date will blow your mind. I am now simply unable to read or write a date at all.

30. If you use contactless on your credit card in a supermarket or shop, you will literally blow the cashier's mind.

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Happy Bones

We really are spoilt for choice when it comes to finding a perfect cup of coffee in this city. To tell you the truth, it's rare that we venture past our reliably perfect and hyper-local Blue Bottle to pick up our daily dose of caffeine, but when we find ourselves on the other side of Brooklyn Bridge, overwhelmed by all the options, Happy Bones in Nolita is quickly becoming a favourite Manhattan hide-out.

Serving up ethically sourced Counter Culture coffee, donating a percentage of their profits to Free Arts NYC, selling a range of much-loved Dough Doughnuts, and giving you the prettiest paper cups in town, you'll leave with a much-needed energy boost and probably a glimmer of a smile on your face too. Even on a cold, testing January day.

Happy Bones, 394 Broome Street, New York, NY 10013

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LDN to NYC

We arrived in New York late last Thursday night. When we finally clambered into a yellow taxi after a long flight, an interminable queue for security at JFK, and then another huge line of people waiting for taxis outside the airport, we suddenly realised that, after months and months of planning and organising and stressing, we had, finally, made it to NYC. We drove through the outskirts of Brooklyn with the windows down, staring at all the buildings, people, lights, cars, signs, that we passed by. Everything seemed big, noisy, hot,  and overwhelming. 45 minutes later we were dropped on the pavement (or sidewalk, as I should now be calling it) at our hotel on 4th Avenue, Brooklyn. We lugged our heavy bags inside and fell asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillow, only to wake up a few hours later, still exhausted. Oh, the joys of jet lag.

10 days in to our new New York life, we have walked all over Brooklyn looking for a flat (or apartment) to move into; we have found a flat; we have signed a lease; we have filled in many, many forms; we have complained about the heat innumerable times; we've opened a bank account; we have eaten ice-cream every day; we've set up American 'cell' phones; we've run around Prospect Park; and we've just about got over our jet lag (although B still insists that he needs a cup of tea at 6pm every day to keep him awake until it's an acceptable time to fall asleep). It's been busy and it's been exhausting, but this big city which we had barely stepped foot in before last week, is slowly beginning to feel like somewhere that we think we will someday be able to call home. Despite all the bizarre Americanisms that keep popping up and reminding us that we are strangers in this city.

We're excited and inspired - and a little bit scared - but I can't wait to share our new American life here with y'all.

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