New Friends and Lots of Food

Wife has informed me that since I have neglected my newfound blogging duties for most of this week, I am required to write a post tonight (we are an exciting bunch on a Friday night). The last few days haven’t been particularly exciting—unless you consider studying the minutia of tax law enthralling (I’m thinking of writing a post on interesting elements of tax…at least two of our readers may find that interesting). In the last couple hours, Wife and I did get out to have a little bit of fun.

A few of my new law-nerd friends who are familiar with NYC invited Wife and I out to explore the area, so they could treat us to some of their favorite eateries in the neighborhood. When Wife and I got the invitation to go out for food, we expected to be eating a late lunch/early dinner with these city-folk. With this expectation, we skipped lunch. Instead of having lunch together, our new friends took us to their favorite spots to find sweets and desserts.

We started our exploration by stopping at a famous little hangout called, The Tea Spot. We went inside for a moment and tried a sample of their White Strawberry Iced Tea. While the sample was exceptionally good, we felt a little more like a coffee drink, so we kept on walking.

Next on our journey was what we are told is “THE place to get coffee,” J & B Coffee Shop. While the place is known for its exception coffee at great prices, it is even more famous for its barista, Jimmy. Jimmy, the remarkably friendly and cheerful gentleman behind the counter, has the incredible ability to remember all of his regular customers’ favorite drinks. We witnessed this in action: when we walked in, Jimmy instantly asked the woman who brought us if she wanted her usual, “Freshly brewed iced coffee, with one sugar, and skim milk.” A minute after we arrived, another customer walked in and Jimmy offered him a chipper welcome and then made him his usual drink without any prompting. After looking at the menu for a few minutes, Wife and I decided to share an iced coffee—it was exceptional. J & B’s is definitely a must-stop for the coffee connoisseur in Greenwich Village.

We continued our journey walking over to Rocco's Pastry Shop. We walked in and looked around at the delectable pastries. This little pastry shop was probably filled with the best aroma I have ever encountered. Our hosts bought a box of cannolis, but Wife and I decided to pace ourselves and not try anything here at Rocco’s (hey, we’re not pigs).

We next stopped at Magnolia Bakery. While a classless guy like me may never have heard of the place before today, it is apparently a legendary bakery known around the world. We had to stand outside and wait in line for over half an hour just to enter this little bakery to see their selection (they have a full-time guard outside just to monitor the line). I looked up Magnolia bakery and learned that the exterior of the bakery, as well as its cupcakes, were featured in Lazy Sunday, a Saturday Night Live flick. The bakery was also featured on Sex and the City, in the film Prime, in which one of the characters throws Magnolia pies at his ex-girlfriends, and in The Devil Wears Prada, in which the character Andy says at one point that she needs to get to the bakery to pick something up for her boyfriend (I found this information on Wikipedia). In the last few weeks, I learned that cupcakes are now “the thing” here in the city. Apparently, the cupcake craze was started in the mid-1990s by Magnolia Bakery. Wife and I each tried one of their delicious little cakes (I never had such wonderful icing in my life).

Finally, we stopped at a little shop where wife and I tasted the peach Italian ice. Though all of us felt too filled up with sugar to actually buy anything, the little café was extremely gracious in offering us each a sample. After our taste of Italian ice, we said goodbye to our friends and headed over to Law School.

Law School keeps incredibly tight control over who can enter the building and where each person may proceed once they enter (I will probably write an entire post on this someday). Wife wanted to see Law School’s incredibly unique library, so I gave her a little tour. I would love to explain why Law School’s library is so special, but that would instantly reveal our location (but I will probably end up explaining it sometime anyway).

After our time in the library, Wife and I decided that we ought to get something a little more substantial for dinner (an iced coffee, cupcake, and bite of Italian ice wasn’t quite enough for the day). We decided to head over to the “the best and cheapest falafel place in town” to grab a bite. Wife and I decided to order two different items and share them both. We ordered a falafel sandwich and a humus sandwich (neither of which we were familiar with). We took our sandwiches over to Washington Square Park to watch the street performers and eat our dinner. We opened up our sandwiches and began to eat. Wife tried a bite of the falafel sandwich and announced, “I don’t like it—you can have. it.” As I ate the falafel sandwich, Wife nibbled on the humus sandwich. After eating about a quarter of the sandwich she announced, “It tastes like dirt, you eat it.” So, we learned something today: don’t take wife for falafel or humus; just stick to Chinese.

Husband’s Note: Wife generally eats anything she is given, and she is willing to try just about anything. But the falafel, and especially the humus, were pretty strange (I even had trouble getting humus down—and I eat EVERYTHING).