When People Stop Being Nice, and Start Being Real

I could sit here and tell you that things have been sooooo crazy lately, and it wouldn't necessarily be a lie, but I've certainly had time to blog...I've just been lazy. Regardless, there's much to discuss in the world of food and the world of Brianne.

[image courtesy of streetsblog.org]

We left off on the 10 mile run that wasn't, and I can safely say I more than made up for it the next day. Two Sundays ago I discovered Prospect Park, and I think I'm in love. Seriously, this park is beautiful. I like it better than Central Park. Yes, I really do. It's a challenging park for running, but it doesn't rub salt in your wounds like my park in Queens.

I did two 3-mile loops around the park, then headed out and up Prospect Park West, then went out on Union up to Boerum Hill. The weather was perfect and I felt awesome. I then tried to repeat this same route this past Saturday, and because I didn't eat breakfast (I know, me skipping a meal is unheard of), I failed miserably and cut it short at 6 miles. You live and learn.

Going back to the good run day, I triumphantly rode the subway back to my apartment covered in sweat and salt and probably some dirt, not really caring what others thought of me, but taking enough care not to get too close to anyone, then took a long nap with my cat laying on my legs. I woke up about an hour later then prepped for my first trip to the Port Authority Bus Terminal. Little did I know I was stepping into another world.

I wasn't getting ready to take a bus anywhere (my MegaBus days are OVER), but instead was waiting for one of my dearest college friends to arrive for a few days of fun! Poor Katie was stuck on the bus a good hour and a half longer than she expected, and I conducted an observational study of a night in the bus terminal.

Any time I heard someone talk about the Port Authority Bus Terminal, it was always, "whatever you do, don't let anyone convince you to stay the night there." Not a problem, I never have any intention of doing so. As I checked in there on foursquare, I read through the tips and none of them were wrong or exaggerated. There were plenty of homeless people offering to give people directions to their buses hoping for money in return, more screaming children than I could ever hope to encounter, and this overall feeling of dread and misery. That, my friends, is the bus terminal in a nutshell. It makes Penn Station look like paradise.

Katie got in late Sunday night and I took her to the diner for dinner because I take everyone there and it's awesome. I took Monday and Tuesday off so we set out the next morning for bagels and adventure. We took to train to Brooklyn hoping to get in some day drinking at the Brooklyn Brewery, and when we arrived we quickly learned that the tasting room is not open during the day Monday-Thursday. Huge bummer, particularly because I built up hype around the brewery cat, Monster.

Instead, we accidentally walked to the L at Bedford and went to Chelsea Market where we obtained gelato and proceeded to the highline. I've been on the highline a couple times now, and I still think it's one of the coolest things in the city.

We then headed back into Brooklyn where we caught a bus to Ikea. I had been to Ikea in Canada, but never one in my own country, and I have a fondness for cheap home furnishing. We had entirely too much fun and didn't buy anything. We explored each set up, tested chairs and couches, attempted to read Swedish, and saw that Statue of Liberty. Not bad for a Monday afternoon.

The bus ride back took us through Red Hook which reminded me of one of our favorite pastimes living in the dorms at college, and that was scheduling our night to watch Real World: Brooklyn - the greatest season of the Real World that was ever filmed. The house that the crew lived in was in Red Hook, and I was immediately struck with nostalgia and a need to own the season on DVD.

After dinner in Forest Hills at the wonderful Mint's Thai Kitchen (where I tried amazing Thai Iced Tea, calamari, and my standard chicken pad Thai), we walked back to my neighborhood and dug through Netflix and MTV.com. We totally found full episodes of Real World: Brooklyn...and watched a bunch of them.

[image courtesy of Wikipedia]

It still rocks.

The next day we met Katie's aunt in Bryant Park where we dined at the Bryant Par Grill, then came back for more Real World before I said goodbye. It was a lovely time with a lovely person who I missed very much!

Since then, I've cooked here and there, but haven't made anything mind-blowing. But can we talk about buying raw chicken fingers? Because this is a big issue.

For starters, I didn't realize I had bought chicken fingers rather than chicken breasts and the store, and considering I've worked with them rather miserably numerous times, I think this will be my last time. Looking at the package, you have no idea how many of them are in there. There are more than you think. And most are connected by this horrible thick, tough white....stringy thing that doesn't seem edible and that will destroy the chicken fingers when you try to pull it out of them. What the hell is this? Seriously! What is it! And why is it only in chicken fingers?

Anyhow, I made these recently, shook them in hot sauce, and realized I didn't have any ranch or bleu cheese to cool off my mouth. So I made my own...kind of. I mixed sour cream with an assortment of fresh herbs, added fresh lemon juice, salt, pepper, then whisked in some softened goat cheese to thicken it up. If I had had dill, it would've been tops.

This past weekend was a good one for food. Ryan visited and we went to Forest Hills again and tried Bareburger. Everything there is organic, and they try to keep most products local, plus they have a pretty cool assortment of patties.

I got The Western, which included pepperjack cheese, maple bacon, fried onions, coleslaw, and steak sauce. I wanted to go with bison for the patty (and if you haven't had bison meat, I highly recommend it. It's like beef 2.0), but didn't want to pay extra and opted for the grass-fed beef. Ryan got The Ruby which included havarti, pastrami, maple bacon, fried pickles, apple smoked onions, and horseradish mayo. He got it with the wild boar patty. Yes, wild boar.

We split an order of fries (they don't come with the burger) which came with three different sauces. One was curry ketchup (quickly becoming one of my favorite things), one was a "special sauce" that reminded me a lot of In-N-Out's sauce, and the third definitely had horseradish...and I didn't like it. But hey, two outta three ain't bad!

Last night included an hunger-induced trip to Trader Joe's, meaning we got tons of food. Most of it was stuff I actually needed, like milk, cereal, and dark chocolate bars filled with speculoos. And then we got beer. And Trader Joe's strawberry licorice (good god it's amazing). And tortilla chips. And popcorn. We actually didn't eat most of that last night though, instead we made the frozen orange chicken and biryani that we bought. Sometimes, it's fun to just throw things on a tray, pop them in the oven, and have dinner.

I think that pretty much covers my exploits from the last two weeks. More good things coming your way in the next few days!