August 13, 2013

It started with the meltdown in Tribeca...

August 13, 2013/ Marta M. Darby

[WARNING: Brutally honest sharing ahead. Proceed at your own risk. You've been warned.]

I so didn't want to blog about this. I over-share enough as it is. But in the interest of "keeping it real," I'm going to go ahead and tell you what happened...

Remember when I told you I that Plantar Fasciitis is a Big Jerk? Well, I have been trying to get on with my life and basically I have been wearing an ankle brace and medicating when the pain got too bad. (I know that's not the wisest course of action. I'm just being honest.)

So I got myself to New York last month to cook Pastelitos for 100, which was a tremendously fun experience, but I seriously overdid it. I was on my feet, my ridiculous-how-much-pain-I'm-in feet, for twelve (!) hours. I hate to admit that I had to pop vicodin most of the day just to get through it, but there you have it.

This was, of course, after Eric reminded me dozens of times before I left, "Don't overdo it! Remember you're still healing."

I had planned to take a late flight home from New York the day after my gig with the CCC of NY so that I could have one really fun sightseeing day in the city. The Foodie Tour had already happened the night before and lucky for me, my friends were gracious enough to drive me everywhere so I didn't have to do too much walking. But even then, every step was pretty painful.

All I had read (from Dr. Google) was that plantar fasciitis hurt with the first couple of steps and eventually improved. This was not my experience. My personal experience was that the first couple of steps were excruciating and then the vicodin took the edge off the pain, which never really diminished.

I'm a little hard-headed about these things, so I soldiered on. Ignoring the pain for as long as I could, then medicating when I absolutely had to.

I had made plans on the Monday after my Twelve (!) Hour Cooking Day to go to the Museum of Modern Art and take in the Rain Room Exhibit and maybe find a cronut. (We all know how that turned out.) No go.

Because when I woke up on Monday morning in my hotel room in Tribeca, I. Could. Not. Walk.

At all.

Because I had been limping for so many hours, my left knee (plantar fasciitis is in the right foot) which was taking all the stress was swollen to about twice its size. (Oh, why am I even sharing this? I know. Life without pretending.)

I was so nauseated from all the vicodin the day before that I could not stand to take any more. I was in so much distress to find myself 3,000 miles from home, on my own, and unable to get around. So I cancelled my plans with my friend. My one sightseeing day in New York City was not going to happen. Not only that, but how was I even going to get out of my bed?

The Tribeca Sheraton was very gracious to let me check out really late without incurring any extra charges. (For this act of kindness I will be loyal to them forever.) I hobbled over to the ice machine which was just down the hall and made some ice packs for my knee and for my foot. (Are you bored with reading this horror story yet?) And I drank tons of water, hoping to flush my system as much as possible.

Then I started to feel a little better. I decided that I wouldn't attempt to get to Times Square, but that I would go see the new World Trade Center Memorial, which was much nearer to where I was staying.

I grabbed a taxi and got to the WTC.

It was really breathtaking. But it was also 95 degrees and about 80% humidity. I took photos and decided I could maybe walk a little in the area of Lower Manhattan.

What a poor choice that was! Without making this more excruciating for you who are reading this, I ended up walking around for over an hour just trying to find a taxi to get me back to Tribeca and the cool comfort of my hotel lobby.

I held it together until I finally walked into the lobby of the Sheraton Tribeca and then.....

The sobs were loud and oh-so audible to everyone. And I couldn't stop. I was tired and in pain and so very far from home. Pobrecita! (Poor me.)

Too many hours later, as my flight finally started to descend into Orange County, I breathed a very long and emotional sigh of relief.

I've never, ever, been so glad to be home. So, all in all, it was a fantastic trip... until it wasn't.

I finally jumped (figuratively, not literally, because, hello! I'm still in pain) through all the insurance hoops to get my long overdue appointment with a podiatrist who did an untra-sound and was shocked (shocked!) that I could even stand up, let alone walk.

"You have stress fractures along both sides of your ankle. We'll have to immobilize the foot for at least three weeks."

Which brings me to today. I take full responsibility for my personal stupidity and hard-headedness.

I'm wearing this lovely and super attractive inflatable cast. (Who knew there was such a thing?)

And I promise I'm being very obedient to stay off my feet for the requisite 3 weeks.

As the late, great Cuban comedian, Alvarez Guedes used to say, "Te paso por comem**rda.*"

I know. Shut up.

*"It happened to you because you're....an idiot." (For my non-Cuban readers, it's a less-than-PG-rated descriptive word, but that's not important right now.) *sigh*

July 25, 2013

My (Accidentally Cool) NYC Foodie Tour

July 25, 2013/ Marta M. Darby

Warning: Lots of fabulous food photos and details of my Foodie trip to NYC. Proceed at your own risk.

My plan was to arrive in New York, get to my hotel and maybe explore a little bit of the Tribeca area where I was staying before my Cooking Pastelitos for 100 gig on Sunday. I was traveling alone, which doesn't bother me. It was just the getting-from-one-place-to-another that I had to figure out.

The best direct flight was into Newark (which didn't look that far from my hotel on the map), but then that left me having to find my way into the city from New Jersey.

I put the word out on Facebook, hoping that maybe some of my local New York FB friends would tell me the best way to navigate their world.

Here I am in Tribeca having a quintessential New York Minute.

Enter my amazing and generous MBFCF readers...

Arriving in the City

"We would love to meet you and pick you up from the airport."

So it was that I arrived in Newark and was greeted by sweet Christy, her husband Koe, and their beautiful daughter, Sunny. I got to spend the first leg of my trip chatting with these lovely people and bonding over our Cuban similarities in spite of living on opposite coasts.

The ride from Newark to Soho.

Our route took us through the famous Holland Tunnel, which apparently is 10 times more crowded at any other time, but that's not important right now.

We arrived at the hotel where the Rodriguez's dropped off a very tired and very, very grateful Marta. (Also, isn't that the über-cutest child you've ever, ever seen?)

The NY Foodie Tour

I'd just arrived in New York City and frankly, I was hungry. I know enough about New York that answering the "where to eat?" question was not a simple thing, unless, of course, I was willing to get corner-store pizza (I was definitely not willing). New York has every kind of food in every kind of neighborhood, some more accessible than others.

Enter MBFCF readers Mario and Michele. He is Cuban and knows how much I love Cuban food, but I also mentioned that I'd be having Cuban food all day at CCC of NY event.

"We'll pick you up and we have a great plan for the evening to make sure you get to enjoy the best NYC food experience possible."

Obviously, I was in a beggars-can't-be-choosy position here. Also, I had seen enough of their photos on Instagram to know I was in good culinary hands. Plus, they totally understood that I was all about documenting the magic at all times which, gratefully, Mario subscribes to also. So I didn't feel too weird about taking pictures of my food and uploading them to my Instagram account.

(Parenthetically, if you're not following my adventures on Instagram, you totally should. I'm Smrtqbn.)

NYC Foodie Tour Stop #1: Nom Wah Tea Parlor. Chinatown.

Nom Wah Tea Parlor • 13 Doyers Street, New York, NY 10013 • (212) 962-6047

The oldest Chinese restaurant in Chinatown. It opened in 1920. Click here for a fascinating history of Nom Wah.

It was just around the corner down a narrow and slightly scary old New York Chinatown street, just sitting there awesomely in all its slightly dive-y glory.

We started at Nom Wah with appetizers, or Dim Sum in Chinese, consisting of a variety of egg rolls, dumplings and buns. I'd never had, but fell totally in love with the Steamed Shrimp Sui Mai (top left with the green pea in the center), Roast Pork Buns (bottom left) and fried Sesame Balls.

Let me be perfectly clear (lest it appears by the photographic documentation that we had completely thrown caution to the wind and were decadently indulging our inner gluttons): We didn't eat every, single thing. We mostly just sampled so that we got a taste of everything, and also so we could have room to enjoy the rest of the food on the tour. The night, after all, was young.

NYC Foodie Tour Stop #2: Katz's Delicatessen. Lower East Side.

Katz's Delicatessen • 205 E Houston St., New York, NY 10002 • (212) 254-2246

The central highlight of the New York Food Experience - good, old-fashioned, New York deli food.

Katz is where the infamous "I'll have what she's having" scene from When Harry Met Sally was filmed.

Also, they give you an interesting ticket with numbers that are part of some kind of elaborate deli code when you first arrive. And heaven help you if you lose this Very Important Ticket. There's a $50 fine for losing it. Don't ask me why. The ticket is then turned in when you go to pay. If you have the actual back story as to why this is a thing, please share.

So, what to order? Everything on the menu looked so tempting.

We started off with a plate of Pickled Things. Sweet, salty, and oh-so-lip-puckery. I'd never tasted pickled green tomatoes. (I guess it's an acquired taste.)

Then we ordered Katz's Deli Seltzer and Dr. Brown's Celery Soda. (Because regular soda is for sissys.)

For the main meal, we decided that the hand-cut (!) pastrami on rye was mandatory, or better yet, real kosher hot dogs with mustard and sauerkraut. Or both!

Again, let me reiterate that we split all of this deliciousness. (We were hungry. We did not have a death wish.) And although the hand-cut pastrami was fantastic, I could barely finish my 4th of the sandwich. (Plus there was one more food stop after this and we had to pace ourselves.)

This particular sauerkraut was wonderful. It had just enough tang to add lots of flavor but not overpower the hot dog. Being a novice at this, I don't know if all sauerkraut is the same everywhere. I've never really enjoyed it before this, so I'm guessing Katz's features the Cadillac of All Sauerkraut.

I just have to interject here that Michele, who was driving (in New York, people!) was the Goddess of the Perfect Parking Job. She could not only find, but she managed to squeeze her mafia-sized car into any spot that any New York City street accidentally offered up. Minstrels should sing songs about her ability to maneuver a car in between two others the way she did all over the city. (You, Michele, are my hero.)

NYC Foodie Tour Stop #3: Brooklyn Farmacy & Soda Fountain. Brooklyn.

Brooklyn Farmacy & Soda Fountain • 513 Henry St., Brooklyn, NY 11231 • (718) 522-6260

Home of the Famous Traditional Brooklyn Egg Cream. (Which, interestingly, has neither egg nor cream in it.)

The Brooklyn Farmacy & Soda Fountain is a beautifully restored old-school 1920's soda fountain in the very gentrified Carroll Gardens neighborhood of Brooklyn.

The atmosphere was 1920's-soda-jerk cool. The service was wonderful. The egg cream truly delicious. (Milk, soda water, and some truly amazing chocolate that doesn't exist on my coast.) That's the egg cream in the next photo, on the right.)

We also stumbled upon something called a Mr. Potato Head on the menu which involved vanilla ice cream, real peanut butter, caramel sauce and potato chips. Did you catch that? Potato chips! And caramel sauce! Over ice cream! (I guess you just had to be there...)

Okay, so I had a taste and I didn't love it. But then I don't particularly love peanut butter. And I'm not a huge fan of ice cream, either. But I really loved the idea of it. Ice cream and potato chips - together at last! Genius.

This is where our tour ended for the night. I felt like I got a fantastic sampling of all the gastronomical wonders that New York City holds. Bonus: I got to spend a really fun evening with the greatest people you will ever meet.

My blog has allowed me to have some really amazing opportunities. At the top of the list of Reasons I Love Blogging would be: Spending time with the most generous and thoughtful people on the planet. That would be my Cuban Cubiches.

Thank you, Koe, Christy, Mario, and Michele. You are the reason I *heart* New York.

Also, next time we will find that cronut.

September 09, 2011

Ten years later. I will never forget.

September 09, 2011/ Marta M. Darby

Ten years ago at the end of September of 2011, my daughter and Amy went to New York City.

We were there exactly two weeks after Muslim jihadists flew airplanes into the World Trade Center buildings and left a gaping hole in the New York skyline and in our collective American consciousness.

The wreckage was still smoldering and burning and the black cloud was still very visible from everywhere in Manhattan when we arrived.

Fire fighters from all over the country and the world were there helping in the recovery efforts. Human remains were being pulled from the wreckage that day and photos were forbidden.

The line of ambulances and coroner's wagons wrapped around the block. I remember that the crowd of us looky-loos stood there stupidly, impotently, reverently. Most of us had were teary-eyed and choking back emotion. The devastation was so much bigger in person than on our tv screens.

How could this have happened in our America?

After what seemed like the longest time, we left the scene quietly, deep in sorrow and contemplation.

We walked all over Manhattan taking in the touristy sites that were still accessible. Marveling in the amount of volunteers that had descended upon the city.

Then we turned a corner and came up on this makeshift altar:

It was at this spot that my emotions, which were already raw from the past two weeks, found an outlet. I didn't care that I was sobbing audibly. I didn't care because everyone around me was doing the same.

****************************************************

Eric and I returned to Lower Manhattan in May of 2009 with Lucy and Jonathan.

They were so young when the attacks happened that we had not told them exactly what had transpired on 9/11. Now we used the words "jihad" and "terrorists" in proper context. I hated having to tell them the story. I hated participating in the theft of their innocence.

But we were also able to tell the story of true courage. Of real heroes. Of the selflessness of men running into burning buildings and of the first Americans to engage in the War on Terror on Flight 93 that ended in deaths in a field in Pennsylvania.

We told them of the volunteers that came from everywhere to help with the clean up. And how the caps with the initials FDNY became the accessory of the day.

This was taken in St. Paul's Chapel, which now houses most of the memorabilia from those terrible days after the attacks.

We told them of the miracle of Trinity Church and St. Paul's chapel which remained standing while everything around them crumbled.

During the September 11, 2001 attacks, as the 1st tower collapsed, people took refuge from the massive debris cloud inside the church. Falling wreckage from the collapsing tower knocked over a giant sycamore tree that had stood for nearly a century in the churchyard of St. Paul's Chapel which is part of Trinity Church's parish and is located several blocks north of Trinity Church. Sculptor Steve Tobin used its roots as the base for a bronze sculpture that stands next to the church today.