The Girl Who Ate Everything

NYE dinner

Less than 15 minutes before 2006 turned into 2007 one could find me lying in bed, staring blankly at the ceiling while clutching an unhappy belly. It probably wasn't a good idea to start my New Year's Eve meal with a frosty bottle of Mike's Hard Crisp Apple and top it off with chilli, corn chips and hot wings. Aside from my stomach contents resembling a mass of beans/tomato sauce/corn chips/chicken meat floating upon a sloshing tub of mildly alcoholic apple juice, after dinner I had watched Shaun of the Dead with Tristan, Tristan's friend Nathan and a few other people who were at Tristan's house for his family's New Year's Eve party to help keep us awake until midnight. The comfort level of my tummy was not aided by having a mind filled with disturbing images of blood and entrails. Blood and entrails are okay inside the body—not so much outside. (I'd like to add that the movie was otherwise fun.)

As I contemplated going downstairs to check out that Times Square ball dropping business on the telly, Tristan excitedly burst into the room.

"I MADE THE BONFIRE!" In his slightly crazed state he most resembled the family puppy, Hoppy. Hoppy is named Hoppy for a very good reason; she hops a lot. Like "I had way too much caffeine today!" a lot.

"Dude, it's raining," I weakly stated.

"Yeah! I got it! Look outside!" I peeked through the curtain to see the pile of wood and branches across the driveway in a bright orange blaze.

"Whoa. That takes dedication."

"Or a butane torch!"

fi-yuh

After sipping some champagne to ring in the new year, a few of us went outside to observe the fruits of Tristan's labor in the form of a mountain of flames.

"Where others gave up," he announced while staring straight at his father, "I went on! These hands created fire! I AM PROMETHEUS."

fireee

We had the vague idea of making s'mores earlier that day, but the fire was much too large for anyone to safely get close to it while roasting marshmallows, aside from that we were all overly stuffed from dinner. We just stood around the fire and watched it burn while light, misty rain continued to fall on us.

"This is where my OCD traits comes in handy," said Tristan in reference to spending possibly an hour to turn damp wood on a semi-rainy night into a roaring bonfire.

Out of my 21 years of life, it was surely my most enjoyable New Year's celebration.

My main reason for eating out so often is because...I like da foods. The process of shoving tasty things into my mouth and maneuvering my jaw in such a manner so that my teeth may best crush up the bits of tasty things and send them along the lengthy, squishy, mucus-lined journey through the series of digestive tubes so that I may reap the alimentary benefits or gain another subcutaneous layer of fat fills whatever part of my brain that feels joy with...joy.

[That sentence was much, much longer than I had planned it to be.]

But there's another good reason for eating out so often. (Of course, there are many good reasons, assuming your budget can handle it.) Going to NYC from my suburban home in NJ means I have a reason to get the hell out of NJ and be mildly distracted by food and friends in NYC. Which is nice. Especially since I just realized one reason why spending the past semester in Paris was so awesome; I had very little stress. Family problems were left behind, possible friendship issues were put on hold, and even if I did need cheering up, I knew just where to get a delectable baguette or macaron (which I would eat no matter what mood I was in) to make things superficially better.

I don't want to appear overly spoiled, but...I probably am. I think about it every now and then—that I have a lot, that I probably don't deserve it, that I feel guilty for not deserving anything I have, but I don't hate it enough to reject it all. [shrugs] I assume that karma will get me in the end and by the age of 35 after a string of failed careers I'll end up living in a ditch, clinging onto a plank of discarded wood that I'll name Stabby and regard as my only true friend.

...Wow, I really need to not write when I'm in a funny mood. This is why I sometimes go so long without updating, in case you're wondering. I do have a fit blogging state; this ain't it.

But I have a lot of catching up to do, so HERE I GO, OHH HOLD ONTO YOUR STOMACHS KIDDIES!!@!#!@

falafel

Last Tuesday I went on a "let's revisit some of my favorite places in NYC" fooding tour with Lee Anne, one of my best friends visiting from Arizona. We met up with my friend Amy at our first stop, Taim, also known as my favorite falafel-rie. Unintentionally, we all ordered the same harissa falafel pita, the spiciest of the three falafel choices. Happiness is a warm, soft, slightly crunchy pita pocket filled with light, crispy falafels with just the right amount of whatever tasty sauce they put on it along with the raw chopped vegetable salad stuff and...yeah, I'm going to stop talking about it because my words will only bring down its quality. I want to put this sandwich on a satin pillow and gently fan it with an obscenely large feather plucked from the most beautiful bird on the endangered species list.

...uh, what did I say? I don't know. [shakes head]

Uugghgnngh.

...

Sometimes I wish I could know when I'm going to die. It's just that kind of day.

lil' dumps and other Chinese things

a tide of Shanghai

Upon JJ's recommendation, Lee Anne and I trekked to Shanghai Tide for a late lunch/early dinner on Tuesday afternoon. This was following a session of ice skating at Rockefeller Center, after which I can say that I don't particularly enjoy strapping thin metal blades onto the soles of my feet on which I slowly glide over the ice with the grace of a bloated whale...who can't skate. I was also unaware, due to being holed up in my "warm as a malfunctioning sauna that is even warmer than a normal sauna should be" apartment, that the weather had dropped maybe 50 degrees in one day (which would explained why the heat was turned on at full blast, 24/7, resulting in slowly steamed Robyn), meaning that I hadn't dressed up as warmly as I should have.

How do you brighten your mood in this kind of situation? With LITTLE DUMPS.

mm, soupy

These little dumps are steamed, thin-skinned blobs filled with fat-tastic burning hot soup and balls of ground pork. Thumbs up.

Sometimes people ask me how often I update my blog. I figure at least once a week, but ideally twice. Unless I just don't eat much. Which is what this past week has been like. Today I ate some fruit and Terra Chips for lunch even though I wasn't very hungry (or rather, I didn't eat any more than that because I wasn't very hungry) and my stomach unsurprisingly gurgled and blurged and [insert other stomach-like onomatopoeia] during my afternoon "Food in the Arts" class.

But I still wasn't that hungry. I blame it on a mixture of physical sickness (a bug I seemed to catch as soon as I stepped off the plane in Newark) and mental unrest. I know I have a network of friends I can turn to if I need a chat, but...some things are better kept to myself. The last time I went through a weird shitty relationship issue I unintentially made my friends feel helpless by telling them my problems but giving them no real way to help me and made my antagonist look like an asshole. Which wasn't my intention. Anyway, I assume that whatever problem I have now will eventually sort itself out or float away.

Or I'll go insane. It hasn't happened yet, but there's a first time for everything. Maybe it's time I go insane—I can check it off my "List of Things to Do Before I Die". I went to bed at 9:30 PM on Monday night due to lack of will to do anything else (probably taking about 4 hours to fall asleep), which is absolutely ridiculous for someone who's used to going to bed after midnight. INSANITY, HERE I COME!!!

So during those times when I don't email you back for a long time or update for a while or sound jolly, it's because I'm stewing in a vat of my own brain poo. The more I stew, the more intense it gets. Like...real stew! Mm, unlock those beefy flavors (assuming your stew has beef in it). Unless you cook it to a mush. Like my brain. Um.

I'm kind of okay at this very moment in time. I'll probably just eat fruit tonight since I have no appetite, but if you find it entertaining I can regale you with what I ate during the last week.

inedible food

"We should take the B or D to Grand Street. Because...um, I want an egg custard tart."

After spending a few hours at the Brooklyn Museum last Saturday, Jason, Joana and I emerged in various states of lethargy and tried to decide the best way to get back into Manhattan to visit Babycakes for the sake of Joana's gentle tummy. Although I can eat just about anything without too much bodily harm (until I ultimately get diabetes), I enjoy the "not as guilt inducing" sugar/wheat/gluten free treat from Babycakes every now and then. But first, I craved...egg custard tart.

We picked a great day to roam around the city. And by "great" I mean horrible windy and burninatingly cold. But at least it wasn't raining. Or that the sun didn't explode. The day would've been much worse if either of those had happened, particularly in the latter situation, which would've resulted in the destruction of Earth.

We stepped out onto the gritty block of Grand Street between Chrystie and Forsynth swarming with Chinese markets and Chinese people. I headed straight towards Egg Custard King Cafe with one thing in mind: egg custard goo in a flaky pastry shell. ...Okay, I also wanted to get warmer. Two things in mind. Yes.

It's not the one I ate, but they all look pretty much the same. Sometimes my stomach is faster than my camera.

After making my purchase we stepped back into the cold, me 75 cents poorer but also an egg custard tart richer. OH YES, I WIN. I snarfed that sucker down on the way to Babycakes, savouring every goopy custardy moment that wasn't spent making sure I wouldn't walk into a human or get run over by a car. My body warmed up from the slight heat of the just-born tart and the happiness that buuurns from within (it's less painful than it sounds) from eating the tart. It's magic.

RANDOM TACO ATTACK!!!

I shall have another post laden with excessive food photos soon!...ish.

For now, I just want to announce the creation of the new...

TGWAE forum!

After reading Youngna's food rec question I thought it would be nice if she could post that on a forum instead of at the bottom of a stack of questions at the end of an entry that may never see the (virtual) light of day. Of course, there are lots of food forums already in existence, but...buuuut...

...

I don't know. It seems like my purpose in life is to take up more space on the Internet, and it was easy to install Vanilla, so I did! I AM DRUNK WITH "HOW CAN I FURTHER INTERACTION BETWEEN ME AND My READERS?" POWER! [flails around wildly] I've never been successful with making forums in the past, but you guys seem to like giving advice about things and asking questions. So.

The forum is rather bare, so if you're interested in contributing I'd love it if you could make suggestions in the "Suggestions" category. My plan is to make categories for major locations that you or I have recommendations for. I made the "Virginia" category in order to pull together all the comments people have left me on that post, for instance. I'll do the same for the "Paris" category. Eventually.

But in order for this to make sense, you should let me know that you're alive. From there I can think about add-ons and styles and all that other stuff that makes the website look prettier. THANKS!

so many choices, so little stomach space

When you're hungry, you tend to forget that your stomach will reach that point of over-satiated-ness. You know, when you feel like your stomach has expanded to reach your throat or that you're well into the gestation period with a new baby bolus. Dim sum looks manageable with its wide variety of enticing, cute little plates holding cute little portions, but those dishes hold lies. LIIIES! Tasty steamed, fried, baked, and sauteed lies.

fried taro bird things