Steve and the City (Get it? It's like that show!) and Food Porn

I'm not a very cultured person. For example, I didn't own a tie until I went to a homecoming dance in the 10th grade, and to this day, I still only own one. (It's not the same one - This one has kangaroos on it, and I inadvertently stole it from my buddy Mike Smith. Sorry Mike!) I own about three dress shirts, and two pairs of dress pants.

Thankfully, my new job doesn't require me to dress up. It does require me to travel to New York City though on the train, which I always find to be an odd experience.

Generally, I'm more used to taking the train up to Boston, or the subway while in Boston. So the mass of humanity milling about, on their way to Connecticut or New York or Washington D.C., is fascinating to me. I managed to avoid having a seat-mate until the New Haven stop, about 90 minutes out from the city. (Unfortunately, unlike every movie I've ever seen about train or plane travel, a foxy Natalie Portman-like lady is not sitting next to me. This woman looks like Medea.)

Anyway, for the first couple stops out of Kingston, the people across from me were, to put it politely, trying to make a baby. Like, they were draped across their two seats, entangled and kissing. It was kind of... really gross. I hope they had a good reason for it.

Also on the early trip were a pair of young girls, who apparently were allowed to travel by themselves. By "young" I mean 10 to 12, which seemed REALLY young to me. They had to call and check in with their mom after each stop, which led to a somewhat comical 2-minute phone conversation each time, since the reception isn't really that great.

Girl: MOM! I'm in Westerly now. West-ter-ly. It's like in Rhode Island or something. I think New Haven is next. New HAVEN!

This repeated itself about five times, since she was wrong each time about New Haven being the next stop. Good times, good times. The Lovers didn't really think much of The Young Travelers, even though they were seemingly doing their best to create future Young Travelers.

My only companion during this long journey is my trusty MacBook. However, in the "Rhode Island Is Too Small" category, I did bump into a girl from college at the train station. I don't remember her name though, and she wasn't traveling alone, so again, I avoided the Portman scenario outlined above. (I wouldn't have minded this necessarily, although I'm not sure how well the "I don't remember your name" thing would have gone over.)

I will note that the MacBook has a ridiculously good battery. It looks like it's going to survive just about the entire four-hour trip. (4:17 p.m. to 7:40ish p.m.) I'm watching Criminal Intent, or at least, I'm trying to. I have the first five seasons, but the first season was skipping way too much, and so far, I've already seen the first 14 episodes of season two. (It is weird to see Holly from The Office and Beadie Russell from The Wire in "Suit Sorrow" though, now that I know who she is. And Daniels from The Wire in "Probability", which ironically cribs from the plot of the fifth season of The Wire.)

Anyway. I finally get off the train, grabbing a slice from one of those pizza places they have in the terminal at Penn Station. By now, it's about 8, and since it's overcast but not horrible out, I decide to hoof it the two miles to my hotel.

After about a tenth of the mile, it starts POURING. I get effing drenched, from head to toe. According to the news broadcast I saw, the city got about two inches of rain in a couple hours. Wonderfully, I waded through it, since I had no idea how much a taxi cost. (Looking it up after the fact, it probably would have been about $5 to $10, a price I would have gladly paid.)

Also, I may have inadvertently freaked a girl out. Apparently, she decided to walk from Penn Station to Broadway (where my hotel is roughly) as well, and I trailed behind her the entire time. This was mostly because I had two bags to carry, and couldn't really work up a good pace, since it was raining and all that.

However, once I finally made it to my hotel, the night got radically better. My room is ridiculously nice, and the only downside is that I just get one night in it. Womp womp womp. It was completely dark by the time I got here, so you might not get any pictures of the skyline from the windows. The room is very, very nice and spacious:


My bath tub and shower. I used this almost immediately, since I was trying to thaw out from getting soaked in the rain. As I was waiting in the lobby to be taken to my room, some people saw me and said, "Oh wow I'm glad we decided not to go out!" Yeah, well, I guess that was smart on your part.


A nice flat screen.


A ridiculously plump and cushy bed. I'm practically nodding off laying on it right now.


However, bookshelves continue to taunt me. My room has one, and it is full of classy books on art and conventional fare. Unfortunately, I don't really have time to read, otherwise I'd probably poke around a bit.

Considering my night though, I didn't feel bad about splurging on room service, the first and (probably) only time I will do this. Here is some of that delectable goodness:


Described as having taleggio cheese, caramelized onions, pickled mustard seeds and herbed fries. Whatever was on it, it was delicious, although not as good as...


Holy smokes these things are like a DRUG. I devoured them, along with the green herb stuff that accompanied them.


I also got some stromboli. It was fancy stromboli though, and it was delicious.

And last but not least, they have their own fancy, delicious mustard:


Anyway, as you read this, I'm on a train from New York City (7 p.m. Monday) to Boston (10:30 p.m. Monday) for the second day of training on Tuesday. I'll probably have an entry about that whole experience as I go through it ready for Tuesday night's post. I'm finally back in Rhode Island on Tuesday night, and probably sleeping off most of my travel on Wednesday morning. I'll be back to regular posting at that point.

Restaurant Review: Seven Moons

So tonight, I'm hitting up Seven Moons with my friend Becca. As a result, I'm kind of half-butting this entry off the top of my head right now, before I go. (As a reminder, entries are time delayed; I don't actually type them all up right before 7 p.m.) I'll have another entry today about the awesome episode of Community that was on this week, and the other Thursday night shows I watch, The Office and Parks and Recreation.

Anyway, Seven Moons is the best restaurant of one type of Asian food - Good food. This is in contrast from places like Chen's, Bali Village and New Dragon, which tend to have cheaper food in greater quantities. In contrast, Seven Moons has sushi and tempura and other better, higher-quality food.

The Burger King breakfast is kingly

Hi. Let me tell you folks about something that is so wonderful, I am always amazed that more people have not experienced. Are you ready? Are you literally holding your urine in?

Good, because here it is – The Burger King breakfast menu is simply outstanding. Listen, some people swear by McDonald's, because the two-for-$3 Egg McMuffin is a good deal. I too was swayed by this at one point, and this isn't even taking into account the other things on their menu, like the 50,000 calorie McGriddles and Newman's iced coffee. These are all potentially-wonderful things.

However, all of them are laid to waste by the Burger King breakfast. Before we really delve in, I'm sure I must answer this question – Yes, Burger King has breakfast. I know, I was kind of surprised too. But there is a Burger King on my way in to work on Wednesday mornings, so my waistline can attest to the validity of its existence, and the veracity of its deliciousness.

Burger King breakfast has pretty much everything from McDonald's you would want at Burger King, such as a rip-off of the Egg McMuffin, crossiant and bagel sandwiches with your choice of sausage, ham, “steak” or bacon, and things like orange juice and coffee. But BK offers four distinct things that McDonald's does not.

1) French toast sticks. Ohmygod ohmygod!!! The only thing better is actual French toast, and of course, you're not going to get that from a drive-thru or a fast food place. Even better is that the sticks come with maple syrup, or if you're smart like I am, you also order...

2) Cinnamon buns! Ahhhh! As Dave Dameshek would say, it is enough to make me scream like a lady getting free diamond earrings while she's in Oprah's audience. While the buns are kind of small, they are only $1, and most importantly, they come with this big thing of delicious white icing. Now, this is a move that might be too much for you beginners out there, but I like to conserve the icing a bit, so that I can use some on my French toast sticks. I know, I know – You're daunted by such expertise of sugary condiments. But trust me, it is worth mastering this elusive skill. Moving on.

3) Hash brown patty chips. Instead of the rectangular thing that McDonald's serves you, which lasts about two bites, Burger King fills up one of their small, medium or large fry containers with hash brown patty chips. I have no idea if this is more potato than McDonald's or not, but it SEEMS like more, which is an important factor for breakfast. I feel like I could down about a dozen McDonald's hash browns, but a BK chip portion fills me up pretty good.

4) Free crown! This is still something I enjoy every time I visit, although I don't normally indulge.

The Jamaican Burger King breakfast menu is from this Flickr account. The Burger King crown is from this message board posting of crowns.

Fantastic Focus on Food Fantabulously: Applebee's improving and decadent desserts

To break up some of the television posts, and my daily following of the Conan Tragedy, let's focus on food for a bit. Some odds and ends bouncing around in my head on the subject, since I'm not motivated enough to sign up for a Yelp account.

- I'm surprised at how decent the food at Applebee's has gotten. My first experience with the popular chain was about five or six years ago, when a friend brought me there and insisted that I try the riblets (the mini-bone-in meat they had). I did, and I was not impressed, since it was more bone than meat for the most part. The other portions of my meal, which I believe was a simple fries and chicken fingers basket, also disappointed.

Now though, they actually have a couple decent burgers. Their two for $20 deal is also quite splendid - Two entrees and an appetizer for $20. Yeah, it's not gourmet food, but it is a good amount for when you don't feel like cooking. Today I tried one of their under-550 calorie meal, some sort of peppercorn and cheese steak with mixed vegetables, and that was surprisingly edible as well. Again, it wasn't anything that would compare to a good steak house or anything, but it was serviceable for the $10 I paid for it.

- On the other end of the spectrum, I had this pretty delicious dessert the other night from a place in Dudley called Eighty Ates. You can check out their dessert menu here; I had the Irish Cream Mousse Cake. It tasted so smooth that it didn't really taste like anything at all, if that makes sense. Also, it was friggin' delicious.

The closest approximation I could find on Google Images was the slice on the right, and even that doesn't come close to really giving a proper display of my dessert's decadence. While I was eating it, I didn't think it was anything super-special, but as I've had a bit of time to ruminate on it, well, it really was splendid.

- And finally, does anyone have weekly food rituals? Mine is a bit odd, at least in my opinion for a 25-year-old dude. Every week, when I get my paycheck, I like to go out that night and get some Coldstone. The odd part is that it is normally after covering a meeting or something for work, so it is 8 p.m. and nobody is there. I imagine that the worker thinks I'm some mysterious or creepy loner who oddly ventures out to Coldstone by himself for ice cream.

I'm still trying to find my favorite Coldstone combination though; I've only been about six times to the place. I like the strawberries themselves, but some of the other fruits like raspberries and blueberries are too pulp-y to me. So far, my favorite signature combination is Cheesecake Fantasy minus the blueberries, which you can see to the left. For the full list of their signature creations, check out here.

The Irish cream cheesecake picture is from here, which I would now like to visit the next time I'm in Nashville. The food porn image is from here.