Coloring The City

I have a problem. Okay. Two. Maybe more…but I’ll focus on these two. When the sun comes out on the weekend, I can’t spend time in the kitchen. Not. One. Second. I have to soak up every ounce of sun…especially when I’m soaking it up on my friend, Ashley’s roof deck. With this view? You understand, right? Thanks for being so supportive.

This leads to problem number two: no time in the kitch means nothing for the blog. With that said…I might have cheated a little bit with this recipe. Maybe its the sun calling my name, or maybe it’s Sandra Lee’s pretty but frighteningly airbrushed face on the cover of October’s issue of Semi Homemade (that has been on Ashley’s desk for 8 months) calling my name. What ever it was, it led to Semi Homemade Pizza. Who has time to make pizza dough when the sun is out, bikini is on and Adele Pandora is playing? No me. Not Ashley. You shouldn’t either.

I have to give all credit to Ashley on this one. Pizza, and Adele on the roof on a Sunday afternoon was totally her brain child. I just nodded and agreed enthusiastically when she brought up the idea. Thank goodness my friends are such good idea makers or I would probably be on a quinoa and cupcake only diet. Or I would forget to eat. No, wait that would never happen.

I’m not going to give you a recipe for this one because you can really do whatever you want with it.  Buy some pizza crust and top it with ANYTHING then bake! I’ve even seen smores pizza, which sounds amazing right now by the way…can I get that delivered?

Ashley and I did one with pesto, zucchini and mushrooms and the other with tomato sauce, fresh tomato slices, mozzarella and a huge pile of arugula. Both were incredible.

We topped it off with a (completely homemade) strawberry salad with balsamic vinaigrette.

It was the perfect early summer meal.

Hi Friends! I’m know I’m a few days late, but how was your weekend? Mine was packed full of friends and food with no room for sleep or blogs. Now, my body is punishing me with a sore throat and fever, boo no fun. :(

On Sunday, I took my favorite train over the Manhattan bridge into Brooklyn. I love, love, LOVE taking the Q train… It might be because I lived in Brooklyn on the Q line when I first moved to NYC, and I always get hit with a wave of nostalgia when the train comes out of the tunnel on to the bridge and we are greeted with the Brooklyn Bridge and the Statue of Liberty on one side and Midtown Manhattan on the other. Also, I feel sort of like I’m getting away with murder when I have cell phone service on the train.

I was so immersed in my phone on Sunday, I almost missed the entire bridge experience, but I looked up at the last minute and was shocked. There was so much fog, I couldn’t even see the river…I’ve never seen that happen in NYC. Super creepy. I felt like I was in the movie The Mist. So what I’m trying to get at is that it was the perfect day for yummy diner food at Juniors and a walk over the Brooklyn Bridge. But I’m sure you already knew that’s what I was trying to say…

My friend Ashley had some friends visiting from New Orleans this weekend, so she spent the weekend playing tour guide and I tagged along for the ride. We started at Junior’s, a famous Brooklyn diner and cheesecake bakery. This is a photo of Jen’s french toast, which got rave reviews. We filled up on omelettes, french toast and eggs benedict, with no room left for cheesecake at the end of our meal! (I unfortunately didn’t get Fitness magazine’s tips on how to eat less at brunch until today…split meals? who would have thought…)

But there is always room for ice cream, right?  We stopped at the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory before we ventured into the clouds and across the Brooklyn bridge. If you haven’t been here before, it’s definitely worth trying. The location is beautiful, right on the water next to the bridge in DUMBO.  Order the Butter Pecan (it was our favorite) and wander around the Brooklyn Bridge Park, which has amazing views of Downtown Manhattan.

Hello to all my followers who are anxiously awaiting my next post, and thank you to Ashley for threatening to read another blog if I don’t write something today. (don’t worry, she would never do that because if she did I would stop emailing her pictures of puppies. That’s awful.)

I have another Cupcake review for you! As I mentioned in a previous post, my mom was in town from Portland, OR last weekend to celebrate her birthday. I can’t think of any better excuse to eat a cupcake. On Friday, we walked across the Brooklyn Bridge and wandered though Cobble Hill (I’m in love!) then went on to Carroll Gardens and ended in Park Slope for lunch. A co-worker of mine highly recommended a bakery in Red Hook called Baked. Since he practically died describing the sea salt dark chocolate brownies to me, I thought I better check it out. For those of you that have been to Red Hook, you know that it’s probably not the best place to take mom when she comes to visit,(“Mom, New York is totally safe…don’t mind the gang fight over there, I mean really, that could happen anywhere!”) So we walked to Carroll Gardens and hailed a cab when we were just about 10 blocks from the bakery. Baked is definitely a hassle to get to, but it was worth the trip once I took a bite of the Dark Chocolate, Sea Salt and Caramel cupcake. Hands down, the BEST cupcake I have ever had…and I’ve had a lot of cupcakes. The sea salt really balances out the sweetness of the chocolate/caramel frosting. And the cake was amazingly light and fluffy. In addition to this wonderful cupcake, they also had beautiful Key Lime, Coconut and Peanut Butter Chocolate cupcakes that made me want to throw a birthday party….for myself so I dont have to share :)

Here is the link to Baked so you can drool over the pictures of cakes, just like i do at least once a day at work.