Hear, Hear

Corner of Mercer and Spring Streets:

Seen While Walking

This was next to a nail salon on East 10th Street.  Pity it's been painted over.

One Year

There has been radio silence on the blog for quite a while - one post in the past year.  Well, it was a busy year.  I realised today that it was this weekend last year that we brought home the Puppy.

Wow

The Husband and I only recently discovered Baked in Red Hook. We are a little late to the party, of course - I think they have already been featured on the Cooking Channel. Yesterday, we tried their Sweet & Salty Brownie - this is what they featured on television. It's the best brownie I've ever tasted in my life. It was so good, I wanted to light up a cigarette after we finished eating it.

Baked

359 Van Brunt Street

Brooklyn, New York 11231

(718) 222 0345

bakednyc.com

More Mud

One of the pleasures of living around Union Square is the fantastic farmers' market. Yesterday, I bought some heirloom grape tomatoes from said market. The seller suggested that I put the tomatoes on a plate to separate them when I go home. So I decided to have fun with some of the Mud pieces.

Did I mention how amazing food looks on those gorgeous dishes?

Wedding China

When I was much younger and still believed in fairytales, I fantasised that I would have a big, white meringue of a wedding - the dress, the cake, the dessert... I even had my wedding china picked out. After many hours, over many summers, meandering through the china halls in Harrods, I decided that it had to be Wedgwood Florentine in black and white, though Turquoise was also lovely.

Cut to many, many years later. The Boyfriend and I eloped - Blue, black, gold dress with black shearling coat and black boots; romantic lunch at Il Buco. Needless to say, we don't lead a Wedgwood china life, though we went to a dinner at some friends' house and it was served on inherited Wedgwood Florentine plates in turquoise. But we have our wedding china.

It still amuses me no end to think of the dishes as our wedding china - it didn't occur to us to have a registry but our friends asked; I am most grateful and thrilled that they did. We registered for Mud Australia at Global Table. I love that no two pieces of Mud Australia china are the same. The china is perfect in its individual imperfection. The core collection began with sale pieces I found out and about years ago. It was great fun to go to the store and work out what we needed. We have expanded the collection to be able to have a dinner party - now we just have to tidy the house around the dishes.

The last pieces we got were pink dessert plates. Nathalie, who owns Global Table, was absolutely right when she told me they would be beautiful and whimsical at the end of a meal.

Global Table

107-109 Sullivan Street

New York, NY 10012

USA

(212) 431 5839

(Full disclosure: The pink Mud Australia salad / dessert plates were bought at ABC Carpet. Also, when an item we registered for was discontinued and the only available one was the slightly damaged store display unit, we were given a store credit. Then Natalie very generously gifted us the item when I indicated to her that I would buy the item if it was going on sale.)

Tropical Fruits

This past weekend, I was told that mangosteens were in season and in Chinatown. I dragged the Husband on a fruit shopping spree after our dim sum brunch.

We got some lychees.

I was beyond excited to see rambutans. There was a rambutan tree in the garden next to the first house I remember living in. The lovely neighbours would send over a bag of the delicious red fruits when they were in season.

The main reason for the Mulberry Street excursion, of course, was the mangosteens. I had not had mangosteens in over five years.

We also got some Thai mangoes and three small tubs of jackfruit. The fruit shopping turned out to be a bit of a splurge. Sometimes, nothing can substitute for the taste of home.