Last weekend I made a trip to New York City to meet up with Anna and stay with my good friend Jenny for an early birthday celebration. It's been over two years since my last trip to NYC. It's been too long.
This time around, the plan was just to hang out: nothing touristy like visiting museums or seeing the Statue of Liberty. We also did not plan on visiting any famous restaurants. I know...SHOCKER. Seriously, I was just happy to catch up with Anna and Jenny, do a bit of shopping, go salsa dancing (a must!), and meet up with Gina.
Our low key weekend started Saturday night with dinner prepared by Jenny's boyfriend. Chris decided to make dinner for all of us and did not want any of us to help. Fine, twist my arm! This was the first time we were meeting Chris, and I was looking forward to it! Jenny has had so many good things to say about him and the meals he cooks :)
We were in for a treat! I apologize for the photos: they definitely don't do justice to the food.
I can't remember the last time someone cooked for me, so to come in and have a table set up with plates, napkins, silverware and candles was a treat for sure! While we chatted, Chris was starting to cook home-made gnocchi. {If you've never made gnocchi before, it takes a bit of time, patience and care. Here is my first attempt at making gnocchi.}
We chatted and sipped wine.
For the first course we had a salad, but I forgot to take a photo of it. The second course was gnocchi with Parmesan and sage and pork loin stuffed with roasted peppers and fresh mozzarella with a side of grilled asparagus.
The food was incredibly good! The gnocchi were like little puffy clouds, the pork was juicy and still a bit pink in the middle, and asparagus made us all believe that Spring was really on its way (despite that 40F degree weather).
We were pretty full, but could not say no to dessert. Chris picked up Biscotti from a local bakery and served them with a dipping sauce made from ricotta and fig jam. Coincidentally, it was the same fig jam I used to make hamentashen. This was a fabulous way to end a meal.
Luckily, we all went salsa dancing after the meal to shake off some of the delicious calories! Thank you, Chris for an awesome meal!!
Stay tuned for a few additional posts coming up in the next week or two about other meals I've had in NYC.
7 comments:
Tell jenny he's a keeper!Glad you had fun!
Oh dear, are you truncating your posts now, too?
You guys, I had to truncate my RSS Feed because my posts were being copied/pasted without permission or credit. I'm sorry if this is inconvenient, but you can still see them without "after the jump" or "read more" on the blog.
Ah, but where did you go for salsa?
wow, it sounds and looks delicious. I just made gnocchi for the first time last week, and after a few doughy ones, i got a pretty good consistency in the end.
That looks delicious! Gnocchi is one of my favorites,as a change from pasta. It goes well with different sauces!
that dinner looks DELICIOUS! man... I need to make dinners like that. or.. learn how to cook better. (both?)
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