New York: Grand Central

Well, it took 13 days but I've managed to find the time, and motivation to continue with part two of my New York Post.  The main issue being, that prior to the trip I decided to start to re-watch all the Friends episodes from the beginning. The reasons for this is two fold; Friends is the whole reason I wanted to go to New York, and two, The Boy hadn't really watched it.

Anyway, back from the trip, The Boy is now hooked and we spend every evening watching it.  It has got to the point that I'm staying up past my preferred bed time to watch more episodes.  And then regretting it at 6:30am the next day.

Anyway so back to NYC, as well as his new found love for friends, The Boy also has an obsession with public transport, namely trams, trains and subways (buses aren't his cup of tea- in fact he doesn't even like tea!) so we ended up spending quite a lot of time on the subway.  One of the most famous subway/train stations in New York HAS to be Grand Central. And for someone who is sometimes irritated by her other half's obsession about train stations. Even I had to admit that Grand Central is stunning.

But what the hell has this got to do with food? After all this is a food blog.

Grand Central also happened to have a food court, and it was brilliant, way better than the food courts you see in the UK, with their mandatory Subway, KFC and Maccy Ds- although keeping in mind that being in a foreign country, these could have been chains that are found all over New York and the average New Yorker would be rolling their eyes at the same old mundane options!

I could have happily eaten at the food court in Grand Central for every meal- excluding breakfast, the choice in the morning wasn't as good.  The thing I liked is, as a vegetarian who doesn't wish to have cheese for every meal, there were a lot of vegan options.  One day I had a bento box from the sushi place, there were actually two types of vegetarian bento boxes, I can't remember which one I went for but it was delish.

I'm a big fan of Asian food and although Indian is my favourite, Japanese is a close second (as you can tell from the sushi!) and I love Asian tofu dishes, especially when I'm craving a protein fix (I'm not a big fan of fake meats), basil also happens to be my favourite herb (rosemary comes a close second- I do NOT like coriander). So when I saw a stall selling this tofu and basil dish, I had to have it.  It also came with free rice!

I managed to do a little research before coming to New York and found out about a pizza chain called Two Boots that sells vegan pizza, with Daiya vegan cheese. Now I'm not a big cheese eater, and the vegan cheeses I've tried in the UK have been quite gross to be honest.  But I'd heard a lot of positive things about Daiya cheese, so when I realised that there was a Two Boots in the food court, I decided to try their 'V for Vegan' pizza, which contains artichokes, onion, shittakes, red and green pesto and Daiya Cheese.

Daiya is the best cheese substitute I've tasted.  Although I'm not vegan, I do try to cut down on dairy and egg.  However its pretty rubbish that Daiya is only available in the USA and Canada. If anyone knows of any petition to bring it over the UK, let me know!

Surprisingly, apart from the Sweet and Sara goodies, I didn't really eat that many desserts, however it was hot, and heat always makes me crave sorbets (and ice cream, if I can't find sorbet). Luckily, there was an ice cream stall, that sold sorbets, including lemon (my favourite- in fact I like it so much I never took a picture because I was too eager to eat it!) and a dark chocolate sorbet which I'd never seen before.

If you ever visit New York, I would recommend Grand Central. Even if you don't go to the food court, its a truly stunning building as well has having plenty of shops.

New York, New York (Part 1)

I haven't blogged in a while (same old excuses- work commitments, laziness- you know the drill) but having come back from a holiday to NYC I thought it was time to get blogging again.

We stayed in the famous Waldorf Astoria, as we managed to grab a bargain in the January sales.

After checking in, the first stop, was a walk round Times Square and to the Rockefeller before heading out for tea at a Japanese place- you chose a main, and then two sides to go with it.  I went for Tofu, rice and stir fried vegetables. Unfortunately I didn't think to take pictures, but it was one of my favourite meals of the holiday- and at $13 (including a refillable drink) I thought it was good value.

The next morning, we decided to head to a cafe that was quite close to our hotel, I had a bagel with avocado and lime, seems an odd combination but it worked and was my favourite breakfast of the trip and will be recreating it at home!

Alongside it I got a strawberry apple juice that tasted amazing- I couldn't find it anywhere else throughout the whole trip.

I was surprised at how many vegan things were readily available in an average place, I couldn't believe my eyes when I came across Sweet and Sara products in the local Duane reade, which is a kind of drug store come TESCO express type place in New York.  Sweet and Sara produce vegan marshmallows (normal marshmallows contain gelatine, so aren't suitable for vegetarians), you can get them in the UK but they can cost £6 for a small box.  Although they didn't sell marshmallows, they sold Sweet and Sara smores and rice crispy squares.

I wasn't a fan of the smore, it's basically a wagon wheel, but I loved the rice crispy square as did The Boy, which is unusual as he avoids vegan products like the plague!

In addition, at JFK whilst waiting for the plane home I spotted a load of vegan meals in one of the shops, they had boxes of Thai and Shanghai dumplings, various noodle dishes and a Bento box containing Thai dumplings, vegan chicken style pieces and rice. I decided to take a Bento box back with me to eat during the journey from Heathrow to Bolton.

The dumplings were the nicest part, I didn't eat much of the rice as I got a bit worried about getting food poisoning (and it was a bit meh). The vegan chicken pieces were strange, the manufacturers had obviously tried hard to get the texture of meat as it was really chewy, so chewy that the texture reminded me more of beef than chicken. As someone who disliked the chewiness of meat during my carnivorous days I wasn't too fond of it.

Overall New York was a nice surprise food wise, it was a lot more vegan and vegetarian friendly than I suspect, and what's more everything wasn't covered in cheese! And they seem to have a more positive approach to veggies than I expected.  Next to come are Grand Central and the East Village.