Lady Wong Patisserie

Lady Wong is favorite Asian dessert food place in New York!

I try to come here when I can in NY.

Look at all the colorful cakes, I just want one of each...

They also have other cakes too, very pretty ones, but since it's not easy to take on a plane, never got a chance to try these. 

I haven't had one of these in so long, had to get one to eat right away.  This is the Talam Jawa, which has caramelized coconut sugar with pandan layer. 

So from top left to right (then down): Vietnamese Layer Cake (mung beans in the filling with pandan), Baked Cassava Cake, Talam Jawa.  Rose Kush, which has rose steamed cake with coconut cream layered.  Khanom Chan, which is pandan based with coconut in between the layers.  Rainbow colored but still has pandan and coconut cream, Talam Pandan, which has pandan and salted coconut custard.  The ones with blue tint is Pandan Serimuka which has pandan custard with salted coconut sticky rice. 

They are all so yummy; and if it's not because I don't get the variety and selection here easily accessible here, I wouldn't have to buy them all, and then progress to enjoy them all in a few days. 

Anyway, it was a fun jaunt to NY even though I can always spend more time there; eat and shop my way through town.  Alas, have to go home.  

Lady Wong Patisserie

inside Urban Hawker

135 W. 50th Street

New York, NY 10020

https://ladywong.com/

 

Hainan Jones

Another piece of New York

Hudson Yard is so unique to me, we don't get architecture like that in Texas, so it's always fun to visit it.  And at Hudson Yard itself, it has a mall, and they have giant screen for movie, tennis match or whatever the event might be.  Seems to be a fun place for gathering. 

But then, take a turn uptown, came to Urban Hawker, which is a food hall for Southeast Asian all in one spot. 

After checking out the noodles, masala and such.  I came to have some Hainan Chicken.  

They have a full set with soup, rice and chicken dish with double the veggies.  I skipped one of the veggies just because I know I won't finish it all.  At any rate, the set comes with rice, poached chicken, cucumber, and soup.  The rice is the traditional Hainenese style with chicken broth.  I usually like it with garlic, but I do like black soy sauce as my second favorite.  The set minus the veggie was $17, so for lunch in New York is not bad at all. 

Hainan Jones

inside Urban Hawker

135 W. 50th Street

New York, NY 10020

https://www.instagram.com/hainan_jones/?hl=en

 

Pasquale Jones

For the night out, we caught this beautiful and touching view.

Also, happened to be NY Fashion Week too, so the entire town is busy.   We decided to go down the Little Italy.  Not knowing it was the 99th annual of Feast of San Gennaro.  So the the entire small little street was turned into a festival.  They even squeezed a ferris wheel in a tight street.  And mind you, the festival last majority of the month. 

Luckily, we found this place that has a few seats.  Thank goodness.   We were sitting by the chef, so we got to watch them prepare food, and they also gave us some recommendations. 

First off, Sugar Snap Pea Salad.  To my delight, this was a great recommendation.  I was truly surprised because I'm not a snap pea person, not that I don't like them, I just don't go out of my way to get it.  But it had fennel, radish, what did the trick was the buttermilk vinaigrette, that's the key to the dish. 

I was hungry and got the Tagliatelle, which it came with lamb rags and Pecorino Romano cheese (yes please!). 

My coworker got the chicken Salimbocca, that thing is super large for a dish, so even though we were hungry, there's no way we would've been able to finish it.  It was super good though, don't get me wrong. 

The service was great, the food was great, super homey, the chef and staff danced beautifully in the small space.  It was a wonderful experience.  Super grateful for the staff since we don't have a reservation, the entire street was filled with festival-goer, and fashion week goers, they fitted us in.  Some places they wasn't able to seat us until 10:30pm, so as you can imagine how grateful we were to get a seat. 

Pasquale Jones

187 Mulberry Street

New York, NY 10012

917-596-0716

https://www.pasqualejones.com/

 

Blu on Hudson

Just staring and bragging on the view I had from work. 

Technically, this is New Jersey, but it share the same air, that's what I'm going with. 

It's a nice fancy restaurant blue on the Hudson, boasting the view of the Hudson River.

For first course, we had Burrata with charred peaches, tomato, orange, basil puree, and grilled filone (which is Italian Sourdough).  I was loving the burrata, peach, tomato combo.  It's pretty delicious. 

Then wedge salad, with bacon, crispy shallots and blue cheese.  Very straight forward, and the table's favorite. 

Then we have these 'rice cakes'.  It's literally rice at the bottom, and th top has spicy tuna, tobio (which is caviar), and avocado. The rice is like fried but it's chewy, but to Asian people, that's what you do with old burnt rice, which is a very weird texture thing. 

This is Gnocchi, this is one of my favorite dishes they served all night.  It is hand rolled, has spicy vodka sauce with ricotta.  Very good. 

For entree, we got salmon, which has polenta at the bottom, peas, and basil.  It's very super mild tasting. 

Steak however was good, they poured the au poivvre sauce on top. 

Then we got the Chicken Parm, YUM!  Havne' had some legit chicken parm in a long time.  There's spicy vodka sauce again, and mozzarella on top.  Yes please!

This is the Flourless Chocolate S'mores, it has a graham cracker at the bottom, chocolate mousse which was hard, and marshmallow on the outside.  It is delicious, no doubt, but it was a tad heavy.

This is a Blue's Tiramisu, which has mascarpone cream, lady fingers, and cocoa everywhere.  It's actually not much coffee taste, more chocolatey more than anything else. 

This was a large group dinner, and food some hit and some miss, but most importantly for me, is their timing on rolling out the dishes.  When we sat down at 7p it took them till 10p to be done.  The courses in between was at least 30 mins in between.  Given that everyone splits the dish, it's not like it would take so long to eat.  So 30 mins in between courses was too long.  Plus, this is a set menu, it's not like everything has to be made to order, they could've control that piece better.  As much as we visit with colleagues, 30 mins it's just too long for in between conversations.  Not to mention, trying to get drinks review is not an easy to do trying to flag down someone.  For somewhere high end like this to have service like that was quite disappointing. 

Blu on Hudson

1200 Harbor Blvd

Weehawken, NJ 07086

201-636-1200

https://bluonthehudson.com/

 

Kopifellas

While in NJ, I hopped a ferry over for food.

At night the view is very nice.  It's crazy, I've mostly been IN the city, instead of being on the outside looking in. 

Came upon a Singaporean coffee shop.  Just for walking around, I grabbed an Earl Grey with Lemon tea.  For Hong Kong style, I should've done Ceylon, but haven't tried Earl Grey with lemon before, so thought I'd give that a shot.  

The tea reminded me of when we have High Tea, sometimes I do Earl Grey with lemon instead of milk, and with it iced, it's a perfect walk-about drink for humidity days in NYC.

So turns out they serve breakfast too.  Wish I've got more time to enjoy that. But that's definitely on my list next time!

Kopifellas

inside Urban Hawker

135 W. 50th Street

New York, NY 10020

https://www.kopifellas.com.sg/usa/

 

Work Cafeterias

So I was attending a conference at home office. 

And of course, I have to check out the food.

I knew the firm has cafeteria for staff that works there, but wasn't sure what they're like.  So had to go check it out.  

First off, they have their own coffee bar with pastries and all.  Then, there's places for food made to order.  Not to mention, they have a prepared food section filled with yogurt, salad, sushi, and sandwiches, various types of drinks.  An ice cream fridge, and various snacks available for purchase. 

First day, I got me a full breakfast.  Got an omelette and grabbed some tater tots from the hot bar, and got an Americano.  

So here, the interesting part.  The omelette was less than $4.50, and the tots was by weigh, and the coffee was $2.20.  Mind you, in their effort of getting people back to office, they have already subsidized the food, because let's face it, you can't get that price in Houston, how would've been able to get that in New York?  (note: for snacks like chips and candy that are ordered in, they are full price since they have no control on the food cost - but that's still not shabby).

Then! On top of the low prices, on Monday/Friday they get half off, on Tuesday/Thursday, they get 25% off, and Wednesday is full price.  So in theory, Wednesday is the least attended days.  

The second day, I found the Wellness Bar, they have avocado toasts, yogurt, açai bowls.  I grabbed a shake and added some protein for decent measure.  

This is definitely interesting to see, since I don't get that very often.  The space is nice and friendly and open.  There are workstations around should you want to catch up while you eat away from your desk.  Or if not, you get a decent view of the harbor.  I just grabbed a table to check my emails and sit at giant sofa's like I can at home.  It's a very neat experience. 

 

Udon Lab (NYC)

Alright, last post on NYC food.

For dinner while in KTown, we went to Udon Lab.  Basically true to NY, if you want to eat something decent, having a reservation would go a long way.  I think we waited for over 30mins and lucky for us someone skipped out on their reservation, and we swooped in.

We started out with some Brussels Sprouts.  Pretty good and crunchy.

I got the Buta Don - which is pork over rice.  I know I came to a place that's called Udon Lab, and the weather was wet and drizzly that a bowl of noodle hits the spot. But I was trying to get food that's easy to chew, so I went with this.  Flavor is there, and definitely have the egg over the rice is superb.  Mix it altogether is a nice texture with meat, egg, some nori and rice.  It's nice and warm the belly.

I will say they do turnovers fast here.  Given the volume they do, they are not pushing you out, but you do feel the rush.  Also need to give kudos to the hostess.  THere's lots of people in and out, and to keep tabs of that all is not easy, but she carried herself very professionally and very polite to even people who are rude to her.  So that just a plus for me, especially when she's the first person you see when you walk into the store.  

Udon Lab

43 West 22nd Street

New York, NY 10001

https://www.udonlabnewyork.com/

 

Lady Wong (NYC)

Was kinda bummed that I didn't get to go to Urban Hawker.

That is a food court for all Asian cuisines in one place.  It's near Rockefeller Center, so if you're in the area, you should check it in. 

I did trek up here on the way to the airport of this place. 

Lady Wong is a patisserie shop with all the Nanyang (South Sea) with Southern Coastal flavors like from Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam. 

Look at the display of all the colorful pieces of Kuih, which is little pieces of snack and dessert.

You can see, mostly coconut, pandan...

...ube, are the common flavors.

Literally had to ask the girl to pack these well, since I'm walking up to the plane for there.

The green stripe one is pandan and mung bean layered.  It pretty common in the Vietnamese culture.  I do miss those, having had that growing up.

This is Cassava Cake, it is made from yucca, baked and broiled to achieve this texture.  The flavor comes out a little bit banana-ish. 

This is Pandan with Coconut caramel.  You basically use the coconut sugar and make it into a caramel mixture as the other part.

Pandan and coconut palm sugar.  

The great thing about these desserts is that the flavors are not super sweet.  It has flavor from the region, and it is very nice, soft, and moist.  And I wish I can order more and take them all home.  We don't have something like this in Houston.  We have some bake shops that touch on mainly pandan, ube, coconut but not mixed together in this way.  Yet another MUST RETURN store for yummy goodness.

Lady Wong

inside Urban Hawker

135 West 50th Street

New York, NY 10020

https://ladywong.com/

 

Shake Shack (NYC)

Since we were at the birth place of Shake Shack, we have to go there.

Except, we were at Upper West Side, and it's rainy...

So everyone came in to grab lunch and dodge the rain.

I love the table tells you where it came from.

Here's our food.

I got the Half and Half - which is half tea and half lemonade.  Chicken tender with BBQ sauce, and fries.  Just because it's rainy and fries is a MUST. 

Shake Shack Upper West Side

366 Columbus Ave

West 77th St

New York, NY 10024

646-747-8770

https://shakeshack.com/location/upper-west-side-ny#/

 

8-Bit (NYC)

One unique place we went to was 8 Bit Bites

As all mom and pop restaurants are in NY, this place is small too.

There are 5/6 ables, where it's tied to a station and you can choose from menus upon menus of arcade games from the 80s, 90s, 00s, and variations of those games.  

It is expected that you order food before getting a table.  And each table is expected to play for 30 mins during peak times.  Their staff actually does a g read job in managing that traffic.  And they will tell you to hold off ordering when they see that guests just sat down.  And once they see things are moving along, they have you order, sit down play and your food will appear. 

I got the Retro Loaded Fries. It has onion, I skipped the japaleno peppers, and beef bacon with cheese drizzled all over. Trust me that's a meal to itself, and it's alot of food.  Totally designed for you to take it togo.

Given it's mainly fast food, it's appreciated the staff manage the flow for the clients not have to have cold, fried food while we're playing.  This is a unique place for kids big and small.  They also have milkshake, burgers, chicken tenders, so it's no gourmet, but it's great for entertainment.

8-Bit Bites - Chelsea 

197 7th Ave

New York, NY

646-398-8188

https://8bitbitesbk.com/