For Christmas, I went on a seven-day cruise. When I tell people this, they go, “ooohh” and “aaahh” and look at me with big eyes. But, really, people; no need to be envious. I was on an expensive ship full of old obese people. And kids (shudder).
It wasn’t all cheese, though. For the first time in, oh, years, I actually turned my cell phone off—and kept that sucker off—for a solid week. It was forced relaxation to the extreme. I wasn’t gallivanting around like a tourist anywhere, plotting every sightseeing hour and restaurant stop. I was confined to a boat, and this meant either participating in various ridiculous cruise activities with Dan Dan the Party Man (really) or slipping in and out of consciousness on a deck chair by the pool. I chose the latter. Obviously.
On days that we did dock somewhere—Grand Cayman, Jamaica, Haiti—there was some exploring to be had, but it was always Royal Caribbean’s version of exploring. I went along with it. This was a family trip, after all, and there are always laughs with family, no matter where you are in the world.
So, I relinquished control and jumped into my cruise commercial. I snorkeled off Seven Mile Beach in Grand Cayman. I read my book in a hammock swinging from palm tress on the fenced-off artificial beach in Labadee, Haiti. I drank my way through the evenings’ Tom Jones impressions. I feigned delight at the odd towel creatures that I found on my bed in my stateroom each evening.
The only time I really stepped out of this alternate reality, albeit briefly, was in Jamaica, where we went tubing down the Ocho Rios river, which runs through the most beautiful rainforest. We clung together in our inflated rafts, riding the rapids all the way down the river, with our guides singing Bob Marley’s Greatest Hits, acapella, tubing-edition, while pushing us away from the brush along the edges.
The river dumped us out at a little beach on Cutlass Bay, so we piled our tubes up and walked along the shore to the nearest place to stop for a bite of brunch. Well, really, it was probably lunch, as I believe it was a weekday, but by that point in my vacation I had lost all track of what day it was (except for when in the ship’s elevators, which conveniently remind you). And, really, this pit stop was all part of Royal Caribbean’s master “excursion” plan; it’s not like we really had a choice where we were brunching.
Regardless, we ended up at the Shaw Park Beach Hotel, a quaint old resort right on the shore. Its beach has a long pier topped with a beautiful gazebo that juts out into the most aqua water I’ve ever seen in my life. The view was stunning. On the back patio, cooks were barbecuing jerk chicken, and the wait staff was setting up for a massive buffet. We found a table with chairs facing that Caribbean water, ordered bottles of Red Stripe, and settled in. Now this is a vacation.
Along with piles and piles of spicy, tangy, simply amazing jerk chicken that was so fiery it made me sweat (thank God for ice-cold Red Stripe), the buffet served up bucketloads of salad, including a cucumber-and-tomato salad, probably for the sole purpose of cooling down your mouth after all that jerk spice. We went back for seconds, and perhaps thirds.
It was a beautiful lunch with a beautiful view, and I thought, maybe one day I’ll find my way back here to Jamaica. The Shaw Park Beach Hotel wouldn’t be a bad place to crash for a little while, as long as you have a room looking over that aqua water.
Afterwards, we continued on our excursion to climb the Dunn River Falls like real tourists (all cruise ship excursions in Falmouth seem to eventually lead to the falls), and then board the ship again through a manufactured port that looked more like Epcot than Jamaica.
But even through all the manufactured cheesiness of that cruise, that brunch cut through it, making it perhaps the best part of the trip. It might have been the chicken, or the cold beer, or the beautiful view, or my family with me, or a perhaps a combination of all those things. Whatever it was, it was finally a vacation.
For Thanksgiving this year, my mother, who lives in Asheville, North Carolina, decided she wanted an adventure. And so we packed ourselves in her car and drove four hours south through the state of South Carolina to Charleston, that charming little Southern city right on the water.
I had been to Charleston just once before, back in April for a magazine conference, and had the fortunate chance to stay in the city’s best hotel, dine in the city’s the best restaurants, and wander around its streets like an overwhelmed tourist. It’s just so pretty there.
Everything in Charleston—at least everything in the beautiful southern tip of Charleston’s peninsula—is gorgeously ancient and quaint. Being there makes me feel like a Southern Belle in an extreme state of leisure. I just wanted to sit on my pretty porch or in Battery Park, reading for hours. Where’s my hoop skirt?
The city’s long history unfolded itself for my family and me over Thanksgiving weekend through a series of touristy excursions. First, on a requisite horse and carriage ride around town. And then in the evening, on a ghost tour through the alleyways and cemeteries. Sounds cheesy as all hell, but those are two must-do things when visiting Charleston.
For Thanksgiving dinner we ate turkey, smoked fish, and filet mignon at High Cotton Restaurant, which came highly recommended by a friend of my mom’s. We were seated by a window and so were able to watch people wander down the cobblestoned, gas-lamp-lit Easy Bay Street throughout the evening. The restaurant was so lovely and cozy on the holiday. The food was amazing, and the waitress was pleasantly kind and good-natured, even though she was clearly working late, like a dog, on a busy holiday.
The next morning we had coffee and bagels at City Lights Coffee on Market Street. This café is a must-visit for a quick pit stop, to catch up on the paper, to fuel up on some caffeine, and then be on your way to the market.
As we were leaving City Lights, we noticed another café right next door, Sweetwater Café, and decided to try it the following day for brunch. The line, after all, was out the door, so it must be good, we thought. We should have done a little more investigating.
Sweetwater Café looks charming from the outside, especially with the rub of City Lights Coffee right next door. Inside, and upon further inspection, the place was busted. The shiny red booths were ripped, the chairs were rickety, the walls cracking and flaking white paint. Who knows what the kitchen looked like. The walls were covered in old posters of movie stars, in an effort to look like an old diner. Ancient, yes. Not so quaint.
We would have overlooked that first impression had the food made up for it. We were eager to dive in to the egg dishes on the menu (and the menu is primarily egg dishes). Except the food took, oh, an hour to arrive to our table. Yes, the menu did warn of the cooking wait, with a sentence that said something to the effect of “We start cooking when you order, so it’ll take a minute.” But an hour for three egg dishes was a little extreme. And, our coffee was not refilled promptly enough to keep me calm.
My mother’s spinach, feta and tomato omelet was woefully disappointing. She ordered it with tomatoes and spinach and got a mushy mess of undercooked eggs and runny tomato guts spilling out. My brother had a breakfast sandwich, which was egg and cheese heavy, and promptly devoured before I could take a bite (the norm when dining with Christafoffle).
Even with such things as The Deuce (two buttermilk pancakes, two eggs, two pieces of bacon, two sausage links, side of grits and bread choice) on the menu, I decided to play it safe and order a basic two-egg breakfast, with egg, bacon, and side of of sourdough toast. It was as boring as I expected. Nothing fluffy or tasty at all.
Sweetwater also serves grits, biscuits and gravy, and Nutty Banana Pecan Cakes, which we should have tried, but alas, I doubt we’ll be back. There are so many gorgeous restaurants in Charleston, we won’t be leaving our next brunch pick there to chance.
The Bitches say: D- Definitely go to Charleston for its charm, but give Sweetwater Cafe a miss. Find a better brunch spot in this gorgeous city.
“Heading down south to the land of the pines And I’m thumbin’ my way into North Caroline Starin’ up the road Pray to God I see headlights I made it down the coast in 17 hours Pickin’ me a bouquet of dogwood flowers And I’m a-hopin’ for Raleigh I can see my baby tonight” -Old Crow Medicine Show
Warning … nostalgia is setting in. As y’all now, I went to the first (and best) public university in the nation. If you think Washington is pretty in the fall (speaking of which, where is fall?) you ain’t seen nothing ‘til you’ve experience fall in North Carolina, more particularly, Chapel Hill.
Beautiful old trees changing colors, a Carolina blue sky, crisp sweater weather, football, tailgates, front porches—there’s a reason they say Chapel Hill is like heaven. There songs about it. Hell, Walt Whitman even wrote a poem about it.
After spending a beautiful fall weekend reliving college with my three best friends and sorority sisters, we traded cheap beer, stadium food, cowboy boots and fraternity front porches of Chapel Hill on Saturday for brunch and relaxation in Raleigh on Sunday.
We headed to NoFo at the Pig, an eclectic general store-meets-restaurant built in a former Piggly Wiggly, a Southern grocery store chain. On the first floor is the gift shop, which houses eclectic trinkets, children’s toys, aprons, antiques, home décor and more. It’s all very kitschy with a Southern feel. Down the stairs is the restaurant and main bar, which is colorful and well-lit, with floor-to-ceiling windows. It’s filled with families having brunch together and children scrambling about.
It was a perfect fall day—brisk, breezy yet not too cold—and the hostess sat us outside on the front porch. A live band consisting of two teenage girls (both wearing Toms) with acoustic guitars and accompanied by a man on a keyboard sang folk songs on the front porch. It was very modern day hippie—“granola” as they say—like something you’d find in Asheville, North Carolina, rather than Raleigh. The girls were very talented (wish I could sing like that) and made for a lovely, relaxing brunching experience.
Unable to decide between two menu options, Maggie and I split both the honey French toast and “Bill Neal’s Famous Shrimp n’ Grits.” “Neither dish lived up to its alluring menu description,” says Maggie. And she’s right.
The honey French toast came served with butter, syrup, bacon, and a side of fruit. It was pretty standard—made on regular slices of bread, rather than something exciting like French loaf, challah, or cinnamon raisin. It was good, but nothing memorable.
The shrimp n’ grits was made with oily cheese grits, jumbo shrimp, mushrooms, topped with chives and served with two biscuits. It was prepared well, but lacked flavor altogether. So bland, so disappointing. Not only did it sound better on the menu, it also looked better than it tasted.
Honestly, the biscuits—moist, fluffy, warm, perfect—were the best part about the meal. It is North Carolina; they do make a mean biscuit. Maggie’s Bloody Mary, which did pack a punch of flavor, comes in a close second.
Meanwhile, Steph was far more impressed with her salad. She says, “The generous portion of mango salad topped with blackened shrimp was 100% delicious and everything I wanted in life at the moment. It definitely gets an A from me.”
Not to side between my best friends, but I’m going with Maggie on this one, she says: “The food was comforting, the atmosphere relaxing yet fun (very indie), so I give it a B.”
The Bitches say: B. The ambiance is spectacular. The service good. The menu options expansive. The flavor, however, is lacking.
Britain was burning—and I landed in Manchester last Monday morning in the middle of the most violent riots the country had seen, confirming my knack for perfect timing. I was there for a week of vacation, to visit family all over the Midlands, and it was quite possibly the worst week to visit the country.
Gangs of children had decided to light cities on fire. Shops and buildings that made it through the World War II blitz were suddenly destroyed by 12-year-olds in Adidas hoodies. The youth was angry and violent, and their frustration spread through every other city across the country within a few days.
And so there I was, stuck and stranded in Chesterfield, Derbyshire, where my grandma, aunt and uncle live. We didn’t even go into town at night for fear there were kids with baseball bats waiting. During the day, when we did nip into town, it was to get some groceries or tea, as you do when the standard pub fare of “What do you want with your chips (fries)?” starts to get old.
But at least the scenery was beautiful. Staying in Derbyshire is like spending a week in Jane Austen’s world—nothing but rolling hills carved into a patchwork quilt by centuries-old stone walls. It was my grandma’s 84th birthday on Tuesday, so we stopped by a chocolate shop in town to pick her up some sugar-free sweets. Upon the owner’s recommendation, we made our way down the road to a lovely café for some tea.
My dad, Papa Love, swore up and down that he spent his youth in Stephenson’s Coffee & Tea House, hanging out there on Saturdays before going to the cinema across the street. But when we inquired with the owner, we learned the café has only been open for about five years. I had suspected it was relatively new, as the sleek wooden floors and tables with glass tops were nearly untouched.
You have to climb three flights of stairs to get there, but once you’re up, it’s lovely and bright and airy. The windows of the café overlook the bustle of Chesterfield’s high street, and the windows from stairs frame the town’s infamous Crooked Spire perfectly. It’s peaceful and warm, and the staff is exceptionally welcoming.
Once he was corrected, Papa Love then conjectured that the café is named after George Stevenson, who invented the steam train. Apparently Stevenson lived in Chesterfield, giving the town another claim to fame.
We didn’t brunch at Stephenson’s—Brits don’t really brunch, per se. Instead, we had some coffee, tea, and pastries and went on our merry way. The place was empty, though, because we had made a morning pit stop, and Brits don’t really have their tea until about 4 o’clock.
The great thing about this café is that the teas are locally sourced and the cakes and pastries homemade. But what is the difference between a scone, a tart, a cake, and a crumpet? I asked my dad, Papa Love, who explained it like this:
A crumpet is a cratered flat cake. Toasted and covered in butter, so that it drips into the holes, it’s what you Americans like to call English muffins, but really there’s no such thing as a proper English muffin.
Scones look like biscuits, and sometimes have raisins baked into the pastry. They should be eaten with clotted cream and strawberry jam (cut the scone in half and spread the jam). A tart is a pastry with jam or fruit topping, and sometimes comes with cream or custard poured on top.
Now that you’re armed with that knowledge, you can head to England for proper tea, not brunch. Just be sure to pick a week without riots.
Stephenson’s Coffee & Tea House
11 Stephenson Place
Chesterfield, England S40 1XL
01246 205111
This past weekend, I headed to Dallas, Texas, to celebrate beau’s brother’s 30th birthday, enjoy 110 degree temperatures, listen to country music, and continue my grooming to become a daughter-in-law. Unfortunately, there was no brunch on this particular visit—Saturday was absorbed by a 100-person BBQ to celebrate said birthday, complete with an exorbitant amount of burnt orange and University of Texas fanfare.
Photo credit: Cori Sue Morris
Despite having attended the best (and first) state school in the nation, the fanfare and love Texans have for Texas, football and the University of Texas is somewhat unbelievable to me. Beau’s brother, a Bourbon drinking, boot-wearing, truck-driving, Texas alumnus and former Spur, epitomizes all of this. (He even has a burnt orange man cave). His love for UT is so great that his sole birthday wish was the presence of Bevo, the UT mascot, a 3,000 pound longhorn.
Photo credit: Cori Sue Morris
Prior to this momentous occasion, I spent Friday party-planning with his wife, Elizabeth, who blogs about food, design and décor over at Deux Maisons. We quickly became hungry and decided to “ladies who lunch,” perhaps appropriately so—as they’re more proper down there in Dallas—at Forty Five Ten.
Photo credit: Cori Sue Morris
Forty Five Ten is a boutique paired with a tea room that reminded me a lot of the mixed-use ABC Home and Kitchen in New York. The boutique is all things glamorous—and expensive—and features some of my favorite designers including Thakoon, Stella McCartney, The Row, Givenchy, Commes des Garcons, Rag & Bone and many more.
Photo credit: Cori Sue Morris
The boutique is perfectly designed and curated—wood floors, gorgeous light fixtures and long glass cases full of spectacular, gorgeous jewels. Intermingled throughout the store are gorgeous lustworthy pieces like a gorgeous Stella McCartney dress I’d kill for, $500 candles (yes, you read that correctly), and shoes so stunning they should be considered works of art. Above it all hangs a sign that reads “Happiness is Expensive.”
Photo credit: Cori Sue Morris
Considering that, I left empty-handed (and unhappy) from the boutique. However, I truly enjoyed lunch at Forty Five Ten’s T Room.
Photo credit: Cori Sue Morris
I sipped on the T Room’s iced tea, a Chinese black tea with blackberry, boysenberry and blueberry as we sat next to a window overlooking a lovely little courtyard with a fountain.
Liz and I split both our entrees, and the restaurant plated them separately before they arrived at the table. The first dish was the Asian Pear Salad, made with mixed greens, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, julienned pear and topped with a five-spice pecan baked goat cheese that really made the dish. I typically find salads boring, but this was anything but.
Photo credit: Cori Sue Morris
We also split the artichoke panini, made with marinated artichokes, basil pesto, provolone cheese and tomato. While it was just a panini, the ingredients were fresh, the bread delicious, and the preparation perfect.
Lastly, despite the boutique’s exorbitant price points, lunch was affordable—less than $20 a person in total. This charming boutique and tea room, located on McKinney Ave, is worth a stop if you love shopping and lunching as much as we do.
Last weekend I flew home, to Tampa, with a group of friends from D.C. The plan? Lounge in the pool and in the Gulf of Mexico for three days, avoid the heat, and attempt to relax.
I have a fondness for Tampa because I grew up there, but I’m not inclined to say it’s a great town for dining. In fact, the sprawling, suburban city is a bit of a cultural wasteland overall. Downtown Tampa lacks cafes and restaurants (except for Fly, which we tried Friday night and liked), and theaters and bar districts are few and far between.
What Tampa does have is great history. The cigar city has gone through the hands of everyone from Cuban Mafioso to railroad tycoons. It’s been visited by the likes of Jose Gaspar, the pirate, and Teddy Roosevelt and his Rough Riders. And its retained a lot of its most beautiful historic buildings and districts along the way.
One great example of Tampa’s history is the Columbia Restaurant in Ybor City, which is actually the oldest restaurant in Florida. It’s been on its block on Seventh Avenue for more than 100 years, serving Cuban and Spanish food and drinks. Still run by the family that founded it, the restaurant has grown and expanded with each decade of its existence: Prohibition meant more dining rooms. After prohibition, cocktails and the bar. It was the first air-conditioned dining room in Tampa. And now, the labyrinth of a restaurant seats more than 1,700 people.
It’s an old, opulent restaurant. The outside is lined with gorgeous hand-painted Spanish tiles and columns. Inside, each of the 15 dining rooms is a different experience. There’s a red velvet and damask room, with heavy wooden chairs and low lighting. There’s a room with a dance floor, clad with a massive glittering chandelier hanging from the ceiling. There’s a terrarium that lets in tons of light and features a fountain in the middle. That’s where we had brunch. Or lunch.
In this massive dining room in this massive restaurant, our brunch table for 12 didn’t seem so big after all. In fact, there were plenty of families and groups bigger than ours. On the weekends, the restaurant opens at noon. And while there isn’t such thing as brunch there, the lunch menu—which is a mix of their most popular dishes along with some tapas, sandwiches, and soups—is still pretty extensive.
Oh, and they serve sangria de cava, which I’ll take over mimosas any day. The pitchers are made fresh next to the table. They squeeze all the citrus, add a touch of brandy and orange liquor, and top it off with sliced fruit and cava.
To start, everyone gets a cut of fresh, hot Cuban bread, wrapped in wax paper. It’s nearly impossible not to eat this entire thing, but beware you don’t fill up before your meal. From the menu of tapas, we ordered the Empanadas de Picadillo—two pastry turnovers filled with spiced ground beef and topped with a drizzle of black bean salsa and roasted corn, which made it kind of mushy. The beef inside didn’t have much flavor, either.
Their signature “1905 Salad,” like the pitchers of drinks, is made fresh beside your table. It’s an epic salad, named after the year the restaurant was founded: iceberg lettuce, a julienne of baked ham, Swiss cheese, tomatoes, olives, Romano cheese, and the Columbia’s famous garlic dressing, which is an old family recipe of fresh garlic, oregano, wine vinegar, and Spanish EVOO. To top it all off, they squeeze fresh lemon on top. The salad is lovely and refreshing, and a classic not to be missed.
The Cuban sandwich is the original, of course, and comes with plantains on the side. (Here’s an educational note for my Bitches: the “Cuban Sandwich” is, in fact, from Tampa. Not Miami.) It’s filled with smoked ham, roast pork, Genoa salami, Swiss cheese, dill pickle, and mustard. And, once again, served with amazing hot Cuban bread.
I ordered the chicken and yellow rice “Sarapico” chicken dish, which is a traditional dish from Ybor City. It’s a quarter chicken baked with yellow rice, green peppers, onions, and tomatoes, spices and EVOO. It was good, but ask specifically for the breast. I got the leg portion and ended up picking off a lot of dark meat.
That said, the yellow rice is undoubtedly fantastic. It’s rich and flavorful and filling, with a touch of saffron. I’m assuming the cooks have massive vats of the stuff cooking all the time in the kitchen.
The Pollo Riojana is like a boneless Cuban chicken Parma. It’s breaded, grilled, and topped with Rioja tomato sauce and melted Spanish Tetilla cheese. The el combo de Cuba is a sampling of all the big Cuban classics: roast pork, boliche, plantanos, empanada de picadillo, black beans and yellow rice.
Could you get better Cuban food for less money in Tampa? Sure, you could. But you wouldn’t get it steeped in such history. We had two older male waiters who were prompt but unfriendly. All the waiters are in tuxedos, which went with the ancient ambiance, but it was a bit out of place on a 103-degree day.
The Bitches say: B+ Go for the history and the experience. The food is classic and good; nothing cutting edge or gourmet. But it doesn’t have to be.
I’m a Floridian. And while you don’t often visit the beach when you actually live in the Sunshine State, you sure as hell miss it when you’re away from home.
Photo credit: Becca Clara Love
Rehoboth is my northeast holdover until I fly south every once in a while. There’s just something quaint and nostalgic about the little town. Its boardwalk is lined with colorful hotels and candy shops. People fly kites (kites!) and take family portraits sticking their heads through wooden cutouts. It’s worth it for a day trip, or a weekend trip, or longer.
But it’s a haul to get there: almost a three hour drive, and most usually in traffic. A few weeks ago, on my way to the Delaware shore, I stopped at a friend’s house in Denton for the night, which cut the trip in half. In the morning, I only had to grab brunch and zip another 50 miles to the beach. Perfect.
Photo credit: Becca Clara Love
My friend’s next-to-the-highway brunch recommendation? Cindy’s Country Store, which sounds more like a roadside stop clad with roosters than what it actually is: a bakery, a convenience and craft store with great taste (selling beautiful deli items, wine, fresh bread, pies, and baked goods made from scratch), and a restaurant serving delicious brunch plates.
Photo credit: Becca Clara Love
You order your dishes at the counter and the super friendly (I mean, really friendly) staff cooks them fresh. Our big, beach-bound group decided to sit in the dining room in the back to wait on our gigantic order. While we were there, the staff brought us a huge platter of fresh watermelon slices complimentary, which was lovely. They also brought the entire coffee carafe back to us, which was necessary.
There were lots of hot breakfast dishes to choose from, but the winner all around was the donut French toast. It’s a donut, sliced in half, and cooked like our favorite type of toast. It turns it into a buttery, greasy biscuits of sorts. Clearly the most unhealthy thing on the menu, and clearly the most delicious. You can get sausage or bacon on the side.
Photo credit: Becca Clara Love
I went for the breakfast sandwich, which was scrambled eggs, sausage, cheese and bacon in a grilled wrap. It was like a great breakfast burrito but crispy. The eggs Benedict were perched on homemade biscuits—the best buttery biscuits I’ve had in a good while—with lots of ham and hollandaise. It was those biscuits, though, that made that Benny so grand.
Photo credit: Becca Clara Love
You could also order breakfast medleys, with eggs cooked any way, bacon, sausage, and potatoes. In fact, you could probably ask Cindy and her staff for any sort of brunch dish of your heart’s desire. They were so accommodating, and the food was so good.
It was a pleasant surprise to stumble upon such a treasure in the Eastern Shore—on the side of a highway, no less. Next time you’re en route to Delaware Beaches, pass up the Wawa, make a pit stop in Denton, and go see Cindy. You can get all your beach beverages after brunch, too!
Photo credit: Becca Clara Love
The Bitches say: A. The perfect roadside brunch stop on the way to the beach. Great, fresh, home-cooked food, and a lovely, accommodating staff.
Cindy’s Country Store
10518 Greensboro Road
Denton, MD 21629
(410) 479-0088
I’m not really sure what compelled me to go to Pastis for brunch when in New York last month. The French bistro, located in the Meatpacking District, is frequented by celebrities like Gossip Girl’s Leighton Meester and Jessica Zohr, and bajillionaire power couple Beyonce and Jay Z.
Of course, anything Blair Waldorf does I simply must do. I think some acquaintances had raved about it as well. Regardless, I had it in my mind that this was the place to brunch, and I would be dragging poor beau from the Upper East Side to the Meatpacking District to brunch there.
Silly me. I was wrong (a rare admission). Pastis has a good thing going in terms of the space. The enormous restaurant somehow still seems like the quintessential quaint Parisian café. The interior is adorable with typical wooden café seating, mirrors with the menu written on them and big train station style clocks on the wall. The waiters wear white shirts and white aprons like a French garcon. The napkins, remarked beau, are more like dishrags. It’s all supposed to give off this casual, whole-in-the-wall café in Paris vibe, but at steep New York City prices.
The service was good, and our waitress was—you guessed it—French, which makes the quality service all the more surprising.
So, the prices were fairly silly for the taste and quality of the experience. And, yes, I realize this is New York, not Washington. (We’re not in Kansas anymore, Toto). The drinks were fine—nothing more, nothing less—and appropriately priced. I ordered an orange juice ($6); beau ordered a cappuccino ($4.50) and a small grapefruit juice ($4.75). The juices were fresh squeezed, as they should be.
I contemplated ordering a basket of fresh bread, since I’m sure it would have been amazing, but it was $18. Eighteen dollars. For bread. Figuring the carbs just go to my thighs anyway, I opted to use that $18 toward shopping that afternoon, which also helped ensure I could still button any pants I tried on. Win-win, for me, readers, but a loss for you as I cannot tell you whether the bread basket was worth $18.
Instead, I ordered pancakes ($16), which were not worth $16 as I’ve had pancakes at IHOP (in a past pre-brunch blogging life) that are better. Boring, cold, mediocre. The syrup was just syrup—not sure it even was maple. Worst of all, the side of fruit wasn’t fresh. You know how I feel about that.
Beau ordered an eighteen dollar bagel—with lox, cream cheese, tomatoes and onions. It was good. It was just a bagel. He has nothing more to report. Two days later, on our way out of town, we picked up bagels, including the same lox-cream cheese-plain bagel order, from a Jewish bakery on the UES. The bagelry bagels were far better and a third of the price.
Brunch at Pastis was boring and overpriced. With the seemingly endless array of dining options in the city, why would you even bother? Perhaps as a non-native New Yorker I’m missing something. If I am, please fill me in.
I was gone, but now I’m back (did you enjoy your week of Cori Sue?). This time of year is always the craziest of the year for me, work wise. A magazine I work on has a jewelry show in a town known as Las Vegas. And each year, a heck of a lot of hard work culminates in one full week of round-the-clock working and partying in Sin City.
This year, I got to stay in the Aria at City Center, a hotel so high tech it took me two days to figure out how to turn the air conditioning down. Within stumbling distance of this fabulous resort is Crystals, a high-end shopping center with a Nanette Lepore. I forfeited getting jewelry from the show and instead splurged on a gorg red frock from my favorite designer. (More on that red dress later)
Just a short futuristic monorail ride from Aria and Crystals is the newest of The Strip’s monstrosities, The Cosmopolitan. And within this glittering tower is a nightclub that I have been lusting after for six. solid. months.
The reason for my Marquee obsession is twofold: 1. It was built for its resident DJ, one of my favorite DJs in the world, Kaskade, who spins there once a month, and 2. It is the most extravagant, enormous, over-the-top, super club I’ve ever seen. Three levels, including a coliseum-style center stage, a pool, a “library,” and a hip hop lounge, and the most incredible sound and lighting systems in the world (they poured $60 million into this space). It’s 62,000 square feet of debaucherous sound, and I had to hear it.
So I zipped up that new red dress, grabbed my boyfriend, fought my way through the Fort Knox-style entry, and snagged a table for two and a magnum of Veuve Clicquot. Sander van Doorn was spinning, from dusk ‘till doorn, as they say. We didn’t leave – or even realize the time – until the sun was up, so I guess that maxim rang true. It was some of the best clubbing I’ve done, perhaps ever.
A couple hours of sleep, and I had to get back to the jewelry show floor. I was there to work, after all. I grappled with the techy console that controls the room’s curtains and finally fought my way out the door to the place that makes a long night in Vegas all better: the buffet.
Now, I’ve been to Vegas a few times, and I’ve given plenty of advice about the best way to tackle a Vegas buffet. Being able to consume that much food is an art form: you have to assess, plan, pile, and tackle. Take a breather. Repeat. If Vegas really is Sin City, then without a doubt, gluttony is found in its buffets.
The Aria buffet is an airy, cafeteria-style setting. The buffet wraps around the perimeter of the space, with a wall of floor-to-ceiling glass that overlooks the pool area and lets in tons of light (which can be kind of hard to handle if you’re a vampire at that time of the morning … or afternoon).
On the weekends, there’s bottomless mimosas or bloody marys. Plus, all the OJ, coffee, and water you can consume. The first station I hit was the breakfast food, which had everything you could imagine including breakfast burritos, a nice touch. Beau, who had frequented the buffet twice during the weekend, went straight for this magical yogurt he found, filled with sliced bananas and strawberries.
Next up? Seafood. Mountains of crab legs and shrimp. Sushi and filets of salmon or delicious halibut – you name it. Also on the plate, made-to-order pastas and omelets. There’s a sandwich bar and a salad bar, carving stations and pizzas. There is, quite simply, anything you want.
The dessert buffet at the Aria is equally as impressive. Jean-Philippe Maury has a chocolate shop near the guest elevators that had been tempting me all week. At the buffet, I got to try it all: beautiful little pastries and cakes. And hell, they even have bananas foster!
The best part of the Aria buffet is that it’s one of the inexpensive ones. At $20 you get it all (a bit more for bottomless, of course, but hey). Buffets at other hotels can get up to $50, so watch out. This one is right for the money.
The Bitches say: A for absolute gluttony.
The Buffet at Aria
3730 Las Vegas Blvd.
Las Vegas, NV 89158
It’s two in the morning and I’m sleeping in a tent on Playa Blanca, an isolated beach that’s a three-hour boat ride from of Cartagena, Colombia. I’m roused awake by loud rustling outside of our tent.
“Hunnie! Hunnie!” I whisper, shaking beau awake. “It’s the FARC,” I hiss, assuming he had led me into rebel territory and now my favorite band of Marxist rebels was going to kidnap me for ransom.
In a classic example of chivalry, beau grumbled and rolled over, so I quietly peeked out of the tent. Thankfully, the rustling turned out to be a few hapless wild cows—not armed guerillas—who were stumbling through the cut palm fronts used to make the island huts.
I attempted to fall back asleep—trying not to think about the ants, bugs, cows and armed guerillas in my vicinity.
I sprung awake three hours later at 5 a.m. to a horrifying smell (which, based off my new midnight friends, I now assume was cow urine). The smell, combined with some local island cuisine the night before, caused me to spring awake, leap out of the tent, fall into the sand, and vomit. And I continued to vomit, for 15 hours, every time I moved.
I was hot, smelly, and dirty. I’ve never used the restroom outside, much less slept in a tent or lost my lunch in the sand, but, somehow, here I was on my relaxing, tropical vacation in pure misery stuck on a predominantly deserted island. (I guess that’s what happens when you let your boyfriend do the planning.) Between bouts of nausea, I was determined to negotiate myself off the island—and I was not waiting for the 3 p.m. leisurely tourist boat ride to do it.
In comes Herman, a lovely Colombian man with a two-person moto. Herman squished himself, beau, me, and our duffel bag onto his scooter and we embarked on an hour-long joyride through the unpaved, rocky, pot-holed roads of rural Colombia, passing impoverished towns, cows, sheep, pigs, and armed Colombian troops along the way. I did my very best to enjoy the scenery while trying desperately not to become ill and having loads of dirt blow into my face and teeth.
Eventually, Herman pulled over and led us to a river, and I thought to myself, “You have got to be kidding me.” But, no biggie, we just hopped in a wooden canoe and a toothless man ferried us across. After a 30-minute stroll through a pueblito, we located a taxi, and another hour later I was nestled in the bed of a four-star hotel in Cartagena, where I remained for 24 hours, watching the Disney channel in Spanish.
What does this have to do with brunch, you say? Well, just before this adventure, I did find a brunch spot in Cartagena, and it was phenomenal.
We stumbled upon Café Milla, an upscale boutique café and bakery, in the streets of Cartagena before our little beach excursion. Then, we went back twice more, because it’s the only cuisine our very weak stomachs could stand. (Beau eventually met a similar fate—must have been the fish.)
Now, yours truly rarely visits the same restaurant in Washington, and I would never go to the same spot twice, or thrice, on vacation, but now you know why we did.
Cartagena, Colombia, is a charismatic old city with beautiful, brightly colored buildings, cobblestone streets, Spanish colonial architecture, and friendly, vivacious residents.
You could spend weeks wandering the city’s winding streets, buying fruit from the corner stands, and salsa dancing until the sun comes up. The traditional tropical cuisine is rice, plantain chips, and plenty of seafood and ceviches.
Café Milla, nestled on the corner of Calle de la Iglesia and Calle de la Estrella, offers an upscale European twist on traditional Colombian cuisine. Its pastries are beautiful, rich and delicious—cupcakes, flan, rich chocolate cakes with gold-flaked icing, croissants, churros and more. The salads are huge—big enough for three people—and filled with fresh fruits and veggies.
The beverage selection is amazing—coffees and teas are presented in a stunning fashion. They also have tropical Colombian beverages like a mango slushie and a coconut-lime concoction that is pure heaven.
Beyond café fare, Milla serves lunch and dinner. On one of our visits, for lunch, beau had a mouth-watering steak served with a creamy white rice, sun-dried tomatoes, and a sweet balsamic reduction. Meanwhile, I opted for a variation of a Caprese salad (I know, I know, Italian in Colombia) with a similar amazing sweet-yet-tart balsamic dressing.
Best of all, they have brunch. I opted for the Colombian version of pancakes—served with sour cream and dulce de leche—and syrup, if you must. The pancakes were light, fluffy, and perfect (but you may not want to trust me as I hadn’t eaten anything in 36 hours).
If you’re ever in Cartagena, (and you should go, it’s an amazing city), be sure to stop by Café Milla for the best pastries in the city, a delicious dinner, or brunch.
