AWESOME ALERT: Free Outdoor Adventures From Zozi and Bear Grylls

Ever fancied yourself an outdoors enthusiast? What about someone who at least likes trees? Either way, you're in luck because the deals site Zozi is giving away free outdoor adventures in NYC and around the country as part of a new promotion with Bear Grylls. I got the Outdoor Photography Class (regularly $97) and after referring 3 more people, I picked up the day pass to Brooklyn Boulders (regularly $32).

To sign up, click here and select your free adventure! Comment below on what you picked.

Riding Wax Wings at LPR

Last night was one of those amazing New York nights that makes me so happy to be where I am and doing what I'm doing. I have never been someone who remembers the name of every [insert famous band name] song or who can quote lyrics at the drop of a pin, but there are certain artists and certain songs that have clung to me at different points in my life that remain vital to who I am as a person. Joshua Radin is one of those musicians and if you've ever heard his music, or even better, heard him play live, you know why.

The wonderful people at Le Poisson Rouge invited me and a friend to an intimate Joshua Radin performance tonight and I was over-the-moon happy all week in anticipation. LPR is a great venue for a concert because they offer plenty of seating if you get there early enough that enables you to feel like a civilized adult at a concert rather than the college students we all used to be standing chin to shoulder to hip to elbow trying to get a glimpse of the stage. Yes, there is a 2 drink/food item minimum per person at tables, but to be honest, their food is great and their drinks are even better. I'd highly recommend the edamame with truffle salt ($5) or the fresh-out-of-the-oven chocolate chip cookies and milk ($5) if you are in the mood for something sweeter.

There are not many people I'd go out at 10:30 on a Wednesday night to see (the doors didn't even open until 10:15...here's to being hip and happening!), but with a Pina Colada sandwich from Peanut Butter and Co. freshly down-the-hatch (best Greenwich Village dinner ever), we got to the front of the line only to run into other friends and managed to snag a table so close to the stage that we were sitting practically on top of music people (one musician and 2 suited execs perhaps?) that seemed to be "with the band."

My Name is You opened with some pretty mushy gushy loves songs (hey, there's nothing wrong with those) reminiscent of The Weepies and Of Monsters and Men. Songs like Come Back (The summer’s passing so are you and i’ll come if you want me to, but if you leave without me dear i’ll understand. Come back to me my dear. All has been forgiven. For life without you here is barely even living) will melt your heart, but I especially liked Fortunate Ones (We have all that we could need and some more that we don’t even need, so when we see something new why do we now think we need it too? Let me tell you a secret: we're the fortunate ones. Let me tell you a secret: we're the ones with it all).

My Name is You

When Josh Radin came on stage, clad in a dark grey t-shirt, ripped jeans, and an orange beanie and proclaiming this show would be just like us watching him play in his living room, I knew we were in for a treat. He played the majority of his first two albums We Were Here and Simple Times, which I was very happy about, and I loved that he kept stepping away from the microphone and once even unplugging completely for the most authentic live acoustic experience we could ask for. He also played a good selection of tracks from his newly released album, Wax Wings.

Joshua Radin

Playing with My Name is You

Songs like You've Got Growin Up to Do (So the best thing I can give to you is for me to go, leave you alone cause you got growing up to do) and Winter (I should know who I am by now. I walk the record stands somehow. Thinking of winter. Your name is the splinter inside me. While I wait) are super relatable and have definitely helped me through harder times in my life, but the best part of the show was knowing that life may suck sometimes, but sitting no more than 20 feet away from Joshua Radin pretending he was serenading only me made my entire universe infinitely better. I can only hope to one day feel the way he describes in Today (But you are the one I've been waiting for today. And here comes the sun that's been baiting on today) and You Got What I Need (When I see you it's a beautiful world, but when you're gone, I want you in my arms I'm telling you the last time. Baby you, you got what I need. Baby you, you got my sunshine).

Josh also brought up Brandon from My Name is you to cover Bob Dylan's Don't Think Twice, It's All Right:

Ok, enough sap for today. Hope you enjoyed the pictures (taken with my new phone!) and a big shout-out to Lauren for providing the video.

Food Trucks Take Flight

I think I'm still full from Choice Eats. Seriously. But New York is a city that revolves around it's wide array of cuisine and various means of distributing food, so inevitably the blog must go on. The Village Voice recently held their outdoor food truck event, Choice Streets, at the Intrepid and I was invited to go check it out. This event is arranged differently than Choice Eats in that there aren't as many food vendors and the lines are super long, but we still made a night of it, and ate some delicious tidbits from NYC's best mobile vendors.

With our tasting glasses in tow, we started the night at Shock Top where I tried their Honeycrisp Ale, a super refreshing summer beer. If you wanted Lemon Shandy, they were serving it directly from a tap in the trunk of a car!

Because of the staggering lines building at most of the trucks when I arrived, I opted for dessert first, and started at my beloved Cool Haus ice cream sandwiches where I only found about 5 people in line. I tried the snickerdoodle cookie with sea salt caramel ice cream. Yum! And I was very appreciative that they weren't serving full-sized ice cream sandwiches for that would have been a mess.

Snickerdoodle cookie and sea salt caramel ice cream (Cool Haus)

Next Up was Mexico Blvd, one of my favorites of the night with their Adobo Taco--pork loin marinated in adobo served with cilantro, onion and salsa. Next door was Mausam Curry 'n Bites, which served a fairly typical chicken tikka, not bad, but fairly generic in my opinion.

Adobo Taco (Mexico Blvd)

Chicken Tikke (Mausam Curry 'n Bites)

I tried two different mini empanadas from Nuchas and some "Authentic Indian Street Food" from Desi Food Truck (not quite sure what was in it, but there was definitely rice, potatoes and curry involved).

Mini Empanadas (Nuchas)

"Authentic Indian Street Food" (Desi Food Truck)

Tacos (or taco-like foods) were definitely a theme of the night. Big D's Grub served up some spicy pork tacos that definitely had a kick, whereas Mike n' Willies served up their take on a flauta, stuffing falafel into a fried corn tortilla and covering it in tahini. I really enjoyed the latter.

Spicy Pork Taco (Big D's Grub)

Falafel Flauta (Mike n' Willies)

Souvlaki GR was a hit among my friends, but to be honest it didn't do it for me. The charcoal grilled chicken had a funny taste, but maybe I just had a bad batch. The Greek fries were pretty awesome though.

Charcoal Grilled Chicken and Greek Fries (Souvlaki GR)

Wafels & Dinges was one truck I was highly anticipating and it did not disappoint. They were serving up full sized wafels with candied bacon, caramel and whipped cream. Deeee-lish!

Wafels & Dinges

Wafel with candied bacon, caramel and whipped cream (Wafels & Dinges)

At this point unfortunately my camera started to go wonky, and the following pictures are either blurry and/or borrowed (thanks Laura!). Regardless, the burger at Rhong Tiam was amazing and I felt equally excited about the pupusas at Solber pupusas (glad I finally know what that is!) and the arepas at Palenque Homemade Colombian Food.

Burger (Rhong Tiam)

Meat Pupusa (Solber Pupusas)

Corn Arepa with Chicken and Portobello Mushrooms (Palenque Homemade Colombian Food)

We topped everything off with an Arnold Palmer Kelvin Slush and called it a night. Unfortunately Mac Truck sported lines 50-people deep all night and ran out before I gave them a try. I was equally disappointed that Gorilla Cheese NYC didn't even show up. Next idea for an event...an all mac 'n' cheese/grilled cheese food extravaganza!! Who'd be up for that?

AWESOME DEAL: $45 for Up to 600 Fitness Classes in NYC

Since moving to Astoria in December and training for the Brooklyn Half Marathon (eeeeek! This Saturday!), I have yet to commit to a gym membership. I used to be a tried and true member of Crunch on East 34th Street and I honestly really loved it there, but the distance is too much for me now. I've been racking my head as to where I'd like to join after the race and then I discovered a fabulous deal.

Lifebooker, as you may know and love, is a website where you can not only book all your beauty appointments at a discount, but they also sell Lifebooker Loot--essentially daily deals related to fitness, beauty, and health. Starting today, they are partnering with the American Health and Fitness Alliance to offer a deal that almost seems to good to be true. For $45 you can get free 7-month access to over 165 of the best health and fitness clubs in New York (and throughout Brooklyn, Bronx, Queens, Manhattan, Staten Island, and more). Each pass is good for a minimum of TWO free visits per club, with some passes good for an ENTIRE MONTH - for a total of over 600 complimentary visits in all. The full list of clubs is available here, but some examples are:

• 2 visits to Crunch Fitness
• 2 visits to David Barton Gym
• 2 visits to Manhattan Plaza Health Club (rock climbing wall!)
• 2 visits to the 92nd Street Y
• 3 visits to Pablo Fitness (spinning and yoga!)
• 4 visits to Club Fitness (great for Astoria residents like me)
• 4 visits to Pure Power Boot Camp

So you can see that even if you only go to 3 or 4 classes over the course of 7 months, you'll definitely get your money's worth. BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE!

Lifebooker is also offering a yoga pass and a Pilates pass each for $45 and also each good for 7 months. To supplement my fitness pass, I'm planning on purchasing the yoga pass, and here's some examples of what that includes:

• 2 classes at Atmananda Yoga (recently featured on Gilt Group)
• 2 classes at Dance New Amsterdam
• 2 classes at Exhale Spa (hello, these regularly go for like $30 a pop!)
• 2 classes at Om Factory (one of my favorite yoga studios in the city, try Forrest and Aerial yoga here)
• 2 classes at Pure Yoga
• 2 classes at Yoga Works
• 2 classes at Sheila Kelley's S Factor (not exactly yoga, but you know you'll have a good time)

If you're into Pilates  the Pilates pass comes with a lot of private sessions, which you know can be very expensive if purchased individually.

To purchase one, two or all three passes, go to Lifebooker, create an account if you haven't already done so, and search for the $45 Fitness Pass in the Loot section. If you have friends in Chicago, Houston or LA, be sure to pass this onto them because there are options available in those cities as well. Happy working out!

A Little Bite of Heaven

NYC seems to be at the epicenter of new dessert trends. We've seen cupcakes, donuts, macarons and the like come and go and wax and wane. Dylan's Candy Bar is a major tourist destination and I won't even get into some of the magical desserts being served on food trucks these days (cough...Coolhaus...cough...Wafels & Dinges...cough).

I recently had the pleasure of sampling a new dessert item straight out of a Manhattan-based company called Becky's Bites. These bites are an original concoction, almost a mix between a chocolate truffle and a bon bon. They consist of a creamy based filling, rolled in a delicate layer of graham cracker, and are dipped in the finest quality Belgian chocolate, coming in 12 flavors ranging from Apple Pie, Salted Caramel, Cappuccino, Chocolate Covered Strawberry, Peanut Butter & Jelly and many more.

I tried the NY Cheesecake and the Cookies and Cream flavors and it was very hard for me not to eat the entire box in one sitting. They were delivered to my office so where slightly melty by the time they got to my desk, but who really minds a little chocolate all over their fingers, really? After I tried a couple I put them in the freezer and I actually liked the frozen bites better. To be honest I couldn't taste too much difference between the flavors because it almost seemed like the cookies and cream was just NY cheesecake with some chocolate/cookie powder added in. Who really cares though? These little bites were definitely heavenly.

Cookies and Cream and NY Cheesecake Becky's Bites

Cookies and Cream

NY Cheesecake

Boxes come in combinations of 4 ($5.99) or 12 ($15.99) bites and are currently sold at Gentile's Fine Foods and Grace's Marketplace on the Upper East Side. You can customize your packages as holiday or novelty gifts and Becky's Bites also caters.

Becky's Bites provided Awesome In New York with a free box of bites for the purpose of this review.

A Mr. Popper Moment

Two nights ago the most amazing thing happened--I took a pictures with a penguin in a photobooth. No joke, here's the proof:

How awesome is that right? As jealous as you all are of my avian encounter, I'm sure you're wondering why and how this is relevant to your lives. Let me back up a bit. My friend Stephanie invited me to wine hour event at NIOS, inside the Muse Hotel. The back room of NIOS is having an identity crisis and the restaurant had an event to launch their re-naming contest. The contest will run through Friday, May 17, with entries themed to two categories: Greek and Wine. The winner will receive a cocktail party for up to 25 people in the newly-named space. You can enter to win by submitting your Greek and/or wine themed entries through the hotel's Facebook and Twitter pages or by stopping by the restaurant.

Photo Courtesy of NIOS

The Muse Hotel is part of the Kimpton Family and they have a policy that if you can walk in the door you can stay at the hotel. Hence, the Columbus Zoo was visiting with a real live penguin! Even better, there was a photobooth to document the penguin's visit! I was so excited that I couldn't even control myself and I think I was grinning ear to ear for the rest of the night.

You can check out Kimpton's pet policy as well as some adorable animal photos here.

You Want to Visit the Park with Tequila in Its Name

Last night I went with my friend Jen to check out the grand opening of Tequila Park Taqueria in the Hudson Hotel. It was a tad chilly by the time we got there, but with my jacket on it was a super enjoyable night at a rooftop bar.

The place is very large by comparison to other similar venues, and the vibe is definitely downtown meets uptown ($16 for margaritas?! Holy cow!?), yet nostalgic and whimsical (hello strings of lights, fake grass, and foosball tables).

In all honesty, their menu looked super interesting. I started with the Horchata Apple Blossom Margarita with Riazul Reposado and apple blossom honey and Jen got the Smokin' Apple with Corzo Reposado, ginger, mezcal and red sea salt. These couldn't be more different apple margaritas if they tried. Mine was on the sweeter side while Jen's had quite the kick, but I enjoyed them both.

Horchata Apple Blossom and Smokin' Apple Margaritas ($16 each)

For food we split two orders of tacos, one from the "common" side of the menu--the crispy 48-hour pork carnitas ($8 for 2)--and one from the "uncommon" side of the menu--sriracha cheesesteak ($12). Both were served on homemade tortillas and the latter packed quite the punch with the sriracha. Would highly recommend both!

Crispy 48-Hour Pork Carnitas Tacos ($8)

Sriracha Cheesteak Tacos ($12)

No visit to Tequila Park is complete without at least 3 rounds of foosball (best of 3 wins of course!). We played 4 and yours truly won 2, leaving with sufficiently sore arms. I forgot how much fun those little men on poles could be!!

Ready, set, foosball!!

It's definitely the start of rooftop bar season, so what do you think? Will you check out Tequila Park?

Authentic Sichuan Food on Restaurant Row

Over my years living in NYC, I've learned that Restaurant Row, though it has it's gems (I'm looking at you Bourbon Street), is typically a seedy place to eat dinner. You've got the hustlers trying to get suckers to pay for their overpriced pre-theater menus, and just the general hustle and bustle of that neighborhood can be a bit too much to handle. So you can understand my hesitance when I was invited for dinner at Grand Sichuan last weekend. My mom was in town and we had plans to see Tom Hanks in Lucky Guy (excellent! go see it!), so I suggested we give this place a try.

First thing I noticed when we were ushered back to our table in the back room of the narrow, white-walled, simple restaurant--everyone was speaking Chinese. That piqued my interest because you know those people aren't there for the General Tso's Chicken or the Beef with Mixed Vegetables. Maggie (I don't think that was her given name), our bubbly and cheerful host for the night gave us a bit of perspective about the menu. It was mostly Sichuan-inspired, with some more traditional elements as well (for the tourists who stumble in most likely). She did warn us that Sichuan food is inherently very spicy but was very nice in suggesting things for us that were not as hot, while still authentic.

First up, we tried the egg drop soup ($2.25). While it was similar to the egg drop soup I'm used to, this version had a lot more flavor. It was made with vegetables and had a bit of a peppery kick to it. It would definitely be nice to cuddle up with on a cold winter's day.

Egg Drop Soup ($2.25)

Next up, we opted for something a big on the spicier side that had rave reviews on Yelp. Dan Dan noodles are as traditional as you come in Sichuan food, and Grand Sichuan offers two different versions; plain or Xie Lao Ban's version from the Dunlop book (both $4.25). We chose the latter because Maggie said it was fairly famous and had a lot more flavor and no sugar added. Wow, was this delicious. My mouth is seriously watering now just thinking about it. However, it was one of the spiciest things I've ever eaten in my life. It was the kind of thing that you have to just keep eating because if you stop the heat will just take over and your mouth will explode (see all that bright red in the bottom? yea, that's straight hot pepper sauce). But the strange thing was that even though this dish was so spicy, it had so much flavor and I actually went back for seconds after the rest of our food came, event though that was slightly masochistic.

Xie Lao Ban's Dan Dan Noodles ($4.25)

The menu offers two different duck options, and we went for the Smoked Tea Duck ($16.95) which was served crispy with buns and sauce you use to make little sandwiches. This meat was delicious and super moist. You could even taste a slight tea flavor under all that crispiness. Good stuff. 

Smoked Tea Duck ($16.95)

Then the entrees started coming. First were the beef short ribs served with a corn salad and topped with spicy shredded beef ($13.95). Next to the meat there was something that Maggie even had a hard time describing. It was like a white film made from milk that was fairly bland tasting and two brownish balls that were liquidy when you poked them and those were made from meat and that's all I can tell you about that. The shortribs however were jam-packed with flavor and super tender and delicious (as they should be after being cooked for 80+ hours!). The corn was a bit funky (do they even grow corn in China?), but the meat was soooooooooo yummy.

Beef Short Ribs ($13.95)

We were also sent out a dish of the curry chicken ($9.95), which is on the chef specialties list even though curry is not typically found in Sichuan food Maggie told us. Still, the meat was delicious and the sauce full of flavor.

Curry Chicken ($9.95)

We opted for the vegetable happy family as our last entree because, well, you can see that we had been eating fairly heavily before that. I was a bit puzzled by this dish but it was very fun to look at. It had some boiled pieces of pumpkin, sweet potato, potato and squash and was served with a radish foam, tomato/pepper puree, spinach jello like things, and dried flakes of different vegetables. I'm still not sure exactly how this is Chinese, but it was nice so have some fiber included with the meal.

Vegetable Happy Family

All in all I'd say we did pretty well. We got some looks from the other patrons when Maggie kept bringing out dish after dish. I'd venture to think they got some kicks out of seeing us eat those Dan Dan noodles. We turned down Maggie's offer of dessert because we were so full, but they did bring us some orange slices and fortune cookies to round out the meal.

Our table once we'd given up

Orange Slices and Fortune Cookies

I must say that I've got to rethink my entire opinion of Restaurant Row after eating at Grand Sichuan. Maybe there are some more [authentic] hidden gems on that stretch of West 46th Street, and I'll definitely add this to the list!