La Sirene in NYC

One of my friends is leaving us! She's going to South America to teach English. We were sad to see her off but we did feel happy that she was venturing off to pursue an interest of hers. To celebrate, we went to La Sirene in Tribeca for a farewell dinner.



First we order two different styles of clams since clams are a very popular French dish. We ordered the classic clam dish (bottom) and the chef special (top). Everyone liked the chef's special the most because the curry really did accentuate the flavor of the clams more than the classic. The classic was very plain; the taste reminded me of boiled clams.


Next we went on to order the Goat cheese tart, which definitely became an absolute favorite for me and my four friends. The creaminess of the goat cheese just melts in your mouth with each bite. I would go back to the restaurant just to have the goat cheese tart again.




For our main dishes, we ordered the Hanger Steak, Roasted Lamb Leg, and the Skate Fish.

The Hanger Steak was ordered medium rare. The steak was very tender and the mixture of the herb sauce really made this dish a real enjoyment.

The Roasted Lamb Leg was very flavorful. The creamy, wine sauce with the lamb was delicious. Very creamy and very flavorful. However, the leg was very chewy, like it needed to be roasted a bit more to achieve a more tender texture.

The Skate fish was a-okay. The mango on top of the fish was an excellent touch. I love sweet and salty dishes. However, the fish gave me a rough texture rather than a silky to the bite feel.

Last but not least, DESSERT

The profiterolles are so good. It is hard not to be good given that it is drenched heavily in chocolate syrup....

We also had the peach, and the pear dessert which both kind of tasted the same since both had ice cream and whipped cream with almonds, but just different fruits.

Thrift Shopping

Glancing through the Housing Works website at the beginning of this year, I had noticed that they had a $20-bag sale on Saturdays at their warehouse at Long Island City. Housing Works is a non-profit organization that provides housing services, AIDS-related services, and many other services to the community. The organization operates thrift shops around NYC in which it takes donations and resell them, donating all proceeds to the organization to fund the services provided to the community. The way the bag sale worked was that you would purchase a paper bag from Housing Works for $20 and stuff it with as much as you can.


I mentioned this $20-bag sale to a friend, who is an avid thrift shop shopper. She was very excited and wanted to go check it out. Curious as a cat, I went with her.

The experience, I must say, was pretty enlightening. Many people showed up at the sale. I was scared at first; there were so many people and the clothes were being thrown all over the place that I felt like I was swimming in an ocean of clothes. There was a point in which I couldn't even walk since I was knee-high in clothes.

But I must say that this bag sale was a great deal; definitely my money's worth. As my friend and I went around the warehouse, I saw many different clothes that carried brand names such as Ann Taylor, Kenneth Cole, United Colors of Beneton. I even saw this woman who found a leather jacket in one of the bins. Isn't it so surprising how you can find great deals like this? I got a lot of items (mostly accessories) for an overall of $20 only. Sugar sweet life....

WD-50

Tonight we headed to WD-50 for dinner. My friend had heard reviews about this place and how it's cuisine is created using molecular gastronomy to perfect the different dishes on the menu.

The place was located on 50 Clinton Street, which was a street that I usually do not venture onto. Why? No other reason besides that it's far away from the area that I work, live, and hang out at. Surprisingly so, the whole street seems to under gentrification into something more elegantly bourgeois. You can see that as you walk along the street and notice many local mom & pop stores and fabric stores. A few condominiums also have developed along that street and the new stores popping up all give out a new clean-cut high tech look compared to the old stores.

Back to the restaurant:

The place was designed in an elegant way. With a bar at the front of the restaurant where one can look through the store windows to the street, the inner half of the restaurant contained many seating booths.

Dishes are all cooked at a low temperature and took some time to come out. It gave my friends and I some time to catch up with old times and to chat about each other's lives.

When the dishes came, we ordered:

Skirt steak (medium rare): Nothing too spectacular, but the steak had a slight peanut flavor and was also accompanied with peanut sauce noodles
Duck Breast: Absolutely delicious. Extremely tender, no fatty tissue, and very juicy despite beating duck breast.
Lamb shoulder, pine nut "baked beans": The meat was tender, but really salty. The baked beans was pretty interesting since it was made with pine nuts packed with a slightly sweet baked bean flavor.

For dessert, we had everything on the menu!!!! Yes, we ordered all seven. My favorite was the jasmine flavored custard with banana ice cream. Unfortunately the lighting did not make it easy to take great pics. I think it's time for me to search for a new camera to add some quality to my blog.