A Day of (Sinful) Comfort Food

For the past two days in New York City, it felt like the Arctic. Not like it’s unusual of New York to be this cold but I just don’t like to walk or get out of bed in this type of weather. Unfortunately, life doesn’t work that way for me since I have classes. Pooh. At least classes start late for me today so I indulge myself into a bit of sinful, comfort foods. I should note that I’m not supposed to eat these items just because I have to go “on a diet.” I put those words in quotes just because it’s only dieting for vanity, not really health reasons. (Even though sometimes I wonder I should watch what I eat since my blood sugar levels are above the norm: diabetes or my cholesterol and triglycerides are bad enough that I can no longer eat my beloved pastries…I hope none of those will be a problem.) My cousin’s wedding is next week and I bought a dress and well, you know the rest… So I’m screwing my diet of rabbit food (i.e. salads without dressing and/or croûtons) and non-fat Fage yogurt, for the sake of my mind’s wants due to my (and possibly your) Paleolithic ancestors for survival. How ironic.
For breakfast, I ate at City Bakery. It’s the start of the Hot Chocolate Festival! For those of you who are die hard fans of CB’s hot chocolate go there before the month’s over. Strangely, they didn’t announce it when I was there on Feb. 1st. Here’s the photos of the schedule (click on it to see it larger):

Anywhoo, today’s flavor is bourbon. I just ordered a shot (about 1/3 of the small; cost $2.50) instead of the usual small cup just because I was planning on eating something more fattening and caloric for lunch. Also, I had the pretzel croissant.

Bourbon hot chocolate: still thick and creamy

Pretzel Croissant

Innards!

The bourbon hot chocolate is still rich, creamy, thick and decadently chocolatey. The only difference is the subtle background flavor of bourbon. No, there’s no alcohol in this hot chocolate. All there is the bourbon flavor and it had a subtle bourbon alcohol aftertaste that lingers on the tongue for about 10 seconds. If you don’t like bourbon or alcohol at all, just opt for the regular hot chocolate, it’s still chocolate heaven to me. :)

If you haven’t read my lengthy post about NYC croissants, City Bakery’s croissants generally are flaky, buttery, and crisp but it tends to be doughy. The reason I wanted the pretzel croissant is just because I needed something salty to cut through the sweetness of the hot chocolate. I’m very content with my breakfast. It’s decadent, caloric and fattening but I enjoyed every moment of eating the delicious, salty, buttery croissant and the thick, rich chocolatey bourbon hot chocolate.

On to lunch. For a long while since January, Stand burger has been opened for lunch. I have thought about going there to try out their burger just to find out if it’s worth all the craze over burgers for the recent months in the city.

Sorry; it’s a bit blurred.

I already knew what I wanted to order: their Lunch Pack. The only thing I changed was the beverage; I opted for the chocolate malt shake to replace their soda, so it’ll cost me an extra $3 to make up for the difference in price of the soda to shake. So here’s the shake:

The second photo is meant to show you how thick that shake was. The darn thing is suspended in the straw and whenever I’m trying to drink it, I feel like I’m sucking my lungs out that my brain’s about to explode from the lack of oxygen. That’s how thick it was. Also, in case that shake isn’t caloric and fattening enough, just top it with some whipped cream. Good God! That little glass probably have 2,000 calories! Those of you who aren’t Americans that’s the U.S.D.A.’s suggested average calorie intake (for an adult) for one day. At least these calories were delicious, creamy and obviously (much stressed) decadent; not something that I wasted on a bland, fattening food/drink. The shake had a nice chocolate flavor with a hint of malt. The reason I ordered chocolate malt was I wanted to have that old, nostalgic feel of drinking a malted shake and eating it with a burger and fries.

Onto the food!
The fries were pretty good. It’s lightly salted, slightly crisp, and it had enough potato that well…it doesn’t feel like you ate burnt, fried things that doesn’t taste remotely potato. I know. I need a better description but it’s the best I can do for the moment.

The burger…
From the first photo of this burger (it’s the one above the fries), it’s kind of funny. They want to indicate to you that you ordered a medium-rare burger by running a stake through it with a small sign saying, “Medium-rare.” I know, it’s not that funny. Moving on…the burger is perfectly cooked to medium-rare with it’s meaty juices absorbed by the brioche bun. It had a pretty strong, charred flavor that it’s sort of complimented by a mustardy kick, and thinly sliced raw onions, and a touch of vinegary sweetness by the ketchup. I would say this burger is fine; not superb or mind-blowingly good. For the price I paid for, it’s decent but I wouldn’t come back for it if I had the choice. It’s not really often that I would eat a burger anyways.

So, this is my day of eating a lot of nutrient poor foods but at least I enjoyed it for today and I’ll just run on the treadmill over the weekend and go back to my temporary habit of eating healthy.