Spring Day Trip -
We've been lucky that past couple years to visit NYC right on the brisk of Spring. Although this trip held a little cloud cover, the temperature was beautiful enough to hop around the city with a light hoodie on and not fall over from heat or those crazy wind gusts.
This trip started on Houston by Broadway, to which we headed East towards Katz's. We intended on making a stop off and splitting a Ruben, but it was early and neither of us were that quite hungry yet. We had already split a bagel on the way down, and I was craving something a little sweeter. So we turned off onto Ludlow, going South a couple short blocks until we got Cakeshop!
I had been wanting to stop in as this place truly encompasses almost all of my favorite things; it's a bakery, bar, and music venue. Heaven.
Here we split (lot's of sharing on this trip, ey?) a chocolate pretzel cupcake. The cake itself was slightly dry, but the frosting.. the frosting was to die for. About an inch and a half thick of this butter cream deliciousness, that even a non-sweet fan (J) wanted more of.
From there we continued South and made our way over to Chopshop on Essex. J wanted a edge up from one of the most reputable barber's in the area.
He got what I would call the most detailed haircut I've ever witnessed on a man. For about an hour Yuke (a Boston-ite whose 5 months into his NY residence), cut, faded, feathered and buzz J till nothing but a proper pompadour remained. Not to mention the hot towel and straight razor shave at the end. When I say this guys went above and beyond, I mean. And when I say it was affordable, I mean way cheaper than I would have expected for an hour cut in the City. Albany prices, Big Apple quality.
Needless to say, we were both getting thirsty. So we headed North, back up Essex and stopped into Double Down's.
I'll warn you right now, we could have easily spent the rest of our visit sipping those buy one/get one shots and brews, and chatting with Damien (the awesome bartender and the locals who had indeed been there for awhile).
Their day time happy hour goes something like B1G1 for any drafts and any "J" shots. So we took a couple Jameson's and the Double Down brew (J had dark, I went light).. and followed with some more shots of Leprecon Piss (a delicious, fruity shot of wonder).
This really is the happiest place on earth!
Now that we're wasted, let's go shop! ..or eat.. yeah.. let's eat. Here we are at Ray's, slicing it up.
Now it's shop time! Over to good ole St Marks for some browsing and Enz's for some buying! I loved everything in this store, and you can check out some of their goodies on their website as well!
There was a lot more in there but it's all a flash of blur at this point.
I can tell you we haled it over to Otto's again for our usual Zombie's before heading back home to Albany.
Another awesome day in NY. Can't wait to go back!
