Manhattan with Christmas decoration & Lebanese restaurant

Welcome to 7th Kitchen!

On Friday night, I went to Manhattan to meet up with my friend from California for dinner. The dinner was in Midtown so I walked around midtown a little bit before going to the restaurant.

Everywhere you see is already Christmas. Decoration for the stores are all Christmas and people were skating in a Bryant Park and Rockerfeller Center.

Christmas decoration at stores

Skating at Bryant Park

Skating at Rockerfeller Center

It was quite warm that day so many people were enjoying the skating.

I stopped by at the Magnolia Bakery to buy Banana Pudding before going to the restaurant. Click here for yesterday's post about Magnolia Bakery.

We met up at this restaurant called "Naya". It is a Lebanese restaurant. Ever since I went to this Lebanese restaurant in Germany this summer, I was searching for a Lebanese restaurant in NY. Click here for the post about Lebanese food I ate in Germany.

For Appetizers we had Babagonoush and Batata Harra.

Babaganoush

Batata Harra

Batata Harra is a fried potato dish with some cilantro, garlic and some spices. It is super good! I remember having this dish in the Lebanese restaurant in Germany. I think this is something I have to order ever time when I go to Lebanese restaurant. I just love it!

For main course, I had Lamb dish. I had this Lamb dish back in August in Germany and I think this was the same dish. It is with ground Lamb in a tomato sauce and some vegetables. I would like it better if the onions on top was sautéed.

My friend had beef dish. It had some spices and tasted good but I think it will be better if there are some kind of sauce with it because it was little bit dry.

My husband had a Chicken dish. I think this was the best main dish of three. Chicken was juicy and the sauce was garlicky and good.

We also had dessert. This was some kind of pudding. It tasted like a flower. I think they use rose water for this dessert.

If you are interested in this restaurant, here is their website below. Please be careful when you open the site because the music will start when you go to their site. www.nayarestaurants.com

Well, I really enjoyed seeing my friend again. She is a old friend of mine. I was friend with her older sister first and when she went back to France for summer vacation, I went to visit her in France. That's when I met her little sister. After a year or so, her little sister moved to the U.S. also and we started to hang out. When I was living in California, we used to go for a coffee and talk a lot. She is very friendly and down to earth but very smart. I like her a lot and I miss her a lot because ever since I moved to NY, we kind of lost in touch and we hadn't been talking for a few years. So it was really nice to see her again.

She has not changed a bit. Even though I have not talked to her for a while, I felt so comfortable talking to her. I hope she felt the same way. I really wish she live close by. She likes NY so I am trying to convince her to move to NY :-)

After dinner, we walked around the city since it was a nice night. I had a great Friday night. I really appreciate her to make time for me from her busy schedule. I hope I will see her again sometimes soon!

Magnolia Bakery's Banana pudding

Welcome to 7th Kitchen!

Magnolia Bakery got really famous after they were in a episode of "Sex and the city" and they are famous for their cupcakes. But I really like their banana pudding.

Our friend brought this banana pudding one day and my husband and I really liked it. Every time when we go to Bleecker st, we see a long line in front of Magnolia bakery and we normally give up just by looking at the line.

The other day, I found out that they have stores in Rockefeller center and uptown. I was going to a restaurant in Midtown on Friday night with my friend from California so I decided to stop by at the bakery.

There was no line in front of the store so I went in. There were many people in the store but since they have a few different ordering windows for different kind of order, I did not have to wait to long to order. So I bought 2 banana pudding. One for ourselves and one for my friend because I wanted her to try it also.

Oh, I love this banana pudding. It is pretty rich so I can not eat them a lot at once but I just have a few spoons at a time and I am satisfied.

I highly recommend this banana pudding. If you have chance to come to NY, try this banana pudding!

I would love to re-create this banana pudding at home but I am not quite sure what kind of cream they use. I hope I can re-create this sometimes at home ;-)

Japanese breakfast Dinner

Welcome to 7th Kitchen!

My husband did not dinner last night so I made a Japanese breakfast dinner for myself. In my house, we always had Japanese traditional breakfast such as rice, miso soup, fish, egg etc. Now a days, many people eat bread or cereal for breakfast but I always had Japanese traditional breakfast when I was living with my parents.

Sometimes, I miss these Japanese breakfast. When I was eating them everyday, I did not think about anything but now I miss it sometimes.

I made rice with some different grains. It is quite popular in Japan now to add some different type of grains in your rice since it is considered healthy.

Miso soup is easy to make if you have miso paste. You can add different kind of vegetables in it. I had onion so I added onion and dried seaweed (wakame) and tofu in it last night. My miso paste is running out. I need to go get it sometime soon. I remember my mom used to make her own miso at home. She would boil soy beans and add some stuff and keep them in a big container and keep it in a cool place for a long time. I use miso paste from supermarket.

Since I did not make egg or fish last night, I made this vegetable dish which is called "Kinpira Gobou" Gobou is a popular root vegetable in Japan but I don't see it here much. In dictionary, it says "a burdock root". This is vegetable is considered pretty healthy in Japan and used for many kind of dishes. "Kinpira Gobou" is one of the most known dish for this vegetable. It is seasoned with soy sauce, mirin, sake, sugar. Also you add some red chili flakes and sesami seeds. In a Japanese supermarket, they sell this vegetable already cut and frozen. It is very convenient to have this in the freezer because I can not get this vegetable in a local super market.

The last but not least is "Fermented Beans". I know. It sounds horrible. And yes, it smells horrible. BUT it taste good! I mean I kind of grew up with it so I like it despite the smell. It is very popular in Japan. My mom never liked this fermented beans but my father, my sister and I would eat them so my mom has to suffer from the smell. (she hates it especially when she does the dishes). Even though this is smelly item, it is also considered very very healthy item. It is made from soy beans. I wonder how people came up with this. How brave of the first person who ate this smelly fermented beans. Anyway, I buy these in a Japanese grocery store and freeze it so I can defrost them and eat whenever I want to :-)

So, this was my dinner last night. Nothing special for the people who are Japanese but it might be interesting for the people who are not Japanese. These are very simple, healthy and easy Japanese dishes.