Weekend Cooking- Diane and Brigette's Excellent Birthday Culinary Adventure

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Two of my sisters-in-law and I share a birthday, so whenever we can, we try to get together to share our special day. This year, my husband's sister Brigette came to NYC and we had a whirlwind ten hour adventure, mostly revolving around food.

We started out at the Macy's Flower Show, which is always so much fun. Brigette is an avid gardner (and I nearly flunked leaf identification in college), so I try to pay close attention and learn something. (I'll post about the show this coming week.)

We take the guided tour, and this year we had the same interesting tour guide we had last year. The theme was Carnival, which I had my doubts about, but as usual they did a marvelous job.

A rooster filled with flowers from the Macy's Flower Show

Next we headed for a leisurely lunch at Butter, chef Alex Guarnischelli's restaurant in midtown. Brigette ordered the Marshma llo'Bomber drink, made with chocolate liquer and homemade marshmallows. It was a warm drink, which kind of surprised us both. She enjoyed it.

Then we split a Butter Burger and fries and the Fried Chicken Waldorf Salad. The burger was very tasty, and it came with a side of a cheese sauce that added a nice flavor to the burger. The fries were crisp and hot too.

Butter Burger and Fries

The Fried Chicken Waldorf Salad was interesting- it came with fried chicken strips and on the side were lettuce leaves, each with an apple slice, half of grape and a walnut. The plating was fun, and the dish was wonderful.

Butter Fried Chicken Waldorf Salad

It was off to Eataly, where a cup of gelato was on the menu. I got my traditional pistachio, Brigette had a few scoops of some kind of chocolate. We wandered the store and couldn't resist taking a few photos of their lovely fruits and vegetables displays.

We headed down Fifth Avenue to check out a sandwich shop recommended by my co-workers, Eisenberg's Sandwich Shop, a real old-fashioned shop. The walls are lined with photos of celebrities (Leo DiCaprio, Paul Giamatti, Katie Couric), and there is a long counter with stools that runs along the opposite side. I will definitely make a stop there for lunch someday soon.

Turning down Broadway, we stopped into a few kitchen shops- Whisk and Fishs Eddy, which are always fun to visit and see the cute things I don't have room for in my apartment. We also passed by Maille, which is a shop that only sells Maille mustard. The pretty spring colors caught our attention.

We made it just in time to visit Union Square Greenmarket, and just looking at all of the pretty plants and flowers made us wish for spring to have sprung already.

Our last stop was dinner at Quality Italian, where we met my husband and shared their famous Chicken Parmesan, which is pounded so thin, it is served like a pizza. The nice thing about that is that there is always leftovers for dinner the next night.

Brigette and I walked off some of our dinner as we headed over to the Port Authority Bus Terminal so she could catch her bus. We just missed the three manhole explosions and fire that happened a few hours earlier and still had traffic snarled with all the police and fire trucks there. It was a miracle that no one was injured.