February is the coldest month of the year

YESTERDAY:

It's true. The temperatures have been morbid lately. But despite the weather, Mica and I trudged up to the upper west side to enjoy lunch at Bar Boulud. We took advantaged of the seasonal $24 3-course meal. But us sassy girls each had to get a $14 mimosa and a $4 cup of coffee each, do the math and we pretty much racked up our bill to twice we would've paid for. Oh well, meals at Daniel Boulud's restaurants would only happen twice a year so I guess we were entitled to a little bit of luxury.

We were so full after lunch that we needed to walk it off. Met up with Kendra and we strolled Central Park. It was a cold day but not windy so it was good for walking. We went past strawberry fields to see the small John Lennon memorial.
I've never been to the Bethesda Fountain. The name might not ring a bell but believe me you've seen this in a LOT of movies and TV shows.
We went passed Wollman Rink (Ging, sa Serendipity toh...)
Then we headed back down to the West Village to meet Mica's friend Aisa. I went back to Murray's to get a quarter block of another one of Louiie's cheese recommendations, the Truffle Tremor. It was THE SHIT, btw. I liked this one better than brillat savarin although that was good too. The Truffle Tremor had a flavor that lingered in your mouth long after you've eaten it but not in a bad way. But like the savarin, it was pricey, at $24/lb.

We bought this organic rustic bread (i dunno, Mica chose it) from Amy's Breads and picked up a couple of items from the grocery plus a bottle of Malibu Rum for dinner. We got home and made tomato basil and mozarella bruschettas and garlic anchovy pasta along with a bottle of house red wine from Cipriani where Caitlin (new roommate) works. We proceeded with our planned inebriation by enjoying glasses of Malibu Pineapple as we watched Leap Year and A Knight's Tale in the living room.

TODAY:
I woke up and read Tita Chon's facebook wall message asking me to make cookies for Omar's birthday party on saturday. I immediately got off bed and went out to buy ingredients. I decided to make red velvet cupcakes along with the cookies since Omar loved the ones I gave them for Christmas. I spent the afternoon baking (while watching St. Elmo's Fire, go eighties brat pack!) and could not understand, for the life of me, why my cupcakes would not rise and just looked wrong. I blamed the shortage of flour and vegetable oil for the sorry looking cupcakes. I kept thinking how, having done these for so many times, could I get this one batch wrong. As I was cleaning up and putting my ingredient's back on the shelves, I realized my mistake. In small containers I bought from IKEA, I kept some of my powdered ingredients. What I thought was baking soda had been CORNSTARCH so that's why my damn cakes wouldn't rise! I will make another batch again tomorrow since I just found out today that Omar's guest have risen to 40 children PLUS parents/guardians so I need to have enough for everyone by Saturday.

I went to Queens today to take the Elabdouni's out to dinner. Ate at Enjeline's and had bistek tagalog, chicken adobo, daing na bangus, and kare kare. I also went to the Phil-Am store and scored myself pan de sal, leche flan, lucky me instant sotanghon (I missed these!), plus a bunch of other goodies.

I'm still so full from dinner but the leche flan in the fridge is calling me...let me go answer it.