Hello, hello.

We like eating cupcakes but we also like to *make* them. I bought a Groupon (one of maybe three I’ve bought my entire life, FYI) for a cupcake class at Butterlane almost a year ago. Finally got to use them when my mom and sister came to town. Cupcake 101 aka Frosting.

The class made three different frostings: vanilla, chocolate and cream cheese and then the head baker, Sunshine, taught us what you can mix into these basic frostings to give them more flavor. It was a short class, next time I would have opted for one a little more longer and more in depth, where you’re measuring the ingredients yourself but it was still fun! And yummy, of course.

Frosting the cupcakes was the fun part although I could NOT get their signature swirl down for the life of me.

I love this picture.

Cupcake anyone?

I love Peels. I won’t deny it. I wrote a love letter to their brunch the other day. And on a weekend late afternoon, sometimes you don’t have to wait for a table at all! We had been walking around all day and our feet were killing us so my mom, Emily and I stopped at Peels for a little smores cupcake I saw in their bake case recently and some iced coffee and iced mochas.

Isn’t she pretty? We had to try. The whole top is a marshmallow basically.

And of course they also have really good iced coffee:

Well, hey there. Busting out the big guns today. Maple and bacon doughnut at Northern Spy Food Co. I know my mom and my sister in Michigan might see that and think, “Ew, gross” but let me be the one to educate you. Savory and sweet together can sometimes be amazing. If you’ve never tried chocolate covered bacon, you should. It’s the same idea here and this maple bacon doughnut was a-mazing.

I went to Northern Spy Food Co for brunch with my homegirl Melissa this weekend. Once we were both there we didn’t have to wait at ALL which was awesome and unusual for a Saturday brunch in the East Village. I will be back.

Melissa had a Cucumber Mint Cooler (Gruner Veltliner, cucumber, mint, lime) and I had a watermelon and basil mimosa.

For eats, Melissa had eggs and polenta:

Kind of looks like a smiley face to me. Also, I like polenta.

Here’s our table from my end. I chose the kale salad with baked eggs:

What a beautiful table and friend.

And then there is me:

Hello.

One more thing you should know: not only is Northern Spy Food Co good at food, they are also good at Twitter. Go forth accordingly.

Ladies and gents, this is Deepen Shah. He’s actually kind of famous, but that’s the only intro you’re getting for now. We went to Chikalicious Dessert Bar this week, which was awesome as it was another place that’s been on my short list for awhile. Walked by it all the time when I lived in the East Village but somehow never found a reason to go there. Until Deep was like, “Do you want ICE CREAM?”

Um… HI the answer is YES. So Chikalicious we went. I’m a little confused about Chikalicious actually… are there two locations? Dessert Club and Chikalicious Dessert Bar? There are two different websites that have very different branding. ANYWAY, we were at the Dessert Club. We thought we needed two desserts (and by we I mean me) so the one Deep has at the top is a sundae with toasted pistachio, chocolate pearls and kataifi – which I can’t even explain. Yumzville.

But what we really came for was the molten lava chocolate cake:

Because how could we not? And there’s a picture of Deep going to town already.

So Chikalicious is pretty good. Also, please tell me you noticed the couple in the background of the picture of Deep. They were making out half the time and it was awesome. And that is my “Happy Friday” gift to you.

Hi, Kelly. Where are you in my life? Oh yeah, probably on a plane some where, flying to other lands for no good reason except just to go.

Well, this photo is from Sundaes and Cones, which I went to for the second time in my life and this was Kelly’s first. I’m not going to lie, it was not half as exciting as the time we went to Milk and Cookies.

This is my tiny scoop of Strawberry Cheesecake, which was pretty good. It’s actually completely absurd of me to get a flavor besides vanilla with chocolate chips. This Strawberry Cheesecake needed some chocolate, so Kelly let me steal a bite or two of hers. Doesn’t the world know that everything is made better with chocolate chips? Strawberry Cheesecake Chocolate Chip probably would have been perfect for me.

Just so you know, Sundaes and Cones has fancy flavors like wasabi, ginger, and corn. Kelly and I both tried the Black Sesame and Kelly and I both made faces. We’ll stick with the classics, please.

I’m not gonna lie, I don’t think I’ve ever done fondue before in my life. Actually, I have a vague memory of doing it once but I can’t remember where I was or why I was doing it. But basically, it would never be my idea. Sure, I love cheese – but that’s what I’m having for dinner? So it was my good friend Stephanie’s birthday and she told us to meet her at Taureau. Taureau has awesome reviews on Yelp, so I was like hey. I also looked at their website and realized it was going to probably cost a million dollars (They have $37 and $57 prix fixe menus) but hey, it’s Stephanie’s birthday!

There were five girlies and we ended up not doing the prixe fixe only ordering two cheeses with vegetables. They keep refilling the vegetables, which is nice. We definitely could have gotten three cheeses, but we didn’t.

We also got one thing of chocolate and fruit for dessert. Oh and it was BYOB! That was nice. Actually the best part was the owner. We had a bottle of champagne for him to open and he said he would open it with a spoon and he made me go outside with him so he could open it in the street and he did! He just hit the bottle with a spoon somehow and the top came off. That was sweet.

And here is me, the birthday girl, and Alanna:

So Taureau was good. Definitely a good fondue experience, one that I would maybe do again. And our bill ended up being pretty cheap since we ordered barely anything. And psst – I have a secret. I got a slice of pizza on my way home! Which is actually kind of gross considering I had just had melted cheese. Yeah…

Ok I lied. This post is not about ice cream. It’s about CRAB!

Last night we went to a crab boil at Back Forty. Oh man. I had never been to a crab boil before and it was so much fun. And a lot of work. You gotta rip these babies apart and hit them with mallets to get to the crabby goodness.

And in the process you’re getting crab everywhere! The woman next to me even set up a napkin wall between us cause I kept getting her. That’s what you get, lady, it’s a crab boil! It’s messy!

Here’s a picture of Kelly because as you can see, we’ve been following each other around everywhere. Or at least to every restaurant in the five boroughs.

And here’s me with a crab I’m about to tear to shreds.

We also had cornbread, and the best potatoes and corn EVER. So delicious.

Did I mention that eating crab like this is a lot of work? Most of the time you’re breaking it apart and using the mallet just to get an iiiiity biiiiity piece of crab, but sometimes you break the crab just right and you get a nice hunk and you’re like, “YES” and then it’s awesome. Also it’s extremely messy. I wanted someone to get a picture of my dirty hands but I didn’t want anyone’s dirty hands on my camera so no dice!

We also had pieces of blueberry cobbler which was pretty delicious as well. Basically, crab boils are legit. So get your newspapers and mallets ready and get going!

I apologize if you do not like oysters because I’ve been featuring them on City Mitten quite a lot lately. And what am I supposed to do? I work full-time for a seafood restaurant and I happen to be thinking about oysters for most of my day. Not to mention, it’s pretty much the only thing that sounds good all the time. If you’ve never tried them, I’m not going to make any promises, because not everyone likes them, but I think they are refreshing and delicious and if you’d like to try them, I’d love to be the one to take you there.

This is my sister’s friend Kelsey trying her first oyster. I don’t think she was *entirely* sold but I was a moron and only ordered enough for everyone to try two. What was I thinking!? They all taste different!

It was also Sambe’s birthday so she got an extra large pudding (did I mention yet that we were at the Mermaid Inn East Village?).

Love it. We had a super early dinner because 1) we didn’t have a reservation so I knew that was our best bet and 2) we were seeing Next to Normal afterward!

If you haven’t seen Next to Normal yet, I really really suggest that you do. I’ve seen it twice now and I just think it’s fantastic. So get some tix!

In other news, you got lots of my sister Samb this week and you might get more of her next week too because I’m headed to Detroit again this weekend for her real birthday party! I’m so excited to see my family. Who knows what we’ll be up to. :)

I told you we went somewhere else for dessert after Motorino. And Momofuku Milk Bar & Bakery it is. David Chang FTW, if you will.

The Milk Bar’s soft serve flavors change all the time. Cereal milk is a standard flavor and right now they also have blueberry muffin, cinnamon bun, and zucchini bread. Soft serve, people. Yes. Nora got zucchini bread and I got blueberry muffin and we both got toasted struesel as a topping and the key is they put it on the top AND the bottom. It’s fabulous and the way things should always be done. Always.

Matty over here got a cereal milk shake with cinnamon bun ice cream I believe:

That’s Matt’s shake face and this is Nora’s soft serve face:

And this picture I just like:

Momofuku Milk Bar & Bakery is known for their milks and soft serves but also for their cookies and cakes and pork buns. Yep! They have this most amazing chocolate chip cake that I was able to try back in the day when they sold it by the slice. Now you have to get the whole thing so I’ll have to wait for a special occasion with special people who will appreciate a cake from Momofuku.

Will it be you?

Motorino is NYC’s latest pizza obsession. Slice loves it. I tried to go a few weeks ago and the wait was too long. But I finally made it to the East Village location with some of my peeps and it was pretty good. This top pizza here is cremini and sweet sausage and we also had margherita (’cause you always have to try the margherita) and stracciatella: which was basil, olive oil, and sea salt. YUM!

Yes. It was all nice. There’s also a Motorino location in Brooklyn, so I’m going to have to check that out.

My pizza-shaped heart still beats for Grimaldi’s though. Just wish that wasn’t always the place with the longest line.

Motorino usually has tiramisu but the night we were there it didn’t set properly or something so we weren’t able to try that. Bummerzville! We went on Nora’s actual birthday and they were accommodating, we got chocolate soft-serve with a candle and they came out and sang happy birthday to her! It wasn’t tiramisu but it still was nice! We ended up getting a *real* dessert somewhere after that but I’m gonna leave that one for tomorrow. ;)