Taking A Bite Out of The Big Apple

Just had a taste of the most amazing apple ever at the Farmer's Market this Tuesday in the SF Ferry Building. It's a varietal I'd never heard of before called Arkansas Black. It's skin was the deepest burgundy so saturated in it's natural red pigment that every bite stained my lips. The meat of the apple was incredibly crisp with a juicy tart sweetness that made me gobble the thing up with a voracity usually reserved for the best chocolate gelato (a food I can never eat with any restraint). I wish I had taken a picture of it before I scarfed it down. It was so beautiful!

Enjoying the Arkansas Black reminded me of another amazing apple that I had experienced recently: New York City aka "The Big Apple".


View of Columbus Circle from Bouchon Cafe and Bakery


Fall in NY. There's no better time to be there. Manhattan is beautiful in late September, early October. The weather is warm without being muggy. Everything is still in full bloom on the streets & in Central Park. The softening light of autumn casts a golden hue over the city gilding every tree and building top; an effect not evident in the harsh light of summer or the white pall cast by the winter sun. Spring is great, too. The budding blooms and all that; but, I prefer the autumn just as the leaves of all the city trees begin their glorious show. You'd be surprised how leafy & almost sylvan New York streets are; particularly when compared to San Francisco which sadly has the fewest trees of any urban city in the country.

We went with another couple (the men on business, the ladies also on business: the business of fun-seeking, a serious endeavor in the pleasuredome that is Manhattan!). We stayed at Ian Schrager's newly-refurbished Gramercy Park Hotel in the fabulous Gramercy/Flatiron District of Manhattan. We ate at some exalted restaurants & some less exalted ones. I really need a few more posts to do the trip justice and will do so by ending now and picking up the thread in my next few postings. I just wanted to get the process started & now I have. More to come...