The (mostly) liquid edition
Four out of five of these things are drinkable, and I won’t tell you *not* to Vitamix your cookies
Rose lychee black tea at Sun’s Organic Garden
79 Bayard Street, Ground Floor, New York, NY 10013
A visit to Sun’s Organic Garden feels like stepping into a magical apothecary. Endless plastic jars of dried flowers and leaves line the walls of this snug shop. It’s worth stopping by even if you’re not a tea drinker (blasphemy!), if only to read the labels on some of the containers. A plastic tub near the entrance advertises “Harry Potter tea,” and in smaller, Sharpie-d words on the masking tape label, it promises “hallucinogenic” properties. A whole rickety shelf near the cashier is stocked with certain physical-enhancements, including “Indian Viagra,” which is apparently very popular, as there’s only an inch or so left of white dust in the bin. (The saleslady, a young woman, confirmed that she often saw middle-aged men buy the substance.) Me, I stick to the teas, especially the oolong and flavored black teas. The rose lychee black tea smells divine and tastes pure and sweet, no milk or sugar needed.
Organic carrot juice at… everywhere
You can buy this at your local Trader Joe’s
Friends, it turns out that carrot juice is… really really good? I know, I know. You come here for the fun bakes and the bar stories and the cozy restaurants but this week you’re getting CARROT JUICE, because I’m hopelessly addicted to it. Seriously, I made a special trip to Trader Joe’s on the way home just because I needed to drink more carrot juice with my dinner. How do I describe this to you. Hmm, carrot juice tastes like only the good parts of carrots and none of the bad parts, like chewing. It also has a mouthfeel that reminds me of chocolate milk?? The reason it’s so good is probably because it has a ton of sugar in it, but, hey, it’s a vegetable! And if you’re bored, I bet it’d be great as a mixer with gin or tequila.
Perfectly puffy chocolate chip cookies at my kitchen
Kids, try this at home!
I meant to eat a healthy dinner — I really did — but I had cookie dough chilling in the fridge, and it just made sense to pop them in the oven while I was showering. When I pulled the tray out of the oven, 12 minutes later, I found myself staring at a sheet of the most perfectly puffy-soft chocolate chip cookies I had ever seen. My usual jam is crispy-chewy-crinkly flat cookies, but these perfectly round specimens, lightly browned on the bottom and soft and pillowy-moist throughout, made me rethink my preferences. That's how dinner ended up being warm chocolate chip cookies and a bottle of carrot juice. Better luck next time, I suppose. You can find the recipe, which uses coconut oil instead of butter, online at Gimme Some Oven. Make sure to roll and chill the dough a few hours in advance (I know, I know).
Hot whiskey punch at the Dead Rabbit
30 Water St, New York, NY 10004
The Dead Rabbit proudly calls itself “the World’s Best Bar.” Anyone who’s lived in New York City for a period of time knows not to trust establishments that claim itself to be the world’s best in anything, as evidenced by the dollar slice pizza shops on every block. That being said, it’s a pretty damn great bar. I can only vouch for the ground floor (there’s a fancier cocktail establishment upstairs that I now really want to try), which has a warm, bustling, authentic Irish pub vibe* according to my research, which was a trip to Dublin two years ago. The Dead Rabbit is famous for its Irish Coffee — which is very very good — but because I cannot be trusted with coffee, I prefer the whiskey punch, which is basically a fancied-up hot toddy, the absolute perfect drink for a blustering January afternoon.
*That vibe unfortunately comes with a drunk middle-aged man who wants to take selfies with you and keeps saying things like “I don’t mean to offend,” while looking only at your male friend but implying you, and you keep waiting for him to say something about Asian people because hold my beer I will toss it in your face, so you hold your breath for the whole drunken invasion even though it turns out the thing he thinks will offend you is merely the f-word, and you are left feeling less relieved than you thought you would be.
Iced matcha latte with oatmilk at Chalait
299 W Houston St, New York, NY 10014
My preferred way of consuming matcha is minimalist — shaken, not stirred, with ice. But some sleepy afternoons in the office call for more indulgent forms of caffeine consumption. The matcha used at Chalait is pretty decent, nowhere as good as my beloved Ippodo, but a solid choice for a 10 minute walk from the office. When mixed with creamy oat milk and a splash of simple syrup it’s reminiscent of a milkshake. I’m not sure how much of this is just a vehicle for creamy oat milk and sugar and how much counts as an afternoon pick-me-up, but journalists can have a little matcha as a treat sometimes.