Let there be light!

If you saw Louisa's comment, you probably figured out that we had lunch at Cookshop over the weekend (on Friday, to be exact), and promptly discovered that they do a salad as well as they do a cookie - and it's a lot easier to take photos when the place is flooded with light.

I started off with the beet salad, which also appears on the dinner menu. Roasted beets, strained yogurt, and grapefruit segments are topped with a generous handful of chervil. (Sidenote: Does anyone know a good, reliable place in Manhattan where chervil is regularly available? I have the hardest time finding it!) This was delicious, if you like beets, which I do (though Louisa does not). The root vegetables and grapefruit are pure winter, but the chervil nods to the coming spring - it's both cool and hearty, tangy and meaty. Big hit.

Louisa's cocktail - also a big hit. It was the Gin Jersey, a combination of gin, Boylan's cherry soda, and mint. Refreshing and so pretty. While the rash of really bad cosmos that swept the city in the early 2000's almost spoiled me for pink cocktails, I can still appreciate the combination of hard-ass and girly that is a spiked blush-colored drink.

I had another (ok, I had two, what can I say) St. Germain Collins, and Nick had an excellent (and very, very strong) Sidecar. I like my friends because they like their cocktails - they have superb taste in booze.

Our second course was full of lunch-y goodness - Louisa had a delicious chicken salad, I had the juicy and thoroughly satisfying steak salad, and Nick had a ridiculously good burger with pickled onions - ALL burgers should have pickled onions. All of them. Every. Last. One.

Finally, dessert, which I enjoyed solo, since Nick and Louisa have given up dessert for Lent, those crazy kids. I had the milk chocolate bread pudding, which comes with a tangy, almost lemony cream which I'm guessing was a buttermilk creme anglaise - cut right through the richness. Loves it.


I'm trying hard to find a bad thing to say about our lunch, a piece of constructive criticism, but I honestly can't think of anything. It might have something to do with the two cocktails, but I was really impressed. Oh, and - they have a $25 prix fixe three course lunch. Go, and go now. Escape from midtown!!!