I decided on my way home from Madrid that I hadn’t eaten enough good food so I needed to stop in New York for a quick 15ish hour layover.
First stop was to get the newly trending huge soup dumpling from Drunken Dumpling. The real name for this large and in charge dumpling is the XL XLB; extra large xiao long bao. It is a soup dumpling filled with crab, scallops, shrimp and pork. First question I would assume is coming to mind is how do you consume this beast? You start by setting the steamer basket on top of a bowl, then you put your straw in the bun and drinks some of the hot delicious liquid, then you use a fork to eat the bun and filling, and finally you then drink the soup that has dropped in to the bowl below. The end. We also enjoyed pork soup dumplings, because who could ever have too many soup dumplings in one meal?
Next stop was beers at Drop Off Service to catch up on life. Next we needed an appetizer before dinner so we headed to Feltman’s where I had a chilli cheese dog that was seriously awesome and Caitlin had a dog with sauerkraut. The consistency of the chili was key; not too loose so I could consume it without a fork and just pick the dog up!
We then decided we needed more drinks to help digest the appetizer and headed to The Vig Bar for cocktails before heading finally to dinner at Uncle Boons. My advice to anyone going is to not miss the Khao Soi Kaa Kai, seriously heaven—basically Thai Chicken noodle soup, but a ton better.
So much good food in too little of time! I was on a flight home the next morning at 7 am and headed into the office. Did I regret my quick trip decision when my alarm went off at 5 am? No way, all of this food was worth it!
New York, I will be back soon!
