We're One Year Old Today!

Happy Earth Day! And Happy Birthday to us! One year old. Can you believe it? Does NYC feel more like home a year and 129 posts later? Yes, I can say it does. I know its neighborhoods, its quirks, its activities, what it eats and where it shops a lot better. But we've still got a ways to go. On my wish list for year 2:

• A home--literally: I have a secret I've kept from all of you. I've been a condo/co-op hunting madwoman. As of yesterday, I have seen almost 80 properties in Manhattan in four months. I haven't blogged about it much because frankly I'm too exhausted when I get home from these open houses and a don't have a lot of energy to write, but I promise to share what I've learned in future posts.
  
• A community: I have a patchwork quilt of friendships in this city--a beautiful quilt no doubt with each precious patch from a different part of my life, but a quilt nonetheless. What I'm looking for is a big strong goose down comforter that I can wrap myself up in! Since moving to NYC, I've lost four close friends to relocation, so I always feel I'm starting from scratch with friendships. I'm still dreaming of a "Sex and the City" or "Friends"-type group of close friends but I would settle for a group of people I like hanging out with regularly. So, this year, I pledge to get out there, get more involved and meet more people.
  
• Success: The dream that brought me to this city is still unfulfilled. This is another long, difficult journey I've kept from all of you. But maybe I'll find the courage to write about it. Until I reach my goal (or make peace with not reaching it?), I doubt I'll really be able to give my heart to this place.
  

Just a few thoughts on this anniversary. Now that I look at my list, it seems pretty obvious. Isn't that what everyone wants? But something about NYC makes getting those things harder than it would be elsewhere.

Anyhow, what do you want me to blog about? What do you want to know about my life in the city? About living in NYC in general? Email me or leave me a comment and I'll try my best. Love to all of you.

This NY Moment: Dinner for No Special Reason at Park Avenue Winter

Now This is Winter
City Guy surprised me by taking me to dinner at Park Avenue Winter on Saturday night. There's nothing like getting dressed up and going to a nice restaurant for no particular reason.When we arrived for our 6:30 reservation, the restaurant was still bathed in the warm light of the setting sun, and I struck by how peaceful and beautiful the space was. AvroKo, the celebrated design firm, responsible for making the restaurant over every season, really captured the best things about winter in their 2009 space, with soft grey fur on the wall, matching fur lined throw pillows on leather banquettes, bare branches in glass vases, gossamer white curtains, snakeskin place mats on wooden tables. These photos taken with my camera do not do the space justice.

Almost Perfect Meal
After taking our drink orders, the server came over with an amuse bouche of a potato fritter topped with a dollop of lemon creme fraiche. Crunchy on the outside, moist and warm on the inside. A great beginning. Then came a bread basket with brioche bun, walnut/raisin, pumpkin loaf and flat bread. The first two were very flavorful; the flat bread too hard.

I started with the cured lemon caesar salad; City Guy with the sweet bay scallops appetizer off the special menu. Both superb. The caesar salad had a tart dressing I really enjoyed; the scallops had been seared and covered in a sweet cream sauce--so soft and delicious, they melted in your mouth.

For my main course, I had the miso glazed lobster with clam chowder beurre blanc. The server brings you the split lobster then pours the beurre blanc over the lobster. You can use the toasted mini-baguette to sop up more of the sauce. It also comes with a small onion and arugula salad. This was by far the highlight of the night. Sweet, salty, tender, delicious.

I would highly recommend the potato latkes--crispy on the outside, tender on the inside, served with two kinds of sauces--one was a rosemary sauce; the other, which was tangier, like a yogurt, was my favorite.

Sorry to say, City Guy's filet mignon over braised short rib was dry and flavorless, the nadir of the meal, if you will. Braised short ribs should be moist and the muscle fibers falling off the fork, but this had a consistency closer to pulled pork. Oh well. Perfection is a rare thing.

For dessert, we had to try the Chocolate cube--a box of hard chocolate filled with chocolate mousse with pieces of what I was told was fruit cake (though I didn't taste the fruit ), served with a side of ancho chill chocolate sorbet (okay, not great). If you're a chocoholic like me, you'll enjoy this sugar high. If not, you might find it too sweet. City Guy wished he had ordered the apple pie in a box.

Over the course of the night, the lights were dimmed, and couples and quads of Upper East siders, many of them over fifty and wearing jackets (which surprised us since the restaurant was recently on Gossip Girl), filled very corner of the dining room. The service was okay--not the best or the worst in town--a bit cold--but it did grow more negligent as the room filled. After our main course, it took our server a very long time before checking with us for our dessert order and later, to bring us our check. As Downtowners, we did feel a little out of place, but sometimes it's fun to be a tourist in your own town.

On My Mind: NYC Birthday

Come to think of it, this isn't a great city for a Pisces...
Guess who's got a birthday coming up? Yes indeed. Your favorite Girl Next Door Piscean. For those of you unfamiliar with the Piscean personality, a quick search of "Pisces" on Google produces the following:

pros: creative, artistic, poet, dreamer, sympathetic, compassionate, intuitive, sensitive, selfless, kind, old soul, emotional
cons: escapist, idealistic, weak-willed, secretive, vague, daydreamer, passive, melancholic

Sound like me? Should someone fitting the above description live in NYC? You be the judge.

I don't know how much I believe in astrology. I used to read Susan Miller's Astrology Zone to give me that extra push every month (Ah! The new moon promises a financial windfall - got to be on the look out for that). But I grew disillusioned when they consistently got things wrong (No financial windfall. The wind, however, did knock me off my feet...?), but I still leave room for doubt. I got my chart done once, and it was uncannily specific and accurate.

It's No Party
Anyhow, I've always had trouble with birthdays. I think I'll know that I really feel at home in NYC when I have the guts to throw a big birthday party.

I guess I don't quite trust that my friends in the city would show up. Horrible thing to say, but people disappoint all the time, and I just don't know which of my friends in the City would drop everything to have dinner with me on my birthday. Funny thing, I had dinner with another Piscean, Book Babe, recently, and she admitted the same fear of being the birthday girl with no birthday guests. I think my nostalgia for LA is partly to do with my nostalgia for my friendships there--I had great parties then.

One Perfect Day
So, what will I do? Well, City Guy always makes it special. :) Roses, cakes, present, fancy schmancy dinner--the works. He always gets me a cake from Black Hound Bakery (my favorite, the Choc Choc Mousse Heart Cake is pictured above). This year, he's taking me to one of Frank Bruni's four star restaurants - not saying which until I blog about it after the fact, but there's only five (and he took me to Le Bernardin last year), so your odds are 1 in 4.

My birthday falls on a Tuesday, and City Guy will be at work for most of the day, so how will I spend the day? Last year, my birthday fell on a Monday - crappy day for a birthday - but I had a lovely day. I planned it all out. I wanted to relax and indulge all my senses, so I got a massage at Oasis Day Spa, treated myself to a warm chocolate chip cookie at Jacques Torres, bought myself a small gift of a fragrant Tocca candle ("Stella" was the scent) from Bigelow Chemists and ate lunch in K-town at one of my favorite down-home Korean restaurants.

I'm not sure what I'll do this year. Maybe a repeat of last year? I feel less hopeful and less solvent this year, so I don't know, but I do know this--I've got to get out of my apartment. With the snow days and the freezing temperatures, you know I've been hunkered down a lot lately.

Birthday Wish
In any case, dear reader, you can make one of my birthday wishes come true by leaving a birthday wish or a simple "hey hey hey" for me on the comments thread for this post. I hardly ever get comments--is that because I'm writing this blog anonymously? Or some other reason--so that would really make my day. If I don't get any comments, I'll know a> no one read this post, b> everyone who reads my blog is shy or c> it's a good thing I didn't throw that party.

Great Find: Broadway Dance Center

It's a new year--actually, if you're following the lunar calendar, today is New Year's Day. So happy new year. I love the "new" in new year because it's an opportunity to change my life for the better. Yes, I know, every moment can be a new beginning, today is the start of the rest of your life, blah blah, but there's something about having a clean slate that gives you that extra incentive to break the inertia.

In my life, I have this little list of not-quite-resolutions, i.e., things I'd like to attend to someday when other priorities in my life don't cut in line. Taking a dance class has been on that list for many years. I never missed a dance in high school or college, in my single days, I loved clubbing, and weddings, to me, are really an excuse for buttoned-up adults to let loose on the dance floor (thus, the popularity of the conga line.) I always assumed I was a pretty good dancer, but as I got older, I realized I didn't dance very often. When I did dance, I felt more self-conscious. I couldn't move like I used to. I felt like the tin man from Oz, and that's not very sexy.

NYC is THE dance capital of the country, and dance classes abound. So what, then, has held me back? The vision of my uncoordinated self flailing in a sea of perfectly svelte and graceful aspiring Broadway dancers--that's what. I'd researched and bookmarked some of the top studios in town years ago--Broadway Dance and Dance New Amsterdam, for example--but I'd always been suspect of how truly "beginner" the beginner classes were. Did "beginner" mean "I'm a professional ballerina, but have never taken hip-hop" or "I haven't taken a dance class since I was eight." (me)?

Which is why I was so overjoyed to find Broadway Dance's Absolute Beginner Workshops:

A tradition started in 1993, The Absolute Beginner Workshop offers introductory instruction in the beautifully diverse styles of dance — for ADULTS ONLY! This exceptional program will ignite your passion and spirit for dance. If you have always wanted to dance or dreamed of dancing, these workshops are created just for you!

They read my mind, I thought. Still doubtful, I had called to confirm that adults who haven't danced since they were eight years old were the core audience for this class, and the girl on the phone had assured me it was so.

Long story short, I've been taking a ten-week Hip-Hop workshop. I've had three classes so far, and it's exactly what I was looking for. The studios and facilities are immaculate and modern. I love getting there a little early and walking through the halls and watching the other classes in session through the glass windows. Very inspiring.

The class moves at a swift, but manageable pace, which means it doesn't coddle you but it's not leaving you in the dust. There are about 25 people in the class, and I love my instructor (Chio). You start with warm ups, do some basic moves, then work on a routine. You definitely sweat. After my first class, I was sore for days, but my body's getting used to moving in these strange new ways, so now I'm not sore at all. I think you have to be wiling to look like a fool in order to take this class, especially if you haven't had a lot of dance experience, but if you just focus on the instructor and keep telling yourself you can practice the moves later (i.e., your flailing is only temporary)--you'll enjoy yourself. It's so much fun, especially when you start to move like a real dancer.

When I get home from class, I do my routines for City Guy. He laughs and says I don't look very scary yet, but you just wait - seven weeks from now, I'll be fierce, yo!

New Perspective: Small Apartment Insecurity & Entertaining

This photo ("borrowed" from NYT.com) of NY Times food writer Mark Bittman in his home kitchen made my day. As one of countless Manhattanites who suffer from what I like to call "small apartment insecurity," I thought here's one of us! And he's not ashamed to show the world he's got a small one...kitchen, that is.

I particular loved the discussion that this photo generated on the NYT site. Some were surprised that such a venerable food expert would be cooking in such a small, low on frills kitchen, but other astute commenters reasoned that the people with lavish kitchens are the very ones who order in all the time.

City Guy and I hardly ever entertain in our 555 square feet (68 of that a nice-sized kitchen) studio apartment and we never have overnight guests. That's more space than a lot of people in NYC have (and we have lovely high ceilings!), and it's all we need for the two of us. When I moved in with City Guy a year and a half ago, I thought we'd end up killing each other living in a studio, but now I think when we get around to buying our 1 or 2 bedroom condo, I'm going to miss the intimacy of always being in the same room as my husband. It's also easy to keep neat and clean, and we like that manageability.

That said, when it comes to having people over, "When we move..." is my mantra. When we move, I'll have dinner parties. When we move, my mother-in-law can visit. When we move, my friends will drop in at all hours.

Maybe Manhattan's thriving food culture is fed by legions of people just like us, who'd rather meet up with friends at a restaurant than invite people over to their little apartments?

The NY Times also had another great article about how couples are choosing to raise their kids in smaller apartments, just so they can stay in Manhattan. I completely relate to this love of Manhattan. The lure of more square footage is strong, to be sure, but I can also see making do in Manhattan at least until our kids (just theoretical at this point) reach an age when they need their privacy. It's an interesting dilemma, one that my friends in California just can't relate to--i.e., we live in an apartment the size of most of their guest houses.

The truth is I love that in NYC people do with smaller and less. In the "green" revolution, the rest of the world should be taking a cue from us. We use less electricity, take up less space, have a smaller impact on the environment.

So why such shame? Because more square footage and designer furniture signals money and status? Because in the rest of the country, living in 555 square feet seems down right third-world. Sure, but shouldn't I trust my friends to like me for me, not the size of my apartment?

Which is why I took a big step on Monday. I invited Funny Dude (I've known for almost ten years now, he's been to our place before, and he lives in a small apartment himself --figured he'd be most forgiving) over and cooked dinner for him. I cook for City Guy almost every night, but somehow cooking for someone else really made me nervous. I planned the meal in advance, shopped for ingredients and stressed about the preparation. The food didn't turn out as tasty as I had hoped, and it was an hour late getting to the table, but it was nice to have someone over, and I hope he'll forgive me for being such a disastrous hostess. It was my first time. No shame in that, right?

The upshot is it felt good. It's a small step on my road to recovery, and I hope I'm brave enough to keep do it again.

P.S. If you are suffering from "small apartment insecurity," the entries in Apartment Therapy's annual Small Cool Apartment Contest will inspire you. All entries are under 850 square feet.

NYC Rant: Late Night Weekend Subway Service Sucks

I've been busy this week and only now getting around to blogging about the weekend. Let's start with the helluva time I had getting home on Sunday night.

The night was going well. I had dinner with a friend visiting from LA, let's call her Ms. Merlot, and a friend of hers at Shabu Tatsu, one my all-time favorite places to eat in the city. We then caught a 9:15 showing of Nick & Nora's Infinite Playlist with a couple hundred NYU students in Union Square. Not necessarily my first choice for cinema, but a fun, brainless movie that fit the bill for a girls' night out. My two companions were thrilled to play "spot the NYC landmark" throughout the film, which is about a couple high schoolers falling in love as they hunt for a lost friend and a secret rock show in the city.

Anyhow, after the movie let out, around 11 pm, it took me an HOUR to get home to the Financial District. Let me explain my journey.

1. First I try taking the R/W . I wait a few minutes, but realizing something is weird, check the little route signs. It turns out those lines stop running after 11 on the weekends--Sunday included.
2. Bummed, I walk over to the L, but I just miss my train, and the LCD signs tell me the next train isn't coming for 23 minutes!
3. I go back to the R/W platform, thinking I'll ride to Canal and transfer to the J/M/Z.
   
4. I get to Canal Street, and it turns out the J/M/Z is not running late on Sundays. At this point, I think why don't I just take a cab home, but the stubborn fool I am, I have one last idea.
   
5. I decide to walk out along Canal, all the way to the 1 stop past West Broadway. That walk is soooo long! And creepy and not very well-lit. I decide Canal Street is one of few streets in Manhattan I don't feel safe walking on alone at night. I'm completely freaked out, afraid of being kidnapped or assaulted. I wear my down winter jacket, even though it's 68 degrees out, to cover up "the girls."
   
6. Finally, I get to the 1 station on Canal. But guess what? The 3 is running on the 1 track! Gosh darn it!
   
7. So I ride the 3 to Wall St and walk 10 minutes home. Thank god for the armed security men in the Financial District. They make me feel safe.
   

Ugh. I know. I should have just taken a cab home, but it just gets me that a cab home from Union Square costs me $12-15 with tip. At any rate, the MTA is completely unreliable south of Canal Street on the weekends. Also, their trains are also really screechy and probably causing hearing loss. Where is all my fare money going?

Real Estate: Open House Post-Mortem

Yesterday afternoon, City Guy and I spent four hours traipsing around in the hot, humid weather to visit SEVEN buildings in the FiDi. Fun, but exhausting. I have mixed feelings about buying after all this. Things I've learned:

• It's going to be hard to get everything we want. We'd ideally want a 2 bedroom or 1 bedroom with home office (that we could convert into a nursery down the road), but even in this market, we're looking at a million (maybe $800-900K if we're willing to give up certain things, like location or amenities).
  
• Based on running the numbers in a handy dandy mortgage calculator, based on what we're paying for rent right now between the two of us (on the low side), buying doesn't make financial sense, even with the tax savings. However, the minute we compare the cost of renting a two-bedroom to the cost of buying a $850K place, for instance, we can justify the expense.
  
• I feel poor. When you go to these open houses, you see the same faces over and over...there are a lot of bankers with a lot of money still buying in this market and they don't seem to blink at the prices.
  
• We're going to start considering Brooklyn. The Williamsburg waterfront developments, for instance, would satisfy my jonesing for a water-view and the units are bigger for the money. Check out The Edge.
  
• Even with the glut of condos in the area, developers are planning even more. 50 West St is scheduled to open in June 2010, for example.
  
• There's no rush. Like with everything else in life, I must be patient.
• If we buy, we might have to stay in NYC for the next 5 to 7 years.
  
• We need a good mortgage broker.
  
• We need a good real estate attorney.
• NYC real estate is no joke.
  

Real estate is vexingly on my brain. I've already scheduled three appointments for next weekend. We're going to check out The Edge, Northside Piers and the beautiful green condo development in Battery Park City, Visionaire. Wish us luck!

On My Mind: Why I Came to NYC and How I Made It My Enemy

So, here's my confession. Friends who've heard my latest theory, bear with me, but today, I'm feeling this to be especially true. I'm starting to believe my dissatisfaction with my life here in NYC is due to the fact that I still haven't achieved the goal I set out for myself when moving to NYC. I wonder if this is the case with other transplants who never quite settle in here. Don't most of us move here with a dream? And how many achieve it? How many let it go? How many can't live with letting it go and leave?

Without giving away too much , I'll say that I moved here for graduate school in the arts, and the idea was that I would not leave until I made it in my chosen field of art. In every field of art, there is a point at which you know you're legit, when you can go to a party, meet some strangers, and when they say "What do you do?" answer, "I'm an artist" and know you've got the goods to back it up. And what better city to become an artist than NYC, the birth place of so many of the world's most revered artists?

I'm close, but still no moose head. And being close never got anyone any respect. The closer I get, the more impatient I get, and when I'm all tangled up in my dissatisfied energy, I think maybe I'm just not happy because in some part of my brain, I think this city is a taskmaster who is keeping me from my dream. I know it's irrational, but I associate NYC with this grand dream that brought me here, with all the hard work, rejection and suffering I've felt because of it, and sometimes I blame the City for keeping the bar so high, and making it so hard to achieve. Because the thing at the core of my life here is unfulfilled, it's hard for me to look with love upon the things that surround the core. And so, until I conquer the city by making my dream come true, I don't know if I'll ever be content living here.

I fantasize that when I do achieve this dream, the city will suddenly transform. All the rats will turn into footmen and the taxis into carriages, and so on...I guess I won't know until I get there.

Stuff I've Learned: How to Pass for a Native New Yorker

Came across a couple of articles on the Interwebs today that I thought you'd find either apt, incensing or hysterical. They happen to be at NYPost.com. BTW, I never read the NY Post, even when they pass them out in the mornings for free. Is reading the Post one of those things only natives do? But I digress.

How to Pass for a Native New Yorker is a profile of the Magic Garden, a party you can't get into unless you can prove--by answering a battery of tricky questions--that you were raised in NYC. The woman who organizes the event is quoted as saying,"New Yorkers have this reputation of being cold and pushy. But it's really only the people who move here from somewhere else who act that way." Nice theory...might be true. Come to think of it, I don't know a lot of born and bred New Yorkers.

The article goes on to say, "Schneider, ...started the Magic Garden in 2001 to build connections among locals in a city overflowing with transplants from across the country." Is that a little xenophobia I smell? Still, the idea of a reconnecting with old classmates and kids from the neighborhood is nice. You know what they say about wanting to be a part of a club that doesn't want you as a member. Now, I'm intrigued. Could we transplants start our own exclusive party? You get in not by proving you went to my high school, but by proving you're lost, lonely and bewildered--together, we could figure out why we're all so "cold and pushy."

If you're trying to pass for a native New Yorker, you could follow these words of advice. I'm no judge of what's native, but these tips seem pretty accurate. Though they do give the impression that our city's full of impatient assholes, don't they?

What do you think makes a person "native"? The way you dress? How fast you talk? Your level of snarkiness? How unphased you are by puppies, babies and Hallmark ads? How you don't think twice about walking ten blocks in heels? Your strong calves and ugly feet? I'll think on this if you do.

P.S. OMG. Our work is done. Check it out. Time Out NY's take on this is brilliant.

On My Mind: What Makes a Home?

In light of the stated mission of this blog, I was wondering. Is there a checklist of things that make a city feel like home? I thought about other cities I've called home and what made them so and came up with this little list. What do you think?

• Knowing where to find what you need--whatever it is--a good massage, a great formal gown, low-priced cheeses, vintage records, party favors... [great finds]
  
• An intimate knowledge of your neighborhood and a working knowledge of other parts of the city [street-by-street, cool spaces]
  
• Knowing how to get around most efficiently. In LA, this meant knowing what freeways got you from point A to B most quickly; in NYC, it's knowing what subway lines get you from point A to B most quickly, with the fewest transfers, or avoiding crowds. [stuff i've learned]
  
• Food--a handful of places where the staff recognize you when you show up; a few gems no one knows about but you (or so it seems) [great finds]
  
• Friendly faces, friends and a sense of community...b/c if no one in the entire city cares if you live or die, you're no better off than the woman who dies and gets eaten by her cats [people]
  
• A house or apartment you like living in. Can you really feel at home in a city if you're living in digs you can't stand? If you dread going home, the city can't feel like home. [cool spaces]
  
• Having coping strategies--how to minimize your exposure to bad weather, how to avoid crowds, how to avoid traffic, when to show up to X theater to get good seats for movie opening this weekend, when and where to buy tix for Y festival before all seats are sold out. [stuff i've learned]
• An appreciation of the quirky, unique facets of the city's culture [have you noticed...?, only in new york, gotta love it]
  

I figure now that I have a list, I can systematically work towards making this city feel like home. You'll notice I'm using subheaders to introduce some of my posts. I'll use them so you know when I'm covering these various "home requirements"--like Street-by-Street (a detailed walking exploration of neighborhoods), Great Find, People, Cool Spaces (architecture, real estate, urban landscape), Nature in the City, Happenings...I fully expect my definition of "home" will evolve with time, experience and your input, but I'm excited to see where this little experiment takes us. Until next time...

Happenings: Tribeca Film Festival - Part 2

I watched my second film at the Tribeca Film Festival today--"Sita Sings the Blues." A gorgeous, smart, layered, romantic, tragic, funny modern animated version of the Indian legend of Rama and Sita and their complicated romance (at least from Sita's POV).

The filmmaker, Nina Paley, is one of those humble artistic geniuses that you love and envy all at once. She's a one woman production team, and it took her 5 years to do this film with multiple animation styles from comic strip to Mughal art to cut out animation to shadow puppetry. When Sita "sings" the blues, we are actually hearing little-known blues singer Annette Henshaw's 1920's recordings. The music is just lovely and I wish I could buy the soundtrack. Hell, I wish I could buy the entire movie.

It was a Friday matinée and much more crowded than yesterday when the theater was half filled with elderly couples, elderly mothers with their film geek sons, and loners with their backpacks. Today's film was shown in a much larger theater and filled almost seat for seat with a great cross-section of people (Indians were well-represented, of course) at 3 pm.

Nina Paley and her cast and crew graciously answered questions afterwards. "The Internet's been good to me," she said at one point. Paley helped fund the project from anonymous donations from people who read her blog.The film does not yet have distribution, and apparently people always ask Nina if she plans to show the movie in India, but it's a tricky thing b/c Hindu's might be offended by the portrayal of the god Rama.

Great Find: Ibiza Kids

A friend of mine had a baby last month, and I've been putting off buying a baby gift b/c I didn't want to do the easy and generic thing and just go to Baby Gap or Babies R Us. I've always known there are a number of these beautiful little baby gift boutiques around NYC, but never really took note. Yesterday, I found Ibiza Kids on 4th Ave, betweeen 10th and 11th st.

You could easily pass this place by, as it's on a less trafficked part of the Astor Place area, but it's a great source for lovely, unique baby clothes, shoes, toys. They sell fairy wings for girls and the most stylish little shoes and of course, sassy little onesies, like the one I purchased. Isn't this a riot? It's very 2008, don't you think? When my friend's son gets older, if they keep this onesie around, it can be something they can laugh about.

Great Find: East Village Cheese

Yesterday, while killing time before the screening of "Playing" at the Tribeca Film Festival, I wandered into East Village Cheese on 3rd Ave, just south of 10th for the first time. I found to my delight a small, unpretentious store (they advertise their specials on butcher paper stuck to the storefront window, as seen here) stocked full of inexpensive, high quality cheeses, first and foremost, but also olives, baguettes, imported cookies, drinks, crackers. Just to give you an idea of how good their prices are, a pound of brie cost me $1.50, whereas it's $3.50 at Zeytuna, and $4.00 for a pound of mozerella (vs. $9+ at Whole Foods). I guess I've found a new favorite gourmet food store.