Category Archives: My Favorite Places to Eat

How Can You Not Love New York City?

I like New York City a lot, and although it’s not my favorite city, I do appreciate its amazing museums and grand theaters. I love the neighborhoods that stretch all the way from the Battery to the Bronx and the new Brooklyn, unrecognizable to my wife now who went to Bayridge High School and grew up a stone’s throw from the Verrazano Straights. New York has a busyness to it with its big, broad avenues, and trying to catch the pedestrian lights as you walk so you don’t need to stop and can just zig zag your way from 30th to the park. I love Soho and the Village and always wondered where I would live (probably Soho although the park is stunning). So my question on New York is why is it so ratty in places? London can be patchy and the outskirts of Paris are dreadful, but we are talking downtown New York City. It’s very uneven to me. Fun, but dirty, and even the late-night scene is sketchy.

My favorite restaurant in the city is Esca. I love this place – great seafood, nice wine list, but honestly, it’s stuck in the seediest part of town on 43rd Street and 9th Ave, next to porn shops and dodgy quick bites. It’s weird, New York. The transportation hubs just seem to be seedier than they need to be. Grand Central is a beautiful station but it’s confusing. The shops and kiosks around it are grim. Penn Station is even worse and is surrounded by dodgy hotels. Yet here in the thick of it is Madison Square Garden. Let’s not forget to mention LaGuardia Airport, antiquated and inefficient, with no great transportation link into town. Welcome to New York.

So, yeah, I do like New York for two days, grab an overpriced play and go out to a nice dinner, but in the end, no prejudice, London is just a cooler place.

The Beauty of Sayulita

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What a pleasant surprise to discover that just 45 minutes south of Puerto Vallarta is a cool, laidback, surfer’s town called Sayulita.

Famous for its beach break, Sayulita has a guaranteed supply of mixed level waves, perfect for the amateur and pro together.

It feels that Puerto Vallarta has been attacked by the overdevelopment syndrome, but Sayulita, with its year-round population of around 2,000, has remained relatively unscathed.

It was first discovered in the 1960’s and was (and still is) a surfer’s paradise. The beach is a beautiful, huge crescent shape intersected by a river that seems to emanate from the jungle. Grazing by the river by an old plank bridge are horses and donkeys.

This is a town where the beach is the magnet. The beach is stacked in the center with surfboards, surf shops, and surf schools. You can rent everything from paddle boards to boogie boards. I sat under a very civilized umbrella easily rentable from Don Pedro – a restaurant come beach set-up where you can get fantastic grilled octopus and seared tuna.

Frankly, my idea of fun on a beach is to find a place like Don Pedro that sells umbrellas and lounge chairs and where I can get incredibly fresh and delicious seafood with a drink while watching other people do what I cannot do, namely surf and paddle board! So I watched expert surfers, beginner surfers (who wore beginner’s t-shirts), paddle boarders, body surfers, and just regular splashed types like me. At the far ends of the beach the fishermen and the pelicans went looking for their dinner. I’ve never seen so many pelicans diving in between surfboards in my life.

There are numerous tiny seaside accommodation places and at the end of the beach is a very nice, but not glitzy, hotel called Villa Amor which is where I stayed. Rooms range between $175-$300 per night for a one bedroom in high season. Sayulita is loaded with fantastic restaurants, taquerias, and a whole slew of funky bars that stayed open way after midnight. The crowd was mixed, cool, and very fit looking. Surfers usually are.

I love this place. The tiny shopping streets that stray off of the beach, the groovy restaurants, the mix of locals, old hippies, and newcomers. The beach had a freer feel to it.

If the beach was a spectacular white coral sand beach like the one in Cancun, it would have been ruined years ago with high-rises and packaged tours. This place never got there. A fiercely strong local citizenry protected it and the beach was funky enough to not pull the developers in. One of my favorite shops in Sayulita is Révolucion del Sueño which does an incredible trade with Zapata t-shirts made from beautiful soft cotton. My only tip to travelers who discover this place, don’t tell too many people.

A Morning to Remember in Barcelona

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We got into Barcelona on the Friday along with the commuter traffic but it really was a pretty smooth journey in. There is only one thing to look for when you come in from the airport and that is the Sagrada Familia – now in its 134^th year of restoration and due to finish in 2026. On a side note, I have to say, and I am surprised, that they have not put up a Sagrada Familia in Las Vegas. Let’s face it, if they were to do that it would be done in three months!

But seriously I love Barcelona. I think what I love most about it is that there are no real iconic sites. No major distractions to clog up your day. Yes, there is Gaudi, Parc Güell, the Olympic Village, the Frank Gehry fish in Barceloneta, and Las Ramblas, but it is a city that is just so relaxing because you kind of wander through the neighborhoods without the need to see the Eiffel Tower, Roman Forum, St. Peter’s, the Tower of London, etc. I grabbed a couple of hours sleep, took a bike tour of the city which was an absolute joy (Un Cotxe Menys Bicicletes), hung out a little bit at the beach area (the cleanest city beach in Europe), and walked back through the El Born district and Gothic Quarter. In between, I got lunch at the La Boqueria market and had razor clams and more razor clams (navajas). 03

The Feast of the Jamón

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My daughter recently got married and among the many things that we had to eat, we elected to have a serrano ham on the bone as part of the entertainment. Why the Feast of the Jamón? Jamón serrano is a true cornerstone of Spanish gastronomy. It is a type of cured ham that is generally cut into very thin slices and can be seen at any good tapas bar in Spain.

So the wedding was fabulous and the food was delectable. As I had predicted, the jamón was getting a lot of activity. I have two dear Spanish friends who live in Madrid and were at the wedding. At one point, one of my friends noted that the catering assistant, which the caterer had respectfully provided, was not properly cutting the jamón. He stated, “I cannot take it anymore. I have to give this guy a red card and get him off the job. He’s killing the ham!” (Which was already dead of course). Within 5 minutes, he came back with a bright red t-shirt, and his brother sharpened up the knife but remained in his suit, sending the assistant on his way. The cutting of the ham began in earnest. In quite an extraordinary display of expertise, no matter how many times people came to the ham, because of the thinness of the cut and the way that he moved around the bone, we had ham all night long.

There was only one glitch, someone came up to him and said, “I love prosciutto.” He looked at them appalled and said, quite defiantly, “This is the feast of the jamón and prosciutto is for sandwiches. Jamón is to be consumed with the finest red wine. Prosciutto can be complimented with Coca-Cola!”

I got my ham from LaTienda.com. It was fabulous. If you really want to splash out and pay serious money you can get the jamón iberico but for me, the serrano was fine. Best of all, we all got to see an artist perform for the best part of 3 to 4 hours. Thank god the party went on until the early morning!

I’ve followed up my insiders’ guide to Ashland, Massachusetts, with a tour of my second adopted home-town: Boston!

A lot has changed in Boston over the past few years, (hello, artisan coffee and cheese) but one thing remains the same: this city dominates in athletics. Whether your an superjock or a sensualist, Boston is ready for you!

Don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel for Pietro Place in Boston, Massachusetts and dozens of other video blogs!

Rooftop Dining – New Soho House

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Rooftop Dining – New Soho House

London’s Soho House recently opened its new house on Dean Street and, even though it has an early closing limitation because of the neighbors – yes people actually do live in Soho – it’s a little bit of a jewel in the ever-so-crowded craziness of a Soho evening. It has a small rooftop bar, along with its Greek Street counterpart and the notoriously fun Shoreditch house. It seems like Soho House is heading for rooftop views all over London. Despite the weather it’s kind of cool to look above the chimney tops of London and get a Mary Poppins view of both Old London and the scintillating New London popping up towards the East. Soho House is a private members’ only club and a genuine respite from the madding crowds in post-theater West End. If you happen to know somebody, who knows somebody, who knows somebody, who can take you in there, it’s a great place to hang out. If you don’t know anyone, oh well…

Looking for a special roof outside of London? Other memorable rooftop bars I’ve visited:

Plaza Santa Ana Melia Hotel Rooftop Bar in Madrid (http://www.melia.com/en/hotels/spain/madrid/me-madrid-reina-victoria/the-roof.html),
Berlin Soho House (https://www.sohohouseberlin.com/en/house)
Shoreditch House London (https://www.shoreditchhouse.com/house/rooftop-restaurant)
NuTeras in Istanbul http://www.nuteras.com.tr/,
Les Deli – Cieux in Paris http://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g187147-d3346801-Reviews-Deli_Cieux-Paris_Ile_de_France.html –

Ski Diet Recipes

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Why do people ski in Switzerland? Because if they didn’t, they’d weigh 400 pounds. I’ve taken the liberty of finding some links to my favorite Swiss recipes.

1. Rosti potatoes with fried eggs and ham Eating Well Recipe.

2. Fondue (melted cheese ) with bread and potatoes (photos)

3. Raclette – grilled cheese with potatoes and bread. (=

4. I’m surprised there aren’t cheese doughnuts. Oh wait, upon further research, there are.

They’re called Malakoffs.

Thank goodness I only head to Switzerland on an annual basis – cheese in these quantities is not sustainable for any heart.