Brooklyn

The New York weather continues to behave perfectly - 23 degrees, sunny and not at all humid. 

We walked past City Hall and across one of America's oldest suspension bridges, Brooklyn Bridge, to an area with the hilarious name of Dumbo.

"We got cake"

I'd read about a couple of places to try for cakes in Dumbo The first was Almondine, whose strapline is 'French pastry without the attitude'. Even though NY's grid system and clearly marked street names usually mean that even someone with no internal gyroscope can get by, I had trouble finding it. I asked for directions in a large pet store but owing to my hilarious accent all the girl heard was "blah blah blah coffee blah blah?". She patiently explained to the cretin in front of her that it was a pet store and they didn't serve coffee.  

We eventually found Almondine and it certainly was French in that there was nothing vegetarian to eat. Luckily there were lots of cake - macarons as everyone is now calling them (I still stick to macaroons, or thanks to a joke dating to a 1990 trip to the Norfolk Broads, Cameroons). 

I ordered two, which in my accent clearly sounds like "one" and got the pistachio. It was delicious - light biscuit with a chewy filling. I also bought a rocher which was like a Ferrero Rocher but much much nicer and not in a pyramid.

Then we crossed the road to Jacques Torres the chocolatier. Sunday 8 May is Mother's Day in the US and Monsieur Jacques had plenty of gift ideas and good advice. 

I bought myself 4oz of "Bark", milk chocolate with caramelised almonds, hazelnuts and pistachios. Bloody delicious and ideal for breakfast.

Jacques Torres was recommended for his ice cream but they only make that during the summer. 23 degrees and a sunhat is frankly my idea of summer but Monsieur Jacques begs to differ. Shame because the queue outside the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory was so long that I had to content myself with a view of Manhattan - very nice, but devoid of cream and sugar.

Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory

My legs were very tired (that's my excuse for getting grumpy) so we got the subway back to Wall St, made pasta and had an early night. Oh, and ate some of that massive handbag cake.