Eleven Madison Park and Other Restaurants

Well this is it! Six days later and I'm sitting in Jfk Airport finishing off my first leg of my trip and waiting to board my Rio de Janerio bound plane, It's a strange mix of feelings at the moment. It's quite surreal that I'll be leaving the continent to a foreign and new hemisphere for the next six months, excitement to play futbol on the beaches and explore the carioca's (rio locals) lifestyle, and lastly a touch of anxiety not wanting to get lost or worse while I get used to it all!

So thats the future and present, lets finish off the last half of New York. In the last few days I've checked out Brooklyn bridge, MoMa, Top of the Rock and the nice shaded grass area in Madison Square Park. Grass area in a park you might be thinking?? Well I took a fantastic three hour nap after the best meal of my life at Eleven Madison Park. 

Eleven Madison Park - Three Michelin Stars, 4th best restaurant in the world, and I was lucky and scored a reservation! 

Every bit of hype and anticipation I've had built up in anticipation was Far surpassed as the meal was unlike anything I've ever experienced before.

Caviar, Smoked potato sorbet, Potato tuile

From the first bites of Apple cheddar cookie to PERFECT duck breast with roasted rhubarb and shallots to my final nibbles of shaved ice with green apple syrup and compressed apples, everything was brilliant, playful and absolutely delicious. The service was whimsical and well orchestrated, serving up a tableside Waldorf salad as well as having my own mini pretzel picnic.

They knew I was a friend of Charlie and ended up hooking me up with wine pairings to go with my meal. After a glass of champagne, a champagne cocktail, two glasses of white, one red, one beer, and a sip of apple brandy, it was nap time. I stumbled over into a sunbathing area in the park and promptly took a beautiful three hour nap. Woke up and I was still smiling from the meal ;)

My beautful server making the Waldorf Salad

Lavender roasted Duck, the showpiece before carving

Anyway, then I ate at some more restaurants and saw some more sights in the Big Apple. 

Channy

June 30th - John F. Kennedy Airport, New York

First Stop - New York!

After a five hour flight from Seattle I touched down in The Big Apple! Two hours later, baggage in hand I made my way to Washington Heights where I'll be staying for the entire six days with Couchsurfing Host Kevin! After three days of exploring the city and eating at Jungsik, Atera & WD-50, it's safe to say this city is RAD!

Day 1 - Left at 1230am for Seatac, 6am flight to New Jersey, arrive at Kevins' at 515pm EST. 

Jungsik at 745pm,  a two michelin star korean restaurant. It is a unique concept and composed of a nine course tasting menu with an amuse and petit fours. Royal Bibimbap stood out - Pearl barley cooked like risotto, montéd with foie, truffle, kimchi, parmesan and then LIBERALLY shrouded in shaved black truffle. I was quickly identified as a cook because as this dish was being described my face lit up and the waitor quick note of that. Took a few selfies in Times Square after, was aight. 

Not Bibimbap, but oysters, pickles & seaweed

Day 2 - Keste Pizzeria for lunch, it was good but I've had a better pie before! Strolled through the 9/11 Memorial Museum after, quite a somber atmosphere within, brought up a lot of detail I never knew about the attack. Staten island ferry & Wall St. after. Again, nice. 

Dust cloud from Tower Two's collapse

Atera for dinner, two michelin stars under Chef Matthew Lightner. Twenty-Four course tasting menu. Brilliant dinner, probably the best I've ever had in my life. It was playful, beautiful and most importantly, absolutely delicious. Hot smoked trout, Lobster & Meringue, and Rhubarb sorbet stood out among the crowd. 

Rhubarb Sorbet, Rhubarb nitro'd pate de fruit, Liquorice Caramel 

Day 3 - Shake Shack for lunch! Went to the original location in Madison Square Park, essentially a much tastier, glorified McDonald's burger. Took some photos at Grand Central Terminal and on a bike in Central Park during the 30 C, 100% humidty weather. Both nice. 

WD-50. One michelin under Chef Wylie Dufrense for a fourteen course tasting menu. Ended up befriending Jason the attorney to my right who bought me a shot of scotch towards the end of the meal, cheers! Very forward thinking and a ton of modernist techniques at play throughout the meal. Shrimp "grits" and pickled jalepeno was definitely the most flavourful while an egg yolk ravioli with mash potatoes inside and charred chicken liver, compressed melon, pickled pearl onions & melon soda foam being the most modernist. 

Charred Chicken Liver

Silvana's with Kevin, Gotham, Alberto, Gabriella and Tomaro for some New Orleans sooooouuuul music late at night!

Halfway through my time in the Big Apple, and I'm lovin' it thus far :)

Channy

June 26 - B train, somewhere between 72st and 81st, New York City

Pigs, Mudder &, Departure

I love doing things. Small little nitpicking jobs, big ol' hikes, a round at the hive. But my favourite things are big events that take weeks/months to plan for and once executed it feels amazing to have done it.

Pig Roast

Last saturday I had the privilege of cooking for the Brown's First Annual Pig Roast out at their Cabin in Hope. Having two days of prep done already, the big day was mainly focused on getting a beautiful slow roast going.

630am - Start fire, score skin, slather meat with salsa verde, roll, tie, begin roast. 

After a relaxing day of taking care of the fire, finishing off last minute jobs and hanging out with some of my best friends we got to eat! Porchetta, carrot slaw, shredded potato salad, charred corn, grilled stonefruit and carmamelized honey yoghurt. Simple summer food. 

Tough Mudder @ Whistler

My final weekend before my trip was spent up in Whistler with some of my closest friends. A slightly frantic friday morning led to a smooth afternoon ride to our hotel in the village. The energy in the town was amazing, everybody was stoked for mudder and it was an intoxicating environment to be in. Saturday led to a relaxing afternoon at Lost Lake, which isn't exactly the correct name for it considering the two gigantic signs, the road named after it, and the golf course next door.. A quick (and ridiculously cheap) dinner at The Warehouse followed by lounging in the hotel hot tub set the stage for Sunday.

7am wake up. Breakfast. Check out. Drive to Mudder. Sign in. Face paint. Take photos. Get into corrals. Hoo-rah x 25. Start.

Tough Mudder was a rocky, muddy, physically demanding 19km obstacle course. The obstacles themselves were simple and extremely fun. Highlights include destroying Levi during the "Mud Mile" - A series of mud filled slippery trenches, beasting through "Devil's Beard" heavy mesh rope that you have to scurry underneath with Spence and last but not least, the Beer & Protein bar awaiting my arrival at the finish line! Mudder was quite a rewarding race but not for the usual reasons, but because of the energetic sense of community between the mudders and because I was able to cross off another item off my bucketlist with the help of four close friends!

Departure
I leave for my trip in 9.5 hours, first stop in Seattle to catch my flight to New York City. It's such a surreal knowing that I won't be back home in Vancouver anytime soon, trading my Pacific ocean and Rocky mountains for the Atlantic ocean and the Andes. Currently I'm doing laundry, photocopying vital documents, packing my travel backpack, packing everything else into moving boxes and trying to figure out what I'm doing with my life. See ya in NYC!

Channy
June 22&23 - 4429 Sundial Place, Whistler & 142&86b, Surrey

Motorcycles & Mountains

Lets just say its been a busy June so far. Moving back to my parents place for the month while running the final errands has been a push and a half. Almost being ready to walk through the departure gates is a sigh of relief though. Here's what I've been up to lately.

How to Ride a Motorcycle in 6 Days

Monday June 2 - The start of my 6 day motorcycle class. Two days of theory, two days of practice in a parking lot followed by two days of road rides. All of this was done at Pacific Riding School (which I highly recommend) which ended up being a great six days of pure learning. As someone whose never ridden a bike before, It's amazing how powerful of a course this really is and the proof behind that is my new class 6 license! I immediately booked my road test the day after my final day and passed with flying colours :D

My favourite lesson of the 6 days was this one - "Canary Technique" by allowing a car/truck/pedestrian to enter an intersection first, you get to test the waters without putting yourself in harm's way. If there was to be an accident, it wouldn't happen to you but to the Canary thus keeping you safe and sound. Better the little rice rocket next to you than yourself! Almost sadistic in a way.. but whatever keeps you safe!

Mountains & Mountains

The Lions from Mt. Brunswick

I love to go hiking with Josiah. Only when I am not actually on the trail with him though, and that's simply because he is much more fit than I am. This results in a chirpy junior hockey player leagues ahead of me while I'm huffing and puffing behind him. Not that I'm unfit by any means, just that Josiah likes to set a grueling pace which I am then subjected to. We decided to hike The Lions which starts in Lion's Bay.. go figure. Karli decided to join along and off we were, following orange markers and arrow signs. Roughly a hour and a half into the steep hike with Josiah leading, we ended up missing a seriously unfortunately small turn off. Instead of leading us to our intended mountain, we were now in unknown territory however still led by orange markers. Our new trail led us right up a grotesquely congested stream bed, and up Mt. Brunswick. Needless to say we had a pretty quiet lunch when we discovered we were on the wrong mountain.. There were still gorgeous views, but none of us crossed off anything on our bucket list that day..Good times
Then the following week we hiked the Diaz Vistas Trail with a huge group of people. That was nice too.

Josiah & Mt. Brunswick

Channy
June 19 - 142 & 86B, Surrey

The First Half of the Year

Better late than never! I've been wanting to get a post up since about February and eventually kept postponing it again and again until I eventually forgot about it until today, so here we go.

In the last few months I've been keeping life pretty mellow by running the sunrun, completing my first marathon, finishing off my Red Seal, travelling to Portland/Lincoln City, and obtaining my class 5 drivers license.. but we'll just skip all of that and jump to mid May.

After almost two years of being at Hawksworth restaurant downtown Van, it was time to pack my knives up in May and move on. Instead of jumping right back into the flames, I decided to take a year away from the kitchen to immerse myself in new cultures, rediscover what daylight feels like and to simply explore a fraction of what the world has to offer.


Immediately after leaving my job Sunday night I left for a trip across Canada via hitchhiking Monday evening! I made it from Vancouver to Halifax in 4.5 days stopping in Calgary to visit Leah @ Teatro before pushing on. The purpose of the trip was two fold.
1) See the country
2) Get a sick photo of the East coast (seen here http://tinyurl.com/pgywp2d )

I then made a quick stop in Montreal before making it all the way to Sudbury before getting sick of hitchhiking and hopping on a greyhound home bound! Hitchhiking is an interesting form of travel with only negative connotations following it however after 34 rides, meeting 37 new individuals and roughly 8036km on the road, I can say that it trumps all forms of travel in one way.

The people. I rode with people from all walks and shapes of life. Anywhere from Nikki & Alex, two students from Quebec studying in Ottawa,  to Yuri & Petro  who are Ukrainian truck drivers from New Brunswick who taught me basic Ukrainian in Nipigon, Ontario. People like African-Canadian Rejean who went an hour late to work just to give me a tour of Montreal, to Lisan, a 32 year old boilermaker who drives a stick shift 1986 Volkswagon Convertible while smoking cigarettes, drinking coffee, drinking NOS, heat cranked and top down... All while rocking a toque, aviators with a blue and white poncho. The people, conversations, advice, theological debates and straight up laughter were the true highlights of my 11 day bomb across the country.. Montreal is pretty amazing too though.

Then I finally made it home, and within 12 hours went to Guu for some chicken kaarage, packed my life into boxes, moved back to my parents place, and made it back to surrey in time for Arise! ;)

Till next time!
Channy
June 17, 2014 - 142 & 86b, Surrey

P.s follow me on instagram to see all my pictures! @itsnathanchan
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Lisan's legendary Convertible - Just past Canmore