6:30pm: We arrive at Quality Meats for Gabrielle’s birthday dinner. We both wanted to try Quality Meats after the recommendations of numerous friends. Plus I feel like with the name Quality Meats the restaurant better be good. Such a New York name; don’t waste time on non-sense just tell me exactly what you serve please. Thank you.

We are seated promptly at a table upstairs. The ambiance of the restaurant is very clean, dark and masculine, which I like. The tables are a little crowded together. Not more so than most restaurants in New York but I expected in an upscale midtown restaurant for the luxury of space. If I am paying $50 for steak I would like to eat it with some breathing room not listening to a couple decide what color they are going to paint their living room.

6:40pm: Our waiters’ name is Josh, maybe a bad omen because it’s the name of one of my sister’s ex-boyfriends. However, this Josh seems very nice if not completely spastic. He talks a mile a minute and he talks a lot. We end up ordering scallops and a salad to start. For our sides we ordered creamed spinach and creamed corn crème brulee, which Josh assured us, is the best side. I wanted something regular like mashed potatoes but being fancy they don’t even have those. Who doesn’t have mashed potatoes? They are my favorite scratch paste. For our main courses I order the special aged bone in filet with bone marrow gratin and Gabrielle ordered the aged bone-in sirloin. Josh calls this the “power porterhouse” because a porterhouse is a filet on one side of the bone and a strip steak on the other. So we both ordered the better version of each steak. As per usual we have won ordering.

7:00pm: The scallops are excellent but they are very teeny tiny and there are only 3 for $19 dollars. My Dad has a theory* that some restaurants who serve you large scallops aren’t actually serving you scallops but they just serve you round pieces of other fish. I doubt this theory but if I believe the theory, I can be comforted that Quality Meat is probably actually serving me scallops because they are too tiny to be fake.

7:30pm: Our giant plates of meat arrive. I feel proud to be an American.

Gabby has the filet in front of her at the moment.

My bone marrow gratin comes in a cut bone. The bone marrow gratin looks similar to lard with herbs on top. I scoop it out of the bone and spread it on top of the steak. The gratin looks like lard. I have now just smeared my fancy steak with fancy lard. Feeling the most American I have ever felt. If only I had killed and butchered this cow myself using a semi-automatic rifle. My steak is amazing though. Probably because I just doused it in extra fat but Gabby’s steak sans bone marrow is also delicious.

The creamed spinach comes in a popover (Yorkshire pudding), which is nice visually, but the spinach gets stuff in the nooks and crannies and I feel like I am mostly eating bread and not eating creamed spinach. Why must you make things so complicated Josh? I just want spinach with cream. I don’t want this disgusting popover, which is arguably the worst bread ever. Is it a gross roll? Is it a disgusting French crawler?

8:45pm: We stumble out of Quality Meats. I am so so full. We unwisely ordered dessert because we ordered coffees and Josh is pushy but it was mistake. It was a very good sticky pudding dessert but now I feel quite sick. I might have been the fancy lard though and not the dessert. Either way I should probably pre-order my juice cleanse for tomorrow.

9:15pm: We arrive in the East Village at Jimmy’s No. 43, for our friends’ monthly comedy variety show, “The Coven.” My friend Michela Ratto hosts the event. She just started doing stand-up. Just in regular conversation she is legitimately one of the funniest people I have ever met. Like painfully snorting soda out of my nose while laughing funny. She's so funny, my abs often hurts when I hang out with Michela because she makes me laugh so much. She is worth coming to see. Also the show is free and most of the other acts in the show are also pretty funny. Jimmy’s 43 is also a pretty cool bar, for being in a basement, they have a nice selection of hard ciders and beers. I sampled a few… for research purposes.

11:00pm: We meet Jimmy of Jimmy’s No. 43. Seems like a solid dude. He also loves Michela. He gives me a free drink of what I am going to call “mystery cider” for being friends with Michela. Michela is actually the best.

*My dad has a lot of theories. None of them are wild conspiracy theories about aliens or the political machine. Most of them are about being people tricking you over everyday mundane things – like coffee not being decaf or that most companies give away your personal information for profit. I believe most of them (not totally sold on the scallop one) because I am also super paranoid. I mean for good reason, has anyone read the news lately?