7:00pm: Drinking Sancerre at my apartment with my NYC native and fellow wine lover, Exie. If you don’t drink Sancerre you should start. It’s the white wine that’ll make you like white wine. I literally found an WSJ article about why everyone likes it. It’s a really bangin sauvignon blanc grown in one specific region in France, Sancerre, located near the Loire Valley. It’s usually like $15+, so not an everyday wine, but sometimes you gotta treat yourself. I am in mourning for the end of summer. RIP summer. I am not ready for autumn. I like pumpkin muffins as much as the next person but they are not worth the price of cold weather. And realistically, pumpkin comes in a can guys, you know you can eat it anytime of the year… #nobasic

Pumpkin Spice lattes are just a pound of sugar and cinnamon everyone. You like them because a tall has 39 grams of sugar.

7:30pm: We meet up with Anne & Katie at the Mulberry Project in Little Italy. My friend Jose is the bartender there. Mulberry Project is known for their “bespoke” cocktails. Basically you tell the bartender what kind of base alcohol and what flavors you like (citrus, spice, berries) and they make you a cocktail. I can’t speak for any of the other bartenders but Jose is a booze wizard. His drinks are always on point. I ask for something with bourbon and he makes a blackberry bourbon slushy with angostura bitters. Yes please! My friend Anne wants a vodka soda and gets the nicest vodka soda ever: fresh mint, earl grey bitters, and fresh lemon.

Big fan of Mulberry Project, although it’s on the pricier side. The drinks are $15 each but they are always strong and delicious with fresh ingredients and top shelf liquor. Here you feel like you’re getting something for your money. Go Monday-Wednesday to see mix master Jose.

Jose & Anne at Mulberry Project. Photo courtesy of Katie Jagel.

9:30pm: Anne, Exie & I head to Uncle Boons, an upscale Thai restaurant in the Nolita. I have tried to go here three different times in the past year, but the wait has always been an hour. Even at 9:30 on a Tuesday there is a ten-minute wait. Luckily there are 3 seats at the bar. The décor is kitsch with a faux wood barrel with tiki men carved into it behind the bar. I order the Bolan because it’s the only bourbon/whiskey based cocktail on the menu. It’s Jasmine Tea Bourbon, Lemongrass and angostura bitter. Basically a Thai influenced old fashioned. It’s good, but super strong. I wasn’t trying to get turnt before dinner but OH WELL. What’s done is done and that is me…

9:40pm: For dinner, I order the Kai Yang Muay Thai, rotisserie chicken with green mango salad and sticky rice. The food arrives quickly. I am thankful, at this point I am ravenous. My chicken is moist and delicious. It’s sort of surprising how hard it is to find good chicken. Most restaurants overcook it till it tastes like Styrofoam with salt. I sample Exie’s and Anne’s dishes and they’re both delicious as well. I can see why this place always has a wait. The only thing that was underwhelming was the sticky rice because it was pretty bland and it came served in plastic. I know a lot of Asian restaurants serve it this way to keep in the moisture but I still find it off putting. Another negative- they don’ t have coconut sticky rice on the menu which is my absolute favorite. Like sticky rice is fine but coconut sticky rice is orgasmic. Have you eaten it? Eat it. You’ll rethink rice.

Rotisserie Chicken image from the Uncle Boon's Website.

10:50pm: We meet back up with Katie at Kingston Hall in the East Village. Kingston Hall, a Jamaican themed bar, is one of my favorite bars that happens to be above one of my least favorite bars, the 13th Step AKA bro city USA. Kingston Hall is a bit of little hidden because you have to walk up the second story. I liked Kingston Hall for three reasons.

They have a great 2 for 1 happy hour until 8pm on all Beer, Wine, & Well Drinks.
They have lots of nice booths to sit in.
The level of commitment to the decoration theme is on Disney World levels - super pretty in a slightly postcolonial decadent way.

Inside of Kingston Hall. Images from the Kingston Hall website.

Basically if I love a bar with a strong commitment to “theme” even if that “theme” is just dive bar. I want a place to be an escape, an experience. If I wanted to just drink alcohol I could do that at home. I just order water. The bartender looks like Thor. I commit to memory what day it is in hope he’ll be the next time I visit. HEY CHRIS HEMSWORTH.

11:00pm: We sit at a big booth with Katie, Peter, Peter’s South African friend Rob, Exie, Anne, and Mia. We get into a conversation about how Peter, the most English English person you’ll ever meet (like biscuits and tea levels of English), is actually “American.” He was born in the Colorado and his dad is American but he grew up mostly in the London, his mother is English. NYC is full of people who have dual citizen-ship or are internationals whose parents are European but grew up in Asia or vice-versa and I hate them. Not really but maybe a little. It’s one of those things that makes you immediately more interesting and also has so many perks but you literally did nothing!* Your parents just happened to marry foreign people or have cool jobs that put them abroad and you piggy backed on their interesting lives. I know that most of these people are perfectly nice and are actually very interesting on their own merit, but sometimes I just get a little jealous that I am just one boring nationality. Oh well, I guess I just need to look for some foreign people to marry or a job abroad so my kids can be immediately more interesting.

* Also speaking multiple languages because you learned them as an infant when your brain was a sponge and your neurons weren’t hardwired. Baby you did nothing!