Potato and Beet Salad and Our Trip to New York City

Potato and Beet Salad

Potato and Beet Salad



This is a glorified potato salad which can be eaten as a meal.  Vegetables of different colors and nutritional values, namely, beets, olives, green beans and carrots have been added together with sliced eggs.  Mayonnaise mixed with red wine vinegar and a little bit of sugar is used as dressing.  Very simple, delicious and filling salad not to say healthy too. I am thinking salad for this post on our trip to New York City since I had a couple of good ones with our meal while my husband and I were there after Christmas this past year.

Our New York City Trip

The subway and lottery tickets for Broadway plays
We were in New York the day after Christmas for three nights and four days.  Upon learning it will cost us at least 80 dollars and even up to more than 100 dollars to get to our hotel from the airport we decided to take the Metro bus and then transfer to a subway train.  The subway actually became our main means of transportation all throughout our stay aside from taking the taxi for a couple of times.  I am proud of this feat of finding our way around this transit system which we accomplished with the help of kind co-passengers that we met.





We also lined up for the so called lottery tickets for the Book of Mormon play   Those who win the lottery held before the performance get to buy the tickets for a low price of around $30 versus the regular $100 .   When we were not lucky to get them,  we joined the queue for standing room tickets which we also failed to obtain.  We did not mind.  These were all new experiences for us and we found them fun.   The enthusiasm of the other people at the lottery waiting for the results and the patient people in the line for the standing room tickets was infectious.

We also got to talk to people during the waiting period which made the time go by really fast.  We met the twins from Singapore one of whom will be studying at Oxford for his law degree after studying at Georgetown.  His twin brother will go back to continue study law at Singapore.  Both will be working for their government after they finished their degrees.  Before we could learn more about their future plans the announcement that all standing tickets for that afternoon show were all gone was made and we bid them good bye as both they and we left empty handed.  This was the twins' seventh futile attempt.  The pursuit became more important than what is being pursued it seemed for people like them.

Where to eat
We ate at several places.  After all we were in New York City, one of the gastronomical capitals of the world.  First night was at the Benjamin Steak House where we had a wonderful waiter, originally from Albania, who oversaw almost all the tables.  That is part of their system, one guy getting the orders and then directing the rest with specific roles.  It is one of the greatest services I ever had in a restaurant so this approach works.

I found out a curious fact after we ate.  The nine year old restaurant, Benjamin, is occupying what was once the Chemists' Club.   What a coincidence since both my husband and I are chemists. When I learned about this factoid I started picturing famous chemists like Djerassi (who created the Pill) and Hoffmann (another Nobel Prize winner) having coffee as they discuss the latest developments in chemistry.  I am still very excited to realize I just ate where the chemists I idolize met and discussed concepts and discoveries we read later in journals or even applied in our experiments in the lab.

The other memorable meal we had was at the Grand Tier Restaurant located right at the Metropolitan Opera House.  Anyone with tickets at any of the performances held at one of several in the Lincoln Center complex can dine at this splendid restaurant.  I ate the best fish dish I ever had in my life.  It was striped white bass on a bed of cranberry bean ragu.  The waiter claimed it was their French way of cooking the fish namely on a hot flat skillet that kept it moist and crispy at the same time. Whatever. It worked.

Grand Tier Restaurant at the Metropolitan Opera House, NYC

I had an awesome salad before the meal.  Greens with butternut squash, figs and pecorino. The wonderful saltiness of the Italian preserved meat still lingers in my memory.  We had a dessert (Creamsicle Tortino) after the meal which we shared.  Then we each had our choice of dessert during the intermission in the same dining room at the same table.  Very convenient than sipping coffee in the lobby. I had chocolate mousse while my husband an apple cobbler. We were living it up, calorie wise.  We were on vacation so we rationalized to ourselves. By the way, one can have dessert only without the meal in this restaurant during the intermission, just make a reservation.

For our last supper in the city, I had to have the spicy chicken from the Halal kiosk at the corner of the street where the hotel we were staying was. It was just as delicious and memorable as the ones from the fancy restaurants we ate at and much much cheaper.

The operas I saw and "did not see"
Oh I almost forgot we were at New York to see three operas at the Metropolitan Opera Theatre.  It was my Christmas gift for my husband who is an aspiring amateur opera singer.  I was not feeling well all throughout the trip and as a result I only stayed fully awake for one of them, La Traviata.  I slept through the whole performance of the magnificent Aida and managed to see only the last half of the famous children's tale Hansel and Gretel.  The fact that I was awake through out La Traviata is a testimony it was not because operas were boring.  I was just bone tired and very sick with a sore throat and cough. 

La Traviata was staged, as intended by Verdi, the composer, using props reflecting the era during which it is being performed.   I love the fact that they used only one main stage setting for the whole opera designed in a very sparse modern manner.  It was adapted for the differrent scenes with just the use of clever props and staging.  My husband, on the other hand, found this approach a little bit too contemporary and boring for him.

As I was watching this opera, I could not help reflecting on the thought provoking opinions in the programme given to us.  The writer stated that the courtesan or prostitute, Violetta, was the true, decent character in the opera while a respected citizen of the community, the father of her lover was the villain.  He was a hypocritical, self righteous and manipulative person according to the writer of the programme. The father was asking Violetta to stop seeing his son, Alfredo, or else the fiance of his daughter will give up marrying her because of Violetta's reputation and connection to the family.

As a testament to the goodness of her heart, Violetta decided to go with Alfredo's father's request and broke off her relationship with Alfredo by hooking up with another guy.  And the plot thickened which kept me awake throughout the performance despite the sore throat I had.

All these wonderful experiences made the New York City trip special. You will find the salad below just as special too.

Potato and Beet Salad

Ingredients:                                      

                                 

• 2 1/2 cups boiled red potatoes cut in wedges
• 3/4 cup baby carrots, boiled till soft but still crisp in the microwave with little water
• 3/4 cup frozen sliced green beans, microwaved till cooked
• 1/4 cup sliced pimento olives
• 1 8 oz can of sliced beets*, drained
• 4 tbsp mayonnaise
• 1 tbsp red wine vinegar
• 2 tsps sugar or Splenda
• salt to taste
• 3 hard boiled eggs, sliced
• pepper

Mix all the vegetables (except the beets*) in a bowl.  In a small container mix the mayonnaise, vinegar, sugar and salt.  Toss the vegetables with the dressing.  Garnish with the hard boiled eggs and beets*.  Add freshly cracked pepper before serving.

*Note (an update):  The beets may be added together with the eggs as a garnish like I did in the picture shown above to avoid making the salad turn red.  If you do not mind "seeing red" you can mix them with the other vegetables.