It's raining cats and hotdogs

...it rained and rained all day on Christmas Eve so our lovely plans for an outing in Brooklyn were scrapped and instead we decided to eat and drink through our Xmas Eve in nice and dry conditions.


First we headed to Benefit brow bar for some pampering (for me, as A has never been that keen on cosmetics). After a much needed pampering, it was time for some home comforts so we headed to the Financial District to Fika to enjoy their Christmas Jul Platter - herrings, smoked salmon, mustard sauce, Christmas ham, Jansson's temptation, beetroot salad, red cabbage, and weirdly also some chipolatas and ribs (?? not very Christmassy, but divine though!). Afterwards we ran for cover from the non-stop rain to the nearby Dead Rabbit for an afternoon pint. Stephenweisse for me and Brooklyn Rye Pale Ale for A.


An incredibly comfortable place, warm, dry and sawdust on the floor - could have happily stayed there the whole day but we had a new hotel to check in to and wanted to make it there for the wine hour at 5.


The Roger Hotel was only a short hop in the taxi to Madison Avenue. We were greeted by a very festively decorated lobby and once in the room we had a lovely note and a bottle of bubbly from the hotel - I could get very used to this sort of luxury :).


After the wine hour, we headed off to NoMad near the Flatiron building. I remembered Mario Batali's Eataly was nearby so we decided to drop in for a quick pre-dinner drink. The Birreria was located on the roof top (luckily the roof was covered!) - great selection of beers and snacks. Prosecco for me and an IPA called Gina for A (A strange name for a beer and even stranger it was flavoured with thyme). Next we checked out the Christmas Market at Union Square, followed by a stroll through the streets of Manhattan before finally settling in at Hells Kitchen at Rudy's Grill - a true dive bar NYC style. Cheap pitchers of beer but better yet, the hotdogs were free so we took full advantage of them and scoffed three each..oops! We settled in in one of the red booths and from here we saw Christmas Day in. A merry night with a bunch of random drunkards - great fun! In the early of Christmas Day we staggered out of the bar and straight into a New York yellow cab back to the comfort if our hotel. Happy Christmas!