december photo project: december 3rd

dinner at mr. wonton in park slope.

the vendée and brunch in brooklyn

 chanda and i made it out in time for the vendée preliminary starting race! the boats looked beautiful all lined up in front of the north cove marina. 

sorry my filming is so shaky . .  you can hear the starting shot set them off and some cheers from people on the quay and out on the water. the boats sailed from here to the verrazano bridge where they lined up for the true official starting point and were again cheered on. you can read about the update of the race here. several boats hit sharp objects and had to stop at newport for repairs. the boat i'm following with skipper alex thomson from the UK is still sailing on without damage, but he reported a lot of fog and slow sailing. the japanese skipper almost hit a huge cargo ship in the fog and said things had gotten a bit dangerous!

chanda mentions how the boats start to tack to change direction.

 each boat has a sponsor and one skipper with team support on land. most of the skippers are french but there are a few others from england, japan and new zealand.

 i'm kind of rooting for this boat and skipper.

 sweets! we stopped at duane park patisserie for a dessert for our brunch with friends in brooklyn. i couldn't resist having some cheesecake and chanda chose a fruit tart . . we chose a brownie for greg who was waiting in the car.

 then we drove out to park slope. my friend's apartment felt so cool and refreshing . . well, they did have the air conditioner on.

setting up for a delicious brunch . . 

 salad and a spinach and zucchini frittata. jeanette is such a great cook . . the frittata was incredible.

 making espresso . . 

 her espresson maker is a stainless steel alessio which i would like to get one day to replace my aluminum bialetti.

jeanette is pouring the milk from a special frother she brought back from italy. it's very simple to use with hot milk. amazon probably has one . . 

 the amazing lemon tart from duane park . . tony and i always like to reminisce about patisserie lanciani which used to be on west fourth street until madeleine lanciani moved to the duane park spot in tribeca. i used to bring korrina in a stroller to the west village location when we lived there (before we moved to brooklyn) and i used to buy my mom grand marnier chocolate cakes for her birthday . . 

 the cups were tony's grandmother's . . 

 it was a nice afternoon.

we drove back to manhattan and dropped chanda off at her twelfth night rehearsal uptown and then parked the car by a neighbor's rose garden. it's rose season . . they are all in bloom . . 

when chanda returned she reminded me how a favorite neighborhood restaurant was closing. i know how quickly these closings can go so i figured we better go this evening.

it was good we did because we found out they only have one week left. alexander at the place has been around since 1998 and we'll really miss his restaurant. besides serving delicious food, the atmosphere is intimate and warm (he would have "fires" burning in two fire places in the winter--they were the large sterno containers but still lent a cozy air). my friend kendall lives in the same building and they've been going through a lot of changes since the original owners died and the grandchildren took over.

just another change in the neighborhood . .