On Sunday, Kristin and I did a whole lot of nothing. it was actually rather fun. It was raining out and neither of us really wanted to deal with it. We were tired, sore and frustrated that it was raining steadily all day. I said in my last post that we were going to head to Hoboken for Cuban food... well, that didn't happen. at all. we decided to stay in Union City and hang out with each other at the house. At one point, we walked a few blocks down to eat before coming back. Maria, one of the owners, suggested that we go to Noches, a Columbian restaurant that was relatively new in the area, but that was really good and always busy. Away we went!
We got the umbrellas, jackets and whatever else we could find and headed down the street. When we got to Noches, we were seated right away and the waitress asked if we knew what we wanted to eat. By this point, around 5pm, we were starving because we had barely eaten - a HUGE change from Googa Mooga. She suggested their empanadas and brought us two. They were wonderfully light and not too filling, but hearty and delectable at the same time. Instead of being made with a pie crust, they were more cornmeal based with a light crunch. The filling was shredded beef and beans, it kind of tasted like Ramona's by El Camino which was fine by me. The empanadas came with slices of lime and their housemade hot sauce - pretty much salsa verde, but it was made really well and I wish I could have shipped home a gallon. Kristin ordered their Arroz con Pollo and I had the Huevos Rancheros. Holy freaking crap, so much food. Kristin's dish was basically a huge serving of saffron chicken fried rice, without the fry. It looked and tasted amazing. My food was just as good. The beans were mixed with rice, scallions and seasoned great, and the egg scramble had onion, tomato and tasted exceptional. Kristin's came with a salad, two pieces of fried sweet plantains, a third (!!!) of an avocado, an incredibly bland, dense arepa and a few plantain "fritters" that reminded me of latkes with far less flavor. Mine came with a third of an avocado and the dense arepa. The food was great, we ate about a third of it, and took the rest home. Both of us wanted a million empanadas to take with us as well.
Kristin went home to Lancaster, PA that night, rushing to meet her train, which ended up having crazy engine issues the whole way back, but nevertheless, she made it. It was great to see her and we're already planning when we can get together again. I realized that I didn't post a picture of us from Googa Mooga, or at all... so here it is!
I came back to the house and ended up meeting the other two girls that were staying there. They were German, both named Katharina, and we had a great conversation about our trips and everything. We all kept talking and made it downstairs where we had dinner, around 10/11pm but whatever. We talked and they found out that I cooked a lot and we started joking about making cakes and cookies.. and then I realized that the house had just about everything we were going to need to make something. We settled on chocolate peanut butter cookies with chocolate chunks. Someone had gotten Dean & Deluca cocoa powder that was mind blowing so we made sure to use that. The cookies came out great and all three of us did something, from measuring things, to chopping chocolate, to mixing and putting them in the oven. We had a great time and talked about everything until the first batch of cookies were done. We stayed up until 1 talking and making plans for Monday, as they invited me to see the city with them.
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