American Traveler

We spent the weekend with family and at the elegant Gideon Putnam hotel. It’s on the National Register of Historic Places.

The fabulous Gideon Putnam Hotel in Saratoga Springs.

Nick and Toni’s is delightful in November. Nick and Toni’s during Restaurant Week in November is doubly delightful. We sampled their prix fixe menu last weekend. I had the beef short ribs wile Lauren had the fluke. Both were wonderful. Had dosas for lunch the next day at Hampton Chutney in Amagansett. Had the deluxe Masala. Delicious! You can check out my article about the place here: http://bit.ly/99sTa3

It was warm enough that i was able to take a bike ride out to Napeague Bay Saturday. Beautiful, quiet, not a soul around.

Here's Lauren waiting for the LIRR train back to Penn Station on Sunday.

The king-size room at the Saratoga Springs Holiday Inn is surprisingly nice. Big room, comfy bed, friendly service, various perks and upgrades for club members. All-in-all better than the Inn at Saratoga across the street where we had stayed in November. Did not, unfortunately, make it to uncommon ground for the bacon egg and cheese on a jalapeno bagel. Settled for room service continental breakfast (toast and melon balls)—-saving appetite for brunch an Mannas in Ballston Spa. Standard steam table fare, but with a nice omelet bar and good potatoes. All for $15. The culinary highlight, though, was, once again, Hatties Chicken Shack on Phila St. in Saratoga. Best fried chicken around. And we learned this time, mighty good wings too. Had a chat with the chef and owner who didn’t deny that they might be considering opening up a branch in NYC! That would be good news for the Big Apple. Could picture them doing very well in the Village or LES. Continue Reading »

Even though the Majestic somehow seemed to improve over the weekend, and actually looked better in daylight, the experience made me think twice about Paris. Don’t want to get stuck in a dump there. And when Lauren heard some horror stories about La Louisiane, I decided to start looking elsewhere. Lauren was still lobbying for the Hotel Mansart, but I held out and eventually found a great deal at the stylish Radisson Blu Le Dokhan. It looks fantastic! We’ll let you know.

Read all about how they celebrate maple sugaring season in Quebec

One of my favorite articles from the late, great Gourmet magazine.

You can download it in pdf form here.

shacks part 1

shacks2 part 2

My off off Broadway play (Who Put the Ex in Xmas?) closed Friday night. The snow storm kept out of town friends from coming for the weekend, so Saturday I hopped on the jitney to spend the remainder of the weekend with my woman in the Hamptons. We had had a memorable (and expensive dinner with friends at Nick and Tony’s in East Hampton earlier in the winter and decided to go back to take advantage of their movie deal: two course and a movie voucher for 30 bucks. Not bad! Because it was off season and because we made a resy for 6:00, (not so much because we’re fabulous) we got a great table.

Why so early? Because we wanted to make it to the screening of “Mean Streets” and post-movie talk with Alec Baldwin at Gild Hall. (Lauren has crossed paths with him before in her professional life and his repeated refusal to grant her an interview has become something of a bit between them.) Lauren kept telling people that the Q&A would be moderated by Ted Nugent. Of course, peoples response was “Wha?!” It wasn’t Ted Nugent at all of course, but David from the Hampton’s Film Festival.

But, back to dinner…

we didn’t realize until after the fact that the special was drawn form their Alsatian menu. Lauren had an onion tart with greens as an appetizer an I had a frisee, ham and Gruyere salad. Both were delicious. For main course, Lauren chose the chicken, while I had the baeckoffe, a stew of brisket lamb and pork under a blanket of potato puree. with desert and a glass of wine, our bill broke the $100 mark, but we did pocket two movie passes. (Or I should say Lauren pocketed two movie passes. I barely got a glimpse of them before they disappeared into her purse.

That was not our only food for the night; the movie event included a free desert at the Maidstone Living Room. I’ll just have a bite of desert, Lauren said as we walked to the restaurant. (Actually, we walked away from the restaurant as for some reason Lauren got it in her head that we were going to the Hedges. Once we got straigtened out we made it to the maidstone where we had more than a taste. We actually shared three deserts between us. (That brownie with warm espresso sauce was too inviting to resist.) At least we had pre-worked off a few calories with that walk to the wrong restaurant.

Nest stop: Miami!

So the flight had been booked, through Dublin for better or worse. The deed was done and Non-refundable as it was, it was time to move on to accommodations. I had done some web searching and found a few places that seemed charming asd were inexpensive (less than 100 euros a night). however, they were in Dublin. no not really, but far from the center of Paris. As Lauren’s mantra was “Gotta be near the Louvre,” those wouldn’t do at all. WE spent a Saturday afternoon at the computer finding—and rejecting—lots of options.

Then we headed off to a party where we ran into the film maker Albert Maysles. (Grey Gardens, Gimme Shelter, Salesman.) When the conversation turned to travel (He mentioned that he has begun work on a film about train travel.) we asked if he had any hotel recommendations for Paris. Turns out, he is heading to Paris for a retrospective of his films and will be staying at the place he always stays in Paris. Hotel La Louisiane. Clean and inexpensive, it’s been a faovirte of artistic types for decades. Guests have included Jim Morrison, Alan Ginsburg, Earnest Hemingway, Chet Baker, Miles Davis, Albert Camus, Salvador Dali—not, presumably—all on the same weekend. We decided to book a room. The price was right: 100 euros per night. And if it turned out to be disappointing, neither of us would take the rap. We could blame it on Albert.

Hotel La Lousiane

60 rue de Seine

(+33) (0)1 44 32 17 17

Stay tuned for the personal accounts of down-to-earth travelers and their adventures in destinations both far-flung and close to home. New Zealand is on our list. Paris too! Don’t forget Boston and Vermont.

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