September 30, 2026 Breakfast - At Bill and Elaine’s apartment. Lunch, Leo Cafe at Asia Society Center Museum Dinner - Peking Duck House
We got up at 3:00 and 4:00 respectively and went back to sleep at 5:00 and 6:00 respectively and slept until 9:30. Elaine came to the hotel room at 10:00 and we walked to Le Fournil Bakery at 111 2nd Ave, where Elaine bought us an assortment of pastries. Then we walked to Billy and Elaine’s apartment. Elaine brewed coffee, Suzette steamed milk, and I made a cup of tea with hot milk. Then at 11:00 we took a one hour cab ride uptown to the Frick Museum at 70th And 5th Ave.that must be counted among America’s cluster of museum gems that were elegant homes turned into a museum with a stunning collection of art. It has many works counted among the greatest works of art in the Western World, including Rembrandt’s The Polish Rider, El Greco’s St Jerome, Vermeer’s the Note and the Mapmaker, and Gentile Bellini’s St. Francis in the Desert.
At 1:00 we walked two blocks to the Asia Society Center Museum where we ate a Hanoi Mushroom bowl that was mostly watercress with some thin rice vermicelli and lots of chopped marinaded beech, oyster, and shiitake mushrooms, a owl of carrot and ginger soup, and a spring roll stuffed with mushrooms in its Leo Cafe. Suzette drank an Asahi beer and I drank a Lunar Yuzu soda. I liked the yuzu soda. Yuzu is an oriental citrus fruit that appears to be taking American gastronomy by storm at this moment.
We then toured the exhibit of Asian art collected by two generations of Rockefellers. Broth statues and ceramics were impressive.
After viewing the collection we visited the gift shop and Suzette had a shopping moment and bought 13 pairs of colorful acrylic sock/slippers and an old wooden panel mounted on legs that she swore would fit in the duffel bag.
We carted our two bags socks/slippers and the wooden panel out to the curb and taxied back to the room where we rested from 4:00 until 4:37, when we took a taxi to the Peking Duck House at 28 Mott St. in Chinatown but soon after the taxi turned onto Mott heading south the taxi was snarled in traffic behind a Sysco delivery truck making deliveries and a an assisted handicap van stopping to pick up elderly in the only open lane, so we paid and walked the last four blocks to the restaurant.
When we arrived we were created by Elaine and her two friends with whom she hiked the Camino Santiago and who stayed with us for a night in Pontevedra two years ago and Rebecca had arrived with my new nephew, little one year old J.P., seated at a large long table in the back of the dining room nearest the kitchen.
Elaine had brought a bottle of rose’ from Cassis/Bandol that was chilling in ann ice bucket and a bottle of Spanish Rioja OK, are we officially up? Well, I can barely hold my finger to the page and Manipulate the computer, I guess.
Rebecca ordered two whole ducks, two orders of a chopped stir fried chicken and pinon nut dish served with lettuce leaves and we made lettuce wraps.
Then the wines were opened and we drank wine and tea and water was served. I felt like part of me was still in Bandol when I sipped the chilled rose’ from Cassis.
Soon Mickey arrived and sat next to me and told us he was very busy and had to return to work at 6:15. I have never been on such a tight schedule and told him at this rate he was going, he probably could retire at 50, if he wanted to, but added that there is a lot of fun staying in the game. I hope that did not offend him.
Soon two large roasted ducks on large platters with their heads still on arrived, shown to us, and then taken to a table near the front of the restaurant where a
man with a large knife was expertly slicing thin slices of skin and meat and arranging them on large platters. The waiter brought bowls of plum sauce, bowls of green onion and cucumber spears, and a huge round hooded metal container filled with a tall stack of delicately thin Mandarin pancakes.
As the platter of duck slices were served we distributed pancakes and each person slathered their pancake with sauce and added several spears of cucumber and green onion and slices of duck and skin and rolled them into roasted duck burritos.
Mickey asked me how I liked the duck and I said the skin was not as sweet or as crisp as those I had eaten in San Francisco. But on reflection I now realize that this duck dinner was excellent. The pancakes were perfect and served in a heated container that kept them hot, the plum sauce was pleasant, and the duck skin was crispy.
I am reminded of the 900 year old restaurant we ate grilled eel at in Narita, Japan last November that had its own special BBQ sauce it basted their eels with as they were grilled. It had a subtle flavor, not too sweet, not to salty, not to picante; just right. The flavor of the skin of the duck tonight tasted like that grilled eel sauce, subtle.
If we turn this comment into an axiom, I could suggest that in gastronomy the degree of subtlety of flavor and presentation are signs of excellence.
Then several more dishes arrived, a noodle dish with a pork stew and more cucumber spears, a platter of General T’sao’s Battered, deep fried and sauced chicken, and a platter of stir fried Chinese Broccoli. I ate a few spears of Chinese broccoli, practically no noodles, but I could not stop eating chunks of General T’sao’s chicken. It was the best I have ever tasted. It was not greasy or highly picante; again, it was just right. Instead of an overly sweet and spicy glaze I usually find in this dish, there was a light brown sauce that lightly sauced the firm deep fried clusters of battered chicken. I could not stop eating them.
My first impression of Peking Duck House was that just like Michelin starred restaurants that specialize in their sauces, sauces seem to matter at this restaurant, even if it is the same sauce that is used to glaze the duck and sauce the Major T’sao’s Chicken.
I took a few photos of Mickey, Rebecca, and squirming J.P. before Mickey left.
Soon after Mickey left we finished the wine and asked the waiter to box the leftovers. Elaine and her two friends left together and Suzette and I with a large bag of leftovers followed Rebecca and J.P. In his stroller about six blocks to a bus stop on 3rd. Ave. where we boarded an uptown bus that delivered us to 9th Street on 3rd Ave. and we walked to their apartment on 10th Street at 1st. Ave.
When Rebecca lifted J.P. out of the stroller he started rapidly crawling around the apartment living room and hallways and lifting himself up to walk while holding on to furniture. Rebecca and I both thought J. P. will be walking without holding on to furniture within weeks. J.P. Is the most cheerful and active baby I have ever seen and a joy to be around. He seemed as interested in watching as we enjoyed watching him.
We sat and watched J.P. scoot around the apartment and later watched Rebecca dress him for bed. Around 8:00 we said goodnight to him and Rebecca and walked back to the 24 hour market just below our hotel, where I bought a yogurt with fresh fruit and granola. I saw they had fresh squeezed orange juice, so I told the lady attendant that if I could not sleep, I might see her again for a glass of orange juice during the night.
We were tired and went to bed and slept until 1:00. Suzette went back to sleep around 3:30 and I stayed up until 4:30 to finish this blog after a long fun day seeing good museums and family.
If the Buddhist concept that we as soul choose to recenter into bodies into a family that allow us to work out our karma, it makes sense that those who have progressed in working out their karma and been rewarded with joy should be reincarnated into a family of intelligent, wealthy, happy evolved souls. When I look at the photos of Mickey, Rebecca, and J.P. I see what appears to me to be a group of evolved souls
Bon Appetit
