Foods of New York Tours-Chelsea Market & Meatpacking District

You know what's better than eating one meal at one restaurant? Getting tasty tastings (lame attempt at alliteration that really is the same word) from a bunch of different places! I am totally on this kind of samplings kick right now, I guess like eating Tapas except I'm getting the smaller meals at a couple of venues. A couple of weeks (maybe more like months) ago, I did something that mostly only tourists do: went on a food tour in New York. This one happened to be in the Chelsea Market/Meatpacking District area. One would think that many more native New Yorkers or other locals (gotta count Long Island too) would also attend such a wonderful tour, yet, my good friend and I were the only ones from the local area. Because of this fact, I thought that I would basically just eat some free grub and learn nothing new about the area. What would I possibly learn that I didn't already know? Psh I'm not a tourist like the rest of the folks.

Essentially, I learned a lot and had a tour guide that I basically became BFF with. And met a bunch of cool people from Michigan. (Who knew they could be so awesome?) But this isn't a reflection blog, it's allll about the FOOD. Getting on with it:

The seven different places we had tastings from began in Chelsea Market, which wouldn't cha know used to be the Nabisco Company Factory? Oreo artifacts were everywhere! Also, the Food Network is filmed upstairs here. My. Heaven.

Eleni's is the first place we visited within the Chelsea Market venue and was a classic American bakery. Yes, the owner's name is really Eleni and she hails from good old California. I love that we began with dessert, because my highly-planned-ridiculously-non-spontaneous self never eats dessert before the meal. It was a very small, but highly satisfying red velvet cupcake.  I feel as if the cupcake craze that once took over NY and the world has died down a bit (especially with the popularity of the Cronut-which I have yet to try :cries:) but I've still had my fair share of these types of cupcakes. It was good, but not crazy memorable. Of course, our tour guide knew that milk was needed after the dessert. So we moved on towards getting some milk.
Ronny Brook Milk Bar is an offshoot from the farm, which I suppose meant everything came from a real farm and landed in Chelsea Market. Actually, of course it came from a real farm. Sometimes you shouldn't listen to what I say. Anyways, the cows aren't fed hormones so basically the chocolate milk we drank came straight from the utters. Now I feel grossed out, but it was definitely the best chocolate milk I've ever had. Fresh and chocolaty, yet not too heavy. I've also in the past had some type of sandwich here, and it was great so I'd go back for more.
Lucy's Whey is an American Artisinal Cheese Shop that originated in East Hampton (soo fancyyy huh) by Lucy Kazickas, who, like myself, has a passion for cheese. Om nom nom.

So first we tried some pieces of cheese, that I can't remember the names of because this was months ago, but what matters is I loved them. One was definitely cheddar though, in case that helps. Then, finally, after only eating tiny niblets of food for the last 2 stops, we had a whole half of a grilled cheese sandwich that had some fancy honey and fig inside! The bread that we had it on was from Amy's Breads, a French American Bakery that actually has many locations within NYC. The cheese mixed in with the other ingredients was A-MAZ-ING, and the bread was clearly freshly made. How do I know this? Because it didn't taste like store-bought Wonder Bread ok. There were also some olives oils within this little enclave at The Filling Station, so I obviously tasted those as well. Chocolate balsamic vinegar? Who knew it could be so tasty.
Buon Italia is  a wholesale/retail Italian specialty food shop filled with authentic Italian goods that I can't afford. Much like Eataly which deserves an entry of its own. One day, oneee day. Here we sat around a table of plenty and ate as one big, happy, nontraditonal family! We talked about kids, our futures.....no but really we all went around and said where we were from. The lovely people of this place brought us out a big frittata-quiche type dish that had mushrooms inside.

This dish left me wanting more and more and moreee. But I mostly like everything so that doesn't say much. So then we moved onwards.
Tuck Shop is an Australian eatery that specializes in meat pies, which are native to good old Aussie Land. If one has ever heard of Pie Face in the city, this place is basically the same deal. We sampled the pork and sage pie, which, unsurprisingly, I really enjoyed. I wish I was more picky sometimes, and I mean I am, but only about certain things. Food isn't really one of them. I would go to Australia just so I could eat a bunch of these every day, so there's my review.
Chelsea Market Baskets was the second to last stop in Chelsea Market before stepping outside onto the Highline. It is gourmet specialty food shop where I tried some fresh lemonade and chocolate truffles. And some salts with celery as well, which really confused me and made no sense. This was probably my least favorite venture of the tour, just because it was a cluster of random foods put together that didn't match up. My tour guide was REALLY excited for the salts though. But she was mostly excited the entire time.
Sarabeth's Bakery was the last stop (for food) before heading to good old Meatpacking District. This place is a gourmet American bakery, owned and operated by Sarabeth herself and her husband. A noticeable theme in the Chelsea Market is that every name of every place is associated with an actual person of that very name. You would think that's common for most places, yet usually I feel like they're bought out by other people and the families don't stay involved. In case anybody cared to hear my thoughts on that. So here we tried an orange apricot marmalade and I think a strawberry preserves with buttermilk biscuits. Usualllly I am not that big a fan of oranges or apricots, but I actually like this one the best out of the two. Clearly this Sarabeth knows her marmalades.
Morimoto was a surprise stop before we headed over to the Highline and learned all about the Meatpacking District, which one would think I'd know already, but she was just chock full of knowledge I never knew before. What is Morimoto, you ask? And why do you see a picture of a toilet below? Well, Masaharu Morimoto is a Japanese chef, who is best known as an Iron Chef on the Japanese TV cooking show Iron Chef and its spinoff Iron Chef America. So basically, it was pretty amazing that we could even step foot in this establishment, even if no food was served. WORLD FAMOUS. Oh, and we all used the bathroom here and had the best experiences of our lives. These toilets might have been better than all of the food combined.

BEHOLD THE HOLY GRAIL

Sorry for straying from food, but believe me, my experience was just worth it.

Macelleria was sadly the final stop on this amazing tour. While walking over the Highline (which also deserves an entry of itself for the cute eateries nearby) I learned that every sign that is brown in NYC means that you are in an historic district, while the green signs are regular places that I suppose deserve no historical merit. You would think my mind wouldn't have been blown by this fact, but it was. I was just like the people from England at this point. Also, I saw the original dock where the Titanic was supposed to be. Ya learn something new everyyy single day. Anyways, Macelleria (which means "butcher shop" in Italian) is an Italian Steak House that is probably the only not overly pretentious place left in Meatpacking. Funny that a place that used have raw, bloody meats come through its streets is now the most pretentious and over-the-top rich place in Manhattan. Here, we ate some garganelli with oxtail ragu. It was not my first time eating oxtail, so I thoroughly enjoyed it. I guess one could say oxtail tastes like chicken, but that wouldn't really be accurate. Maybe more like a hybrid between chicken and steak.

When we finished we hugged our tour guide because she touched our souls. I miss her still. I highly recommend these tours, and definitely want to try another very, very soon. Not only do you get amazing food, but you also learn new facts about this great city that you may never learn otherwise.