Food

Wanda contacted me via twitter looking for recommendations of where to eat before going to see the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular with her family. Since I've been meaning to write about family friendly restaurants in Midtown for ages I figured I'd just answer her here.

For over a decade I worked right across the street from Rockefeller Center and, like anyone who works near there knows, the food choices can be down-right depressing. (Oh, wait, maybe that was just my job.) But there are some good choices if you know where to look for them, from special occasion restaurants to quick and inexpensive eats.

Here are my top picks for kid-friendly places to eat near Rockefeller Center:

We've written about Fall Farms, Pumpkin Farms, Pick Your Own Apple Farms, Spring and Summer Berry Farms, and even Christmas Tree Farms out here on Long Island. But what about the Turkey? Whether you just want to pay homage to your Thanksgiving feast or pick up a fresh, local or even organic turkey, Long Island has many poultry farms where you can get up close (or snap a photo from far away) with Thanksgiving's most popular mascot. Stop by and say hi, or for you serious locavores, pick up a fresh local turkey to eat and save yourself a trip to the frozen foods isle. Here are some of the local farms to check out:

If you have not heard of Ninja, a Japanese ninja-themed restaurant in Tribeca, I wouldn't be surprised. Like the warriors the restaurant is named after, it seems to hide in plain site, but this special occasion dining spot is worth discovering, especially with kids.

With all the hullabaloo about Halloween lately, you might have missed another great happening here on Long Island-It's Long Island Restaurant Week. And, aside from giving you an excuse to get out and sample the local flavors and specialties, the restaurants participating are also giving you a chance to save some money. Over 200 venues are taking part in the celebration, and all are offering a 24.95 prix fixe menu. It's your chance to enjoy high end dining at lower end prices.

Every year a mom at our school makes these fabulous Halloween cookies and I've always wanted to try them myself. They're such a simple, clever idea and I love that they're not overly sweet with lots frosting like most theme cookies are. Feel free to improvise on the recipe. Some people add a little green food coloring or paint the fingernails. You can also add red gel to the "severed" ends or put some strawberry jam under the fingernails. Get creative.

Many New Yorkers associate City Island with summertime (that is, if they even know about it).  Afterall, the main cuisine offered is seafood, there are panoramic water views, and sailboats galore.  However, we find the best time to visit City Island is a) anytime but a Friday or Saturday night (lunchtime is fine) and b) off-season!  Therefore we're recommending it as a perfect Columbus Day weekend daytrip. 

Many people want to know where you can pick your own organic apples near NYC. I've asked the farmers about this and they say that in our climate it's very hard to farm apples organically and nobody really does it. Instead what you'll find is farms that use low-spray or sustainable farming practices.

While apples are one of the foods that are recommended that we eat organic because of the high amounts of pesticides and fungicides generally used, if you can't get organic local apples, at least know that picking your own apples or buying local apples is much better for the environment than buying organic apples shipped in from distant climes and supports small local farmers.

Here are a couple of places where you can pick your own not-quite-organic apples in New York:

Labor Day Weekend is the official start of apple picking season. Starting this weekend and lasting through October, pack up the family and head to the apple orchards for an afternoon of grabbing apples straight from the source. And when you get home with those twenty pounds of apples (what was I thinking???), check out allaboutapples.com/cooking for recipes from apple leather to pork-and-apple pie with horseradish sauce. Just be sure to put an apple aside for the teacher!

One of my favorite things is birthday cake, especially from a box and double especially covered in frosting. I'm not a fan of all the fancy buttercream frostings and fancy cakes. I like regular old moist and fluffy chocolate or vanilla birthday cake slathered in rich, sweet frosting. But knowing that your cake is filled with hydrogenated oils and trans fats really takes the fun out of it. Especially as a mom. How can we enjoy stuffing our faces with cake when we know how bad it is for us?

Thankfully, Nora Schultz, a New Jersey mom, has solved this problem with her Naturally Nora cake and frosting mixes, made from 100 percent natural ingredients. There are not even any artificial colors, flavors or preservatives. (The confetti cake is colored with things like spinach extract and turmeric!). They are also dairy and soy free. But most importantly, for me, Naturally Nora mixes contain no trans fats or hydrogenated oils.

We've been having a great time hanging out in Red Hook, Brooklyn lately. The neighborhood has become quite the destination what with Ikea, Fairway, a new pier park and beach, lots of yummy food, and, of course, the free Ikea Water Taxi and buses make it even easier to get there.

Whether you are anchoring your trip to Red Hook around a pragmatic trip to Fairway for groceries or Ikea for household goods, or just heading to the neighborhood for fun, there's tons to do that's fun for kids and parents alike. Here are the top spots in Red Hook for family fun:

Things to do with kids in Red Hook, Brooklyn: