Chicago Chillin'

It is officially 2017! This is my first post of the year, yes I know it's already 19 days into the new year but better late than never right? The most popular saying since the new year: new year, new me. I hope this happens to me, for the better of course. I'm about to start my second semester at NYU as a graduate student as well as interning 3 days a week so I'm hoping I can juggle both to really build up my resume as I pursue my master's. I can't wait to see what's in store for me this year and I hope it's a great year for me and you!

This year has already been pretty good for me. Rang in the new year with my close loved ones with no concrete plans but ended up having a great time, got a 3.94 GPA (so close yet so far to a 4.0), scored an internship at a well-known designer's corporate office as a press intern, and went on a trip with my best friend -- which is where these photos come in. 

I really wanted to have a mini getaway with just wendy, just wendy and me. We were initially planning to go to Boston, but having been there together already and due to pretty inexpensive flights we decided on: CHICAGO. Wendy had never been and I've been but when I was 12, which was a decade ago (o m g a decade) so I have almost no memory of it except that I don't like deep-dish pizza. We had such a great time in Chicago that we keep wanting to go back. Minus the cold everything was awesome. When we felt the crisp, cold air of Chicago, we realized NYC cold ain't shit.. we would stand outside for maybe 15 seconds and already feel our exposed body parts starting to get numb. It's no joke in Chicago. On our first night, during a trip to Walgreens it was 4 degrees but felt like -7.. insane. Which is why I wore AT LEAST 4 layers every day. 

I love being able to explore a new city. One that is quite similar to NYC in terms of a lot of skyscrapers and a lot of shopping; Chicago's Magnificent Mile is comparable to our 5th Ave. BUT it's a lot nicer walking through Chicago streets because there are about 19387598x more people walking the streets of NYC. We were contemplating on whether or not to rent a car but we found out that Uber is pretty inexpensive there, so we opted to just uber/lyft-ing around. Getting to try restaurants in a different city is so exciting to me. A few places I would recommend:

• Honey Butter Fried Chicken: BOMB fried chicken. I got the Original Fried Chicken Sandwich "The O.G" and O m G it was so good. The chicken was flavorful, tender, and juicy, the sauce was delicious.. just TRY IT. Wendy ordered the 2-piece honey butter fried chicken, which had 1 piece of white meat and 1 piece of dark meat and came with a side of butter that you're supposed to spread on the chicken. First we tried the white meat one, so obviously it was a bit dry so I thought it was eh. But then the second one was dark meat and MM yes, dark meat is the way to go. Also super juicy and tender and with the butter.. well MO BUTTA MO BETTA (hi5 if you know who says this.) We also got a side of the pimento mac n' cheese, it was interesting but it wasn't really up my alley. I don't remember if we ordered cornbread or if it was given but it was whatever, just tasted like any ol' cornbread.
• Mortar & Pestle: Alaskan King Crab Benedict. Delicious. I don't believe we have anything like this in NYC; I know we have lump crab at Sarabeth's but it doesn't compare to the alaskan king crab. I love king crab and I love benedict so it was so good. Chicago also does their eggs really well. All four of our poached eggs were perfectly poached, which is a must in this dish. The price was also very affordable considering the ingredient used - $17! I can imagine it being about $25 if it were elsewhere. We also ordered the fruity pebble funnel cake to share and it was good as well! Not much of a fruity pebble taste though if you ask me, but you can never go wrong with funnel cake.
• RPM: This was a random spot we yelped since the place we initially wanted to go was booked for the night. We learned that in Chicago it's important to call before going to a restaurant, so we did and they told us the next table available would be 11PM but we could sit at the bar. We just agreed since we were hungry and wanted Italian. When we arrived, expecting to sit at the bar, we actually got a bar table which was pretty much our own little hightop table. We didn't mind at all! We ordered the Maine lobster ravioli, the spicy crab squid ink spaghetti, with a side of broccolini because us Chinese girls need our veggies. EVERYTHING WAS SO GOOD! It was so good that we ordered 2 spicy crab squid ink pastas to go, hehe. I recommend this place if you're in Chicago! It's right off of Magnificent Mile so quite convenient if you're in the area. 

There are a few places that we went to that were recommended to us or had a lot of reviews but we didn't find that spectacular. 

• Wildberry: A brunch spot that supposedly gets really busy on the weekends. We got super lucky only having to wait about 5 minutes on a Friday at around 1:30. They're one of those restaurants that close at 2:30 then open later again. The one perk was that it was pretty inexpensive for the amount of food that they give you. It's a lot. But the food itself was okay. Wendy got some kind of mexican skillet and I got the benedict with chorizo. Both were okay. Maybe we didn't order the right items.
• The Purple Pig: If you ain't a meat, or PORK lover, this is not the place for you. This is supposed to be a tapas/small plates restaurant but holy pig the portions were HUGE. Each 'tapa' resembled a regular entree dish size. Our waitress told us to order 2 each and we could barely finish 2.. I LOVE salty food, but the food was pretty salty. I'm also not a food critic, but in my opinion things were a little over-seasoned. The dishes seemed to have too many flavors going on in one dish, to the point where it was quite overwhelming. 

I could go into more detail but don't want to make this a crazy long review but if you have any questions you can drop a comment or email me! 

I seriously had such a great time with just my bestie ^_^ I can't wait until our next vacation together! We need to make this an annual thing before we get married and have kids!! 

BITE x INFLUENSTER

I've heard about Influenster for a while but I never actually tried it until a few weeks ago. After registering and setting up my profile, I was lucky enough to be picked to be a part of the Bite x Influenster box filled with Bite matte creme lip crayons! I received a cute box with lipstick swatches on it. Inside were 3 lippies: cava, glaze, and red velvet. Red velvet is a bold red. On Sephora, they describe glace as a dusty mauve but in my opinion cava is more of a dusty mauve and glace is like a dusty rose color. I am the worst at describing colors especially when it comes to make up. My strength is in fashion and my weakness is in make up so this is my poor attempt at a make up review. 

Cava and glace are actually super moisturizing, and are good every day lip colors. Red velvet is obviously more bold and vibrant but can definitely be rocked as an every day look. I did find that red velvet is a little less moisturizing than the other two, so it was a struggle when I was trying to fill in my lip. But, it was so easy to outline my lips with red velvet. Precision on point! The duration of these lippies are pretty good, but you do have to reapply. I would recommend these lippies! I have a photo of me in red velvet on my Instagram (@kay_ng). 

Also, you should all sign up for Influentser because it's such an amazing program! Leave your reviews and get a chance to receive boxes from them full of goodies from make up products to snacks! Here's a link to sign up! 

influenster.com/r/2411494

influenster.com/r/2411494

Comfort Zones

I would say these photos are quite different from all of my other photos.  These were taken upstairs on my roof.  I usually come up to tan due to the fact that I have no privacy downstairs and practically live next to a man who I should never be wearing a bikini in front of.. (beating around the bush by using nicer phrases).  Living in Queens, there's not many convenient places in which I can shoot so I had a great idea of shooting on my roof.  I initially planned on doing these myself but my intern (hehe jk my good friend) Evelyn came over one day so I decided to take advantage of her since she usually takes my photos anyways.  

I would say these shots are not what I would usually do and I definitely changed up my game a little.  These are much more "street" than I'm used to so it was a little weird posing for them.  As Evelyn was taking these photos she was like "Who are you?? You look so street." I kind-of liked when she said that because it showed I was stepping out and doing something I've never really done before.  I've never had that "bad bitch" vibe and I'm always categorized as "cute" and "tiny." I used to feel some type of way because who doesn't wanna be a bad bitch right? But over time, you have to realize you were born with a certain look, a certain vibe, a certain personality and the bad bitch life ain't for me. I'm in no way trying to pose as a bad bitch in these photos but I took inspiration from Sophia Chang, a YouTuber, who's style is such a mixture of styles and reminds me of my own style. 

I think it's important to stay true to who you are – but it's also good to try new things and step out of your comfort zone from time to time.

Below is my second fashion YouTube video! Go check out my Fall Lookbook ft. my Stuart Weitzman 5050 Boots!

Ruby's Cafe

Ruby's Cafe has grown to be one of my favorite spots in NYC – an Australian restaurant just as Dudley's but without the bad service.  Yes, Dudley's has horrible service, so I'd recommend Ruby's over Dudley's. 

This was only my second time at Ruby's but I fell in love after my first visit and am still in love after my second.  The first time, my friend and I ordered the Creamy Chicken Pasta – rigatoni, sun dried tomatoes & cream for $13.50 and the Chicken Schnitzel Salad – bibb lettuce, sweet chilli & mustard dressing for $14.  I am a huge pasta fanatic (if I had to pick only one food to eat for the rest of my life I would choose pasta) and this pasta was BOMB. It was so damn good. The chicken schnitzel was also super tasty. We also ordered a side of truffle fries because you can't go to an Australian restaurant without ordering a side of truffle fries because they are scrumptious as hell.  I've tried it at Dudley's and there it's a bit more sour + mustard-y but at Ruby's the mustard flavor is a bit more subtle, which is more to my liking. The piece of chicken they give is also quite generous.

My second time here we ordered the Spicy Italian Sausage Pasta – rigatoni, baby peas, tomato sauce for $13.50 and their crispy rice dish (not sure of the name because I don't see it on the website).  I think crispy rice is an Australian thing because I've tried it at Dudley's as well. It's a bit sour because of the sauce used but it's a very light dish, minus the enormous block of (halloumi?) cheese that I mistaken for a piece of chicken.  The spicy sausage pasta was not as good as the creamy chicken one but it was still delicious. I can't wait to go back to try new dishes because they haven't let me down!

The set-up of the restaurant is super simple yet cute and the service is great. I think a requirement to work at Ruby's is to be Australian because all the hosts/waiters I've encountered have an awesome Australian accent! I highly recommend this restaurant, mates! ;)

RITUAL

I was lucky enough to be reached out by Ritual to try their app and receive a $20 credit. Ritual is a food-ordering app where you get to place an order at a specific restaurant/cafe and you'll be notified as to when to leave to pick up your order.  When you arrive at the food spot, your order should be waiting for you at the counter! 

As of right now, Ritual is only participating with restaurants in lower Manhattan: Financial District, Brookfield Place -- Hudson Eats, etc. The destination I chose for lunch that day was Brookfield Place, Hudson Eats.  On the app, it shows you a list of restaurant choices and the location. I decided to go to Hudson Eats because it's consisted of a bunch of vendors so I'd have the option to go to two places since I was bringing along a friend.  First, I was going to get Skinny Pizza but then I stumbled upon Tartinery.  I had no idea what a tartine was but with the help of Google I found out that it's an open-faced sandwich, pretty simple but French so a little fancier.  When it was time to order, I opened up the App and went to Tartinery's page and clicked "Roast Beef Tartine" and added it to my cart. My friend wanted a bagel from black seed bagel so I attempted to add that to my cart as well, but it turns out you have to do it separately, which was kind-of a bummer for a few seconds but it was no biggie.  I punched in my credit card number and clicked check-out and that was it! It said my order would be ready in 6-10 minutes.  My friend and I walked to Hudson Eats to look around and damn, it was PACKED. Understandable since it was around 12:30, lunch time. We found the Black Seed Bagel counter and I saw a little brown baggie with my name on it! I was shocked that it was already done since it had only been about 3 minutes since I placed the order. Then we found our way to Tartinery and waiting for us was another brown bag with my name on it. It definitely saved us a lot of wait time, and it was super fast. If you're ever in a rush, I definitely recommend this because it will, with no doubt, save you time.  After placing your order, when it's time to get your food, you just go to the pick-up counter where usually they will have a Ritual sign.

Signing up was super easy which makes it easier on behalf of a consumer.  Be prepared to either take or upload a selfie because that's part of the set-up process (this caught me by surprise) but it's so the employees can recognize your face before giving your order to someone else.  Hopefully, Ritual will expand throughout all of Manhattan because I did find it really efficient and helpful.

If anyone is interested in this app, you can email me kaaayng@gmail.com and I can invite you to the app and you'll be able to receive $10 in credit -- $5 off your first order and $5 off the second!