SWEETS
"Kids of all ages love Serendipity for the frozen hot chocolate,
which is one of the best chocolate drinks in the world, and the
foot-long hot dog. I went there when I was 17 years old. My
daughter is now 17 and she goes there. It's open quite late at
night. On the corner of 60th and 3rd is
Dylan's Candy Bar. You've
never seen a more fabulous candy store. Downstairs, they have
clothing and baseball caps. Really fun stuff. It's co-owned by
Ralph Lauren's daughter, Dylan, and it's a big hit."
OUTDOORS
"The other thing to do downtown is to rent bikes and bike the
Hudson River path. It will take you all the way up to the George
Washington Bridge, the length of Manhattan."
CULTURE
"There's a whole museum path now in Queens, where you can do a loop
of things. It's become very much the spot. P.S.1 is in Queens, and
it was a public school that's been made over into a cutting-edge
museum. Incredibly interesting, quite avant-garde exhibits. There's
also the Noguchi Museum. A really fun museum is the new Museum of
Modern Art, Queens. It's easy to take the subway there; it goes
direct. You can take the subway back and get off at Lexington and
59th and have an early dinner at Gino, an Italian restaurant with
terrific
food. I've gone there since I was a kid, and they haven't
changed anything."
DINNER
"Danube is one of the most beautiful dining rooms. It's
Vienna at
the turn of the century. Viennese cuisine. It's a small dining
room, very elegant, very romantic. The chef is David Bouley.
Another restaurant I love because it's so festive and because the
food is delicious is Osteria Del Circo. It's the casual version of
Le Cirque, owned by the same family. Circo means 'circus' in
Italian, and there are metal sculptures of monkeys and people on
tightropes up over your head. There's a wonderful sense of
animation to the room. It's a great place for dinner before or
after the theater. Also for Italian, there's Elio's. It's very
casual, intimate, and lively, and the food is really wonderful.
Another great Italian place downtown is Lupa. It's completely
unremarkable looking with completely remarkable food."