Joe, Ryan, and I spent yesterday afternoon in and around Union Square in NYC for holiday fun. We lucked out and found parking right on 15th Street and 5th Avenue, and avoided at least $40 in parking fees for our little trist around the park. It was a bit cold out to do a lot of walking, but the smell of hot apple cider and gingerbread in the air let us know that it wasn’t going to be a problem — that and the fact that we were doing brunch first!
We hadn’t been to Chat n’ Chew since we moved out of Chelsea back in 2005, and we decided that our old favorite haunt deserved a visit from us, conveniently located on 16th Street between 5th Avenue and Union Square West, just 1/2 block from the park. The place is retro-decorated with all sorts of old metal and wooden signs, the entire menu is comfort food, and concern with calories or carbs is a problem in this place. My favorite dish is Uncle Red’s Addiction — honey-dipt fried chicken – to die for, literally. 
Once we were stuffed, we hit the ATM, then into the park!
The Union Square Holiday Market operates from early November until Christmas. It’s rows and rows of merchants in small red-and-white tents selling unique, mostly handmade items for gifts and ornaments. It’s like no other collection I’ve seen. If you haven’t gone and are going to be in the area, please make a note of going. We shopped till we dropped, hitting up the Hot Apple Cider stand a few times for jet fuel. By the time we left the park, we looked like crazy old bag ladies with a dozen shopping bags in each hand. Luckily the car was only a block away. Traffic was heavy at the entrance to the Holland Tunnel, but otherwise we zipped home. We spent the evening fussing over our aquisitions.
I think I said “Oh, that’s adorable” like 100 times yesterday – a few times to the boyfriends of some young ladies. CARLOS
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