Thanks for buying our new book, The Holiday Goddess Handbag Guide to Paris, London, New York and Rome. These are exclusive extras for you to download to your iPod or print and pack.

Drawing: Anna Johnson

PARIS

Watch the chapter come alive, from tins of snails at Galeries Lafayette, to the streets of the Marais. All the v-cards in our book have been edited by  Holiday Goddess editor Peter Clarke at Heaven and Earth Films.

Continue your Paris journey with us online here.

LONDON

The Dove is one of our favourite pubs. But then we find it hard to leave The Victoria and Albert Museum too. Watch the video here.  All our London extras are online including a complimentary download from Sweet Tooth, featuring London chanteuse Fleurtini (pictured, below) with the sounds of Soho and Mayfair.

Sweet Tooth

NEW YORK

If you can’t listen to Woody Allen’s jazz on the flight to New York, the next big thing is a handpicked selection of the best Manhattan soundtracks around. Pick it up here, along with other NYC extras for the book. And don’t miss our New York video postcard.

ROME

Chapter extras are here. And this is the best place to see even more of Roma.

Drawing: Anna Johnson

AUSTRALIAN GODDESS – DITA VON TEESE IN MELBOURNE

We know where the hotels are.

Dita Von Teese (and her lingerie) guest-stars at the L’Oreal Melbourne Fashion Festival on Saturday 10th March at 8.30pm. We have a handpicked (limited) number of  good, central Melbourne AUD$100 hotels, on offer now at the Holiday Goddess Bookings website – like the Jika International  (sauna, bar, restaurant) , the Park Squire Motor Inn (on the park, natch) and our tip – The Richmond Inn Hotel (boutique bargainista). Dita’s Von Follies show will run at Melbourne Docklands on Saturday 10th March. Details here. 

 

PHUKET RESORT AND SPA UNDER AUD$100 A NIGHT

The four-star Sunwing Resort and Spa (seven pools) on Bangtao Beach, Phuket, Thailand is on offer for AUD$699 for eight nights – accommodating two adults – children under 17 stay free. Breakfast included. Children under 12 enjoy free dining. Free yoga classes and on-site spa. Offer runs from 10am Saturday February 4th to 10am Monday February 6th unless sold out.

AMERICAN GODDESS GO! US$49 GREYHOUND FARES

US$100 Flights One-way winter flights from New York, Boston, Long Beach to various destinations under US$100 at Jetblue. Limited offer.

BRITISH GODDESS – BARGAINISTA TRIPS UNDER £20

Train fares are now well under £15 for advance bookings from Leeds to London, London to Manchester, Manchester to Leeds, London to Bristol. Limited offer. And 1 million seats for £9 or less on National Express coaches across Britain. Book by January 31 for travel to the end of March. Limited offer.

Gorgeous Pembrokeshire Coast cottages £99 and under are booking quickly. Beaches, cafes, restaurants and cold weather deals (sometimes as low as £12.50 per person, per night) don’t last. Valid until March 24th, excluding the week starting February 11th. Call Coastal Cottages to book.

Bag at www.cathkidston.com

So what exactly is a free porridge UK holiday?

Old-fashioned porridge holidays!

Well, it does what it says on the packet of oats. And it’s retro-style fun.  If you book a cosy campervan for the weekend (only £69 over any winter Saturday-Sunday booking) and return it to its London or Edinburgh collection point, Wicked Campers will contribute a weekend’s worth of free breakfast porridge from Rude Health. The uber-low £69 price includes insurance for one driver, over 21 years, for travel within the UK and Ireland.

Handpick the campervan you want and find out more about the deal at Wicked Campers.

To book  email info@wickedcampers.co.uk with the type of van you’re after (multi or two-seater) and the dates of the weekend you would like and they will send through a booking link.

Porridge Cairn (Wikimedia Commons)

If you are collecting your weekend campervan from London drive it away after 6pm to avoid the additional £10 congestion charge. Looking for somewhere to holiday after breakfast? Try Porridge Cairn (pictured) or the legendary Porridge Pot Alley.

Holiday Goddess Video – Hotel Lafayette, Paris (From well under US/AUS $50 per night).

A glass of champagne in a Paris cafe for Valentine’s Day has never been this cheap. As the Euro plunges to record lows against the American and Australian dollar in time for 2012, women will spend less than ever before, to see the Louvre (from a fifty-buck, one-star hotel). Then there are hotels well under AUD/US$50 like Hotel Lafayette.

Illustration Anna Johnson

Airfares to Paris from the USA and Australia in particular, are just silly, compared to prices last summer, or even in 2010. American travellers are really celebrating. But even Australians, who have long been kept from Paris by high fares and expensive hotels, stand to gain. Sydney to London is now well under AUD$2000 return on major airlines in February (add on chic, comfortable Eurostar London-Paris return train fares for around AUD$150 and you’ll be there in time for breakfast.)
Staying on in Europe? The European Credit Crunch isn’t ending any time soon. But then, the Louvre isn’t going anywhere either. And it’s just stops away from Louis Blanc station, right near the cheapie-chic Hotel Lafayette, in our video.

The Louvre is stops away from a bargainista hotel

There is also good news if you can book months ahead, on European hotels and airlines who want your dollars now. Don’t forget seriously cheap Irish airlines which can take you to Dublin, then onto Paris a day or two later.
But back to that one-star hotel you can see in our video. It’s called Hotel Lafayette and it’s a short walk from the Eurostar terminal, at the Paris Nord train station (also known as Gare du Nord). It is now well under US/AUD$50 a night for a double bed with shared bathroom (though on a second visit, we were offered an en suite bathroom, within the room).

British Goddesses are in an even happier position – not only is Eurostar a bargainista (below £70) train ride from where you live, you can stay at Hotel Lafayette without jetlag. Fear not the one-star experience, goddess! In Paris, it will typically offer all the charm you expect from the French.  A classic one-star Paris hotel has bar soap, scratchy towels, a sink within the room, a pretty wardrobe, big mirror, plush-looking bed and sweet retro chair. No breakfast. You’ll use the same loo and bathroom as everyone else on the same floor, but if you go off-peak (February is definitely off-peak) then you may get lucky and find you have the floor to yourself.

Going out for breakfast? It’s steps away from Hotel Lafayette, and you are spoiled for choice. The hotel is close to a clutch of old-school French cafes near Paris Nord (also called Gare du Nord) train station, and the omelettes, croissants and coffee are great. If the difference between you going to Paris (or not) is the high price of hotels, then just do it. Are you here to experience The Louvre,or to walk around your hotel room admiring the mini-bar? There is no plastic card to swipe (and go wrong, or forget) at the typical one-star. Just an old-fashioned key, and  bolts which work from the inside.

Music: Airborn by Kolliope. To hear more music by Kolliope visit foghornrecords.net To read more about saving a fortune in Paris, buy The Holiday Goddess Handbag Guide to Paris, London, New York and Rome at Booktopia.

Chinatown, New York is Holiday Goddess Editor Karen Moline’s $5.50 lunch location of choice.  And her young son loves the cool, cut-price shopping too. Story: Holiday Goddess Editors.

Chinatown Bargains

You go to New York for the bagels and the Manhattan madness, right? Actually, a lot of New York locals would disagree with your choice. For them, Chinatown is the real New York, in a funky, downtown way. And if your travel budget just dipped below $50 a day, then this is the place for you. The slippers are a great alternative to your white, terry-towelling hotel room freebies (and you’ll have money left over for lunch).

If you really love Chinese food then head to the home of the cult $1 dumpling takeaway – Prosperity Dumpling. It may be a hole-in-the-wall but there is a reason why so many women queue up to buy five chive and pork dumplings for a dollar.

Prosperity Dumpling has no website, like most Chinatown eateries, but it does have a solid fan base on the cult travel website Yelp. Read the (nearly) 900 glowing reviews here.

The legendary Tings

Not keen on dumplings? Even the delicate, tiny, fried kind? Chinatown is still a wonderful place to wander, in the morning, then settle in for lunch. Don’t miss the Fuleen Restaurant. It’s hard to think of any other restaurant in New York that could have won rave reviews in a Michelin guide, Zagat or Time Out, with a fixed-price $5.50 lunch menu.

Some of the dishes on the menu at the Fuleen Restaurant not make much sense to you – it might even have you pulling a face – but try, try, try. Fillet Seabass with Loofah is not some new delight from The Body Shop. It is apparently rather delicious. If you are with small children, though, they may want to try the jellyfish. Just for fun. Fuleen Seafood Restaurant is at 11 Division Street.

If you are one of those women who love their own bowl of fresh fruit in a hotel room, come to Chinatown for the biggest, freshest, most fascinating range of fruit in New York. Everything is plump and shiny, laid out for your perusal.

How to begin your morning wander in Chinatown? Take the subway to either Grand Street or Canal Street and just follow the crowds.

Lunch!

Remember landmarks as you go, to find your way back. The shop with the smiling golden pig in the window. The statue of Confucius. The extraordinary green Chinese slippers (the kind you know you’d like to put on a shelf somewhere, even if you don’t wear them).

Chinatown is full of alternative enticements. Foot rubs and shoulder massages. Pretty paper lanterns which squash flat in your suitcase – perfect for a summer garden party on your return. And best of all, if you have children with you, the white plastic buckets full of frogs and miniature turtles. To be purchased, then eaten, by the locals.

It’s all enough to make you long for a good cup of tea. And in New York (so deprived of tea) this is the place to come.

It might seem ironic that the Chinese should be selling the best teabags in America, but Ten Ren is the place to come. While you are here, take a tiny china cup to sample the more unusual teas, free. The black teabags sold at Ten Ren are great for your hotel room, or nice to take back. Ten Ren is at 75 Mott Street between Bayard Street and Canal Street.

Finally, if you have never been to a Buddhist Temple, try the Mahayana Temple Buddhist Association at 133 Canal Street, between Chrystie Street and Forsyth Street. The glittering gold Buddhist statues inside are remarkable. And for a $1 donation in the slot, you can take home a tiny rolled-up scroll of parchment, with a Buddhist blessing.

Read more about Chinatown, New York in The Holiday Goddess Handbag Guide to Paris, London, New York and Rome.

Travel broadens the mind they say and visiting exotic places can be as much an internal journey as an external exploration. Tamara Pitelen – and her mind – wandered off on a 10-day Vipassana meditation retreat in the United Arab Emirates.

So, you’ve got 10 days leave owing and a longing to sit doing nothing in some exotic, peaceful locale. Maybe you’ve been fantasising about escaping somewhere far away from the madding crowds where there’s not a computer or mobile phone in sight. What if I told you where you could get all this and on top of that promised you’d lose a few kilos in the process plus have all your vegetarian meals cooked for you? Oh, and one more thing… it’s all free. That’s right, no charge, not even for food and accommodation.

“Impossible!” you snort, “I’ve trotted the globe and no such holiday resort nirvana exists.”

My friend, you’d be wrong. Sort of. Such escapes from the rat race do exist. About 120 of them in fact, they are the Vipassana centres where 10-day residential meditation retreats are held. These centres are dotted all over the globe from India to Oceania, Asia, Europe, Africa, America and the Middle East.

I know this because I’ve just got back from one of them. The retreat I went to was held on a date farm in Ajman. Where is Ajman? Next door to Dubai and – along with that glitzy diva of a city – Ajman is one of the seven emirates that make up the United Arab Emirates in the Arabian Gulf.

Vipassana, which means to see things as they really are, is one of India’s most ancient techniques of meditation and it’s goal is to bring harmony and happiness to people’s lives. It was taught in India more than 2500 years ago, by people who include the Buddha, as a universal remedy for universal ills caused by negative emotions such as anger, greed, animosity and depression.

Yep, fine so far so what’s the catch? Well, you have to get up at 4am every morning to sit cross-legged on a cushion for about 12 hours a day, you’re not allowed to speak, read, write, mix with the opposite sex, or even do any exercise beyond short periods of walking on specially marked, segregated walking paths.

No, I’m not going to sugar-coat it. The ultimate goal may be purity of the mind, happiness, love and compassion and an end to suffering and for all beings but the 10-day retreats involve battling through some lengthy stretches of tough emotions including spitting rage, irritation, sadness, abject misery as well as moments of gouge-your-own-eyes-out boredom. Why put yourself through it? You do it for spiritual development and in the hope you will be happier after weeding out some of the decades-old (even past lifetimes old) negative thought patterns and miseries rooted in the deepest soil of your subconscious mind.

So I sat and I sat and I sat. I sat cross-legged on a cushion till my back throbbed with aches and pains and my legs got pins and needles – which didn’t take very long, I had to ask for a chair in the end.

Every morning for the 10 days, me and 23 other students – 13 men and 11 women – were woken at 4am by the banging of a gong. By 4.30am we had to be in the Dhamma hall for two hours of meditation and by the end of each day we’d spent about 10 hours meditating. Or trying to meditate.

It is also an awful lot of time to think because, try as you might to stay focused on your breath or physical sensations, your mind journeys in some bizarre directions. I found I couldn’t stop thinking about the British TV soap Coronation Street for the first three days and when that obsession died down it was replaced by an igniting of my libido. Sat for hours in a room of silent people, I was suddenly consumed with thoughts of sex and couldn’t press the stop button on the erotic fantasies and pornographic scenes playing out in my head.

I wonder though if this is the kind of mental trash that your brain vomits up as a smokescreen; an avoidance tactic to dodge inspection of the really deep painful stuff lodged in the depths of your subconscious? Or am I a pervert. You could argue either way. I also had imaginary arguments with people I knew, rehashed relationship failures ad nauseum and hauled long forgotten fragments of life from my memory vaults.

By the end of the 10 days though, something had shifted. I can’t put my finger on it but you feel better, lighter. And it wasn’t just me. When we all started talking again on the final day, everyone said the same. Yes, it had been tough at times and there had been tears shed, especially in the first three days but some baggage had been dropped along the way and it felt good to let it go.

A FEW FAQS

Q. What is the Vipassana meditation technique?
A. Vipassana is just one way to approach meditation and this technique involves simply observing your own breath as well as scanning the body for physical sensations and, when found, detachedly observing them in the knowledge that they are impermanent, they will rise and pass, rise and pass.

Impermanence is at the heart of Vipassana. The Pali word for this is ‘annicha’ – a word we heard over again via the recorded teachings of S. N. Goenka, the world’s principal leader of Vipassana meditation. Born in Burma, Goenka relocated to India in 1969 to teach Vipassana. Forty years later, he’s largely responsible for its worldwide revival.

Q. Where can you study Vipassana?
A. If seeking spiritual enlightenment is what you’d like to do on your next vacation, check out www.dhamma.org for a list of all centres and a worldwide courses schedule.

Q. Is it really free?
A. There are no charges for the courses – not even for food and accommodation. All expenses are met by donations from previous students who wanted others to do the course. So, you can make a donation if you want to and have the means but there is no pressure.

Get Tamara Pitelen’s new book called Spokes, Blokes and Blarney, all about the time she spent three months cycling around Ireland in search of twinkly-eyed Irish men for husband material (think ‘Bill Bryson meets Bridget Jones’). It’s on Amazon at http://amzn.com/1463569750  or as an ebook at http://amzn.com/B00560Q17U

Or, get a free copy on PDF! Just send an email to spokesblokesandblarney@gmail.com with the subject heading ‘Free copy of Spokes please‘ and you’ll get an automated reply with a link to a free download. Just make sure you have Free copy of Spokes please in the subject head.

Where are the world’s cheapest flights? Here are the ten big rules for saving thousands. By Holiday Goddess Editors.

THE BARGAINISTA RULES

On-board luggage is the way to go for bargainistas (Illustration Anna Johnson)

1. Book several months ahead.
2. Go in Autumn, Winter or Spring.
3. Go midweek.
4. Never travel on weekends or public holidays
5. Leave your luggage at home. Shop for clothes and accessories there,  then mail it back.
6. Hop around the world on cheap one-way fares. This will be your biggest single saving.
7. Fly early or late in the day.
8. Queues may be long to check in so take your iPod. Always turn up early in case of check-in chaos.
9. Some airlines offer fast (front rows) boarding for extra payment. It’s worth it.
10. You’ll probably have to buy all food/drink. Check menus online first.

THE HOLIDAY GODDESS CHEAP FLIGHT SHOPPING LIST

AMERICA

AirTran  - Airtran.com

ASIA

Malaysia – AirAsia airasia.com

India –  Goair goair.in

Japan – Easyjet  Easyjet.jp

Korea – Air Busan airbusan.com

Singapore – Tiger tigerairways.com

EUROPE

Austria – Intersky  intersky.biz

Bulgaria – Wizzair wizzair.com

Czech Republic – Smartwings smartwings.com

Denmark – Cimber Sterling cimber.com

Germany – Germanwings  germanwings.com

Hungary – Wizzair wizzair.com

Iceland – Iceland Express icelandexpress.com

Ireland  – Rynair ryanair.com

Switzerland – Easyjet easyjet.com

Spain – Vueling Airlines vueling.com

United Kingdom – BMI Baby bmibaby.com, Flybe flybe.com, Easyjet easyjet.com, Jet 2 jet2.com

AUSTRALIA – Jetstar jetstar.com.au, Tiger Airways tigerairways.com

NEW ZEALAND – Pacific Blue flypacificblue.com

Author, travel writer and Holiday Goddess Editor Julie Miller loves the seafaring cats and strawberry margaritas at beautiful Buddha View.

Beautiful Buddha View, Thailand

My feet are dangling a metre above the water, twinkling with darting fish and a mermaid. She’s a little weathered from years submerged, but the Khmer Apsana dancer staring up at me is still an intriguing companion.

This is the last place I expected to be having such a cool dining experience – the Thai island of Koh Chang, in the north-east corner of the Gulf of Thailand near the Cambodian border. But the Buddha View Restaurant has raised the bar for fabulousness in the region, combining European chic with relaxed Thai charm, great food and a seductive ambience.

Chill out and forget city life (Photograph Julie Miller)

Owned by three Belgian friends, Buddha View perches on stilts above the waters of Bang Bao Bay, in the south of Thailand’s second largest island. Bang Bao is a working pier, trawlers docked alongside and women pounding shrimp heads into paste. Seafaring cats wander along the planks squeaking for handouts, and there’s always a fishy whiff in the air.

In the past few years, however, Bang Bao has also become a tourist mecca, with the narrow half-kilometre pier jammed with souvenir sellers, dive shops and restaurants. Guesthouses and private homes have also sprung up, with real estate prices exploding as society folk from Bangkok establish weekender accommodation.

Originally a sprawling Thai restaurant, the Belgians took over Buddha View four years ago, determined to upgrade, modernise and attract a different clientele – namely Europeans. First on the agenda was to convert half of the space to guest accommodation – there are now eight rooms available, simple yet stylish, all with king beds and four with spacious en suite bathrooms.

Dine by the pool and unwind

During the day, guests are welcome to soak up the sun on day beds strategically positioned on the pier; in the evening, these are the perfect place to sip on cocktails (the strawberry margaritas are to die for!), soaking up sunset views and watching the twinkling lights on the bay.

The coolest place to dine, however, is on colourful cushions alongside two large glass-top tables, hovering over holes cut into the original decking. The addition of the mermaid sculptures below, visible only at low tide, make for a mesmerising dining experience.

Matching the chill-out lounge ambience at the Buddha View is the quality of the food – exceptional flavours and presentation, with seafood barbecues and delicious jungle curries a specialty. And of course, you couldn’t get much fresher seafood, straight off the boat and direct to your plate.

Buddha View: 28 Moo 1 Bang Bao Pier, Koh Chang.

www.thebuddhaview.com

Rooms cost from 1000 baht per night in peak season (Dec-Jan), less at other times of the year.

New Jersey’s not the first place you think of when you’re after olde-worlde charm, but then Hoboken’s always been the state’s maiden aunt — the one with the elegant charm and wads of money under her mattress. It’s a chiconomical place to find a hotel when you are visiting New York. J Mag Editor, cult blogger (Hey Man Now You’re Really Living) and Holiday Goddess Jenny Valentish loves it…

Hoboken, the ‘mile square city’ may offer panoramic views across the Hudson of Manhattan — just minutes away by train — but its population only teeters around 40,000 and the architecture’s barely been touched since the city’s 19th century township days. Add to that the old-fashioned delicatessens and grocery stores, and Hoboken’s a Christmas card-perfect vision of how American cities used to be.

While family SUVs are rife, Hoboken’s also fairly bohemian and alternative health conscious, and can offer a budget alternative to New York accommodation that actually doubles your experience if you yomp off to the Big Apple during the day.

Most cafes have wireless internet access, while for fantastic cheap meals look up Zafra Kitchens , Karma Kafe for Indian and Maria’s Italian Kitchen for a Sinatra-obsessed Italian family experience.

The PATH subway to New York goes from Hoboken Terminal to Christopher St (which drops you in the gay-friendly West Village), 9th St (Greenwich Village and Washington Square Park), 14th St (Chelsea, south and Union Square), 23rd (Chelsea, north), 33rd (Herald Square, Macy’s), taking around 15 minutes to reach its final destination. Behind the Hoboken Terminal, NY Waterway gets you across the Hudson by ferry to either Pier 11/Wall Street or the World Financial Centre.

More details at the website

It’s not by chance that Genova is not one of Italy’s prime destinations; its impacted verticality can be daunting, and its sprawling port and general air of having gone-to-seed are often off-putting to the casual visitor. (An unusually hip shopkeeper opined to me Genova was fifteen years behind other similarly-sized Italian cities, in a country that was itself fifteen years behind the rest of Europe.) But it has a few things going for it: the extreme beauty of its physical setting, with a cityscape of painted 18th-century apartment buildings tumbling down the Ligurian Apennine hills to the Mediterranean, and a largely intact mediaeval core and a rollicking maritime history. Not to mention a delightful way with food and wine, including producing the world’s most sublimely fragrant and intensely green pesto.

I lived through the good part of last summer in the city, with my two daughters and my Italian-born husband; his mother had grown up there before marrying his Puglian father, and then migrating to Australia in the mid 1970s. Rather like in Michael Winterbottom’s film Genova, it was a summer stained with grief, through the film’s absent mother was obviously not me. My own mother had died suddenly the year before and, as a travel writer might be expected to do, I sought the solace of disorientation, the familiarity of the unfamiliar.

The hot, humid days were sometimes punctuated by trips to the beach, but when Italy’s terminally-in-decline rail system was, in the heat, too much of a hassle to contemplate, we made do with the port’s postage-sized but location-perfect swimming pool or walks – up and down and around the city’s hillside network of stairs, grand public lifts and spiralling red brick paths, searching for glimpses of the sea and a place to spread a picnic rug. Then there was the endless shopping for food, devising menus, preparing food, and eating. Italy’s highly ritualised culinary habits can be as claustrophobic as Genova’s centro storico, but like the tightly wound knot of an ancient city, they can also bolster and comfort.

Our first apartment in the city was in the heart of that old city, in a ruined palazzo, as overdecorated as it was grimy, but with the small blessing of a terrace perched at the base of a 14th-century tower. The kitchen was barely functional, so we ate each night at a small restaurant downstairs cheerily named Mangia Buono (via di San Bernardo, Genova). The menu was hand-written and changed daily, but there were no surprises in the rota of cucina tipica Genovese staples – borage-stuffed ravioli, minestrone infused with pesto, rabbit braised with tiny black Taggiasche olives, sweet, fat, flash-fried anchovies with no adornment but a wedge of lemon. Why fix what isn’t broken?

One of the first dishes I ordered was corzetti di levante, large coin-like disks of pasta, the smooth blondness of its pinenut and parmesan sauce shot through with an astringent jolt of marjoram, the city’s signature herb. (The ‘levante’ mentioned in the pasta’s name does not refer to the Middle East, as I first thought, given both the pine nut topping and the Genovese’s wide-roaming ways, but rather is a nod to the eastern Ligurian towns of Chiavari and Recco from which the dish hails.)  The corzetti themselves were each embossed with a pattern, the indentation not just making for a pretty face, but also allowing for each to hold its fair share of sauce.

Up the hill in apartment number two, with a better kitchen and the summer coming to an end, I wondered how I could go about making my own. The pasta dough simple enough, yes, but what of the stamp? The disks could, of course, be cut out like scones with a humble jam jar or espresso cup, but that would be missing the point. I still get a childlike thrill from stamps of any sort, always struck by the pleasure that comes from creating replicas, especially if its utilising pre-industrial tricks of the trade. Non-mechanical reproduction, if you will. I discovered a woodworker named Franco Casoni still plies his corzetti-carving trade in pretty Chiavari (the town’s also known for their turned wood chairs), each stamp customised on the spot for around €30.

Franco will do you up anything your heart desires, though traditional patterns include trees, laurel wreaths, butterflies, Punic-looking swirls and crosses. In fact, the pasta’s name is said to come from the Ligurian dialect term for ‘little cross’, dating the pasta to the Crusades. Other accounts place their origin a few centuries later, with wealthy Renaissance families flashing their noble coat of arms in front of guests at the pasta course – an early example of furthering your brand.

I was as keen as any Genovese aristocrat to have my own stamp made up, but with the master carver off on an extended holiday, I bought the simple, happy, geometric one you see above. This one came from the tiny Alladin’s cave of cookware shops, Butteghetta Magica di Tinello Daniela (via della Maddalena 2, Genova; +39 010 2474225), who must do a fair trade in them – I was offered a recipe in English with my purchase. It reminds me of a shortbread mould, but it’s neatly hollow on its reverse with a sharply beveled edge to do the cutting.

My first corzetti were commendable, if still a little too fatto a mano for my liking. Washed down with a glass of the local Pigato, a pale and airy white that also helped moisten the dough, they made for a wonderful late summer lunch. My mother would have turned her nose up at it all, and requested instead a cheese sandwich and a cup of tea. But she would have been proud.

One day, in January 1985, during my first visit to Melbourne (in fact my first time away home), I became a little lost. I ended up in Johnston Street, Collingwood, and while making my way back to what I hoped was the more familiar territory of Fitzroy, a strange and beautiful sight suddenly came into view. Here, on a ratty, windswept, traffic-ridden stretch of road, facing away down the hill to nothing and no one in particular, was a large, and totally unheralded, Keith Haring mural. A sphinx-like computer-headed worm, a glowing brain within the screen, rode rough shod over a sea of electric boogie, defiant dancers breaking and spinning and popping with a relentless, if anxious, energy. What a city, I thought to myself, so utterly cool it casually plonks a major international art work somewhere like this, and forgets to tell anyone about it.

Keith Haring was invited to Australia in March 1984, by curator and dealer John Buckley, when he was on the cusp of international fame. During his visit he painted a couple of large, but ultimately temporary, murals for the National Gallery of Victoria and the Art Gallery of NSW. Critics would later decry his willing accessibility and his openness to the commercial, even describing his work as ‘not much more than pleasant downtown wallpaper’. But his signature dancing figures and ‘radiant’ babies, bombastically bright palette and reoccurring social themes have an insistent power; his work manages to both symbolise and transcend the decade that his career spanned. I was privileged to watch a high-top sneaker clad Haring aloft a scissor lift, at Sydney’s AGNSW, calmly and assuredly making his mark above the neo-classical arches. With a swift, precise hand honed through years of chalk and magic marker drawing on the walls of New York’s subways, he worked without preparatory drawings or even the usual gridded markup of mural-makers. This direct, and public, way of working was a rarefied but no less immediate form of graffiti tagging. It not only put his consummate skill on display and referenced the original outsider act, but became performance in itself. Haring was well aware that he was fusing disparate practices, describing hearing Christo talk in 1976: ‘that had the most profound effect on me…the event as public art takes it into another arena besides object-making’. He was also conscious that in his work the language of the street and the clubs met with that of the gallery.

While in Melbourne, Haring was also asked to create a permanent work for the city’s new contemporary ‘kunsthall’, the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, now located in South Melbourne. As ACCA then lacked a permanent home, a wall was found at the Collingwood Technical College, a tatty ‘tech’ school in what was at the time a rough-and-ready inner urban neighbourhood. The chosen site appealed immensely to Haring who was always keen to engage, and on many projects actually work, with children and teenagers; he considered himself an activist as well as an artist. Once the wall was primed by volunteers, Haring completed the painting in a single day.

Fast forward 26 years. Haring is long gone, having succumbed to an AIDs-related illness in early 1990, at the age of 31. His Collingwood mural, unlike so many others, persists. But while concerted preservation efforts were made in 1996, it is but a shadow of its former self. Its kinetic lines of red and green are faded into chalky rust and blue tones, its vibrant mustard-yellow ground is wan and, in parts, flaking. The current state of neglect is partly due to years of bureaucratic buck passing. The site was listed on Heritage Victoria’s register in 2004, so the mural cannot be destroyed, but the building itself has gone through several changes of departmental ownership and is currently up for sale, leaving no party willing to fund relatively insignificant maintenance costs. Troublingly, the inaction also stems from a seemingly unbreachable divide between two camps of Haring devotees.

Those on the conservatorial side see the mural as a cultural artefact, one that contains the artist’s rare and authentic touch evidenced in each singular brushstroke; they advocate a commitment to preservation, or stabilisation, with the caveat that even with their best efforts, the mural will continue to fade and eventually cease to exist. The Haring Foundation, and many others, including several curators and Haring’s original Australian contact, John Buckley, are hoping to restore, or more accurately, repaint the work, claiming that this would most closely follows Haring’s wishes. Yes, the original paint and brushstrokes would be forever lost, but Haring’s intent, creative vision and integral design will live on, in all its jellybean vibrancy. Buckley recalls a conversation with Haring who, with a characteristic lack of preciousness, said that the mural could, when needed, just be repainted by any good signwriter.

Whatever your take on the preserve/restore schism, and whatever the eventual outcome, the mural should be on every Melbourne visitor’s itinerary. It’s an amazing example of Haring’s work, a prescient vision of the dark, depersonalising shadow of digital technology, and the spirit of resilience and resistance contained in popular dance and music. It’s also a poetic and serendipitous document of its time. Gaze a while and take yourself back to a world before Google and iPhones. Conjure up the image of Haring making a brief descent from his cherry picker. Not to size up his work as a Renaissance master might, but rather to change sides of the Fab 5 Freddie mixtape playing on his Kenny Scharf-customised boom box, making sure the kids who’d gathered to watch kept working their freshly-acquired b-boy moves. The mural is currently behind a locked gate, but can clearly be seen from the street, both through a fence and towering above. Plans are also afoot for greater public accessibility. These days the neighbourhood, now my neighbourhood, might still present a tad bleak (and does still contain pockets of extreme disadvantage). But, with a slew of cool-kid patronised pubs, cute cafes, restaurants, shops and bars, it’s a destination in itself.

Where else to see Keith Haring’s murals

• Napier St, Fitzroy (1984)
  Btw Gertrude and Webb Sts, Fitzroy, Melbourne
  During Haring’s month-long trip to Australia, he was to casually daub quite a number of walls in both cities, including a railway overpass, a nightclub and a private prep school. This small but iconic figure on the fence of an inner city terrace – a gift for the one-time resident – is one of the only that both endures and is publicly accessible.

• Crack is Wack (1986)
  East 128th St& 2nd Ave (the Harlem River Drive), New York
  Painted on the northern face of a handball court wall, Haring’s cautionary response to New York’s crack epidemic was executed without permission (or remuneration), but was put immediately under protection of the City Department of Parks.

• Carmine Street Swimming Pool (1987)
  Carmine St & 7th Ave, New York
  Painted on an ajoining wall between the public pool and the James J. Walker Park handball court, this aquatic-themed work is unusually sparse, but still joyfully kinetic, and at 18ft high and 170ft long is huge.

• L’hôpital Necker (1987)
  149 rue de Sèvres, 15ème, Paris
  Haring’s most enduring and evocative figure is the ‘radiant baby’ – a symbol of innocence and hope – and his interest in the wellbeing of children was borne out in many of his public works. This soaring, vertical mural graces a brutalist external stairwell of a busy children’s hospital.

• Tuttomondo (1989)
  Piazza Sant’Antonio, Pisa
  The idea of creating a mural in Pisa happened by chance when a young Italian student met Haring in the street in New York. This 180sqm work is on the side of the Church of Sant’Antonio, and was realised in a relatively subtle palette in deference to the surrounding streetscape. The interlocking figures optimistically represent the struggle for peace and harmony in the world. This was to be Haring’s last public work.

Want to boost your odds with Lastminute.com Top Secret Hotels deals? Bestselling author and style blogger Maggie Alderson has classified information.

Finding somewhere reasonably priced and decent to stay in central London is on a par with locating the Holy Grail, hens’ teeth etc, so  Lastminute.com’s ‘Top Secret Hotel’ offers seem like the answer. You get a greatly reduced rate – but the catch is you don’t find out which hotel it is until after you have paid.

The sell on the website is as follows: ‘Shhh, these rates are so low that our hotel partners don’t want to put their names to them. So we can bring you these exclusive deals, we don’t reveal the name of the hotel until you’ve booked.’

It does give you the hotel’s star rating, facilities and quite a specific location, but the moment you click the ‘buy’ button remains a bit of a nail biter.

I confess the set-up appeals equally to the gambler and the bargain lover in me, but it comes with some risk. I have had some very happy experiences such as being upgraded on arrival (the Millennium, Berkeley Square), but I’ve also been treated rudely by check in staff, and been given a room so small and horrid it defied belief (let’s just say it was somewhere in Piccadilly).

My last experience, at the fabulous Inter Continental right on Hyde Park Corner, was to be told there were only rooms available on the smoking floor – and I heard another couple getting the same line. It was a bit stinky, but the room was so amazing with views right over Hyde Park, and such good value with a fabulous breakfast all in at £130, I would definitely stay there again.

But now there is a thread on a website which can take all the risky guess work out of it. Money Saving Expert has introduced a forum where people post which hotels they ended up from the Last Minute descriptions and what they were like.

Finding an affordable hotel room in central London just got a whole lot easier.

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/uggboy/ / CC BY 2.0

Forget the Dead Kennedys’ song – Tamara Sheward is smitten by the new Cambodia.

For years, ‘adventure’ in the Gulf of Thailand meant hallucinatory ‘fruit shakes’, dodging toothless ex-pats and wondering how to detangle those regrettable cornrow plaits. But exploring South East Asia’s marine majesty need not involve cringing vampire-style every time the full moon (parties) roll around.

Think Cambodia and Angkor Wat – and ethereal monks -  spring to mind. Fifty people and their goats crammed on the back of a moped, for sure. Pol Pot and war and Dead Kennedys songs, sadly, yes. But a paradisaical string of islands that make The Beach look like it was filmed in New Jersey? Who knew?

It’s a sad irony that the beauty of Cambodia’s 60-plus islands has been spared the fate of its oft-seedy, overrun Thai neighbours thanks mainly to the vile barbarism of the Khmer Rouge: hermetically sealed during decades of civil war, the islets were left to nature and the rare hut-dweller who escaped the purges of Pol Pot and pals 

Apart from those close to the beach town of Sihanoukville, the majority of the islands are off travellers’ radars, but are now accessible to intrepid souls looking for a private piece of paradise.

It’s BYO travel in the truest sense — hammocks, camping gear and food supplies are essential — but for those with pioneer fantasies, it’s unbeatable. And with larger islands like Koh Rong and the floating fishing village of Koh Kong offering audacious wayfarers immersion into local life, you can’t get more native without being born an apsara.

Anyone with a hardy spirit and, ideally, a translator can launch themselves into the best adventure Southeast Asia has to offer. Head to Sihanoukville’s fishing port and ask around for a willing captain. Tip: Scotch eases bartering proceedings.

Don’t believe what you hear. Sure, New York is expensive but in the city that never sleeps you can still have a fabulous time without breaking the bank. Or robbing one, writes Rebecca Sparrow.

1. Woody Allen Was Here:  Hotel 17 and Hotel 31 New York
Here’s the thing: New York hotel rooms are notoriously small and ridiculously expensive and you don’t get a whole lotta bang for your buck. But hey, who needs to stay at the Four Seasons when you’re hardly going to be spending any time in your room?  Exactly. Hotel 17 and Hotel 31 are in prime NYC locations and offer great value budget accommodation. Each room has private air-con, twenty-four hour concierge, daily maid service, cable TV and a phone in each room. Plus the rooms are seriously neat and very clean. Hotel 31 is located in the heart of NYC on 31st Street, between Lexington and Park Avenues. A twenty-minute stroll and you’re in Central Park.  Hotel 17 is downtown in the East Village – the perfect locale if you want to get a taste of Greenwich Village and Gramercy Park. And then there’s the Woody factor. Monsieur Allen filmed Manhattan Murder Mystery at Hotel 17 and previous guests have included Madonna.  For more information on Hotel 17 and Hotel 31 go to www.hotel17ny.com or www.hotel31.com Single rooms with a shared bathroom are approx US$100 per night.

2. Free Stars under the Stars: Bryant Park Movie Festival
It’s been described as “one of the most sensual, graceful open spaces in New York City” with its Parisian look and feel. But if you ask me, the best thing about Bryant Park is the Summer Film Festival, which runs every Monday evening from June to August.  Pack a picnic or just grab a blanket and a hotdog and sit back and enjoy some cinematic classics for free. Last year they screened gems like Annie Hall and Casablanca. Bryant Park is located at 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue. Movies are screened at 8pm but gates open at 5pm – if you want a good spot, get there early! For more info go to www.bryantpark.org.

3. A New York State Of Mind: Walk the streets
I know what you’re going to want to do – you’re going to see those famous yellow NY taxi cabs and wanna grab a ride. Well, don’t. The traffic in New York is slower than Forrest Gump and, within the blink of an eye, you’ll have a US$50 cab fare just to get a few blocks.  So my advice is to pack your walking shoes and hit the pavement. New York is a walking city – it’s flat, easy to navigate and walking the streets is the best way to get a feel for the city and to discover your own little gems.  And here’s a tip – don’t shell out the big bucks for those TV tours. Seinfeld, Sex and the City, the Sopranos – you can find all those key locations yourself on an internet search engine. Why pay a tour guide $60 for that?

4. The Staten Island Ferry
You’ve heard it before but there is no greater view of the Statue of Liberty than from the famous Staten Island Ferry. Every day 60,000 passengers are ferried between Staten Island and Lower Manhattan giving them the most gorgeous view of New York Harbour without paying a cent. That’s right, this ferry is free, baby! So sit back, enjoy the fifty minute round trip and don’t forget the camera.  For more information go to www.siferry.com.

5. Shaken, Not Stirred (or Tap, Not Evian) – The Algonquin Hotel
If you really want to have the ultimate New York experience then you need to have a drink in the Algonquin Lobby. This writer’s hotel was the once famous hangout of New York’s literati. In fact the daily lunchtime meetings of these writers, journalists, publicists and actors led them to being called the “Algonquin Round Table”. Today the Algonquin lobby is one of the places to be seen in New York and you’re sure to spot a TV star (sporting the mandatory tortoise shell glasses) or real-life author having a cocktail or hammering away at a laptop. So sit back in one of the wing-backed chairs and order a glass of water if you’re skint or a martini ($15) if you’re feeling flush. The Algonquin Hotel is located at 59 West 44th Street.

6. Cue the Applause: Free TV Tapings
I’m a little embarrassed to say that on one of my first trips to New York I wound up in the audience of Ricki Lake (I think the show was called “Boyfriend, I’m pregnant and  –  surprise – get lost!”). Tacky? Sure. But it was truly hilarious. Ricki’s gone but there are some great shows taped most days in New York like The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, The Late Show with David Letterman and The View (a female panel show featuring Barbara Walters, Whoopi Goldberg and others). Who knows, you just may be there the night Brad Pitt announces he’s single and looking for a down-to-earth backpacker. Tickets are to TV tapings are free (hooray!) but you do usually have to try and reserve them a few months in advance. Or you can try your luck and turn up at the studio on the day. For more details go to www.thedailyshow.com, www.cbs.com/latenight/lateshow and http://abc.go.com/daytime/theview/tickets

7. Culture Vulture
Just because you’re on a budget doesn’t mean you can’t experience some of New York’s most famous attractions. There are a dozen free museums (like the Guggenheim) while others (like the Metropolitan Museum of Art) ask for a donation per entry. If all you can afford is five bucks, that’s what you pay – just plan to be more generous on your next visit.  For a full list of New York museums including free days go to www.ny.com/museums/free.

This Holiday Goddess can smell a bargain from the Bronx to the Battery, but even New York City can put a dent in Cheapallonia’s budget when she’s taking a wander with her six-year-old in tow. Luckily, if you know the right places to go, you’ll not only entertain the kids, you’ll be astonished at how many free activities there are. With a bit of planning, you won’t have to spend much more than a subway fare to have a dazzling time.

Here are some of Cheapallonia’s favorite (and free) hidden gems in lower Manhattan that are perfect for kids (and big kids aka mummy and daddy).

Teardrop Park
Hidden from view is the coolest water park in the City. Not only does the water come out of several fanciful fountains cleverly set into rocks, but there’s an incredibly long, straight slide that kids slick down with water so they can shoot off, screaming with laughter, into the sand pit below. Teardrop Park is unique in that even the smallest kids can safely enjoy the water feature and sand pit, and bigger kids will not tire of climbing up the rock stairwell to go down that slide all afternoon. As Teardrop Park is tucked between several large apartment buildings, you can walk by it and never know it’s there, so it’s rarely crowded. Too bad the water is only on in the summer, but there’s also a large lawn for picnics, and the City Parks Department often has free activities on weekends. *Teardrop Park is located between Warren St. and Murray St. in Battery Park City, east of River Terrace. Nearest subways: 1/2/3/A/C at Chambers St., E at World Trade Center.

 
Governor’s Island
If you like history, Governor’s Island is a gem. Its strategic location in the middle of New York Harbor made it a crucial defense for Yankee troops, and during the Civil War, one of the forts was used as a prison for Southern soldiers. The island became an army base, then a naval base, and was eventually turned over to the Coast Guard, who gave it back to the city with the condition that it not be developed for commercial gain. While planners try to figure out what to do with it, you can take a 7-minute ferry ride on Saturdays during the summer, hop on an air-conditioned bus for a guided tour, and marvel at the view before having a picnic on the beautiful grounds, near the gorgeous homes built for the officers near one of the forts that Cheapallonia’s imaginative son swears is haunted.

*Governor’s Island is open from June through September. The Governor’s Island Ferry departs on the hour from 10 am to 2 pm at the Battery Maritime Building, located next to the Staten Island Ferry on South Street and Whitehall Street. The last ferry leaves the Island at 4 p.m.

Nearest subways: R/W at Whitehall St., 1 at South Ferry, 4/5 at Bowling Green, J/M/Z at Broad St.

 
Staten Island Ferry
Cheapallonia is not one to pay for overcrowded tourist boat cruising the harbor when she can pose on the bow of the Staten Island Ferry for free and do her best imitation of Emma Lazarus. Sure, there’s no tour guide droning on, but she can read a travel guide and look out the window and figure it out for herself.

The Staten Island ferry ride spans 5 miles, takes about 25 minutes, and is brilliant free fun for people watching, scum-in-the-harbor watching, big cruise ship watching, and sunset watching. Eat a hot dog and feed the bun to the nasty gulls, then turn around and come right back. Be sure to stand in the front for a heart-stopping view of Lower Manhattan.  

The Staten Island Ferry is located at Whitehall Street and the East River. Like all city transport, it runs 24/7. You do have to get off the boat at Staten Island and transfer to another one for the return voyage. Nearest subways: R/W at Whitehall St., 1 at South Ferry, 4/5 at Bowling Green, J/M/Z at Broad St.

Daffy’s
While you’re near the Ferry, you might as well tap the piggybank for what you’ve saved on entertainment, and spend it instead on absolutely crucial fashion items, darling. Since most Holiday Goddesses have likely thought about having a shopping accident (the accident part comes when you faint after opening your credit-card bill) in the ginormous designer discount emporium of Century 21 (across from the World Trade Center site at 22 Cortlandt St,  between Church and Broadway), do yourself a favor and skip over to the smaller and more civilized Daffy’s instead. This chain has goodies for all family members, and you can either strike real gold (hugely discounted items from many different famous designers, like Cheapallonia’s favorite, Les Copains) or strike out. There’s no predicting what might be hidden in the sale racks, and that’s have the fun. Even if you don’t find the perfect new outfit for yourself, their selection of kids’ designer clothing and shoes never fails to disappoint.

There are many different Daffy’s in Manhattan; check at www.daffys.com. In lower Manhattan, go to 50 Broadway, 212 422-4477. Nearest subways: R/W at Whitehall St., 1 at South Ferry, 4/5 at Bowling Green, J/M/Z at Broad St, E at World Trade Center.

Shu Uemura Beauty Boutique
Now that you’re loaded with gorgeous things to wear, don’t forget your face. Make the Shu Uemura Beauty Boutique a must-see, as you can sample the hundreds of lipsticks, eye shadows, and blushes to your heart’s content, and then get a free makeup lesson with a staff makeup artist. Trust me, Cheapallonia hates a hard-sell, and you’ll never find that here. Located at 121 Greene St., between Houston St. and Prince St  212-979-5500. Nearest subway: N/R at Prince St. and Broadway, #6 at Spring St, C/E at Spring St.

SoHo Nails
If your feet are starting to ache after all that walking, why not soothe them with a quick pedicure. You’ll be thrilled with the bargain-basement manicure/pedicures available from the ubiquitous, no appointment-needed nail salons on practically every block of the city. Most salons are open seven days, from about 10 a.m. to 8 or 9 p.m., and many have specials early in the week, when you can usually find a mani/pedi for about $20, not including tip. Bribe your little girls (and fashion-forward boys) with a manicure and you’ll not only get a respite from shopping but a chance to relax together.SoHo Nails is enormous, and cheap, and it’s where you’ll see fashionistas comparing Essie colors and getting their eyebrows waxed without a yelp. SoHo Nails is at 458 W. Broadway, 3rd Floor, between Houston St. and Prince St. 212-475-6368. Nearest subway: N/R at Prince St. and Broadway, #6 at Spring St., C/E at Spring St.

Have no fear, Cheapallonia is here to direct you to her favorite downtown Manhattan hidey-holes where strollers are (gasp!) welcome and the glares from fellow diners less noticeable. You won’t break the bank going to any of these restaurants, either.

The ubiquitous Greek diners are always good standbys, especially when they have kids’ menus offering free drinks and dessert (usually Jell-o or ice cream), but my advice is to visit the diners for breakfast and get more adventurous when schlepping the kids to lunch or dinner. Do remember, though, that none of the shrines to deliciousness listed here take reservations, so try to go at off-hours. Nothing’s worse than standing in a long line with a hungry and grumpy brood (particularly if surrounded by equally grumpy locals)!

Bubby’s

If you want star-watching along with your extra-thick challah bread French toast, then head down to Bubby’s in Tribeca, where you’ll be gratified to notice that the offspring of celebrities can behave as badly as your own little darlings.

Speaking of darlings, Bubby’s is the clubhouse for the locals who moved to the area when it was still scary with abandoned warehouses along with the nouveau riche hedge-fund traders who (with famous Hollywood actors) are now the only people who can afford the condos nearby. But the food is yummy, the waitstaff endlessly accommodating (although sometimes a bit harried), and there’s a bookshelf crammed with books and toys for the kids to amuse themselves. Don’t leave without having a piece of one of the many, tempting pies (especially the Key Lime).

-120 Hudson St. at North Moore St.
Nearest Subways: A, C, E to Canal St., #1 to Franklin St.

Little Poland

Back when my son was a baby and we lived in the East Village, Little Poland was our home away from home. We’d sit at one of the table near the front window, watching the endless parade of funky dressers and groovers pass by, while eating fluffy buckwheat pancakes the size of a dinner plate, or scarfing down a plate of eggs, home fries, and toast (each cost about three bucks then – and aren’t much more now).

Polish diners are one of the last great bargains in the city. You can’t go wrong with the soups (ask for home-baked challah bread) or the pierogis (steamed or fried dumplings; best are potato and cheese or sauerkraut), or any of the daily specials. The service is quick and friendly and kids are treated with smiles and coos.

-200 Second Ave., between 12^th and 13^th Streets
Nearest subways:  #4, 5, 6, N, or R to 14^th St./Union Square, L to Third Ave.

Masala Bollywood

The Indian community in Manhattan is quite small compared to that of Southall in London. Jackson Heights in Queens is the hub, but it’s still a trip to visit the saree emporiums and restaurants of Curry Hill, on Lexington Ave. near 28^th St (or take a walk down 6^th Street between 1^st and 2^nd Avenues, where nearly all the restaurants serve curry).

Kids who like their food with a little spice will love Masala Bollywood. Not only is the food delicious (and you can ask for extra-mild, for tender palates), but you can watch endless loops of the most glorious stars of Bollywood movies performing some of their most notable numbers. You can’t go wrong with the dosas and the huge assortment of freshly made breads, and there’s even a Chinese-inspired selection if you want to mix things up. 

The pickiest eater ought to go for the Raas Malai (sweet cheese with a hint of rosewater, Gulab Jamun (dumplings soaked in sugar syrup), or homemade kulfi (ice cream) for dessert.

-108 Lexington Ave., between 27^th and 28^th Streets
Nearest Subway: #6 to 28^th St.

Petite Abeille

Petite Abeille is a Belgian bistro that has four outposts downtown, and they’re all particularly kid-friendly, handing out crayons and paper placemats, not grumbling at the Bugaboos clogging the aisles, serving the kids first, and sporting spotlessly clean bathrooms. The prices are reasonable, the selection of Belgian brews vast, and the kids’ menu is more sophisticated than the usual fare. Kids love Stoemp, a Belgian take on mashed potatoes, and parents can’t keep themselves from digging in, either.

-401 E. 20^th St. at First Ave.
Nearest Subway: L Train to 1^st Ave., #6 to 23^rd St., then walk or take the M23 cross-town bus
-466 Hudson St. between Grove and Barrow Streets
Nearest Subway: #1/9 to Christopher St./Sheridan Square
-44 W. 17^th St. between 5^th and 6^th Avenues
Nearest Subway: #, 4, #5, #6, R, N to 14^th St./Union Square, F to 14^th St.
-134 W. Broadway, between Duane and Thomas Streets
Nearest Subway: #1, #, 2, #3, A, C to Chambers St.

Rai Rai Ken

What could be more fun for a child than sitting on a stool in a tiny restaurant, watching the other patrons loudly slurp their soup? Well, if you want to eat ramen noodles properly, you need to slurp them in one go-which is why ramen parlors are ideal for kids. No worries about eating like a guest at a dainty tea party here.

The bowls of steaming soup, with the delicious (and nutritious) broth laden with roast pork, fish cake (called naruto, its sides are a lurid pink, which makes it enticing to even fussy eaters who’d never eat a piece of fish otherwise) veggies, long, long noodles, and then topped with an egg, are always served very quickly, and are hard to resist.

Most ramen parlors only have counters, so they’re best experienced by kids who are old enough to sit on the stools by themselves

-214 E. 10^th St. between 1^st and 2^nd Avenues
Nearest Subways: #6 to Astor Place, L train to 1^st Avenue at 14^th St.

Rickshaw Dumpling Bar

Chinatown is ideal for cheap pork-and-chive dumplings (try the five-for-a-dollar-dive Fried Dumpling at 99 Allen St, which is as authentic as it gets) but if you want to sit back and relax with the kids and chow down on more versatile offerings, head to Rickshaw. Try chicken and basil, Peking duck, shrimp, or vegetarian – or the much-loved Chocolate Shanghai Soup Dumplings (melted Caillebaut chocolate with a black sesame mochi wrapper).

-61 W. 23^rd St., between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. 212 358-7912
Nearest Subways: R to 23^rd St, F to 23^rd St.
-53 E. 8^th St., between University and Broadway
Nearest Subways: R to 8^th St./NYU, #8 to Astor Place

Second Avenue Deli

Lovers of kosher pastrami, corned beef, and chicken soup with matzo balls (floaters, not sinkers) were heartbroken when the beloved Second Avenue Deli, at 10^th Street and Second Avenue, was forced to close its doors after an alleged rent dispute. For several years, we mourned the loss of the saggy floors, the ancient waitstaff, and the cholesterol-clogging selection from which you could scarf down the plates of free rye bread, coleslaw, and pickles before being given a sandwich large enough to feed a family of six for a week. (Sure, Katz’s Deli on Houston Street hits the spot if you’re craving a great hot dog, but it doesn’t have the same sort of vibe.)

Happy days have returned, as the Deli has opened in a new location. Okay, it’s not on Second Avenue anymore-so sue me. But the matzo balls are as fluffy as ever, the waitstaff as grizzled, the noise level as high, and now, you get free gribenes on the table, too.

You probably don’t want to know that gribenes are rendered chicken skin, fried to a crackling crunch and laden with enough calories to make you walk all the way to Gucci and back in penance, but they sure taste divine.

You may have long waits on weekends and dinnertime.

-162 E. 33^rd St., between Lexington Ave. and Third
Nearest Subway: #6 to 33^rd St.