I'll have what she's having

Thursday morning we finished packing and headed over to J's and M's for our final day in NY. Dad and Irina arrived and we all headed to Houston Street on the subway.

Katz' Deli is famous for the "I'll have what she's having" scene from "When Harry Met Sally" but it should really be famous for having really great Jewish style food and a really cool atmosphere.

It's really old style New York cafeteria, a big room with basic furniture, a giant deli counter along one side and a ticketing system run by the yellow ticket Nazi.

What a way to finish our NY adventure! Big Jay got a famous Reuben sandwich with pastrami (which was huge and delicious). The kids got cheeseburgers which they confirmed were "the best" and I got a chili dog which is a hot dog with beef chili all over it. Americans do hot dogs well, really well, which I have always thought is a no-brainer. What's a hot dog? A good frankfurt sausage on a decent fresh bun with your choice of accompaniments. Easy. Not here in Oz. As veterans of most sporting venues on the East coast we know that hot dogs are a way of catering companies saying "screw you, suckers". But I digress.

My chili dog was yummo as was everything else I tried from other people's plates. I especially love the plates of pickles they bring to the table when you arrive. Two different types, both delicious. The other thing I tried was a New York Egg Cream, which I thought sounded like a custard dessert of some kind but was actually a milk shake with a spritz of Seltzer water in it. Not bad but a bit strange.

We came out of there stuffed and walked straight over the road to the Italian ice cream laboratory where we stuffed down some gorgeous ice cream (well it was a really hot day). Too hot to walk anywhere we took the subway back to Brooklyn and waited for our car service car to head to the airport.

Goodbyes (I HATE long, drawn out farewells) and the car arrived. It didn't fit all of us and the luggage and this is the exact point where things turned into a big steaming pile of manure.