A Great Meal in NYC

I went to NYC last weekend and had a wonderful meal at a great restaurant-but first a word about comic book movies.
I love most comic book movies-and I'll go to almost any one (yes, FF2 and The Hulk remake included. I'm still upset over the Galactus thing). But when I heard Seth Rogen was in The Green Hornet, my heart sank. Why would I want to see it? No thnks, Green Hornet and Bruce Lee love aside, I don't think so. And then I read about Stephen Chow both directing it and playing Kato and I was forced to change my mind. Stephen Chow! From Kung Fu Hustle and Shaolin Soccer, two seriously great movies. I may have to go see it after all.

So, M and I went to Soccarrat, a paella bar in NYC. They eight differnt kinds of paella, pages of tapas and great sangria-one that was not too sweet but full of fruit and a good red wine. There are only two separate tables for groups of four, everyone else sits at one long table, so don't expect privacy. The paella is served from the pan, set on a raised holder in between you and your partner. We had the meat paella with mushrooms and it was tasty. Most paellas I've had have been pretty bland-just rice and lots of seafood and not much spice-but this had garlic and shallots and pepper-it was wonderful. The rice on the edges was crispy and burned, it might have been the best part. And tapas were great too-croquetas filled with cheese and bits of ham, meatballs (M didn't like them and usually loves meatballs) and sauteed vegetables. And at the end, the gave us two small glasses of sherry-unfortunately it was a bit too sweet for both of us.
Overall, a great meal and perhaps the quintessential New York meal. I'm still thinking about it.