Boston, the scene: Vox Populi, Top of the Hub

After flying and transferring and waiting and eating peanuts and drinking airplane coffee, I couldn't wait to feel Boston's fresh air. (It also helped that my body believed it was three hours earlier than it actually was, but n'importe quoi).

Our first stop was Top of the Hub, one of Boston's more well-known bar and restaurant haunts with spectacular views of the city (for a hefty price). We decided overpriced drinks and a long wait for a table weren't worth it, snapped a few pics, and went on our merry way.

Instead, we visited Vox Populi, a place Jon had heard about and wanted to check out. It was bustling, more a bar than a restaurant, with a second upstairs bar area that became more busy as the night wore on -- think: college students and televised basketball games.

However, they had a lovely martini menu for some sweet prices ($11-$12), which was a nice change. One example: the Pear Tree Martini, with Grey Goose Le Poire, St-Germain Elderflower liqueur and fresh lime juice.

What are your favorite places in Boston?

Coming soon: Erbaluce, Mike's cannolis, and Legal Seafoods.

Photos, from top: View from the Top of the Hub; enjoying friends at Vox Populi (both, credit Kelsey Ramos); Top of the Hub (maywong_photos)

What's your breakfast fancy? (And the story of The Breakfast.)

My answer: everything. Including that French toast up there.

You already know how much I love breakfast -- I've already reminisced about Sunday morning pancake breakfasts before church.

So naturally one of my favorite memories of college years (I'm already reminiscing about something that ended 7 months ago) also involves breakfast. It was a night a good friend came over to my tiny, barely-big-enough-to-live-in-let-alone-host-even-one-guest college apartment and we invited a bunch of friends over to cram around our little 6-chair round table and eat homemade breakfast burritos with chorizo and eggs, pancakes with all kinds of toppings and syrup, fresh fruit salad and juice.

And in high school and even a couple years into college, before we lost our unnatural childlike metabolism and developed adult taste buds for calorie-laden wine and beer, my best friend and I would spend an early morning in our pajamas attacking the process of constructing The Breakfast.

It deserves title-case because it was literally big enough to be its own entity, with a name. We'll call it Joe. Joe, who was resurrected during the shared Cal Poly SLO-UCLA spring break, consisted of blueberry pancakes, tator tos (naturally), turkey bacon, fresh fruit, french toast sticks (I could be making that up), my best friend's delicious scrambled eggs, "english muffins and jam for sure" (says BFF), ketchup (most people consider this a side dish -- definitely elevated to main dish status for her), sausage and chorizo and various other things we felt like throwing on the table. If Joe sounds nauseating, pretend you are an 18-year-old.

Here are some really delectable breakfast recipes that I've been wanting to try -- let me know if you make them. What else have you been eating for breakfast?

• Edna Mae's sour cream pancakes -- doesn't that photograph look positively LUSCIOUS? Smitten Kitchen
• Healthy & delicious baked oatmeal. Serious Eats
• Heart-shaped cinnamon rolls. Pinch My Salt
• Slow-cooker ultimate breakfast casserole. A Year of Slow Cooking
  
• Chilaquiles -- use up those tortillas and hot sauce! Serious Eats
  
• And, just for fun: a video of what Photoshop might look like if you could bake cookies with it. Serious Eats

Photo: Homemade french toast (a perfect way to use old bread!). Credit: Kelsey Ramos

PhotoBite: What I'm craving right now (Hint: starts with "pan" and rhymes with cake)

If Mardi Gras isn't enough for you (or if it's too much), know that today is also Pancake Tuesday ("Shrove Tuesday") and you can celebrate with a big stack of flapjacks. There will definitely be a little breakfast-for-dinner time on my table tonight. Homey and casual Breakfast is one of my favorite things EVER and now, a whole day to celebrate it with pancakes! Rejoicing ensues.

If king cake is more your style, I'd recommend this LA Times recipe for homemade king cake with cream cheese frosting and tart apple filling. I had a slice of it this morning (never too early for King Cake) and it made my Mardi Gras day.

Happy Mardi Gras, happy Shrove Tuesday!

Photo credit: Kelsey Ramos

PhotoBite: They sought me out to hold the chopsticks

The food editors came to find me because they needed someone to hold dumplings with chopsticks for a food section photo shoot...

...because I'm Asian (I can only assume). :)

http://tweetphoto.com/10419910

(Noelle Carter, the Times' Test Kitchen Manager, shot a picture of the action and Tweeted about it.)

I left my heart in Boston

Back in the daily grind after a blissful week-long trip to Boston which included, among many other things: cannolis from the North End, running in the snow, baking a cake, oysters and beer, fabulous wine and meandering all over Boston and Cambridge with three fantastic Boston friends. One of our stops was the highly-touted Top of the Hub restaurant and bar.

I'll chronicle all of our delicious culinary adventures on Frugal Nosh in the next couple of weeks, as I recover from the shell-shock of returning to work, upload my photographs, etc. Stay tuned.

And in the meantime, answer me this:

What do you love about Boston?

Photo: Top of the Hub, Boston, MA. Credit: maywong_photos