Hair skills and haute cuisine

Today's shout out has to go to that amazing pilot who landed a plane in the freezing cold Hudson without anyone being seriously hurt. miraculous.

And on a much more inconsequential note, I wanted to call attention to a great hair salon that I've discovered (via Carrie) that's cool and (somewhat) affordable. It's called Hayato, and it's run by a bunch of very hip Japanese people.

In addition to their hair skills, I love the fact that they give you a free 10 minute back/shoulder massage and that they have a handy list of NYC recommendations they pass out, old-school style, as copies of a handwritten document. The list points clients to cool restaurants, bars and shops.

I figure you can definitely trust Japanese expats in their choices of Japanese food, so here's a few of their picks of Japanese restaurants to try (I'm only including the affordable downtown options):

Ippudo, 65 Fourth Ave.
Kyoya, 94 E. Seventh St.
Setagaya, 141 E. First Ave.
Gyukaka, 34 Cooper Sq
Shabu Tatsu, 216 E 10th St
Sobaya, 229 E Ninth St.

And turning my attention to NON-affordable restaurants, I accidentally found myself with friends last night at one of the hottest restaurants in NYC, Ssam , part of the Momofuku empire that recently got a NY Times three-star review . I've now realised why I tend to avoid NYC's "hottest restaurants." The food was pretty stunning, but we calculated we might have had to spend $100 a head to get enough sustenance to actually have a dinner-sized meal. Instead we
got shavings of raw country ham, one bite each of an amazing beef pasta, and some spectacular stir-fried brussels sprouts -- all delicious but more like a tiny appetizer with a big dinner price. So with our stomachs primed but still mostly empty from three-star cuisine, we dashed across the street to fill up on fantastic zero-star free pizza at the Crocodile. That seemed more agreeable with the credit crunch and my freelance "income."