When I was in New York a few weeks ago, I spent most of my time rushing from meeting to lunch to coffee to another coffee to drinks and dinner to drinks again. Rinse and repeat every day. I didn’t even come close to seeing all the people I wanted to see or doing everything I wanted to do the Best City in the World. There will never be enough time for me in this place.

A lot has changed since I lived in the city during grad school. Many of the once-hip places I loved are now shuttered or forgotten, but the energy and seemingly endless possibilities remain. I wish I could to do a city guide for New York, the way that Tiff knocked it out of the park with Goa, but there is no way I could do it justice. New York is too massive and fabulous to cover in a week. Lucky for me, I had Joanna.

Joanna is one of my great friends from college in Oregon. She has an amazing devotion to food and all things delicious and beautiful, which makes her one of my favorite people to spend time with. She recently authored The Hunt Guide: New York City, which is one of the best little city guides I have seen.  It’s full of gorgeous photos, clever and eloquent writing and actually tells you where to go. Where a Lonely Planet says “Here are ten options, what do you want to do?” The Hunt Guide says “Shut up and follow me, you are going this amazing place, and it’s going to be the best damn thing you have ever eaten.” Buy it here.

It’s tough finding good sushi in Phnom Penh, so when Joanna asked what I wanted for lunch, the answer was easy: put all the fish in my mouth. We met at 1:30 for the last lunch seating at Sushi Yasuda, near Grand Central Station. After being told that the size of our order was, in fact, disgusting, we decided to go for the omakase option. The omakase is the best sushi bar experience possible for me. I get to eat at the bar, talk to the sushi chef, watch every piece made, and the fish doesn’t stop showing up on the gorgeous little bamboo plate until I tell it to.

For those of you that don’t know me personally, self control in these situations is not my forte, and true to form, it wasn’t on this day.

Here are some of my favorites from the day in sushi-collage format.

This was my favorite sushi experience outside of Japan. Special for many reasons, and it truly felt like a treasure. If you are in the neighborhood, get in there. Ask to sit at the bar with Tatsu, he was our chef that afternoon and my new favorite person.

Cheers to New York, Sushi Yasuda, and Joanna.