NEW YORK CITY: EATING AT RED ROOSTER IN HARLEM

On our April trip to New York City, we wanted to be close to Columbia University, where our son is going to school, and the best accommodations we found based on price and location was the Double Tree by Hilton on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River. To get to New York we had to cross the Fort Lee Bridge, the same bridge the was part of the 2013 "Bridgegate" scandal involving New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. Lucky for us, the bridge was open and traffic was flowing nicely, at least as nicely as it flows in that area.                                                                                                                        

 We decided to leave our car at the hotel and try out Lyft for the first time. As new users, we got $20 of credit towards our first rides, and our son got some credit for referring us. It's a great system--we ordered a ride through an app on my phone, and we could see where the driver was as represented by a moving dot on a map on the screen. The app gave us a picture of both the car and the driver, along with the make and model of the vehicle. The price is established by Lyft, so there was no worry that we were being cheated, and tipping is not expected.  The map continued to show our progress once we got in the car, so we could see that we were going directly to our destination. Our driver was polite and efficient, and our ride was pleasant.

Later on we saw this billboard:

We ended up using Lyft several more times during our time in the city.

Our first destination was in Harlem, and we enjoyed the wide variety of sights along the way, from interesting street art:

. . . to an LDS chapel suddenly appearing out of nowhere on Malcolm X Boulevard:

Our destination was Harlem"s Red Rooster, the #1 item on my list for this trip to New York City (aside from spending time with our son). I know, I know--it's usually my husband who focuses on food destinations. What's so special about Red Rooster?