Minneapolis, MN - The Convention Grill

The Convention Grill is pretty much my favorite restaurant of all time. A 50s diner/soda fountain thatt's a historic landmark (it's remained virtually the same for decades) and has been in tons of food and travel magazines. Technically, it's just a diner. But it's the best damn diner that ever existed. EVER.

You might think I'm a little biased since I literally grew up down the street from it, and I have fond memories of walking out of my house only to have the delicious smells of grease, meat and onions wafting toward me. But really, I've never met a person who didn't love it. Their milkshakes, which come in a much bigger array of flavors than at most diners, are so thick you usually can't drink them through a straw, at least not at first. They are served in huge metal containers that allow you to get 2-3 full glasses worth. Their burgers are big and juicy. Their grilled cheese - my favorite - is a double-decker sandwich that comes with 3 slices of bread and 3-4 different types of cheese (you can also add with tomatoes and bacon). Their french fries come in huge portions (a "half order" is good for 2-3 people at least) and they're greasy, skin-on style and quite tasty.

So basically, save lots of room in your stomach before you go. Also, be prepared to wait if you go at the dinner rush, particularly on a nice day. It's a popular place, deservedly so.

Brooklyn, NY - Union Hall

Union Hall,* located in the lovely brownstone-laden neighborhood of Park Slope, is my favorite bar in all of the five boroughs of New York City. The main floor has cozy couches, shelves of books that give it a great homey feeling, a fireplace and a great beer selection (plus the drink prices are pretty good to NY - a well drink will cost you $5-6). In the back they have a small space you can reserve for private parties. They also have pretty decent bar food. But of course, one of the things Union Hall is most known for is its bocce ball courts. There are two courts and if you're there on the weekends, get their early to sign up. For those of you who don't know, bocce is an Italian lawn sport where you have a small ball (the polina) and you try to get your teams balls closest to the small ball. In the case of Union Hall, you play on sandy courts inside the bar (see below). It's a laid back game, perfect for playing with a drink in your hand. It can also be a fun way to meet new people. There are some players who take the game a little too seriously though - once I played a duo who brought their own balls! Also, you have better chances of getting on the court if you stick close. A lot of people put their name on the list and then walk away and don't really bother checking back in, so you can usually hop in on one of their spots if you stick close by. For those of you bocce enthusiasts looking to play more often or without the crowds, you can join their bocce league.

And I haven't even gotten to the downstairs yet... Downstairs is a concert venue where they have some pretty great shows (and some not so great ones of course). I think they also have poetry, comedy and even a science night there sometimes. The best thing of all though is Friday nights: Karaoke Killed the Cat. It's the best karaoke I've ever been to (although Live Band karaoke at Webster Hall in Manhattan comes pretty close because with an actual band behind you, you really feel like a rock star). Most of the people who go up are great entertainers. Irony seems to be key to the entertainment - you get two of the whitest white hipsters rapping or you get a tattooed metal head singing a ballad, etc. All in all, it's a really good time and people are very supportive of each other. It's always packed pretty shortly into the night and everyone in the audience is dancing and singing along. The only downside is that you also need to get there pretty much right when it starts though in order to get your name in line to sing.

*NOTE: not to be confused with Union Pool, a hipster bar in Williamsburg, OR Union Bar, a yuppy bar in Manhattan.

New York, NY - Park Avenue: Winter (or Spring, Summer, Fall)

My favorite restaurant in New York City is Park Avenue: Winter. Or well, Park Avenue: (insert season here). They change the menu and the decor of the restaurant with every season, but most of the times I've been there have been in the winter (not intentionally, it just worked out that way) so I think of it as Park Avenue: Winter. Winter is pictured above and Spring is pictured below to give you an idea of how much it changes. It's pretty pricey (think $30-50 per entree) but the food and the customer service is amazing. And actually, it's really not that pricey considering the overall experience.

I found out about the restaurant because they were featured on Gossip Girl and they had a promotion, which was listed on one of the "cheap things to do in NY" blogs that I read. The promotion was that if you came dressed as a school girl, you got a free meal. FREE. So I went with five friends on St. Patrick's day of 2009 and I was thinking it would be, you know, a free entree and everything else you had to pay for. Nope! They gave us a free appetizer, free entree, two free side dishes, two free alcoholic drinks AND a dessert. The whole meal would've cost probably $120-140 per person had we paid for it. Not only that, but they still treated us like royalty even though they knew we were eating for free. At this same meal, I had the most delicious filet mignon I've ever had (to this day).

I have to say, this whole free meal thing was a genius move on their part. While at first we wondered how they weren't losing massive amounts of money on this deal, I have been back to the restaurant several times since, as have most of my friends. And I've recommended it to countless other people. So they've definitely made their money back off of at least our free meal, and then some. The second time I went really stood out to me, as well. For one thing, they had this side dish of broccoli and cheetos that was surprisingly amazing (albeit rather incongruous with the rest of their menu) and secondly, the table was wobbly so my drink spilled on my skirt and they rushed to make it right immediately: they put something under the table so it wouldn't wobble, they gave me soda water for my skirt and (best of all) they took a few items off of our bill. Really, their customer service is amazing. You really feel like your business matters to them and I find that improves my restaurant experience almost infinitely.

So if you can only afford to splurge for one meal during your time to New York, make it Park Avenue: Winter (or Spring or Summer or Fall depending on the time of year you go).

Louisville, KY - Buck's Restaurant

For dinner my one night in Louisville, we went to this very nice restaurant, Buck's. The atmosphere is great - they have a live piano player singing old classics and it's a very elegant looking restaurant. We got there earlier than our reservation so we sat at the bar for a little while. The bartender was nice and recommended different types of bourbon to my boyfriend (since we had just come from the Maker's Mark distillery, he had Bourbon on the brain). There are free Andes mints at the bar and by the door (not the cheap red and white candies that most restaurants have). The food was delicious - I had the Bourbon Pecan Chicken (stuffed with brie cheese, yummy!) and my boyfriend had the Breast of Duck Hoisin (though I'm still not sure what hoisin sauce is). For dessert we split whatever was the most chocolatey item on their menu (their dessert menu isn't listed on their website so I forget what it was called). It was all quite delicious and attractively served. The service was good, everyone was quite pleasant. They even called a cab for us to get to our next location (we didn't drive so that we could share a bottle of wine).

For some reason, most of the patrons of the restaurant seemed to be over 50 and I kept thinking that the young people in Louisville are clearly missing out, (so don't let that deter you if you're younger - I'm 23 and my boyfriend is 26 and we very much enjoyed it). I highly recommend this place and it was one of the highlights of my (very short) trip.

The best way to see Salt Lake City

When I went to Salt Lake City for the first time in May of 2008 on a business trip (to film for a documentary), I was in awe of the mountains (it was my first time seeing real mountains in person). So naturally, my favorite memories from that trip were the ones in which we got some lovely views of them from on high.

Our second to last day we went to the Sundance Institute (an hour or so outside of SLC) and took the ski lift to the top (we're not wusses, we were just short on time so we didn't hike it). The views were amazing. It was also my first time being at that altitude and I made the mistake of running up part of the rest of the mountain, and could hardly breath. But the views were breathtaking. And the drive was beautiful too (the drive between Park City and Ogden at the Sundance Film Festival was equally gorgeous and one of the only positive things about that trip). If you're there in the non-skiing season, it's definitely worth taking the lifts to the top just for the views. You can also use the lifts to bring mountain bikes to the top and bike down.

Our last morning in Salt Lake City, one of the people we were filming took us up in his small 4-seater private plane. We flew around the mountains, dipping and swaying with their peeks (not for the weak of stomach mind you) and over the Great Salt Lake, which was so much more amazing than I expected it to be. We got to see Promontory Point, wild bison, old Native American caves, the Spiral Jetty (totally underwhelming btw), salt mines, red and orange water (different minerals in different parts of the water). It was seriously such an amazing experience and I got to see parts of the lake that I never would've otherwise. So if you can hire a pilot to fly you around Salt Lake City, do it. It would be expensive, yes (although probably not as expensive as you're imagining if you do it in a small plane for 4 people or less), but I think it's worth it. The best things that Salt Lake City has to offer you are its natural wonders, some of which would take days of hiking or hours of driving uninhabited dirt roads or boating through dangerously shallow waters to see. And some of which can only be seen from above. As proof, the slide show: