NYC Donut Tour

It has been many moons since I posted - between working full time, graduating from my MBA program in May, and expecting a baby (next week), it has been a busy summer, and this is just the pre-infant beginning!  Posts may continue to be a bit irregular until we get our feet under ourselves with the new addition to the family, but I'll try to check in periodically.

Anyway, preface to today's real topic: donuts. Or doughnuts, depending on where you are from. Mmm. These rings of fried deliciousness are all over the city, but vary widely in style, price, and flavor. We set out to conquer as many as we could!

The facts:
Tour Guide: We joined Redeemer Presbyterian's  NYC Re-Imagined Donut Tour - kindly let by a (volunteer) donut afficianado
Stops: 6
Locations: Lower East Side to Brooklyn
Hours: 4
Level of post-tour Sugar Sickness: Moderate

The stops:
Stop 1: Locanda Verde (377 Greenwich St)
Locanda Verde is actually a popular brunch/general restaurant in TriBeCa, but nestled to the right side inside the restaurant is a 'to go' counter featuring a variety of espresso and pastry products.  Donuts are made in small batches throughout the day (we actually bought the last 4 donuts for the group and shared) - so they are fresh and tasty.  The cake-based style was a bit crunchy on the outside and covered in granulated sugar - ours were a soft lemon cake inside (though I believe the flavor sometimes varies).



Stop 2: Balthazar (80 Spring Street)
Like Locanda Verde, Balthazar is a full restaurant with a take-out pastry option. This one is actually a separate door beside the restaurant, and upon first going in seems to be full of breads, with a few muffins and other pastries. Visible donuts: none. Do not be deceived! Ask what donut flavors are available - there were 3 during our stop, including a banana pecan (which we got) - a cake-style, but with a thick top frosting (unlike Locanda Verde's simpler sugar coating). I found the icing a bit sweet, but my husband was a definite fan.







Stop 3: Babycakes (248 Broome Street)
Babycakes is most known for being vegan - no small feat, then, to create fluffy desserts, which they still manage to do.  We enjoyed a toasted coconut donut. The style was cake, though it was a denser, moister inside than most cake donuts (perhaps due to the vegan ingredient substitutes). I preferred some of our fluffier donut stops, but for those cruising for vegan treats, this is a great choice.

Stop 4: Donut Plant (379 Grand Street)
Donut Plant is one of our go-to donut shops in the city - though we typically visit the Chelsea location. The shop has a mix of cake and yeast donuts, topped with flavored glazes.  Donut Plant had by far the largest flavor collection of our NYC stops (bested only by Peter Pan in Brooklyn - Stop 6).  Seasonal flavor options included coconut lime, green tea, and more.  (My personal favorite: the Tres Leche cake donut.)

Stop 5: Brindle Room (227 E. 10th Street)
This was a "hidden" gem - at least in the sense that the restaurant in no way appears to be donut-related at first sight. It's a "normal" sit-down restaurant, but offers donuts on the dessert menu, which can be ordered to go. This was my favorite stop of the day, though the fact that they make the donuts to order meant that fresh-fried crispy deliciousness went a long way towards winning my heart. We selected the chocolate hazelnut donuts, a cake donut topped with Nutella and sliced almonds.

Stop 6: Peter Pan Donut & Pastry Shop (727 Manhattan Ave, Greenpointe Booklyn)
Peter Pan takes the cake (or at least cake donut) for being the "old tyme," classic donut shop. Offerings were equally broad and delicious, from gigantic cinnamon buns to myriad yeast and flavored donuts.  This was one of my husband's favorite stops - in fairness, it might have been one of mine as well if I wasn't already feeling a bit ill from so many donuts! I don't know how frequently we'll return, since it's a bit of a trek from our midtown abode, but definitely worth checking out.



After 4 hours of walking in the heat and subsisting on sugar (at 36 weeks pregnant, no less), I was seriously ready for air conditioning and vegetables by the end of the tour. But we had a great time, both enjoying donut delicacies and meeting other Redeemer-types on the tour. The intrepid crew is below!

International Women's Day

In honor of International Women's Day (which was on Friday, March 8th), I attended an interesting lunch session with speakers from three great non-profits.  Each takes a different, yet innovative, way of creating global change for good by investing in women and girls.  A few of their initiatives:


The Hunger Project
Mission: To end hunger and poverty by pioneering sustainable, grassroots, women-centered strategies and advocating for their widespread adoption in countries throughout the world.



Programs: While THP runs a variety of effective programs, we primarily learned on Friday about their efforts to create educate and activate women in elected positions in India. A 1993 amendment to India's constitution reserved 1/3 of all elected local council seats for women, but traditionally women in rural areas were subjugated both to less education, and less food/nutrition, than their male family members (check out a great one-minute video on the cycle of malnutrition here). This meant that women were filling the council seats, but were essentially only speakers for how their male family members instructed them to vote.  THP developed a 5 year training program to educate local women in areas such as developing leadership skills, breaking through bureaucracy via Federation-building, creating policy change, and increasing female voter participation. To date, the program has empowered more than 80,000 elected women officials.

Village Health Works
Mission: To provide quality, compassionate health care in a dignified environment while treating the social determinants of illness, disease, violence and neglect in collaboration with those we serve

Programs: VHW is an off-shoot of the well-regarded Partners in Health, a non-profit co-founded by Paul Farmer which revolutionized the concept of rural health care. The model pivots around the use of local community health workers, who live in remote areas and help their communities find effective health care through PIH's doctors and health centers, where other healthcare services would be a 2-3day walk away (You can read more about PiH here).


VHW is focused on rural villages in Burundi, providing programs around clinic services, nutrition/food security development, and economic development. Women are a key focus, as experience has shown that healthier, better-educated women foster healthier lifestyles among their children, families, and communities.

The story of one of VHW's founders, Deo Niyizonkiza, is told movingly by Tracy Kidder in the NYTimes best-seller Strength in What Remains.

Room to Read:
Mission:  We envision a world in which all children can pursue a quality education, reach their full potential and contribute to their community and the world.
     To achieve this goal, we focus on two areas where we believe we can have the greatest impact: literacy and gender equality in education.  We work in collaboration with communities and local governments across Asia and Africa to develop literacy skills and a habit of reading among primary school children, and support girls to complete secondary school with the life skills they’ll need to succeed in school and beyond.

Programs: Room to Read focuses on several initiatives: creating school libraries, developing girl's education, publishing local-language children's books, and more. They currently have programs in Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, India, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Zambia, South Africa and Tanzania.

Feeling inspired yet? If you're still wanting to learn more about the struggle of girls in developing countries, check out Girl Rising, a new groundbreaking film, directed by Academy Award nominee Richard Robbins, which tells the stories of 9 extraordinary girls from 9 countries, written by 9 celebrated writers and narrated by 9 renowned actresses. Girl Rising showcases the strength of the human spirit and the power of education to change the world - it is currently playing in select theaters nationally. (See the link for the official trailer).

Gingerly, Saucily, and Meatily

Having already fed our minds today with the Contango post, it is time to feed our bellies!  I broke out three recipes today (two of which were new to me), and all came out with a tasty-yet-pretty-easy consensus, so I am passing them on - along with lazy people (aka cooks like me) tips/comments in blue:


Spicy Italian Sausage Lentil Soup
Recipe and pic adapted from Kalyn's Kitchen, a great resource for easy and healthy (and low-carb) recipes

Ingredients:
1 pkg. (5 links) turkey Italian sausage (I like the hot/spicy kind, and used turkey sausage to be healthier)
1 medium onion, chopped
2 tsp. olive oil
1 tsp. dried oregano
2 tsp. ground fennel (I can never find this in the grocery store, and am too lazy to grind it myself, so I just throw in some 'italian' seasoning that came with my spice rack)
1 T minced garlic (let's be honest here - I use the chopped garlic that comes in a little glass jar)
1 cup slow roasted tomatoes, finely chopped
1 can diced tomatoes with juice (if you don't have roasted tomatoes, which I never do, use 2 cans diced tomatoes, with liquid plus 2 T tomato paste)
1 can garbanzo beans (chickpeas) mashed slightly
1/2 cup brown lentils (I bumped up to 1 cup)
4 cups chicken stock
4 cups water
2-3 T fresh chopped basil (optional, I am usually too lazy to buy/use)
freshly grated parmesan cheese (optional, again I usually don't bother)

Instructions:
Preheat oven or toaster oven to 400 F. Lightly grease roasting pan with olive oil, place sausages on pan and roast about 40 minutes, until skins are slightly hardened and browned. When sausage has cooled slightly, cut into half lengthwise, then slice.

While sausage roasts, heat olive oil in heavy soup pot and saute onions about 5 minutes, until softened and barely starting to color. Add oregano, fennel, and garlic and saute 2-3 minutes more. Add roasted tomatoes, diced canned tomatoes, chicken stock, water, garbanzo beans, and lentils. Simmer 40-60 minutes, until lentils are very soft and starting to slightly break apart.

Add sliced sausage to soup. Deglaze roasting pan with 1 cup water, scraping off all browned bits on the bottom of pan, and add to soup. Simmer 30 minutes more. Stir in fresh basil if using and cook 2-3 minutes more. Serve hot, with freshly grated parmesan cheese if desired.

Great with a side of toasted italian bread or pita bread!


Spicy Sauteed Garbanzo Beans with Beef
Recipe (and pic) also adapted from Kalyn's Kitchen
Ingredients:
1/2 lb. low fat ground beef
1 tsp. plus 1 T extra virgin olive oil
1/2 tsp Spike Seasoning (optional, I used a random Tex Mex seasoning we had on hand)
2 cans chickpeas (garbanzo beans), drain and save liquid
chicken stock to add to chickpea liquid if needed to make 2 cups (I didn't need any)
1 1/2 tsp. ground cumin
1/2 tsp. ground chipotle chile powder, more or less to taste (No surprise, couldn't find this in the tiny NYC grocery store. Used normal chili powder, and served with a dash of chipotle hot sauce)
1 1/2 tsp. minced garlic
salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste
1/2 cup finely chopped cilantro (I ignored this one)

Instructions:

Drain chickpeas into a colander, saving liquid. Add chicken stock to chickpea liquid to make 2 cups, set aside. (If it's close enough to 2 cups, which mine was, ignore the stock thing).

Heat 1 tsp. olive oil in a large deep frying pan over high heat, then add ground beef, crumbling into pieces as you put it into the pan, and seasoning with Spike Seasoning if desired. Use a metal turner to stir and break up the meat while you start to brown it, about 3 minutes. When meat is fairly broken up, add chickpeas. Keeping heat high, saute meat and chickpeas together until meat is well browned and chickpeas are quite brown and starting to pop, about 10 minutes. (If the mixture starts to stick turn down the heat a tiny bit.)

Add ground cumin, ground chipotle chile powder, and minced garlic and cook a minute more. Add reserved cooking liquid (with added stock if needed to make 2 cups). Scrape the bottom of the pan with turner to loosen any browned bits, season with salt and pepper, then reduce heat and simmer until most of the liquid has evaporated, about 5-10 minutes. (The liquid in mine took more like 15 mins to reduce)

Turn off heat, stir in chopped cilantro and 1 T olive oil. Taste to see if it needs more salt or pepper, then serve hot. The picture shows a giant bowl of this stuff, but I found it a bit heavy (though delicious!). Probably a ramekin-sized serving is plenty, served with bread/salad/yogurt sauce/something a little less intense.

Ginger Cookies

 Adopted from Ina Garten (the Barefoot Contessa)

Ingredients:
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt (Too fancy - I just used normal iodized salt that I had)
1 cup dark brown sugar, lightly packed
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/3 cup unsulfured molasses
1 extra-large egg, at room temperature (I just took mine from the fridge - oh well!)
1 1/4 cups chopped crystallized ginger (6 ounces) (Mine was actually candied crystallized ginger from Trader Joe's. Worked just fine, and was pretty darn cheap)
Granulated sugar, for rolling the cookies

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line 2 sheet pans with parchment paper (I ignored - cookies did fine without greasing or parchment paper).

In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, ginger, and salt and then combine the mixture with your hands (What?? Didn't see any point to mixing via hand - used a wooden spoon). In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (I don't have one - though I drool over the thought of a non-NYC kitchen where one wouldn't take up 2/3 of my available counter space - so I just used a normal hand mixer and it was fine, though after awhile it was sticky enough I was afraid it would burn out the dinky hand mixer motor so mixed by hand - good exercise!), beat the brown sugar, oil, and molasses on medium speed for 5 minutes. Turn the mixer to low speed, add the egg, and beat for 1 minute. Scrape the bowl with a rubber spatula and beat for 1 more minute. With the mixer still on low, slowly add the dry ingredients to the bowl and mix on medium speed for 2 minutes. Add the crystallized ginger and mix until combined.

Scoop the dough with 2 spoons or a small ice cream scoop. With your hands, roll each cookie into a 1 3/4-inch ball and then flatten them lightly with your fingers. Press both sides of each cookie in granulated sugar and place them on the sheet pans. Bake for exactly 13 minutes. The cookies will be crackled on the top and soft inside. Let the cookies cool on the sheets for 1 to 2 minutes, then transfer to wire racks to cool completely. Yum, these were good! But very serious on the ginger - don't attempt if you don't like ginger/gingerbread!

Contango

Gold Contango: One of our recent portfolio trades was a "contango" - where you believe that the price of a commodities future is higher than it should be (meaning it is higher than you think the "spot," or quoted, price will be in the future). 

One of the underlying terms in buying/selling futures is the idea of the "spot" price versus the "futures" price.  The spot price is simply the price of a security at any given time. The futures price is the expected price of a security, which is estimated using the spot price and the future time frame.

Generally, people are willing to pay more for a commodity in the future than they are now, since buying later saves them the cost of transporting and storing whatever the commodity is (grain, soybeans, oil, etc).  This means the future/forward price is generally higher than a spot price to buy today, but as the future contract nears its maturity date, the price will drop to the current spot price (theoretically).

Making money on this strategy is a contango trade: Say an investors determines that the price right now to buy gold in 12 months is much higher than the actual price to buy gold in 12 months will be.  The investor essentially expects the value of the 12 month contract to decline over the course of the 12 months, so the investor shorts the 12 month contract. In order to protect themselves against general movements in the price of gold, the investor also goes long the current spot price (i.e. 'buying' gold at today's price, and betting that the value of the contract to buy gold in 12 months will decrease).

Still sound confusing? Perhaps a Wikipedia graph will help - essentially we see the forward/future price declining for a given contract over time (as it gets closer to delivery date). By shorting the future/forward, the investor makes money.

Of course, this all depends on the rather giant assumption that no macro economic (or other factors) will cause the value of gold (or whatever other commodity) itself to change.  If the perceived value of gold changes, it can throw off both the spot and the forward curves, making it difficult to profit.

The opposite of a contango is a "backwardation." This is where the future price is perceived as too low compared to the current spot price. The strategy here would be to short the commodity at today's price, and go long the futures contract.

Short Euro/USD: One of our other macro trades recently was to short the Euro in EUR/USD futures contracts. This happened to be very profitable since the trade was put in right before the Italian election, whose results brought a group of anti-austerity politicians to power.  Seen as a blow to Euro-zone economic stability, this weakened the Euro.  The trick with currency and commodities trades is that movements can be quick and rather fickle; once profitable, we closed the position (thankfully, since the Euro since started to rally  bit).

If none of the above spot/future babble made sense (or worse, put you to sleep), at a bare minimum you can now impress (or frighten) your friends at cocktail parties by throwing out the term contango.  Heteroscedasticity is also a fun one, but that's a story for another post...

Cattle, Apples, and Blackberries

Slightly belated, but a snapshot of several recent (pretend) portfolio trades:

Long on Live Cattle: Let's be honest, this one was a total gamble.  Of all the futures, agriculture is arguably the riskiest category. Areas like currency exchange rates, interest rates, and metals (gold, silver, etc.) at least arguably follow macro economic trends. Agriculture? Often comes down to the weather - good luck betting on that. But whatever, we needed a macro trade, I realized that CME sadly no longer sells pork belly futures, so I picked long cattle.

(Speaking a couple weeks later, this ironically turned out to be our best pick so far in the portfolio - apparently drought/other weather issues has driven up the price of cattle! Score - though the satisfaction is slightly diminished knowing it was pure luck :o) ).

Long on Apple, Short on RIM: A year ago, I tried to talk a work colleague out of buying apple when it was around $700. It just seemed like their idea pipeline was running a bit dry (never a good sign that a company prefers to sit on more money than the US Government rather than put it to work on good ideas), and that love for the brand had been a big driver in the shoot-up in stock price.  As of a couple weeks ago though, Apple had taken a beating and settled around $460. At the same time, RIM, the long-beleaguered Blackberry maker, had come out with a new model, and the stock price had shot up.  We thought Apple had room to grow, but that RIM perhaps had been over-boosted, so we settled on bit of a technology hedge and went long Apple, short RIM.  Not much price movement yet, so profitability is still TBD. (Though RIM did fall from $16.96 to $14.63 since we bought, so headed in the right direction, anyway).

Long on Samsung, Short on KRW (South Korean Won):  Going long on Apple and long on Samsung in the same week is a Texas Hedge*, but we offset at least the exchange rate riskiness of buying Samsung (which is traded on the Seoul, London, and Luxembourg exchanges) by going short the South Korean Won (KRW).  This way if the KRW drops, hurting the exchange rate at which we buy/sell stock, we will have lost money on the Samsung stock, but made money on the KRW future.

Short on 2-Yr Treasury Futures: It's no secret that we are over-due for some serious inflation given the amount of money that the Fed has been pumping into the economy.  Because it's not a secret, it's also hard to make money on the concept ... a trade then becomes all about the timing. That said, we decided to try going short on 2-year treasuries. As inflation kicks in, interest rates will rise. Because a treasury is a bond instrument, when interest rates rise, price falls, and we make money (theoretically). For more info on inflation and the Fed, see my post on the Taylor Rule.

*Terms:
Texas Hedge: The opposite of a normal hedge (where you reduce risk by buying different types of securities, or going long and short on a single type of security), the Texas Hedge actually increases your risk by going long on 2 similar items. The origin of the term is unclear, though some think it began with Texas cattle farmers who "doubled down" on their risk by also buying cattle futures.

Long on Pork Bellies: Portfolio Review

One of my final term (!) MBA classes is "Hedge Funds," which takes a look at those investment vehicles of mystery and intrigue (though the whole aim of the class is to prove that HF are not so mysterious - we shall see). As part of the class, we have to keep a mock portfolio of futures trades, so I will do an ongoing (short) post this term looking at a few of the long/short* trades we are making, and why.

*If you are wondering what the difference is between long and short, and confused about what a hedge fund actually is (you are not alone!), see the bottom of this post for a few term definitions.

Of course, all the usual caveats apply - this is just for fun, so please don't sell your house, car, and trusty dog to cash out and invest in what I'm posting. But it can be fun to play with 'fake' money! (So far we are up a couple grand this week). What the heck, use all that free time and build your own portfolio!

Trades: 

Our investment strategy this week was macro, meaning taking a look at broad-sweeping world events and making investment decisions based on them. For these trades, we are focusing on commodities on the CME (again, see terms) and decided on two plays:

Trade 1: Long on Gold
Ininitially I was actually against this trade, though so far this week it has been profitable. Gold is one of those "safe havens" people pour into during times of economic pessimism and uncertainty. It has had an incredible run over the last few years (not surprising given how our economy has stunk - see the graph below), and remains appealing to many as a protection against inflation. After all, if inflation hits, your $20 bill will buy less at the store, but that gold brick will just rise in value.

My resistance to going long was that a) gold has already had a huge run-up (so it may be over-bought and nearing a bubble) and b) it's a risky play - there is so much economic volatility/uncertainty (political and otherwise) that who the heck knows what will happen. My teammates argued that even if the economy improves, inflation will still be a huge concern given the amount of money the Fed has printed (see my Fed / Taylor Rule post for more inflation thoughts), so gold could still rise in value even if the economy improves.  So far, they are right - we'll see how long we have the courage to hold on to the position.

The price of gold over the last 5 years:



Trade 2: Short on Brazilian Real (BRL)
While emerging markets like Brazil have shown periods of explosive growth in the past, my group and I were particularly concerned that Brazil has peaked past its top periods of growth. Specifically, Brazil is putting in place increasingly stifling investment rules, making it difficult for international firms to do business in Brazil (in fact, one of my teammate's firms recently closed down their Brazil offices due to regulations that were becoming so burdensome that it no longer made sense to have a footprint in the country). Lack of competition and increased state-controlled presence in business have also contributed to lower growth, as well as the looming specter of high inflation, which Brazil has frequently battled in the past (with mixed success.)

Technically, you can't bet against a country - so in this case we went short an FX future for BRL/USD.

Not to toot our own horn (though obviously I am), we made the short play on Jan 15th, and the Economist came out with an interesting article on troubling Brazilian economic news on the 19th:
http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21569706-more-inflation-less-growth-wrong-numbers

Thoughts?

That's it for the past week - though now on to a few definitions...

Terms:

CME: Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the main home of futures/derivatives trading.

Futures: A type of derivative (option); specifically, the right to buy something at a future date at a set price. Say pork bellies (nod, Trading Places) are selling for $2/lb (I'm completely making up units here) and you think the price will go up to $5/lb. Therefore you want to go long a futures position (giving you the right to buy pork bellies at $2 in, say, 6 months), then you get to resell your pork that you got to buy for $2/lb to those poor suckers who didn't buy futures and are now paying market price $5/lb. Of course, guess incorrectly on which way the market is moving, and you'll lose money. Farmers are classic examples - they use agriculture futures to help protect themselves against price movements.  Of course, you can't actually trade pork bellies anymore, but you get the drift.

FX: The trade of currencies (i.e. foreign currency exchange rates/Forex). You are making a bet on whether the exchange rate for a certain currency will go up/down versus a second currency.

Hedge Fund: An investment group typically set up as a Limited Partnership. The investment manager is the General Partner, and the investors are Limited Partners (which must number less than 100). The investment manager uses money that the limited partners contribute to invest in any number of strategies, such as macro (making bets based on global trends), fixed income (bonds), distressed (companies in bankruptcy), fund of funds (investing in lots of other hedge funds), emerging markets (Brazil, China, etc), and so on. There is typically a high minimum investment, since the HF can have no more than 100 limited partners, and the investment manager makes money both from management fees (set fees charged to the investors) and performance fees (sort of like a bonus, these are a % of profits and where most of the money is made).
     Of course, HF may or may not be hedged; the true meaning of a "hedge" is offsetting positions to minimize risk (such as being both long on corn futures and short on corn futures so that you're not hurt no matter the movement). But, NO ONE is perfectly hedged. A, it is impossible (most trades are too complex to find perfectly offsetting trades). B, by definition you couldn't make money if you had no risk. Actually, to quote my professor, "The only way to be perfectly hedged is to be dead."

Long: Buying something, essentially betting that the price will go up. For example, to go long a stock or a future, you simply buy a share of stock, or buy a futures contract.

Short: Borrowing and then selling a position, essentially betting that the price will go down. This is easiest to explain with stocks. IBM closed on Friday at $194.47. To go short means that you borrow the stock from someone and sell it on the open market, hoping that the price will go down (say to $190). Once the price hits $190, you buy the stock at $190, and return the shares to the lender. The lender is no better or worse off (well, they may have charged you a small fee to borrow), while you made $4.47 per share (i.e. the $194.47 you received from selling, less the $190 cost to repurchase).
     Of course, if the price had gone up, your losses could theoretically be infinite - say an act of God occurs and the stock shoots up to $5,000 a share. Unlikely, but you're still on the hook to buy the shares and return them, so you'll lose $4805.53 (i.e. the $194.47 you earned from selling the stock, less the $5,000 you had to shell out to repurchase).