Malinda Lo

Yes, I’m still on the East Coast! Today I was at NCTE in Philadelphia. Tomorrow night I’ll be at Giovanni’s Room, Philadelphia’s LGBT bookstore, participating in a fundraiser/read-a-thon for the Lambda Literary Foundation and Giovanni’s Room. Twenty LGBT authors will be reading from their books, answering questions and signing books, and you can see the whole list here. The event begins at 7 p.m., and I’ll be reading at 8:45 p.m. If you’re in the Philadelphia area, I hope you’ll come out to support this historic bookstore — and say hi to me!

Next week, I’ll have photos of my book events, but this week I have food photos! These are some of the many delicious things I’ve eaten during my East Coast tour:

Of course, I started off with pizza. Amy and I went to Pizzeria Regina in Boston’s North End, which many Bostonians believe is the best pizza in town. My conclusion? The crust was perfect. The sauce and mozzarella were a smidgen lacking, but overall, it was well worth it.

Pizzeria Regina, Boston

In New York, we went out for Indian, because it’s so much better in NYC than in San Francisco. We decided to try Vatan, a vegetarian restaurant where you get an all-you-can-eat selection of many, many veggie dishes for $31. It was delicious.

Vanta, New York

Obviously, we also went out for New York pizza:

Lombardi's, New York

This is a pie at Lombardi’s, which is supposedly the first pizzeria in the U.S. The crust, I have to say, was not as good as Regina’s, but the sauce was great and the mozzarella was amazing.

Ramen has also become huge in NYC, and I love ramen (the real kind, not the 25 cents/package kind). I went to Ippudo, which was very loud and crowded and had delicious pork buns:

Ippudo, New York

I also ordered their Akamaru Modern ramen:

Ippudo, New York

Is this the best ramen I’ve ever had? YES. It was simply amazing. The picture, which is a little fuzzy, does not do it justice. I wish they had this in San Francisco!!!

Last but not least, when I was near St. Mark’s Place, some friends and I stopped in a random Asian eatery named Je’Bon, where we had some awesome sushi:

Je'Bon, New York

They also had great mini sesame balls. Tasty!

May you eat well this weekend!