In January and February Kyle and I checked out a few new places in Pittsburgh in our quest to keep our dates exciting and different while creating memories at the same time. We tested out Maggie's Farm Rum, Phipps Conservatory, and a Mezcal tasting class at Verde. I have to say these 3 seperate dates were all winners and I definitely want to go back and check them out some more. 1. Maggie's cocktails are super fun and I love supporting local businesses including distilleries! The bartender was great and walked us through all their liquors and let us taste them before deciding on a few cocktails. I really liked the farm fizz with white rum, lemon juice, sugar, cream soda, and egg white! 2. The botanical gardens at Phipps were beautiful and a great escape from the snowy winter, well for at least a few hours. I can't wait to go back in the summer and spend more time at the surrounding park and maybe have a picnic! 3. At Verde we learned all about Mezcal and how it's different from Tequila, we sampled a lot of them, and then even learned how to make our own cocktails. Even with all the taste testing I still learned a lot and realized how yummy Mezcal is to just sip on, I think it might edge out Tequila as my Mexican food partner. Also the chips and black bean dip were superb! I can't vouch for the rest of the food quite yet since we ended the evening with burgers and a shake at BRGR!
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After looking through my vacation photos I decided to split them into 3 categories for this post. Kyle and I crammed a lot of good food, drinks, and sightseeing into our vacation but we were also able to relax and not rush through anything so it was a perfect combo of planned stuff and just going with the flow. Asheville was a neat town and pretty small. We were able to see most of the city in 2 days and then spent the rest of the time checking out the other sights outside of the downtown area. I doubt we'd vacation there again to see the city but I wouldn't mind stopping back to stay in a cabin in the mountains and grab a meal or two in town since the food was amazing. FOOD! DRINK! EXPLORATION! My favorite foods lately have been cheese and chocolate (well I always love chocolate) so Kyle and I decided to have a fun fondue night and celebrate a year of dating! We looked up lots of recipes and decided to do a cheese one with a beer base and then just find yummy cheese at a local shop based on suggestions. It turned out really yummy and we dipped some steak, tater tots, and veggies in it. Then we moved on to chocolate fondue next and kept with the alcohol theme mixing dark chocolate with cream and Kahlua. In this one we dipped strawberries, pineapples, and pound cake. We definitely fell into a food coma after all the food. We enjoyed all of it and now want to do more and experiment with different cheeses and chocolate! I had a super fun and full Valentine's Day/President's Day weekend in the middle of February. I roadtripped up to Pittsburgh to hang with Kyle on Friday the 14th and then we headed to Columbus for the rest of the weekend. We had tickets to the George Strait concert with my friends on Saturday and then spent part of Sunday meeting up with my family for food and then some exploring. It was such a fun weekend even with a few bumps (hotel room not ready) and it still being snowy and super cold. I could go on and on about the whole weekend but I think my photos will tell the story better! For Christmas I received a partner brunch cooking class from Kyle and this past weekend was the set date! I've never done a cooking class before so I was super excited and even more so since it was cooking brunch mmmm! It was at Crate Cooking School in Pittsburgh. There was 5 items on the menu so we split into groups to tackle each recipe. Kyle and I made the cheddar scone "sliders" and the cocktails, and at the end everyone cooked their own French omelet. After all the cooking we had a full meal of all the items and we were stuffed from all the good food but can't wait to make some of the recipes again. I included the two items we made below! Champagne Cocktail
1 sugar cube 2-3 dashes Angostura bitters 1 ounce brandy dry champagne 1 maraschino cherry superfine sugar and maraschino syrup for glass rim Moisten the outer rim of a champagne flute with maraschino cherry syrup and coat with super fine sugar. Place the sugar cube in the bottom of the flute and saturate with a few dashes of bitters. Add the brandy and when ready to serve fill the glass with champagne and garnish with a cherry. Cheddar Scone Sliders with Ham and Honey Mustard Butter Scones: 4 cups flour 2 tablespoons baking powder 1.5 teaspoons salt 1/2 cup cold unsalted butter 6 ounces coarsely grated extra-sharp cheddar 1 cup whole milk 2/3 cup heavy cream Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Cut butter into small bits and with pastry blender blend into flour mixture until it resembles coarse meal. With a fork stir in cheddar. Add milk and cream, stirring until just combined. Transfer mixture to a floured surface and with floured hands knead until it forms a dough. Roll out dough to 1/2 inch thick and cut out 2 inch round scones. Arrange on baking sheet and bake at 425 degrees for 12 minutes until pale golden. Sauce: 1/2 cup softened unsalted butter 3 tablespoons coarse-grained mustard 3 tablespoons honey Mix all ingredients together. Assemble by splitting the scones, spread with the honey-mustard butter, and add ham slices. Enjoy! Happy New Year everyone! 2013 was a fantastic year and I'm looking forward to this year even more. Here's a quick list of some of the fun things that happened this past year: * My 3rd nephew Henry was born January 31st and he is super cute and I love seeing our family grow! * Tried new things health wise by starting to run and ran my first races a 10k and 5k and hit goal times for both! * Met Kyle and had so many awesome adventures with him and lots more to look forward to! * Traveled to a couple new states/cities: New Jersey, Oregon, and Pittsburgh also traveled back to Delaware, Ocean City, MD, and of course Ohio for lots of family time and events. So those are the major points from last year and could go on and on on everything else but that would take forever, so probably easier just to look through old posts for more details if you want! I rang in the new year with Kyle and his friends in Pittsburgh. They had never been there before so we got to be "tourists" for a few days and do lots of exploring and trying fun new restaurants. Photos below! Yikes! Where does the time go?! I'm not sure how it's already DECEMBER! I have so much to do in the next few weeks to get ready for Christmas. I need to do some shopping for gifts, make lots of yummy treats while still staying healthy, and also spend lots of time with family and friends! I have atleast started the decorating and have up my little tree and some trinkets in my apartment. I love this time of the year except for maybe the extreme cold and blizzards that come with winter... Well since I've been so bad at blogging the last few months, here's some photos of what I've been up to, enjoy! I vacated the DC NOVA area for the 4th of July since I've already done the whole "tourist" national mall fireworks thing before. I was also in need of the beach so Kyle and I hit the road to Cape May, NJ (got to check a new state of my list). It was nice to get away and very low key we checked out some local sites, went to some wineries and a brewery, an enjoyed the sun and sand (maybe a little too much sun since we did get a little burnt one day). The other weekend I tried a new restaurant in Arlington with Kyle (new to us) called the Green Pig Bistro and it was ahhhhmazing! Like soooo good and we were both successfully in food comas and sugar overload afterwards but it was definitely worth it. It's fun to go out and have a fun new fancy meal once in a while!
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