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San Francisco: The Cheesy

Well this was deserving of a post all its own!  On our last day in SF we had lunch at Slanted Door and then walked around the Ferry Building, which was not nearly as crowded as it had been on Saturday morning.  We decided to indulge in some bread, cheese, and sweets for our last dinner, and we went from stall to stall until we found what we were looking for.

For bread we picked up two baguettes, one sourdough and one sweet (although they really tasted about the same!) from Acme Bread.  They only take cash, good thing we still had some on us!

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Next we headed to Cowgirl Creamery, which we could actually get into on Sunday as opposed to Saturday when it was swarmed with shoppers.  Ya’ll, this place was heaven.  We took a number and waited a couple of minutes for them to call it.  While we waited we picked up a half round of Humboldt Fog cheese, which I’d heard nothing but raves about from my cheese-loving friends.  When it was our turn, we told them what kind of bread we had and he started cutting samples of cheeses he thought would go best with it. We tried a few but in the end, we agreed that Midnight Moon, another much firmer goat cheese, was just what we were looking for.

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The Humboldt Fog

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The Midnight Moon

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The feast.  Yes we ate it in our hotel room on top of a dismantled paper bag, using nothing but our hands and one plastic spoon to form the perfect bites of bread and cheese.

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San Francisco: The Sweet

Previously: The Good and The Not as Good

There were many many delicious sweets to be found in San Francisco, here are the ones we sampled:

gelato at Naia in North Beach

divine!  fabulous fabulous gelato!  On the left, vanilla and pumpkin, on the right, chocolate and cherry chocolate chip

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Jelly Belly Factory in Fairfield, CA

Tyler and I share a love of Jelly Bellies, in particular, the pear flavored ones.  We discovered them in the early days of our dating years and joked about visiting the “mothership”, well, on this vacation we did, and it was so much fun!  And we came home with tons of sweet loot, including lots of belly flops.

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Stella’s Pastries in North Beach

Stella’s was recommended to us by our tour guide, who grew up in the area and frequented Stella’s as a child.  Per his recommendation we ordered the sacripantina, fitting as they are “the home of the sacripantina.”  I picked out an assortment of cookies, the macaroon was divine!

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Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory in Chinatown

This was one of the stops on our city tour, and we got to sample fresh from the oven fortune cookies.  They tasted so good, nothing like the nasty styrofoam ones you get at restaurants!  Sorry for the terrible picture, food photography is tough in a dark alley.

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TCHO chocolates

We didn’t make it to the TCHO shop/factory on the bay, but we did pick up some of their chocolates at a market at the Ferry Building.  I remember reading about them on food blogs sometime last year, they are supposedly great for baking.  They are also great when a chocolate craving hits you!

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Miette Patisserie at the Ferry Building

The adorable displays and cute little sweets were calling to me from Miette, so we bought a few treats for our last night in San Francisco.  Madeleines and macarons, in vanilla, chocolate, raspberry, and rose flavors.  These were great, but would of been best fresh.

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Kara’s Cupcakes at Ghiradelli Square

We had no ghiradelli chocolate on this trip, I just didn’t see the point when you  can buy it in the check out line at Walmart.  However, my friend wheezer monkey highly recommended Kara’s Cupcakes at the square and holy cow, these were yum!  So while lots of tourists popped in to Ghiradelli for overpriced hot fudge sundaes, we dined on pricey but oh so worth it cupcakes from Kara’s, chocolate raspberry and vanilla coconut.  The coconut BLEW MY MIND.

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So there you have it folks, sugar overload in San Francisco, worth every cavity ;)

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San Francisco: The Not as Good

So none of our meals in San Francisco were bad by any means, but a few were disappointing or just sub par.  But I photographed them and tried to make them look pretty!

In N Out Burger at the Wharf

We were so hungry when we first arrived at our hotel, so we walked a couple of blocks and stumbled into In N Out, one place we had been planning on trying.  It was crowded and the tables had not been cleaned all day, but what do you expect in the most touristy section of SF?  I could deal with all of that but the burgers just weren’t that great.  I was shocked, as I’d heard nothing but raves and Tyler and I both agreed that they didn’t taste much different than a McDonald’s burger, the patties were just so thin.  However, our tour guide told us a couple of days later that the In N Out’s in N. California do not hold a candle to those in Southern California, so we have to reserve final judgement until we try them there I suppose!  For now I remain a loyal fan of Five Guys, the East Coast burger :)

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Cafe Pescatore, attached to The Tuscan Inn.

On the busiest day of our vacation we had spent the morning in Fairfield at the Jelly Belly Factory, the afternoon at Muir Woods, and had a limited amount of time to grab a bite to eat before our night tour of Alcatraz.  So we decided to eat at Cafe Pescatore, the very nice looking restaurant/cafe attached to our hotel.  We figured we’d have some good seafood and be on our way.  We both found our dishes underwhelming.  Tyler had gnocchi with tiger prawns and I had crab ravioli.  The ravioli was very thin with minimal filling, and the tomato cream sauce was more like a soup.  In fact in splashed on my blouse no matter how careful I tried to be as I ate (and I wasn’t about to wear my napkin as a bib…).  For almost $20 per plate we expected more, however the dishes just fell flat.

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Steps of Rome Caffe in North Beach

We heard some of the other guests at our hotel saying good things about Steps of Rome in North Beach and restaurants were filling up on Saturday night so we grabbed a table on the patio just before things really started hopping.  Our service was only so-so, we were only given one menu as they had run out of them, which was inconvenient but not the end of the world.  The flop was our appetizer.  The homemade cheese was stringy, ohhhhh so stringy, and the flavor just was not good.  But our main dishes were great, I had pumpkin ravioli in a delicious white cheese sauce and Tyler had some kind of vegetable pasta mixture.  Plus it was an affordable meal and we left with full stomachs, so in the end, it was fine, I just don’t think I’ll ever be brave enough to try homemade cheese again!

the questionable appetizer plate:

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the great entrees that redeemed the meal:

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So three meals out of eight were less than fabulous, but not bad, it could of been much worse!

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San Francisco: The Good

Tyler and I recently took a long weekend trip to San Francisco, here are some of the best meals we had:

Calzone’s in North Beach

we picked this restaurant randomly after walking around North Beach and checking out menus.  They had an open table on the patio and the food we saw on the plates of diners out there looked delicious, so we settled in for a great meal.  Great food, great people watching.  Loved the oval shaped tables facing outwards so people didn’t bump into us.

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drinks: reisling

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appetizer: bruschetta-garlic pesto toasted baguette topped with chopped fresh tomatoes and drizzled with basil oil
comments: not the best bruschetta we’ve ever had, but very tasty, loved the pesto.

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Tyler ate:  Roasted Fulton Valley Chicken, broccolini and zucchini mashed potatoes.
comments: chicken was kinda dry, broccolini was so-so, but zucchini mashed potatoes were PERFECTION.

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Julia ate:  Arugula salad with artichokes, garbanzo beans, oven-roasted tomatoes, Humboldt Fog goat cheese in lemon oil.
comments: great salad, could of used more artichokes and tomatoes, goat cheese was out of this world, needed more dressing as the salad was a bit dry.

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Babs Delta Diner in Suisun City

We went to Fairfield, CA to visit the Jelly Belly Factory and stopped in nearby Suisun City for lunch.  There weren’t a lot of options for restaurants but Babs was hoppin’ so we decided to try it out.  We waited about 5 minutes for a table and after ordering our food came quickly.  This place has been around for about 30 years and they have standard diner food, but everything looked good, not too greasy.

Tyler ate: a Reuben sandwich

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Julia ate: corned beef and swiss sandwich

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comments: both of these sandwiches were great!  Thick pieces of corned beef made them hearty and the perfect lunch on a busy day.  So glad we stumbled upon this place!

Mijita’s Cocina Mexicana at the Ferry Building

This was one of my favorite meals on the trip, but I am a lover of Mexican food, Tyler is not as big of a fan.  We wandered the Ferry Building looking for a good lunch spot, so many great options but Tyler caved to my insistance that we try Mijitas.  We were both happy!  Small but dynamic menu, fast service, and DELICIOUS FOOD!

we drank: strawberry juice
comments: sadly not as good as it looked, didn’t have much of a punch to it, but it didn’t taste bad by any means.

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appetizer: guacamole with chips
comments: great guacamole!  excellent flavor, couldn’t  get enough of it!  Only complaint was that the chips were a bit burnt.

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Tyler & Julia ate: 4 different kinds of tacos, including:

carnitas-
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carne asada-
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pescado (deep fried mahi-mahi)-

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vegetariano-

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comments: the vegetarian taco was nothing special, but the other three were fantastic!  Tyler’s favorite was the steak, my favorite was surprisingly the pork (and I don’t usually care for pork!)

The Slanted Door at the Ferry Building

This restaurant was the only one we made reservations at, as we chose to not over-plan this trip like we have for prior vacations.  Everyone recommends this restaurant, and for good reason, the food is outstanding!  We made lunch reservations because 1) it’s cheaper and 2) it was all that was available by the time we got around to making reservations the week of our trip.

we drank: fresh squeezed lemonade and phoenix bird tea, sorry, no pictures!

appetizer: crispy imperial rolls
comments: these kick PF Chang’s lettuce wraps in the ASS.  And I LOVE those lettuce wraps.

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Tyler ate: north Vietnamese style halibut with vermicelli noodles, fresh dill, and pineapple-anchovy sauce
comments: absolutely fantastic, great balance of flavors, not too “fishy” despite the halibut and anchovy.

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Julia ate: niman ranch flank steak with fresh ginger over rice noodles with roasted peanuts
comments: everything about this dish was wonderful, but the beef took the cake!

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Wrapping Up: none of the meals on our trip were bad per se, but these are the ones that stand out as truly great, restaurants we would dine at again and again if we lived in the SF area.  The best part (besides our happy tastebuds) was that we did not spend over $65  total (including 15-20% tip) on any single one of these meals!  Our hotel had a wine hour from 4-6 pm so we had a couple of (free!) glasses of wine there before heading out for dinner, saving us money on drinks!  That left some money for some fabulous sweets at various bakeries and gelaterias, which I will blog about in the coming days!

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Our little taste of Chicago

I figured I would share a bit about the food we ate in Chicago while the memories are still fresh in my mind! I spent a lot of time researching restaurants before we left for our trip because I knew there were plenty of good eats to be had and I didn’t want to miss out! Many thanks to my friends both “in real life” and online that shared their recommendations with us, we were NOT disapppointed! Here’s a wrap up (long, but I have trouble being brief when I discuss food), with a few pictures, some horribly blurry (although I did not go full out foodie and photograph every meal, I am just not that hardcore!)

Breakfast at the West Egg Cafe at Fairbanks & Ontario: we were quickly seated and our waiter was very nice and helpful (gave us directions when he saw us studying our map). I had the french toast, Tyler had a breakfast burrito, both were excellent! The food came out quickly and we were fed and on our way in less than 30 minutes. It was a great start to the day! This was the only breakfast we ate out since we sweet talked our hotel into putting a mini-fridge in our room for free and ate cereal for breakfast the rest of the trip to save time and $.

Lunch at Corner Bakery (many locations): we grabbed a quick sandwich, chips, drink, and a cookie to go and ate it in Millennium Park while we soaked up the sun. Delicious sandwich, perfect size for 2 people! Oh and it came with a pickle, I LOVE pickles! Better than the sandwiches at Panera in my humble opinion.

Dinner at Quartino at Ontario and State: YUM YUM YUM HEAVEN YUM YUM YUM. Yeah, we REALLY liked this place! Delicious wine, fabulous little appetizer tasting plates (for lack of a better term), fabulous mushroom risotto, and divine gelato sundae for dessert. The atmosphere of this little restaurant is so great. Love the little wooden tables and chairs, worn cloth napkins, old silverware, old movies playing on the tvs, antique appliances as decor. It just had charm, and the staff are so friendly and gave us great wine suggestions. We loved this restaurant so much we went back on our last night and had a great spinach and walnut salad, neopolitan style pizza, and mushroom bruschetta, oh and more wine of course! Everything is made to share, Italian style tapas if you will. I am just sad this restaurant isn’t in Kansas City, because we would be regulars. This was my favorite restaurant in Chicago and we had 2 amazing meals with amazing wine, who could ask for more?

appetizer plate with smoked prosciutto, fontina cheese, and other assorted goodness!

gelato with biscotti and lots of chocolate shavings!

the mushroom bruschetta!

Lunch at Lou Malnati’s at Hubbard and Wells: I had tried Lou Malnati’s before and knew it was great so I took Tyler there for his first authentic Chicago style deep dish pizza. We had a salad that was far too big for 2 people but delicious of course, and a supreme style pizza loaded with cheese, sausage, veggies, and tomatoes. Also delicious but a little heavy on the sausage for my taste, but hey, that’s Chicago. If it doesn’t clog your arteries, what good is it? The decor was a little lacking, but the pizza was stellar and that’s what counts. No picture of the pizza to share, we ate it up so fast, here is all that remained!

Dinner at Geja Cafe: I knew I wanted at least one “romantic” dinner on this trip and several people had recommended this restaurant. Tyler and I are big fans of fondue but not huge fans of the Melting Pot. I really hate how much time the waiters spend at your table at the MP, mixing up your food and explaining how everything works. Geja Cafe was much more hands off, bringing the fondue to your table ready to eat. We opted for the salad, cheese, and chocolate meal since we knew that would be plenty. The salad was simple but had a great dressing that we both commented on. The cheese fondue was our favorite course. They brought us all the bread, apples, and grapes we desired for dipping, then they brought out the flaming chocolate fondue. Yum! Tyler didn’t rave about the chocolate course, but I thought it was just fine. I was a little disappointed that the pound cake we got to dip was burned so I had to pick off the crust. Overall a great meal though and we were stuffed when we left! The drinks were fabulous too, Tyler had a glass of red wine and I had a white sangria that was divine. I should of had another! Very romantic restaurant, but DARK (don’t worry your eyes will adjust). There is only one type of cheese and chocolate fondue, not several like the Melting Pot, but they were great so I didn’t mind not having a choice. We would definitely go back for the food and the romantic atmosphere. We made our reservation through opentable.com and things worked out perfectly!

dippers: pound cake, pineapple, cherries, apples, strawberries, and marshmallows

the chocolate!

Lunch at Phoenix (in Chinatown): Tyler and I went to this restaurant per the request of our sister-in-law who LOVES dim sum and came down from Milwaukee with her family to spend the day with us at the Shedd Aquarium. Tyler and I had only had one experience with dim sum before and it was okay but not amazing so we weren’t sure what to expect. The Phoenix was far and away better than the dim sum restaurant we had tried in Kansas City. We got there around 11:30 and there were many carts going around so we had lots of choices as to what to try. The potstickers were AMAZING, I also loved the spring rolls and the pork buns. We tried several steamed dumplings too and some broccoli greens (I did not try the chicken feet, for I am not that brave.) It was all delicious and the waitstaff was friendly and the restaurant was run very well. It was surprisingly not that crowded for a Saturday. Oh the custard pastries we had for dessert were so delicious. My sister in law is Chinese and knew exactly what to ask for, I was grateful for her assertiveness and ability to speak Chinese with the waitstaff. This was Tyler’s favorite restaurant/meal in Chicago. We would absolutely make it a point to go back the next time we’re in Chicago. Thanks to Joelen for her write up on this restaurant on her blog recently, it helped me have a good idea of what to expect!

Dinner at Portillos at Ontario and Clark: This restaurant was recommended to me over and over again so I knew we had to try it. Tyler had the hot dogs and I had the beef sandwich and we shared some fries and a root beer, heaven! Very very good food and not pretentious! Huge restaurant too, we sat up on the second floor with a good view of the gigantic McDonalds across the street, nice for people watching!

Lunch at Zapatista at 13th and Wabash (near the Museum Campus): we ate here between visiting the Planetarium and the Field Museum. We are always on the hunt for good Mexican food and this place delivered! It was a nice day so we sat out on the patio enjoying our Coronas and margaritas (can you tell we did a lot of drinking on this trip? lol it was great!) I was a little disappointed they didn’t make the guacamole at the table for us like I thought they would, but the guac was excellent so I got over my disappointment. Tyler had a sampler of three different kinds of tacos, the pork was his favorite. I had a combination of a chicken enchilada and a steak taco, both were so good! The black beans were also great, and I usually leave those untouched when I eat Mexican. Their chips were thick and crunchy and their salsa was just spicy enough. We ate and ate and ate some more, it was a fantastic lunch. Although we ate a lot the portions were NOT ridiculously oversized like many restaurants these days, we thought the portion sizes were perfect, left us room to gorge ourselves on chips and salsa and guacamole :)

Tyler and his Corona

Me and my strawberry margarita, on the rocks!

Dessert at….The Cheesecake Factory (underneath the Hancock Building): okay I know I know I swear I said like 2 weeks ago I would never eat at CF again but we didn’t actually eat THERE, we got cheesecake TO GO and ate it in our room after our adventure to the top of the Hancock Building. That place was packed and we stopped in around 10pm! The cheesecake was predictably delicious as usual. We got a slice of chocolate raspberry truffle and a slice of lemon raspberry and ate it in bed while watching The Colbert Report. We made fun of all of the tourists that were actually eating dinner at CF while we waited in line at the bakery for our cheesecake, oh we are such hypocrites, lol!

Seriously though, I’m glad we avoided the pitfalls of chain restaurants (for the most part) on this trip and tried so many great Chicago restaurants. Thanks again to everyone that gave us recommendations, we enjoyed the food and drinks as much as the sights we took in around Chicago. It was a fabulous vacation!

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The Great State of Maine

So we’re not technically back yet, and I don’t technically have any recipes to post, but here are some pics of the yummy food we had on vacation (I held back and chose not to photograph our meals everynight, that would be way too embarrassing). I did however snap a couple of shots of things I’d like to recreate myself. Oh, and if you ever go to the coast of Maine (Portland, Bar Harbor, Camden, or Ogunquit) ask me for restaurant recommendations, I’ve got some great ones!

Fresh blueberry pie with shortbread crust and crumble topping, from Poor Boy’s Gourmet in Bar Harbor, ME

Popover with strawberry jam at Jordan Pond House in Acadia National Park (Bar Harbor)

Oh and just for kicks, here’s Tyler eating “Lenny the Lobster.” We couldn’t resist naming him before we gobbled him up ;) Turns out neither of us really likes lobster that much, for shame!

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