Wednesday Photos

On Monday, my sister and I went the National Museum of Natural History and visited the butterfly pavilion.

Summer Restaurant Week 2012

Saturday was the last day of Restaurant Week for this summer.  I was so excited that my sister was going to be here to experience it.  Plus, with three people, we get to try even more great dishes.  If you haven't been before, 200+ restaurants in D.C. offer a prix fixe three course menu for $20.12 for lunch or $35.12 for dinner.  It's a great chance to eat at some fabulous places that we wouldn't go to otherwise. 

This time we tried District Commons, which is located right at the Foggy Bottom metro stop and is owned by the same restaurant group that operates Acadiana, D.C. Coast and Passion Fish.  I love to go to restaurants in this group because most of the restaurants that participate in the Restaurant Week give you a limited number of choices for your meal, but Passion Food Group lets you choose any entree on their menu. 

Appetizers:   For our first courses we had Texas Chili (Jim), Mixed Greens Salad (Sara) and Seafood Chowder.  Jim's chili came with this adorable star shaped cornbread and my soup had Hidden Valley Ranch oyster crackers.  The salad had excellent deviled eggs with pralined bacon. 

Entrees:  Jim ordered the Pork Rack Chop “Blue Ribbon” with Benton Ham, Mozzarella, Eggplant Chow Chow and a Jonnycake.  My sister ordered the Roasted Duck “Low & Slow” with a sorghum chili glaze and Wild Rice-Sweet Potato Hash.  I ordered the North Carolina Mountain Trout with Broccolini, Pine Nuts, Citrus Burnt Butter, because I can never say no to trout when I see it on the menu. 

Dessert:  Honestly, I'm surprised we had any room left for dessert at this point, but we had the Boston Creme Pie, Peach and Mango Sundae and the Chocolate Raspberry cake.

A fair is a veritable smorgasbord...*

I see that it has been nearly two months since I came to visit you at this blog.  What can I say, I've been busy.  In that time, we found new tenants for our rental property, got said property ready for the new tenant (carpet cleaning, painting, etc), went to Tennessee to see Jim's brother and his wife and all our nieces and nephews, went to a baseball game, went to a soccer game, and celebrated our third anniversary.  I'm exhausted!

Food on a stick

Last night, we went to the Arlington County Fair, mainly to indulge my addiction to traveling death rides and fried food on a stick.  It did not disappoint.

Keep your head & hands inside the Sizzler

It was starting to get cloudy when we left the house, so we were just hoping to get some rides in before it started to pour rain.  Plus, you always want to do the rides before you eat.  We almost made it.  First we rode the Sizzler.  The Sizzler, which is sometimes called the Scrambler,is my favorite carnival ride.  It has three main arms with four buckets on each arm and it just whips you around so that it looks like you are going to hit either the middle support or the fence around the ride. 

After the Sizzler, we went to a ride called the Hurricane.  This ride has six arms with a bucket that seats four people.  It rotates and uses compressed air cylinders to bounce riders up and down.  This is ride we were on when it started to pour rain.  It was also at the far end of the fair ground, so we had to run the whole length of the midway to get back to the indoor exhibits.  Needless to say, we were completely soaked.

Mmm,  Twinkie

Fortunately the rain didn't last long, so we were back outside and looking for food on a stick.  We got corn dogs, the obligatory funnel cake, lemonade and Jim ordered a deep fried Twinkie.  I have to tell you, it was better than you would have thought, although how you would eat a whole one, I don't know.  I only had a small bite, but the Twinkie gets sort of melty and creamy once it's fried and it is very, very sweet.

So, as the title says (thanks to Charlotte's Web), a fair has a little bit of everything and I, for one, will never pass it up.

Soaking wet and lovin' it!