Nice Saturday and Food Ideas

Our Saturday started very early, 5 am to be specific. We needed to be out the door by 6:30 to head south of DC for the second part of the two part boating course. We had finished the class by 11am and were headed back to Baltimore to have lunch with our friend Louis. We all decided to meet at our usual place at noon. Our friend Aimee was working today so that was wonderful. She and Louis have a pharmacy connection since she wants to be a pharmacist and Louis is one. Are you starting to notice all the connections? ;-)

For breakfast Dan and I have green smoothies before we headed to class so we weren’t very hungry. We started lunch with the hummus and veggie wrap that Ian makes for us. He included some fresh jalapenos to this version which added a nice heat with the sweet and crisp veggies which we loved. We enjoyed the beets on the side of this sandwich too.

Ian also thought we needed a bowl of fruit to go with the sandwich. Who were we to say no? ;-)

Louis got the Sicilian tuna salad for lunch. This salad includes capers and is light in mayonnaise.

After lunch we decided to head to the boat store and pick up a few other items. We bought a grill to attach to the rail of the deck, boat shoes for Dan and another beaded eyeglass chain for my sunglasses.

When we left the restaurant Ian asked when we would be back and I said maybe tonight because I won’t be home to cook. Guess what? We did end up back at the restaurant for dinner.

Aimee and I had more time to chat at dinner and are still trying to coordinate a trip to the museums in DC and a trip to Jaleo. Both Dan and I adore Aimee in case you hadn’t noticed.

The weather was gorgeous Saturday evening so the patio was full from about 5:30pm on. We knew Ian didn’t have time to think about anything for us so I made specific requests from the kitchen for our dinner. Ian always tells me that whatever I can dream up they will execute. How lucky are we to have that option?

Our first dish was Ian’s soy and truffle marinated mushrooms which we both adore.

The next dish was a new menu item which is crispy herbed bread with a tomato and olive relish. The crispy bread was the perfect counterpoint to the salty olives and slightly sweet fresh tomatoes. Since I love olives this was a real winner with me.

Ian added a new pizza (which he calls a flatbread) to the menu which sounded delicious. We knew with a few changes it was easy to make vegan. This pizza included: tomato and harissa sauce, roasted red pepper, olives, fennel, roasted portabello, tofu and arugula. Delicious! The omni version has lamb sausage and feta but we enjoyed the mushroom and tofu substitution.

I thought we needed a little more veg and asked for Sicilian Swiss chard. This dish included: Swiss chard, garlic, golden raisins, hot pepper, wine vinegar, and carrots. Since we are both fond on anything agro dolce we enjoyed this.

Saturday I wasn’t home long at all as you might have noticed. It was a busy day but also a good day.

Happy thoughts:

We had a nice week but it was a busy one. Things are all starting to fall into place and that makes me very happy. Here are my happy thoughts this morning:

• It is nice to have the first boating course behind us. We wanted a quick refresher before our new baby got here and now we can cross that off our to-do list.

• Both of us love to see our buddy Louis. When he moved to Delaware I was a little sad. However we talk to him a few times a week and see him fairly often so it has been nice that we didn’t lose touch.

• Next week we have some fun things on our calendars which we are both looking forward to. Specifically we have the following activities planned: cooking class, a marine electronics talk, jazz concert, and a photography workshop. Yikes, I am going to be busy.

• We had at the restaurant on Saturday for lunch and dinner. The food is always delicious and we enjoy spending time with everyone who works at the restaurant.

• Sunday we had a nice trip to the farmers’ market. We picked up a nice variety of produce and even a container of black truffle hummus which I can’t wait to try. Talking to the hummus guy I got a lot of ideas for other flavors of hummus which I will be trying out soon.

Signing Out:

I haven’t made us breakfast yet so I need to get moving. I hope you have some fun planned for today. We will be doing some yard work and maybe heading to the harbor to sit by the water and watch the sunset this evening. Talk with you later. :-)