Weekend Update: The San Francisco Treat! (Part One)

The story goes like this:

Sometime Sunday afternoon

Jay: Don't we have those non-rev tickets from Lynn somewhere? I think they are expiring soon. 

Amie: Oh yeah - they're in that box over there....

Jay: Here they are - and yeah they expire May 6. So where do you want to go?

Then we talked for a few minutes about Seattle, Portland or San Francisco for a weekend getaway sometime soon. 

Tuesday-ish

Amie: So when do you think we should go? Two weeks from now?

Jay: I was thinking we should go this weekend....

Amie: Oh sweet! I probably should talk to work about getting a day off...

Jay: Let's wait a bit...I'll check on hotels, etc. 

Amie: We can always go Saturday and come back Monday...or Friday and come back Sunday...

Thursday Morning

Jay texts Amie: I'm thinking San Francisco!

Amie texts Jay: Awesome! When are we going? Friday or Saturday? 

Jay texts Amie: I was thinking Friday...

Amie tells work she won't be coming in the next day. 

Thursday Night Before Bed

Jay books hotel.

Friday at 7am

Amie and Jay's flight departs to San Fran for the weekend!

Ok, now that you have the scene set, here's the first installment of our trip!

Arriving at the BART station & pimpin' it....

It was a PERFECTLY sunny and warm day which can be rare in this city with all it's fog! We had a nice & pretty short walk to check in at our hotel. We booked at the King George Hotel from a deal we found on TravelZoo. By the way, I love TravelZoo - it's where we got our hotel for our Montreal trip too. It was a great rate for this last minute booking and the King George was a really cute boutique hotel - I liked that it had character :) Jay and I called it the "Georges a Cinq" the whole weekend ala the movie French Kiss. Just pretend we're saying it with a nice strong French accent....

A quick freshening up and we were off! Well, more like UP! We decided to walk up the street our hotel was on - Mason Street - up towards Nob Hill. It was a fantastic workout! 

At the top of the hill were beautiful views of the city along with Grace Cathedral...

It was built with serious inspiration from Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris and is also famous for it's Ghiberti doors (which I remember learning about in Art History class!).

Magnificent inside:

After our visit to the Cathedral we started looking for a place to have lunch. One of my favorite things about San Francisco are the flowers that most corner shops have for sale on the sidewalks! There is fruit in most of the windows too! I can just imagine living here and walking by my favorite shop every day buying an apple and maybe some daisies...ahhhh....

Back to reality! We had worked up a serious appetite by this point and ended up having lunch at Nob Hill Cafe - a tiny Italian restaurant located right near the top of Nob Hill. We got there just as it opened, so we had a cozy little window table which was perfect! I had a white cheddar, apple and pancetta pizza and Jay had pasta with garlic tomato sauce. Both were very good! The only thing is that the pictures we took inside were pretty dark, so instead you get a picture of the outside...

Our next stop was Chinatown which was such an adventure!

We found our way to this tiny alley in search for something in particular....

The Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory! It is tucked away with a tiny little entrance that we didn't even realize was "the" place until an old man motioned for us to come inside! It was very cramped quarters and VERY hot! We had to pay 50 cents for each picture, so since I paid $1, I'm getting good use of them & posting both for you! 

This poor lady must have been so hot! She didn't even flinch having us right up there in her personal space to take the picture. I'm sure she's thinking, "Darn tourists..."

We went on a search for Durian. Those of you who have watched "Fear Factor" (hello 2001!) or "Bizarre Foods" might have heard about this stinky/yucky fruit. We were hoping to be able to find a place where we could try a piece of it...

...but it took us several fruit stands before we even found them! And they were up on this shelf with this dusty alarm clock. We decided to try Durian some other time....

We stopped at this tea shop for a free tea tasting. The lady there was awesome! She brews tea so fast and was full of knowledge about the benefits of each type of tea. Some were really good (rose!) and some were nasty (Angel!).

We ended up picking 3 of our favorites and left $50 poorer....(oops!)....

After a long day, I needed to sit down!

We walked by Union Square Park on our way back to the hotel for a much-needed nap. They had a beautiful installment of these heart sculptures that were so pretty I had to snap a picture!

More to come soon - the day is just halfway done!!

xoxo

From our Kitchen: Delizioso!

Since nobody guessed what we purchased at the outlets a few weekends ago, I figured I might as well give it away....

...we bought a pasta maker!

Making pasta is ridiculously simple. It's flour, a little water & egg:

You slowly mix it up until it forms a nice firm dough:

Then let it rest for about 10 minutes.

It was fun putting it through the "machine"....

...but let's just say it was a learning curve. We think we put the pasta through the spaghetti side when it was a little too thick because it stopped working. So we then switched to the fettuccine side which worked just great. Later on Jay tackled "fixing" the spaghetti side:

at least the fettuccine side still works

Here is our beautiful spaghetti all ready to be cooked:

And in the pot - a little of both! It only takes a few minutes until it's done! 

While we were making the dough and testing out the machine I also made some homemade sauce (simple, easy & yummy recipe!)...

...and topped it off with our homegrown fresh basil! 

Ok, I admit we did purchase the parmesan! 

We loved the fresh pasta & recommend you give it a try sometime! Even if you don't have a machine, you can just roll it out real thin & then slice it with a knife.

Now THAT is delizioso!

From our Kitchen: Maple Muffins

My mom sent me The Official Vermont Maple Cookbook a while back & since I received it, I've wanted to try these Maple Muffins (of course among other delicious dishes!). 

You start with the dry ingredients - flour, baking powder, salt. 

The main sweetener is - you guessed it - Vermont Maple Syrup!

FYI: You're not a true Vermonter unless you have it in enormous quantities:

Gently mix the dry & wet ingredients - the key word is gentle (or as my mom used to warn me - you'll get pointy, tough muffins) - and then spoon the batter into muffin tins. 

And after a short time in the oven, here they are their yummy goldenness: 

I chose to top my fresh-out-of-the-oven breakfast with our homemade butter and a tiny drizzle of maple syrup. Delicious! 

I'm trying a new thing here, so bear with me if it doesn't work, but....Click here to print out the recipe! 

Date Night: Take Me Out To The Ball Game!

Tuesday night I scored some sweet tickets to the Diamondback's vs. Padres game. Remember this post from last year? Well, how could I turn down tickets for the same seats & valet pass?!

It was a beautiful day,but with the roof open, it was pretty windy and chilly once the sun went down. It was funny hearing ourselves (and others around us) talk about how "cold" it was - realistically it was probably in the high 50s or maybe even in the 60s, so it wasn't THAT bad, but I definitely wish I brought another layer! 

Somebody was in a rather goofy mood that night:

Besides the valet parking (seriously - you park right at the stadium - can't get any closer!), my next favorite part of these tickets was that each one came with $10 "DBucks" which means it was money that could be spent at any of the vendors, the bar below us, or with our waitress. That means $20 to spend and to top it off, Jay wasn't hungry!? 

I was hoping to get another hot dog panini like last year, but it's no longer on the menu, so I started off with Gordon Biersch garlic fries. Anyone that knows this place knows how delicious the fries are! I was worried about stinking out the people around us but luckily (for me at least! poor Jay) the couple next to us got them too! Later on in the game I got a hot dog & soda, and right before we left I got a giant bag of cotton candy to take home.

::sidenote:: I do not recommend eating an entire bag of cotton candy in one sitting as I did today at work. B-A-D idea.

Unfortunately the Dbacks didn't play too well and lost 3-6. There was a true win that night though because we had a great time! (yes, I'm a dork).

And just for fun, let's compare last year & this year:

Hope you have a great date night planned!

xoxo

From our Kitchen: Kale Chips

Since I first fell in love with the superfood Kale, I have wanted to try making kale chips. I came upon this recipe & gave them a shot! 

It's super easy. Trim off the stems of the kale, then wash & dry. Toss in olive oil & salt, then spread out on a cookie sheet like this:

Then bake them in a 300 degree oven for about 20 minutes until they look like this:

They are very fragile chips and practically turn to "dust" if you handle them too roughly, but they taste really good are good for you! Next time you see kale at the grocery store, give these a shot!

xoxo

Weekend Update: Easter

We started this weekend off with some grocery shopping & errands on Friday night. It was great getting the errands out of the way so we could relax the rest of the weekend! One of the stops we made was to the library & Jay picked out this book. We got home & he made himself comfortable on the couch for most of the night reading about everything from building a 1-acre farm to canning to composting to raising pigs. 

I got The Help and am really enjoying it! Today I looked forward to going to the park to read a few chapters!

Saturday we had a pretty lazy morning before deciding to go for an afternoon drive. When heading out to the car, I noticed that birds had built a nest up under our roof. You can barely see it here (of course the birds put their heads down as I was taking the picture!), but it's right under that top branch of the bougainvillea up in that corner. I'll have to check back some other time to see if I can get a better picture. 

So, we decided to head south and check out Casa Grande first. There really isn't much there except for some outlet stores that we stopped in. We picked up something perfect for a future "From our Kitchen" post. Anyone have any guesses? 

Next we headed to Eloy to relax a bit at the airport. Can you believe from this sign that it's one of the busiest in the world? 

Well, for this it is:

Can you see 'em now? 

Just as we arrived, 20-30 skydivers jumped out of a plane above us. 

They look really slow until they speed past you in the landing area. 

According to Jay (as you know he's usually right w/these things), Eloy is one of the (if not THE) busiest skydiving airports in the world. Both of us used to fly down to Eloy during flight school for various training flights (hi Ryan!).

We had a beer and appetizer at The Bent Prop Saloon and then sat out on the lawn for a while just watching all of the activity while another round of divers made their way down. It's definitely a hang out spot for people other than skydivers - it's most likely the only place where anything is going on in this very small town!  

Next we headed to Coolidge - another town we've both flown into. Let's just say there wasn't much going on in downtown Coolidge on this Saturday afternoon. I wonder if everyone goes up to "The Big City" on the weekends? It was like a ghost town. 

We also went to Florence which might as well be the same picture as above. Florence had a bit more character though as (I think) it's a bit closer to Phoenix. 

Sunday morning, Jay slept in (till 9!!) while I got up at 7. Talk about role reversal! Due to that, we went to the 10:30 mass. Well let's just say that next Easter, we're going to the 7:00 or 8:30 options! It was crazy packed & we had to stand the whole time. It was a beautiful service & we both really enjoyed the homily. 

We saw Erika & Raelyn along with the Coy family in the courtyard afterwards. Erika was gracious enough to invite us over for a bit and it was so nice catching up! I wish I got a picture of Erika & Raelyn but did snap this great picture of Kelly, Chris, Lyla and Jacob. 

As soon as we got home, I got to cooking. We made ham, corn, these homemade rolls, potatoes, and for dessert, Pioneer Woman's pineapple upside down cake!

Lets just say the cake didn't TURN OUT quite as we planned. Get it? TURN OUT. (I know, I'm hilarious).

It tasted real good but what a sticky mess to clean up! That cast iron pan is just so heavy & next time, instead of trying to help Jay do the flip, I think I'll just let him do it all himself :) 

We hope you and your families had a wonderful Easter weekend and took some time to remember the reason we celebrate it every spring!

xoxo