30.8.09

SUPER LATE!

Why do I always always ALWAYS put off ding a vacation blog post. Its like some weird thing, like I wait until the third day after I get back, and then I don't even feel like doing it anymore. But not this time! Not this blogger!! Anyway, yes, I am back! It took me long enough, but I am here. Now I could go on and on about how nice the hotel was, and how they only sold snickers and Gatorade in the gift shop, but I'm not going to. This is a food blog, and I have a tendency to put my life happenings in here.... Okay well I'll make it like 20/ 80 food. I have to tell someone about my day lol. Super long picture time so bare with me here.

Before we got to the hotel, we got hungry. Very hungry. So we stopped at a Denny's on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere Virginia, and ordered some food. I got a tomato and onion omelet with a side of hash browns. I ended up forking all the tomatoes out of the omelet because
I didn't like the way they tasted; they were too wet.
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You can somewhat see the hash browns in this one, next to the burger I ordered. It was sorta dry, so I had to put ketchup and mustard on it. Plus, I really don't like a burger (or sub for that matter) with any other lettuce besides ice burg. I feel like i ran the burger in a field before I picked it back up to eat it. But still it was good.

After making our way to the hotel, I decided to take pictures of the bathroom! Exciting!!

The bedroom, the one on the right is where I slept!

So around 12 the first night, everybody was still hungry, but no restaurants were open at the time, so we went to a BP gas station and bought all this crap. I bought the nerds, Oreo cookies, vanilla wafers, strawberry milk, water, fruit roll, and hot fries!

The next evening we ate at Il Giardino in VA beach. The people were very friendly, but it seemed over staffed for some reason...and not necessarily in a good way. Like for every person in the restaurant there was a waiter. Awkward....

I ordered the foccacia with olive and red pepper oils. I don't understand why every restaurant doesn't do this! It's so much better than the regular oil alone. And with grated Parmesan cheese inside, are you kidding me?!

Of course every where I go that offers Caprese salad I have to order it (just to see how it holds up against other restaurants). This one was good, but instead of a balsamic reduction they just did the vinegar plain. I'm not complaining though, the heirloom tomatoes were very firm and good.

My last dish at Il Giardino was stuffed Manicotti, covered in Parmesan cheese in red sauce. It was a bit too thick for me, as I could barley taste anything but ricotta cheese. A little less cheese and a thinner noodle would have been perfect.
A few days later, I had breakfast at the Pocahontas breakfast restaurant down the street from the hotel. The dining room was packed with people, and I see why. I ordered the chocolate pancakes; buttermilk pancakes filled with chocolate chips, with chocolate chips on top drizzled in chocolate sauce. So much chocolate I didn't want to eat anymore for a week.

A closeup of the pancake.

As if three monster pancakes weren't enough (obviously they weren't) I also ordered an onion and cheese omelet. I decided against tomatoes this time as I didn't want a repeat of Denny's. It seemed like they cooked the egg, then stuffed it with melted cheese and sauteed onions. Then covered in a sharper cheddar cheese.

For my last breakfast at the beach, I went to the Maple Tree, a Swedish breakfast restaurant. The Swedish pancakes I ordered were very thin, almost like a crepe, and covered in raspberry butter, which I absolutely need to learn how to make; it was delicious.

Okay, so I didn't actually eat the above salad while I was on the trip, but I did however eat this last night. I thought to myself; I HAVE to blog about this. The salad was mixed micro greens, dried cranberries, dried cherries, strawberries, blueberries, blue cheese, green apple slices, and candied walnuts lightly covered in a sherry vinaigrette dressing.

What to put here now hmm? I feel accomplished that I covered my vacation, plus last night so I feel all caught up. Today I was really feeling like baking some lemon poppy seed cookies, but we have no poppy seeds so I need to go to the store. No one wants to drive me, so that seems impossible then. I guess the store is right up the street, but I hate the sun; if it was winter I would gladly go up there. But its 90 degrees outside, so no. I would also bake apple pie, but we only have one apple. And no, there is no chocolate in the house either. I'm stumped. More tomorrow.