Date DAY in Chicago

We have been so busy lately that it has taken me two weeks to post about this wonderful day that my husband and I had together. Since my husband now has more of a realistic schedule, it has been easier to go on dates and hang out more regularly!

It was a wonderful summer morning and we got up and went for a run together along the river to the lake, one of our favorite routes because it's along the water the whole way. After working up an appetite, we made a big pancake breakfast with bacon and smoothies. A favorite around here!

We had some time to kill before heading to his cousin's going away party, so we decided to just walk around the area. It was quite hot out, so we stopped at the French Market across the street to get some gelato. YUM!! (This market is so cool, I'm sure one day I'll write an entire post about it!) It was relaxing to just wander around our city neighborhood and nibble the creamy and fruity goodness.

As we were wandering, we remembered that the wine shop nearby has free tastings every Saturday afternoon. Just Grapes is a very modern wine shop with many rows of wine! The people working were super nice and very helpful. It was also fun to see people come in who were clearly regulars. All I could think was, we buy a lot of wine, so wouldn't it be nice to have a regular place to go where people know what kind of wine we like and can recommend new ones or promote awesome deals? Yes! However, we have to watch the budget, so I think we'll try to make it a semi-regular thing to stop by for the free tasting and maybe get a bottle of wine every now and then :)

Later, after the going-away party, we got to our dinner plans. I had a Living Social (similar to Groupon) deal at a restaurant called One. Six One. I was interested in going to this restaurant because their philosophy is all about balance and sustainability, their menu looked great, and they got pretty good reviews on Yelp. This restaurant just opened in late July, so I wasn't expecting too much, but I was pretty impressed! The owner even came out and welcomed us! We sat outside on the patio among the tiki torches and candles. And the food was excellent! I think this restaurant is going to become very popular in just a short time. It was a great dinner and it was fun to check out a new area of the city, Little Italy.

I love exploring this city! There are so many adventures around every corner! It was a day of great dates!

Trying to be Minnesotan

Last weekend some friends were in town for various reasons and we just needed to capitalize on the serendipity that so many great people were in one city! We were able to coordinate having everyone over for brunch on Sunday. I'd already made my favorite Vanilla Yogurt Pancakes for some of them, so I had to come up with something new. Breakfast food is one of my favorite types of food to make, so I was excited find another favorite dish.

When I realized that "mostly Minnesotans" would be occupying the table (minus a native Philly girl and myself) I thought it would be fitting to make some sort of casserole-y dish. What makes more sense than an egg bake? (Egg bake makes me sound like an old lady - I prefer egg dish or quiche). So, I started researching egg dishes on Epicurious and this Baked Egg Custard with Gruyere and Chives recipe caught my eye! It seemed easy, involved few ingredients, and little prep so that I'd be able to hang out with our guests rather than be in the kitchen forever.

Of course, I couldn't just serve an egg dish. As I mentioned, I love breakfast, so I had a few other items on the table. Breakfast is not complete without bacon, so we had that with grilled breakfast sausage (another personal favorite from my childhood), and a mixed fruit bowl that included strawberries, blueberries, peaches and bananas. We topped it off with lots of coffee and mimosas.

The spread:


The friends:


The egg dish:


Close up:


My plate:


Good food, great friends, and wonderful conversation. Love you guys!

My Husband is the Sandwich Man

I think one of the first things I learned about my husband is that he loves sandwiches. He eats them everyday for lunch. No joke, everyday... unless there is some delicious leftover placed aside ahead of time, then he will make an exception. And, he can eat the same kind of sandwich everyday if he wants - he never gets tired of them (I do after a while...). However, he usually gets complimented on them because they are so immaculate. We're not just talking about your regular meat and cheese between two slices of bread. There is usually yummy deli meat topped with some fresh sliced cheese, yes, but on top of that includes a multitude of veggies like onions, all colors of peppers, tomatoes, avocados, mushrooms, mixed greens and spinach (all of these veggies coming in a variety of raw to sauteed/caramelized) and a variety of sauces to top it off even more. He is the sandwich man.

I had to work this past weekend Saturday through Tuesday, and it was pretty exhausting by Sunday already. I happened to have some time to come home for a quick lunch on Sunday and requested he make me dinner because I knew I'd be too exhausted to even think about making anything. I didn't even have any requests, just a nice dinner please.

I came home and he let me just lounge on the couch and read while he made me dinner. It smelled sooo good and I was curious, but he said it was a surprise. Not long after, he called me over to eat. I should have known, he had prepared super fancy sandwiches!! And they looked delicious!!! He seasoned and grilled steak strips, placed them on a bed of mixed greens, topped them with shredded mozzarella, caramelized onions, tomato then avocado with chipotle mayonnaise on a market fresh baguette. MMM!!! It was served with a mixed greens salad with dijon vinaigrette and yummy flavored Kettle chips, and a large glass of red wine. It was the perfect nice but simple dinner on a hot summer night.

Girls Breakfast Date

Last week I met up with my bestie, Lucy, for a wonderful breakfast date. She suggested we go to Walker Brothers Pancake House in Evanston, IL. She said it has the best brunch food she's ever had, and I just had to check it out. Boy, was she right! The menu looked incredible!

Lucy has been really wanting to try the infamous Apple Pancake, so we decided that must happen. At least one of us needed to order that so the other could try it. But, the problem with ordering only pancakes at a brunch place is that you only satisfy your sweet craving. But what about the savory craving? Well, it's a good thing we think exactly alike. Lucy and I both really love our eggs and bacon at breakfast, so we promptly decided that one of us should order sweet and the other should order savory and we'll split both dishes. YES - it's perfect.

We decided the other dish to split should be the Venicia Benedict. This was not your normal eggs benedict, but it was super fancied up. And it was absolutely incredible. It included poached eggs with fresh sauteed spinach, mushrooms, and bacon on a wheat English muffin served with fresh fruit on the side. I like to order the eggs benedict from restaurants as a standard on which to base my opinion on the restaurant. And these were the BEST eggs benedict that I've EVER had! MMM! The apple pancake was also incredible! It was basically the insides of an apple pie woven with pastry dough and baked with a cinnamon glaze to create a ginormous plate of gooey, caramely goodness. It was still bubbling from the oven when it was served! It was enormous, and sinfully delicious!



We also enjoyed the bottomless coffee and we had a great girly date as well :) I love you Lucy!

Second City

Even though we've lived in Chicago for 2 years now (wow!) and have made a pretty huge dent in our list of things to do and places to go, there are still plenty of items on that list that we're really excited to conquer. For budget reasons, we try to space them out.

This weekend, we had friends in town and saw it as a good opportunity to go to Second City, a popular improv-based comedy club. I've really been wanting to go for a long time. Well known comedians have come from this club such as Tina Fey, Chris Farley, Mike Meyers, Martin Short, and MANY more! The show we saw was called Spoiler Alert: Everybody Dies and it was absolutely hilarious! It included a number of skits about everyday life in many types and forms and the actors/actresses were super funny! It was totally worth the money, and I'm sure we'll be back, although that will probably be when we have friends in town again.

Rock and Roll Half Marathon

Speaking of enthusiasts, I ran the Rock and Roll Half Marathon along with 18,555 other runner enthusiasts yesterday! It was my first half marathon, and I thought it was awesome!!! There was a band every mile, the weather was perfect, and running through downtown Chicago was really fun! My husband even rode his bike around the downtown part of the course to multiple locations to see me and cheer for me!

Here is the course map.

I felt super great until about mile 8 where the course goes south along the lake shore. It's about the time I thought I'd get tired because I didn't train as well as I wished I could have. Also, the course was along a straight road and there were basically no cheerers because it was near a major highway for a couple of miles. After the bottom turn to come back up north, we got to run right along the lake. I picked up my pace again. There were more people cheering and the finish was near. I finished strong, and felt pretty good! All in all, I loved it and will probably do another in the future!

Around mile 3, feeling great!


Downtown shot of the crowd:


Smile on the face, around mile 3-4!


Hurting a little, about a mile to go.


The last curve around the Aquarium, under a mile to go.


Just after the last curve, with downtown Chicago in the background. I'm just near the light pole in the center.


Almost to the finish. The end is just down the way the runners are going, then make a right into the straight away into the line of trees.

Enthusiasm

Chicago is full of enthusiasts. Whether you’re talking about sports fans, symphony goers, El riders, beach dwellers, street shoppers, or parade fanatics, they’re all here. En mass. It seems as though if there is something going on in downtown Chicago, everyone is there. While it is fun to get excited about fun things in the summer, it is sometimes exhausting and I just want to get away from the crowd of sweaty people.

Example #1, good crowd: When Obama was elected as president in 2008, we were some of the lucky 60,000 people who actually got tickets into Grant Park along with the millions and millions of people that extended the park and went onto the streets. That was one of the best nights ever! Having so many people downtown all getting excited for one thing (well one HUGE thing) was incredible.



Example #2, not so good crowd: When the Chicago Blackhaws one the Stanley cup this June, the mayor decided to have a parade for them. But, not just any parade… Chicagoans have massive parades where everyone takes the day off work, and everyone goes to the parade. There were 3 million people flooding the downtown streets on a 95 degree day just to see the Blackhawks hockey players ride around in a bus, then stand on a stage and wave! This was not a good trip home on my roller blades!



Another downfall to having so many enthusiasts in a condensed area is that if there is a craze, everyone wants in. My husband and I had an impromptu date night on Saturday when he got off from work super early. We went out for sushi (we found an amazing new place nearby) and then wanted to go see Inception. Since we live downtown and know it’s busy here, we planned to get to the theater early. But even by then all the showings were sold out until the latest one which we were too tired to stay up for. We decided that we could walk to the next nearest theater, 4 blocks away, and try to get tickets there. Nope. It was sold out just like the first one! So much for just wanting to see a movie! Too many enthusiasts once again, Chicago.

I must say, it was still a great date night. We went home and watched a movie and ate ice cream, for free :)

Dimitri

Approximately four weeks ago, we got a new kitten!!! He is a Siberian and is hypoallergenic because my husband is allergic to cats. Good news: he hasn't had the slightest reaction to the new kitten, so I guess it's true that he really is hypoallergenic.



We decided, after a long debate, to give him a Russian name (since he's Siberian) and settled on Dimitri. We think it suits him well :) The breeder did a really good job raising him for 10 weeks. She started calling him Dimitri so he already knew his name by the time we got him. She did a great job of socializing him as well. He is so curious and playful!





He is also very cute and cuddly!





He also sleeps a lot. As a new kitten, he is expected to sleep around 16 hours a day. He's also quite cute when he's sleeping.





My husband claimed to hate cats prior to getting Dimitri. I think that is mostly because he was allergic to all other cats. So, the best part is that my husband absolutely LOVES Dimitri. He continues to make us laugh with his playfulness and love him more every day with his cuddles.

Soccer - My Sport of Choice

It's interesting to see how many people become instant soccer fans when the World Cup is going on. Me, I used to eat, sleep, breathe, and dream soccer like it was my life for the majority of my life. Ever since I was able to walk, I had a soccer ball between my feet. Soccer has helped define who I am. My competitiveness, eagerness, self motivation, and desire to live a healthy lifestyle all stem from my soccer playing lifestyle. I made some of the greatest friends, traveled all over the country and internationally, learned some life lessons, and I miss playing more than I thought I would.

I can vividly remember being on the field and playing the game like it was yesterday. I remember the feel of my cleats on my feet and the ground pounding beneath them. The smell of the freshly cut grass. The sensation of running so hard for so long that you feel like your legs are going to fall off. Slide tackling on wet grass that carried out the slide much more than you thought was possible. The natural feeling of striking the ball at my feet. I loved creating plays and the incredible moments when I could watch the ball sneak past the goalie's dive. Most of all, I love to remember my teammates who played beside me. Those girls helped me get through some tough years more than they will ever know.

During the summer season, when we were out of school, we'd often have two-a-day practices. This photo reminds me of our early morning practices when the grass was still wet from dew. We had some intense training sessions that we ... learned to appreciate.



This photo reminds me of our late night games. The feeling of stepping out onto the soccer field at night with the lights all lit up is incredibly energizing! Night matches were always so fun during the summer when it would still be in the 80's long after the sun went down.



Soccer is full of beautiful plays:



And some hilarious mishaps:



That must be what a concussion looks like. I got a concussion once, where I went one on one with the goalie in an indoor game. Somehow we ended up colliding at full speed and I flipped over her and my forehead broke my fall on the indoor track field turf. I wonder if that's what I looked like smashing into the floor for a split second. Well, all I know is that I had the floor pattern indented in my forehead for a good week and had to wear a neck brace, and I'm not posting a picture of that!

Sunday was an awesome food day!

My husband is studying for the national board exams for medical school, and I am in the midst of taking a semester length course condensed into 4 weeks, while maintaining my full time work schedule. Needless to say, we are quite busy right now, and it is not very fun. The good news is that there is light at the end of the tunnel and we’ll both be done less than 2 weeks.

I love cooking, and usually have a lot of time on my hands to find great recipes. However, with our crazy schedules right now, we just don’t have much extra time to cook. But with the long holiday weekend, I finally had some quality kitchen time apart from my busy life. I was recently intrigued by a new recipe I saw on a friend's blog for Vanilla Yogurt Pancakes and really wanted to make them. I had never made pancakes from scratch before, but was so excited by the recommendation, I just had to try out the recipe. They turned out to be the best pancakes I’ve ever had! They were thick, light, and absolutely delicious. Next time, I think I’ll add wild blueberries to the batter! Yum! The pancakes went very well with my special smoothies made from vanilla yogurt, frozen berries of all sorts, soy milk, honey, and sliced almonds. The almonds give the smoothie a light nutty flavor, a slight crunch, and added protein! My favorite addition to a Sunday brunch! I tried to take pictures of this delicious spread, but they just didn't do the food justice. Next time.

After a relaxing afternoon at the beach enjoying the upper 80’s, clear blue skies, and getting some quality people watching time in, I was so ready to make my recently discovered favorite dish. If you like pasta, you’ll love Fettuccine with Peas, Asparagus, and Pancetta. Before trying this dish for the first time a couple of months ago, I had never cooked with pancetta before, but I’m so glad I tried it because it’s awesome! I love bacon and any dish that includes it, and pancetta is like fancy bacon! Plus, the asparagus, green onions, and light sauce make this a great spring/summer dish! Another great aspect of this recipe is that it makes so much food! It’s enough for my large appetite, my husband’s three sizeable helpings, with enough for leftovers! Give it a try when you’re feeling creative! I got a semi-successful picture of this dish:



Yup, Sunday was an awesome food day.