Pre-Trip Eats

I'm such a glutton before I travel, it seems. So before I make my way out of Boston for a week, I eat.

The Saturday before I leave, Tai and I attempt to go for brunch. First we try Kristin's in Braintree, but they're super busy. Next we go to Mad Hatter Cafe in Weymouth, but we can't even park. So, we had back into Quincy and finally, third time's a charm. We are seated at Craig's Cafe.

Brandon's Benedict - two poached eggs on bacon and hash browns. I'm not sure how much of this I could eat, but the two bites I had were really good. Tai finished it though. It was salty from the bacon, and crispy from the hash browns.

Blueberry muffin French toast - the whipped cream was great. But the "French toast" really just tasted like a toasted blueberry muffin. Definitely did not get the egginess.







Food is solid, but not outstanding. Service was slow. Overall, okay.

After some errands, awful traffic, and a nap, we meet with Jessica, Rosa, and Wei for dinner at New Golden Gate.

Seafood soup.

Clam with glass noodles.

Fried stuff.

Pork with vegetables.

Beef sauteed with onions.

Crab.











Standard fare at our Chinatown dinners. :)

Sunday, Tai and I go to Pikaichi for ramen before I head to the airport.

Tokyo shoyu ramen.

Jigoku ramen.











And then I'm off to Logan for some wine and waiting (and lots more waiting, as it turns out).

I Hate Allergies

So. This week has been awful for me, health-wise. But a huge improvement from last week, food-wise.

Tuesday's lunch from Falafel King. Which ended up being lunch and dinner.

Buffalo mac and cheese from Southside Tavern. The correct one, this time. The buffalo was still rather overpowering. I wonder if they would serve that on the side.








Family dinner on Saturday was at Sichuan Garden in Woburn. We went fairly early, so there was no wait for a table, and the food came out pretty quickly.

I guess I didn't take a picture of the soup. But we got the fish maw/crabmeat soup. And it was really good. Thick, with lots of meat.

Pea pod stems.

Tangerine beef - I really liked this. Crispy, but soft, and sweet.

Chengdu chicken wings.

House hat crispy whole fish - spicier than I thought it would be.

 My golden mai tai :)

Um, some kind of red bean dessert. It looks like those sesame balls filled with red bean paste just smushed.










Sunday, Tai and I went to Brunch Bar at the WGBH Studios. Below is not everything we ate, but I couldn't be THAT person (even though I totally was).

Cold brew with maple syrup, rye, and a sprig of thyme. So good!

Frittata with lobster gremolata.

I think this was cinnamon raisin french toast with pulled pork.

 Succotash.

Honestly, I don't even know. It was like baked mac and cheese with cinnamon sugar.

The bottom was like yogurt, oats, with spicy honey. The top was a biscuit of some sort with gravy.

Couldn't even tell you. Hah.

Mimosa, thanks to Wegman's.

The yogurt and oats concoction was too healthy. And the gardein chicken slider was odd, but okay.

Chilled lobster bisque, almost.

Bloody Mary. Still not a fan.

Fruit.

 Peach bellini.

 Liquid nitrogen ice cream.

Peanut butter beer.

 Blackwater Pilsner.

Popcorn.

Thanks WGBH!

A Week of Woes

This week was full of lessons. Some obvious, some less so.

First lesson:
DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT go anywhere near Ikea on Labor Day weekend in Massachusetts. Or maybe in any state. Just like we avoid Allston, thanks to Allston Christmas, and Storrow drive. Avoid Ikea.

(I also want to note that Tai was the one pushing to go. But I digress.)

Our Ikea lunch

It took Tai 20 minutes in lines to get above lunch.

After browsing the showroom, we had to wait another 15 minutes for a cart. Yes. I waited in a line for a freaking cart.

And probably another 20 or 30 minutes in line to checkout. So, my day was spent in line, basically.

Second lesson:
Southside Tavern in Quincy and Southside Tavern in Braintree are not interchangeable. My southshore coworkers are always telling me how good Southside Tavern is. How great the mac and cheese there is. So, after a quick trip to Southshore Plaza, I thought mac and cheese sounded great. I google Southside Tavern. Menu looks okay. Oh look! There's a Quincy location! Let's go there.

Oh my. What a bad decision. It's definitely a neighborhood pub. Okay, fine. We seat ourselves. Wait for menus. Get said menus. No mac and cheese?!?! Sadness.

(Sorry for the super dark pictures, but this was no place to use flash.)

We ordered buffalo wings. Instead, we got buffalo tenders. Gahh this sauce was overpowering.

Steak tips, with sweet potato fries and a side Caesar (although the menu says ceasar; but again, I digress). So the good: the steak tips were really good. Flavorful without being the buffalo tenders that I forced myself to eat. Tender. Cooked well. And the bad: wow, talk about an  overdressed salad. And the meh: sweet potato fries were serviceable, but nothing to rave about.



And so, maybe, just maybe I would come back if I lived in the surrounding 3 blocks or so. But I don't.

Third lesson:
Sometimes a smoothie can be a lunch. But while it will be filling, it might not be satisfying.

Liquid lunch from Barry's Bootcamp

Fourth lesson:
After two visits to Chatime on Harrison Ave, I have given up on them having boba. I might have to try another location.

That is all for the week. Hopefully next week brings me better luck.

Wake Me Up When September Ends

Weather has been fantastic. After working from home Wednesday, Tai and I go out for dessert at Caffe Bene by Symphony. We've tried to come here several times previously, but parking in the area is such a nightmare. Glad we made it this time though.

Strawberry ice parfait - so it's layers of shaved ice, red bean, and I think a strawberry compote type thing. Topped with fresh strawberries and strawberry ice cream. This was really good, but really big. And some of the strawberries were on the too tart side.

Strawberry waffle - really good. Much better than Zinneken's.

I'd like to come back and try a toast thing. And maybe have another waffle. :)

Thursday, we met up with Kim and Soon Tani for dinner. It's always difficult suggesting places to a foodie, but we ended up at Seasons 52 in Chestnut Hill. The restaurant just switched menus to focus on fall flavors, so you had a lot of apple, pear, mushroom, etc. on there.

Butternut squash soup - eh. It was okay, and I know the restaurant aims to be healthy and all, but I wanted it creamier.

Chicken pesto flatbread - this was really good. Not greasy at all.

Tai's pork tenderloin - he said it was really good (and he ate the whole thing).

Dessert - I think it was a mocha one? I don't really remember. But it was good. Nice way to finish our meal.

I quite liked the restaurant. Kim got a soup and flatbread; Soon Tani got Brussels sprouts and a flatbread. And everyone enjoyed their meal.

Friday was early release. Tai and I were roaming around Boston aimlessly and managed to get to Christopher Columbus Park, so I figured we could go get in line for Giacomo's. It was hot with the sun beaming down at us, and I wasn't sure I wanted to wait. But luckily, we made first seating.

Small calamari - good. Comes out piping hot, and that probably makes the difference.

Fusilli with lobster and shrimp in Giacomo sauce - one of the specials of the day. It was really good. Plenty of lobster meat. Nice creamy sauce.

Half lobster, mussels, and clams over linguine with fra diavolo sauce - Tai said everything was really good. He nearly finished it (save for the lobster claw and head).

We were not hungry. We got in line at 4:05pm and were seated around 4:30pm. We do not eat dinner that early ever. And still Tai nearly finished his dish.

Would I do it again? I'm not sure. But I'm glad I got to do it.

Saturday was moving day. For brunch, I picked up McKenna's.

Grampion champion omelet.

Cobb salad.



















Oh McKenna's. How I have missed your food, but not the service.