The Motor City

So I arrived in Detroit this Sunday and ate at a Mediterranean Grill at the airport in Terminal A (Northwest). Could you believe anything in Detroit was nice?!?! Terminal A was beautiful; there was a monorail in the terminal, and there was a mediterranean grill!!! Couldn't believe it! I had some chicken shwarrma which was really good and it was a huge portion! My coworker had the shrimp grill?? It was just like sauteed shrimp and vegetables with some rice; it looked ok, but she said it was not great.
On Monday, the President of the business took us out to a place called Eastside Marios. This place was delicious! I had a Linguine Chicken Amatriciana; which was linguini and chicken in a blush sauce which basically tastes like a marinara with cream sauce. It was delicious.
Monday night we dined at Mountain Jack's. It was amazing. It was an upscale steakhouse that served all types of steaks, pastas, seafood, and other meats. I got a Grilled Sole with lump crab meat and broccoli and rice on the side; it was delicious!!! The bread that came out prior to the meal was amazing, crispy on the outside and soft on the inside! They have a unique way of serving salad. They bring out a huge wooden platter with lettuce in a large dimple in the middle and different toppings like shredded carrots, croutons, baby tomatoes and other things. We also had a potatoes au gratin side which tasted very good; to top it all off, we had a turtle cheesecake that was basically drowned in caramel and fudge. It was delicious! I loved the crunchy brown crust and the actual cake was very tasty, not very cheesy. I usually don't like cheesecake and I enjoyed this one.
Tuesday's lunch was spent at Taco Loco Cantina & Grill which was apparently voted Michigan's best bar, best Authentic Mexican food and other great things (wasn't joking). Can you believe, I talked the waitress into getting me some Chorizos Juevos which is mexican sausage and eggs which is amazing (basically an omlet). It came with rice and some light beans. We had chips and salsa. Chips were very crispy, thick and delicious... extremely good for plain corn chips! A hot salsa and a mild salsa were both brought out and both tasted good. My coworker got an enchilada and taco. The taco looked like a white whoopie cushion it was so big and inflated. She said it was delicious.
Tuesday night we dined at Lelli's. This place is a very upscale Italian Steakhouse. They serve delicious steaks that are cut up while simmering tableside, veal dishes, seafood and an enormous pasta selection. I got the half spaghetti half ravioli where I chose Napoletana (creamy sauce like vodka sauce) with my spaghetti and meat ravioli. The portion was a bit small, but did the trick. I tried some of my coworker's fettucini and red clam sauce which tasted pretty good. The ravioli pasta was al dente which made it pretty good. The service here was very nice; the wait staff was dressed in tuxedos. Our meals came with the bread which was AMAZING! It was almost a perfect sphere; hard crispy crust and super soft insides, a bit better than at Mountain Jack's. The salad was tossed in front of us which was nice and the creamy minestrone soup was very good as well (bits of potatoes in it). The meal also came with a chocolate cake which had white icing and tasted like any other cake. We really enjoyed our meal.

Hopefully we get to eat somewhere nice today before we head home!

The Big Apple

I haven't written in a while because I've been in NJ/NYC. While I've been here I've been to quite a few restuarants, so lets get right to it!
Last week I went over to Cranberry Station, a bar/restuarant on Route 130 near Dayton, NJ. It seems this is a hot place for happy hour for people from south brunswick, west windsor and north brunswick and there is a karaoke night on Thursdays at 8 PM. We had some calamari as an appetizer. The breaded outside was crisp and fresh out of the oven, but the squid was a little rubbery. All in all it was good. I had a penne with vodka sauce w/chicken strips which was amazing. The sauce was so good, and the chicken was fresh. There was a seafood salad which was just 3 lumps (1 tuna, 1 seafood salad and another lump of I am not even sure what) that didn't look that great, but my dad seemed to still eat a bit of it. My mom and uncle both got stuffed shells; my uncle got the Italian Feast which included meatballs. The shells seemed a bit hard, but it looked pretty good. There were mixed reviews.
Then the next night we went to McCormick and Schmick's at 400 Commons Way in Bridgewater, NJ; it's right outside the Bridgewater Commons Mall. The calamari there is unbelievable!!! It is so fresh, so soft and crispy; it comes with a sweet marmalade sauce, a tartar sauce and a tangy mayo. I ordered a catfish with jambalaya which was amazing!!! The catfish was a bit salty, but I like my food a bit blander than the norm. The jambalaya included puffy white rice which was ok, chunks of tomatoes, strips of peppers and best of all medium sized round sausage puffs which were tasty. I really enjoyed it. I was able to try bits of the shrimp alfredo. It was probably too bland for most people (a dash of pepper could do the trick), the halibut which was a bit fishy; but I don't eat much Halibut, so I'm not sure how good it really was (it came with some rice pilaf that was a bit hard, but still good), and the steamers which included clams and mussels which were DELICIOUS!!!!! We had an upside down apple pie with cinnamon ice cream and the triple creme brulee (orange, vanilla and choco CB's) both of which were really good.
Finally I made it to Park Blue, a lounge/bar on 57th and 7th in the city. They only serve one entree which was not impressive; a New York Strip that was a bit tasteless, but served with fries which were a bit sweet, crispy and very good! We also had a quarter leg of duck, and a tuna roll; both were pretty good. The great tastes were the shrimp skewers served with a tangy gaucemole which was amazing and the mini cheeseburgers!!! The burgers came with swiss and cheddar which made the delicious beef (the manager said it was not ground beef) taste like it was dipped in a chipotle mayo. They are a bit expensive at $8 a piece, but they are definitely worth trying. The restaurant plays jazz at a nice higher than normal volume; you can have a normal conversation because jazz is soft to begin with. They have a beautiful bar that looks like it's marble white.
Hope you get to try!

Seattle

That's me on the left in the boat of my main man Ray's GF's (Amy) parents' boat. Wow, on Friday I hitched a ride w/my coworker to Seattle. It's a 2.5-3 hr drive from Portland; the great news was we stopped at a nike factory outlet store just about halfway to Seattle. I picked up a lot of clothes for myself and for friends and fam. Can anyone tell me if someone would wear a Korea soccer jersey (other than koreans)?


We arrived in Seattle around 6 and Ray picked me up from the Springhill Suites. We all went over to Hopvine Pub and got a great pizza ("the hoach"), beers and lots of appetizers. The potstickers were amazing and the chips were really good and spicy. Later we found out that my friend Dave and wife Katie were home, so we went over to watch some skiing videos and Karate Kid Part 2! For those of you who are wondering, they do not play the song whose chorus is "You're the best, AROUND!" They only play that in the first one unfortunately.
The next day, we were treated to a wonderful breakfast of french toast ham and egg sandwiches! Ray took me around the downtown area and I was able to get some coffee from the first starbucks for my parents! That starbucks was in Pike's Peak Market which is the home of the fish store where the employees take orders and throw fish to patrons; except they throw the fish to anyone, as in people who AREN'T buying the fish. People stand around for entertainment as people catch or run from flying fish their way! Craziness.
Later we met up w/Amy and her roommate Becca to cruise around the Puget Sound in the soft rain. We toured the shore parts of Seattle and made it all the way to the "lock" where the river meets the Ocean. Since the Ocean water is lower than the river water, there is this lock that has 2 retractable walls with space for vessels. The water is locked in and raised or lowered to the height of the river or ocean respectively depending on which way the boats want to go. Since there's a long wait for this, we decided to just watch some salmon jump and flip in the air. Salmon attempt to make it back to the freshest of freshwater by jumping out of water away from the ocean. There were some HUGE FISH! We ended up going back to eat at Ivar's. We docked the boat at the restaurant and enjoyed some very very good food! I got a grilled Atlantic Salmon and it was a bit crusty on the bottom and tender pink on top. Great food! The salmon chowder I had for an appetizer was great as well!
Ray's roommate Nathan met and ate with us. He joined us on the ride home. We eventually watched the movie "Burn After Reading" with Brad Pitt, John Malkovich and George Clooney. It is apparently a Cohen bros. film. They made "No Country for Old Men" and "The Big Lebowski". The movie was ok, not much happened and there seemed to be no point. The best part of the movie was before it when we were in Geraldine's Counter, a diner-esque restuarant and ate their special that night Apple and Strawberry Crisp. That was DELICIOUS!!!! The 2nd best part of the movie was when we left and Becky greeted us with a fresh baked blackberry pie. It tasted so so good!!!!
A few notes: Ray's an architect. I learned they not only draw and design buildings, but they basically manage the entire creation of the building. The coordination of the builders, designing and handling any problems from collecting building licenses to construction are the responsibility of the architect. One of the classes they can take at school is a furniture making class. Nathan created a really nice japanese style table while becky created an almost matching (not on purpose) rocking chair. I thought it quite amazing that they have these practical skills whereas I feel I don't have much other than maybe making people feel better or motivating people.
Anyway, today I woke up and watched the Giants win in overtime over the lowly Bengals. My Fantasy team is probably going 0-3 as I again have the 3rd highest score and lose. Fantasy has been pretty frustrating.
Ray, Amy and Amy's friend Nate went with me to the Puyallup Fair, a huge fair in Washington near Tacoma. We walked around and saw several goats, lamb, cows, a camel and a zebra!!! Soon after I got picked up and was in Portland 2 hours later. We capped the weekend off eating at "El Gaucho" which is an AMAZING Argentinian restaurant. I had another salmon that was UNBELIEVABLE! We celebrated my coworker Lynette's 30th bday in style. The waitor even helped us surprise her. She wanted Creme Brulee' and he brought out a menu that didn't include it! Amazing because we asked for the check and he brought one special Creme Brulee' out!
What a great weekend. Thanks to Ray and Amy and everyone else who I met in Seattle. It was my first trip out there and hopefully not my last!!!

Weekend w/Pops

Plenty of time has passed since my last post; my only reader, me, has been drowning in anticipation.

My pops came to Portland last week and enjoyed himself thoroughly; he walked around downtown Portland on Friday, we drove to Mt. Hood and Multnoma Falls (right) and did some shopping at an outlet mall we found South of Portland. I got the black letters on black jersey U of Oregon bball jersey as well as the green w/yellow lettering one. The green jersey has a sick camoflage design on it in all green that really looks nice.

Anyway, we went to Jake's Grill on Friday night again; I unfortunately forgot what I ordered. We had some calamari (delicious), and a seafood sampler (pretty tasty raw seafood including small oysters, small shrimp and a crawfish). We had a creme brulee', blackberry tart, and chocolate puree dessert sampler as well which was not tasted, very good but could lose the seeds, not very good respectively. My father had a grilled Halibut which he enjoyed thoroughly.

We ate at the falls on Saturday; I had a French Dip which is always tasty. This one was a bit on the tougher side meatwise. The day was a long one, but we survived, and I got back into poker, winning a small sit and go while coming out about 10% in the black in a cash game.

Sunday I agonized while watching Patriots/Jets because the West Coast didn't show my beloved Giants. They won, so I was happy, but starting football at 10AM is a bit crazy! I'll be doing that tomorrow morning! Once the first set of games over, my dad got back from his public transportation "tasting". He basically purchased an all day pass to ride around the subway/light rail/bus for however long he pleased. He took a practice run to the airport as his flight was Monday morning and he wanted to be sure of the time it took to get to the airport.

Once he came back, we ate at Buffalo Wild Wings (BW3's). Their wings are AMAZING!!! I had parmesean/garlic wings, medium wings, teryiaki wings and honey BBQ wings. Can you believe we ate this as I was trying to process the Chargers/Broncos game?!?!?! That was when Cutler fumbled, but it was called an incomplete pass. The Broncos scored the apparent game-tying TD, but went for 2 and were successful!!! Mike Shanahan is a crazy coach who should get a lot of respect for taking risks like that!

Once we were done we decided to drive to the Rose Garden where i picked up some presents for the people back home.

Monday, I went back to work and found out around 9PM PT my dad arrived in NJ safely. Coming back tomorrow w/a post hopefully about my great weekend in Seattle.

1st week in Portland

So I totally forgot I have a blog that no one reads. It's been two weeks since the last blog where I was in Connecticut. I finished the project over there and have moved on to Portland, Oregon! The Delta flight was a long 5.5 hours from Newark (EWR) to Portland (PDX). The plane seemed pretty new and clean. The leather seats were a nice touch, but honestly I was sweating profusely while we waited for the flight to take off (always happens at EWR) and throughout the whole flight I'd get up and my back would be moist with sweat. Anyway, I sat next to a gentleman seemingly in his late 20's from Portland who had driven across country to help his friend make the Portland to NYC transition (quite a transition).
There were TV's with DirectTV in each headrest for everyone's enjoyment, everything except the in flight information, flight trivia game and TV cost you 2-6 dollars. The TV didn't even work for at least 25% of the flight as there was no signal. That was pretty frustrating. I wanted to check out TO's touchdown dance (he's on my fantasy team) and the signal was lost everytime the Cowboys highlights came on.
Speaking of Fantasy Football, I have Randy Moss (who's MVP QB just went down for the season; hopefully Matt "Sam" Cassel can hold up his end of the bargain). I really liked my team until Lendale White didn't play much and Ricky "Light it up" Williams laid an enormous egg vs. the Jets. Matt forte made me happy though; I was able to see him rip off a 54 yard TD against the Colts on Monday night.
I walked around Portland's downtown area tonight and couldn't find the restaurant I was searching for, so I settled for Pastini Pastaria. I got a delicious Pollo Rosso which is spirals w/spinach, chicken, sun dried tomatoes and gorgonzola sprinkled on top in a red sauce. It was served w/a small side of bread. The hostess and waitress were both very nice and I was seated at a "corner" table. Corner is in quotes because the table was near the wall, but there was a column near the wall; the table was placed around one corner of the column, which made an interesting shape. I sat w/the column on my left (the empty seat was to the left of the column, whereas there was an empty seat to my right, but there was no leg room for my imaginary friend.
After dinner I walked to Nike town and left befuddled that it had closed its doors at 7PM?!?!?! I strolled over to Nordstroms and perused for about 4 min. Later I rode the stationary bike for 15 min and did my normal bicep workout before hopping in the hot tub. I planned to be in there for 12 min, but the smell was so strong that I had to get up and leave.
I'll mention that I had Chinese buffet for lunch. It was decent, not great. The rice was plump, but if I'm mentioning the rice, you know the food is not great.
Last night we had Jake's Grill for dinner. I had an appetizer that included a soft garlic type bread w/shrimp in a watery mustard (not really tasting like mustard) sauce w/mushrooms. That was very very tasty. I then had a grilled Atlantic Salmon for dinner w/amazing rice pilaf. My team ordered macaroni and cheese (pretty tasty, but not comparable to Flemings) and steamed spinach which was healthy and tasty as well.
That's about it for tonight. It's 3:07AM ET, and I need to get up at 7AM PT; figure that one out.

First weekly post of all time

Greetings; I don't think anyone will be reading this. My reasons for starting this blog is to track what I'm doing on a weekly basis and where I am in the US (or possibly world). I also wanted to start up an online business, but wanted to try a blog first to test potential customer interaction; due to this, I'd like to see how it affects an email box. Are there many annoying emails that are forwarded to my box? If so I'll create another email address linked to the blog.
There will be further posts later, later in the week, or next week.