Summertime…

It is summer in the northern hemisphere and I have really been enjoying it to the absolute fullest.  Eating, hanging out with friends (old and new) and family, traveling and eating some more. 

I have picked out some pictures to highlight the first couple of days of our trip to Washington, DC and then to Pittsburgh before we headed to see family for the remaining 2+ weeks.

Washington, DC

Checking out the dino’s at the Smithsonian

Crashing the Smithsonian staff picnic in the National Mall

The White House bee keeper’s collecting honey

Pittsburgh, PA (The Strip District)

Best little donut shop!  Tiny and with little donuts…

German Chocolate

Favorite spice shop ever!

Best sandwiches ever!  White bread, French fries, coleslaw and your choice of meat…very efficient these Pittsburghers!

Pastrami somewhere under all of the sides…

Greek treats from one of the street vendors.  Delicious!!!!

Greek street vendors…

Once we left Pittsburgh we headed to Tony’s family to celebrate the 4th of July and Kyra’s 10th birthday.  More to come…

Orange Belt and a celebratory dinner!

My oldest daughter got her Orange Belt last night! I am such a proud Mama! She has been doing Karate for almost 2 1/2 years now and has flown through the Tiger belts and is now on the "Big kids" ones. What a great thing for a little girl to accomplish. I am so incredibly proud!

Breaking the board with an Axe Kick

So to celebrate she wanted to go to the "place with the really good food" that Tony had been to the night before! She is definitely a foodie in training. She wanted to go to Cin Cin which is a nice restaurant that has a really huge tapas (appetizer) menu. Well she was not disappointed. But I have to tell you it so amazing to listen to a 7 year old describe and try to guess what is in the food that she is tasting.

I ordered the smoked salmon on fried goat cheese with a lemon caper vinaigrette and the lamb and rice stuffed grape leaves served with a lemon yogurt sauce. I didn't really think that she would try any of the stuff that I ordered but she did. She wasn't crazy about the stuffed grape leaves but she sure loved the salmon and goat cheese.

For the girls meals they ordered the Crunchy Fried Calamari (their top choice at any restaurant).

Tony had the garlic-chili shrimp and chorizo sausage which my youngest one really liked but the most amazing one was the stuffed quail - They took a quail and stuffed it with Fontina cheese and walnuts then wrapped prosciutto around it and cooked it...Yummmmm. Now the funniest thing though was that my 7 year took a bite of this, cocked her head to the side and had a really perplexed look on her face and said "Mmmm I wonder what the crunchy is in this...could it be nuts?" So funny. That sure made her Daddy proud! What a great food adventure her life will be!!!

As Always...

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy

http://www.nofearentertaining.com/