Aug 6, 2012

Weekend Recap

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If you are a guest of the wedding and you are looking to go straight to the wedding details you can click here!

For the rest of you that want to hear more about our crazy busy but fun filled life you can keep reading! I have some random all over the place topics to share today!

Dinner at 3-Point

If you live near the Akron, Oh area and you haven’t tried out 3-Point Restaurant I think you’re nuts. I’m reluctant to discuss my love for 3-Point because right now I think it is just kind of a hidden gem. We don’t have to wait to get a seat, the service is fast, and the servers are friendly and just great. It’s a diamond in the ruff of Akron but I suppose I should share.

We originally went to 3-point because we had a Groupon (or maybe it was Restaurant.com) gift certificate and it was around my birthday so we went with a few friends and ate some delicious burgers. Once again Tim and I found a restaurant.com gift certificate in our hands so we thought let’s go on a date! And so we did!

Photo Aug 03, 7 38 33 PM

This time around I enjoyed a root beer martini. Although pictures below I am holding Tim’s banana split martini because a) it matched my outfit better and b) it tasted better and I was trying to steal it from him. The matching outfit picture was a success but the stealing it part not so much. The root beer one was good but ended up tasting like licorice after about half of it. While I do  like licorice I wish they would have just made it with root beer vodka instead of throwing other stuff in for flavor- but still a good drink.

Photo Aug 03, 7 43 10 PM

Banana split martini is highly recommended.

I had the duck with some risotto on the side and it was DELICIOUS. Tim had the smothered chicken with mac and cheese on the side… delicious as well! We are never disappointed by 3-Point. Give it a try!

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Juicing

So as you may know my mom got Tim and I (ok mostly me) a juicer for one of our showers. You may remember that I was trying to be really consistent with the Vitamix but at the end of the day the consistency of veggies being chopped up into little pieces didn’t do it for me.

Photo Aug 01, 7 50 15 PM

Although I have only really tried apples, carrots, oranges, and spinach in it thus far it has been working like a charm! Easier to clean than most juicers I have seen and it’s super easy to use. Shove the goods down the shoot and BAM.. like magic juice comes out!

Photo Aug 01, 7 52 37 PM

Eventually I am going to try to branch out a little more on the veggie selections.

Bridal Showers

I realized I never really included any pictures or any details about the bridal showers! Tim and I are just so humbled by the amount of love and support we had over the course of 3 bridal showers! Everyone was so gracious and supportive and we couldn’t ask for better family or friends! I included some pictures below for you to enjoy!

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Filed Under: Good Eats and Treats · Tagged: , , , , , , , , , ,
Jul 29, 2012

Yo what… YONANA

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I wish I could say that I am getting paid some massive amount of money for this post but unfortunately I am getting paid nothing.

Well except getting paid in delicious love.

The latest and greatest new kitchen gadget in my life is called the YONANA. Never heard of the Yoanna? You are Yo-Nuts. But you can check out the website here for a video on what the Yonana is all about.

My review of the Yonana is pretty simple. It’s amazing. I will say that it is not AS easy at the video makes it seem on the website… I have to put some series pressure on that little thing to push the banana through the end of the tube but my muscles have no problem with this. If a little muscle produces a delicious and healthy treat at the end of the day I think that’s a big win.

Essentially all you do is freeze fruit. Yes, life can be that simple. They say for at least 24 hours and I think we have been able to refrain from pulling the bananas out early at this point and time but I would highly doubt that will last forever. So we take VERY ripe bananas (the riper the better- maybe the grocery store will give you a discount?), peel them, break in half and stick them in a freezer bag. Let them freeze and then pull them out and shove in the YONANA machine.

Then, like some serious Harry Potter magic this comes out.

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And if you are feeling adventurous and want to add a little chocolate in your fresh BANANA ONLY ice cream go right ahead.. the YONANA can handle it.

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Or you need a little more protein in your diet? Sure, add some peanut butter on top of that ice cream that is really just a frozen banana that came out of a magical machine.

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So thus far we have tried bananas (like a lot), strawberries, and mangos. My recommendation (and what they recommend on the instructions I hadn’t read prior to attempting this) is to leave the strawberries out for a few minutes before you put in YONANA otherwise they come out more like sorbet(ish) and less like ice cream. And although not ALL recipes call for bananas I think bananas really give it that creamy consistency that you see so while it’s not a hard rule I would try to use bananas as often as you can.

Definitely one of our favorite gifts from our wedding showers over the past weekend! Deliciously awesome.

Enjoy!

Filed Under: Good Eats and Treats · Tagged: , , , , , , , , , ,
Jun 14, 2012

Food is Music to My… Belly?

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Yes, yes it is! Sometimes you just cannot help yourself but to really go head over heels into a delicious meal…. which is exactly what we did this past weekend when we went to Momocho. You may remember my very first experience at Momocho which was fabulous! The margarita sampler combined with the guacamole sampler if heavenly.

Rich, Kara, Dana, Tommy, Heather, Tim, and myself all headed out for a night on the town.. which started and ended at Momocho because we all stuffed ourselves and just wanted to go to bed! I had the delicious drink sampler and I  have to say sometimes just an old fashion original margarita does it for me. I certainly enjoyed all of the flavors I got which included a pretty delicious pomegranate one but the flavors start to take over the tequila a little bit and while I am not a huge fan of shots of tequila I don’t mind the taste in a deliciously tasty drink.

And I know that this looks like Rich and I are on a colored-coordinating date but we weren’t. We are just that cool and know each other that well to know that you always wear bright blue to Momocho on a Friday evening.

So after we crashed at Kara and Dana’s, the bestest and I got up and headed to a bridal shower for her soon to be sister in law Danielle. It was such a BEAUTIFUL shower and Danielle’s maid of honor Rachel just did a fabulous job organizing the event! They had all sorts of tasty treats and Kara’s chicken roll-up recipe that she got off of Pinterest was a big hit.

I cut up lemons and put them in pitchers with water. My treat was not nearly as appreciated.

In any case Josh and Danielle (below) looked fabulous- so excited for their wedding. If there were 2 people made for each other, that’s them! Which I know from first hand experience because Josh asked me to go to his prom with him and then ended up staring at beautiful Danielle all night and ignoring me.

Good thing he is practically my brother or I would have been really offended.

After the shower and a quick 10 minute power nap I tried to hide from Kara as she did the dishes (hehe sneaky) we got dressed and headed to Zocalo, a Mexican restaurant (I didn’t get enough on Friday right?) and I had this fabulous quesadilla filled with coat cheese, spinach, and chicken. Seriously, this thing was good. I still can’t figure out why they charged me $5 to add the chicken do it but hey whatever, it was a good meal!

Kara liked her quesadilla but she liked her margarita even more (yes more margs)

We went to some bars, dance a lot in very high heels, and eventually had Dana pick us up downtown before we went to bed incredibly too late for this old lady. Speaking on old lady this very young man (who probably had a fake idea) said to Kara and I as we walked by “damn you girls still got it” well thank you toddler boy. I’m glad that at the ripe age of 26 I “still got it”. I didn’t know I was running the risk of losing it quite yet.

Guess he told me.

It was a really great weekend. Tested my high-maintenance sleeping habits for sure considering Sunday was filled with family fun at a 90th birthday party, a high school graduation party, and doing an accounting mid-term for grad school. All of that also meant that I had to miss my soccer game which was really needed considering all the crap I ate that weekend! Oh well, give em’ hell next week right?

Filed Under: Friends Make The World Go Round, Good Eats and Treats · Tagged: , , ,
Aug 22, 2011

Disney has a serious competitor

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Sometimes I forget the definition on busy until it literally attacks me and bites me in the neck to suck out all of my blood (yea so what I have a think for vampires!). Anyway that is exactly what this Saturday did. I woke up early on Saturday to get ready to head out to co-host my friend Kara’s wedding shower. Up at 8am to pack up the car and make sure the check list I had made the night before got completed…

  • Pack buffalo chicken dip
  • Get sherbet out of freezer
  • Pack make-up
  • Pack outfit
  • Fill out card/gift card for gift
  • Pack curling iron

Luckily that was about the end of my list because I had done so much the night before. I was out the door at 9 with wet hair and comfy clothes to go set up for the special parrrtay. When I got the Kara’s mom’s house there wasn’t too much to be done. The girls are awesome and had been working hard the night before so it was really more cleaning up and getting things out and less of oh my gosh what the hell do we still need kind of set up. The party was a ton of fun and it was so nice to see Kara get all of those cool presents the couple gets at a shower and see how excited she was to  have so many friends and family there to celebrate in her happiness. Kara is this amazing person who has this unique way of truly showing you how much she appreciates having you in her life. It is unique because she doesn’t have to send cards or hug you 100 times but the look in her eyes when she just says “thank you- you made this special for me” truly let’s you know that she means it. I really enjoy doing things for her because her friendship means so much to me so hopefully this shower was just a small way of me saying “I love you and appreciate you right back!”

Me and my bestest at her shower!

We had a variety of foods to eat the shower and I did some picking throughout the party. My favorite items were

  • My own buffalo chicken dip of course
  • Meatballs
  • Stuffed mushrooms
  • Veggies
  • Mini Cheesecakes

Those were probably the items I had trouble staying out of but I tried my best not to go too crazy! We played some fun games at the shower including a quiz about Kara and Dana which her friend Robin from college won! I was in charge of the prizes for games so as you can imagine they were pretty sweet options haha. They included bottles of wine, candles, and gift certificates to Starbucks. I think the wine disappeared the fastest! The other game we played was that famous make a wedding dress out of toilet paper game and it was so fun! I was helping organize so I got to just walk around and check out all of the dresses and I was honestly so amazed at how awesome they all were. Some of them were like legit wedding dresses… maybe I should recruit those girls to make a dress for me! In the end Kara and Dana decided on the winner and Kara’s grandma and her team came out on top!

Kara and Dana enjoying some gifts!

So overall it was just such a fun time to be with Kara, her family, her friends, and the rest of the girls in the wedding party! Now, I am just really looking forward to the actual wedding day!

Saturday Afternoon/Evening

Our dates for the evening!

After the shower I came home and passed out (no, not from the vampire sucking out all of the blood) but from pure exhaustion. Tim was nice enough to wake me up a half hour later to tell me to get ready for our night out with Casey and Mark. We were headed intoAkronfor the Hamburger Fest going on. I am not really sure how to describe this event other than to day Holy Hamburger. It was pretty much a blocked off street that had an enormous amount of vendors set up to feed the very hungry and interested people ofAkron. There were SOO many choices very similar to the Feast of the Assumption we just went to a few weekends ago except this was HAMBURGERS which happens to be one of my favorite things to eat! So anyway we went to the burger fest and did some walking around before we decided on what we wanted.

YAY for Burger Fest

First, we decided on wine. Well Casey and I decided on wine and the boys decided on beer. So I got a Moscato and Casey got a Pinot Grigio. Usually I am a red wine drinker but it was pretty warm outside so I had no interest in drinking a room temperature beverage.  The Moscato really hit the spot and was just what a needed for a refreshing sweet treat. Casey said it tasted too much like juice and not enough like wine but I thought it was pretty perfect for the mood I was in! After scoping out all of our options Tim and Mark both decided on a deep fried burger from Metro Burger and Casey and I got a giant burger from Menches Brothers. They use this “special sauce” that I was forced to try but guaranteed from the man at the grill that I would love it or he would give me my money back. So, since I had his promise, I went for the sauce and LOVED IT. It didn’t add quite the flavor I thought it might however I LOVE pickles and put a serious mound of them on my burger so I was glad to not have that flavor over powered by a sauce. It’s a good thing I am an honest perfect but I half considered eating the thing and going back to say nope didn’t like it to get another free one. But.. that would have made me dishonest and probably made me look like a fat kid so I decided against it. As if this picture doesn’t make me look like a fat kid right?

BIG Burger!

Our Matching Burgers!

After the burgers we agreed that the 4 of us would be crazy not to split a funnel cake so that is exactly what we did. Casey and I sent the boys to the dessert line and we went back for a few more cocktails =) The boys decided on a Reese Peanut Butter and Chocolate funnel cake with powdered sugar… sounds delicious right? Well take a look!

Try not to be jealous!

Yes- that thing was just as tasty as it looks. Since we all shared it we agreed it wasn’t that bad for us (we can pretty much always come up with a reason something is healthy for us). I am not sure how or why I have never had this wonderful masterpiece before but I haven’t. I was truly a virgin to the Reese funnel cake… but not anymore haha.

Needless to say it was really good

After the funnel cake Casey and I decided to get our photo taken with the Eat n Park man. I think he enjoyed having some adults like him because I had only seen little kids messing with him earlier in the night.

Smile Cookie Man

Then we made our way back to the wine haha to get our picture taken with the big Barefoot Wine Foot. I think this is my new favorite picture of us actually.

We Love Wine!

We ended the evening with a group picture so that we could remember what a great tasty evening it had been! Paul, Amanda, and a few of their friends came and sat with us for a bit to listen to the band play as well so it was fun to be with lots of friends! Plus, the band was a Jimmy Buffet tribute band and I don’t know if I have mentioned this or not before but Tim is OBSESSED with Jimmy Buffett. So this was like the highlight of the night for him… well besides the funnel cake.

Our Group Picture

The Jimmy Buffett Band that Tim loved!

Oh wait- I’m sorry- did you think that was the end of our evening. NOPE… the best part happened next. The 4 of us (Casey, Mark, Tim and I) decided to check out a new FROZEN YOGURT place near us. For those of you that follow you know I have been waiting for Menchies to open… waiting so much that I already signed up online for their rewards program. So we walked into Menchies and then the magic happened….

FRO-YO everywhere. We walked in and the girl that works there (the manager maybe) was SO friendly and gave us the run down of how everything works. You pick the type of frozen yogurt you want (sample whatever you like first) and there were probably like 20 flavors. You can add whatever flavors into the cup and then go to the topping bar. They have everything from fresh fruit cut up to cheesecake bites to gummy bears. I went with the Kiwi Strawberry Sorbet mixed with a little Mango Sorbet with kiwi chunks, strawberries, and raspberries and a few gummy bears for good luck. O M G. I think I will be going back to Menchies A LOT. Casey and I couldn’t get out of the store without taking a picture….

We love Fro-Yo

My Fro-Yo Cup

And even though it doesn’t look like it- Mark loved his Menchies.

Yummy!

Tim did too

Tim wants to go back... I hope!

Heck- even the spoon was adorable!

But the best picture of the evening and the one that sums out how wonderfully terrific Menchies really is (drum roll please)…

Yes so I don’t know how many of you live near a Menchies but find one on their site and then go there! SOOO delicious. I’m sure you will be hearing about a lot of Menchies trips on future posts. I can’t always see into the future but this time I know that will be happening!

Oh and one more thing… when you go to check out at Menchies or go to leave the store this is what the employees say to you “HAVE A SMILEY NIGHT”. If that doesn’t make you smile something is definitely wrong with you! So needless to say, for 25 years I have believed that Disney was the happiest place on earth… turns out I have a serious competitor right down the street from my house.

Filed Under: Good Eats and Treats, Random Crap · Tagged: , , , , , ,