Let there be rain (in Williamsburg)

And so day 2 began with rain. LOTS of rain and wind. This was us. Do we look happy?



Since we were experiencing remnants from hurricane Ivan we decided we decided a good way to get out of the weather would be to go to the De Witt museum and spend some time looking at their collections. We saw it all, some was interesting, some not. Mostly I liked the silver and pewter, the china dishes and the quilts.











After the museum we braved the elements and went into some of the restored stores, homes and other buildings. I loved walking down the little empty street. It seemed like there was a memory around every corner and in each shop. From remembering what Dan and I saw 10 years ago, to being there with my family years beyond that, to recognizing things from the home I grew up in.








We went back to our suite to dry off and get ready to go to Christiana Campbell's, another historic tavern, for dinner. The dinners are really fun because they have someone either singing, or playing an instrument or giving a little speech about what happened taverns in the 18th century. I love the ambiance with candles, but for that reason sadly none of our pictures really turned out. So, imagine warm candle light, an upbeat atmosphere, and the best sweet potato muffins I've ever had.





We ended the night with a ghost tour, which was well...kind of lame. We liked it mostly because we were walking around at night with lanterns. We love candles, especially the ones in all the windows of most of the buildings.

Birthday Time

We both had a fabulous and busy weekend. This past Saturday, we celebrated Holly's Birthday. I decided to make her a yellow butter cake. I'm still experimenting with from scratch cake recipes. This one was from Cook's Illustrated. It tasted good, but was a tad dry. Next time I'll probably add sour cream to the batter before I bake it. Also, this chocolate fudge frosting is a great recipe.

I decided I wanted to make a chocolate cookie monster cake topper. So I got out my food dies, white chocolate, milk chocolate and made a 5" cookie monster face, to go on the 6" cake. I thought it turned out super cute! We had fun munching on it yesterday as we decided to do Birthday festivities over two days.



We had a lovely dinner at Saltoro. We both LOVE that restaurant up on 143rd and Greenwood Avenue. We had amazing risotto cheese balls with tomato jam for an appetizer. We both followed that with salads. Holly had a caesar with house caesar dressing. I had the Saltoro salad with blue cheese, dates, candied walnuts and sun dried tomatoes with orange vinaigrette. We both rounded out our meals with pasta dishes. Holly had some spicy chicken sausages in a fettuccine cream with spinach pasta. I had smoked salmon in white wine cream sauce with capers, tomatoes and roasted veggies. It was a perfect meal.

Happy Birthday to the cutest girl in the world!

Williamsburg Part 1

Whew, this week has been a killer! I'm just now getting our photos off the camera to share. Thanks for waiting, I know you are all dying to see what we were up to!

Our trip started from SLC where we flew to Atlanta, ate dinner at TGI-yuckers, then continued on to Richmond, VA where we picked up our rental car...a pimped-out PT Cruiser...and drove the 40 miles to Williamsburg. We had a tiny bit of road rage issues since apparently it doesn't look good to have street signs in a historic town. But eventually we got there and this is what we were welcomed with.








We felt like a king and queen in our fancy hotel! We sat down at the desk and planned our day looking at the events for the week in Historic Williamsburg and decided that the next day would be good to go to Jamestowne. It was really neat! They have a very nice set of galleries that depict the departure from europe, arriving in America, learnings from Indians, life as a slave, and early settlers challenges. All of which is done beautifully and would be GREAT for kids. Outside they have reconstructed the fort and an indian settlement as well as replicas of the ships the settlers traveled in.











We also saw a demonstration of glass blowing on the tiny historic Jamestowne island. Glass blowing was America's first commercial industry which originated in historic Jamestowne.







It was a beautiful day!

Afterward we went back to "downtown" Williamsburg and ate lunch at a yummy cheese shop, found some chocolate, and did a little shopping. We went back to our hotel to explore a little more, the grounds were very lovely.






By the way, all the windows on the top right wing of this building was our suite :) Okay, enough with our suite. We ended the evening with a stroll down Duke of Gloucester street, catching the fifes and drums parade, then being serenaded at Shields Tavern and dazzled with a candlelight organ concert in Bruton Parish church.






My favorite was the weird chick in front of us bobbing her head to the music.



It was a great first day!

Colonial Cookie

For those that follow our blog on a regular basis, it's not secret that I'm a tad obsessed with Cookie Monster, and have been for years. I/We have collection of all sorts of Christmas Cookie Monster ornaments, as well as toys that I plan to share with our daughter some day. Anyways, on the other side of the country, in historic Williamsburg VA, Holly and I were walking in the shopping section of town and Holly's eagle eye noticed "Colonial Cookie" clear across the block! After it was pointed out, I needed to covertly take a photo of this, incognito, while the person at the computer didn't notice. This was clearly office space. I tried covertly for a while and finally just went up and took the picture and smiled at the lady working at her computer. Funny! All "Colonial Cookie" needed was a Thomas Jefferson or George Washington inspired 1776 era hat!

Soup, Warm Blankets & Brisk Weather

For dinner last night I decided to make soup. Partly because a coworker of mine is out for a few weeks recovering from knee surgery, and I told her I make her dinner and she could request whatever she wanted. She wanted potato cheese soup. I went online and looked at a few recipes and culled this together based on one from Cooking Light, one from Southern Living and the Craven Family Broccoli Cheese soup recipe. It turned our fantastic I thought. My coworker will be getting a big container of this on Thursday night when we go and visit her.

Baked Potato Cheese Soup

4 baking potatoes (about 2 1/2 pounds)
1 onion, diced
3 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup butter
6 cups 2% reduced-fat milk
1 cup shredded extra-sharp cheddar cheese
1 cup shredded Velveeta cheddar cheese
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 cup reduced-fat sour cream
1/2 cup chopped green onions, divided
12 bacon slices, cooked and crumbled

Preheat oven to 400°. Pierce potatoes with a fork; bake at 400° for 1 hour or until tender. Cool. Peel potatoes; coarsely mash. Discard skins.

Melt butter in a large soup pot or dutch oven. Sauté onion for 8 minutes or until translucent and caramelized. Add garlic and cook for 2 minutes more. Lightly spoon flour into a dry measuring cup; level with a knife. Stir flour into onion/butter mixture and form a roux. Gradually add milk, stirring with a whisk until blended. Cook over medium heat until thick and bubbly, about 8 minutes. Add mashed potatoes, cheeses, salt, and pepper, stirring until cheese melts. Remove from heat.

Stir in sour cream. Cook over low heat 5 minutes or until thoroughly heated (do not boil). Sprinkle each serving with extra-sharp cheddar cheese, green onions, and crisp bacon crumbles.

NOTE: You can use all regular cheddar cheese, but the soup typically separates and gets oily. Replacing half with Velvetta ensures it stays together and does not separate. Also, it gets very thick. Reheat slowly and thin with more milk as needed when you re-serve.

Colonial Williamsburg

What an amazing time in Williamsburg, VA. We'll be posting many photos and stories over the next few days. From amazing meals, to top notch hotel accommodations, and a bout with the remnants of Hurricane / Tropical Storm IDA, we have many stories and photos to share.

Weekend In Utah

You can't ask for more perfect fall weather in Utah. The changing leaves here are simply amazing! Warm in the 60s/70s during the day, with a winter like chill at night in the 30s/40s. We've had an enjoyable time visiting my family in Bountiful, UT, as well as visiting Holly's family in Sandy, UT. Having meals with family is always a nice experience and memory. Sharing recipes, trying other siblings new dishes, the annual Candy Making Weekend with the Craven's was a blast. On a more quieter Sabbath note, we get to enjoy a nice ride up the canyons to the Utah ski resorts to see all the changing leaves, and enjoy a nice, traditional, sit down dinner with Holly's family, the Finlayson's, and spend time with six fantastic young nieces. We love our families, and the opportunity we get to spend time with them as frequent as we do living out of state.