Le Pain
Posted: October 9, 2010 Filed under: Connecticut, food | Tags: Le Pain Quitidien 3 Comments »Greeting from Connecticut!
I am up in my homeland for the weekend to celebrate my mom’s 60th birthday!
I have been busy putting the final touches on the decoration and finishing up some favors.
Yesterday we went shopping for party outfits and we stopped to have lunch at Le Pain Quotidien. French for Bothe on her birthday!!!!!! Happy Birthday PB!
This place is actually a chain with amazing bread, ingredients and a sense of community. The sandwiches are served open face without a side of fries and they focus on sustainable and organic. It is a chain from NYC, but I wish Baltimore could get its act together and create a market for a place like this. There are a few small cafe’s with this idea, but LPQ could have the market share of a Panera with a focus on good ingredients.
We sat at a communal table (they do have small personal talbes) that all come with amazing olive oil, balsamic and every type of coffee additive you could think of.
It was really hard for me to figure out what to order because everything looked so good and I was starving, but I went with a open sandwich with avocado, cucumber, chickpeas, sprouts and a spicy tahini sauce.
Just liked a salad on bread with mashed avocado!
The bread is amazing and fresh throughout the day. They also have a lovely assortment of French pastries sitting in the window calling everyone in.
I may not really enjoy the people of the Greenwich community, but the food in these parts is simply amazing!
Time to head to the farmer’s market with mom then to Whole Food and I am hoping to get to the Y for a little bike action to losen the legs. I ran 5.5miles yesterday and my right quad is feeling it (it has always been weaker).
Happy Weekend!
Weekend at Home
Posted: July 12, 2010 Filed under: Connecticut, home | Tags: beach, home, sunset Leave a comment »My weekend at home in pictures…
Polo, beach and Kent.
There is no place like home.
Back to B-More
Posted: August 23, 2009 Filed under: Connecticut, weekend | Tags: Amazing Grass, chobani, robek's, tomoatoes, wine 1 Comment »Lets see, where did I leave you? Oh yes we were heading to Rae’s house for dinner!
Mom and I made the green salad.
Heirloom tomato from mom’s garden.
Shredded snap peas, nasturtiums, marigolds, basil, purple pepper, cuc and 3 types of lettuce!
Rae had these awesome moon flowers on the way into the house!
We started off with some nibbles and wine.
Cape Code Golden Russet Chips, homemade guac and there was also some great cheese and bruschetta to come!
I was not a fan of this wine. I little to sweet for my liking. I gave the rest of mine to mom.
Dinner was amazing food. Thank you again Rae!
I love these candlesticks!
There was tabbouleh, black bean and corn salad, roasted lamb and some warm crusty bread. I also had a glass of red called “Fog”.
For dessert Rae had made homemade lemon mousse with berries.
This was so light and fluffy!!! I heart lemon! We also had a dessert wine that was way, way too sweet for me. I guess I like young grapes!
Overall the dinner was so delicious and full of good food!
______________________________________
SUNDAY
This morning I woke up for a long run. I had a little bit of water and the last third of my Amazing Grass bar and headed out the door for another 6mile + run.
I felt so good after this run! I think I really am building endurance! So excited to further next weekend!
After my run I had 1st breakfast with mom.
1/2 a Chobani Pom flavor with berry granola and blueberries. Then it was off to yoga! There is a store on Greenwich Ave that has free yoga classes on Sunday mornings. It was a total strength class and I was beat after it.
I had been wanting to try Robek’s – a fruit juice and smoothie bar chain. I got a carrot, celery, spinach and banana juice with whey protein.
I think they forgot the spinach!?!?! It was bright orange I don’t think that would have happened with spinach in it. Grrr it tasted like banana celery water. Oh well, I drank it and it wasn’t that bad.
After packing up the car with stuff for the apt (!!!!) Mom and I sat down for some tomatillo soup that we made yesterday with some bread butts and a little honey cup mustard.
Yummy! Just enough spice.
I had half of a huge CT peach for dessert.
5 hours later I was back home and starving!!!
I mixed up some applesauce with cinnamon and almond butter. I also toasted some bread with tomato from my mom’s garden, parm and basil.
Alright I am off to unpack and get ready for another week of work, blah!
I will probably have some granola a little later, but we will see.
I hope every enjoyed their weekend!
Connect-
Posted: July 13, 2009 Filed under: beach, ciao bella, Connecticut, farmers market, flank steak, scallops, wine Leave a comment »Welcome to Connecticut!!!
Before I got there I had to finish out my day at the office and meet Nick for dinner. I had a meeting at 10, which lasted all but 20min so did not eat into my day as I had hoped. My comfort oats did however keep me full until the lunch bell rang!
I had leftover stuffing from our purple peppers, plain chobani, cherries, blueberries and white nectarine. I even put some fruit in the last of my yogi. Fruit + yogurt (any yogurt) = amazing!
I had the same oat bar for mid-afternoon snackage and had to sit in a ton of traffic up 95 to get a wedding shower gift for my friend Kristin before meeting Nick for dinner. He also go stuck in traffic and ended up getting to Panera 30min late, huff.
I got the chicken and apple salad? I think that is what it was called…bed of lettuce, tomato, gorgonzola, pecans and apple chips with a champagne apple dressing that I had on the side. Who would seriously use two of these, it was total sugar and I used about 1/2 of a tub. I also got some delicious whole grain bread on the side. You could see the flax and millet in it (I did specifically have to ask for whole grain, they are supposed to give you the option – bad order taking lady!)
Onward to CT I went until I got to Delaware where I ran into tons and tons of beach traffic. SO what’s a girl to do? Why drive through Philly of course! I had never been home that way so at least it was a change of scenery – not pretty scenery though. About 1/2 way there I broke into my PB cookie Luna bar. It was all melty 
I don’t think I am getting the concept of these bars. Are they supposed to taste like rice crisps with a little bit of bottom flavor coating???
Oh and I licked the melted PB off the wrapper! Don’t judge it WAS the best part of the bar, and I wasn’t about to let it go to waste!
Once home it was straight to bed, but my mom had laid out a bunch of fruit she had gotten for me! Organic blueberries, white nectarines and Rainer cherries.
I woke up at 6:30 and dozed until about 7 when I went down and woke mom up! Ha! I made the coffee and we both had kashi flakes with different Bare Naked granolas – mine was mango almond crunch. I also added some blueberries and crunchy almond butter to mine. I even got to have some grapefruit juice! I love this stuff but is something I have taken off the grocery bill due to its price.
After breakfast mom and I went down to the beach for a run/walk. I ran about 1.5 miles before I ran into her going the other way along the loop. I love the beach in the morning! So cool and all the birds are out in the marshes! Beautiful start to the day! And it only got better!
Onward to the farmers market, or should I say zoo! The market opens at 9:30 and when we got there at 9:15 it was already a mad house…people in Greenwhich sure do like their farmers market (people actually have to form lines at the check-out, nuts!)
We walked away with 3 different heads of lettuce, radicchio, ginormo fennel bulb, golden beets, blueberries, eggs, goats milk yogurt and multi-colored organic eggs.
After the farmers market we hit up Whole Foods for a steak to grill tonight and a few more items. I wanted to find chai seeds but when I asked customer service she looked at me funny and had not idea what they were.
Quick shower and I was off to meet my dad for lunch at Red Barn in Westport. They have an excellent brunch menu with many specials every day. I would say seafood and italian dishes were their bread and butter…ha ha so funny!
I had a slice this multigrain with butter…
I had wanted to grill scallops for dinner, but I was stopping by my fish market on the way home for crabmeat so I opted for lunch scallops, perfect! Warm Scallop salad. I am really glad I got this dressing on the side. By the color of it it looked really artificial, but I was happy to dunk a few times. You can see it peeking out behind my riddicio bowl. The scallops were cooked well and all the way through, no one likes slimy scallops! I also had a few of my dad’s homemade gnocchi, that were amazingly much less dense then the gnocchi I am used to.
I stopped at my fish market FishTales on the way home for crabmeat, but they were SOLD OUT! I opted for some fresh shrimp that I think we will either make into cakes or a salad for tomorrows polo match.
I am currently sipping on this and downing more of these cherries then I care to count. I hope we are able to go to the beach for cocktails tonight, the clouds are moving in but cross your fingers for no rain until after we leave!
****Edit****** Added post dinner.
We ended up going to the beach, but the wind gusts were out of control so we had a glass of wine and finished off my homemade guacamole with avocados, cilantro, jalapeno, salt and lemon (the best combo in my opinion!)
When we returned we grilled up a flank steak marinated in the same wine, lemon pepper, white balsamic and fresh tyme. We also grilled up some radicchio and fennel bulb. Paired with a lovely green salad!
This was deliciously enjoyed out on our deck!
Dessert was Ciao Bella Chocolate Jalapeno gelato! My mom had raved about this so I had to try with some dark chocolate sauce! I was good but actually spicy, it would take some getting used to savory ice cream!
****This post was half written in CT and half when returned to b-more. Sunday is to come tonight!*** Have a great day! 
