I picked M&G up in Northwest DC on Saturday morning (they'd stayed Friday night with another friend), just in time to shuttle us all to the Falls Church Farmer's Market to choose some delicious items to enjoy over the weekend. We wasted no time diving into the samples offered at every stall, making a lap of the whole market before deciding on everything we wanted to take home. In the end we decided on: spicy and extra-spicy homemade salsas; black bean dip; a huge loaf of homemade whole wheat bread; two different types of cheese - an aged smoked gouda and a chipotle cheddar; six homemade chocolate truffles; a small container of just in season cherry tomatoes; a loaf of apple-walnut bread; and two packages of homemade sausages, one hot italian and one chicken with roasted red pepper.
While every last item was delicious, there were two standouts. First, M&G snagged an apple cinnamon muffin that Michelle flatly stated was "the best muffin ever."
The already semi-annihilated apple cinnamon muffin
Second, sampling the sausage at the last booth was also incredible. On our way into the market we'd sampled the chicken sausage with roasted red pepper and when we stopped on our way out to make our purchases we tasted breakfast sausage and lamb sausage. As I handed over my cash for our purchases, still swallowing the last of the breakfast sausage sample, I nearly cooed to the guy behind the booth, "your sausage is delicious." And then of course, I giggled like a 14 year old girl.
After the Farmer's market, we headed over to Whole Foods to get the complimentary foods we needed to make an amazing dinner. Some bell peppers, sweet onions and buns and we were set. We finished our shopping just in time to stop over at the pet adoption event at Wylie Wagg where my friends Ashley and Jason were showing their foster dog Zoya. Rescued from the streets of Moscow, this dog has fantastic spirit even if she is sometimes scared and anxious. It was great to see her out on the sidewalk with Ashley sporting her orange Clemson ribbon, tail wagging, ears up and ready to meet potential adopters. Fingers crossed she finds a fabulous home!
After our puppy interlude we headed back to the house to unload our purchases and meet up with Ben. After initial greetings and tour of the house we wasted no time packing into the car and heading into Arlington for lunch at Tandoori Nights, a favorite Indian restaurant of Ben's and mine that we had succeeded in getting M&G hooked on during their tenure in DC. True to form, our food was extremely tasty. Ben and I both ordered Chicken Makhani to do a flavor comparison since this is a dish Ben frequently makes at home. The verdict? I like Ben's better. It may not be as authentic (although the recipe and its many reviewers claim it is), but it's not as sweet and is therefore more pleasing to my palate. Not that Tandoori Nights has anything to worry about, theirs is delicious too! Michelle went for a tried and true favorite of hers, as did Gustavo - Chicken Korma Kashmiri and Prawn Vindaloo respectively. When we were all painfully full, we grudgingly stopped eating and had our leftovers packed up.
Back at the house we sat down in the living room for a few minutes to decide what we wanted to do next. Fast forward an hour and Michelle and Ben are both napping and Gustavo and I are in the kitchen comparing notes on our giant families while chopping and dicing the ingredients for dinner. Don't worry, we didn't eat dinner for several more hours as we were all so painfully full from lunch, but we did spend most of the afternoon just chatting and laughing and enjoying the company of one another.
By the time evening rolled around we were ready for our dinner made from our fantastic Farmer's market finds!
Tasty Chicken Sausage Sante Fe, made right here in Arlington, VA
To go with the sausages I broke down three huge sweet onions and three red and yellow bells peppers. We caramelized the onions in a cast iron skillet for nearly 30 minutes before adding in the bell peppers. In the end, they were the perfect sweet complement to the salty sausages. Ben grilled the sausages and toasted the buns until they were crispy and delicious. And we were ready to eat.
We got a little excited about the food and didn't snap a pic until our plates were nearly cleared, but you can see the tasty bits still left to be consumed.
We probably spent two hours at the dinner table just talking and laughing and enjoying the company of good friends. It was wonderful. But eventually we had to move. Deciding that we needed to do something that at least required us to do more than sit, we opted to go Duck Pin Bowling in Silver Spring, MD. It's a little bit of a hike from our house, about 35 minutes on the Beltway, but it's worth it. It's a really fun, fast paced game and on Saturday night they "Cosmic Bowl" with disco balls and loud music. Yes, total, utter, complete dorky fun. Michelle and I each won free admission to a future Cosmic Bowling trip by getting strikes at the right moment. All in all, we had a blast!
We finally packed it in about midnight and headed back to Virginia. At that time of night even the DC Beltway is a little clearer and we made it home in just under 30 minutes. Even with all the food of the day, we were all ready for a snack. We ended our night huddled around the kitchen island munching on more Farmer's market goodies which reappeared at breakfast the next day.
No comments:
Post a Comment