Boston

The Lansdowne Pub with Boston Brunchers

February 19, 2012

Irish pubs are synonymous with Boston. Just as much as Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. So it’s no surprise that Boston Brunchers was able to put together an Irish brunch at The Lansdowne Pub near Fenway Park last month. The brunch as paired with a fundraising effort for Amanda, who is raising money to run the Boston Marathon. I secured 1 of 3 spots available to be purchased by donating $25 to Amanda, the rest of the spots were raffled off from the rest of the brunchers who entered to go.

As the group arrived one by one we began to order the usual coffee and juice. But what is a brunch without a cocktail?!? While brunching I enjoyed a Muddy River and a Liquid Caramel Coffee. I loved the Muddy River was a lovely concoction of coffee brandy and half & half over crushed ice. It was very heavy and rich.

While the Irish Breakfast sounded good, I ordered the crab cake eggs benedict which did not disappoint. I try to order Eggs Benedict ever where I go because it is my favorite brunch dish and I love to compare it from place to place. The crab cake was very flavorful and did not include very much filler. Tender pieces of crab were gently held together with a flavorful binder. On top of the crab cakes sat poached eggs that were covered in a lovely lemony Hollandaise sauce. I love a lemony Hollandaise sauce and this was perfect. The intense lemon flavor paired nicely with the crab cake as well. One of my poached eggs was over cooked a bit but I will take an over cooked egg over an under cooked egg any day. They Eggs Benedict was served with home fries, which always act as a great medium to scoop up Hollandaise sauce.

Shortly before we were leaving the musicians started to practice for their afternoon performance. Live music begins every Sunday for brunch at 1pm. We were lucky to experience a little bit of it as our meal winded down.

I highly suggest going to The Lansdowne Pub for brunch to enjoy some live Irish music, amazing food, fun drinks, and great service. Head over there for their brunch from 10am- 4pm and you will enjoy yourself and get lost in the Irish feel of your meal.

*While I did recieive a complimentary brunch from The Lansdowne Pub these opinions are entirely my own.

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‘Hometown’ tourists

July 13, 2010

It’s funny that in almost 7 years here in Boston neither Price or I had really walked the Freedom Trail. Well, I had done portions on class outings but never a real outing to walk it. I mean, I walk by/on it every workday to get to my office from the T stop, but never count that. So we decided that we would make a point of doing it, along with other touristy things, this summer. It was also sooo annoying to be in class when a teacher would be shocked that I had never been to various local museums, gardens, cemetaries, and other landmarks. How am I supposed to see a new exhibit when you just assigned me 6 hours of homework for the week? Now we have a summer completely free of classes and school prep we are making the most of it here.

This past Saturday we stayed in Boston and took our turn at the Freedom Trail. I thought out recent trip to DC was hot and humid to sightseeing- well this was so much worse. We knew a storm was going to pass through in the afternoon, which made it soooo oppressive. So we did the trail pretty quickly, having seen some of the places already and trying to beat out the storm.

I was happy to reach the North End around (late) lunch time. We stopped in some place to split a calzone and salad. Of course lunch was not timed properly/long enough for the rain to start while we were there. No, it had to start about 3 minutes after we left. So we ran down the street with my teeny tiny umbrella into a local bar to wait out the rain. It came down in buckets, resulting in some pretty severe flash flooding in Somerville, a neighboring town. Visibility was reduced to 100 feet or so. Luckily* the rain passed within an hour and we were out again to finish the rest of the trail.

We walked over some bridge to head into Charlestown to see the USS Constitution and Bunker Hill Monument over there. In the end we decided to skip the monument since it is just a mini Washington Monument and we just saw that. One obelisk is like another. We got the last tour of ‘Old Ironsides’ which was nice since there was little wait time. So glad I was not a sailor on there since I learned that they got 1 gallon a water a day to do with water they wanted- which generally was drinking. Man on stinky, cramped boat.

*I’m having some pretty big issues with rain this year. First the flood in March and now this intense storm trampled my newly planted tomatoes and my flower squash. There goes half my veggies this summer. 🙁

Opening Day at City Hall Farmers’ Market

May 26, 2010

I love farmer’s markets. Booths packed with fresh breads, pastries, flowers, vegetables, fruits, herbs, and prepared food. I love to wander around all the booths first before selecting where I will shop. Sometimes I go with something in mind, but I try generally to let the freshness and selection lead me to my purchases and ultimately lunch or dinner.

Monday marked the beginning of the City Hall Farmers’ Market. The farmers market runs 11-6 on Mondays and Wednesdays from 5.24 to 11.24. I have been going here for years since my office is a minute walk from it. This year’s opening brought out a few regulars and fresh faces.

One of the new booths was from When Pigs Fly Bread. They are a local company that sells their breads at their retail locations, local food stores, and markets like this. They had a fantastic selection of breads on hand. They savory breads looked great but their sweet breads looked amazing. I recently heard how great their chocolate bread is but their Mango, Pineapple, Raisin with Toasted Sesame and Ginger bread caught my eye. Yep, bread name is a mouthful but it seemed interesting because of its combination of fruits and nuts mixed in. While one can argue bread is perfectly fine for lunch I had to skip them, for now, to try something new. They are at the Farmers’ Market on Mondays and Wednesdays.

Another new vendor is Seta’s Mediterranean Foods. This booth called me in since it was the only prepared foods besides pastries farther down. I’m a sucker for Tabouli and Stuffed Grape Leaves but she had other things so I figured I should try something new. I got a salad made of bulgar wheat, tomatoes (paste), onion, and parsley. Bulgar is a favorite of mine because it is a great medium for holding together a salad and has a bit more bite than cous cous. Seta is at several markets this summer so check our her foods.

I was in love with th flowers at the Keown Orchards booth. They were selling fantastic hanging baskets, potted plants, tomato plants, and honey. The flowers were stunning! I think I have a dozen photos of this booth alone. I think my desk needs a calla lily 🙂 Keown Orchards is a pick your own farm so I imagine I’ll be dragging Price out there for apples this fall! Pie anyone??

I had seen Baked Orchard last year at the different farmer’s market. The owner carries a great selection of baked goods, like macaroons, tea breads, biscuits, and whoopie pies. I only had a dollar left left so I tried a walnut bar. I was explained that the bar is vegan and that it is made with rice milk and agave. I am not vegan but I like to try vegan items to see how the compare to ‘traditional’ items. I felt that this bar was really good; it had a nice flavor, light texture, and was not bland (which I was expecting since it is vegan). Follow Baked Orchard on twitter while they share their pasties around the city and MA for different farmers markets.

I really can’t wait for the weather to get warmer and the number of vendors increase and the fresh produce is available!!

Out of Africa

July 26, 2009

Yesterdays trip to the zoo was interesting. I had not been to the Franklin Park Zoo in a few years and the last time I went I was chasing after an 18 month old so I was not really take it in. Emily and I decided to go since there has been a big stink lately about the economy hitting the zoo’s state funding. The zoo director played dirty by going public and crying out about the drastic cut in budget by saying the zoo might have to close and as a result euthanize animals. Needless to say, Governor Patrick has been attacked for putting the zoo in such as hard place and the zoo has been chastised for saying it would euthanize animals. (Lineham did come back and say that he was incorrect about euthanizing the animals).

Well, we took this as an opportunity to fork over $13 each to visit the struggling zoo. I use struggling nicely. As a designer, it was really hard to embrace a place that uses laminated sheets of paper tacked up to posts telling people that the Andean Condor saying that the bird was born in the 50’s and acquired by the zoo in the early 90’s (I forgot the exact dates). A zoo is an education place that is to teach everyone about the animals. Did you know that the condor is the largest flying land bird in the Western Hemisphere? No? Well, you would not have known that about the condor going to the zoo for it was not posted on the 1 sign of info about them (I looked it up the the nifty Internet).

I know that I am being really harsh about the zoo and its appearance now, especially when it is facing budget cuts. It just makes me wonder if others even notice what the zoo is lacking or they just view it as a place for them to take their kids to kill a few hours on a Saturday morning? Thoughts?

Enough ranting…

They had quite a few zebras that were in two parts of the zoo. I love their short manes…. mohawks!

We did get to see the lion quite a bit and even hear him roar. He sounded more like the cowardly lion than the ling of the jungle. Still really cute. Check out my video.

Moving along the ill-marked paths we came across two hornbills. We watched them for awhile and one became so comfortable with us there that he? dug up a chunk of dirt and grass, walked over to the enclosure fence and put it down to give to us. Well give in the sense that we were still two feet away from it. Then it stuck its beak out of the fence as far as it could and sat there for awhile watching us.

We also saw flamingos, kangaroos, a tiger, giraffes, butterflies, and more.

Post zoo visit we walked back to my house- 5.5 miles. Sweet.

All in all I know I will go back but I just hope that they get the funding they deserve and outfit the zoo to properly house their animals and educate the public.