Hungry Times Two

Thus far in our married life routine of juggling family time, Scott and I developed a pretty awesome and efficient holiday routine - Thanksgiving with his clan, Christmas with mine. It works because it boils down to two things: Thanksgiving is about food, which the Adams Family has down to a big ol' literal gravy-covered T, and Christmas is of course about all things red, green, and white with Santa and Baby Jesus guest-starring, the lot of which my Mother Margaret smothers and covers all over the damn place. I love Thanksgiving at the in-laws because of the sheer number of them. Growing up, it was my parents and me, the only child, with widowed grandmothers and the occasional aunt, uncle and cousin thrown in the mix. I became used to the holidays being pretty intimate, but now that I have a wealth of in-laws, it's so fun to see all the personalities and the food preferences gel and collide. This year, the in-laws hosted at the family house at Sullivan's Island, South Carol...

Oh, New York, New York. The Empire of all things fabulous, diverse, high brow, and well, high-priced. This past weekend I visited the mecca of Tiffany's, Sex in the City -style shopping sprees, $15 cocktails with a penthouse view, the Subway (and I don't mean the six-inch sandwich), and lots of very important people (I'll get to my celeb spotting moment in a minute) rushing about. It's amazing. As a girls weekend in The City, celebrating two moms-to-be, the occasion called for a couple must-dos. We must find a cute place to honor the maternal ones amongst us and we must head out for one night on the town, dressed to kill (or at least dressed for something other than a night with the remote control, a bag of Doritos, and a Bud Lite). Thankfully, our seasoned and giddy expert KH, a resident of the Upper West Side, came to our aid. For our baby-shower-esque spot, KH discovered this gem, Alice's Tea Cup , a whimsical, colorful nod to Lewis Carroll's cast of char...

Erin and I took a trip to Kentucky this weekend (2.5 hours or so from Nashville) to tour whisky distilleries the way they're meant to be toured .. with tastings! I say this, as Tennessee's two big ones, Dickel and Jack Daniels, are in DRY counties, so good luck getting a tasting there. Cheers to you, Maker's Mark and Heaven Hill Distilleries (makers of Evan Williams and Elijah Craig). The spellcheck on this just flagged "whisky" above, asking that it be spelled "whiskey." I did a quick look-up on history and culture, with Irish and American whiskeys being spelled that way and Scottish, Canadian, etc. being spelled whisky . Bourbon, we learned, must have the following attributes: -at least 51% corn (most are 70% or so) -made in America -no more than 160 proof / 80% alcohol by volume (ABV) -finished in charred white oak barrels In fall 2008, we visited Isle of Arran Distellers , where we learned that Scotch is ironically finished in used, oak barrels, oft...

Can you guess what we did this weekend?

Well good grief, Charlie Brown - the only thing bigger than the Great Pumpkin in the room is that white elephant of guilt - ya know, the big, angsty feeling of " Oh hey, we abandoned the blog for two months. Whoopsies." Good thing this baby doesn't need to be watered or fed. Well, I suppose it does, as blogs that go stagnant for too long are a drag. I know I feel that way about a couple or two blogs I keep up with - they're well intentioned but if they don't' stay fresh, they're like the abandoned produce in the crisper drawer - a damn dirty shame. The main excuse - Scott and I honestly are in the midst of trying to get it all sorted out - this life thing. Job searches, relocation tactics, the whole "What does it all mean" scenario... I know, "WHATEVER, Erin, just get back to talking about what food you made or ate yesterday, what you wanna eat today, and what you might be thinking of eating tomorrow." Well, okay then. It's November...