Taste of Charlotte

 

Friday was a big food day thanks to Taste of Charlotte! I went last year so I was stoked to see what the lineup was this year. I made the big trip Uptown to go since I had some free food coins coming my way courtesy of Yelp. Big trip, it is not, it’s only 10 minutes away however I never go because I’m cheap and don’t want to pay for parking. And in regards to the nightlife, it’s a bit douchey and more of a college crowd which I’m not into. I took the bus in and the first stop of the day was the Starbucks in my old building. I went to this place almost every day for six years so it’s like a second home to me. But then I started to freak out, what if the baristas I know and love weren’t there? What if they didn’t recognize me? Well, neither happened since a few of them were there—it was so good to see them again! I texted a few of my ex co-workers and let them know I was downstairs. Most of them were swamped or in meetings but I got to see one!

Would you believe that’s my first picture in front of a Starbucks? Mental note, I really need to buy stock in the Bucks.

Afterwards, some members of the most recent team I was on told me I should come up to see their new area they moved to. I was up there for maybe 10 minutes when management kicked me out. I told them I wasn’t stealing customer information ( a) that’s wrong and I would never do that b) I wouldn’t last a day in prison) and I was just there to say hi but they weren’t having any of that.I was going to make a remark on how one of the guys who left came up to our old floor when I worked there and how this was sexist but I just left quietly instead.

One of my old co-workers and I grabbed our coins and started to walk around. And just like last year, it was a scorcher out. They set up Taste of Charlotte along Tryon Street, the main road that runs through Uptown, so we walked up and down checking out who was there. Of course we found the cupcake place to stop, I’ve never been to Polka Dot Bake Shop so this was the perfect opportunity to try them.

They had mini red velvet cupcakes for one coin so that was the first thing to try. I was even good and took two little bites instead of popping it in my mouth. The cream cheese frosting? Holy smokes—it was great! However two bites doesn’t have me completely sold on Polka Dots so I will have to stop by there sometime. I love justifications

It was so hot out,  I started to get a bit lightheaded and felt like I was going to faint. Hello horrible timing—it’s a food festival, it’s my happy place! I think it was a combination of the heat, dehydration and number of people crammed into one street. I sat down and got some water and was ok for a few minutes but continued to feel “off” all day. Thumbs down.

Next up was Chicken Satay from Namaste India

I just saw a huge sign reading “THAI FOOD” and I was there. I’m still a bit confused by the Indian place was serving Thai food. Hmmmm. I’m proud of myself for straying from my stand by of pad thai. I like to think I’m an adventurous person and want to try other thai dishes when I go out but I just love the pad thai so much I’m afraid I’m going to try something else out and it will pale in comparison. The satay was delicious….and this is coming from someone who doesn’t like peanut butter.

Last on the BBQ Slider from Outlaw BBQ. The meat was perfectly cooked and seasoned that I didn’t even need bbq sauce—unheard of!

It was fun to try things from restaurants I’ve never been to but Taste of Charlotte was a bit of a letdown this year. It felt like there weren’t as many vendors as there were last year and that there were more chains. Also, if TOC wants to play with the big boys, they really need to expand. You’re crammed in with people near cookers and it feels like hell. I don’t like sweating while eating much less feeling sweat run down my crack.

Later that evening, I went to Vida Cantina for my friends birthday. The reservation wasn’t until 8:30 as always, I was a bit early. I am perpetually early so one can only imagine how much of a pet peeve tardiness is for me. Luckily, there were other perpetually early people I recognized enjoying a cold one. I was trying not to try all week and if I did, I was going to have liquor or wine because I really need to cut down on how much beer I’ve been drinking. But the idea of a cold beer on a Friday night sounded too enticing to pass up so there I was with my Dos Equis Amber.

We had a big table in the upstairs area which is the more private dining area. There was only enough room for our table and the other big party there so it was as crammed nor did we have a lot of food traffic like downstairs. I love Vida but there is a huge wait staff and usually a line of people there so it seems like you’re always on top of someone else.

There were a couple of rounds of tequila shots but this girl sat out thanks to…..I just don’t like tequila. Even the quality stuff. No thank you.

 

Me and the birhday girl

I loved her rings! The one on the left goes on two fingers—I’ve never seen that before.

 

We noshed on lots of baskets of chips, salsa, guacamole and queso dip. Like lots of chips, we would start going through one basket, be done, wait for another, get it, devour it, repeat. I wasn’t feeling a huge meal so I order the appetizer of mushroom flautas

Gorgeous right? They were just the portion size I was hoping for and I could only finish one of them! I took the rest to go and hope they will be semi decent leftover….who am I kidding, Mexican food leftovers are usually better than the original!

Are you a big festival person? I love festivals! It’s more the crowd that hate dealing with so if I do go to one, I want to go in the down time where there isn’t a bunch of people.

Do you have a food festival like Taste of Charlotte in your city? If not, do you have other festivals?

Greetings from Florida!

Hello everyone—hope everyone is having a great week so far!!

All I need is to insert a postcard here and I will be all set.

(source)

Sigh, I long for the days when stamps were $.37.

But for now, I will just show this gorgeous picture of sunset Sunday night (please disregard the dead flies on my windshield)

We left early on Sunday after a good nights rest. I started with my regular pre trip breakfast of Dunkin Donuts. Their egg white flatbread rocks my world and you can’t go wrong with their iced coconut coffee.

It was a gorgeous day for a drive, thank God we didn’t have any horrible weather or traffic.

I wish I had some good stories from the road but unfortunately I don’t. I just jammed out, stayed alert and watched Lincoln.

He slept through SC…..

through GA….

Woke up to help me drive in FL….

To save money, I brought some snacks for the road. I hate how much gas stations and rest stops charge for food plus you don’t find the healthiest selection of stuff. Plus when making an 11 hour drive, I wanted to fill my body with good stuff as opposed to crap.

Which I ended up getting the hummus on my pants so it looked like a funky, yellow stain near my girly bits. Good times.

Dannon Greek Yogurt-Honey. Wanna know my thoughts on this?

Save your money, it was disgusting!

I ended up stopping for linner since I wasn’t sure what was going to be on the agenda for dinner. I saw a billboard for Daytona Pig Stand BBQ and knew I had to have it.

They had a spacious patio are that was pet friendly! The server ever brought out some water for Lincoln.

I went in to order and when I ordered the pulled pork sandwich, they asked if I wanted it ON garlic toast or a regular roll. A sandwich on garlic toast?? I’ve never heard of such thing so yes, Pig Stand, I would like my sandwich on garlic toast.

It was fantastic! The pork was served without bbq sauce and you can add the original or hot bbq sauce. I wasn’t too impressed with the original but the hot bbq sauce had some heat and was tangy.

There was so much meat on there, Lincoln got to have a little treat o’ pig!

But he did not get one ounce of that mac n cheese since I was licking the bowl for the last remnants of cheese. This was a great spot to stop at and relax for a little while. Plus any place that is dog friendly gets two thumbs up in my book.

I rolled into my city and talked with my parents. They were still on the road from visiting my sister on the other coast of Florida and would be home soon. I said “Ok, I will just let myself in” thinking that they left a key for me since who wouldn’t leave a key for their daughter who had been driving 11 hours with her dog right? No. So I sat in the parking lot of Whole Foods and waited for them to get home. I was starving at that point and wanted nothing more than to go in and get some grub but I was all grody from driving all day. I swear, the second I got into FL my skin and hair were on red alert because both went from normal to greasy and frizzy.

My plans were to sleep in on Monday but it was so hot in our house, I couldn’t. I felt like Elaine on Seinfeld when she goes down to FL with Jerry and stays the night on the fold out couch and can’t sleep because it’s so hot. I almost had a freak out session because of the humidity….almost.

I woke up at 630am and was on a mission to find coffee, food and free Wi Fi. I ended up at Sequella Café in Boca after reading reviews on Yelp.

I ordered a small latte and contemplated getting breakfast but the items were pricier than I wanted to pay. Plus, when I got online, the connection was terrible slow. As much as I enjoyed the atmosphere and Beatles playing, I was ready to get out and find another spot.  When I went up to pay, I learned you had to spend at least $5 if you wanted to use your check card. I was a couple of dollar short so I got two raspberry rugaleh to go and headed out.

After that, I headed to Starbucks where I was greeted with normal prices, comfy chairs and speedy Wi Fi….and hot men! Each time I looked up, it seemed like another hot guy was walking into the place and I was diggin! Until I saw the popped collars that is. I saw two guys with popped collars within 20 minutes. Ugh.

I went to the beach for about an hour and a half around lunch time. I wanted to stay longer but I forgot how expensive parking gets there you only get 10 minutes for $.25 and I had $1.50 in quarters. Next time I go, I will go back to being 15 and have my mom drop me off and pick me up.

And the beach? Holy men in speedos Batman! And I’m not talking sex pot, Greek god body like Daniel Craig in a Speedo

(source)

I’m talking men who look like Celine Dion’s husband and are too furry to not shave (and this coming from a girl who likes fury men) Thanks everyone for your input on which one to read—I still can’t decide!! Next time I go to the beach this week, I will start on one of them!

Well, my time at Starbucks is up—I can’t wait until I can get back to using Internet access in my own home where I can get stuff done when I want. I have blogs to catch up on among others things! Til next time……

Do you pack snacks when traveling or stop off at different spots?

What’s the best beach you’ve ever been to?

Loving the Q

My friend was in town last night flying out of Charlotte so we got together for dinner before I took her to the airport. She was in the mood for a salad and I couldn’t name off a good salad place right off the bat so we checked out The Liberty, a newer gastropub in Dilworth.

I got the BBQ pork belly sliders and a side of fries

Beautiful babies! These succulent and delicious.

When I got home from the airport, I did absolutely nothing and enjoyed every second of it. There was a SVU marathon on so I put on my comfy clothes, parked myself on the couch and zoned out. I hate going out on Friday nights since I am usually exhausted from the work day. Soon I was in bed and I ended up sleeping a beautiful, soothing nine hours—that never happens! Most weekends, I wake up around 7A, have my coffee, breakfast and decide what I’m going to do with my day. I had plans to go with friends to the North Carolina BBQ Festival so I had to get ready then get on the road.

America runs on Dunkin-you got that right.

I picked everyone up then we hit the road. Lexington is supposedly the BBQ Capital of the World and only an hour away from Charlotte so it was a perfect day trip. I don’t know what I was more excited about—the bbq or the people watching

We went in not knowing to expect. I was expecting different restaurants from all over the state having their own tents with their style of bbq but there were only a few tents with the same general bbq, so it was a bit of a let down. In addition to that, they have every kind of fair food imaginable.

Fried butter? Um, no.

When we got to the food tent, there was a selection of hot dogs, pork sandwich, pork platter and fries. To get the full bbq experience, I went with the platter.

Oink oink!

It came with pork, red slaw and two buns. Lexington is known for their red slaw which has ketchup instead of mayonnaise and it was damn tasty.

The food was good and so was the people watching. We saw many mullets, men without shirts (Why??? It’s October in North Carolina-put your damn shirt back on!) and teenage moms. I don’t know if they aren’t doing sex ed anymore but it was really sad seeing these young kids who I think are babies having their own babies. Use condoms, they work.

At the north end of the festival, we found a location soda shoppe kind of place called Char’s so we stopped in for some ice crea, One of their specials was birthday cake ice cream which one of my friends raves about so I had to give it a try

Holy balls. Why did I try this? It was absolutely amazing—I don’t need to know that this yummy goodness exists!

Soon we found the beer garden. We were walking around and found it quite odd that there wasn’t any beer vendors. We walked right by it and got in line to get in. While we were in line, I saw the Sweetwater van. Sweetwater Blue is one of my top three favorite beers ever so I was happy that they were offering it. Not only did I see the van…..a guy was painting it a funkalicious tie dye color while we were waiting

Yay for hippies, double yay for beer.

We got in and sadly, they were out of Sweetwater and out of most beers there. I went with Bud Light Lime since it’s refreshing when it’s hot out. I can drink a few but after three, it tastes a bit nasty to me.

Dinner was lazy—-Totinos Pizza. This frozen pizza takes me back to my high school days and I know it’s totally bad for me but sometimes when I see frozen pizza for $1, I buy it. And when the hell did they change their pepperoni? I used to love their little pepperoni bites but no mas.

All in all, a great, foodielicious day. It was nice to get out-of-town for a bit, partake in some interesting people watching and eat some Q.

If you haven’t entered my Fresh Express coupon giveaway—there’s a few hours left so jump on it!

Also, I’ve added another tab to the top of my page featuring restaurants I’ve visited recently here in Charlotte but in other cities as well so feel free to check it out–The Good, The Bad, The Ugly