Covington, KY

Tony and I recently stayed overnight in Covington, KY. It's just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati. While we were there, we happened upon a tiny pizza place called Newport Pizza Co. The pizza was amazing! Sadly, there was only 1 window a/c and a couple of ceiling fans to cool the entire restaurant, so it was hot as monkey balls in there. The pizza was delicious, nonetheless.

We had room service delivered in the AM. When we placed our pre-order the night before, Tony swore that he only wanted coffee, cereal, fruit, and juice. And that's exactly what I ordered him.

Tony was quite disappointed in the morning when I had a plate of bacon and eggs and he had Raisin Bran and a banana.

Universal Law of Food

Universal Law of Food: Steamed broccoli cancels out the fat and calories in buttermilk fried chicken and mashed potatoes with gravy (all homemade by moi, btw)

Connor's 9th birthday party

These are pictures from Connor's birthday party, not to be confused with his birthday dinner. The kids always get a special meal on their actual birth date and then a family party on the weekend. We had friends and family over for pizza (Domino's) and cake.

Nothing says class, and practicality, like boxed wine.

Connor's birthday cake! I made this.


For Connor's third birthday, my dad gave him a snake that he found in his yard. It was elegantly presented to him in an old bucket. Connor wasn't scared of the snake, rather offended by the gift. He promptly dumped the snake in to the yard and stomped away. This year, my dad gave Connor a brown paper bag containing a mystery gift... Make sure that you read the poem stapled to the bag...


What could it be? The anticipation was almost too much to take....


It was a bag of mushrooms from my dad's yard!

Connor's 9th birthday dinner

Alright, these pictures are old. Over a month old. But I'm going to post them anyway because they are from Connor's 9th birthday dinner. He chose carryout from Roadhouse Wings & Grill as his birthday meal. As always, he ordered 10 wings with medium sauce.

Connor is showing off for the camera here.


Here's my meal - chicken tenders with extra hot sauce and a side of wedge fries.



I banned Tony from my blog several months ago. He was starting to pose for the camera and seeking out opportunities to get his picture posted. His ego is already big enough and I didn't want to encourage his antics. BUT this picture was too funny not to post. He had 10 hot wings.

Here is the birthday boy with a very un-homemade cupcake!

Cinco De Mayo

This meal happened some time around Cinco De Mayo and it was outstanding.

The ingredients to the perfect margarita...

Cilantro and lime marinated chicken and spicy chorizo sausage.

Add jalapenos and queso fresco!

Quesadilla!


Chicken and chorizo quesadillas with refried beans and cilantro lime rice

i'm baaaaack!

Here are some random things that we've had to eat since I last posted. Enjoy.

Connor's 9th Birthday Cakes

Happy 9th birthday to Connor! I usually outsource birthday cakes, but I made these myself. One cake is chocolate with chocolate frosting and the other is vanilla cake with buttercream frosting - both covered in KitKats and M&Ms.

Hippie Graffiti in Athens, Ohio

I recently had occasion to be in Nelsonville, Ohio for work. There aren't a lot of restaurants in Nelsonville, so we decided to head to the nearby campus of Ohio University for lunch. We went to Casa Cantina and started out with a variety of salsa, chips, and margaritas.

That was followed by a shredded pork and farmer's cheese quesadilla.



Next up was a trip to the lady's room. I was amused by the graffiti in the stalls. Everyone knows that Athens is full of hippies, so it makes sense that there would a lot of flower-child ramblings scrawled on the walls.



Deep thoughts....



Finally! Graffiti that speaks to my soul. Who doesn't love Mark Paul Gossler's character, Zach Morris, from Saved By The Bell?

Odds and Ends

A new Chinese restaurant opened near our house recently. It was previously a Chinese restaurant - but it had been fined (and closed) many times for health code violations. Knowing that it had new owners, I decided to give it a try. The egg roll was clearly handrolled and stuffed with a lot of ground pork and just enough cabbage. I ordered Szechuan chicken but they gave me Hunan chicken... No big deal because the dish that they gave me was really good.

Here is Connor at his first trip to Cold Stone Creamery. He ordered the medium size with mint ice cream, chocolate chips, and crunch bars mixed in... All inside a chocolate dipped waffle cone. He finished about 25% of the ice cream and 0% of the cone.

An attempt to heal strep throat with Mexican food

This was my first meal of real food after being stricken with the evil, evil strep throat. I had enchiladas and refried beans because they are... soft. I also had a margarita. My thought was that it might cauterize the open sores covering my tonsils. And this worked... for about 15 minutes and then the pain came right back.





My mom had a chorizo and chicken quesadilla. I've this before (we were at Fiesta Mariachi) and it's awesome.




Ian had the chicken nuggets. He hated them. The menu listed "chicken fingers" but they actually served chicken nuggets. Ian took one bite of each nugget just to prove to me that each one was "disgusting".

Strep Throat

This is my mouth. Those are my tonsils, infected with strep throat. Strep throat sucks. It can give you a fever of 103 degrees, a migraine headache, and make you cry like a baby from pain.

I would post a bunch of pictures of what I ate while I was down with strep, but it would just be photos of popsicles and campbell's chicken noodle soup.

Easter

Wolf in Sheep's Clothing

Connor and I ate at Donato's last week. He had a Big Don Sub. He reported that it was "uh, like... it's good or whatever. I guess it's okay." He only ate half of it.

We also ordered a pizza. This pizza photographed really well. It looks like it should be tasty. It actually looks like it was ordered from a mom & pop type of pizza place. This is what makes Donato's pizza so deceptive. It looks like it comes from an independent place but it tastes like chain restaurant pizza. It's okay but not great. Connor commented, after one bite, "uh, yeah. I don't like this very much. It looked good but it doesn't taste good."

Henry David!

This little guy is named Henry David and he's my nephew! He was born to my sister and her husband on March 27th, and weighed in at 8 pounds and 14 ounces. His favorite food is MILK!

Really, Lucy? Really?

While I dropped the kids off at school on Wednesday, Lucy ate at least 1/4 of a tub of margarine that was left on the counter. She proceeded to vomit the margarine throughout the house for the remainder of the day.

While I dropped the kids off at school on Thursday, Lucy grabbed a container of chocolate frosting out of the pantry, chewed it open, and ate most of the contents. I think that Shadow was in on this one too. He had a guilty look on his face.

A few of Ian's favorite things

Making funny faces, eating White Castle chicken rings, and making funny faces with chicken rings... This are a few of Ian's favorite things!

Jet's Pizza

Tony loves pizza. He would eat it every day if he could. This pizza is from Jet's. It was good but I quietly pretended that it was something more interesting, like Tikka Masala, while I ate it.

Connor's Favorite Snack

This is one of Connor's favorite snacks - cheese and crackers. His specifications are exact: 10 Ritz Crackers, 5 slices of sharp cheddar (not Kraft brand), and 5 slices of marbled cheddar (not co-jack and not Kraft brand).
*Note that the quantities on this plate vary from Connor's specifications because the items were prepared by Ian, who doesn't give a shit about Connor's "rules".*