Sonobana Nashville, TN

 

This was the miso soup at Sonobana.  I like this style of miso soup. I think it is better when it does not have seaweed in it.  It was delicious.  Then we ordered a fairly standard sushi order except I created one of the rolls.  We ordered spicy tuna (asparagus and cucumber), bagel roll (smoked salmon and cream cheese), tuna roll, and the one I created--salmon and avocado. I took this picture while Sam was demanding I give my iPhone back to him. 

 

 

I think it may be a bit blurry.  Sam add plain rice and we ordered chicken yakitori for him but he wasn't really a fan.  The chicken was good even if Sam didn't think so.  Other than his protest about the iPhone, both of our children were very good for this lunch on Saturday.  

 

They play background music so that minimizes sound from any diners.  I hardly notice other diners when we are out because I am so focused on the food and our children if they are with us.  I did notice a couple of other diners this week.  Near us a woman seemed to be yelling what sounded like genealogical information to man who appeared to be over 80 years old.  Either that or she was talking about the cast of Romeo and Juliet because she was listing all of the Montagues.  I was heartened that our children could not possibly be the most disturbing element at this meal.

 

Thoughts on sushi at Sonobana: this is the best sushi I ever usually eat.  I regularly eat at sushi restaurants in Atlanta when I visit there a couple times a year.  I also eat at sushi restaurants in Lexington, KY although we recently had a bad experience that I will not share here.  I promised that I would only blog the positive.  The sushi is fresh and for some reason, better than what we usually have.  I question how there could be such a big difference in sushi quality so that this restaurant is much better than others.  But it is.

 

I have been eating here since around 2002-2003.  At that point, it was called Ben Kay.  Once in 2004, probably Veteran's Day, I went to Nashville to have my Volvo serviced at Volvo of Nashville.  I was alone so I ate at the sushi bar.  I sat next to a man who claimed to be Ronnie Milsaps's son and who told me that the man sitting with two women at the other end of the bar was Don Everly of the Everly Brothers.   I admit I was skeptical.  But I also have to admit that this would not happen anywhere else but Nashville.  You gotta love it!

 

As to why we were in Nashville this time. we came to Day Out with Thomas.  Sam was not as excited about Thomas the Train as he was when he went on the Durango, Colorado train.  We decided that maybe we should just go to Carbondale, IL one weekend morning and board Amtrak to Du Quoin or Centralia, IL because it would be cheaper and I think he would enjoy it as much.  We could then get back on the train around noon and come home.   Maybe we will take this trip this weekend.

 

We also went to the Nashville Zoo.  Sam seemed to like it and it was small enough that he could walk most of it.  I knew he was with one of his peers when he and another girl were looking at a lynx and both were repeating, "Big cat."  I was also encouraged but concerned that he is starting to understand spelling.  He pointed to the sign above the exit to the alligator viewing area and said, "Out O-U-T."  How much longer will we be able to spell words that he doesn't understand?

 

No trip to Nashville would be complete without a trip to Green Hills Mall.  It gets better everytime I go and gets progressively more high end like Lenox Square or Phipps Plaza in Atlanta.  Phipps is of course the most high end of malls in Atlanta but Lenox Square has a larger variety of stores.

 

We also ate at some wonderful chain restaurants that we don't have in our hometown:  Moe's (West End), Five Guys (Brentwood), and J. Christopher (Brentwood).  All were a good, consistent meal.  Most of the time we eat at these restaurants while in Atlanta or traveling to Atlanta.  Dalton, Georgia has a Five Guys!

 

El Valle Verde Restaurant, Cincinnati, OH

Doesn't a meal at Mexican restaurant always start with chips and salsa?  This week we were visiting Cincinnati and I decided to try for a recommendation.  It came with a 92% like rating.  You can't please everyone, right?  Only a few other Mexican restaurants had an over 90% like rating.  Most of them were further outside the city than we wanted to venture. 

For some reason, Scott was craving Mexican.  Additionally with our young children in tow, a family friendly Mexican restaurant seemed like just the ticket.  We seemed to be surrounded by other families with children, which made us fit right in. 

But on the other hand, we were the only folks there who were not Latino.  That is a sign that you have hit on a good, authentic restaurant when the type of food and the ethnicity of the diners could be the same.  I do not know what actual Mexican food is because I have never been Mexico.  I have been to New Mexico and the flavors of this restaurant reminded me more of New Mexico than some chain Mexican restaurants do.  They also had the interesting drinks that I saw in New Mexican restaurants like horchata (rice water).

I had my pretty boring usual Mexican selection two tacos a la carte.

I was sure to select the steak option as merely selecting beef might have caused me to get tripe or head meat.  See menu below.



For some reason, I can't get this photo to rotate.  How annoying.  Maybe someday I will figure it out.  Scott had mixed fajitas (chicken, steak, and shrimp) and Sam had the kid's meal taco and enchilada.  The refried beans on Sam's plate were really good.  Often, not much effort goes into the sides at Mexican restaurants but not at this place.

 

After our fine Mexican meal, we went back to Kentucky to go to the Newport Aquarium.  Surprisingly, Sarah enjoyed the fish more than I thought a six month old could.  Sam seems to be into sharks these days.  He really enjoyed seeing them.



Peach baby food

"Movin' to the country, gonna eat a lot peaches."  We ate a lot of peaches this summer.  At the beginning of the summer, we bought a huge basket of peaches and shared it with some of our friends.  They then sang this line of the song, "Millions of peaches, peaches for free."  Thank you, The Presidents of the United States of America. 

I decided Sarah needed to have some of our peaches so I froze some peach baby food for her.

 

To make the peaches easy to peel, I dropped them in boiling water for 30 seconds- 1 minute.  Then I transferred them to an ice bath.  The skin pulls right off leaving all of the peach flesh.  I put the peaches in the blender and pureed them.  You can add water to thin them if you need.  But I don't think I needed to thin them.  We are still giving Sarah vegetables first according to our pediatrician's instructions but soon we will try our millions of peaches.  Until then, here is how they remain:

Making Baby Food from Organic LMU Community Garden Squash

Nana came to visit us last weekend for Sarah's baptism.  She brought us some yellow summer squash that she grew at Lincoln Memorial University's Organic Community Garden (here is the link to the press release for the start of it:http://lmu1.lmunet.edu/cgi-bin/MySQLdb?VIEW=/news/view_one.txt&newsid=737).  For more information about Lincoln Memorial University's community garden, see this website: http://growappalachia.blogspot.com/search/label/LMU

I thought beautiful organic squash should be the start of Sarah's baby food.  With Sam, I made most of his baby food from produce from the farmer's market.  To make the baby food, I put about 1 in. of water in the bottom of our pot with the steamer basket (shown below). 

I brought the water in the bottom pot to a boil.  Then put 2 or 3 squash cut in 1 in. rounds in the steamer basket and covered the basket.  I steamed the squash for about 9 minutes until they were tender.  Then I used my immersion blender to puree the squash.  All of the water used for steaming was put back in the squash to get it thin enough for baby food.  

After pureeing, I put it in my Beaba multi-portion baby food freezer tray and an ice cube tray.  Ice cube trays work just as well as the fancy Beaba freezer tray.  After freezing, I transfer it to plastic freezer bags.  When it is time for her to eat it, I will drop a few cubes in a small skillet and heat it on low until it melts. 

Baby food can be made several other ways.  I also have a Beaba cooker but it is better used for individual meals.  A food processor or a blender could be used.  Generally, blenders aren't as consistent as a food processor or an immersion blender.



Portofino Restaurant Lexington, Kentucky

On the last weekend in July, we visited Lexington, Kentucky for my great nephew's wedding.  We had Scott's parents (Moomaw and Pappadoo) who could watch our kids while we went out to eat.  I decided to go with an Open Table selection because it seemed easier for me.  Pappadoo doesn't use Open Table.  He just has his favorite restaurants programmed into his phone.  Our selection, Portofino, made his phone list. 

Portofino had a nice patio area.  The patio area was fenced with flowers boxes covering the walls.  Unlike Paducah in July, the temperature at 7 p.m. was about 80 degrees.  It bills itself as an Italian restaurant.  I had the soup of the day:  Vegetable.  For secondo, I had diver's scallops described on the menu as "coriander-crusted and dressed with a blood orange gastrique alongside root vegetable fries with jalapeno aioli and shredded pecan brussel sprouts."  Scott had the goat cheese and apple salad and Seared Sesame Tuna: "Yellowfin Tuna with chili plum sauce and steamed baby bok choy tossed in Asian viniagrette with basmati-almond rice." 

A trick I have learned is to take a picture of the menu that way I can quote it later.  As a copyright attorney, I would argue my quotation of the menu is fair use for a news-related article or critique.

Our entrees were as well-prepared as they were described although I did have a question about Scott's rice.  Our waiter was very knowledgeable about the food and promptly answered my question about was in Scott's rice: orange lentils.  I don't think I have ever had ORANGE lentils.

When I saw gastrique on my selection, I immediately thought about the television show CHOPPED on the Food Network.  It seems that almost every contestant makes a gastrique.  I wasn't sure what a gastrique was so I consulted wikipedia.  Wikipedia says that it is "caramelized sugar, deglazed with vinegar, used as a flavoring for sauces."  Blood oranges are a prettier color than regular oranges.  Maybe they also taste a little better or maybe I am just convinced that they are special by their color.

The meal was fabulous!  We finished it off with a wonderful chocolate torte. 

Garden: Feta-Dill Scramble

Sneaking away into our garden last Saturday morning was surprisingly enjoyable.  I never thought that photographing vegetables growing could be interesting.  Certainly, when I put my camera on the flower setting, the pictures turned out better.  I really need to take a photography class when I find the time.  Our garden only has peppers, tomatoes, and herbs.  We had lettuce but we tilled it under last week.  The lettuce had been bitter for awhile.

For annual herbs, we have basil and dill.  This morning I used the dill in a scramble.  I prefer the softer texture of a scramble to an omelet.  I mixed about 1 tablespoon of fresh finely chopped dill into about a 1/4 cup of feta cheese.  Then I added it to three eggs well beaten.  The eggs need to start bubbling before I know they are beaten well enough.  I melted two tablespoons of butter in an 8 in. non-stick omelet pan.  The stove was on a little below medium heat.  I vigorously peppered the eggs and then added the feta-dill mixture.  The feta and the dill were mixed together before being put in the eggs because dill tries to stick to itself and clump when added directly to eggs.  I stirred the eggs while they were cooking until they had a uniform consistency--no puddles.  I actually did not start writing this to write about my scramble (and the measurements are guesstimates).  If I had, I would have taken a picture of the scramble. On the other hand, my husband thinks omelets look better.  So the scramble may not have been that beautiful.

Ham Bar Southern Art and Bourbon Bar

Last weekend we visited Atlanta.  We rolled the dice on a place to stay and booked a Hotwire room in Buckhead.  The gamble paid off.  We stayed in a very nice four star room at the Intercontinental for $78/night.  The room had a beautiful marble bathroom with a garden tub and separate shower.  The view from one of the chairs in the room was straight down Peachtree Street toward Piedmont Road.  The hotel also had a new restaurant Southern Art and Bourbon Bar replacing Au Pied du Cochon.  I think that is the spelling.  French is not my forte.  I visited Bourbon Bar with a friend and we picked up a couple of ham selections.  We tried to order Col. Newsome's Ham from Princeton, KY but was informed that it was no longer on the menu and the above menu was the correct one.  Well, now there were only two Kentucky hams instead of three on the menu.  Who knew that their bar menu would be filled with not one but two of Kentucky's well-known exports bourbon and ham?  Well, it was named bourbon bar not ham bar.  We picked two hams.  One we liked and one we didn't.  I decided at the outset of this blog that I would only blog the positive.  So the ham we liked was the La Quencia.  It was a wonderfully soft prosciutto that was not too salty.  One of these days I am going to learn to take photos with my iPhone without taking the shadow of my own hand...I also have a photo of the ham bar but it was difficult getting the lighting right because it was lit up in a dark room.  Maybe I will charge my "real" camera before my next trip.  If there is any place that you can get away with looking like a tourist with your camera, it is a hotel bar or restaurant.

While in Atlanta, we also had croissants and donut holes from Henri's bakery; tuna sandwiches from Five Napkin Burger in Midtown (okay, we didn't exactly get burgers), sushi at Gekko, and fresh, calorie-controlled food at Seasons 52.  All of these restaurants were family-friendly enough to tolerate our little ones.  Booths are highly-recommended for two year olds who don't want to be treated like a baby and put in a high chair.  Being able to block the escape route of an adventurous, curious two year old is also key.  I realized that I had tuna at all three of these restaurants.  Paducah is too far in from the coast and a little too isolated for me to reliably get tuna.