My oh my, working on getting caught up finally. This entry will focus on our trip to the beach - we'll start off with some new foods we had, both homemade and from restaurants/shops, and then go through a very long list of olive oils and balsamic vinegars we tried, the wrap up with a lunch stop at
Natty Greene's Brewpub in Greensboro, NC on the way home.
- Peach Pie: Brett made this using some local peaches, pre-made all the filling at home, vacuum-sealed it, then cooked it once we got there. This was super good and the just ripened local peaches made it so much better.
- Brett's amazing clove pickles: Sigh - this was supposed to be a copy of the pickles from Cedric's Tavern on the Biltmore Estate and .... instead of whole cloves as called for in the recipe, Brett half-asleep, added ground up clove. By that point, he'd used up all of the other spices in making the pickling medium so he just went with it. If you like clove, the pickles are delicious - they are spicy and taste almost exclusively like clove. For everyone else in the world, they are disgusting. Seriously, follow the recipe unlike Brett!
- Brandy's Corn Salad - We need to get the recipe for this from Brandy, but it was delicious.
- Brandy's Cucumber Salad - Again, we need to get the recipe for this from Brandy, but it was also delicious.
- Brandy's Fresh Lime Chess Pie - Brandy got this from a Ukrops cookbook. She kindly sent the recipe and we'll get it typed up and put on here later.
- Chocolate-covered Oreo from The Fudgeboat - This was good, but Brett thought it was too sweet and it was very hard and difficult to bite through the giant white chocolate seashell on the top of it. We speculated that it might be actual seashell and not white chocolate.
- Glazed donuts from Britt's - They are apparently the number 2 donut-maker in the US (presumably behind Voodoo Doughnuts). Britt's makes only glazed donuts. Neither of us are big donut eaters, but we are seriously glad we don't live anywhere near them because they are absolutely incredible. The two of us could easily go through a dozen without even noticing.
We went out to dinner with everyone one night to
Freddie's. Freddie's gets very good reviews on Urban Spoon and are known for their chops and their salad dressing. Megan had a chop and Brett had lasagna - everyone had salad (served family-style) with the dressing.
- Freddie's Salad Dressing - As noted, people like this so much that you can buy it by the pint at the restaurant. Brett found this to be pretty mediocre and far too sweet - Brett prefers a far tarter/tangier italian-style dressing and there just wasn't enough vinegar in the taste for him.
- Freddie's Apple-Walnut Chop - Megan had this and while the chop itself was good, the apple-walnut mixture put over the top was too sweet. She said it tasted like apple pie filling and not like something you should cover a pork chop with.
- Freddie's Bolognese-style Lasagna - Brett ordered this and again found it kind of mediocre. The tomato sauce was sweet and the noodles were overcooked and mushy.
After dinner, we returned to the condo and toasted Dave and Marty's 40th wedding anniversary with a Moscato. Later in the week we had steaks and had a Cabernet Sauvignon to drink with dinner.
- 2011 - Innocent Bystander - Moscato - This is a carbonated moscato and was actually quite nice. While sweet, it was balanced by a good bit of tartness and it really made it quite drinkable.
- 2007 - Cameron Hughes - The Flying Winemaker - Cabernet Sauvignon - While a 2007, this was hot initially and stayed hot over the two hours that dinner and post-dinner discussion lasted. It did get better, but this could have aged a few more years in the bottle and really needed a good couple hour decanting before drinking.
Late in the week, we went into Wilmington and went to
Taste the Olive. These kinds of shops are opening up all over the place (there's one in Roanoke even - we've been to it but it was before this whole 1000 tastes goal started). These shops have many kinds of olive oil, and often balsamic vinegar, that you can try and then of course they hope you purchase what you like. Olive oil reviews first - start at #462 the olive oils become flavored/spiced. Honestly, there were more spiced/flavored oils, but we found them generally so overwhelming that we stopped tasting them.
- Sicillian nocellara - mild, pepper finish
- California koroneiki - toasty, pepper at end
- Portugese - mild, very little peppery
- California arbequina - nutty middle, some pepper on finish - we bought 750 ml of this
- Spanish melgarejo - really green - tomato leaf?
- Sicilian cerasuola - very creamy, buttery
- Spanish hojiblanca robusto - banana yucky
- Tunisian freestone chetoui - minty middle, long pepper finish, but not overwhelming
- Spanish manzzanillo robusto - olivey, not super pungent
- Organic mission evoo robusto - super green
- Boldly butter oil - fake butter tasting
- Bursting with basil - not aamazing, but just ok
- Tarragon - omg tarragon
- Herbs de provence - tastes like herb packet
- Whole fruit persian lime - lime peel, ok
- Whole fruit lemon - more subtle than lime and better
- Blood orange - subtle bitter orange
- Tuscan herb - very nice, garlic, green herbs, tomato
- Garlic - lots of garlic, nutty
Now onto balsamic vinegar. Brett loves vinegar so we tasted pretty much every single vinegar, flavored or not!
- 18 yr old balsamic - fruity, berry, tangy, very very good - we bought some of this
- Cara cara orange - shockingly orange, megan didn't like at all
- Pomegranate-quince - very fruity, Brett liked
- Honey vinegar - too sweet not much tang
- Peach vinegar - peach, no tang
- Cranberry-pear - really good tartness, pear and cranberry yummy - we bought some of this
- Sicillian lemon vinegar - lemony, but not very special
- Grapefruit vinegar - ok
- Coconut vinegar - bleh coconut
- Honey-ginger vinegar - too much ginger
- Oregano vinegar - well, that is oregano - like chewing on oregano
- Thai lemongrass-mint - minty bleh
- Tangerine vinegar - some tangerine
- Pomegranate - pomegranate is there but not as powerful
- Black currant - super fruity, good - we bought some of this
- Raspberry - all fruit, not much vinegar
- Strawberry - frutiy, mild, nice finish
- Blueberry - all fruit little vinegar
- Cinnamon-pear - cinnamon in the finish, mild pear
- Vanilla - vanilla mellows the tang, nice though
- Blackberry-ginger - tooooo gingery, green
- Black cherry bing - cough syrup, Megan says it tastes like the tears of sick little children trying not to take their medicine
- Maple - could use on pork, but not great alone
- Aged red apple - this just screams fall
- Fancy fig - sweet chewing gum flavor
- Lavender - takes like a cachet
- Dark espresso - more mocha than espresso
- Dark chocolate - i would say milky than dark
Finally, we also tried almond and walnut oil.
- Almond oil - tastes like unroasted almonds
- Walnut oil - tastes like walnut - what a surprise...
Last but not least, we stopped at Natty Greene's in Greensboro for lunch while on our way home to break up the 6 hour drive. This was an excellent choice for lunch and we wish we lived closer to try more of
their menu! We tried 3 beers each in small pulls and ordered some lunch.
- Natty Greene's NC Shandy - this was very easy to drink on a hot summer day
- Natty Greene's Southern Pale Ale
- Natty Greene's Guilford Golden Ale
- Natty Greene's Buckshot Amber Ale - this went really well with Brett's burger
- Natty Greene's Full Moon IPA
- Natty Greene's Hessian Hefeweizen - this is one of the better, true to style, hefeweizens from America Brett's had
- Turkey Razz sandwich - Megan says this was amazing and all her mayo should be raspberry
- Black & Blue Burger - Now on a kick of bleu cheese burgers, Brett ordered this. It was a bit salty, but delicious and pairs with the buckshot very well. The mushrooms, the port mayo, and the bleu cheese really came together and this was a giant mouth full of umami with every bite.
And this wraps up the really big mega-updates. We'll have a more reasonably-sized update to get us up to current. Note that we are now over halfway done!!! We have to say we're really enjoyed this process and find it really makes us slow down and taste things, even those we have had before. Everyone should try a small goal of just one new taste a week and really just focus on tasting whatever it is very carefully and take the time to enjoy what you're eating/drinking rather than just slamming food down your throat!
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