food

Tuesday’s Treats #115

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The Blonde Giraffe Key Lime Pie Factory

Location: Tavenier Key, Fl

THIS PLACE HAS THE MOST AMAZING KEY LIME PIE!!!!

They have great coffee, limeades and other drinks as well, but the key lime pie is my absolute favorite in all the Keys! You can choose from meringue key lime or non-meringue, chocolate drizzled and frozen. You can buy it by the slice or a whole pie. They have a variety of gift items and candies from which to choose as well. On their website, they sell most items; unfortunately, due to meringue issues, they no longer ship the key lime pie. 😩 That makes me so sad, as I crave this pie now!!

They always include a yummy little key lime cookie with your coffee or warm beverage choice. It is scrumptious!. Oops! I took a bite before I remembered to take the pic. 😂

Oh, and they have their own key lime trees right out the side door where you can also walk to a little outdoor sitting area under the palm trees. It was a little too hot in mid June for us to enjoy the sanctuary, but maybe next time.

Tuesday’s Treats #114

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Lazy Days

Location: Islamorada Key, Fl

The atmosphere here is definitely worth taking the time to sit back and enjoy, even if the staff seems a little put out when you come in with your party of eight on a Saturday lunch. We weren’t real sure what that was all about, but we just chose to ignore it and enjoy our lunch.

The bread basket that is brought before the meal is scrumptious. The pic I’ve included has a few biscuits missing, as our party was a bit like scavengers that day. Lol. The sweet loaf bread was divine!

Several in our party tried the coconut fried batter on our grouper and mahi, and although it was tasty, I do believe I’ll opt for the regular fried or blackened grouper next time. My husband’s blackened red fish was delicious, and our son’s steak was yummy; although, the fries could have been just a bit more plentiful.

The desserts were amazing; however, I’m partial to the key lime pie at another location. All in all, this place was good, and we’ll probably revisit when we’re back in the Keys.

Tuesday’s Treats #113

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Subzero Nitrogen Ice Cream

Location: Key Largo, Fl

This place is crazy cool! The staff are friendly and fun to talk to, and the process of making this ice cream with nitrogen is fascinating. They prepare it right there in front of you and add in whatever toppings you’d prefer. The ice cream is very tasty and delicious, too. Oh, if you don’t eat ice cream, they have frozen yogurt as well they prepare the same way. What a fun treat!

Check out the website for various locations across the nation.

Tuesday’s Treats #112

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The Fish House

Location: Key Largo, Fl

The atmosphere here is really cool. You feel like you’ve just entered a dockside restaurant; even thought, you’re right in the middle of Key Largo. The menu is pretty extensive on fish items, and everything we had was delicious.

Our party ordered red fish, hog fish, blackened Mahi, chicken fingers and fries. The tea isn’t sweetened, as is usual in the Keys; so, just go ahead and order water with lemon or a coke. All the fish tastes fresh, and the wait staff are pretty friendly. We encountered one who was not so much, but she only seated us; so, we got beyond it pretty quick. We dis have their key lime pie for dessert, but I’ve had better elsewhere.

If we’re ever back in the Keys, this will probably be in our top 10 restaurants from which to choose. Here’s the website.

Tuesday’s Treats #110

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Luna’s

Location: Gainesville, Ga

Luna’s is great for a nice, romantic lunch or dinner, business meeting or any family gathering. It is white tablecloths and assorted silverware type settings; so, choose accordingly, but I do believe you’d enjoy it. My husband and I went here for lunch, and although, we don’t exactly start the day thinking, “oh, we’ll go have a romantic lunch date today,” we were on a lunch date, and we did feel romantic!

As you can tell from the pics, the presentation is beautiful. (The first pic above is the oil dip for the delicious bread they bring before the meal.) The shrimp and grits were amazing, and the burger was incredible! The key lime pie was absolutely delicious. It tastes a lot like the key lime we get at our favorite restaurant in Florida, and I think might know where they get it. 😉

The waiter was great and the restaurant was almost empty; so, we felt like we had the place to ourselves. We really enjoyed our lunch and will be back.

Luna’s

Tuesday’s Treats #109

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Nose Dive

Location: Greenville, SC

This place definitely has the urban cafe feel with its large, open air windows and cafe style seating. Their “subtitle” is fitting, “Urban Comfort Food.”

Honestly, had I read the menu before I took my two teenage sons here, I might would have chosen a different place, not because of the atmosphere. We were definitely intrigued. At first glance the menu didn’t have many, what I would call, “comfort foods” listed; however, they did have burgers and fries. So, that’s what we ordered, and we were so glad we did! They are delicious!! I also ordered Jasmine Rice, just because I’d like to taste it. It was another winner!

Next time we’re in Greenville, we will definitely stop by Nose Dive.

Tuesday’s Treats #106

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Burger Ranch

Location: Kiev, Ukraine

This place has amazing burgers! The atmosphere is really cool and comfortable, and the food is delicious. As you can see, the burgers they offer are very unique, but they do have “regular” cheeseburgers, too.

If you are American and plan to eat here, you need to be aware of one thing in particular: they will put sauce on our burger, regardless, if you ask for no sauce. Apparently, they offer sauce on the side; so, when you request no sauce, they interrupter this as no sauce on the side. The sauce that is put on your burger is meant to be complimentary. It’s actually a good sauce and is tasty with the burger, but it was a little comical for our party of 9 to come to this conclusion, as it took four tries for the restaurant to understand what a “plain cheeseburger” was. This concept was actually never realized in our visit, even after two translators tried to translate, “no sauce,” but rather than being annoyed, we chose to laugh it off and just eat the burger with the sauce “that wasn’t really a sauce.” 😂 The burgers and fries are just that good!! I’m sorry, I don’t have a pic. I higher I did but apparently not.

This restaurant is rather new, and the staff doesn’t seem to be very versed in much beyond what they are accustomed to; so, if you run into a difficulty as we did, I’d suggest just giving them a bit of grace. They’re new, and hopefully, they will learn differently. As I stated before, the food is delicious, and they have the potential of being a great restaurant. So, hopefully, they can realize what “no sauce” truly means before too many Americans visit and don’t like the additional condiment on their burger, because, again, those things are delicious!! 😉

Oh, and they have a really cool hand washing area, too. You can simply wash your hands here instead of holding up the restroom line.

I’m not sure they have a website yet, but here are a few “review” sites that will probably help you with location and other things.

Tuesday’s Treats #103

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Cafe Intermezzo

Location: Atlanta, Ga

This place is so cool! The atmosphere is different than the Coffeeshop I visited a few weeks back. It’s more of a “cafe” venue, but that definitely doesn’t take away from the enjoyable surroundings.

The desserts are amazing, and the coffee is so strong, it might get up and walk out on you 😂, but everything is delicious! They have a plethora of desserts from which to choose, and they have actual meals to order, as well, but we’ve only had coffee and desserts.

We ordered the apple pie and cherry pie ala mode. I had the Coccoloccino with white chocolate added. Oh. My. Word. Delicious!! The others in our party had the s’mores cheesecake, black coffee, and another non-alcoholic coffee, but I don’t remember the name, and I can’t find the coffee menu on the website. (Yes, they have a food menu and a coffee/beverage menu that’s like a book!)

The noise of the place was surprising a good him at about 10:30 pm on a Wednesday night, but it wasn’t overpowering. It was a comfortable atmosphere for our party of 7 to chat and fellowship for a while.

The special things around the cafe are what is so intriguing. They add special touches within each room to give it character. Like right near the bar area, just in the wall, three or four gold racks had been placed and a few newspapers were hanging. Coming from the restrooms, there were two huge mirrors placed on either side of the wall; so, when you stood there, it was as if your person went on forever. My son called it the infinity mirrors. Near the end of this post, I will post a pic that I rarely ever do for restaurants. I will post you a picture of the bathroom! They were so cool! They have the old fashioned, wood grain, Barclay Victorian style toilets. It looks like it’s right out of the scene in Godfather II. The ceilings had copper tile, and the time and attention they put into ever detail shows.

They have several locations within the Atlanta area. We had been to the Peachtree Street location many years ago and loved it. This might, we were at the Ashford-Dunwoody Road location. For more information, check out their website here.

Tuesday’s Treats #101

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DePalma’s Italian Cafe

Location: Dacula, Ga

We have been to the location in Athens years ago, but this was our first visit to the new Dacula location. The atmosphere is really cool, and the staff is friendly.

We ordered breadsticks, Caesar salad, chicken Alfredo, lasagna and pizza for our part of five. We were sure we’d have to-go boxes to take home; yet, these were all items we wanted to try.

They, also, brought “house bread” tot he table before the meal; so, we had plenty of bread and carbs! Ha ha. The house bread was homemade Italian, served with a olive oil/balsamic dish to dip. The balsamic definitely has a tangy kick, but it was delicious. I could have eaten the whole plate as my meal.

The breadsticks can be made with meatballs and opinions or spinach and onions, but we just opted for cheese. These were fresh made and delicious as well. As I mentioned before, this was a lot of bread; so, I was trying to moderate myself. The Caesar salad came just in Time, and it was scrumptious. The dressing was just right, and the romaine was crispy and fresh and the Parmesan just right.

Next came out meal that we didn’t think we’d finish because of all we had already enjoyed. My husband and son split the pizza. It was half pepperoni and half sausage, pepperoni, mushrooms and green peppers. As far as pizzas go, I do like a little thicker crust, but it was tasty and definitely worth ordering again. Our oldest and his girl had chicken fettuccine Alfredo with broccoli, and they said each of theirs was good. I had the lunch lasagna (with the salad), and although, it was definitely a different kind of lasagna than I’m used to, with its spinach, ricotta cheese and a small bit of meat all topped with bread crumbs, it was still delicious. Surprisingly, I ate the whole serving.

Yes, we did have a bit of leftovers, but not as much as I expected. I’d have to say, I have a few other favorite italian restaurants, but this one is pretty good. We’ll probably be back again.

To find out more, you can check them out online.

Tuesday’s Treats #100

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Roost

Location: Greenville, SC

This is a great lunch venue right in the heart of downtown Greenville. It has a great atmosphere and friendly staff. The menu is a bit limited, but what they have is delicious. Our crowd got burgers and fries, chicken fingers and the salad bar. The burgers were great. The chicken fingers were tasty; although, the breading was a little too thick and crunchy.

The salad bar is absolutely filling and amazing. Everything is fresh and delightful from the three choices of greens, two cheeses, a plethora of other veggies, bacon, cranberries, and croutons, etc. The dressings appear to be homemade, and that’s just the start. Included in the bar are two soups and three choices of flatbread pizza. The soup I chose was tomato basil bisque: scrumptious. They also had vegetable beef. The flatbreads were plain cheese, fresh pepperoni, and spinach and mozzarella. The cheese was more like cheese bread. The pepperoni was very tasty, and if you like spinach on your pizza, I’d say you’d probably like this one, too. I wasn’t much a fan, but it’s not really my preference.

If you’re ever planning to stay in downtown Greenville, check out the Hyatt, connected right next door, and adjacent to that is Kilwins. You can go there for dessert!😉 Roost does serve breakfast and dinner as well; so, it’s incredibly convenient to have this right next door to your hotel, and the NOMA square, in which it is housed, is really cool. Here is their website to find out more.