Family Adventures: Suckers for a Theme

We went to the Village Cup for dinner on Friday night. They are holding a year-long promotion entitled Routes of America, featuring a specials menu each week representing a different area of the country. Each month, in fact, has its own sub-theme. February's is musical cities, beginning this week with Nashville. My Wife and I are both suckers for a theme so we both ordered the fried chicken special. The restaurant is a bit expensive for a weekly visit but we may keep our eye out for particularly intriguing regions. Next week is Chicago, My Wife's longtime home. We're genuinely curious as to what they see as Chicago cuisine. Pizza? Brats?

The fried chicken, unfortunately from my perspective, was not quite what one would expect. I'm a purist. Southern fried chicken should look like this:


Photo via STARCH: a gastroblog

Instead, this was a boneless breast cutlet. It was well cooked, I suppose, but it didn't quite do it for me - more what one would expect from German cuisine, rather than US southern. I didn't try the peas underneath - not my vegetable of choice - but My Wife thought they were undercooked. Specials are chancy by nature. My usual order at The Village Cup alternates between the burger and the duck confit panini and both are excellent. It's worth taking a chance on something else once in a while. We'll be back.

Friday night's broomball game was a lot of fun, though yet another 2-1 loss. The ice was much choppier than it was for our past two games - ideal. I played wing for most of the game and really enjoyed it, even got a couple of decent shots on goal. I did my best to plant myself in front of their goal for rebounds. It really made them nervous, too. I got to feel notorious - always fun. It was the Blue Liner's maiden voyage with his new broomball shoes and the report was positive. I did pick up a helmet from Play It Again Sports on Saturday, on sale for half off. Shoes are next for me.

Saturday was mainly a shopping day for me - comic book shopping! We all headed to Earth Prime Comics in Burlington. In size, Earth Prime is closer to the small, Big Planet Comics (DC) end of the scale than the enormous, That's Entertainment (Worcester) end. For all of the many knocks on Worcester, Mass., That's Entertainment is spoiling me for comic shops elsewhere. Earth Prime has a decent selection, though, and they've recently rearranged their space and things are easier to find. They don't seem to carry manga anymore, though. Barnes & Noble had quite a broad selection but unfortunately not the title I was seeking. Between the two stores, I was able to find some excellent treasures.


Follow Up: Honey Tasting

Shannon Lewis, co-host of the A-Z Challenge, asked to hear more about last week's honey tasting, particularly about tasting the pollen. I thought I'd post my response for the benefit of all:

The pollen itself was quite bitter - not unpleasantly but also not the sort of thing you'd eat by the handful. The point though, was that even tiny, individual pellets were subtly different from one another, ultimately accounting for the variety of flavors in honey. To me, this begged the question as to how commercially produced honey managed to achieve such consistent flavor. Our tasting hostess suggested that it's likely a result of blending honey from various sources, but in fact they might not actually be as consistent as you'd think.


A-Z Update



My Wife has signed up for the A-Z Challenge. She's #496 on the list. Head on over and give her some encouragement at...

Wikes! Hikes on the Long Trail

Evidently Mock and Mrs. Mock are in, too, though I don't know if they've signed up yet:

Mock - Stay on Target...
Mrs. Mock - Exclamation Point (!)