2018: A Year in Review

When 2018 started, we didn’t expect anything grand. Of course, like every year, I was hoping it would be a happy one filled with adventures…but I didn’t expect an out-of-state move, that’s for sure!

But let’s rewind and have a look at the last 12 month, from a very foodie point of view, of course. 🙂

JANUARY

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• The kitties celebrated 9 years with us, and turned 11. With a traveling husband, I turned into a crazy cat lady, and set up a full on birthday party with balloon, costumes, all their stuffed babies and…cupcakes.
• A kind friend of mine let us borrow her raclette grill and made us realize this was the perfect fun meal, especially considering all of Jeff’s food restrictions. Cheese and meat galore.
• I went to Hugh Acheson’s book signing with our friend Brendan. I was so star-struck, I didn’t ask or say anything smart. You can read more about my experience here.
• I re-made one of my favorite recipes using the Instant Pot. It quickly became my most popular post of 2018: The Bottom Round Roast Revisited for the Instant Pot.

FEBRUARY

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• We went to Taco Bell and I tried a Crunchwrap Supreme for the first time and it was life-changing. I’ve been wanting to make my own ever since.
• On Valentine’s Day, my kind traveling husband sent donuts from Dutch Monkey Donuts to my workplace. He sure knows the way to my heart. 🙂

MARCH

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• We hosted a Retro Dinner Party, inspired by my Retro Cooking blog series. I had a blast preparing the various vintage dishes and I absolutely loved that our friends actually took the time to dress up in a vintage manner for the event.
• We celebrated 9 married years and I made a gluten-free dairy-free replica of our wedding cake to share with my husband.
• I celebrated my 32nd birthday with an amazing feast at Nakato Japanese Restaurant…and ate all the delicious sashimi!

APRIL

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• During my spring break. I met my husband who was consulting in Michigan. After a short but painful food poisoning event, we were able to enjoy the Ford Museum. Of course, my favorite part was the vintage diner we had lunch in. During the same week, we also traveled to Toronto where we drank the best sake selection ever. We ate, we explored, we were great tourists. We ended the week in Detroit as, of course, we ate more sashimi and explored the art museum.
• I ended the month with a fun food event with my foodie adventure buddy, Anays as we explored the Best of Brookhaven event and ate ALL THE FOOD!

MAY

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• In May, we went on one of our regular walks to Holeman & Finch, without realizing it would be a life-changing one. On that specific night, they had a seasonal dish of heirloom tomatoes with aioli, toasted brioche and micro-greens. While I may not be a believer, this is the closest thing I’ve ever had to a religious experience. I still think about it now and wish I could have this dish every single day of my life. It was pretty much an elevated version of my childhood beloved garden tomato and mayo sandwich.
• During that month, our apartment community hosted a sushi-making night. While I tend to avoid attending events alone, I knew this was a rare opportunity so I went. It was so nice to learn how to roll sushi! I loved it so much, I went on a seaweed roll bender and made every single rolls I could come up with.

JUNE

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• While this was not a foodie moment per-se, seeing Jenna Kim Jone’s comedy show was definitely food-related. I had been listening to her podcast for years and was so excited to drag my friend out of Atlanta, into the unknown Georgia land, to see her live. Anyone familiar with the podcast “Sorry not sorry with Jenna Kim Jones” knows how special food is to her… from their segment “Foodie Call” to “What are we eating this weekend”.
• On our trip to Quebec, I took my husband to his first Quebec National Day (outside of the ones we used to host in Charlottesville)…between the popcorn, local beer and homemade chips, we were both in a very happy place.

JULY

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• After a couple of days visiting Montreal, we went to a restaurant recommended by every single person I asked “Where should we eat in Montreal?”…Vin Papillon. We ate such delicious local food. Thank goodness the Canadian dollar was lower than the US one because we got almost everything on the menu and regretted nothing.
• As we returned home, I had a few places I wanted to check off my Atlanta bucket list. Thankfully, my adventure buddy Anays agreed to go to The Varsity with me to try ALL THE FOOD! We tried the chili cheese dog, chili cheeseburger, chili cheese slaw dog, onion rings, fried peach pie, frosted orange and peach iced tea…and somehow didn’t die.

AUGUST

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• I visited Texas for the first time as we went to our friends’ wedding. Of course, this was an occasion to eat too much (everything is, indeed, bigger in Texas). We ate an insane amount of BBQ at Hard Eight Pit BBQ, and the best Cuban crispy pork at The Latin Pig. I couldn’t resist stopping by In & Out before heading home, as I didn’t know when I would get a chance to try it again. The rumors are true, that place is awesome and they hold the title of favorite fast-food burger in my book.
• As we learned we’d be moving, I needed one more adventure day at Ponce City Market. I finally tried two places I’d been dying to go to: cronuts from Five Daughters Bakery and cookie dough from Batter.

SEPTEMBER

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• As we learned/decided we were moving to Brooklyn, my first thought was to make a list of our favorite restaurants to make sure we’d tried them all at least one more time. The list included Taco Mac, Mirko Pasta, Holeman & Finch, Empire State South and 26 Thai Kitchen.
• At the end of the month, we finally moved to Brooklyn NY. It was quite an adventure, the kitties took a plane for the first (and hopefully last) time. We settled into our corporate apartment and started to explore our new city. Of course, this included eating too much and doing my best to make healthy and appetizing meals with the very limited kitchenware available in our temporary apartment.

OCTOBER

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• I started a new job at a fun preschool. While I thought I would enjoy the time in-between jobs, I quickly felt the need to look for a new school and, thankfully, found a great one.
• When our friend Mo visited from Atlanta, we decided to meet up at Junior’s Restaurant where we shared the most epic cheesecake milkshake.
• The rest of the month was mostly apartment search and exploring a variety of neighborhoods to find our permanent (well, more permanent than a 2-month apartment) home.

NOVEMBER

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• The biggest event of November was moving in our new apartment. Of course, I spent more time organizing the kitchen than anything else. It was such a blast to set up the place where I knew I’d spend most of my home time.
• We celebrated our first Thanksgiving in our new home. While we definitely didn’t need a feast since it was just for the two of us, I used it as an excuse to test out my new kitchen. It definitely passed the test and I know I will continue to enjoy cooking here.

DECEMBER

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• Putting up the Christmas decorations definitely made our new apartment a home. Several things were not set up yet, we didn’t have all of our furniture yet but at least we had our traditional decorations and yummy smelling holiday candles. 🙂
• My dear friend from Atlanta came to visit with her family. We hosted our first Christmas Eve here and I made my favorite buche de Noel to date.
• I convinced Jeff to help me check something silly off my bucket list as I bought a pastry and a coffee from a street vendor and ate it in front of Tiffany’s…just like Audrey Hepburn did in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, expect looking less fabulous than she did. Haha!

MY PROUDEST FOODIE MOMENTS:

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As always, I have no idea what the new year has in store for us. I really do hope to get back in the kitchen and continue to experiment. I also want to be more adventurous with elaborate/complex techniques…I definitely pushed myself to be more patient in the kitchen, but it is still something I want to work on. I also want to try using some of the meat cuts, produce and other items I’ve seen in my neighborhood grocery stores.

I wish you all a wonderful year to come, filled with delicious food, of course! 🙂