A Few of My Favorite Things...

We were totally impressed with the breakfast buffet at our hotel. The restaurant in ME by Melia was called Salt and they had the most elaborate spread I think I've ever seen for breakfast. Everything from custom-made crepes to a fully stocked juice bar! One of the surprising favorites of our group was this seaweed green-looking juice shown here which contained cactus! Strangely delicious (and healthy tasting). Though despite the impossible array of choices, the price tag was high for breakfast. So we turned it into a multi-course meal, enjoying breakfast and then breakfast-dessert to maximize the value at each meal, carrying away orange juice for our mid-day mimosas! Luckily we skipped lunch, or else we'd have been eating all day long!

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The pool water was very pretty to look at in Cancun but much chillier than the ocean! If you can get to the top of any of the hotels in the tourist strip (and it's tough because they are purposely designed to display views that eclipse the surrounding buildings and properties), you can see the whole coastline of the hotel strips is filled with them! Our hotel alone had something like four pools - all on the beach side of the building. It's their winter season over there and tourism is just starting up for the year, so the pools and beaches aren't completely packed just yet. It makes for more privacy but less sampling of the swim-up bar! They also had an on-site DJ who sat in a little grass hut by one of the pools all day long playing thumping dance music... it made me happy we came here early in the winter. You won't find us dancing poolside on Spring Break Cancun 2009!

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We recently got back from a long-weekend getaway, and this picture really sums up the experience for me. It was one of those all-tourist vacations; we didn't try to travel to all the historical sites or explore the depths of the city like we usually do, and it was so relaxing! I'd forgotten how amazing beach vacations can be. And Cancun truly has some beautiful beaches. The surf knocked me over a lot, but it was warm! How very un-North Shore Massachusetts! We had planned the trip in the fall, for a grand birthday celebration/reunion that Jason's friend's wife had arranged, but the timing couldn't have been more perfect. We had gotten engaged the weekend before, and had a glorious few days of sun to celebrate.

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I was trying to remember whether I'd ever heard of "Fisherman's Pie" when making this recipe. So I did a little Internet research and found myself hypnotized by this hilarious (yet highly educational) tutorial on cooking Fisherman's pie. It does exist! It's a seafood variation on Shepherd's pie using Cod - not quite the same as this tunafish pasta bake. I think VideoJug Food & Drink might be my new favorite cooking site now - if only I had a scale to measure ounces! I love how they do the ingredient credits. It's like a little perfectly executed British play.

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I did manage to find a pretty cool looking vegetable while at Russo's though, and I did, of course, what you must naturally do with food you don't understand. I ruined it. It never occurred to me that it might be a good idea to investigate recipes with purple potatoes or to figure out whether they ought to be treated differently than the regular stock. So I sliced and cooked them, and then made the most horrendous-looking warm potato salad (note, it's brown, sludgy overtones were only part of the reason the raw model and not the result made this post). Poh-tay-toe does not, apparently, equal poh-tah-toe. They're a marvelous-looking species, but now, it's time for me to do my homework.

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Several weeks ago, we went on an adventure outside of the city to a place called Russo's Farm in Watertown. We'd heard amazing things about this place - a large, indoor farmer's market with all kinds of weird and unusual food options. We were eager to check it out. By the time we got there (having made a fortuitous pit-stop at the tile store where we picked up some delicately imperfect Mexican tiles long sought for the kitchen) it was getting dark and packed! It being late November, people were beginning to shop for their wreaths and trees, and the aisles of this seemingly large market spaced seemed oh so cozy once you got inside. It was like being in a vegetable labyrinth... we'd plot our course from one end of the market to the next, finding the free corridors, and then quickly tackle it before someone moved back into our lane again! Whenever I paused to take a picture, I received an irritated glare - others were clearly using the same tactic and I was their barricade on a clear path to the cheese counter! Overall, I liked Russo's, but I'd like to go back on a lazy Sunday morning in the summer, when I'm not quite so hungry - or cold!

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