Our 2002 Volkswagen Jetta hit 100,000 miles over the weekend! There was a time when we put a ton of miles on the car, especially when it was the only car that Kim and I had between the two of us. These days it mostly sits idle in our driveway, unless Kim and I both need a car that day.

Disregard the check engine light. I was hoping that it would go away soon, since my dad and I recently replaced a faulty coil pack. I guess we are still waiting for the cycle to complete, or there is another problem. The car is running great though and has truthfully had very few problems.

In unrelated car news, check out this ride I was behind earlier in the day.

Both the word Porsche and the numbers 917 are on the back, but I don’t think it looks exactly like the cars on the Porsche 917 Wikipedia entry. Does anyone know what this is?

My wife and I recently had our first sit down breakfast since moving back to Cincinnati. We walked up to The Echo in Hyde Park Square with our seven month old around 10am on a Sunday. Even though it was before the big after church rush, we still found a line out the front door full of groups waiting for an open table in the smaller sized diner. We decided to wait it out and were surprised to find that the line actually moved very quickly. We were seated and had food in front of us by 11am.

Red, White & Blueberries

I ordered the Red, White, and Blueberries off of the summer seasonal menu. This was a croissant French toast bake, topped with fresh fruit and whipped cream, with powdered sugar and syrup. As you can see in the photo above, the portion of French toast was pretty small. That was the only disappointing thing, as it tasted delicious. The thick cut croissant was perfectly crusted on the outside but soft and chewy on the inside. The whipped cream was also excellent, and tasted like it was made from scratch in-house.

Potato Cakes

Since my breakfast was a little light, my wife offered to share her potato cakes with me. These reminded me of some potato pancakes that I made last year for a Oktoberfest party, including the parsley in the mix. I would definitely recommend these as a side to any dish. My wife had them on the side of her omelet, which she seemed to enjoy as well. There are many other things on the menu that I want to try, so we will definitely be back. It is the only breakfast place in Hyde Park Square so thankfully it lived up to our expectations.

Yesterday was Trey’s baptism day down at St. Francis Seraph, the same church Kim and I were married nearly three years ago. He was pretty fussy most of the morning, I think it’s teething related, but once the water hit his head and the chrism oil was rubbed through his hair he immediately calmed down for the remainder of mass. Below are a couple of photos from my mom and the rest can be viewed on her flickr page.

While living in Denver we had Sexy Pizza. And now in Cincinnati we have Naked Pizza. Naked Pizza is a newer chain with the first store opening in April 2006 in a New Orleans building that was formerly flooded by Hurricane Katrina with six feet of water. They currently operate twenty locations across the US and Dubai with many more scheduled to open soon. In fact one will be opening on Colfax Avenue in Denver.

The idea behind Naked Pizza is a healthier pizza, a more natural one. They use meat and cheese raised without hormones or antibiotics. The crust is made “from an Ancestral Blend of 10 grains plus prebiotic agave fiber and probiotics (healthful bacteria like the ones found in yogurt for balance and digestive health) bound by water and made by hand.” It all sounds like a great idea, but is the pizza any good?

Superbiotic Pizza

My wife and I asked ourselves that same questions and decided to place a delivery order through their online ordering system. We were told it would be thirty minutes, but it was actually much quicker than that. So the new shop was already doing things right in my eyes. We ordered the superbiotic pizza with artichoke, spinach, bell pepper, mushroom, garlic, red onion, and cilantro. And we also ordered a custom BBQ chicken pizza, after realizing it was cheaper to make it ourselves than to buy the smokehouse combination.

Custom BBQ Chicken Pizza

The verdict? The pizza is actually pretty good. I wouldn’t say that it is outstanding, but I did thoroughly enjoy it. It is hard to find a pizza with as many vegetables on it as the superbiotic, which we really liked. The BBQ chicken pizza was pretty good, but could have used possibly another ingredient. We added pineapple to the hickory-smoked BBQ sauce, onion, and chicken. Next time I would consider adding some jalapeno to spice it up even more.

Having lived in Kansas City for a number of years, I still get a craving for good BBQ from time to time. While it’s true that I don’t eat brisket or ribs, I do enjoy smoked chicken, turkey, and even pulled pork. In Denver we had Moe’s to satisfy our BBQ cravings, and now that I’m back living in Cincinnati at least I have City BBQ. There are a few other BBQ places around town that I would like to try, but it is nice to find a convenient go-to place that gets the job done when needed.

Pulled Chicken Sandwich Platter

On this visit to the Hyde Park location I went with the pulled chicken sandwich, which comes with two sides. I choose mac & cheese and baked beans. They claim that their beans have chunks of brisket in them, but I found no such thing. They were still a great combination of smokey with just a hint of sweetness. The mac & cheese was also good, but next time I would have to mix up the sides. Half of the fun of going to a place like this is trying all the sides, which there are many.

Special Platter

The serving sizes are huge, especially the sides. The pulled chicken is very good and there are a variety of sauces to sample from sweet to spicy and even mustard based. My wife ordered some sort of special that they had going that day with pulled pork, spicy sauce, jalapenos, and sweet vinegar slaw on top of a thin corn shell. I didn’t have any of it, but she said it was good. It would be hard to go wrong with such a flavorful dish, but I think the real deal here are the sandwich platters.

Here are a few photos from my DSLR camera from our recent vacation in and around Virginia Beach. Included are the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel and the USS Wisconsin. We have additional photos on another camera that I will get online sometime soon.

Virginia Beach on Dwellable

While on vacation in Virginia Beach I had a couple of good dining experiences. I found most of the food on the boardwalk to be average at best, but one day my wife and I stumbled into Side Street Cantina just a block or two off of the boardwalk on 11st Street. I have to admit that I’m not much of a seafood eater, so perhaps that’s why I had my best dining experience in a Mexican style restaurant.

The service inside Side Street Cantina restaurant was very quick and efficient. Within seconds of sitting at our table, a server quickly dropped off a basket of chips along with two different sauces. First was a standard but freshly prepared salsa. The other sauce was a secret white sauce that I was not such a fan of. The sauce was a little too sweet for my tastes. I almost took them up on their table side prepared guacamole, but my wife and I decided to keep our lunch on the lighter side.

Lunch Chimichanga

Again keeping our meal light, we both ordered from the lunch menu. I went with the chimichanga, which is a fried burrito that I had filled with chicken, then smothered with nacho cheese and red sauce. The menu indicates it is served with rice and beans, but I opted to have it with a side of guacamole instead. The guacamole looked much too good to pass up on completely, and it was really good. The chimichanga wasn’t as deep-fried as most of the others I have had from other restaurants, but the cheese sauce on top added a nice element that I’m not used to.

My wife put together a lunch combination plate of a quesadilla and a chile relleno. We made a bad assumption that the chile relleno would just be cheese filled, and instead it came filled with beef, which neither my wife or I eat. We were too hungry to complain though, so we just dug the meat out and enjoyed the very spicy shell of the relleno. I also received a free taco for checking in on Foursquare, which could have been the highlight of the meal for me. They have a rather large section of the menu dedicated to tacos, as they should.

I should  also mention that the margaritas were also good. They weren’t too sweet or too sour, just right in the middle. They were more refreshing than anything. Overall we had a great dining experience and will definitely return should we be back in Virginia Beach in the future.

Starting last Thursday with The Decemberists show, my string of late nights rolled through the weekend including last night when John Butler Trio stopped at the Madison Theater in Covington. I expected the show to be over around 11 but the band was clearly enjoying themselves with a packed house in a smaller venue and didn’t stop playing until 11:45! It turns out the Madison Theater doesn’t really have a curfew, which I’ll have to remember for future shows.

Before I comment on their set, I should mention the opening set from Mama Kin, who happens to be John Butler’s wife. Her brother is Nicky Bomba, who is the current drummer for the John Butler Trio. And another brother, Micheal, was playing keyboards for Mama Kin. So it was a big time family affair, with lots of guest musicians throughout JBT’s set.

Though there was no guesting during Mama Kin’s set, the three musicians on stage during the set were constantly changing instruments. All of them were very talented and they warmed up the stage so well. I have actually rarely seen an opening band be so widely accepted by the audience. By the end of the set they had the entire crowd singing along on their catchy tune “Beat and Holler.”

After a lengthy set change, the John Butler Trio took the stage between 9:15 and 9:30. The crowd didn’t skip a beat and the energy was really high. I have praised the technical skills of not only John Butler but the other members of his band many times on my blog, and last night was no exception. I brought along a friend of mine for his first JBT experience and he was very impressed. John played the first few songs all on his modified 12 string guitars, before he eventually settled into the first song of the night on lap-steel, “Treat Yo Mama,” which also featured upright-bass.

Other highlights of the night included the always amazing solo instrumental performance of “Ocean” as well as a bluegrass intro that fed right into “Better Than.” I also really enjoyed hearing “One Way Road,” “Revolution,” and the other tracks from the latest album, April Uprising. I have only heard these songs one other time live, which was at last year’s Red Rocks show, which was actually just officially released last month as Live at Red Rocks.

The night ended with a rocking version of “Close to You” with all members of the trio participating in a superb drum solo. It was great to see them play in such a small venue where every seat seems close to the stage. It really did seem like the band liked it too, though I’m sure they will love their second headlining appearance at Red Rocks in a couple of days, which is like 8 times the size of the Madison Theater. Be sure to catch them if you can.

All week I was trying to find someone to go to The Decemberists and The Head and the Heart concert at PNC Pavilion that took place last night. Finally I found out that a couple of my friends from high school were indeed going, so I made plans to attend the show with them. They had VIP tickets, which allowed us access to a private area with discounted drinks and food along with pre-show entertainment. Around 8pm I headed inside the pavilion to watch the opening act, The Head and the Heart. You may know them from their recent track “Lost In My Mind,” which was played during their short half hour set.

The Head and the Heart are a six piece band featuring violin and piano in addition to the standard guitar, bass, and drum combination. Three of the members provide soaring vocal harmonies, which is the major highlight of their show. All members of the band were very energetic and you could tell that they were enjoying themselves. They closed their set with a great version of “Rivers and Roads,” and then all members of the band stayed on stage to tear down their own gear. It is always neat to see a band on the rise, and they did not disappoint.

Thirty minutes after The Head and the Heart had finished their set, The Decemberists took the stage. After the first or second song front-man Colin Meloy apologized to the audience for his strained vocal chords. I thought he sounded fine, but he must have been in a fair amount of pain. Their concert tonight in Indianapolis was canceled because of this. Missing from the lineup was  Jenny Conlee who is undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer. She plays hammond organ, accordion, melodica, piano, keyboards, and harmonica. Filling in was Sara Watkins of Nickel Creek on fiddle and vocals.

With these issues with the lineup, I still thought that they sounded really good. “Down By the Water” came very early in the set and sounded great. Also played were “The Rake’s Song,” “O Valencia!,” and “This Is Why We Fight” to name a few. Other than the missing accordion on some of the tunes, they all sounded great. Nate Query on bass was especially good. My only problem with the show came when the band finished their set in under an hour! They returned to play a two song encore including Leonard Cohen’s “Hey, That’s No Way to Say Goodbye” and then that was it.

I’m sure the vocal strain had something to do with the shortened set, and possibly the lack of energy from the crowd. I noticed that everyone was sitting in one of the three front sections. Or maybe the were too hot in their suits that they were wearing on stage in the dead of summer. Whatever it was that caused them to have an early departure also seemed to bring the band down. At times it seemed as if they were just going through the motions and that’s unfortunate. I hope that I just caught them on a bad night, but I don’t know if I will spend too much money going out of my way to see them again.

Here is a set of photos from our day spent in Delaware. We drove to Rehoboth Beach (through Milton) from Hagerstown, Maryland in the morning/afternoon. Later that night we stayed in Seaford before driving the next day to Virginia Beach.

Delaware on Dwellable