My First Food Tour

A few weeks after moving to Jersey, I got an invite to go on my first food tour. My dear friend The Urbane Epicurean over at Life in the Food Lane http://discovertaste.blogspot.com/ host these regularly. Check out his site.

On July 25th we headed to our first tour - Latin Libations.

Latin Libations was held at Toloache. Toloache is located at 251 W. 50th (bet. 8th & B'way Aves.) in NYC. They serve a contemporary mexican menu. That afternoon we sipped on a variety of Latin Libations and the best Guacamole I have ever tasted. No seriously the best Guac, and I don't even really like Guac.

A few of the drinks from the Libation menu included:
Mojito de Mango - Bacardi Limon/Mint/Fresh Mango
Michelado Picantina - Pacifico/Fresh lime juice/Salted rim/Hot sauce
Toloache- Frida Kahlo Blanco/Hibiscus/Muddled Blueberries/Fresh Lime

My personal fave was the Toloache. I didn't take many pictures, I was enjoying the Libations.








It was a great afternoon. The Urbane Epicurean invited a diverse group of wonderful people. I made a few new acquaintances and tasted a lot of Latin Liquor I liked. Then we stumbled our way back to the train and headed home for an afternoon nap.

I liked this place so much, I took my mom. She came to visit for her 60th birthday and she loves Mexican food.
Here she is flirting with the manager.

So if your in the city check it out. Toloache.

http://toloachenyc.com/media/toloache.html

This post was inspired by an upcoming Food Tour. Check back for that post as well as a post on our last tasty tour of the East Village.

Baby Talk

Guess What? No, I am not pregnant. But I do have new pictures of my clay plant babies. Everyone is talking babies! I went home last weekend only to be interrogated by my entire family. "So when are you going to start?" "Are you preggos now? Your hair looks shiny." " Are you doing a lot of practicing?" Enough already! There will be no baby rush in 2010 or Spring 2011 for that matter.

But I do have new garden updates. I went out-of-town to Connecticut last weekend. I worried during the trip if my seedlings had enough water. I returned home and to my delight the Zinnias and Basil had begun to sprout!

Zinnia Sprouts Yay!!!

Mr. Everything

If you went to school in the Atlanta University Center, this post will be a quick trip down memory lane. The rest of you should be prepared to be amazed. In the heart of the AUC on MLK Drive is a wonderful place called Mr. Everything Cafe. Since we are only 847 miles away, my husband decided to recreate our favorite dish from one of our favorite places. It's Chicken over Yellow Rice topped with EVERYTHING. (Hence the name) He made the first delicious round and then I took to the kitchen a few weeks later to recreate and photograph just for you! Let us begin...

You need the following + 2 boneless chicken breast


Let rice start cooking first. I use a rice cooker. For stove top cooking follow directions on bag.


Next let broccoli steam while cooking the rest of EVERYTHING
(You can also use spinach, corn, kale, or any other veggies you like)

Sow a Seed

Hey ya'll! After lots of debating I finally started blogging. Welcome to The Spicy Lens. I'm sowing a new seed with this blog thing here and I thought this would be good first post. It's spring here in North Jersey, so I thought I'd start a container garden on my deck. Actually, found these little suckers at Target in the dollar section. Only a buck each! So if I kill it, no large loss.


Each pot comes with a small soil pellet the size of a nickel, seeds, and a pot.

Add 3 teaspoons of water and watch it grow like a sea monkey!

My future tomatoes. (fingers crossed)

Looking forward to a summer harvest. Tomatoes, Peppers, Zinnias, Dwarf Sunflowers,Oregano, and I know it is a stretch but Strawberries.

This cute little basil even came with a plastic greenhouse. Which I had to dig out of the trash once I read it was not packaging.

Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary, I sure hope this garden does grow...

Anyone else gardening this spring?