Portsmouth, NH

After grabbing a bite at the hotel's complimentary breakfast we hit the road to Portsmouth, NH. When we ate at Myers & Chang our waitress gave us some great recommendations and our first stop was one such. Strawberry Banke Museum has 42 buildings representing the span from 1695 to 1950. There are houses to tour inside, pretty gardens, and a WWII era grocery store.

 Pretty fancy dog house!

Here is the WWII era grocery store exhibit. It was so cool!

One of the houses had a demonstration of hearth cooking. The guide, Joe was super knowledgeable, entertaining and talked about food and cooking in general during colonial times. That was probably my favorite place there. Here he is making Indian slapjacks. You can see the chicken on the string in the back. It was kind of like a colonial rotisserie. You wind the string from the top down and let it go and do this about every 5-10 minutes.

We also visited an early Masonic Lodge and museum in one of the buildings.

There were a few actors dressed up in Colonial clothes that you could talk to. I was nervous to talk to them for some reason but we did chat with one lady and it wasn't so bad.

I want this bedding:

Where wooden casks, buckets and barrels are made. We missed the demonstration but it still looked cool.

We wandered around for many hours here and it was definitely a highlight. We had worked up an appetite so we got sandwiches at The Works coffee shop downtown. Really good food and all natural stuff, too. We stopped in a few shops in that area and I bought a cute top at a resale store (no sales tax here!).

Then we drove to our hotel, Port Inn. I was a little nervous about the motel-style - you can drive your car right to your hotel door, but this is way nicer than a lot of the places we've stayed in. They have a really nice outdoor pool but it is way too cold here today (mid 50s).

We have relied heavily on www.yelp.com to research restaurants and destinations for this trip. Our dinner selection was no exception - The Green Monkey. I had the pad Thai (big surprise) but it was unlike any pad Thai I have had before. It was different but good and the tofu was prepared nicely. I had a rhubarb mojito with it and it was awesome! Dan got the macadamia nut encrusted mahi mahi with papaya buerre blanc and tahitian vanilla bean risotto (kind of reminded of us rice Krispie treats!). He had a white sangria with that and I loved it, too. I think I would much prefer a white sangria to a red because that's how I prefer wine in general.

Oh! And then Dan ordered a bluberry lemonade drink. It had blueberry stoli and blueberry puree. It was delicious! It came with a little monkey hanging off the edge of the glass.

Finally, we split the fresh rhubarb trifle (rhubarb is in season!): layer of cake, whipped cream, rhubarb custard, sandy pistachio cookie. This was a really memorable meal and I'm so glad we found this place.

Salem and Boston

Our second day in Boston we decided to take a day-trip to Salem. Our first stop was the Salem Witch Museum. It was really cheesy. You go into the main room and a voice from the loudspeaker tells the story of the 1692 witch trials as a series of vignettes light up around the room.

We walked to lunch at the Gulu Gulu Cafe and I had a cheese plate. Dan had a crepe. Nearby there was a Samantha statue:

We walked around Salem some more and saw this awesome ship:

Dan directed me to make a pirate pose:

On our way out of Salem, back to Boston, I got a ginger lemonade and it was so good. I want to remember to get some ginger so I can add it to things. We hung out at the hotel until dinner time. I chose an Ethiopian place in Cambridge, Asmara. The food was FANTASTIC. I got a vegetarian combination and honey wine.

This doesn't really fit in anywhere, but our hotel is near a Target and we went in to pick up a few things. I happened to find my perfect dream comforter for the bed; yellow, gray, and white! It was the last one. I can't wait to put it on when we get home.

Connecticut, Providence, and Boston

Yesterday when we left Philadelphia we headed to Hartford, CT. We intended on going to Abyssinian Ethiopian Cuisine but it when we got there it was closed! Kind of disappointing since we were in the car for a while. We went to a cafe next door and it was dece.

We also intended on going to the Museum of Natural Curiosities and other Oddities but we couldn't find it for the life of us, so we just headed to Providence. It was too bad CT was a bust but Providence is so beautiful! We wandered the neighborhoods and saw a lot of old colonial houses. All of the houses were so gorgeous.

 

 

After our stroll we hit the road to Boston. Okay, this city is awesome. We headed straight to Faneuil Hall Market and found parking (after a while). The weather was perfect for all of the walking we did - sunny, breezy, and cool.

I looked cool on a bridge:

We checked out a cool cemetery and a squirrel came right up to me.

Major props go to Pamela for giving us the heads-up about the Banksy sighting on Essex St. in Chinatown! This was a delight to find.

This child had just fit his whole body into this newspaper stand:

We discovered we look really good in tri-corner hats.

After grabbing our complimentary freshly baked cookie, that our hotel provides, we went to dinner. Myers & Chang was fantastic. The place is really cute and the food was really tasty. Our server, Gigi gave us some awesome recommendations for our Portsmouth stop, which we are really looking forward to.

Dan's Alaskan King Crab with chili and curry and stuff.

Crispy fresh rolls and tofu "steak" on soba noodles with a lemony cilantro sauce.

A couple hours later we got ice cream cones at Toscanini's (butter Heath bar for me, hazelnut for Dan)!

Philadelphia

After sleeping in a bit we checked out and drove into the city for brunch at Sabrina’s. The service was outstanding and the food was even better. I got an egg white omelette with balsamic leeks, strawberries, and goat cheese. It was a unique combination of ingredients but it really worked. Dan got a mountain of pumpkin pancakes with rum raisin pound cake sprinkled on top with peach-molasses syrup and apple-cinnamon butter. I stole quite a few bites but he needed probably six people to help him with it anyway!

Next we visited the Mutter Museum. It was fascinating and disturbing. No photos were allowed so you’ll have to visit or take my word for it.

Our next stop was also in the area; The Eastern State Penitentiary. They had a fantastic audio tour, narrated by Steve Buscemi! This was one of the highlights of our trip - such a fascinating piece of history.

 Al Capone's cell:

Speaking of cells, after our museums we headed back to check into our hotel, Aloft. It's a pretty snazzy hotel that smells like fresh-squeezed orange juice and we got a good deal!

We had planned on going to Amada for dinner but they were booked. A quick search for other tapas places turned up Chick's Cafe and Wine Bar. This dark and cozy place was a superb find. We got some drinks, a couple small plates and three cheeses accompanied by different jams. For dessert Dan and I shared a dark chocolate creme brulee with carmalized bananas as well as French Market beignets with nutella and honey butter to dip them in. FANTASTIC. I wish this place was tucked away in one of our neighborhoods.