The Obligatory Thanksgiving Post

Thanksgiving is always a weeklong event - inspired by food, friends and usually lots and lots of wine:

This Thanksgiving week began with a trip to Thai Suan Thip, just another stop on my Tour de Thai Pittsburgh. Here is my review that I posted on Yelp:

"Small, quaint and cozy - this restaurant has a very homey, comfortable feel to it. It was a great spot to find peace on a snowy, slushy, rainy and cold winters evening.

The Tom Yum lemongrass soup was soothing and spicy, I ordered mine at a four, and while I'm a big fan of spice, the soup would have been better for me at a two or three. For my entree I ordered my staple dish at a Thai restaurant - Pumpkin Curry. The flavors of this dish were awesome and the spice level four worked well as I was able to cut the hot and spicy with the rice. The only dish I was slightly disappointed with was an appetizer of pineapple fried tofu. The description on the menu was deceiving, I thought the pineapple would play a roll in the actual fried tofu - instead we were served some bland fried tofu pieces with a pineapple dipping sauce. The sauce was tasty, but the appetizer as a whole...eh.

The service was...okay. Luckily I was out for a leisurely dinner and wasn't in any hurry as there there was only one person working the floor.  Though the restaurant is relatively small, there were quite a few people out dining for a Tuesday night. Plus with the place being a BYOB, having my own bottle of wine at the table eased any neediness from servers. Food came out slowly, but as I mentioned before, I wasn't in any hurry and it was a nice easy tempo for a relaxing dinner with a friend. The server was actually quite attentive despite being the only one there, he came around often to refill out waters and orchestrated the pace of serving well.

All in all, great place. I will most definitely be back. Happy to find a Thai place relatively close to home."

So that was fun. I always love good food and great company - got to catch up with my good friend Lisa. Here is her hiding behind her water glass as I tried to take her picture:

I'm sure she'll appreciate me posting that pic in this blog.

And here is the really delicious red wine that we had:

Moving right along to Wednesday, Meghan visited me at lunch for some Starbucks and a hello hug. And I got my birthday present from her :-) A purse that I spotted when shopping with her in NYC at this great little boutique in SOHO near her work - I wish I could remember the name of it because it was so adorable with such cute fun shopping.

After work, the feasting began at #buckoskitchen. It was Stephanie's birthday - which naturally means Tapas and champagne:

Some of the above ^^ Braised octopus, croquis st jacques, shrimp scampi, meat and cheese.

Shrimp and Conch Ceviche!

Stephs dad is just such a fantastic cook. 

Now, these aren't our best, but here's some pics of the group:

Love Annas face ^^

Happy 27th Stephanie!!

Now, sad but true - I have no pictures from the Thanksgiving feast! My family is pretty traditional in that we had a turkey, mashed and sweet potatoes, boiled carrots with butter, cranberry sauce - homemade AND from the can (that's sort of one of my guilty pleasures - cranberry sauce from the can), and a few other traditional dishes, pumpkin pie - the works.

Eating, followed by football and a sad loss for the Steelers to the Ravens- you win, Brian, you win...

Friday involved a little Black Friday shopping locally, and a disappointing dinner at Butcher and the Rye in downtown Pittsburgh. Had been wanting to try the place for a while...and, well, not sure how soon I'd be back. Possibly more on that later.

Saturday involved a lot of the couch and necessary homemade noodle soup:

Which went along nicely with a great Penn State win against Wisconsin.

Sunday was a morning/early afternoon at the Strip and a bloody mary brunch at Six Penn Kitchen - followed by lots of cooking - recipes with which I will share later. #cookingistherapeutic

For now, goodnight, and goodbye thanksgiving week 2013 - I am thankful for you and all the time you give me for friends, family and food.

happy cooking, happy birthday, happy hanukkah, happy thanksgiving.

xo, cheers, namaste.

MK