Birthday celebrations

Since you only turn 30 once, my birthday weekend in August turned into quite the celebration!

It began Thursday with girls night dinner.  It's a tradition that we go out for each girl's birthday in our group, and it's one of my favorite things to do.  For mine this year, we went to Evo Bistro, one of my favorite restaurants in McLean.  The menu is full of small plates, inspired by France, Morocco, Spain and Italy with a great wine list.

We had just learned the night before that one of our close friends was pregnant, so the awesome manager gave us both a bottle of Prosecco and a bottle of sparkling juice for her!

What a great way to start the celebration weekend.

Friday was my actual birthday, and it was a great day.  First, I received this adorable picture message from the 2 cutest kids in Florida.  They are my bff's little ones, and they had a special message for me :)

I spent the afternoon going to Dogfish Ale House for lunch and to see Ted with one of my close friends in town.  We'd been trying to go see the movie for months - what a great time to go!

Once M got home from work, we headed over to Columbia Pike to check out one of the hottest new bars in town, TNT.  It was opened earlier in the summer by the EatGoodFood group, which is the same people who own Eamonns, speakeasy @PX and Virtue Feed & Grain in Alexandria.

Owner Todd Thrasher has a very cool cocktail list, full of both his creations and some favorites of his from mixologist friends around the country.  I love watching good bartenders, and this is a great place for that.  Their specially designed work station centered in an open square bar provided fantastic entertainment.  And the drinks were quite tasty too!

After trying a few cocktails, we headed downtown to the Dupont area and Boqueria.  Inspired by tapas bars and markets in Barcelona, I knew we were going to love this place.  It's named after the big market in Barcelona that we visited last fall.  We ordered lots of tapas and enjoyed every bite - it was a fun little getaway back to Spain for dinner - I can't wait to go back.

Saturday morning I was told to be dressed by 10:15am.  I had a bit of an idea of what we were doing that day, but had left the planning up to MB...and he blew me away!  

At 10:15, I heard a cork pop on the back deck, and 2 of our close friends arrived...and a few minutes later, so did our neighbors.  At 10:30 after a glass of bubbly on the deck, I was told it was time to go...and walked outside to find a stretch limo in front of our house, and another close friend waiting with it! The girls had balloons lining the sidewalk and had decorated the inside of the limo, complete with a photo banner of me growing up and a great music mix.

We were off for a day of Virginia wine tasting!  Our first stop was La Grange. We had never been there, but had talked about it for years, so I was excited to check it out! 

We did the tasting outside under a tent, and luckily the rain held off for us.  The we grabbed a couple of bottles and a picnic table to enjoy some meats and cheeses that M had brought with us!

Our second stop was Pearmund for another tasting...

And birthday cake!  The surprises just kept coming :)

What a fantastic weekend to celebrate my birthday.  Spending the day at wineries with some of my favorite people - couldn't get much better.

The only thing better than photos is video.

#OMG30

Final few things from Barcelona

Well, I've covered a lot of the highlights of our trip, but I have a few more things I want to share - I'm going to recap them in one big post for you here - and then we'll be finished with Barcelona!

Tuesday morning of our trip, we met our tour guide from Runner Bean Tours at Plaça Reial and he took us on a walking tour of the Old City.  At first, we kind of rolled our eyes because he totally had the 'annoying tour guide' look, but he was really great.  The microphone speaker box that he wore was humorous, but really came in handy in some of the crowded squares.  It was better than not being able to hear him!

We visited several squares, walked through the old Jewish Quarter (El Call), the Roman City and the Medieval city.

This was in the cloister of the Barcelona Cathedral, also known as La Seu. 

The tour lasted about 2.5 hours, and our guide Gorka was great.  The Runner Bean Tours are free, you pay what you think the tour is worth.

One afternoon we took the cable car up to the top of Montjuic.  It's a small car that you ride all the way up to the old military fort, Castell de Montjuic.  

The views of the city from the cable car were really fantastic.  You could see from the water to the mountains.

We didn't go into the Castell but walked around the grounds, admiring the views of the city and the port.

Tapas 24 was one of our other favorite restaurants.  It's is the least formal restaurant of popular Barcelona chef Carles Abellan.  The line was to the end of the block when we walked up.  Inside is tiny and was packed - we were lucky to get a table outside on the sidewalk - lots of space, beautiful evening and great people watching.

Please excuse the blurry photo below, but I had to include this one.  So, with the tapas style, we ordered several different things - the bikini is wonderful.  It's a ham and cheese sandwich with black truffle oil.  Yes please.  Also their tomato bread was delicious - everything was!  These were the best.  We saw 'ribs' on the menu, and all 3 of us jumped to them...mom was very hesitant.  A plate with a huge mound of these came out...they were delicious!  Mom wouldn't try them, and claimed they were rabbit.  Not believing her, we asked the waitress.... 

And yes, they were rabbit ribs.  She almost lost it while M, dad and I finished them off - yum!

If you visit the Gas-tron-o-my and Gourmet Traveller blogs, there are some great photos of the food.

We took a day trip on Thursday out to the Montserrat Benedictine Abbey.  It's about an hour northwest of Barcelona by train.  There are 2 ways to get to the top - the cable car, below, or the little train.  Mom and dad took the train while M and I took the cable car.  Straight up.   

It's a beautiful place.  We tried to get there in time to see the boys choir, but it was like sardines crammed into the sanctuary - we could kinda hear and see them, but from very far away.  It was really beautiful, from where we were.  The sing every day at 1pm for about 10 minutes.

We also saw the black Virgin, which is one of the main sights at Montserrat.  There's a long line that runs along the side of the sanctuary from back to the front where the Virgin sits over the alter.  Legend has it that the abbey was built around the statue because the monks weren't able to move it.


We had a fantastic time in Barcelona.  It was a beautiful city with so much fantastic food and lovely people.

Friday morning we got up and packed our things, hugged my parents goodbye and took a train to Montpellier, France for a week together in Provence!

Bistronomics in Barcelona

Throughout our week in Barcelona, we had some fantastic meals.  Sunday night's was truly one of my favorites.  I wanted to tell you about a couple of our other meals that were great!

There's a trend in Barcelona called bistronomics - it combines the casual, traditional feel of a bistro with the fancy and modern food of gastronomia.  The word also refers to a more economical approach to fine dining.  The restaurants are small and discrete, with very little attention paid to decorations and design of the space.  

Monday at lunchtime, after our tour of Sagrada Familia, we headed over to Gresca.  Many of these restaurants have a set menu in addition to their regular menu.  At Gresca, the menu was 3 courses for only 18 euros.  It is a fantastic way to have a big, fancy, delicious lunch at a reasonable price!

source

Everything was amazing - one after the other, beautiful dishes came to our table.  There were 2 options for each course, and M and I ordered one of everything so we could try it all.  The menu was in Catalan, which we don't speak at all, but the waitress was very helpful.  Between my Spanish and her English, we had no trouble understanding everything.

Bacon wrapped calamrai with a tomato puree on the bottom...to die for.

Traditional French pate of pigeon (totally freaking mom out at this point...)

Halibut and lamb meatballs with polenta...those were amazing.

The deserts were very different, kind of a cold yogurt texture.

Thursday night, our last night in Barcelona, we had the first reservations of the evening at 9pm at Embat.  It was just a few blocks from our apartment, which was a perfect walk.

Very small and unassuming, this restaurant is easily missed on the street if you're not looking for it.  It's one of the newer bistronomia restaurants in the city.

We each did the tasting menu 1, but I substituted the lamb shoulder for the pigeon....I didn't think I could do a whole plate of it.  I tasted M's, and that was enough.  It was good, but a little gamey for my taste.  It has more of a beef consistency than chicken.  The lamb was delicious, and a good choice.  Everything was fantastic.

I was too busy enjoying the food (and was completely tired of taking pictures) that I didn't take any of the dishes...you'll just have to use your imagination or visit Embat!

A lof of people ask where we find our restaurants - my husband is the master travel planner.  For these 2, he found them on the websites 60 by 80 and Chowhound.  Also, when I googled Bistronomia in Barcelona, the first link that came up was for a great article from 2008 in the NY Times travel section - check it out here.