Towson Town Center's Restaurants

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I was invited* to Towson Town Center to take a "tour" of some of their major eateries: TGIF's, P.F. Chang's, Stoney River and The Cheesecake Factory.  Below are some of my thoughts on each place.


Also, Towson Town Center has been having some special events this month, including one on Saturday March 24th from 1-3PM: Cooking Demo and Wine-Pairing Seminar

• Local food and wine expert, Laurie Forster "The Wine Coach," will host a cooking demonstration and wine-pairing seminar.
• Seminars will be held at 1PM, 2PM and 3PM in the Level 1 Grand Court
• Seminars will include table-side sampling (SAMPLES!!!!!), fun raffles, giveaways and retailer offers.

Follow Towson Town on Facebook to keep up with more events.

P.F. Chang's
(Check out my last review of P.F.Chang's from 2009 here)

At P.F.Chang's we were given some items from their Happy Hour menu to try.  Their Happy Hour is Mon-Fri, 3-6pm.  The prices I have included in this section are from that menu.

Chicken Lettuce Wraps 
I hadn't been to a PFC in a while, so I have to admit that I was excited about trying the Chicken Lettuce Wraps ($6) again.  They are still so good.  The chicken concoction mixed with mushrooms and water chestnuts are good alone, but even better when made into a wrap with crisp lettuce.  Yes, of course you can make this at home, but if you're at the mall shopping - this is definitely a nice appetizer to order while sitting at the bar.

Talking about the bar, we tried two specialty cocktails, an Asian Pear Mojito ($6) and a PFX ($6).  The mojito tasted very similar to the regular, but with a slight hint of the pear.  It was nice and crisp.  The PFX is flavored with passionfruit and hardly tasted like there was any alcohol in it, though I am assuming that is a good and bad thing :)  It is supposed to be modeled after the cosmo.  I liked both!


 Crab Wontons
Dan was fan of their Crab Wontons ($5), which are made with a cream cheesy crab filling and served with a plus sauce.  He remarked on how much crab there was in the wontons, and how well they went with the sauce.  If you feel like something fried, and are tired of the ubiquitous eggroll, these might be the thing for you! 
Stoney River

Stoney River also introduced us to some items from their Happy Hour, which takes place from 4-7pm everyday.  There are some seriously good deals:

This menu is solid, especially because it  lasts until 7pm!  It would be so easy to come here for dinner and make a good meal out of these offerings, not to mention with some nice cheap cocktails!  For a drink, ask the bartender to make you a Lemon Iced Tea Cocktail, which is made with Bacardi Limon, lime, sour mix and some iced tea.  If you like Arnold Palmers, this is the drink for you. If you like tea (me), this is for you (me).


We tried and LOVED the Jack Daniel Whiskey Shrimp ($6).  It was so good and SO buttery.  The sauce is made with Jack Daniel's (obv.) and mustard and oh my the little slices of baguettes were just loaded with butter and the sauce and a jumbo shrimp.  Yes please!

We also tried the mountain of Bleu Cheese Chips ($6), and it really was a mountain (though it's hard to tell from this picture). Though blue cheese is not my favorite kind of cheese, once melted it has a mild flavor to it, so I surprisingly didn't mind this at all.  If you love blue cheese, it would be right up your alley, especially because the chips were perfectly crisp and salted. It would be nice if they had other flavors for the non blue cheese lovers.

The Crunchy Ahu Tuna Roll ($7) was also quite tasty, especially when dipped in the accompanying soy ginger sauce.  Sesame seeds and breadcrumbs give the roll its crunchiness.



TGI Friday's
Guinness Stout Milkshake from TGIF (sample size)
There are two new drinks for St. Patrick's Day: the Irish Rita (made with whiskey, sour apple, midori and margarita mix) and the Guinness Stout Milkshake (Guinness with vanilla ice cream and chocolate syrup).  Their Irish Rita was way too sour for my liking, but the Guinness Milkshake was surprisingly tasty, and I don't even like Guinness!

All in all, I am simply not a fan of this place.  The dishes were dirty, the food tasted unhealthy and it's really just not my kind of atmosphere for a restaurant.

Cheesecake Factory
(Check out my review of the Cheesecake Factory in 2008 here)

I am not going to lie, I tried bites of about 12-15 different types of cheesecakes.  This sounds amazing, but after a while I got a bit sick.  THAT'S A LOT OF DAIRY, YOU GUYS!!!!

My personal favorite from the Cheesecake Factory is the Fresh Banana Cream Cheesecake, but of all the ones I tried from that day, I really enjoyed:

• Vanilla Bean cheesecake (layers of vanilla bean cheesecake, vanilla mousse and whipped cream) 
• I liked the simplicity of this, plus it felt light because of the mousse.
• Godiva Chocolate cheesecake (Godiva chocolate cake + Godiva chocolate cheesecake + Chocolate mousse) 
• The addition of cake and mousse in this cheesecake took away the usual heaviness from a chocolate cheesecake.  I loved the rich and dark taste of the chocolate.  
• Dutch Caramel Apple Streusel Cheesecake, pictured (terribly) below (original cheesecake with a TON of baked apples and then topped with some delicious brown sugar walnut streusel topping)  
• I loved this because it was so different.  It tasted more like an apple pie with a little layer of cheesecake.  There's a lot more filling than you would think, which is what really made this cheesecake stand out for me.

The problem is that to get a slice of cheesecake, you have to deal with the outrageous wait for a table because that place is packed ALL THE TIME.  What is up with that?

SUMMARY
The mall is definitely not a place I visit very often, but it was fun to take a tour like this to see the food beyond the food court.  Overall, I loved Stoney River.  Their Happy Hour menu was fun, well-priced and enticing!  I would definitely go back there again! P.F. Chang's happy hour menu was also a great deal, and I especially liked their drinks.  There is no need for me to talk about the appeal of  The Cheesecake Factory, because it's already got that in spades.  TGI Fridays didn't do it for me at all, but you can't win them all!





* I was invited by Towson Town Center, but I was not asked to review, nor was I told what to write.  All opinions are my own (and Dan's!)

Langermann's, Canton

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Dan and I went to Langermann's one evening and what a lovely date night it turned out to be!  The Canton restaurant is in a large open space, with plenty of seating in the dining room and around its large bar.  They even have a nice fireplace which I had the fortune to sit by!  They have valet, but there is also a nearby parking garage and plenty of space in the surrounding parking lot - so suburbanites anxious about parallel parking (or is that just me?), do not fret!


Bread Basket of Dreams
First of all, let's talk about the bread basket filled with two large pieces of sweet cornbread and two buttery biscuits.  Way to know how to win over your diners, Langermann's :)  I knew I was in for a good meal after one bite of that sweet cornbread!

Low Country Louie
Thanks to a Facebook suggestion from Minx, I started off the evening with the Low Country Louie ($10.95) - lobster, crayfish, crabmeat, corn coblets all mixed with creole mayonnaise and served in a Martini glass.  What a lovely introduction to this restaurant!!!  There was no skimping on the seafood in this appetizer - it was full of large pieces of crab and lobster.  Though they had a light hand with the mayo sauce, you still need to like mayo to like this dish, but don't worry about it being spicy.  I thought it was a wonderfully refreshing appetizer, and one that would be welcome in the spring and summer months.

Seared Ahi Tuna
Dan ordered the Seared Ahi Tuna ($23.95) -  jerk seasoned tuna on top of julienned squash, roasted fingerling potatoes and served with a pineapple butter sauce.  He has never ordered seared tuna (served rare) before, but I think this entree alone has made him a convert!  He thought the fish paired excellently with the pineapple butter sauce (don't think of it as a curd, it's chunkier).

Shrimp and Grits
It seemed absolutely necessary for one of us to order the Charleston Shrimp and Grits ($19.95), which is what I always hear about and what our server said is their most popular dish.  Taken from the menu, it's comprised of shallots, tomatoes, andouillie sausage, buttery clam broth, stone mill grits and large pieces of shrimp gently placed on top of the bowl.  They do not play around with their grits.  These were the creamiest/butteriest grits I've ever had, so I was thankful for the salty tomato and clam broth surrounding the bowl.  I loved to get everything on my spoon for one big bite - a piece of shrimp, sausage, grits and broth.  Exquisite.  They do this dish well, no wonder they are so well known for it!

It may not seem like a large bowl, but by golly I could hardly finish the grits!  They were RICH.  I probably would just order an appetizer version of this (if they have it) next time, because it was very filling for me which was the reason why I so sadly had to skip out before dessert.  THIS WAS SO HARD FOR ME TO DO.  I wanted to try their apple pie because the table next to me ordered it and I'm pretty sure the pie was as big as my face.  I WANT TO EAT THAT PIE.

Someday, I will eat that pie.  I am going back, definitely.

They have a Cocktail Hour Mon-Fri from 5-8PM with $5 appetizers, select wines and martinis and beers.  They also have a Sunday Brunch that looks phenomenal for $15.95 for an entree and a drink (mimosa or orange juice) from 10AM-3PM.

Dan and I loved Langermann's - we both highly recommend it for a date, for a group gathering, for happy hour, for a business meeting - for whatever!  You will enjoy it!

Atwater's Ploughboy Kitchen. Mt. Washington

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I was off work one day and was in the mood for a sandwich.  Atwater's Chicken Salad sandwich is usually my go-to for that kind of craving, but for the sake of this blog I decided I needed to at least try something different.  I saw that Atwater's has a location called their Ploughboy Kitchen in Mt. Washington that's literally a couple of blocks away from their OTHER location on Falls Road.  The Kitchen is only open for lunch Mon-Fri, 11AM-3PM. I was so confused that I decided that I needed to investigate the difference between the two.

The Ploughboy Kitchen is located in a business park and the space itself seemed so sterile and so unlike every other Atwater's. I wasn't tempted to stay a while, so I grabbed my sandwich to go instead, which took no time at all because there were hardly any customers.  Apparently, though, this place serves hand pies, unlike the other locations. I wasn't in the mood for a hand pie though, I wanted a SANDWICH.


And a good sandwich I had. 

I ordered half a Winter Roast Turkey ($4.95) Sun-dried tomato pesto, celery root remoulade, cheddar cheese, lettuce and garlic mayo on peasant wheat.  There was a LOT of cheddar cheese which was great, but I wish that the celerey root remoulade was more pronounced.  I also ordered the side salad ($3.95) local field mix, red grapes, pistachios and a balsamic vinaigrette that was very tasty, though quite overpriced.  One gripe - I wish the grapes were cut.  There's something SO annoying about trying to stab grapes with a fork.


In all honesty, I'm not sure I'll ever go to the Ploughboy Kitchen again, especially since the Kenilworth location is closer to me and has a better atmosphere, plus the menu is basically the same.  At least my curiosity was sated though!

A Fun Day in Baltimore County's Country and Soup'R Natural, Parkton

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Soup'R Natural is located in Parkton about 30 minutes away from the Baltimore city center.  I know that's a hard sell for those living downtown, so I decided to create a Baltimore County Country itinerary for you that includes lunch at this lovely restaurant.

Baltimore County Country Daytrip

Why not start your day with some winery tours?  There are a bunch in that area, such as Basignani Winery, Woodhall Wine Cellars and Royal Rabbit Vineyards.  Sure, Maryland isn't much of a wine destination, but it's always fun to visit local wineries and find some new favorites!  Check the Maryland Wine Association's website for any events that are going on in a particular weekend.

When you are ready for lunch, drive to Soup'R Natural and relax after your hours of wine tasting, and perhaps pay for your DD's lunch :)

After lunch, make a quick visit to Gunpowder Bison & Trading Company to see where a ton of restaurants get their bison meat. It's a small little farm, but seeing the bison and looking around the cute little shop is worth it.  When Dan and I stopped in, we ended up getting some ground bison (he uses this recipe to make amazing bison sliders) and some bison sausages.  Of course the meat isn't cheap, in fact we somehow spent $50 in that trip (!), but it sure is delicious.

Head south on York Road for an easy drive back to the suburbs.  Stop in at The Filling Station if you need a cup of coffee, and then, since you probably packed a cooler to store your bison meat, head to Hunt Valley Towne Centre to load up on any foodie delights at Wegman's before taking I-83 back home!

See!  What a fun day that would be!

Crabcake sandwich (foreground) and chicken salad sandwich (background)

Now, onto my review of Soup'R Natural!  

Soup'R Natural is a small restaurant that prides itself on using local meats, eggs, and produce from nearby farms.  It has a very casual farmhouse atmosphere that is great for families as well (my sister brought my niece with us). 

My sister and I split the Chicken Salad Sandwich ($8.75) - Roasted chicken with diced fennel, grape halves and sweet almonds and we both agreed it was one of the best chicken salad sandwiches we had ever tasted.  I loved the crunch of the toasted sweet almonds, and I personally LOVE grapes in my salad, so that made me happy.  It came with regular and sweet potato chips on the side, and the sandwich itself was a nice portion.

My bro-in-law got the Crab Cake Sandwich (Market Price) - served on your choice of bread with Old Bay aioli and capers, which he really enjoyed as well.  Though I didn't try it, it definitely was a good looking sandwich.


For dessert we all split their homemade apple pie with ice cream.  The pie was STUFFED full of sweet apples, and it was quite a crowd-pleaser.

This was a wonderful, comfortable, locally-sourced and family-owned restaurant in a scenic part of Baltimore County.  What's not to love?  Next time, I'll definitely try the soup :)

p.s. Thanks to my brother-in-law for taking some awesome pictures!  If you're into biking, check out the blog he writes for!

REVIEW: Graeter's Ice Cream

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So Memorial Day Weekend is here and I know a number of you plan to host or attend some parties, so let me give you some advice if you are unsure about dessert - find some Graeter's Ice Cream and you're good to go!

Graeter's originated in Ohio, but it started to become well known after it was featured on The Food Network and after someone named Oprah became a fan (see her review here) :)

I was sent four pints of ice cream to try, and I was quite happy to oblige :)  Dan and I hosted a BBQ dinner with our families and we all had a taste test for dessert.

Everyone was pretty excited about this line-up
The flavors they sent me were Vanilla Chocolate Chip, Black Raspberry Chocolate Chip, Chocolate Chocolate Chip and Mint Chocolate Chip.  And when they say chocolate chips they actually mean chocolate fudge chunks! Even directly out of the freezer, these HUGE chunks were still chewy and actually tasted DELICIOUS unlike most other chocolate chips in ice cream which are usually small, hard and bitter. 

The ice cream itself is creamy and luscious, but the chocolate chunks really steal the show. My favorite out of all the flavors was the Chocolate Chocolate Chip.  If you love chocolate, this is THE ice cream for you - it's just pure decadence!  The Vanilla Chip was a perfect original and I could totally see it being an amazing addition to something like this this.   The Black Raspberry tasted like a mild chocolate berry and though it was not my favorite, I still ate it because of the fudge chunks hahaha

Anyway, you bet your boots I'm buying this ice cream again!  I loved it!  So get yourself to Mars, Weis or The Fresh Market and buy yourself a pint!

DISCLAIMER: I was sent four pints of Graeter's Ice Cream to review for free, but these opinions are entirely my own.

Stacy Keibler at Penn Station

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Penn Station: A new more popular Man-Woman Statue
After her recent universally acclaimed Oscar performance as George Clooney's arm candy, Stacy Keibler is now undoubtedly the world's most famous Baltimorean. So what could be a better follow up role than replacement of the reviled Man-Woman Statue in front of Penn Station?


This is a perfect career move. Stacy is often described as "statuesque", with her elegant metallic Oscar winning dress as the perfect "foil". The way she wraps around boy-toy George Clooney is a natural progression from the symmetrical gender intermingling of Borofsky's original sculpture, but Clooney's boring black tux clearly recedes into the background as a fitting reflection of modern culture's increasing female dominance.
While the original Borofsky is sometimes described as a nod to "Soviet Realism", the new revised sculpture would clearly be Baltimore realism, with our beloved Stacy as the real Baltimorean.

Big improvement, right?

Trolley Phase One

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Charles Street Trolley Phase One:
Fixing the Fractured Downtown

A connector (shown in orange) should be built so that the proposed Charles Street Trolley (in yellow) can return southbound to the Inner Harbor via the existing Howard Street light rail line (in blue). A future trolley connector (in green) can extend the system to Harbor East and Fells Point, among other places.


The proposed Charles Street trolley project is unfortunately perceived from some viewpoints as just another expensive project promoted by one downtown faction in opposition to all others, each with their own goals and pet projects.

The most recent example of this downtown infighting was the battle over the new Exelon office building, waged by Harbor East versus the Inner Harbor. Similarly, traditional downtown interests led by Peter Angelos have filed a lawsuit against the massive State Center project, which they see as an economic threat. The battle for West Side interests is to demand attention on the stalled Howard Street Superblock development. To others, the battle is against the perceived Disneyfication of the Inner Harbor, typified recently by the Grand Prix which is seen (among other accusations) as an opportunistic threat which allows downtown to be dominated by a high speed tourist spectacle instead of creating a livable environment for residential growth. The proposed mega-convention center arena is also part of this threat.

Battle of Transit Systems

In this political landscape, the Charles Street trolley project has run headlong into the big political push for the rail transit Red Line. The city government and Maryland Transit Administration have been tepid at best in their support for the trolley because they feel they must summon all their political capital in their uphill pursuit of the multi-billion dollar Red Line. The Red Line alliance is particularly convoluted because it also includes another two billion dollars plus for the Purple Line in Montgomery/PG Counties, as well as support from big highway interests through the common ground push for a big gas/sales tax increase and a firewall to prevent spending it on education or other lip service priorities. Big as the state's proposed gas tax increase is (6% more or roughly double the current rate), it is barely a blip of the many billions all its champions want to spend. Meanwhile, amid this alliance, the city has gone into the transit business against the MTA with their severely redundant Charm City Circulator system, further fracturing the city's transit system.

Of course, most of the parties in all this will claim that they are actually working together, or at least that their alliances overlap one or another. Most of the battles are unspoken or under the radar.

Politics Versus Actual Long-Range Planning

Lost in all this is any real focus on the city's long range. How can all this fit together? The short answer is that it does not. Harbor East is now expanding out onto the Harbor Point peninsula, where it has virtually no subsequent place to go except to keep sapping the strength of the traditional downtown. The Inner Harbor is indeed becoming a Disneyfied sideshow. The West Side Howard Street corridor is nearly dead. Charles Street is keeping its head above water, but while the Charm City Circulator is seen as their liberation from the dreaded MTA, it does not bode well for the transit system as a whole. The MTA itself is a bigger money pit than ever. And the proposed Red Line would not even connect to Baltimore's existing subway.

But in all this, the Charles Street trolley project could actually be repositioned to become the glue to bring all the competing downtown factions together. Unlike the rest of the competing monolithic dinosaur-like projects, the Charles Street trolley could actually be instilled with the flexibility to bring Charles Street, State Center, the West Side, the Inner Harbor and Harbor East together instead of creating collateral friction which is blowing them apart.

The most obvious asset of the trolley project is its visual sizzle. Nearly everyone loves the idea of trolleys - spacious accommodating vehicles lumbering through an appropriately scaled streetscape, with the warm glow of nostalgia for a more civilized time long ago. Baltimore's surface light rail remains photogenic even as it fails miserably, and artist conceptions of the proposed Red Line try to make it look as trolley-like as possible, even though its massive disruptions, regional pretensions and giant price-tag are the diametric opposite.

Yes, buses can functionally do almost anything trolleys can do, and the city's Circulator has indeed appeared to live up to its promise even while the MTA remains clueless about how to attract people to buses. And at a cost in the hundreds of millions for a modest four mile run, the Charles Street trolley is not exactly chump change.

So what we need to do is sharpen the focus of the Charles Street trolley project, to satisfy the objectives which take advantage of its inherent strengths:

1 - Minimize its cost
2 - Maximize its positive influence
3 - Make it the center of an actual coherent consistent set of planning objectives for all of "greater downtown".
4 - Make it a project that all of downtown's fractured factions can believe in and support.

A Trolley Plan Everyone Can Love

Here is a plan that meets all these objectives:

1 - Build the "core" of the Charles Street trolley northbound-only from the Inner Harbor to Penn Station/Station North - only one track, one street, and about half the length of the original plan.
2 - Connect the trolley line to the existing Penn Station light rail spur to enable southbound return travel along the Howard Street light rail line.
3 -  Build a short trolley connection along Pratt and Light Streets from Howard Street to the Inner Harbor.
Existing light rail going under Maryland Avenue bridge. This track would be realigned up to Charles Street to connect to the proposed trolley line. (The new Fitzgerald complex adjacent to the University of Baltimore/MICA light rail station is in the background.)

This would be the first phase of a trolley system that would eventually go to Charles Village. It would also be poised for extensions to many other places such as Harbor East, Fells Point, South Baltimore, Northwood, Carroll Park and wherever (see my many blog articles).

This would give the Charles Street interests the core of what they want, and the momentum to get the rest.

It would also give Howard Street a shot of instant visibility and recognition. Current perceptions are that Howard Street is in another universe from the rest of downtown, but it is actually very close to some of Mount Vernon's major attractions, including the Historical Society, Walter's Art Museum and Antique Row (which would need a new station stop near Read Street).

This would also give added impetus to the State Center project along Howard Street, which is supposed to be based on "transit oriented development", which everyone agrees is good, but has instead become notorious for its questionable financial schemes. Perhaps if State Center had attractive transit access from the rest of downtown and the waterfront, it wouldn't need so much additional financial legerdemain.

Incorporate the Trolley into the Inner Harbor's Reinvention

Perhaps most importantly, building trolley tracks along Pratt and Light Streets in the Inner Harbor would renew the city's commitment to redesign these horribly auto-dominated streets in a civilized manner. This was the city's strategy several years ago, before the Grand Prix came long and pushed the city to quickly repave the streets to accommodate 180 mph race cars, to the detriment of the long term goal of a livable downtown neighborhood.


Early conception of the trolley line between McKeldin Square (left) and the Inner Harbor on existing Calvert Street. A much better idea is to make the trolleys the centerpiece in a totally new street design for the Inner Harbor.

Efficiently accommodating a trolley line on Pratt and Light Streets is a tricky proposition, given the high traffic volumes. Accommodating bikes has also proven difficult, especially for low skill riders, which the city appears to have failed to do in both the current and proposed designs. But it certainly can be done. The city previously earmarked $100 million for the total reconstruction of downtown Pratt Street and its connection to Light Street. Accommodating the trolley line in this plan would get the most bang for the bucks.

Ever since Harbor East beat the Inner Harbor in the Exelon sweepstakes, there has been renewed lip-service to making the Inner Harbor and Downtown into a more "livable" community, but this has flown in the face of the Grand Prix as well as the mega-convention arena plan, and tacky Inner Harbor plans such as the  Ripley's Believe-It-or-Not Odditorium.

Just as a short trolley link between the Inner Harbor and Howard Street would force the various forces to think on the same page, redesigning these streets for livability would also align the various priorities.

A trolley system is also the perfect "vehicle" for creating a strong unified motif between the various parts of Downtown, the Inner Harbor and Harbor East, and emphasizing short-distance travel between them. The proposed Red Line is totally ill-suited to fulfill these objectives, since it would be buried underground with inconveniently burrowed-away station locations, most suited for regional travel such as to the Edmondson Avenue/Social Security corridor rather than short jaunts around downtown.

Such a trolley system would also work better than the Red Line in concert with the existing regional light and heavy rail lines, creating a logical hierarchical system, with far easier connections between them.

All in all, building only a modest piece of the proposed Charles Street trolley as a first phase would not only make it far more affordable, but it would also open up all the opportunities to make the system work for all of the fractured downtown interests which go far beyond Charles Street.

World's Widest Waterfall?

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Inspired by 9/11:
A water feature inside the Highway to Nowhere

It is September 11th. I just turned on the TV and it hit me. In my last post, I asserted that fixing Baltimore's "Highway to Nowhere" will require superior design, as well as creative planning. As great as the wanton destruction which has been wrought there, New York has a far larger and more profound wound to heal at 9/11 Memorial at the World Trade Center Ground Zero.

Baltimore needs the same kind of design vision, and I believe I mean that literally. A water feature that frames the destructive hole in the ground at the Highway to Nowhere ditch would be a compelling way to transform and unify the ditch, turning its blight into a focal point and preparing it for redevelopment. The sound of a waterfall thousands of feet wide would create the perfect "white noise" to aurally mask the traffic and create a soothing urban ambiance.

This photo taken inside the ditch during the half-year Highway to Nowhere closure shows a small piece of the south retaining wall, which could be converted into a waterfall. The up-close view across the grassy median and the eastbound roadway conveys how this scene does not need to be the oppressive environment that it currently feels like from a motorist's windshield or the urban wasteland above.

The world's widest waterfall at Franklin-Mulberry? It's possible. We simply need to unleash our collective creative juices instead of the heavy-handed construction machine that brought us The Highway to Nowhere in the first place, and is now trying to foist the Red Line upon us.

An ode to eggplant

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The end of summer brings tomatoes, zucchini, eggplant... and sometimes all at the same time!  Tonight I cooked up the very last zucchini and picked a few of the tomatoes brave enough to survive the increasingly chilly nights.  But most importantly:  the eggplants are getting their second wind.  Here are my latest favorite eggplant recipes, starting with the amazing pasta concoction Ansu posted this week...

Best eggplant sauce to hit pasta.  Ever.  And this blogger's writeup is really entertaining, too.
http://www.thewednesdaychef.com/the_wednesday_chef/2010/06/francis-lams-letmyeggplantgo-free-spaghetti.html

A delicious garlicky Melitzanosalata.  Thanks Julie and Laura!
http://salmonandsouvlaki.wordpress.com/2012/09/12/my-new-favorite-way-to-eat-eggplant/

My old standby ratatouille recipe from Simply in Season is tasty, but only earns an honorable mention next to these beauties.

Building a dream

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My best friend bet me I wouldn't do it.  Which is fair, because I've been talking about it all of my adult life.  For years I've been dreaming, scheming, sketching up different ways to do it.  The fact that I'm in my mid-thirties and haven't taken any concrete action toward doing it has been weighing on my mind lately.

At what point in your life do you stop waiting for a sign?



I'm ready to start building a house now.  Not necessarily the be-all end-all house that I sketched over and over as a teenage daydreamer, architect wannabe.  No, I will start small.



Am I crazy?  Maybe... but I'm not the only one.  More and more people are dreaming about building and living small.  Is it the rotten economy?  Americans' growing disgust with McMansions and our own wastefulness?  A desire to live more lightly on the land?  All of the above?

Last year, the New Yorker ran stories about small living.

A guy named Jay Schafer started a company around it.

Many of his cohorts are blogging about it.

There are scads of books out there about it.

So there's plenty of material out there for inspiration and direction.

As for the actual building part?  I will have help.  It saddens me that my father, great builder that he was, died before we could build this together.  But I have friends who have become family, and we will build it together.

Abraham Lincoln was once asked how long it took him to write the Gettysburg Address. He replied, "All my life."

Time to put pen to paper.

And you, gentle reader, you're part of this too.  Ask me questions.  Send me ideas.  Egg me on.
I thrive on that.

Towson Town Center's Restaurants

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I was invited* to Towson Town Center to take a "tour" of some of their major eateries: TGIF's, P.F. Chang's, Stoney River and The Cheesecake Factory.  Below are some of my thoughts on each place.


Also, Towson Town Center has been having some special events this month, including one on Saturday March 24th from 1-3PM: Cooking Demo and Wine-Pairing Seminar

• Local food and wine expert, Laurie Forster "The Wine Coach," will host a cooking demonstration and wine-pairing seminar.
• Seminars will be held at 1PM, 2PM and 3PM in the Level 1 Grand Court
• Seminars will include table-side sampling (SAMPLES!!!!!), fun raffles, giveaways and retailer offers.

Follow Towson Town on Facebook to keep up with more events.

P.F. Chang's
(Check out my last review of P.F.Chang's from 2009 here)

At P.F.Chang's we were given some items from their Happy Hour menu to try.  Their Happy Hour is Mon-Fri, 3-6pm.  The prices I have included in this section are from that menu.

Chicken Lettuce Wraps 
I hadn't been to a PFC in a while, so I have to admit that I was excited about trying the Chicken Lettuce Wraps ($6) again.  They are still so good.  The chicken concoction mixed with mushrooms and water chestnuts are good alone, but even better when made into a wrap with crisp lettuce.  Yes, of course you can make this at home, but if you're at the mall shopping - this is definitely a nice appetizer to order while sitting at the bar.

Talking about the bar, we tried two specialty cocktails, an Asian Pear Mojito ($6) and a PFX ($6).  The mojito tasted very similar to the regular, but with a slight hint of the pear.  It was nice and crisp.  The PFX is flavored with passionfruit and hardly tasted like there was any alcohol in it, though I am assuming that is a good and bad thing :)  It is supposed to be modeled after the cosmo.  I liked both!


 Crab Wontons
Dan was fan of their Crab Wontons ($5), which are made with a cream cheesy crab filling and served with a plus sauce.  He remarked on how much crab there was in the wontons, and how well they went with the sauce.  If you feel like something fried, and are tired of the ubiquitous eggroll, these might be the thing for you! 
Stoney River

Stoney River also introduced us to some items from their Happy Hour, which takes place from 4-7pm everyday.  There are some seriously good deals:

This menu is solid, especially because it  lasts until 7pm!  It would be so easy to come here for dinner and make a good meal out of these offerings, not to mention with some nice cheap cocktails!  For a drink, ask the bartender to make you a Lemon Iced Tea Cocktail, which is made with Bacardi Limon, lime, sour mix and some iced tea.  If you like Arnold Palmers, this is the drink for you. If you like tea (me), this is for you (me).


We tried and LOVED the Jack Daniel Whiskey Shrimp ($6).  It was so good and SO buttery.  The sauce is made with Jack Daniel's (obv.) and mustard and oh my the little slices of baguettes were just loaded with butter and the sauce and a jumbo shrimp.  Yes please!

We also tried the mountain of Bleu Cheese Chips ($6), and it really was a mountain (though it's hard to tell from this picture). Though blue cheese is not my favorite kind of cheese, once melted it has a mild flavor to it, so I surprisingly didn't mind this at all.  If you love blue cheese, it would be right up your alley, especially because the chips were perfectly crisp and salted. It would be nice if they had other flavors for the non blue cheese lovers.

The Crunchy Ahu Tuna Roll ($7) was also quite tasty, especially when dipped in the accompanying soy ginger sauce.  Sesame seeds and breadcrumbs give the roll its crunchiness.



TGI Friday's
Guinness Stout Milkshake from TGIF (sample size)
There are two new drinks for St. Patrick's Day: the Irish Rita (made with whiskey, sour apple, midori and margarita mix) and the Guinness Stout Milkshake (Guinness with vanilla ice cream and chocolate syrup).  Their Irish Rita was way too sour for my liking, but the Guinness Milkshake was surprisingly tasty, and I don't even like Guinness!

All in all, I am simply not a fan of this place.  The dishes were dirty, the food tasted unhealthy and it's really just not my kind of atmosphere for a restaurant.

Cheesecake Factory
(Check out my review of the Cheesecake Factory in 2008 here)

I am not going to lie, I tried bites of about 12-15 different types of cheesecakes.  This sounds amazing, but after a while I got a bit sick.  THAT'S A LOT OF DAIRY, YOU GUYS!!!!

My personal favorite from the Cheesecake Factory is the Fresh Banana Cream Cheesecake, but of all the ones I tried from that day, I really enjoyed:

• Vanilla Bean cheesecake (layers of vanilla bean cheesecake, vanilla mousse and whipped cream) 
• I liked the simplicity of this, plus it felt light because of the mousse.
• Godiva Chocolate cheesecake (Godiva chocolate cake + Godiva chocolate cheesecake + Chocolate mousse) 
• The addition of cake and mousse in this cheesecake took away the usual heaviness from a chocolate cheesecake.  I loved the rich and dark taste of the chocolate.  
• Dutch Caramel Apple Streusel Cheesecake, pictured (terribly) below (original cheesecake with a TON of baked apples and then topped with some delicious brown sugar walnut streusel topping)  
• I loved this because it was so different.  It tasted more like an apple pie with a little layer of cheesecake.  There's a lot more filling than you would think, which is what really made this cheesecake stand out for me.

The problem is that to get a slice of cheesecake, you have to deal with the outrageous wait for a table because that place is packed ALL THE TIME.  What is up with that?

SUMMARY
The mall is definitely not a place I visit very often, but it was fun to take a tour like this to see the food beyond the food court.  Overall, I loved Stoney River.  Their Happy Hour menu was fun, well-priced and enticing!  I would definitely go back there again! P.F. Chang's happy hour menu was also a great deal, and I especially liked their drinks.  There is no need for me to talk about the appeal of  The Cheesecake Factory, because it's already got that in spades.  TGI Fridays didn't do it for me at all, but you can't win them all!





* I was invited by Towson Town Center, but I was not asked to review, nor was I told what to write.  All opinions are my own (and Dan's!)

Langermann's, Canton

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Dan and I went to Langermann's one evening and what a lovely date night it turned out to be!  The Canton restaurant is in a large open space, with plenty of seating in the dining room and around its large bar.  They even have a nice fireplace which I had the fortune to sit by!  They have valet, but there is also a nearby parking garage and plenty of space in the surrounding parking lot - so suburbanites anxious about parallel parking (or is that just me?), do not fret!


Bread Basket of Dreams
First of all, let's talk about the bread basket filled with two large pieces of sweet cornbread and two buttery biscuits.  Way to know how to win over your diners, Langermann's :)  I knew I was in for a good meal after one bite of that sweet cornbread!

Low Country Louie
Thanks to a Facebook suggestion from Minx, I started off the evening with the Low Country Louie ($10.95) - lobster, crayfish, crabmeat, corn coblets all mixed with creole mayonnaise and served in a Martini glass.  What a lovely introduction to this restaurant!!!  There was no skimping on the seafood in this appetizer - it was full of large pieces of crab and lobster.  Though they had a light hand with the mayo sauce, you still need to like mayo to like this dish, but don't worry about it being spicy.  I thought it was a wonderfully refreshing appetizer, and one that would be welcome in the spring and summer months.

Seared Ahi Tuna
Dan ordered the Seared Ahi Tuna ($23.95) -  jerk seasoned tuna on top of julienned squash, roasted fingerling potatoes and served with a pineapple butter sauce.  He has never ordered seared tuna (served rare) before, but I think this entree alone has made him a convert!  He thought the fish paired excellently with the pineapple butter sauce (don't think of it as a curd, it's chunkier).

Shrimp and Grits
It seemed absolutely necessary for one of us to order the Charleston Shrimp and Grits ($19.95), which is what I always hear about and what our server said is their most popular dish.  Taken from the menu, it's comprised of shallots, tomatoes, andouillie sausage, buttery clam broth, stone mill grits and large pieces of shrimp gently placed on top of the bowl.  They do not play around with their grits.  These were the creamiest/butteriest grits I've ever had, so I was thankful for the salty tomato and clam broth surrounding the bowl.  I loved to get everything on my spoon for one big bite - a piece of shrimp, sausage, grits and broth.  Exquisite.  They do this dish well, no wonder they are so well known for it!

It may not seem like a large bowl, but by golly I could hardly finish the grits!  They were RICH.  I probably would just order an appetizer version of this (if they have it) next time, because it was very filling for me which was the reason why I so sadly had to skip out before dessert.  THIS WAS SO HARD FOR ME TO DO.  I wanted to try their apple pie because the table next to me ordered it and I'm pretty sure the pie was as big as my face.  I WANT TO EAT THAT PIE.

Someday, I will eat that pie.  I am going back, definitely.

They have a Cocktail Hour Mon-Fri from 5-8PM with $5 appetizers, select wines and martinis and beers.  They also have a Sunday Brunch that looks phenomenal for $15.95 for an entree and a drink (mimosa or orange juice) from 10AM-3PM.

Dan and I loved Langermann's - we both highly recommend it for a date, for a group gathering, for happy hour, for a business meeting - for whatever!  You will enjoy it!