Sometimes, there are strange little events around town. Like this past first friday, I went to a Twin Peaks themed art show and pie contest in Kensington. I’ve never watched Twin Peaks, so I don’t really know much, but apparently, Agent Dale really liked cherry pie. I have nothing against pie, and first fridays can be quite amusing, so off I went.

The contest was simple. Taste each of the 11 pies and vote for your favorite. There were three apples and then the rest were a smattering of random flavors, including pecan, lemon, and sweet potato cheesecake. There was no cherry pie to be had, which was a bit odd. I had to taste them in order, and this probably wasn’t planned, but they all seemed to get sweeter as the numbers got higher. It got harder and harder to taste them! Which one won? I have no idea! But I actually voted for the sweet potato cheesecake. It was my favorite!

They also had random donuts and other sweet treats around different booths.

And later on, they brought out some moon pies and some freakishly technicolored peeps.

We went to a few other galleries too to check out what else was going on. Sometimes they had food. And sometimes, like this one, it was a very nice offering. I’m not quite sure what the bottle of sriracha was for though. The dip?

Sometimes, they were philly themed so you could have soft pretzels. And they even had some nice carafes of wine.

But sometimes, it was just boxed wine.

M wanted to get some friends together and go out to eat and frolic. Then she decided that we should stay in instead. And so we did, with sushi take-out from Zento. And we had a hilarious time at R’s fancy pad. M made some japanese cocktail, which was strong, yet good. And she even printed out a cute little graphic for the bottle. Yes, she takes her boozing seriously, and is a big time nerd. And we love her for it!
I love japanese style green salad, so I insisted that M pick some up. Ooh, I really like Zento’s version. Baby greens, tomatoes, and even asparagus! And the dressing rocks. I got some random japanese treats for this night too, that’s where the peas came from. R also made a guacamole. Not japanese at all, but definitely delicious.
So, what kind of sushi did we get? Take a look! I don’t have a freakin idea what any of these are. I think the one in front was crab related. One of the ones in the middle had shrimp tempura in it. The one on the far right corner has cooked salmon. And we had some fabulously fresh sashimi on the lower right. My favorite was the rectangularly shaped one at the top. I don’t know what this was, but it was beyond delicious and it all just melted in my mouth. Yummy!
One of the other random japanese treats I brought over was some green tea daifuku. Daifuku is mochi stuffed with something sweet on the inside. I’ve never actually had daifuku before. I’ve had mochi ice cream before. I thought to myself, heck, how different could this be? Well, I’m used to the mochi consistency and flavor, so I didn’t mind that at all, but the green tea innard is what I did not enjoy. It wasn’t sweet at all. It just had a strange bitter green tea taste. I thought it would be a green tea flavored mochi with sweet red bean on the inside. Instead, it was plain old mochi with green tea flavored mush on the inside. It didn’t do it for me. M liked these the most! She got to take the spare container home with her! Oh, it was a fun night. Three red wine spills still couldn’t stop the fun! And I discovered that I am a natural at Wii dancing!

I arrived in Florence on friday night and there was still a little bit of daylight left so I started roaming. Whenever I go to new places, that’s just what I do. I’m a roamer. I didn’t even have any real maps. But I just started walking. I quickly realized how small Florence actually is and how amazingly walkable it is. Maps make it look big, but in reality, it’s quite small. You can walk everywhere and see everything. It’s hard to get lost because eventually, any street you walk down will end up somewhere familiar, like the train station, the river and any of its bridges, the duomo, this piazza or that piazza, so it’s hard to actually not know where you are, relatively.

I didn’t exactly know where I was going, but I had a couple of snippets of maps to get me to some major spots. I actually had a place picked out for dinner, but once I found it, it turned out to only be a lunch spot. Drat. So I had to just wing it as far as where to have dinner. This is how I ended up at Giannino. When you walk around in Florence, especially considering how touristy it is, all the restaurants have menus outside and sometimes, there are people who try to get you to come into their restaurant. I ended up here because really, it was a toss-up to me, and they didn’t have anyone out front.

When you first go in, the place isn’t that big. Or so you think. But then when you’re sitting, you see giant groups coming in. And you realize there’s a whole other dining room on the first floor, as well as seemingly giant rooms on the second floor. It turns out, this place is huge. Many of the restaurants have special menus that are a set number of euros and you get a few courses of specific dishes. The prices are quite reasonable too. I decided to just go a la carte. It’s a pretty big menu.

As opposed to where I was earlier this week, in Florence, they give you olive oil with your bread. I think this is fairly typical bread of Florence, but it was really bland. I didn’t care for its lack of flavor or its dry crumbly texture. And the olive oil, well it certainly looks green, and it tastes even greener than it is. It didn’t do it for me.

I went real italian and decided to get two dishes, a pasta and a meat. So for my pasta, the parpadelle with meat in a chianti sauce. I know it was friday, and it’s supposed to be fish on friday, but I ain’t catholic, so who cares. I picked it because on their menu, they have certain dishes marked as traditional florentine dishes. I wanted to try traditional, so I picked this one. This was super good! The pasta was nice and firm and the meat and sauce were highly flavorful and full of fresh herbs. Big thumbs up on this. And it was a really good sized portion. I was pretty much full.

Then came my chicken dish – chicken el diavlo (or something like that). It was the devil style chicken, devil, because it was supposed to be spicy. This was another dish that was traditional florentine. This chicken was cooked extremely well, tender, and juicy. But it was boring. So so so boring. It was just plain cooked chicken, and the skin had been brushed with some chili oil. There was nothing wrong with it, it was just too boring for me, and since I was fairly full, it wasn’t a big deal. I loved that it came with fries though, how traditional! But I ate them up because I really wanted a vegetable, even though I’m not sure how much a potato counts as a vegetable. I had some italian ketchup too, and it’s different than heinz or hunts, but I can’t exactly explain how it tastes different. It just does.

You’re in Florence, so all of the wait staff speaks english. So you don’t really have to worry. They’ll bring you an english menu by default. Service was quite fine. And the prices were reasonable too.

After dinner, I roamed around some more, and then ended my evening with some gelato. I mean, you can’t help yourself, because gelato spots are everywhere. There are multiple shops on every block. It’s like a requirement. I got some mixed berry and lemon, and it was a perfect way to end the night.