A Day of Good Friends. New and Old.

Yesterday started like any other, with a morning gym visit and a bowl of oats.

Only it was quite different, as I woke up super early (5:15AM), I was in a hotel bed and work started at 7:30 instead of 9:00- so not really normal per se. When leaving my hotel room I said to myself I wasn’t going to eat anything for breakfast until later on because I was still full from a late night rendezvous with cheese and chocolate at the Melting Pot.

Well, let’s just say that idea went out the window when I saw the breakfast buffet. I thought it over and since I didn’t know when lunch would be I figured I should probably eat something and because there were so many options I couldn’t resist getting more than one thing. Does that ever happen to you or am I the only one that goes kind of crazy with buffets?

I ate about half the yogurt with some raisin nola, some of the pb, and all the oats. I saved the apple for later and drank a few swigs of the coffee with french vanilla creamer- I hadn’t had coffee in ages and it was just okay. Not good enough to carry over to the conference with me.

The morning at the conference went smoothly and before we knew it, it was time for lunch. I volunteered to go for a stroll to grab my co-worker and I a bite. He requested Chicago hot dogs from the famous Portillos and I wanted something quick, healthy and tasty. I was searching the streets of Chicago for something that looked delicious when I spotted a woman carrying the very recognizable brown container from a Whole Food’s bar. AWESOME! I took a turn for the direction she was coming from and to my delight one block later the green signs came into view. ahhhhhh…

I almost got the salad bar when I saw they had roasted butternut squash as a topping (not fair b/c my WF definitely doesn’t have that!!), but I was craving sushi so I got the brown rice spicy trio with salmon, tuna, and shrimp.

I hadn’t had sushi in a good long while so this totally hit the spot. I ate all 12 pieces and used most of the wasabi. My sinuses were clear afterwards, that’s for sure.

And there was also a Passionberry Bliss Synergy Kombucha purchased.

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When the conference was over we packed up shop. My co-worker headed to the airport and I headed out to explore the shopping scene before meeting up with a fellow blogger for dinner. I ended up getting in a nice little walk, trying on lots of things, getting my eye makeup done at MAC and buying a shirt from H&M. Twas a nice little outing- especially exploring the city. Although I didn’t get to see much of it, from what I can tell, Chicago is such a cool place. I love how clean it is, plus everyone is very helpful and really friendly. And, just check out the river view:

Wishing I had time to take the boat architecture tour, see the Sears (now Willis) Tower and visit Frank Lloyd Wright ’s house. I’ll definitely need to make another, longer, visit to Chicago! Only next time I think I want to come in the summer.

After my shopping adventure, I headed to BIN 36, a wine bar and restaurant, to meet up with Miss Jenn from Eating Bender.

She and I have been email pals for a while and had talked previously about how fun it would be to meet up. It just so happened that travel plans with my job unexpectedly fell into place for a trip to Chicago. As soon as I found out I was so excited to let Jenn know that we could finally meet in real life. Eating Bender was one of the first blogs I started reading regularly and I’ve always loved reading as Jenn has such a knack for detail and writes beautifully. Naturally I was pumped to meet her! She’s just as sweet as she seems on her blog and we had plenty to chat about all throughout our meal.

First up we decided to order the Bin 36 Flight of wine. It came with 4 – 2.5 ounce sample glasses- Chardonnay, Cab Sauv, Merlot, and Syrah. We spilt the flight and each took our favorites. Jenn had the Merlot and Chardonnay and I had the Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon.

  

The Cabernet aka “sexy little beast” was good and I enjoyed it. The Syrah was my favorite by far, it was sweet and delicious – although I have to say, I didn’t taste any leather flavors and I’m quite happy about that. I would definitely be willing to purchase a bottle of this one!

For dinner we decided to split the Garlic and Tomato Hummus, which was served with warm pita bread, extra virgin olive oil, red onion and plum tomatoes.

Check out the serving size of the hummus, it was about the same amount that you would get in one container of Sabra. Even between the two of us we didn’t finish it all.

The pita bread was soft, chewy and warm- perfect for dipping in the hummus, only the hummus was so garlicky that it ended up being spicy. I honestly thought they had added cayenne pepper. Jenn and I both agreed it was a bit too much garlic for our tastes, but we were hungry and it was edible so we dug in.

We both ordered a BIN 36 Market Salad as well. I just realized after reviewing the online menu that we ordered the BIN 36 Market Salad from the Tavern Menu which was suppose to have organic baby greens, sundried tomato croutons & shaved pepato cheese garlic confit vinaigrette; however we received the BIN 36 Market Salad from the Cellar Menu, organic mixed greens, warm hazelnut crusted goat cheese, fresh grapes, verjus vinaigrette. I didn’t notice it at the time but I find this quite odd. (Jenn, did you notice this?)

The salad was overdressed for my taste and a little to plain as I tend to like veggie filled salads, however the goat cheese added a nice flavor and it ended up being fine.

Having a somewhat lackluster experience with the food we decided to take a chance on the dessert menu.

After perusing all the unique options we went with the Crispy Brioche, pumpkin zabaglione, pumpkin seed nougatine with pear sorbet. Pumpkin always tends to win my heart when it comes to choosing a dessert at this time of the year.

It came out looking good.

As we ate the brioche we both tried to decide what we thought of it and we both came to one conclusion- SWEET. The pumpkin flavor wasn’t very pronounced but the sugar definitely was and it was also a little too crispy for me. The pear sorbet was my favorite part – I wish we had just ordered a big bowl of that!!

Overall, the dining experience was super fun because of the company, but I wasn’t impressed by the BIN 36 cuisine at all. I do have to say that they are a wine and cheese bar and the wine and goat cheese were excellent so at least they’ve got that down pat.

Here are the two Eating B ladies right before diving into dessert.

The waiter ended up taking about 6-8 photos of us due to camera flash problems, white balance changes, and re-takes. People at the restaurant started turing around to see what all the flashing was about. It was quite comical. Just food bloggers people- no big deal.

Before heading out I had to get a shot of this wine cork tree.

During college I worked as a server in an Italian restaurant and started collecting corks. I have collected them ever since- my collection doesn’t grow as fast now that I don’t work at a restaurant, but once I gather enough I like to make things them with. My prize creation is a huge cork board that I ended up giving to my dad as a gift. Too bad I’d probably never be able to drink enough wine to have enough for a tree like that.

Jenn and I quickly finished up and hopped in a taxi to Union Station as I needed to catch the 8 PM train to Milwaukee. It stinks that we didn’t get to do some more hanging out and exploring but with any luck, I’ll be back in Chicago again and Jenn needs to visit the East Coast as well so hopefully our paths will cross again soon.

I made it to the train station just in time and was in Wisconsin before I knew it. My BF from college picked me up at the station and she and I went to the Pfister Hotel Cocktail and Martini Lounge, Blu, to grab a drink and catch up before heading home. The Blu had great ambience with a jazz band playing and an amazing view of the Milwaukee skyline.

I ended up getting two local beers, the first was a Leinenkugel Honey Weiss and the second was Sprecher Amber. Both were to my liking and very much enjoyed, however I was super full by the end of drinking them both.

And here’s a photo of the Brittanys. Yup- were both named Brittany M. and we lived together for 3 years in college. Surprisingly it never really got confusing. Although, some of our friends did resort to calling us Brittany Brown and Brittany Blonde.

Love her!

Last night was amazing- I was able to visit two cities I’ve never been to before and spend time with two friends- it was a blast! I can’t wait for the rest of the weekend as Britt and I have big plans for checking out Milwaukee today- shopping, sight seeing and maybe even taking a tour of a local brewery!

Happy Saturday folks!

- Brittany