travel: las vegas – trip number 8
28 May 2012 1 Comment
in booze & other drinkables, restaurants & dinning out, travel Tags: booze, drinks, food, las vegas, photography, the fine things in life, travel
on saturday i returned from my 8th trip to fabulous las vegas.
and dare i say, i think it was my most successful one yet.
we flew with westjet… for a few reasons.
flight time was the main one. we left at 10:15am which really makes the most of your first day there. and coming home, there’s a 1:45pm flight which meshes nicely with hotel check out time.
second, westjet includes a checked bag, which i appreciate because it equals saving at least $50 in bag fees.
and lastly, the overall price of the flight to begin with was the best.
so westjet won for this one.
the flight itself was pretty uneventful… which is how i like my flights.
my mom and i had a spare seat in our row, so i sat in the window and enjoyed the view and she sat aisle and we had the middle seat free. wonderful.
the one place where westjet really falls down is their in-flight entertainment. air canada definitely wins for that. but, its a short flight and i amused myself with my ipad and vodka.
we arrived and grabbed our bags and hopped into a taxi to mandalay bay.
upon arriving, there was a line up to check in of about 25-30 minutes, but it was well organized and there was a guy passing out bottles of water, which was nice.
the front desk lady gave us a high floor with a great view of the pool and we were off to the 30th floor.
one thing that i really liked about our view was that it was easy to keep tabs on how full the pool was and if it was worth trying to get chairs in which location.
this trip was largely focused on checking some chef’s restaurants off my to-do list.
and i’m pleased to say that i accomplished 3 that have long been residents of said list. i’m doing a blog post for each restaurant, so more to come on that. and if you’re on facebook, i did save most of my food pictures for the blog, so there will be new content.
the big success on this trip was the gambling.
not only did we ACTUALLY WIN on the slots… but we won a LOT. well, considering we were playing penny slots – its all relative. when your spins are $0.80 each and you hit $300, it’s a big payoff.
for the first 2 days we were in vegas, we could not lose. we were literally sitting down at machines, playing for 30 seconds and hitting $200 wins. we won at the luxor, tropicana, new york new york and a little at mandalay bay.
total, we won about $1300. but once you factor in the losses, we figure we were up about $1000.
this is amazing to me. in all my years going to vegas, i have NEVER won more than about $70 on a machine. we were so excited at all this, it was hard to absorb. we just could not lose. man, gambling is fun when you’re winning.
so because of this, we decided to up the ante on the trip.
we spent a day at Qua Spa at Caesars Palace which was absolutely out of this world. The baths were incredible and i had a 50 minute body polish and a 50 minute sweedish massage that were delightful. we spent a total of 5 hours there and we were hard pressed to leave. i’ll be back there for sure.
we also check out a show – Zumanity at NYNY.
ummm… so not what i was expecting. i knew it was “sensual”, but i didn’t expect it to be so overtly sexual. it was great and i definitely recommend it, but it maybe wasn’t the best pick to see with my mother, haha. don’t get me wrong, she enjoyed it too, but when the “mistress of the evening” is suggesting that you take your date home to the hotel and fuck their brains out, its possible you didn’t bring the right date if you’re there with your mom.
but yes, excellent show and wow, does cirque ever do an incredible job of making the most insane feats look effortless. absolutely stunning.
besides that, it was food, gambling and pool time…
i did a lot of this:
…and this…
…and definitely a lot of this…
ah drinking in vegas… free in the right places, and totally effed when you pay for it.
that irony never gets old for me.
so there you have it kids!
my totally awesome 4 nights in fabulous las vegas!
upcoming posts include:
- Mary Sue Milliken & Susan Feniger’s Border Grill
- Charlie Palmer’s Aureole
- Bobby Flay’s Mesa Grill
- Rick Moonen’s RM Seafood
- Hussong’s Cantina in Mandalay Place
food & travel: O’o Farms, Maui
04 Jan 2012 1 Comment
in food & cooking, photography, travel Tags: farming, gluten free, hawaii, maui, organic, photography, travel, wheat free
one of my favourite parts of my trip to maui was O’o Farm.
I know, for a girl that lives mere minutes away from farmland, you’d think that seeing a farm wouldn’t be a high priority. but i’m oh-so glad that we made it one.
the farm itself was a marvel to me. existing only to service two high end restaurants with fresh organic produce, this is not really a “working farm”, but more a culinary indulgence of chef/owners. which i think makes for a really unique and special farm experience.
every single thing grown there exists because the chef has requested it for the menu or because it is a control plant to attract/detract pests or to add or remove nutrients to/from the soil. everything has a purpose here and nothing is wasted. in fact, there’s not even anything extra to sell. the restaurants and the farm tour use everything grown here.
even the fish carcasses from dinner service and coffee grounds make their way back to the farm to be composted. this was a beautiful working example of a sustainable farm.
i left here feeling inspired. this is the lifestyle of my dreams. to be in hawaii, growing the food that i serve at my restaurant? i don’t think they could have possibly pinpointed this better for me. so if i run away, this could very well be where i am.
okay, now on to the good stuff… we’ll start with the view. the farm is high up the crater with a spectacular view of kihei.
ya, pretty rough, hey? that could sooooo be my workplace view please.
first off, after intros and pleasantries, we went to the coffee plants. now, these plants are just starting to produce and they’re relatively new to this farm, so their beans aren’t being used yet in the restaurants, but they will be soon. until then, they use beans from a farm down the road that are roasted at O’o Farm by the cutie that was our guide for the tour. (seriously, this farm has everything. even dark curly haired gentlemen with strong jaw lines – aka “my type”, lol)
after sampling the berry of the coffee plant – you eat the red ones and spit out the beans. it’s really an interesting flavour… very sweet off the start with a tart finish. of course here there’s no waste, so they use the berry in cooking & garnishes in the restaurants and dry it to make tea from it (which i bought a bag of) and then they roast the beans inside.
we moved on to the orchards after our coffee plant lessons… first the citrus grove. literally, a few of everything was growing here… pink lemons, pomellos, limes, clementines and even buddah’s hand… which i’ve never actually seen growing before! so cool! (it’s basically a citrus made almost entirely of rind & pith, usually candied or preserved and used as a strong citrus flavour agent)
the stone fruit trees were done for the season (funny to hear about it being “winter” in hawaii) so we moved over to where we’d be dining and met the chef.
she told us a little about the food we’d be eating and where it came from (everything from the farm except the fish which was caught yesterday just off the maui coast and the tofu). she also shared her culinary journey and how she ended up cooking for the tours and such.
then we moved on to see the fields and pick our salad greens for lunch.
here’s a shot of my husband picking some yummy sorrel for lunch…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorrel
…and showing off our bounty of lunch greens and filling us in what each one is and how its grown…
…and grabbing a little more arugula.
this one is just a cool picture of a kale plant. because i dig kale.
then we ventured back to the “dining room” for our feast.
first up was the fresh avocados with citrus and the selection of root vegetables… candycane & watermelon radishes, fennel and kohlrabi for the salad…
and my plate all loaded up with the tofu, beet & chard dish, the mahi mahi in sweet maui onions & citrus and of course the fabulous salad. all wheat-free, and all absolutely delicious and bursting with freshness. everything from the farm had been in the ground mere hours ago.
after a plate (okay, maybe and seconds) we chatted with the people sitting around us… almost everyone had brought their own bottle of wine (ours white & refreshing) and we discussed the farm and our own personal reasons for being drawn to visit it.
there were lots of foodies that were fans of the restaurants associated with the farm… a lot of gardeners, both hobby & small business… and just generally people that loved this lifestyle of natural, sustainable living. it was very cool.
after a bit, the chef brought out a plate of chocolates that she had made and a big bowl of still-shelled macadamia nuts for us to crack & snack on and our guide invited us up to the “coffee house” where he had brewed us some coffee that he had roasted that morning.
my husband and i gladly trucked up the hill and had 3 cups of the coffee each, while chatting with our guide about the coffee, growing it, roasting it, varietals ect. we ended up buying $100 in premium coffee from him, including a batch that had just been roasted, but wasn’t even bagged yet for sale. we just got talking about it and so he ran down to the roasting house and pulled some out for us. people, you can not beat this.
honestly, if this kinda thing isn’t up your alley, then there’s nothing i can say to convince you… but if this kinda thing tweaks your fancy, then you MUST do O’o Farms tour in Maui. it was $50 well spent on an excellent and truly awesome experience. in fact, we decided that we would do this every trip, just to see what’s growing at different times of the year. and the restaurant is definitely on our “must eat” list for next trip too.
night vision
29 Oct 2011 1 Comment
in photography, vancouver Tags: photography, vancouver
last week i took a night photography course with my friend and her parents in the effort to learn more about properly working my digital SLR camera.
i’ve had it for about 2 years now i think, and i use it, but it’s not my primary camera (sadly, that’s my iphone) due to its bulky weight & size. but the pictures are incomparably better with the SLR. (duh)
i lusted after this camera and pestered my hsuband for about a year before i got it… and then, like most children after christmas day, i all but abandoned it with complaints of size and delicacy (i can’t possibly bring it somewhere it may get harmed!)
also, i never *really* learned how to properly use it.
i mean, i know how to use an SLR camera… at least i did at one point in high school…
but i didn’t really know how to use the digital version. or didn’t know how to use it to the best of its capabilities.
and so, the vast majority of my pictures were happening on the automatic setting… with the occasional tweak when i had a result i really wasn’t happy with.
so, an actual photography class was long overdue.
i have groupon to thank for this one… back in march they posted it and we bought it… and then we waited. and waited. until FINALLY we had a date for our class. in october. lol. kinda ridiculous, but honestly, worth the wait and VERY worth the $50 spent.
the first 30 minutes-ish was spent going over the basics. i had to buy a tripod for this class, which made more of a difference than i think i anticipated. i’d actually never shot from a tripod before… and i liked it. so i think it’s a purchase that i’ll use again in the future. so we learned how to muck with our settings to get the lower ISO and the long shutter speed we wanted and a few other points, like shooting in RAW instead of JPG and so on.
then we started shooting.
we practiced first on the iconic steam clock in gastown. good subject. here’s a few of my favourite shots that i took.
now, it terms of the technical… definitely not “correct”. but those are the shots i liked most from an artsy point of view. but technically that blinding white burn out is what i was supposed to be avoiding. and the shots without it are boring to me. so, big surprise, i didn’t want to do things the right way, lol.
then we moved on to those cool pictures where the cars turn into streaks of light.
i LOVE these photos. i’ve ALWAYS loved these photos. so i was pretty excited to learn how to make my own. and behold… SUCCESS!
so that was pretty exciting for me. like, actually i was REALLY excited to learn this.
we also did one other exercise which was where we tried to shoot cars driving and moving the camera with the car so that the car stays in focus and the background blurs. that shit was hard. didn’t go so well for me. but here’s my most successful shot…
so all in all, a great experience. definitely well worth the money to learn some new skills, and it was just FUN. we laughed and chatted and enjoyed the crisp fall air and the lights of gastown…
it’s definitely inspired me to take some photo excursions this fall. get some use out of that tripod… and now i’m also pondering the possibilities of snow shots… and sunsets in hawaii on time lapse… ah yes. my love of photography renewed for only $50. now *that’s* a good deal.
