Red Robin

I'm always excited to try a new burger place, especially one I've heard about but that was unavailable locally.  When I went to California a lifetime ago, my friends and I made a point of trying all the local fast food hamburger joints: Carl's Jr. (Captain Crunch milkshake, what???), Jack in the Box, and of course, my true love, In-N-Out Burger.  There we ate like, 3 times.  When Shake Shack opened up in South Beach I was eager to try them - and I was not disappointed.  So, when I heard that Red Robin had opened up by the Falls, I couldn't wait to see what the fuss was about.  A $10 giftcard for $5 offered by one of the coupon sites and I was set.

Part of the problem was my expectations.  I was expecting a burger place, like Shake Shack or Steak n' Shake (which I also heart greatly) but Red Robin is a sit down restaurant.  Right there you know you are going to be spending more than you anticipated.  The server was really great, and the place was crowded.  Unfortunately, the food left a LOT to be desired.  It was cold, all of it.  The flavor was only ok.  I've had better burgers just about anywhere, except perhaps the fastest of the fast foods - and at least when I go to BK or McDonald's I know what to expect.  I wasn't happy about spending over $30 for a family meal that left me disgruntled.  I didn't finish my meal or even my beer, and that's saying a lot.  Wasted beer is like a sin.  It might be that the restaurant was so busy that the kitchen was just uneven, but I really don't see that the food is worth it at all.  At least I know now I needn't venture into the depths of Kendall to eat there again.  I'll leave it to the locals.

Earth Balance

If you're an avid recipe reader like me (I find it completely normal to spend a night hanging out, reading a cookbook, and I have a binder full of recipes to try...not to mention my overly pinned Pinterest boards!) and are trying to eat healthy, you've probably noticed something.  By FAR, hands down, the most popular "buttery spread" out there among vegans and vegetarians is Earth Balance.  I go through tubs of it making this awesome Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe alone (I highly recommend the recipe and the whole blog, Oh She Glows).  I don't know what magic they use for it, but it is deliciously like real butter - much more than those "other" spreads - and without scary ingredients.  I use the regular spread for cooking and adore the whipped spread for toast.  I think it's completely OK to have, as I did this morning, a buttery spread sandwich.  Just bread and spread, that's it.  YUM!

Liberte Yogurt

Eating is such a chore.  I honestly wish I didn't have to do it at all.  Of course, that pesky, intrusive sensation of hunger besides the life-sustaining properties of nourishment don't leave me any choice - eat I must.  I try to eat healthy with varying levels of success.  Because we're SUPPOSED to, blah blah blah.  Menu planning, shopping, food preparation, cooking - all this takes a lot of time and honestly...I'm not the greatest cook.  I'm also ambitious.  I start clipping recipes for making my own cheese and fermenting my own kombucha and such, when I should be planning something simple and nutritious for that night's dinner.  It's just that regular food isn't FUN.

Anyway, in my quest to eat healthy and to save some time I have tried pretty much all the yogurts out there, from the generic store brands, to the mainstream brands, to the "healthy" brands.  Liberte yogurt is far, far better than any other brand I've tried.  I love this yogurt so much I should buy stock - I'm constantly recommending it to people.  I've gone to their Facebook page to say how much I love it.  I should be embarrassed to admit that, but I'm not.  I just happen to be a great cheerleader :)  They have a great variety of flavors and styles: Greek, Mediterranee (this word is chock full of accent marks but darned if I know how to do those), and plain.  I honestly don't look at that as much as I just pick out every single flavor the market carries, 10 for $10 if I'm lucky.

This yogurt is my dessert.  It's my treat to look forward to after a plate of vegetables for lunch.  I throw some almonds in there and I'm happy.  Well, I feel like a Hollywood starlet, dishing out diet tips to some weekly tabloid mag.  Oh!  And the yogurt separates a bit to form this creamy film on the lid of the container which is so good I scrape it off and eat it as my dessert's dessert.  Yeah, I need to get out more.  So.  Try this yogurt and you'll see what I mean.

Global Liquors

Due to reaching a new level of hunger and brokeness (thanks for the pay cuts!) I haven't been out and about much.  You need some amount of discretionary income to gad about, drinking and eating, when you have not yet met your sugar daddy.

I don't drink much anymore but the holidays, parties and birthdays do require the purchase of gifts.  I like giving liquor as a gift - as my friend Wendy once stated: If I can't eat it, drink it, smoke it, or wear it, I don't want it.  We all want less clutter and stuff in our lives, and the best kind of gift-giving takes that into account.  So, enter the liquor store.

In the past I typically frequented Gulf Discount Liquors and Wine which is close to my house.  It's a sort of clean, utilitarian place with good prices, if not the most convenient hours.  It's all right but it's not sexy, to be honest.  It's very brightly lit, you know?

I needed a gift so I decided to check out some other local liquor stores.  First I went to Old Vines Wine & Spirits.  Definitely a pretty, classy little jewel of a joint but I must have picked the wrong time to go.  There was a wine tasting going on - everyone in this hole-in-the-wall was pretty boozy - and I couldn't find anyone to acknowledge me or help me.  I mean, this place is smaller than my apartment, yet I couldn't get anyone to look me in the eye.  It felt like I was a bumpkin in overalls who had crashed a private party at the country club.  The selection is quite dismal unless you want wine.  I mean, this place is tiny.  I left the place and, already late to a party, headed over to Global Liquors just down the street.  What a find!  Happy, happy, joy, joy!

Though you wouldn't guess from the outside, Global Liquors is spacious, elegant, has a large selection, and has great prices.  No fluorescent lighting, no Walmart atmosphere.  They have a good amount of parking and are very convenient - for me, at least!  I easily found someone to help me and they even had a check-in deal for a discount, score!  They have a fancy little delicatessen in the store as well.  I definitely recommend them - I've been there three times in the last month and I always get treated well.  I only worry they don't get enough customers - they can't close, I need them.  I mean, they are only a little over a mile from my house so you know what that means, yep - walking distance.  Though, I've been hearing about the perils of drunk walking lately.  Don't drink and walk!

Choices Vegan Cafe

South American women are like harem women-highly ornamental, they spend enormous time on their personal appearance and rarely leave their homes. When they do venture forth, it's with flawless makeup, cleavage baring outfits and high heels-even if it's to drop off the kids at school. Of course, if it's the only time they venture forth from home, they want to look their best, despite that looking like you're going out on a hot date at 8am is hardly maternal. Despite this obsession with appearance, Miami has among the most unhealthy people in the US. Like Fernando says, it's more important to look good than to feel good, pretty much the Miami mantra.  There are very few vegan and vegetarian restaurants in Miami, so I feel it's VERY important to support those that do exist.  Like Choices Vegan Cafe.

The meal was just great-even GS thought so, and he's someone that normally just exists on occasional mists of water and steamed broccoli.  A meal like that brings out my fantasy of saving a small foreign woman from the international sex trade and bringing her to live with me. Together we'd share a life, shunning men, and she'd walk on my back with her tiny feet and cook me delicious meals. I wish I could bring the staff of Choices home with me to cook ummy vegan foods, or else I can camp out in the kitchen and take all my meals there. The sweet potato fries were the best I've had-I don't even like sweet potatoes-but now I realize I was cooking them all wrong. It's in the preparation, darling. The lovely chef at Choices wouldn't tell me her sweet potato secret, which I fully respect-they were crispy and light-I'd call them fluffy. They melted in your mouth.  I had a Mexican wrap and GS had the portabella sandwich-both were great but I could tell GS really dug my wrap.  The sweet plantain was a nice foil for the spicy vegan "chorizo".  I took home a piece of Banana Walnut cake that was delicious-I'd love to try her coconut or banana cake.  You see, now I'm making demands!

Really, please eat here.  The good is great and you'll be a doing a good thing, not just for yourself but by supporting small, local businesses.

Hy Vong Vietnamese Cuisine

Never let me choose anything.  Not a movie, not a restaurant-not anything.  I will always make a poor choice.  Whatever I order at a restaurant will never be as good as what my companion ordered.  I'm sure I've said this before.  I know this, but it seems I need the lesson driven home repeatedly.

So, GS and I decide to go out for dinner, and he suggests Thai.  I can't think of a nearby Thai place, but I do remember a Vietnamese restaurant that I've been wanting to go to for a while, Hy Vong.  I last ate there about 15 years ago and had a wonderful meal, and I had no reason to think it would be any different this time.

How can I describe it?  GS said it was "a Hispanic version of Monty Python that's set within a Vietnamese restaurant or an intergalactic portal to the fifth dimension".  Either way it was a strange and surreal meal, yet, at least, entertaining as hell.

We drove by the restaurant twice, it was so hard to find.   We were first seated at the worst table in the place- a tiny table right by the kitchen so crammed against the wall that only two sides were free for chairs.  Well, it was busy when we first came in so I can accept that.  The waiter was so nice that he moved us as soon as there was another free table.  They had a nice beer selection and a manageable menu: I ordered the duck with black currant sauce and GS had the curried chicken with mushrooms.  My salad was all right, GS's soup was better-a chicken soup with spinach, with a curiously strong tasting broth-almost beefy.

The runner brought a plate of spring rolls to our table and said, "they were from Kathy".  I replied I don't know Kathy, I'm not Kathy, and that we didn't order that, but he insisted we take them.  Compliments of the chef?  Are we THAT cute of a couple?  Or were they made for someone else erroneously?  Whatever, I won't say no to free food.

The food came and it was "meh" at best-the curry was watery and bland, and my duck was dry and tough.  The runner, who had a charming but unintelligible accent, kept trying to take away my plate.  The food was in front of me, I had the fork in my hand, I was merely breathing between bites, and he asked me if I was done.  He wasn't trying to hurry me; the restaurant was half full by then and it was only like 8:30pm.  I think he was just bored.  Finally I told him to take it away since he seemed so eager to and I wasn't really into it, and he seemed inordinately hurt that I didn't want to take the leftovers.  After he asked me three times about it I explained that we were going somewhere else after and I was worried they would spoil-only THEN was he satisfied enough to take the damn duck away.

The couple behind us asked what was in the beet salad.  The two waiters were trying to even understand what "beets" were, and once they finally understood, they had to confer on what was in the salad and how to translate the ingredients into English.  "Beets in orange sauce" is what they came up with, after a good seven minutes of discussion where the word "beet" came up dozens of time.  I honestly wanted to intercede since I have customer service in my genetic makeup but GS stopped me.  I later heard them joking in the kitchen (which we were close to) about beets but I couldn't even figure out the joke-I think they thought the word just sounded funny.

I was still hungry so we ordered dessert, which I rarely do since I'm a cheapskate.  I ordered key lime cake.  How can you go wrong?  It should have been listed as arroz con mango instead.  Picture this: key lime bundt cake, with a rum sauce, whipped cream, walnuts, and cookies & cream ice cream.  WTF?  Were they cleaning out their fridge?  Were they stoned when they put it together?  It was purely awful.  I HATE rum sauce, I learned.

"Come thirsty", joked GS.  The bored runner kept refilling our water and must have done so about 8 times.  I swear he would refill it everytime I took a sip.  I wanted GS to scream at him, "I don't want anymore f***ing water" but he said that would be rude.  Funny, but rude.  All right, ruin my fun lol

I can't in good conscience recommend the place.  I would like other people to have such potentially hilarious dining experiences but I won't trick anyone into it.  I don't know.  It may have been an off night, but I can't have too much faith in a Vietnamese restaurant that doesn't even have Asian people working in it.  Just saying.

Rapids Water Park

So the kidlet turned eight this past week and to avoid the planning and expense of a birthday party I offered to take him to Rapids Water Park.  It's the least I could do.  I knew as the day got closer I would regret my decision, because I am chronically lazy and hate sun, but once you promise something to your kid, there is no getting out of it.  Unless, of course, you are comfortable being branded as the worst parent in the WORLD who doesn't KEEP THEIR PROMISES.  If I bowed out of this excursion, for sure my son would grow up to be a sociopath and get life in prison for a series of heinous crimes.

We left at a reasonable hour but the wait in West Palm Beach stretched out as we waited for successive generations of the family to show up (four in total!).  My mom and her sisters, who I refer to in my own head as the Fates, all had to go...to just wait in the shade and hold all our stuff for three hours.  Because there is nothing that feels as good to a grandma as being a martyr for the sake of their ingrate children and precious grandchildren.

Well, thank God they did go because they paid.  Weekend admission is $38.95 plus tax.  Regardless of age.  Newborns?  $38.95.  Senior citizens?  $38.95.  That is BOGUS.  We did get a free pass to return within a month but still, this is incredibly overpriced.  The cheapest parking we saw is $10 and you are NOT allowed to bring in outside food and drink.  Eh.

Honestly, though, I had fun.  Despite the whining and waiting in line and walking on red-hot concrete in bare feet, I liked it.  I love water slides.  My second cousin and I left our kids in the kiddie area under the watchful gaze of the Fates and went on all the awesome adult rides we couldn't convince our yellow-bellied spawn to ride.  I did all the shaming techniques I could think of: look, that kid is smaller than you...look, a GIRL is riding it, AND she's smaller than you...but no dice.  Funny, because shaming like this always works on me.  My son is extremely cautious, though...at least I don't have to worry about him climbing onto the roof pretending to be Superman and breaking his arm.

I couldn't recommend this as a cost effective family activity but I'd keep on eye on their website for coupons or discounts-since Six Flags closed down so many years ago, this is the closest water park you'll get-can't wait to plan a weekend Orlando trip someday with Wet 'n Wild and Blizzard Beach.  That would be awesome!