HAPPY FRIDAY!

Can you tell I’m just a bit excited that it’s the weekend? I don’t even have any big plans, I’m just happy to be able to stay up a bit later, sleep a bit more, and enjoy the beautiful weather that’s supposed to stay for a couple days! OH and in keeping with my friend MizFit’s post theme today, my post is brought to you by the letter F.

I got home a little bit later than normal for a Friday, so dinner was on our minds as soon as I walked in the door. We’re having sushi later in the week, so we decided to forgo our regular sushi Friday for something a bit different. I ran across my Entertainment Book card and looked up the places that take the card without having a paper coupon since our book has decided to take a vacation. It turned out that a local seafood place had a buy-one-get-one-free meal discount with the card, so we called, made a reservation and off we went. Please excuse the LOUSY pictures. I was a bad food blogger and left my camera at home, so you’re left with the crappy sub-par BlackBerry pictures.

Fancy schmancy!

Dover Straits has been in the same location for a LONG time. The decor has probably been the same since the day it opened in 1978, including fish tanks, ships wheels, and lovely rope-wrapped wood stumps topped with flickering lanterns. The atmosphere was very “we’re trying to make this look like a classy New England restaurant” but more like what a classy New England would’ve looked like in 1978. We were by far the youngest people there (which might’ve been due to the fact that it was 5:45 and we were in time for the Early Bird Special.)

I love a good sourdough!

The waiter brought us a basket of warm sourdough bread and water, and took our drink orders. We ordered diet Coke without even thinking about it, but later found out (when the check came) that they were $2.50 a piece and $1 per refill! out (when the check came) that they were $2.50 a piece, and $1 for refills! We quickly decided on our entrees and soup, and I had a piece (ok, 2) of buttered bread.

Tomatoey goodness

I decided to get what was called a “Southern Seafood Stew” which was a tomato-based soup with fish, clams, rice, and vegetables in it. I was thrilled at the pieces of fish, but not so thrilled about the fact that there was more okra in it than fish. Okra is the ONE vegetable (besides beets) that I just can’t get into. Something about the goo on the inside. Anyway… Adam got a creamy clam chowder that looked quite good, but I just wasn’t in the mood for a creamy soup.

you can't even really tell what this is, huh?

Not long after we finished our soups, our entrees came. I had decided to get one of the specials, a tilapia filet stuffed with mushrooms(!), spinach, and feta cheese.

It came with a bearnaise sauce that I got on the side, and it ended up not even needing the sauce. Both our entrees came with a vegetable medly that was absolutely swimming in a buttery-type sauce. I couldn’t tell if it was really butter, or just a butter-like substance. As weird

Greasy veggies (that would be a great band name!)

as it was, I stopped eating the vegetables because they just didn’t taste good with that grease on them. A different, pre-food-conscious me would’ve gobbled them up and sopped up the sauce with some bread!

We realized that my entree was supposed to come with some sort of seasoned potato that wasn’t on my plate, so we asked the server for it. The plate came, and I was a bit underwhelmed (So you can be overwhelmed, and you can be underwhelmed, but can you ever just be whelmed?

underwhelming spuds... another great band name!

NAME THAT MOVIE!)They were just sliced potatoes, boiled I think, with some olive oil and oregano and loads of salt. They tasted a bit like what my friend’s mom would make for us when I was a little girl, but not good enough to eat more than a couple bites.

The check came, we got our $15/free dinner discount, paid the bill and left, all the while talking about what a strange experience the dinner was. Every single person in the place, and the place itself appeared to be stuck in a time warp. There was big hair, huge plastic glasses, acid-washed jeans, and it reeked of Aqua Velva and Old Spice. Our waiter was wearing Metallica cufflinks, a band whose prime was in the 1980s. Not to sound like too big of a food snob, but I can’t even remember the last time that the only garnish on my plate was a piece of flat-leaf parsley. We may go back to this place once soft-shelled crabs are in season because they have a killer deal on them, but unless we get a DeLorean, I don’t think we’ll be going back any time soon. Oh well, it was an experience, that’s for sure!

GO CUBS! (sorry southsiders...)

Craving some normalcy, we decided to go to Woodfield to walk around and get some frozen yogurt and candy, and I wanted to look for a new Cubs t-shirt. Now that this experience has passed, I swear each and every one of the little things happened for a reason. I had to miss the bathroom in JC Penney and go to the mall one… then go to not one but two baseball stores looking for t-shirts. I ended up with that one over there —>

We had to get stuck behind some of the slowest walkers in the world, and stuck by a group of teenyboppers in Hot Topic drooling over Edward Cullen posters they’ve seen a thousand times. We had to go to the candy store and ogle all the candy we “shouldn’t” be eating… just to get to Yogen Früz in time to run into three people I haven’t seen in YEARS. Ok, one I’d seen more recently, but the other two, not in a LONG time.

I had just paid for my Früz and was getting my phone out to take a picture when I heard “MARA” being shouted from down the mall hallway (mallway?). I turned, and there was everyone’s favorite blog commenter, Fancy (she’s on the left there), and 2 of her best friends! (I won’t say names since I didn’t ask them if I could!) They all went to college with Adam and I, and were my dear friends in my sorority from day one. Fancy and one of the other girls were holding containers of Früz and immediately told me that they had been talking about me and Früz all through dinner! The best part? Fancy and I got the same thing! Well, I added chocolate chips to mine, but we both got plain yogurt with blackberries! Here’s the fun picture we took… I had Points® to kill, so I got a larger one… approximately 4 Points®!

Fancy and My Früz!

We stood around outside the yogurt shop for literally a half hour just talking and catching up, and it was amazing to see these wonderful women. Fancy and I talked food blogs, while the other two girls and Adam talked about how they just don’t understand food blogs! It was such a great impromptu meet-up!

While we were talking, Fancy mentioned to me that I should try to get myself on Nate‘s “This Week in Blogs” post because they’re just so hilarious! Little did I know, Nate was posting one as we spoke, and as of tonight, I’m the first one mentioned in the fourth installment! Apparently, my post to Adam on his birthday reminded him of Marley and Me, and my foodie date with Jenn should’ve had a more “bucket” related theme… it’s really just worth reading!

Tomorrow is everyone’s favorite day: Cute Food Saturday!!! It will also have a photo, just for the lovely KLM of Bites and Bowls of my manicure to come featuring one of her rejected nail polish colors. I didn’t win hers, but I became obsessed with it, so I bought it for this week’s manicure.

Wow, this was a super-long post…thanks for reading it (if you got this far!)

Have a wonderful Friday night all!

Technorati Tags: dessert, dinner out, fish, friends

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