Turkey Itinerary

Since I'm still waiting for our pictures from San Francisco and I'd like to blog about something I thought I'd give an update on our planning for Turkey.

So we are all booked for our trip to Turkey over Thanksgiving. We leave late on Friday, November 20 so that we can work a full day and then return Sunday, November 29. And the best part is we only have to use 3 vacation days!

We are staying in Istanbul for 4 nights. This is our hotel in Istanbul: http://www.hotellinoistanbul.com/. It's located near all the major attractions and is 69 Euros a night.

Then we move on to Cappadocia for 3 nights. We're flying into Kayseri. This is our hotel in Goreme: http://www.kelebekhotel.com/. We are booked for room 4. Our second choice was http://www.4oda.com/. We decided on the Kelebek Hotel because it's located in Goreme which many on Trip Advisor recommended over staying in Urgup, the other major hotel location in Cappadocia.

Our last night we will be flying back to Istanbul pretty late so we will be staying at either the Holiday Inn or Courtyard by Marriott near the airport since we have rewards points we can use. No matter what trip we go on, we can't seem to escape the Holiday Inns.

San Francisco - Boulevard

Boulevard was to be our big meal of our trip as we were celebrating our third anniversary which is about 2 weeks from now. We were very excited about our first Michelin star restaurant experience.

We arrived a little bit early and had drinks at the bar. While we were there we saw a couple come in with a baby. To a fancy restaurant. And it was almost 9 at night. I was giving them the side-eye.

I started with the Crispy Maryland Softshell Crab with toasted garlic rice noodle salad, lime vinaigrette, red curry, and green papya relish. Absolutely loved the crab. Thought the noodles had a great taste. The Husband was not a fan of the noodles though.

The Husband had the Organic Heirloom Tomatoes with Italian bufala mozzarella, Bellwether Farms ricotta, Padron peppers, olive & fresh garbanzo relish, olio verde, and basil. Some of the best tomatoes we have ever tasted. The bufala mozzarella was to die for. And the ricotta was wonderful as well.

For dinner I had the Butter Poached New England Lobster with creamed Brentwood corn, summer frying peppers, fritto of cornmeal crusted baby corn & Padron peppers, and lobster nage. One of the best meals I have ever had. The lobster was amazing. Buttery and tender. The Husband was in love with the corn. It might have been his favorite part of the entire meal.

The Husband had the Wood Oven Roasted Angus Filet Mignon with fondant fingerling potatoes, blue cheese, celery salad, crispy bacon, spinach wilted with roasted shallot & trumpet mushrooms, warm mustard vinaigrette, and red wine beef jus. This was the disappointing part of the meal. We're from Chicago which is known for it's good steaks. This one just did not measure up. It was overcooked for what was requested and to me it just tasted bland and not very tender. The bacon was delicious though.

For dessert I had a cheese plate. I had the Melange cheese which came with some grapes, bread, and nuts. Heavenly. I just wish they gave you bigger pieces of cheese. I could eat just cheese for dinner.

The Husband had the stuffed chocolate chip cookies. He loved them. I'm not a huge chocolate fan so I thought they'd be better stuffed with vanilla ice cream to make ice cream sandwiches.

After dinner we headed to RN 74, Michael Mina's new wine bar for a drink at the recommendation of our concierge. We liked the hip but relaxed vibe of the place. They had a great looking menu that you could eat at the wine bar and late-night dining. Late-night dining is usually my favorite while drinking but Boulevard had stuffed us. I also liked that you can order smaller tastes than a whole glass which meant I could try more.

RN 74 is pretty upscale though. They had a glass of wine on the menu that was $65. A freakin' GLASS! That's like the same price as our bottle of wine at Boulevard. And most of the bottles we drink at home are $10 from Trader Joe's. So obviously a different class of place than we usually go to. Very nice though and I'd recommend it to wine lovers. Or even wine novices like myself. They had plenty of other wine available for reasonable prices.

San Francisco - Day 2

We started the day by watching some football in our hotel room then heading over to the Ferry Building.

There was also a market across the street selling paintings, jewelery, and housewares. There were a lot of quality products and I bought a really cool necklace.

The Ferry Building is my heaven on earth. Their farmer's market was wonderful. There were types of produce there that I'd never heard of before. And they had a nice cooking demonstration going on.

The inside was my true love though. So many wonderful stores selling delicious goodies.

And samples everywhere! I think we could have made a meal from the samples alone.

We decided to get some cheese from Cowgirl Creamery, bread from Acme Bread, and a ham and fontina with honey sandwich from Lulu Petite to share. Delicious. I seriously could eat lunch at the Ferry Building every day for a month and not run out of things to try.

We headed next to Union Square. The Husband found a sports bar to watch some more college football and I did a little bit of shopping.

Then on to the cable cars. There was a huge huge line at the Powell Street turnaround. So being the very smart people that we are, we went half a block down from where they were loading. All the cars stopped there, we hopped right on because for some reason they don't actually fill the cars at the turnaround, and we actually got prime spots, hanging on the side of the car right at the front. And we missed an hour or more wait in line. Another option is to ride them at night. There was no line and I'm sure the city looks cool all lit up.

We got off the cable car at Lombard Street and walked down.

These awesome little cars can be rented for the day. They're called Go Cars. The car has a GPS tour in it that tells you where to go. Very expensive though.

We went over to Fisherman's Wharf and Pier 39 to see the sea lions.

Then climbed Telegraph Hill to Coit Tower.

And saw the Transamerica Pyramid on the way back to our hotel.

San Francisco - Day 1

Arrived at SFO and took the BART downtown to the Embarcadero stop for $8.10 each. We were staying at Le Meridien San Francisco. We found a great rate of $82/night for this hotel. Hotel is generally $250-$300 and up. Not sure if it would be worth it for that price. Le Meridien was in the Financial District which seemed pretty quiet even when we arrived in the middle of the work day on Friday. The rooms were large, the bed very comfortable, and the bathroom very nice. A very nice hotel but not much that makes it stand out.

We enjoyed staying in the Financial District. It was nice and quiet and not overwhelmed by people. We were able to walk almost everywhere. The two other main areas for hotels in San Francisco are Fisherman's Wharf and Union Square. Fisherman's Wharf was our idea of hell on earth. People everywhere, all tourists, tour busses and tour groups going by, overpriced restaurants, lots of kids. Union Square is still pretty crowded but not like Fisherman's Wharf. Lots of shopping in the area.

We started our trip with lunch at Swan Oyster Depot. But first we had to walk there. Big mistake. SF's hills kicked our asses. Walking up California Street almost killed me.

Should have taken the cable car.

Excellent seafood at Swan Oyster Depot but go on an off hour. We had a long wait and we showed up at 2:15.

They only have one long counter for people to eat at.

We both started with a glass of wine and the clam chowder. They're apparently famous for their chowder and while it was good, it wasn't even the best I had all weekend. Then we moved on to the crab cocktail. This was delicious and we both highly recommend it.

Finally, I decided since I was at an oyster depot, I needed to try the oysters. I got a plate of 6 oysters which they added 1 clam to. Then they gave me another clam to try. Altogether I had 8 raw oysters/clams that I ate. Too much raw for me. I much preferred the oysters to the clams. Payment is cash only and it's also only open until 5:30 pm.

We stopped at Grace Cathedral and wandered through Chinatown on the way back to the hotel.

For dinner we headed to Andalu in the Mission District to meet some friends. It was very good. My favorite was the cambazola fondue although we also enjoyed the flatiron steak, Coca-Cola braised short ribs, sliders, mizo glazed sea bass, wagyu beef tartare, and ahi tartar tacos. Only disappointing thing was the polenta fries. Highly recommend this restaurant.

Turkey for Turkey Day

Turkish Airlines is having a great sale on non-stop flights from Chicago to Istanbul in November. We are seriously thinking about taking a 9 day trip over Thanksgiving to Istanbul and Cappadocia. For now I have 2 travel guides I'll be reading on my 6 hour drive back to Ohio tomorrow.

Adobo Grill Part II

I have been a bad blogger lately. But there have been no new shoes, no new trips, and no new restaurants lately. We head off to San Francisco for Labor Day weekend. And I'm trying to convince The Husband to go to Denmark and Sweden (or really anywhere in Europe) over Thanksgiving but I don't think he has any extra vacation days. And we probably shouldn't be spending a couple grand unplanned anyway. Plus once we've made it to Thanksgiving, our Thailand trip is very close.

We did return to Adobo Grill the other night, this time to the one on Division Street. I'm changing my review to skip it. The food was nothing more than okay and with all the delicious other choices in town you should pick another restaurant. I should have realized the experience would be bad when as soon as I ordered a strawberry daiquiri (I don't do tequila and margaritas) they told me they had no Bacardi. No rum in an entire restaurant? Plus I'm pretty sure there was a liquor store within walking distance. My current pick for Mexican is De Cero so try there instead.

Milwaukee

We're off to Wisconsin! I've lived in the midwest almost my entire life and in Chicago for 3.5 years and I've never been to Wisconsin. That's all about to change as we just booked tickets on the Megabus to Milwaukee for our anniversary weekend in September for a grand total of $4.50. As it gets closer we're hoping to get a hotel through Priceline for a good price.

Milwaukee for our anniversary....how romantic.