XOXO

Hey guys! I’ve been really busy the past few days, so I have a ginormous Valentine’s Day update today. I was going to do an update yesterday, but I got a nasty spyware infection on my laptop that Dustin took care of for me. So annoying, especially knowing exactly what it’s doing, but thankfully we cleaned it up quickly.

Let’s rewind to Friday, the 12th. We headed out to Middletown for our hair appointments and to do some shopping. With a limited selection of places to eat lunch, we went with our safe choice: The Park

We started with a Philadelphia roll, my favorite.

Dustin got the gorgonzola filet mignon…

…and I got the Salmon Duet; 2 salmon filets with 2 different sauces.

My salmon was delicious, but I don’t care for salmon that is cooked with its skin on. It’s too slimy for my taste. But otherwise, it was great. The Park has such a lovely, modern Asian atmosphere, but they really need to ramp up their advertising because they’re not very busy! The sign outside of their building needs to be a little more catchy, too. That’s my marketing side coming out of me.

Then we got our hair done, Dustin HATED his. He was supposed to have it done by Vinny, his usual, but he ended up with someone unknown and she chopped up his hair. We were pretty pissed! Thankfully mine came out great. I have bangs now; one long side one, not straight across. We’re considering hiring a hairdresser to come to our house twice a month or so, it’s so important to have a good relationship with your hairdresser, you need to communicate with and trust them just like you would a health care provider or else you’ll end up with crappy results like Dustin. He had to get it touched up the next day by someone else because the other one gave him a mullet. Seriously, she left it longer in the back and butchered on top. The girl that fixed it that next day was like, “Was it her first day?!” Ugh. Poor Dustin. lol

After our hair was done, Dustin reluctantly put his hat on and we headed toward the city to do some shopping. We originally planned to spend the whole weekend in the city, but we changed our plans when Aunt Flo showed up and I knew I wouldn’t feel good enough to truly enjoy myself.  So we decided to just do a little shopping, mainly for mom’s birthday. I didn’t want to announce my plans until I knew for sure what we would be doing, we were basically undecided up to the last minute.

We didn’t stay out very late on Friday, I was exhausted and still full from lunch, so we headed home, watched a movie and went to sleep. The next day, Aunt Flo was being her usual mischievous self, so I loaded up on Advil and continued with our plans. We decided to stay home on Valentine’s Day and eat out on Saturday night. After some more shopping, we ended up going to Cosimo’s in Middletown again, mainly because it was late and our choices were dwindling once again. It ended up being a FANTASTIC choice as their dinner menu for the evening was superb.

I tried to get a better pic of the menu, but they took it away before I was done. I didn’t want to ask to keep it lol.

The bread basket of DOOM!

We started with scallops wrapped in prosciutto and a goat cheese salad with strawberries and apples…

For our entrees, Dustin got the lobster ravioli:

I had a bite, it was absolutely fantastic. Very fresh. And I got Pasta Della Nonna (spaghetti with meatballs and mozzarella). The waitress was impressed that I pronounced it correctly lol.

Between the bread basket and our appetizers, we had a lot to take home!

Everything was fabulous. We arrived there late in the evening, so it was just us and another couple. It was very romantic.

On Valentine’s Day, I woke up to this beautiful sight:

Flowers and candy from Dustin!!

And this little cutie I wish it was real!!

I swear I took about 200 pics of this arrangement, I just love it so much!

Lots of kitchen goodies from mom <3

What’s this? Oh, no he didn’t!!!!!

!!! yes, he did! OMGGGGG! I wanted a Vita-Mix after seeing them around the blogosphere and my sweet hubby bought one for me. I’m SO excited about this, you have no idea! I cannot wait to use it.  

!!!!!!

*squeals with excitement* LOVE IT!! It came with 3 mixing containers. So incredibly awesome.

He didn’t stop there though! Seriously, my spoiled-ness was off the charts this weekend. He bought me a Prada bag and matching wallet.

He didn’t do too shabbily either. He got a new laptop and scotch. Presents are fun, but food and drinks are even funner. We delved into the inexpensive caviar that the guy at the import store recommended. And by inexpensive, I mean $14 and $20. We had a sampling and decide on whitefish and some kind of black. We bought 2 new caviar spoons while we were shopping on Friday in anticipation of Sunday.

You shouldn’t use metal spoons for caviar because it oxidizes the eggs. These are made from pearl I believe. We brought a cooler with ice packs with us, so we picked up a container of this while we were there:

Then we enjoyed the caviar with creme fraiche on crackers with some Moet.

Creme fraiche is amazing. This is the first time I had it, it really does compliment the caviar beautifully.

Salty little bites of heaven.

While we sipped and savored, I had a batch of whole wheat dough on standby waiting to be made into a glorious BBQ chicken pizza. I found one last way to make heart-shaped food for the holiday:

I shaped the dough into a heart!! Cute, huh?! I used half of the dough for a BBQ chicken pizza and the other half for just plain cheese.

Whole Wheat Pizza Dough

• 2 cups whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup warm water
• 2 TBSP honey
• 1 package yeast (1 TBSP)
• Salt, optional (I didn’t add any)
• 1 TBSP extra virgin olive oil

1. Mix yeast, water and honey together; slowly add in flour and mix until dough bowl forms
2. Coat bowl and top of dough ball with EVOO
3. Cover with damp towel and let sit in warm place until it rises

I preheated the oven to 450F, then placed the dough with 1 medium diced red onion in there without anything else so the dough would get a head start before the cheese and other toppings. I took it out after about 7-8 minutes, then put the rest of the toppings on. My mom grilled a batch of chicken tenders earlier, so I chopped them up and tossed them in Hick Lickin’ Good BBQ sauce, then spread it over the dough and drizzled it with some other BBQ sauce being I ran out of Hick Lickin’ Then I sprinkled a generous amount of 2% cheddar cheese over the top and popped it back in the oven for another 8 or 9 minutes, until the bottom was browned.

The result:

Ultimate YUMMINESS!!!

I had to get my Reebok step board to get all of the heart-shaped pizza in the picture LOL. I love my Canon Rebel xsi, but the lens I have doesn’t work with the zoom in/out function. So my pics are always really closeup and if I want something from a distance, I have to stand way back or way up. I’m only 5’3″ and even after standing on my board, I could still barely get it in. hahaha

It tasted SO good! I had two three pieces. YUM!

I am definitely going to make this again sometime soon. Next time I’ll add some green bell peppers. My veg friends: You could do BBQ tofu cubes OR omit the protein component altogether and just do cheese and veggies with BBQ sauce. Delish!

As you can see, we had a wonderful weekend, despite Aunt Flo trying to crash our celebrations! lol I felt really blah all day today, so I ate leftovers from Cosimo’s and took a day to chill after an indulgent weekend. Tomorrow is back to reality, but that’s ok, because reality is awesome, too. I can’t wait to use my Vita-Mix!!! I already have a plan that involves avocado. I can see a lot of smoothies and soups in my future. Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Did you do anything special this weekend? Did you eat anything yummy? Tell me, tell me!! Inquiring minds wanna know!

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Tagged as: BBQ chicken pizza, caviar, Cosimo's, creme fraiche, Moet, spaghetti, sushi, Valentine's Day, Vita-Mix