20 Brix

Cincinnati hosts a variety of restaurant weeks.  My favorite by far is the one held by the independent local restaurants featured on EatLocalCincy.com.  This restaurant week features a three course meal for $26.11 per person (wine/dessert cost extra). 

This year we decided to try 20 Brix Wine Bar and Restaurant in historic Milford.  The name of the restaurant is unique because Brix is the measure of sugar in a liquid, a measure commonly used when talking about wine.

We started the evening with a bottle of wine called The Beach House. 

Doesn't this look cool and refreshing?

Sommelier chosen wine pairings were offered for each menu item, but I felt like having white wine with the whole meal, so I did. :)

My first course was Roasted Cauliflower Veloute, which was similar to a potato soup but with an immense depth of flavor.  Delicious!  You can see the hazelnuts and crushed pepper on it in the picture below.

David started with a classic Iceberg wedge salad.

We also enjoyed some bread.  The butter was blended with lemon and was almost like a cupcake.  It stood out from your normal restaurant bread and butter.

For the second course, David ordered the Lamb Meatballs.

I ordered the seasonal risotto, which came with sweet corn, local teardrop tomatoes, chiles, and aged cheddar cheese.  This was by far my favorite dish.  The picture is unfortunately blurry, as I was unable to hold the camera still in my hurry to get some into my mouth!!

The entree I ordered was very small, but forgivable given the reduced dining price during restaurant week. 

I had the Pan Seared Day Boat Scallops with celery root puree, baby bok choy, chili orange nage, and crispy brussels sprouts.

Ok, so the plating needs a little work.  Or maybe it slid down to one end of the plate.  Who knows.  I had no problem digging in, I assure you!

David got Steak Frites with an arugula salad.

I couldn't resist dessert.  The folks at the table across from us were finishing up their meal when we arrived, and I couldn't help but notice the amazing dessert they ordered.  As soon as they left I asked the waiter about it.  Theirs was some sort of Chocolate Mud Pie Kiss.  Sounded interesting, but not as interesting as the Chocolate Hampton sounded!

ZoMG.  look at this bad boy!

 I asked David to take an action shot of me with the Chocolate Hampton.  I think you can tell by my zany glasses and the weird look in my eye that I am secretly a cat lady.  Ok, perhaps not such a secret any longer...

Delicious.  You'd better believe that we ate every morsel.

This was an excellent meal with excellent service with excellent ambiance.  We will definitely be returning to 20 Brix for more deliciousness soon.

Heaven and Hell Cake

Looks delicious, yes?

This epic, gigantic cake is called a Heaven and Hell Cake.  It's so rich and delightful that I've only dared make it once.  This is the type of cake you need a gallon of milk and a carafe of coffee to consume. 

The best part of this cake is that the name really means something.  The heaven part refers to Angel Food Cake and the Hell part is Devil's Food Cake.  While tasty, this also means that your oven is going to be running for several hours while you bake the different layers.

While the cake layers are cooking, you mix up a peanut butter mousse.  The mousse is a combination of cream cheese, peanut butter, heavy cream, and powdered sugar.  Oh my thighs.

Here is the Angel Food cake after coming out of the oven.  It's a little dark on top, but it doesn't matter since the whole cake will be drenched in chocolate ganache.

Here are the completed layers prior to cake assembly.
Back Left:  Peanut Butter Mousse
Back Right:  Chocolate Ganache
Front Left:  Devil's Food Cake
Front Right:  Angel Food Cake

I cut each cake round in half, so as to make 2 layers of each flavor of cake.  In the picture below, I have started building the cake.  Between each layer of cake you smear a thick layer of peanut butter mousse.

It's getting taller!  This is by far the tallest cake I've ever made.  I think the slices were at least 6 inches high.  Quite impressive if you ask me.

 Once the layers are all stacked up, you simply need to drizzle chocolate ganache over the cake to make it presentable and allow the chocolate to harden in the fridge.  If you're an awesome food blogger, you'll clean off your counter top and put a pretty picture in the background for your final pictures.

Then you put on your party dress and add a big bow in your hair.  And rope your boyfriend into taking your picture!  Yummy yummy!

Louisville River Swim

On Saturday, my boyfriend and I drove down to Louisville for the third annual Louisville Ohio River Swim.

The swim takes place just north of Louisville in a town called Prospect and near a subdivision hidden down a long winding country road.

I'd heard of the swim before from a few athletic friends, but never made it down to check it out.

Some background on my motivation for doing it this year:  I was out of town on business for an extended period prior to Cincinnati's Great Ohio River Swim.  I got home around midnight the night before the swim-after spending a long day moving heavy equipment.  Followed by spending a long day in the car.  Coupled with four hours of sleep and my muscles just weren't up to the race.  So I decided to go down and watch the swim without participating, but immediately regretting not doing the race.  I set my sights on Louisville instead...

Oh, and Louisville gives you a t-shirt.  Gotta love a good race shirt!

The area where the race was held was beautiful.

I was happy to have my boyfriend with me this year.  We met at a dinner party last spring and the first time we hung out just the two of us was at the Great Ohio River Swim (After a post race shower we met up at Pompilios for some Italian).

They let us in the water for a bit of a warm-up before the race started.  It was hard to hold yourself in place because the current was really pushing against you.  The race officials said it was only 1/4 mile per hour current, but it felt a lot stronger to me.

I'm sitting on the far left end of the dock in this photo.

The race started in the water, so when it was time to start, they just gave us a little count down and off we went!

I'm right behind that person in the middle blocking my photo :)

The race offered three different race lengths.  800 meter (half mile), 1.2 mile, and 2.4 mile.  You could tell who was doing which event by the color of their swim cap.  This helped the race officials make sure you were taking the correct turns on the course.  And it also helped you size up your competition!

In the picture below, I am swimming around one of the 'turn around buoys.'  I took a break from freestyle and did some breaststroke to help me catch my breath.

And here is me following through on my game plan: go fast on the way back because the current is pushing you!

I'm thankful to my honey for taking all these great pictures for me during the race.  I appreciate your support!!

This is me cruising through the finish line.

And just after the finish.  The look on my face says it all.  I felt great.

After the race, we goofed around with the camera and hung out in the shade on the grass while we waited for the race results.  We waited a really, really long time. 

But, our patience paid off, because I won a medal :)  Which I wore the entire way home.

On the way home we stopped at Subway for lunch, then I zonked out for a good half hour.
Can't wait to try it again next year!

Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Gardens

I recently got to experience a Friday afternoon at the Cincinnati Zoo, courtesy of a work outing.  It was the first wonderful, sunny day that we'd experienced in a while and the zoo was absolutely packed.

The zoo seems to be having a lot of problems with their giraffes lately.  One died earlier this year.  The new baby giraffe has a broken leg.  Wonder whats causing the problems?

We got to see this Rhino two ways.  Standing here catching some sun rays, and again in a swimming pool later.  If I hadn't known better, I'd have thought he was a hippo :)

It was a great day for a swim at the zoo.  This polar bear was doing backstroke laps in his swimming pool.

Wish there wasn't a window in the way here!  I wanted to swing around too.

Baby Bonobo Monkeys.  You know what they say about bonobos. 

The zoo had a lot of volunteers outside holding animals that you could touch.  I don't remember them doing things like that when I was little.  I tried to pose with a bunch of them.  Wouldn't it be odd to realize that you are in pictures with a whole lot of people?

What's also cool is when you know somebody who knows somebody and you get to meet an elephant up close.

This is me with Mai Tai. 

And a boa constrictor

No visits to the alligator or crocodiles though

The gorillas were awesome.  There was a zoo keeper giving a presentation and he was throwing pieces of fruit to them.  They were pretty good at catching, too.

Don't worry, folks, I've got this situation under control.

My guess is that this peacock was not showing its feathers on demand...I'm thinking it was probably getting ready to stab someone's eye out...

Maifest

I braved the rainy weekend to check out Maifest in Main Strasse.  It was still fun, even though it was drizzly.

Check out this giant mettwurst with sauerkraut!

In other news, summer semester at Xavier has officially started.  My nose is back on the grindstone.  When I'm not dancing in the rain with my umbrella. ella. ella. of course.

Or...taking night vision goggles to steal other peoples chicken tenders.

I didn't actually eat any of his chicken tenders though. 

Later, we split a cream puff.  There was only one vendor selling them...and they were not delicious.  I was sadly disappointed and we tossed it out.  :(  Maifest fail.  Oktoberfest, bring it on!

Red Velvet Cheesecake

For some reason I've been having trouble uploading photos here.  It's working ok now, so hopefully the trend will continue.

In other news, grad school is a complete time drain.  One day, it will be over.  And I will have awesome free time back again, right?

In the meantime I've made a couple amazing cakes.  This red one was in honor of Red's Opening Day.  I was in the parade, so I took this cake to work a few days in advance to let everyone eat it up.

It was quite well received.  That's a layer of cheesecake there in the middle. 

A wee bit lopsided, but strategic buttercream frosting pile-ups can hide a lot.

I've heard they serve these at Cheesecake Factory.  It's not something I would have picked.  But how fitting for Cincinnati Red's Opening Day!

Yum.

Click here for recipe