Late Night at Milltown, Carrboro, NC

One late evening, we went to Milltown, a bar in Carrboro that specializes in a large selection of Belgian beers.
We also sampled some of their menu, which included bar favorites like mussels and Belgian frites with frite sauce.
One standout included pretzels from the Guglhupf Bakery of Durham, NC.
Since they had poutine listed on the menu, I had to try it. It was an interesting, Southern take on the Quebecois classic- they used a white sauce with shredded cheddar instead of cheese curds. Not as good but interesting.

307 E Main Street
Carrboro, NC 27510
(919) 968-2460

Pretzels

If you're a regular reader of the blog, you may have noticed that I love pretzels. So when I found out that Metropolitan Bakery added a whole wheat fennel pretzel to their menu, I had to seek one out. Super chewy, with great fennel flavor - like a soft taralle. A great twist on a local favorite.

I don't discriminate, I love equally bobo whole wheat fennel varieties, buttery Amish pretzels, my beloved pretzel croissant, and the original Philly classic from the Philly Soft Pretzel Factory.

Our friend who grew up in Northeast Philly turned us on to the place and we still find ourselves veering off I-95 to visit the original location on Frankford Avenue. But the factory has now grown to have franchise locations all over the mid-Atlantic. You can't beat hot pretzels fresh from the oven, and you really can't beat the price - 3 for $1, 20 for $5, 100 for $20, and on it goes...

Dessert meals in NYC

Sometimes when I'm grazing solo in NYC, I just eat what I want to and end up having dessert meals. Yesterday, after seeing the Anglomania exhibit at the Met, I head down 2 blocks to the Lady M Cake Boutique at 78th and Madison. My parents discovered the original Lady M in Tokyo and fell in love with their signature dessert: the milles-crepe, 20 crepes layered with "ethereally light and creamy custard." The hint of burnt caramelized sugar blowtorched on the top is divine. My dad has been trying for years to recreate this -- his personal spin on it is mixing matcha (green tea powder) into the cream.

I then head down to Union Square where I was going to eventually meet my friend, but in the chow tour, the destination was The City Bakery. I love love love the pretzel croissants -- a perfect hybrid: denser and chewier than regular croissants, but still with all those buttery layers; salted on top like a pretzel, but flaky like a croissant. The pretzel croissant inspires such devotion, that it actually has it's own website.

So feeling a bit more in the mood for actual food food, I did actually get a small plate from the salad bar -- for a white establishment they do tofu alright there, not bland like white people usually do, for one thing they use the dried smoked tofu that i like better. Then I got a 1/2 dozen of the melt-in-your-mouth mini peanut butter cookies to bring over to my friend's place.

And this was from NYC earlier in summer, though I never blogged about it. Another grazing lunch where we split a sandwich, so that we could get dessert (the dessert and coffee cost more than our actual lunch): blueberry pie with an oh-so-flaky crust and super-gingery ginger sandwich cookies with hazelnut cream from some place on 10th Street who's name escapes me. Irene if you read this, please help me out.

Flying Monkey Part 2 and Other Reading Terminal Market Treats

Made it back to Flying Monkey later in the week to try the sesame-tahini rice crispie treat. I liked it, the tahini was not too overpowering, just sweet enough, almost could have been peanut butter. The little black things you see are black sesame seeds, not bugs...

Also, whenever I'm at Reading Terminal Market, I can never resist soft pretzels from the Amish place, Fisher's. Fresh and hot from the oven, they brush melted butter all over them before serving. Mmmmm....