Friday, July 31, 2009

haught diggity dogz

around morgantown and in the mood for hot dogs? my suggestion would be to visit haught diggity dogz. they have the best hot dogs in the area. the place is small, just like you would expect a hot dog joint to be, the people are friendly and the prices are comparable. all dogs are $1.50 no matter what you put on it. they also have really amazing homemade seasoned french fries.

i like mine with mild chili and slaw (sometimes with onions).
ryan enjoys his dogs with hot chili, slaw and jalapenos.
haught diggity dogz is located on rt. 7 in the rock forge camrock plaza.

after writing this review i got to browsing around on the internet and found that haught diggity dogz received the 2009 weenie award for monongahelia county from the west virginia hot dog blog. if you are not in the morgantown area and have a hankering for a hot dog check out their website west virginia hot dogs to find information on local hot dog eateries and reviews.

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

announcing baby sheridan elise

she is finally here!! i wrote about four months ago about my dear friends katie & eric announcing that they were having a baby girl.

well, i am happy to announce that miss sheridan elise has finally arrived and is absolutely adorable!

congratulations!!

Saturday, July 11, 2009

dragonfly

i've heard mixed reviews about dragonfly and with my love of sushi, i decided to try it for myself. when ryan & i got to the hostesses (yes there were two and i have no idea why) they told us that it would be a 30 minute wait (and there were plenty of tables open as far as we could see). we preferred to sit at the sushi bar anyways and there was no wait to do that.
after being seated at the sushi bar our waiter promptly came, introduced himself and took our drink order. it was a pretty hot day yesterday so we both wanted water, but as hot as it was, i still can't pass up hot green tea when i'm having sushi. when our waiter returned we got one glass of water and a beautiful pot of tea. we had to ask again for the second glass of water.
for starters i ordered a tomato & avocado salad: sliced tomatoes topped with avocado, hearts of palm, and sesame-crusted goat cheese, with a sherry vinaigrette. the tomato & avocado salad required more than just chopsticks (and trust me, i can eat just about anything with chopsticks however, even i can't cut up a huge chunk of tomato with them) so i had to ask for a fork. i love goat cheese but even this portion was a bit too much for moi. the sherry vinaigrette dressing was good but there was just too much of it.
ryan opted for pork & edamame pot stickers: handmade dumplings with pork and soybeans served with a citrus ponzu dipping sauce. ryan is a big fan of gyoza and he liked the addition of edamame but when he bit into his last one, he found that the pork was a tad too pink.

while we were waiting for our sushi to arrive (which we waited for a while), i snapped pictures of the inside of the dragonfly. ryan described the atmosphere to be sushio 54. the crowd was definitely younger. it seemed like the place to go if you wanted to be seen. the restaurant's music was very loud which in turn made everyone talk even louder. i don't particularly enjoy this aspect.
you can kind of tell that the columns are covered with iridescence to mimic an actual dragonfly. i thought that was a very nice added touch.
for our entree ryan ordered the high rise: spicy hamachi, green onion, and cucumber inside with spicy tuna and tempura flakes on outside topped with eel sauce & the waka: snapper, cucumber, and avocado inside topped with salmon, ponzu and green onions. i ordered the tsunami: crab, salmon, and asparagus inside with snapper and tobiko on top & the pink lady: mango, cucumber, and shisho leaf topped with tuna and green onion. (details of all dishes provided by dragonfly's menu)
left to right: tsunami, high rise, the waka, and pink lady
i enjoyed the tsunami very much. the pink lady was decent but i didn't enjoy biting into the stem of the shisho. ryan preferred the high rise to the waka.

in both of our opinions, the best part of the meal was the lemongrass cheesecake: not listed on the menu but according to our waiter is homemade & hand whipped in the back. it came with strawberry glaze on top. it was very creamy and delicious.
if it's sushi you want, i say go to ogawa. but i would definitely return for a slice of the lemongrass cheesecake.

Monday, July 6, 2009

imagine my surprise

ryan and i love watching skateboarding videos. we had just finished dinner and were watching gordon ramsay's the f word when some skaters went past the house. this is a pretty common occurrence so we didn't think anything of it. we noticed that they were slowing down and then came back up the street. we watched out the window for a bit and noticed that one of them was recording the other one doing tricks. of course, i grabbed my camera and asked if they minded if i got a few pics.

the guy recording is chase bartee from morgantown and the guy doing a nollie-heelflip is eric jones from providence, ri:
then on down the street to an ollie from the neighbor's driveway:

chase records and edits videos for fountain of youth skate shop in providence, ri. he also edited and was featured in the film "all i need." here's a teaser. and if that leaves you wanting more you can check out his youtube channel for more video action.

morgantown photo op


an adorable smoke bush in the neighborhood.

Sunday, July 5, 2009

white park

well, we were planning on going to cooper's rock but unfortunately there was a fatal accident on i-68 that had the interstate at a stand still. we decided to go to white park instead to have our picnic & hike.

our view from the blanket
cadyn in foreground & sadie in background

pyrotechnics

ryan and i decided to walk downtown yesterday to go see the fireworks. (yesterday was a day of walking & my hip is a little cranky from it but i plan on getting the kinks out by taking the dogs to cooper's rock shortly and, yep you guessed it, walk some more.)

my camera has a fireworks setting on it and this was the first time i got to try it out. here are some of the photos i took:
photos by moi

Saturday, July 4, 2009

colorful tour of jerome park

ryan and i took the dogs for a nice long walk around the jerome park area of sabraton today. enjoy some of the beautiful flowers i captured.
photos by moi