My sister sent me this, and I thought it was really neat. I am going to give it a whirl! I will start this week with a recipe from the Aaron McCargo.
The Food Network Chefs Cooking Challenge. Check it out!
Join in on the fun!
Season tickets!
August 26, 2009 by Leave a Comment
So we’re big Philadelphia Phillies fans around these parts and we decided to go ahead and buy Season tickets to the Phillies for the 2010 season. Now we won’t go to all of them games – that would be nearly impossible since there are 83 games! But we can go to the games we want to (maybe 20??), and then sell the rest of the tickets.
This shouldn’t be a problem since there are probably friends, family and colleagues that want to go to the games. Season ticket holders have the ability to sell tickets from their season ticket plan directly through phillies.com / StubHub! — and tickets can be delivered through Instant eDelivery without the use of FedEx. So we wouldn’t have to have any communication with the buyer! YAY!
So I’m totally excited about it! If you’re a Phillies fan (or know someone who is!) and are interested in buying tickets to games in 2010, keep us in mind!
The Finished Product: Bathroom
August 21, 2009 by 6 Comments
So as you’ll recall, about one week ago I challenged myself to a new project. To renovate the upstairs hall bathroom in my house. One week later, I’m finished. And I must say I’m quite proud of myself. However, I don’t think the pictures even do it justice. It looks so much better in person (if I do say so myself!)
In case you forgot, here are the BEFORE pictures:
Now obviously, here are the AFTER pictures:
Blood, Sweat & Tears
August 20, 2009 by Leave a Comment
I haven’t blogged for a while since I’ve been so busy with my painting project. I’m so happy to report that the painting was finished completely as of Monday afternoon! I’m still in the process of putting the bathroom together, but once it’s totally finished I will definitely post some pictures! I’m definitely proud of my first painting project! I started the project on Thursday (one week ago) and I worked my butt off the entire weekend until it was done. I didn’t want to drag it out, so once I started it was full steam (and sweat!) ahead.
And don’t worry – I did remind Carlos that he thought I’d quit halfway through! He said that I did a kick ass job for it being my first time, and that I got it done fast.
I’m actually surprised that I got it done so quickly – I should be finishing everything up tomorrow though – so stay tuned!!!!!
Other than that, there isn’t much going on in my world. My niece turns one year old on Saturday, so we have to go to her birthday party. I was given a list of things to make so I guess I’ll be busy tomorrow night making Pasta Salad, Chocolate Fudge, and Peanut Butter Fudge. Please give me strength not to eat any of it!
On Saturday Carlos gave blood at the Philadelphia Phillies blood drive. We got a tour of Citizens Bank Park and he got to have his picture taken wearing the World Series ring. Here are a few pictures.
Do you want cash back for shopping online?
August 16, 2009 by 2 Comments
If you answered yes, check out Ebates. Ebates has over 900 merchant partners. When you shop on those web sites (by clicking a link when you are logged into your Ebates account) you get cash back for your purchases. It’s so simple. And 4 times a year you get a big fat payment deposited into your paypal account (or you can have a check sent to you).
I just got $10.88 cash back for placing my order on Kohls.com. I needed to order stuff for my bathroom once I’m done renovating it. All I did was click on a link and that $10.88 was in my ebates account a few days later!
I bought my new light fixture online, and a few days later my cash back was in my account. I usually use this money to buy music from iTunes – it’s like free music! 
So far I’ve earned $88.69!!!
Click on this link to learn more and sign up! (It’s FREE). AND you’ll get an extra $5 when you make your first purchase!
I finally spoke to the Owner of the Melting Pot in Atlantic City
August 13, 2009 by 10 Comments
Last night I received a phone call from Charlie, the Owner of the Melting Pot in Atlantic City. He apologized for taking so long to contact me. He said that he read the letter that I sent, and he told the General Manager (who received my email first) that every single thing in my email was true. I was relieved, because I didn’t want it to seem like I was over exaggerating anything. He said I was right on the money with everything.
He said that he was approached by the Food Network/Harrah’s about this prospective event, and he figured it would be a great marketing opportunity. The Melting Pot didn’t receive ANY money at all for this event, and they had no input at all in how things went. They donated ALL of the food. He said that things kept changing up until the event actually happened. The event was supposed to take place at the pool, then it was moved to another area of the pool, then it was moved to the balcony. At the last minute he was informed that he couldn’t use his servers at the event. There was a big deal about Union/Non Union, etc so it was Union workers that were serving the food, NOT Melting Pot employees. So right before the event, they had to learn the whole fondue thing and what to do. Obviously the union workers didn’t really care. Charlie said that he almost pulled out of it because he didn’t like how it was being handled.
He said that there was a very long line outside of the pool area to get in. At 4:01pm they let people in, so there were 200 people that pretty much stormed up the steps to the balcony. No wonder they were running out of food. You should never let in that many people at once and expect it to go smoothly. Plus, at first people were serving themselves, so they were taking huge portions, leaving the rest of us with two shrimp and an attitude from the servers.
Charlie was told that Ingrid and Duff would be walking around, mingling, putting together some fondue, etc. That wasn’t the case. They were pretty much roped off, and there was a line to meet them/get your picture taken with them. Here’s the kicker. I hope everyone is sitting down for this. Duff and Ingrid were only there for TWO HOURS! When I heard that I almost fell over. We only stayed there until about 5:15pm (and then left to go home and we stopped at McDonald’s on the way home since we were hungry!). But the event was supposed to run from 4pm – 8pm. But they were only there for 2 hours. Apparently someone didn’t arrive until after 6pm, and by that time Duff and Ingrid were gone.
So needless to say, this event wasn’t what Charlie expected. He thought it would be a good marketing opportunity (who wouldn’t think that?), but that’s not exactly how it turned out. There are some people that had never been to the restaurant and they were happy to be able to taste the fondue. But there were others like myself who were very disappointed. He said he didn’t know about the seat numbers on the ticket. He told me to contact Ticketmaster and see if I can get a refund. He said if he was in my shoes he would definitely be contacting them. So I am going to try that. We’ll see how it turns out. I’m not expecting much.
Charlie said he won’t do an event like this again – unless it’s in his restaurant. But he said they’d have to pay him since he’s not closing down his restaurant for something like that. I really sympathized with him because he gave so much, only to have the Melting Pot’s reputation on the line. I told him that we go to the Melting Pot often, and we’ve NEVER had a bad experience there. That’s why I was surprised about the servers there, until I found out that they weren’t Melting Pot employees — so then it all made sense.
He invited Carlos and I down to the Melting Pot in Atlantic City for the Big Night Out and a few glasses of wine on him. I really appreciate the fact that he took the time to talk to me and explain everything about the event, as well as inviting us to the restaurant.
Next up – Contact Ticketmaster!
Painting, Take One.
August 12, 2009 by 2 Comments
So I’ve never painted before in my life. I decided to take on a new project – to paint the upstairs hall bathroom in my house. It’s absolutely hideous. I have no idea what the people were thinking that lived there before us. For some odd reason they had a love for gold. And brass. Here are a few pictures of the bathroom so you can see for yourself how tacky it is:
And no, I don’t know how that wood towel bar fits in.
If you were to walk into that bathroom right now, you would not see that gold frame on the wall. Once I had the keys to the house in my hand, I ripped that sucker off the wall. It was velcro-ed on there. No joke.
I just took a trip to Lowes to get all of the supplies that I would need. A ladder, paint brushes, rollers, an extender, spackle, sand paper, primer, paint for the ceiling, etc.
I’m ready to take on this challenge. Carlos thinks that I will want to quit half way through, but I will prove him wrong.
Stay tuned, as I document my project on this blog.
Making a little bit of progress
August 11, 2009 by Leave a Comment
I still haven’t heard from the Owner of the Atlantic City Melting Pot that wanted to speak with me. I plan on emailing the General Manager again to confirm that he received my phone number. Last night I did receive an email back from the Vice President of Analysis & Revenue Management for Harrah’s – Atlantic City. Here’s what he had to say…
I am very sorry to hear we did not meet your expectations for the Melting Pot Fondue event at Harrah’s. Our purpose with this event, as it is with all the events we put on for our guests, was to fully entertain you and give you every reason to say you want to come back and visit us, both for these type of festival events and just to get down to AC to escape. This particular event was supposed to accomplish that with a great setting in Harrah’s Pool, a nice casual atmosphere, great food & beverages, and the ability to meet Duff Goldman and Ingrid Hoffman.Shortly after this event was over we recognized we could improve upon it, however we find your feedback invaluable for us to improve on these type of events in the future. We want to make the Atlantic City Food and Wine Festival an annual can’t miss event and we feel this type of festival is vital for the long term success of the Atlantic City tourism industry. That is why we truly appreciate your feedback so when we set up our festival schedule next year we know we need to improve events like the Harrah’s Fondue Event, or because of feedback like yours we go in a completely different direction and set up some new events. Along those lines, we would very much welcome any suggestions you might have regarding events and concepts for next year’s Food and Wine Festival. With your love of fondue and our desire to improve upon this event, your thoughts and suggestions would be very welcome.
Having said all that, we would like to offer you a complementary dinner for two at one of Harrah’s or Caesars restaurants whenever you can come back in. We want to try to make up for your disappointment and thank you again for your honest feedback. First class service and a quality getaway experience is what we strive for every day for every one of our guests. We would very much like the opportunity to put our best foot forward on your next visit.
Please do not hesitate to call my number listed below or reply to my e-mail for further discussion and hopefully to set up your dinner.
I definitely plan on contacting him and taking him up on his offer for dinner at one of the restaurants there. And I do want to give him some more feedback on this if they plan to do it again next year (although I will not buy tickets for it). Changes definitely must be made.
Ultimately I didn’t get what I wanted (my $220 back!) but at least they are trying to make up for the disappointment. You better believe that we’ll have an excellent meal on the house when we go back to Atlantic City! My birthday is coming up in October, so that might be a perfect time to go!
A little update
August 6, 2009 by 8 Comments
So I wrote a little letter (okay, it wasn’t so little, lol!) about the whole Melting Pot event fiasco at the Atlantic City Food and Wine festival to a few people who put the F&W festival together, as well as to the Melting Pot restaurant in Atlantic City.
So far I’ve only heard back from the General Manager of the Melting Pot. He said he read my comments and he’s very concerned. He asked for my phone number because the Owner wants to talk to me. I haven’t received a call yet, but I’ll definitely update when I do! I’m very interested to see how this will pan out.
I want my money back: Our trip to the Atlantic City Food and Wine Festival
August 3, 2009 by 24 Comments
So yesterday we headed to Atlantic City for the Atlantic City Food and Wine Festival. I was so excited for it – after all, I love food AND wine! I won 2 tickets (worth $30 each) for the Grand Market at Bally’s from a blog, and then we bought the tickets to the Melting Pot event ($100 a ticket! Ouch!). We left our house around Noon. A storm had just passed, and it was still raining a bit. It wasn’t all that bad though.
We’re driving on the Schuylkill Expressway (I-76) and I turned on KYW 1060 to listen to the traffic report. They say that I-76 is closed after Conshohocken. So we decide to get off of 76 and get on the Blue Route and just take it to 95. The next traffic report says to take the Walt Whitman because there is flooding near the Ben Franklin Bridge. So we take the Walt Whitman. There is a good amount of traffic, but nothing compared to what’s coming towards us. Everyone was coming home from the beach early since the weather wasn’t good at all.
We got on the Atlantic City Expressway and it was raining pretty hard. It looks like we caught up with the storm. Just as we were pulling up to the parking garage at Bally’s it started really coming down. What a mess. And apparently Bally’s must be really losing money, because now it costs $20 to park there!?!? WTF! The last time we parked there is was like $5!
So we went into the Grand Market, and there were tons of booths set up. They handed us a wine glass as we entered. There as wine, beer, food, ice cream, etc. It was pretty crowded. I did end up purchasing some Biscotti from My Boy’s Baking because it was SO good. The flavor is Caramel Walnut.
After walking all around the Expo, we looked at the clock and it was about 3:30pm, which meant it was time to head to Harrah’s for the Melting Pot Event.
Here are more details about the event. This will be important later on when I tell you about it:
The Melting Pot Presents: The Art of Fondue hosted by Duff Goldman and Ingrid Hoffmann
Date: Sunday, August 2
Time: 4-8pm
Location: The Pool at Harrah’s Resort
Ticket Price: $100
Sizzling Ingrid Hoffmann and Duff Goldman show everyone how Simply Delicioso fondue can be with the aid of Atlantic City’s own The Melting Pot restaurant. They’ll be serving up fabulous fondue desserts and pairing them with wines and champagnes. This cheese and chocolate extravaganza is sure to delight every dessert-lover. Unique styles and presentations will melt in your mouth. Nothing will be more cool – except maybe the location: The Pool at Harrah’s Resort.
Menu
Quattro Formaggio Cheese Fondue – Fontina, Gruyere and Gran Queso Cheese blended with roasted garlic, basil and tomato pestos and fresh mozzarella Perlini.
Paring : Ruffino Libaio “unoaked” chardonnay
Wisconsin Trio Cheese Fondue – Fontina, Butterkase and Buttermilk Bleu cheeses with white wine, scallions and a hint of sherry.
Paring: Simi Sonoma Chardonnay
Filet Mignon Florentine – Filet Mignon marinated in black pepper, chopped garlic, rubbed sage, kosher salt, blended oil and lemon zest.
Paring: Ruffino Modus – Super Tuscan
Limoncello Balsamic Sirloin – balsamic sirloin marinated in lemon, zest and juice
Pairing: Kim Crawford Pinot Noir
Shrimp Diablo shrimp marinated in Dijon mustard, crushed red pepper flakes, Tabasco sauce and fresh parsley
Paring: Kim Crawford Gisborne “Kim’s Favorite” Chardonnay
Lobster Tail
Paring: Simi Russian River Chardonnay
Pure Milk & Dark Chocolate Fondue – dippers include Strawberries, Banana, Pineapple, Brownies, Marshmallows, Rice Krispie treats
Pairing: Inniskillin Vidal VQA, Canada
So we finally got to Harrah’s (where it only costs $5 to park!) for the Melting Pot event. This is what I was most excited for. After all, the Melting Pot is one of my favorite restaurants. Now I’ll start off by saying that I was expecting to sit down at a table, watch a demonstration, get to taste each of the items listed with the wine that was pared with it.
We hand over our tickets, and walk up to this balcony in the Pool area. As we are walking through the crowd, I saw Ingrid Hoffman walking by me looking at me, so I say hello, and she smiles and says hello back. It was weird because I felt like she knew me…LOL! So there are tons of people standing around in line. We’re wondering what is going on. It turns out that it’s just a bunch of lines and you have to stand in them and to get the food. There’s NO demonstration, there is nowhere to sit. You get a little black plate with a plastic sharp thing to eat with. Seriously…I’m not joking.
I noticed on my tickets that it said we have seats 3 and 4, so right there that is one reason that led me to believe that it would be a sit down affair. Another thing that led me to believe this was the description of the event (that I posted above).
The first station we went to was the dessert station. I picked up a TINY plastic glass that was filled ¼ of the way full with wine, a plastic plate and some dippers (marshmallow, brownie, and rice krispy treat) and a tiny little cup of chocolate. That’s my chocolate fondue right there. Wow.
So we were talking to another couple that we were standing next to. They were under the same impression as us – that it was going to be a sit-down-at-a-table type thing, where you watch them make everything, etc. So we were hoping that maybe this was just the beginning. That there was something else planned for this event.
So we decided to try the cheese fondue. We stood in line (did I REALLY pay all of that money to stand in line?!) and I put some bread cubes on my plate (there were NO veggies at all, just bread). I asked one of the workers if she’d spoon some cheese over top of my bread so that I wouldn’t have to individually dip each piece of bread. You would’ve thought I asked her to hold up a bank! She finally spoon a tiny bit over the bread – oooooooohhhh, thanks a lot.
The next line was the meat/shrimp/lobster line. We had to stand in this line for quite a while. And once we got up to the front of it, they were out of shrimp and lobster. So we stood up at the front until they brought some more shrimp out. Once the shrimp came up, we moved over to the side to get some. We were waiting there at least 10 minutes, and the lady put TWO shrimp on my plate. Seriously!? We did not pay $200 for TWO freakin’ shrimp! So then SHE gives ME attitude! It took everything I had not to shove those two shrimp up each of her nostrils!!!
And while we were standing in the long line for the meat, we were talking to the people in front of us. They were also under the same impression as us that it was going to be a sit down affair, etc. We were all appalled. And one of the girls in that group wasn’t 21 years old, so she couldn’t even get any water!!! She had to go downstairs to get water. Wow.
So I was chatting again with the couple that we met at the beginning. We were just standing there because we couldn’t even believe what was happening. At this point it was like 5:15pm (we had been there for an hour) and we had no idea what else to do. So I approached a worker and asked when the demonstrations will occur? Because I knew I didn’t pay $200 ($100 for each ticket) just to stand in line all evening and eat cold food! He said that there wasn’t anyth
ing else going on. I said to him “So I paid $200 to stand in line for some runny cheese?!” and he said “and to meet and greet the chefs!” – I didn’t come here for a meet and greet. I came here for a fondue experience, and this was NOT it.
So at that point, we were done. I was absolutely disgusted. If I would’ve known this is how it was going to be, we wouldn’t have purchased the tickets. And I have a feeling everyone else feels the same way. Because people were just standing around like “Really?!”
I can go to the restaurant, have a lot of cheese fondue, a salad, a huge share of meat fondue, chocolate fondue, and several martinis TWO different times for what I paid for this pathetic event. This was false advertising. Do you really think people would’ve purchased tickets knowing that they’d spend most of their time standing in line for cold food, and having to eat standing up? There are many guests that left feeling taken advantage of and horrified by the way they were treated.
So over the next few days I’m going to be drafting up a letter to send to the Atlantic City Food and Wine Festival people, as well as the Melting Pot. I’m so disappointed.
Ingrid Hoffman:
Duff Goldman:
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