Tag Archives: pho

Adventure to SD, Saigon Restaurant and School of Mines Museum, Rapid City, SD – Part II

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While I took a day for shopping and visiting old stomping grounds in Rapid City, I did want to try a new restaurant, and I tried Saigon.  Rapid City does have more diverse restaurant choices than it did (cough, cough) years ago when I was in high school.

I had the egg rolls and the regular meatball pho. This was too much, I should have only ordered one egg roll, as they come a la carte (which I didn’t really realize until I saw the bill, usually there are two to an order, but that was fine – I think they were $1.99 each). The pho was different in that it didn’t come with a big plate of assorted herbs and vegetables on the side, which was fine with me, because I don’t usually use all of that stuff, except for the jalapenos, and I had plenty of sriracha sauce, so I was happy. If you are in Rapid City and are either having a pho fit from being away from home, or have never had it and would like to try something new, I give them two thumbs up. The pho had lots of thin sliced onions, which I definitely like.

Then I visited the SD School of Mines Museum of Geology. Our little country school used to go here for field trips all the time, but it had probably been since grade school that I had been here last. It hasn’t changed too much, and I remembered several things from childhood. One very cool part is the phosphorescent minerals – sorry, no picture, difficult to take pictures of glow in the dark rocks.

Very bitey looking.

Dad used to bring home fossils like these when he was doing dirt work, building dams and such. I am sure there is a box around somewhere filled with them. Kind of like the jar of rattlesnake rattles. But apparently not interesting/valuable enough to be on display in the house. Whereas the rattlesnake rattles apparently ARE valuable and interesting.

More bitey sea monster.

We also would find gypsum “out north” on our ranch. One of my uncles convinced one my cousins that these were rare and valuable crystals, which led him to pack his suitcase full of as many rocks as possible before he flew home. Of course, this was discovered at the airport.

Oh, I WISH we had a collection of Fairburn Agates like this. Beautiful.

Other items of note from the trip: I had been complaining to my mom that it was impossible to buy ring bologna in Denver – we have kielbasa and smoked sausage, but no ring bologna. So she bought me a few and froze them for me. I may have bought a few more. Unfortunately, I think I prefer kielbasa and smoked sausage now, maybe the ring bologna will go in soup!

I also stopped in Hot Springs on the way home and stocked up on Prairie Berry wine – we don’t have anywhere in Denver that sells it, and I like to keep a good supply. Someday I am going to make it up to Hill City and do a tasting. I bought Red Ass Rhubarb, Blue Suede Shoes, Lawrence Elk and Chokecherry Medley. I haven’t cracked one open yet, maybe tonight!

Food and Other Randomness

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As I was leaving on my trip to Iowa, I saw this painting covering some construction walls at DIA:

That is an octopus, if I am not mistaken, and of course that made my day.

So I have numerous restaurant meals to report on, since I have been remiss in my blogging. I returned to Golden Bowl Noodle House (see previous entry)  and had one of their Combos – small bowl of beef noodle soup (steak pho), 2 egg rolls, iced tea or soft drink, for $8.95, which is a pretty good price as far as I am concerned.

Here is there menu. EM, you and I need to go here together. SO MANY things on that menu I want to try. And I think that is the most reasonable price on spring rolls I have seen lately.

Here are the egg rolls, Instagram style:

Here is the pho, it was excellent, my almost-favorite, second only to the place where they know my order by heart.

I ate at OOKA Sushi in Broomfield, but I forgot to take pictures of my rolls, I just took pictures of my wonton soup. It was excellent wonton soup.

I think I had the veggie tempura as well. The soup, tempura and rolls were all good, just too much. My eyes are bigger than my stomach, as usual.

And now, finally, a menu from D’Deli, the restaurant in Golden with amazing Banh Mi. (see previous entry)

The Banano is also excellent.

And Mary Anne would like to say “Hi.”

More food pics tomorrow. Can’t do any more right now, making me hungry…….

 

Catching up on MORE Food Pictures

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Things have still been kind of crazy with work (I was dreaming about BROCHURES all of Friday night/Saturday morning, does that give you any indication?) and Ken is crazy busy with his new movie project, so I apologize that the blogging has been scarce. I am trying to get warmed up again for the great Iowa State Fair trip, which will involve MANY, MANY food pictures. Greatly looking forward to that. My food list is LONG, LONG, LONG, probably many more things than I can try in three days.
Why the Iowa State Fair? Well, it is one of the top three state fairs as far as I am concerned. Only Texas and Minnesota have bigger attendance (there are some local fairs in California and TX that also have bigger attendance, but I am talking about STATE FAIRS.)  And they are quite famous for their food on a stick. And I will get to see two sets of nieces/nephews.

Well, I am not at the fair yet, so here are some things I have been eating lately….

Flaming Shrimp Soup, Saigon Grill, Fort Collins

This is the pot it comes in, with a little buffet heater under it. It does keep it warm.

It had pineapple, shrimp, bean sprouts, and other vegetables. Not bad, but I don’t know if I prefer it over their pho. I do prefer their pho over the other major pho place in Fort Collins, Pho Duy. Plus Pho Duy has rather odd background music, a rather short loop of Muzak-arranged hymns. I am not sure what to think of it. It does not enhance the pho experience for me. I have nothing against the easy-listening version of Amazing Grace but I do not want to hear it twice in the course of one meal.

A prettier picture of the whole presentation:

After reading about Huevos Divorciados on Slaking Fool, I needed to try them. The only place I could find on Yelp that had them in Denver was Tacos y Jalisco. Ken working on this movie (and being gone at all hours of the day) gives me the opportunity to try places and things I have been wanting to try (he is just not as adventurous as I am in the food department.)

Huevos Divorciados are eggs smothered in one half green chile and one half red chile. They were good, but I think I have come to the conclusion that I don’t like anything else on top of my eggs. Or I don’t like it very often. I would have this again, just not every week.

Their refried beans are excellent. I am pretty sure they contain either butter or lard. Or both.

Tacos Y Jalisco also has some of the best salsa in Denver. It definitely has the best salsa assortment. You get four different kinds.

Here is how someone else on Yelp described them: “a verde, pico, and two red sauces — one hot, the other hotter.” The verde is different in that it has avocado in it. I love them all, of course. My least favorite is the middle red one. I think it had chipotle in it, which I do not really care for (of all the things for me not to like, I know, I know.)  They apparently have posole and I need to remember to have that sometime. I had eaten here before but I don’t remember what I had, so this was kind of a re-discovery. Mmmmm, I will be back.

And my best discovery lately:

Golden Bowl Noodle House in Broomfield.

This is an area that has at least 4 Pho restaurants in a two block radius. I have tried them all, and this is my new spot. I didn’t even have the Pho, I had something called (I think) Spicy Beef Soup – loved the broth. The beef could have been better, but really, I am all about the broth. And their spring rolls are good and are the cheapest I have found recently. I picked up a copy of their take-out menu and will be posting that as soon as I can find it again…..

I have no idea what those two chunks of pale stuff were, but they were delicious. Maybe friend EM knows??? MMMMMMMM. It was nicely spicy, too. Next time I will ask for additional fire oil. They had chili paste but I don’t care for the chili seed texture.

Golden Bowl ALSO had cheesy Muzak, it was a mix of the best of the 80s, Beatles, and Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals. Interesting.

And finally, dessert! I had a rough week, needed some cupcakes from Butter Cream Cupcakery.

Pictured are (clockwise from top left) orange truffle, neopolitan, chocolate, and red velvet. Yes, delicious. They have the chocolate and red velvet every day, neopolitan and orange truffle were special flavors for that day. Yes, they did improve my afternoon.

Exciting Things We Did Today

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Stayed up too late last night fiddling around with the landscape quilt and then had weird dreams about carrying Leo the cat all around Washington, DC, visiting Senators. Oy. Need to go to bed earlier tonight!

I now have the quilt all ironed together, except the sun had to be removed tonight because the dark blue was showing behind it, so that has to be ironed back on tomorrow and then I need to add all the detail (lots) around the sun.

Couldn’t take any more leftovers (I am really good for only about one round of leftovers on each meal and then I am kind of done with that food…..) so we went out for Pho tonight, at our favorite place. Although I did not have my “usual,” I mixed it up a bit and had shrimp instead of meatball. And no spring rolls, because I wasn’t that hungry. Then I had a 20% off coupon for Bed, Bath and Beyond, which is next door to Pho 78, so we went in to buy a new bathroom rug for the guest bathroom, because the one rug in there has been washed to often with other rugs, and has picked up their colors, and is no longer light blue, but “ishda” as my mother would say. So we got a new blue one, and we had some emergency candy needs, so we took care of them. I can tell you Angry Bird brand fruit snacks are to be avoided. However, on-sale hollow chocolate Easter chicks are excellent.

When we got home we discussed briefly with the neighbor across the street the landscaping that the neighbor kitty-corner from us is doing. Ken originally said it was a ramp to allow runaway cars to leap over their garage, but I pointed out that it was obviously a UFO landing pad, and he realized the error of his ways, and so that is how we refer to it. I wonder how they talk about the strange goings-on at our house when we do stuff…

Here is a picture of the UFO landing pad:

It is much more pyramidal than it appears in the picture, it doesn’t look like much here but a small UFO could definitely land on it.

Supposed to rain/show this weekend so there may not be much gardening, maybe I will get some seeds started….hope springs eternal….