Into Old Town This Morning
Marlyn and I got abruptly woken up by loud construction before 9 am this morning and we aren’t used to having that much free time. Well, she isn’t, she usually sleeps until the afternoon and I get the weekend morning to myself.
We decided to get some brunch in Old Town Alexandria (its like a 2nd downtown or so, full of Republicans if that helps) but we didn’t exactly have a restaurant in mind. The one we were going to go to wasn’t what we were expecting: we really wanted a sit down place where a waiter would serve us. Amazingly it was pretty difficult to find a place like this that served breakfast that had what we wanted. Most of the places were french bakeries and whatnot with Panera-esque ordering.
When we first got there we were able to catch the tail end of the Farmer’s Market, as they were packing up for the day. I guess if you got there at 5 am you could get the full effect of the market, but I mean who is up that early? We bought a cantalope, with mint and spinach for like $7 or so. I thought the prices were fair and they had an excellent selection; I plan to go again in the future if I can Marlyn’s butt out of bed that early.
Afterwords we went around to find a restaurant and finally found a place that had outdoor seating, as the weather was pretty nice out. It was a french bakery too but there was one waitress there with two outdoor seats and chairs so we took our chances. I ordered the Vegetarian Quiche, with Gruyere, Spinach, and Mushrooms. It came with a little side salad and a piece a fruit and to drink I had my first shot of Espresso. The quiche was a little blan, although the crust was nice and flaky and you could tell it was homemade; I probably wouldn’t order it again if we go back. The side salad though had an excellent dressing, something I wasn’t even expecting and it well overshadowed the rest of the breakfast. I am starting to drink Espresso when I have the chance, as it’s the same thing as normal coffee, just without all the water (and without the calories–5 calories per ounce!).
Marlyn ordered a Smoked Salmon Omelet with ham and it was OK too; I felt like the Salmon had too much of a fish taste and not enough of the smoke flavor. Also, you could really taste the eggs in the omelet too, which is something I guess I’m not used to (because I make good eggs lol).
The restaurant (which not only can we not pronounce the name but don’t remember what it was either) had several interesting items, and most of them were organic and a lot of vegan options, if that’s your thing. The prices were pretty decent and I could see going back there again for brunch to try out their other options.
After brunch we went around and did some more exploring in Old Town, she bought a couple things at the thrift store and we came back home. Before we knew it we got back at 1:30 in the afternoon and I realized all my poker time had pretty much evaporated.
Oh well, I spent the next couple hours relaxing until my first tournament started at 4 pm.
