patio opening with a shot of vodka

In the past month, I've been invited to two local Cleveland events and I haven't had a chance to catch you all up on those. If you follow me on Twitter (and some other peeps), you may have noticed a group of us helped "open" the Washington Place & Bistro's patio a few weeks back.

Scott invited the group for the grand opening back to the opening of the patio where we had a kick ass pig roast. I was too busy drinking and mingling and didn't snap any photos. However, I heart Cleveland and Suzanne did so check out out some of their photos of the delicious roast. I've been to Washington Place a few times since the opening including New Years Eve as well as Mother's day for my mom. My parents are always up to try new restaurants and she really wanted to stay at the Inn after I threw it out as an option. VERY bad but my dad quickly nixed that and also didn't believe me that they didn't serve all Italian food.

After I told him I made reservations for a restaurant in Little Italy, I believe his text back was something along the lines of "I don't do Italian." I explained it wasn't and he clearly didn't believe me because the next text was something like "looks like a good menu with pork and other fish choices. I'll go."

On a very different weekday night, I was invited with another fab group of bloggers to a CLE vodka tasting. That's right - a Crav vodka tasting. Brand new vodka available  made my Clevelanders. The group headed to Pier W (which I've never been to by the way because I feel I'm too young to go in there) for a private tasting with two stellar drinks.

Craving Ginger Rogers is AMAZING

Founder Tom Rini shared that developing a vodka was an idea he and his friends came up in college. And an idea that he couldn't get out of his head so voila - he created Crav vodka. He explained the high-quality distillery process which to me makes the vodka sip-able. Or easily drinking on the rocks without that burn taste going down your throat. (Remembering all those terrible lemon drop shots back in the day - what were we thinking!) Anyway, the fabulous mixologist mixed up two drinks and I heavily favored the Ginger Rogers because it was absolutely refreshing and both me and Alexa agreed these could get dangerous. So, so good! Drink includes Crav vodka, ginger & orange blossom infused syrup, prosecco and a twist of lime.

Tom explaining the distillery process

Crav is making its way to local Cleveland bars slowly but surely and is available in 50+ restaurants and bars like Bier Markt, Dragon Fly, Fahrenheit, Harry Buffalo, Sushi Rock and Barley House. I think it will be great in my dirty martini! You can also purchase it state liquor stores - just ask them to special order it for you if they don't have it in stock. 

Here's to drinking martinis on patios this summer!

mistaken identity (all at a dinner)

While at a delicious 5-course preview diner at the Washington Place Bistro & Inn, a new friend, who I called channel 19 (bet he never hears that), otherwise known as  Jason pointed out something about the BF.

(He doesn't know my family so he couldn't possibly know about the brother/dad comparisons.) Could he?

Oh no. He couldn't.

Jason says to the BF, "Could you saw a few sentences? I want to test something."
So, the BF starts to act as if he's giving the weather to the weatherman and Janet and Jason bust up laughing and say, "You look and sound like Nicholas Cage. Almost right from National Treasure."

Sean and Alexa agree and the BF has another feather in his cap for being told he reminds them of  Nicholas Cage.

But, back to the dinner. I apologize in advance to anyone following me on Twitter Monday night because I tweeted throughout the whole dinner, including pictures of each and everyone one of my dishes.

Menu:

• roasted beet and goat cheese salad (chef's garden beets and greens, almonds, mackenzie creamery ranch)
• oxtail pierogies (oxtail ragout, ohio city pasta truffles potato pierogie, caramelized onion, horseradish creme fraiche)
• dayboat scallops (butternut squash risotto, pearl onions, apple cider, beurre blanc, micro greens)
• braised pot roast (c.a.b., chef's garden carrots, roasted garlic mashers, big red reduction)
• pan seared wild pacific salmon (cauliflower gratin, fine herbes)
• housemade chocolate brownie (chocolate jeni's ice cream, bittersweet chocolate drizzle)

Chef Jonathan Guest (right) and owner Scott Kuhn

My taste buds rated my favorite dish as the scallop then beet salad then the cauliflower gratin and chocolate brownie. I'm a sucker for dessert and anything with chocolate automatically gets my vote. Before we cleaned our plates, Scott took a few minutes to talk about dish from where the cheese is from to his love of beets to where the pea tendril came from on top of the scallop. It's all in the details!

But, let's not forget that Scott and his magical team didn't only redo the restaurant but renovated all inn rooms, too.

Scott Kuhn with the BF

Alexa bet me to take a few sensual pictures on the bed and I was totally going to take her up on it, but good thing Scott knew we had dirty minds and made sure to tell us that the bed was boxes. It wasn't an actual mattress to jump on. Anyway, we were adults, didn't jump on any beds and took a peek at the rest of the unfinished rooms with fireplaces! Sign me up for $159 on a Saturday night that includes brunch the next day.

Not bad for a Monday night after a holiday weekend, eh?!