My kind of flowers

This place takes flowers to a whole new level. Every ingredient, baked delight, afternoon snack and cafe drink had flowers as one of the ingredients. And to boot, there were the most gorgeous bouquets scattered around the tiny 3-table shop.  We happened to serendipitously stumble upon the corner cafe after breezing through St. Laurent but came back on our last day to savor a light brunch and some more floral beverages.

Check out the ambiance! I sure did. The cafe used to be a local corner store which is where the old looking wooden shelves and flooring comes from. Fortunately, everything was still immaculately preserved and even the round tables' tablecloth had matching flowers with an old-time feel. 

[Gorgeous magenta colored flowers; Scrambled Eggs, Tomoato & Polenta; Side Citrus Salad.] Everything was served on either vintage-y china or in these adorable mason jars. Everything sure looks a lot cuter in mason jars. 

Orange Blossom French Cake (I don't know what it was called, caramelized on the outside, almost custardy on the inside), & Cinnamon Pasty with Fresh Fruit. 

Iced Dark Tea, Orange/Rose Infused Soda Water, & Rose Infused Lemonade.  The soda water and lemonade smelled like a bouquet of fresh roses.  Who needs roses when you can have rose lemonade? :)

Rose blossom Sugar Cookies, a gorgeous arrangement of flowers & a jug of crisp water against the setting sun.

More flowers, a vintage couch in the background.

LOVED LOVED LOVED this place. I think we marveled in everything for a good twenty minutes, and then again the next day. Capo will never feel the same after this but such is life.

where's the new header picture from?

Creme Fraiche Cheesecake

While I have been kind of neglecting on my promise to be cooking up all sorts of yummy dishes this year, I have not been neglecting my relationship with food. In fact, I have attempted to make use of my Wharton education in a productive manner! (are you reading this parents?)

I know I made a blog post about the dessert food truck Sugar Philly awhile back but now I can say that I am officially endorsing them as I am now their VP of Marketing! (which basically entails eating a lot of desserts and pretending I know what I'm doing...) Actually, I have been spending a lot of time working on expanding their catering business and creating promotional items. And of course, finding excuses to take more pictures.

Pear Almond Tart

So here's my plug to all of my Penn readers out there! For those who are interested in perhaps having Sugar Philly at their next GBM, club event, speaker event, hall event etc. send an email my way at lisa@sugarphillytruck.com (you know its legit when I have an official email!). There may or may not be free samples involved. Just saying. Also, stop by the truck located at 38th and Walnut next to Koja to get your sweet fix :D

Current menu items include: french macarons, creme brulee, mexican chocolate cake, pear almond tart, creme fraiche cheesecake and pumpkin custard although a lot of these are seasonal and are a limited time treat!

Vanilla Creme Brulee

Pumpkin custard with torched marshmallows and candied pecans. 

Starting a new tradition :)

OK. I officially love Tap House. After reading the lackluster reviews on Yelp, I have to admit I was a little disappointed in the highly anticipated beer and burger joint. Fortunately, positive reviews from all my friends persuaded me to check out this fancy "casual dining" spot. After an evening of coffee enhanced Guinness' and rich Belgian drafts (can you tell I don't know my beers?) as well as the Mediterranean plate (which served Quinoa!), both my dad and I were hooked.

Alright, so my parents never go out to eat, much less to a place 45 minutes away from home. 1 week after my dad had a quaint heart to heart what do I get but a call from my parents asking me if I wanted to meet up with them at Tap House again.  What college student says no to a free dinner?   This time, our waiter also lit the fire-pit outside and it made for some amazing picture taking.

Chop Salad. I need to find out how they make that dressing. This salad had amazing greens, chick peas, pancetta, provolone and kalamata olives.

Burger with roasted red peppers and Gruyere Cheese. Tasty but not as good as it was hyped up to be

Probably my proudest shot to date :p

Summer Scenes

As promised, here are some snapshots of our vegetable garden, herb garden, and fruit orchard. I wish I could take credit for the bountiful plants and trees but unfortunately, I just snapped the pictures. Props to my dad for his diligent gardening efforts :)

I also ordered my first dslr camer, a Canon Rebel XSI and I can't wait for it to come in! After reading some really great articles on food photography, I decided to fiddle around with my Point and Shoot as I anxiously anticipate my belated Birthday present to myself (..along with the help of my dad).

These are the shots I liked the most (after a little fiddling on Photoshop):

Pear Tree

Peach Tree

Basil aka Best Herb Ever

The Lonely Lime

Over-Ripe Cherry Tomato

The rest of the pictures are a lot softer but I like the semi-muted shades. They are also kind blurry because I still had the camera on a really low ISO from my Macro shots, but I really liked the way they turned out :)

This one's probably my favorite, I tried to recreate the same color temperature for the other pictures but no to avail.

Yellow Crocs :)

Another basket of tomatoes..what to do with them all??

I was so excited by all these pears because it meant making another crisp for dessert (which is already half devoured my our family)

One last Macro shot!

I really had no idea what I was doing when taking the pictures. I just kept adjusting different features on Manual and kept snapping pictures. I actually wore the battery out! (oops). I mostly used the Auto Functions and Curves adjustment on Photoshop. Hopefully my graphic design class this semester will make me a little more proficient. :)