Goodbye Philadelphia

We had one last outing in downtown Philadelphia before we moved away.  We invited our friends the Murphys, who are also moving away, to come with us.  We met at Reading Terminal Market.  There is so much good food there.  We had to have one last cheesesteak in Philly.  We were able to sit around and chat while we enjoyed our food.  We'll miss the cheesesteaks, but we'll miss our friends more!  We both moved in at the same time and now we're both moving away for residencies.  We've gone through a lot in 4 years together and the Murphys became part of our family while we were away.  We'll truly miss them!

Nathan adores Shawna and Aubrey and asks for them frequently

While we were at Reading we also had to (and I mean had to) stop and get some doughnuts from the Almish.  They ran out of the apple fritters while we were in line, so we tried some new flavors and they were all delicious.

Making apple fritters

On the way home we drove around a bit to see the sights.  We passed the temple, Art Museum, and Rocky.  And then we drove around our old hood and saw our apartment in University City.  Both of us were just so happy we moved to our home in the suburbs!

When we moved to Philly we thought the temple would be done before we left.  Now we're sad we won't see it completed.

It was nice to send off Philly with good food and good friends.  Now on to our new home in Colorado!

Distrito

As I mentioned before, there are 3 other LDS guys in the Brad's class.  After the white coat ceremony we all decided to go to dinner together.  We led the way to a calzone place that our friends said was really good.  As we were walking, (the boys felt so cool walking in their white coats) we passed Distrito (#51), a Mexican restaurant run by Iron Chef Garces.  I'd seen this place several times and it always looked so cool.  It's bright pink and has an old VW bug in the front window.  Plus, it's run by an Iron Chef.  How cool is that?

Too bad we already had a date with calzones.  However, to our dismay and disbelief, the calzone place is closed on Mondays.  It doesn't close on any other day of the week except Monday.  Bummer.  But what luck that we could get seats at Distrito for dinner.  I'm so glad we tried it.  Hip, cool, and very yummy.  The nauchos were the most amazing nauchos I've ever had.  So, so good.  I'm so glad we've found a good place to go for Mexican.  And the bonus, it's only 5 blocks from our house.  I think we might frequent this place a lot.

Philadelphia

Philadelphia is an adventure.  Like I said earlier, some of it's good, some of it's different, and some of it's going to take some getting used to.  In fact, one of the girls in our ward said it took about a year to completely adjust to Philadelphia and like living here.  Oh, I hope it doesn't take that long.  So far Philadelphia has been mostly good.

Our first day here was a bit of a shock.  Let me paint you a picture of where we live.  Our apartment is pretty nice.  We live in the second story of a new building.  2 Bedrooms, hardwood floors, dishwasher, and best of all, central air (which is super hard to find out here.) However, the neighborhood we live in isn't the nicest.  Not that it's scary, but you can just tell when you reach this different part of town.  Since the first day arriving here and we've been getting out of the house more, I've realized that most of Philadelphia is like this.  Unless we live in the suburbs (longer transit time) or in the middle of Center City in a high rise ($$$), this is about as good as it gets.  We are very glad that we have a nice place to live.  Unpacking is making it feel more and more like home and is helping me to come to terms with this new situation.

There are great things about Philadelphia as well.  The neighborhood that is just south of us in University City and in Center City is very much a downtown area and I've really enjoyed exploring it.  It's a different experience to walk out your front door and get exactly what you want so close to you.

Love Park in Center City (I want to go back and explore)

Another great thing about Philadelphia is the history.  There is so much here!  Independence Hall, Liberty Bell, Valley Forge, Betsy Ross House, Franklin Print Shop, just to name a few.  We've been able to see only a little bit of what the city offers in our first few weeks and it's amazing how much history is here.  You may notice that I've added a new page to our blog called, "Phillie Bucket List."  This is something I started compiling when we knew we were going to be moving to Philadelphia.  We're hoping we can get through a lot of the list before we leave in 4 years.

And the food!  Part of moving is the "eating out until you want to puke or you have the kitchen put back together" stage.  Which means we've successfully found the nearest and least scary food establishments in our neighborhood (our poor waistlines are showing it.)  We're had cheesesteaks at Gooey Louie's (so, so messy, but so, so good) and at the Reading Terminal Market.  Every chinese restaurant (at least that we've seen) has exactly the same menu and is not very good.  This is very bad for chinese lovers like me and Brad.  We eat chinese food like it's good Southern soul food.  Chinese is our comfort food and we are going to search high and low for a good chinese restaurant here in Phillie.  Also, we've been sad to learn that there isn't really good Mexican out here.  They have Chipotle and Qdoba (which are both good), but if we want family style Mexican, we're making it at home.

Gooey Looie's Cheese Steak

Our favorite food discovery has been water ice.  No, not ice water.  Water ice.  It's hard to explain.  It's like ice cream, but with snow cone ingredients.  In fact, it's scooped like ice cream.  But oh so good when it's been 103 outside.

Pineapple and Strawberry Banana Water Ice with Gelati

Other funny things about Philadelphia.  No right turns at red lights signs at pretty much every intersection.  This can be a bit annoying.  If it's red, you can't go.  If it's green, there are pedestrians in the way.  And they are serious about it.  The cops will ticket you for turning on a red light.

You have to cash on you.  Our first indicator was the toll roads only taking cash.  Then the little water ice place only takes cash.  When we asked about going to the Reading Market we were told the only payment accepted in the whole place is cash.  A lot of places out here deal only in currency.  Which is a little weird.  I used to never carry cash.  Now I ask Brad before we leave the apartment if we have enough cash.  It feels like we went back in time to when we got paid for doing chores with cash and that's all we had.

We are still figuring out Philadelphia, and I'm sure there will be more interesting things to tell you about here on our blog.  But for now, we are enjoying the adventure.

Christmas Baking

I have been wanting a cast iron dutch oven.  I keep reading recipes that you need a dutch oven to make, but alas no dutch oven.  However, Christmas is a great time for wishes to be fulfilled and I am now the proud owner of a red, enamel covered, cast iron dutch oven.

When I got my dutch oven, I knew the first thing I wanted to try making was this.  My sister-in-law Alissa is an amazing cook and she made this delicious bread for her daughter Ella's birthday.  I've been dreaming of making this bread since we had it.  Hard crusty crust, but soft and airy inside.  I've never been able to pull off bread like that.  So, I gave Alissa's recipe a try.  It turned out better than I thought it would for a first try, but it wasn't anything compared to Alissa's.  Now that I've tried it once I think it will turn out better next time.  Thanks for the delicious recipe Alissa!