Proper National Pies

We're flying to Cairns today, and decided to grab a bite at Proper National Pies to hold body and soul together. I tried the cheese and spinach pie (on the bottom) and the curried chicken pie.

Salt Lake Pizza and Pasta

My husband and I are off to Massachusetts for the weekend for a family event, and because one needs breakfast before a long day of travel, I visited the airport location of Salt Lake Pizza and Pasta for a breakfast sandwich that featured eggs, mozzarella, and bacon on focaccia with (I think) pesto aioli. It was pretty good!

Perry's San Francisco

My husband and I headed home to Salt Lake City today, but we had about two hours at the airport, and since it was lunchtime, we stopped at Perry's San Francisco (conveniently right next to our departing gate).

We started with calamari.

I had a big Caesar salad with some very good chicken.

My husband had a club sandwich and declared
it remarkably good, especially for airport food.

Blair's Bistro

It's fitting, somehow, that the last meal we have in Ireland is at the same place in which we had our first meal: Blair's Bistro, located within the Park Inn, a perhaps five-minute walk from Shannon Airport.

I started with chicken satay, which was rather oddly served
atop what tasted like lo mein. I'm not sure if this counts as
fusion food.

I also had the spaghetti and meatballs.

T3 Bar & Restaurant

My husband and I attempted to fly home today, but it looks like all the flights out of Dublin to anywhere in the States is overbooked, so we'll be in Ireland for an extra two days and departing from another airport instead. We're staying at a Dublin airport hotel - the Radisson Blu - and had dinner at T3 Bar & Restaurant, located within the hotel restaurant.

I started with some rustic garlic ciabatta.

I also had the Irish lamb stew.

Blair's Bistro: Breakfast

I awoke ready to eat a horse this morning (metaphorically speaking). I was delighted to see that our hotel had a wonderful hot breakfast buffet option, so I went to town.

Blair's Bistro

After about 11 hours of flying (and three or four additional hours sitting around between flights), my husband and I finally made it to Ireland this morning; our hotel was perhaps 5-minute amble from the airport, and after a shower and a nap, we headed downstairs to the restaurant restaurant, Blair's Bar, for a (very) early dinner.

I started with some very good seafood chowder.

The chowder came with some excellent dark soda bread. 

We both got fish and chips, which came with mushy peas.
(You can't tell, but there were mashed potatoes served as well.
Somehow, it didn't surprise me that there were two types of
potatoes served.)

T. G. I. Friday's

By dint of not being able to get seats on a flight back to Salt Lake City, my husband and I spent New Year's Eve in Atlanta, Georgia, this year. No one really wants to spend New Year's Eve in an airport, and we were rather worn out from our 12-hour flight from Rome, but extremely grateful that we got seats at all (we got two of the very last seats available on the plane; stand-by can be very exciting), so while we considered our options, we had dinner at one of the several T.G.I. Friday's at the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

I'll note that we had had a truly wonderful time in Rome and had eaten extremely well, but we had had a bit too much pizza and pasta - we found few alternatives during our stay, although I'm sure we could have looked harder - and we very nearly didn't get seats on the only flight from Rome to Atlanta that day. (There tend to be few international flights, in this case exactly one to an airport that would offered a transfer back to Salt Lake City.) I'll also note that it's been several years since I've been to this particular chain - it's not one I seek out - but partly because I was so delighted to be back on American soil and eating something that wasn't Italian food, I enjoyed this meal probably much more than I would have otherwise.

Because it was New Year's Eve, I said to heck
with it all, and got a mojito. I like mojitos and
I drink alcohol extremely rarely, but again:
New Year's Eve! In the proper country!
One of the last available seats on the only flight
from Rome to the U.S.  that day! So, mojito time.

We shared a three-for-all appetizer plate, which came with
loaded potato skins, pot stickers, and boneless buffalo wings.

I was itching for a burger, so I ordered the New York
cheddar and bacon burger.

Fuddruckers

My husband and I flew to eastern Pennsylvania today to visit my parents for a few weeks, after which we'll head up to Massachusetts to visit my father-in-law. There are no direct flights from Here to There, as they say, so we changed plans in Detroit (DTW). Between flights we wanted lunch, and fortunately, a Fuddruckers was near our gate.

I got the chicken fingers, because apparently I eat kids' food
when I travel.

My husband got a (I believe) 2/3-pound burger with bacon.
We split an order of fries, which were pretty darn tasty.

Silver Dragon Cafe

My husband and I spent the weekend in the San Francisco Bay Area, visiting my brother and sister-in-law, who recently bought their first home. We ate very well while visiting, and the only time my husband and I ate "out" was at the airport on the way home. I was not expecting to be hungry before getting home, but clearly I hadn't eaten enough for breakfast, so my husband and I grabbed some food from the Silver Dragon Cafe.

The dim sum platter came with a pork bun, two spring
rolls, and two pot stickers.

We both ordered a dragon bowl with noodles, although I
requested the beef, which had a slightly spicy kick to it.

I did not actually use the Sriracha sauce, but I thought it
was kinda cool to see it in packets.

Shake Shack

And so this morning we left New York behind.

But because of a time zone flub on Google calendar, we got the airport this morning very early for our flight. (Since we live in Utah, the time zone is two hours behind the east coast, which meant that our 12:50 p.m. flight was listed on our calendar as departing at 10:50 a.m.) This meant, however, that we had a lot of time to explore terminal four of the airport, and have lunch before we departed (also meaning we didn't have to buy overpriced mediocre airplane food).

Fortunately, we had arrived in terminal four, and while I noticed passing Shake Shack on our way out, I forgot, although quick search of airport eateries reminded me. (I've been to Shack Shack before, but only their Madison Square Park location.)

It's a bit difficult to tell, but that's a SmokeShack burger (which comes with applewood smoked bacon, chopped cherry peppers, and ShackSauce) on the left; a bacon, egg, and cheese in the middle (which was one of the best breakfast sandwiches I think I've had); and an order of fries. I couldn't eat it all. I tried, though. Unfortunately, I was too stuffed to go back for a frozen custard or a concrete, which was probably just as well. 

It was the best final meal to leave New York.

Goldberg Bagels

Our flight home to Salt Lake City was a bit of a mess; bad visibility brought on by snow in Allentown caused our flight to be delayed for four hours, which meant my husband and I missed our connecting flight in Atlanta. There was one last flight of the night from Atlanta to Salt Lake City, and although we were at the top of the standby list, there was only room for one of us, so I sent my husband on ahead.

This meant that I was stuck in the airport overnight - a 10-hour wait. (I was not offered a hotel voucher, and I had to ask for food vouchers. GRUMPY.)

In any case, with my dinner voucher ($8), I bought two Auntie Anne pretzels (protip: they do not hold up well once they get cold), and with my breakfast voucher ($6), I went to Goldberg Bagel, the only place nearby that was open all night. (To be fair, the McDonald's a few gates down only closed for two hours, between 3 and 5 a.m.).

I...do not recommend bagels from a place that stays open all night.

I bought a sesame bagel that was so stale, I
nearly cut myself eating it.  And the lox cream cheese
did not taste like anything - even cream cheese.

I also ordered a brownie,
which tasted very mildly chocolatey.

Freshens

Because there are no direct flights from the Lehigh Valley in Pennsylvania, where my parents live, and Salt Lake City, a suburb of which my husband and I live, whenever we fly to see my parents, there's a layover involved, usually along the lines of Denver, Detroit, or Atlanta. On our way home from our visit during Christmas, we changed planes in Atlanta, right at about dinner time.

We were neither of us especially hungry, but it's an approximately four-hour flight from Atlanta to Salt Lake City, and we thought it prudent to eat before we boarded the plane. A gate or two down was Freshens, which serves yogurt, smoothies, and crepes.

I got the very good Strawberry Oasis (which didn't lend itself to being photographed): a strawberries and juice smoothie that was low-cal and had no sugar added.

My husband got the chicken caesar crepe, 

which I didn't sample, but which looked pretty good.

Sky Bridge Restaurant

There are no direct flights to the airport in eastern Pennsylvania where my parents lived, so on this particular trip our layover involved a stop in Chicago, and since it was about lunchtime, my husband and I looked stopped at Sky Bridge restaurant.

The Gyro platter, complete with pita and fries.

French Meadow Cafe & Cafe

My husband and I flew from Utah to Pennsylvania to visit my parents for Christmas - and my father-in-law was driving up from Virginia to join us. Our first flight, to Chicago, was very early this morning, which meant breakfast was a necessity. French Meadow Bakery & Cafe was where I stopped off, and got a breakfast burrito, which came with eggs, hash browns, salsa, black bean chili, and cheddar cheese.

Denver: Steak Escape

My mother-in-law died late last week, so we planned the funeral for later this week, mostly so my husband and I could fly home, take care of a few things (including letting me teach my Wednesday morning class), and grab our formal clothing before flying back out to the east coast today. Because of our schedule limitations, we could only find non-direct flights that left later in the day from Utah to the east coast, which meant a layover in the beautiful Denver airport during dinner.

The last time I had been in the Denver airport, I had passed Steak Escape on my way from the end of one terminal the other, and since we were in the same terminal, we stopped off there again for dinner.

And once again, I had the French Onion, which was a steak sandwich with crispy friend onions, mushrooms, and white American cheese: