Sunday, December 1, 2013

Packet House Grill- Little Rock, Arkansas (closed)



       Wow, I can't believe it's December! Time sure flies, especially with all the essays and exams
 at the end of the semester. So, I've been meaning to review this restaurant I went to back in September for a while, but haven't had the chance. On September 28, a friend and I went to see a touring version of Wicked, and as we were dressed up, decided to eat out at a fancy restaurant my friend heard about beforehand. So before we saw the play, we ate out at the Packet House Grill. The Packet House is a fancy dine in restaurant in a renovated mansion. I believe you can ask for seats at the door, but it might be better to call a few hours to a day in advance so you can be sure to have a seat. (Seating was very limited; I counted about 5 tables, but there might be another room I'm not aware of.)

      We sat at a round table, and a waitress came immediately to give us the menus. For drinks I ordered tea, and I ordered roasted duck breast and requested it to be medium well, since she mentioned it was usually cooked medium raw. (I don't think it made much of a difference, but as she said "It tastes better medium," I went ahead with it. I don't usually get medium or raw anything.) The place serves high end Southern food, and a mix of American/European food. They also had a few desserts off menu; they will tell you what they have available after dinner. About decor, it was done in a sleek and elegant, but simple way. It wasn't overly decorated, but they had a few paintings and candles here and there to give you a warm feeling, like you're in a rich person's dining room.

       Now the duck was amazing! I fell in love with it after one bite! I recommend everyone to try it at least once. We ordered seasoned fries with a house sauce and those were very tasty too; the fries tasted freshly cut, and tasted good with or without the sauce. The dessert we got was a s'mores parfait, which was more than enough for two people, but as we were so stuffed we couldn't finish it. (They don't mind putting things to go either.) The parfait was pretty tasty; the crust outer layer is marshmallow cream lightly roasted, with graham crackers and a type of vanilla custard underneath. It was very tasty, but the custard threw me off a bit as I assumed it was an ice cream parfait.

      Overall, I was very pleased and happy with my time at the Packet House, and I plan to take some of my relatives there sometime! ( Photos may be smaller than usual because my friend played with my phone that day.) Oh,one last thing about prices, food ranged about $20 per person, more or less.

                                                                           











Monday, November 4, 2013

Sweet Love Pastry Shop - A Macaron Place in Little Rock (closed)


        Hi everyone! I haven't been posting much since school has gotten in the way. I made a new Tumblr I will eventually add, and I think I might make a third one to sort of go with this blog, and for personal  interests. I bought a few items I might do a review on, and I went out and ate at a few places, but because I didn't take photos of the front of the stores, I decided not to do reviews of them until I do. I also want to talk about movies down the line, since that is what I have been actively watching lately, so maybe when I get the chance. Anyways, on to the review!

         Sweet Loves is a cute bakery in Cantrell I had the chance to visit with a friend, who lived in the area. It was her first time going there, and I first suggested it to her when I was looking for more macaron shops in Arkansas, and saw a review for them. They don't just specialize in macarons though, they also have a lot of pastries, and specialty cakes. In fact you can go and order any type of cake you want, they'll get whatever type and flavor you want, down to the icing. The place has a cute vintage air to it, and everything looks very new and fresh, despite being there about 2 years, (or so I heard.) I went for the macarons, which were all very tasty; I got blueberry, a vanilla, a coffee flavored one, and I forgot the last, but they tasted great and reminded me of a mix of the macarons at The Financier, and The Macaron Cafe'. I had a piece of their salted caramels which were also pretty good; it had the right amount of salt and sweetness. Next time I stop by I'll be sure to try their cupcakes and cookies too!~

                                                                           
















     

Monday, October 14, 2013

Mooncake for the Mid-Autumn Festival (Chinese sweet)


                Hey everyone! I had so many things I wanted to talk about that I have saved on my desktop,(that I'll get around to eventually), but today I decided to talk about moon-cakes. Moon-cakes are a Chinese sweet usually filled with red bean paste, azuki, or lotus seed paste and has an egg yolk to represent the moon. There has been several traditions about the moon, and tales in Chinese history, but regardless of the stories, families will get together in the Mid- Autumn festival, (also called the Moon Festival) and eat moon-cake. This year the festival was on September 19, but I had the pastry before that. I had one with lotus seed paste, and it was very good, but I think it might be an acquired taste since my mother wasn't fond of it.Regardless if one likes it or not, most people agree it's heavy and very sweet so people will  recommend not to eat the whole thing at the same time. Here is some more information on the festival and a few recipes to try it yourself. As for purchases, you can generally find moon cake at Asian groceries closer to the time of the festival, or even at Amazon closer to the holiday. As for me, I really like the lotus seed flavor, but I'd like to try other flavors down the line too.

                                                                       










Sunday, October 6, 2013

Magnum - Gold Ice-cream Bar


           Hey everyone! It's been busy and stressful the past couple of months; sorry for
    not keeping this blog updated as much as I would like to. ~ I wanted to talk about Magnum.
    Magnum is an ice cream brand that was originally made in 1989 and it seems it had started
    out in Germany, but has since been owned by Unilever, a multi-national European company.
    (It's supposed to be an English/Dutch company, but I'm having a hard time out of Wikipedia to
    verify that.) Anyways, I've seen Magnum chocolate before, and I liked it a lot, but instead of
    me saying how good it is, I wanted to show you photos of their Gold bar, since it was my first
    time seeing and trying Gold colored ice cream. (It tasted like chocolate caramel by the way. And
    yes, the bar glittered.)

                                                                       








Monday, September 2, 2013

4square Cafe & Gifts- Little Rock, Arkansas


          4square Cafe & Gifts is a cafe and gift shop right next to the Butler Center that's half gift shop
  and half cafe'. There is a related shop in the Rivermarket that I'm pretty sure is owned by the same
  owners. The cafe has an assortment of grilled sandwiches, soups, and salads, and the ones I tried
  were pretty tasty. A full meal here costs about $8-$12, so it's pretty affordable, haha. The bottom
  photos show a potato soup with herbs, with a salad. I appreciate all the freshness in their food; I lost
  track at how many places sold salads that were obviously stale or had damaged vegetables. Tea
  was about a dollar; very affordable! The gift shop had items ranging from $1 - $20; it's a fun spot to
  buy something for yourself (which I did, and you can see below) or for someone else.