Holly and I took a long weekend early in March to celebrate my birthday. The time off was very welcomed since we hadn’t had a day off from work since our winter break at the end of December.
Not surprisingly for us, most of the weekend involved food and drink. Fortunately, the pandemic had taken a turn for the better by the time the weekend rolled around. Given the better news, we did eat indoors at a couple of restaurants for the first time since early December.
We started the festivities on Thursday night, meeting my brother at Rex at the Royal which had been Rex1516 before they moved to a larger space. We had been frequent customers at Rex1516 and were looking forward to their new space. Because of the pandemic, we never got to go to their old space one last time. We had gone to the new space twice in early December, once for dinner with a friend, and once for drinks at the bar with friends. We thought we’d be going there often during the winter, but Omicron had other ideas.
But with things looking up, we decided to head back. Despite the City of Philadelphia relaxing some restrictions, Rex at the Royal does still require proof of vaccination and wearing of masks when not seated. Given how relatively cautious we’ve been throughout the pandemic, that felt comfortable for us.
The new spaces isn’t as dark as the new space, but it is still not ideal for picture taking. The only pictures I took were of my shrimp and grits and my brother’s scallops. As usual, I took the food pictures with my Samsung Galaxy S9+.
Friday started with delivery from On Point Bistro. I got the Farm Omelet, which is my go-to when we order from On Point. It has three eggs with sautéed mushrooms, spinach, corn, Manchego, and truffle aioli. And it’s always perfectly prepared. Holly got the vegan Breakfast Nachos.
The weather wasn’t great over the weekend, but nice enough for a couple of walks. The first was on Friday when it was fairly cold but bright and sunny. We took a walk through our neighborhood and wended our way to the 30th Street Station area.
I brought along my new Nikon Z fc with the 18-140mm f/3.5-6.3 lens.
After the walk, Holly made us tadka dal with homemade pita for dinner.
Saturday began with Holly making us delicious biscuits with mushroom gravy.
We then took our second walk of the weekend. It was a cloudier but warmer day. We went to Chinatown but didn’t stay very long. It was incredibly crowded which made stopping to take pictures a little difficult.
While we were in that part of town, we looked for a somewhat recent art installation, ContraFuerte by Miguel Antonio Horn. This artwork is attached to a pedestrian bridge over a small side street in-between 2 parking garages.
On our way home from our walk, we stopped at Tria Café which has become one of our favorite spots for an afternoon wine break. We’ve been long time fans of the Tria closer to where we live but have recently taken a liking to the one east of us whenever we take walks in that direction.
We then came home and made Scallops and Risotto with Kale Pesto.
After a busy Friday and Saturday, we had a lazy Sunday and didn’t do much until dinner when we went to Bar Poulet. We had gone there for the first time during our October Staycation and loved it. It was high on my list for a birthday outing, and we couldn’t resist going back. Their specialty is pairing fried chicken with French bubbly. They also offer fried mushrooms so we shared one half order of chicken and one half order of mushrooms.
Monday was likewise lowkey. We mostly relaxed, and Holly made a slow cooked Chicken Mostaccioli from the Half Baked Harvest Super Simple cookbook.
As with any long weekend, this one went by too quickly, but we appreciated having the extra time off from work. Since both our birthdays are winter-adjacent, we’ve talked about celebrating our 6-month birthdays so we can get to enjoy some summer foods and activities.
Leave a Reply