The Works

This past Saturday we went out to dinner (and a movie) to celebrate Jason's birthday.  A new burger joint called The Works, which originated in Ottawa, just opened up in our area and we'd heard rave reviews so decided to try it out.

What a GREAT place!  The service was top notch, the decor funky, the atmosphere laid back and the food spectacular!  Check out the neat salt & pepper shakers:

No sooner did we get the menu's that the kids zoomed in on milk shakes.  I was leery on letting them get one because I didn't want the bellies too full, but the waiter convinced me that the small ones were not too big.  And wouldn't you know that they came out in Pyrex measuring cups?!  Noah went with Oreo (even though you could create you own combo!):

Sarah was a tad more adventurous and ordered chocolate, chocolate chip blackberry:

Even my water came in a 2 cup measuring cup!

Now, I had heard that the menu options were quite extensive; 60 choices to be exact, so we all took a peek at the menu online earlier in the day.  Here's what they have to say about their patties:

And the protein options to choose from:

Armed with our decisions, we order right away since the place was filling up and we needed to out of there in time to make it to our show.  Noah ordered the "Mac & Cheese" which we all assumed was just that.  Oh no!  What came out was a burger TOPPED with mac & cheese and cheddar:

After giving it a really strange look he shrugged his shoulders, grabbed the ketchup and proceeded to polish it off.  He didn't make it through the fries, though!  Sarah, who unlike me loves meat, ordered the "Richie's Butt Burger" which was topped with grilled Canadian back bacon and cheddar cheese:

She made short work of that!  I just can't figure out where she puts it all!  Jason went with the "Sorento Sunset" which had fresh avocado slices and Monterey Jack cheese on it:

I chose the "Johnny Be Goat" with no bun.  Thankfully, there burgers are gluten free!  Mine was topped with roasted red peppers, spinach and goat cheese:

As delicious as it was, I'm just not a huge fan of meat so I made it through most of the burger and ALL the toppings.  Jason had no problem finishing of my patty.  ;)  We all had sweet potato fires except for Noah who had regular ones.  And now for some goofy family pictures!

The movie we went to see was "We Bought a Zoo" with Matt Damon.  what an amazing movie!  Have you seen it yet?  When we got home there was just enough time for Noah to get a quick snuggle from Pepper:

Have you tried a new to you restaurant lately?

Bye for now!!

T'is The Season....

.....to be BUSY!!  Hi folks!  How is everyone doing?  Are you all caught up in the craziness that is December just like me?  Between work, Christmas shopping, hockey, dance and the end of Sarah's volleyball season I've barely had time time sit at the computer, which I am sure is the case in general.  Instead of posting here I decided to use that time to continue reading all your blogs.  I haven't been commenting as much, but I have been keeping myself up to date with you guys!

On Sunday Noah's hockey team had a game in a border city.  Whenever we play there I plan a quick trip across the border for a little shopping.  This time we only hit Target because it had been raining pretty heavily all day and we were afraid it would freeze before long.  Getting stuck in the States wouldn't be such a bad thing; just extra money for us that could be used in other areas right now.  :)  We actually went to Panera first because, as is the case more often than not lately, Noah was starving.  That kid eats more than me these days and is still only weighs 59lbs at almost 10yrs old!  LOL  Because I'm pretty much gluten free, sandwiches were out for me.  I went with the Chopped Chicken BBQ Salad with a side of potato chips:

This was delicious!  I already used some of the ingredients in this as an idea for dinner.  More on that to follow...I pretty much found everything at Target that I wanted to.  I can't post everything, though, because some of the items are gifts!  Here are the edible goodies I bought:

Anyone know how to rotate photos in blogger?  I don't have WLW at work and can't figure out how to do it!  DOH!!  If you can help leave me a comment, please & thank you!  Jason LOVES the Archer Farms corn & black bean salsa!  I've had to hide those Mounds bars and Fage yogurts from my son...AKA...bottomless pit!

I also managed to stick to my meal plan last week.  Monday was pizza night.  While the fam had some oven ready pizza, I made a pizza for me using Udi's GF pizza crust.  I've never tried it before and really enjoyed it!  My toppings included a (leftover) GF hotdog, spinach and cheddar cheese.  I used salsa as my sauce:

Next time I will cut back on the baking time.  The crust got a little too crisp for me, but that was my fault, not the product. (*note: I bought these Udi's pizza crusts on my own).  Here's a picture I took of the leftovers that I enjoyed for lunch the next day:

Tuesday we had a FREE night!  I took the opportunity to roast a chicken with onions and garlic for dinner.  I also made steamed broccoli & quinoa to go along with it.

That's mango chutney on my plate beside the chicken.  ;)  On Wednesday we were out of town until 7pm.  Knowing this would be the case I made and baked off meatballs Tuesday for subs.  All I had to do when we got home was heat them with tomato sauce, toast the buns and melt the cheese.  The fam had sub buns while I ate mine on a GF burger bun:

Thursday was quick and simple; turkey sausage, brown rice & peas;

The plan was to have chicken stir fry on Friday, but we ended up at Boston Pizza after a bit of Christmas shopping.  I went with a personal Szechuan on GF crust.

I took one bite of this and realized that instead of the Szechuan sauce that's suppose to come with this pizza, it was plain old tomato.  Instead of sending it back and waiting for another pizza, I just had the server bring me a ramekin of the sauce and I put it on myself.  :/  Seeing as I already had the chicken out of the freezer, we enjoyed our stir fry Saturday night!

As you can see, there is some rice spiral pasta on the side there.  I also made sure I got more veg than chicken.  I'll leave the fam to the meat!  LOL  And that's that for my "meals of the week"!  I gotta admit, I can't wait to get some natural light again at dinner time!  All my pictures look so blah.  :(

I don't really have a set plan for this week.  From Sunday to Saturday Noah is on the ice every night but Thursday, so I'm kinda winging it.  I have a loose idea of what I'll be making each day, but don't want to commit to it.  I'll leave you all with a photo of the kids school pics!

Man, they are growing so FAST!!  One last little thing!  I tried to post this yesterday, but Blogger was behaving badly!!

Bye for now!!