Guest of the Day, Day Two!

When we last left our hero's... and we are, really, we are super hero's, shh don't tell!
Sunday morning we started the day by going to the "Governor's Club" for a light breakfast. It was full so we got trays and brought it back to our room, which was even better cause we got to watch TV, and surf the net for direction for where we wanted to play that day.
First stop was Olbrich Botanical Gardens, and I must say it's pretty impressive for $1 admission!!! Hell $10  would be more like it. It's huge. First we when into the conservatory that houses over 650 plants. It's like a rain forest in there! Warm and very humid. Made up for the cold and wind the day before.

They had a pond with Koi fish in it. So far my wish has come true!

 And you should definitely click on this photo to see the pitcher plants close up!

This was one of the amazing planter's they had around the grounds.

There was this adorable topiary of bears with a bowl of honey. Can you see the small bear on the right side?

 Really nice hanging plants.

We could of easily of spent another hour there, but back to the hotel we went for our late check-out.
Next we drove to Orange Tree Imports. Actually we got there and realized it was a store we'd (and when I say we I mean I) would spend a good hour in, they recommended Jac's for lunch, so we went there first to fuel up. What a quaint place. If I owned a restaurant I would like it to be just like this. Old building, wood floors, small bar on one side, great food, friendly service. It was perfect! Awesome burger with the best frites!!! Frites NOT fries, and if you don't know the difference you should not die without finding that out! Trust me on this one! DH had the crab cake benedict, all I can say is OMG, who ever came up with that one, brilliant!!! Sorry I know it's not Foodie Friday but I just had to get that off my chest.

Back to Orange Tree what a spectacular place! They must of had 25 kinds of spatula's, and bakeware and cooking ware and, and, and, if you cook, you'd love this place. They even have cooking classes. While we were there, a class just started on how to make fresh pasta. We both grinned when we heard the teacher say "Oh lets have a glass of wine while we cook"! Yes ma'am, Sunday afternoon cooking class is the way to go!
Next on the list was Wisconsin Cutlery and Kitchen Supply store. Completely different from Orange Tree, oriented for the restaurant business. The main reason I want to go is because they sharpen knifes and I wanted to find out the best way to sharpen my Global knife.

And you will not believe me when I tell you, we (and when I say we I mean the DH) can keep that baby sharp for $4.99! That's right a 2 sided sharpening stone will do the trick.
I need to mention that I never could see spending the big money on cooking knifes, I thought that my cheap Target buys were just as good. Listen to me, I was wrong, so wrong. (sing that like Patsy Cline)
If you cook you should absolutely invest in a restaurant quality knife. And keep it sharp with an inexpensive sharpening stone!

Click here to go to Amazon to get you one

Damn, it's even less than what we paid!
OK, where was I? Oh we had a hour or two before we needed to head back downtown for supper. Most of the shops would be closing soon, lucky for us there was a Border's Books right across the street.
Everybody knows that's the best place to kill time.
The nice women at the front desk at the hotel had given us a pass so we could park for free at the hotel and walk to the restaurant. How nice was she! (it turns out she's a fellow foodie :)
Dinner was at the Icon Tapas Bar. Good food you know how we love tapas! And wine was half price! Lucky me I wasn't driving home! But the whole 50's music and paintings of Elvis and Marilyn were odd. What's in a name? Right!
Well I've gone on and on, you'll just have to wait for Foodie Friday to hear what we did on our day off, Monday! And yes surprise, surprise it's food related!

Guest of the Day! Day One

Well our long weekend in Madison was a blast! It all started with chocolate croissants (from Trader Joe's) and Sweet Maria's coffee! We left for Madison around 9:00 arriving around 11. We went to the front desk of the Madison Concourse Hotel to see if we could check-in early and found out we were chosen to be the "Guest for the Day"! Which meant an upgraded room, access to the "Governor's Club" that included:

• Private key-access floors
• Complimentary continental breakfast, top-shelf cocktails, hors d’oeuvres and desserts in the Governor’s Club Lounge
• Complimentary wireless Internet access
• 42” flat screen TV
• Compact refrigerator
• Granite top furniture
• Spacious bathroom with a glass walk-in shower
• Comfort Collection™ bedding and bath towels
• Terrycloth robes
• Complimentary in-room bottled water during turndown
• LodgeNet Digital Interactive TV system offering hit movies, DIRECTV® Sports, digital music, games and more
• Turndown service

I know! WOW!
Here's a picture of the room,

ours wasn't facing the Capital, it was facing Lake Mendota which was nice too.
So after we jumped up and down on the bed we commenced to "the square" for the Farmer's Market! OK we didn't really jump on the bed, but we could of we were so flabbergasted at our good fortune!
The farmer's market was wonderful. We walked around to check out the prices and see all what the vendor's had to offer. I bought some fingerling potatoes and some purple carrots!!! I've seen them on TasteSpotting and now I have some of my own! Bought some jerky for my brother for his b-day that's coming up. He's a persnickety one, but I've never seen him past on homemade jerky! Oh I also bought a handful of "cosmo" flowers, a handful for $3!!!!!! I gave them to the wonderful women at the front desk of the hotel that helped us, she was also the one that picked our name for "quest of the day". The price's at the farmer's market were really good compared to the one's in Barrington, I was surprised though, that most of the vegetable vendors were asian.
Next we walked around State Street. Popped into Pop Deluxe and bought some cool gifts. Bought some cool paper and more gifts at a scrapbook store. Bought a sweater for $36 at one of those hippie type shops, I know it won't last long but it will be fun to wear until it starts to fall apart. The DH was so nice acting like a "girlfriend" as I ooh'd and aah'd at everything, and just shopping with me in general. It could of been that he was just grateful to step out of the wind, because it was coming off the lake with a good clip! But he told me he was having fun looking at all the unique things too, and I believe him!!!
We when back to the hotel around 4:00. Took a short snooze before dressing for dinner. Ok DH snoozed, my mind was whirling with all the fun we had! And we'd only been there 5 hours!!!
We used our special "gold" card to go upstairs to the "Governor's Club" for FREE cocktails! We each had 2 cosmopolitans, they were small, plus we were walking to the restaurant. Not that there's anything wrong with that!
Dinner was at "Restaurat Muramoto". We were a little confused how to order at first, then we realized it was like a japanese tapa's restaurant. The first thing we had was kobe tartar with a raw quail egg. Wow, now I see what my dad means when he told me that fresh eggs taste so much better that the ones you buy at the store. It was one of the favorite things we had there.

"My" second favorite thing was fried sweetbreads with apple puree and apple chips. This may not seem like a big deal to you, unless you know what a "sweetbread" is.
It's the pancreas of a pig or lamb under one years old. That died of natural causes. OK I don't know that for sure, I don't know if it was lamb or pig either. I do know if you ate it without anyone telling you, you would say thank you may I have another, cause it is delicious! It tasted like really tender italian sausage. Really, tender "expensive" italian sausage, which is why I tried it as a small plate, that and because I wasn't sure I'd like it. I was also surprised I ate the fish eggs that were peppered around the rolls that we ordered. OK, OK "caviar"! All I know is the first time I ever saw "caviar" was when my dad would gut the coho salmon he caught. If you would of told me then that someday I would eat it and like it, well I probably would of stomped on your foot and called you a snaggle toothed liar, and now I'd have to join facebook so I could find you and apologize.
On the walk back to our hotel the Capital building was lite up like a christmas tree, unfortunately the batteries died on my phone so no picture. (It looked just like it does in the first photo of the room, so click on that to enlarge it.) It's OK though cause on the way to the restaurant I got in this shot for JW.

Tesla Roadster! An electric car, the car of JW's dreams. It is a beauty, and as you can see they have beautiful men in Madison too!
Day Two tomorrow!