The view from my hotel window
I had a wonderful time over the Christmas weekend in Philadelphia. However, I have only this one photo to show for it. During the snowstorm and downtime in a hotel room, I was reading my Nikon camera guide trying to learn some things I didn't know about my new camera. Unfortunately, I thought I was deleting one picture but it turned out I was deleting about 20, including the horse and carriage ride I took with my son Alan and a wonderful picture of my two sons and I standing in front of a beautiful Christmas tree in the elegant lobby of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel. My heart is still crying which is better than the cussing out I gave myself at the time.
The highlight of my weekend was two fabulous, and expensive, meals at two fine dining restaurants on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Paying for them was my Christmas gift to my sons and son-in-law. Then they turned the tables (pardon the pun) and informed me they were paying for the Christmas Eve feast. When I saw the bill the next night, I was very glad they had helped me out that way. But thinking about it, I have always spent that much and more when I've entertained family here at Castle Yonder for Christmas.
We ate at Fish one of the top 10 restaurants in Philly and chose to have the traditional 7-course Italian dinner with the wine pairing. Selected wines were brought in small portions that complimented that course. We started out with baby Bibb lettuce salad with anchovies, then (and I won't remember these all in order, I'm sure) an oyster on the half-shell, clams with linguini, roe, shrimp, octupus (!), and salt cod. These were all served with lovely sauces in beautiful presentations. Dessert was a cake-like nut bread with whipped cream and tiny diced peaches. The restaurant setting was very intimate, and the ambience was warm with dark red walls, and low, artistic lighting.
Our Christmas dinner was at the Ten Arts, a restaurant inside the elegant Ritz-Carleton Hotel. Our table was surrounded by mammoth marble columns, and crystal chandeliers hung above us. It was as elegant as Fish had been intimate. We chose the 5-course dinner with the wine pairing. The courses I remember was a magnificent truffle soup with a parmesan and foie gras embellishment and the thinly sliced skirt steak. I'm sorry I can't remember all the courses but by this time there were just too many unfamiliar foods to remember.
It truly was two of the most elegant dinners and restaurants I've ever experienced. My sons don't eat this way except on very special occasions, but they are fine food conniseurs. My son, Alan, was trained as a pastry chef and graduated from the Philadelphia Restaurant School twenty years ago. I had the same fun I have when I go on a cruise which is pretending to be a member of the jet set. That's what happened to many of us who grew up during the Golden Age of movies. We aspired to be the Beautiful People.
I make no apologies.
