Hotel Food and More

From Maryville we headed to Lexington KY to see my folks. We are not from Kentucky nor do my parents live there. My Mom is sometimes wheelchair bound and Columbus is a long drive from Blairsville so my Mom wanted us to meet in the middle. So Lexington it was. All the time leading up to it my Mom complained and fretted that Lexington would suck, there was nothing to do and the hotel would be horrible.

We had a great time.

I've been accused my whole life of being a pessimist. Still don't understand that.

Anyway, Mom booked rooms at a Marriott resort outside of Lexington. The rooms were nothing spectacular but they were nice. They had an expensive breakfast buffet, though I've had more expensive ones, much, much more, while working the past 10 years. It was typical of some Holiday Inns and Embassy Suites. The bacon was better than average. But they had an incredible fresh fruit bar. Absolutely perfect blueberries, humongous blackberries, deep yellow pineapple and three different melons, cantaloupe, honey dew and watermelon (two of which I don't eat). Oh yeah, ripe strawberries too. They also had a phenomenal hash brown casserole. Two things made it special. One, it was peppery. They did not use a light hand on the pepper. Two, crisp, toasty melted cheese on top. Mmmmmm. Those were two excellent breakfasts in Lexington.

The first night my Mom was recommended to eat at Malone's. And again the fretting over would it be any good. "You just never know what your going to get from someones recommendation." She had us look at restaurant descriptions in the travel booklet. My Dad and I were both up for Billy's Bar-B-Q but Mom wanted something nicer. Finally I said that since we didn't know the area, let's just go with the recommendation of Malone's.

It was about a 10 minute drive and we were running late which made me more than anxious. We also thought we were lost but Dinah called while we were en route and smoothed it all out. Nice place. Mom said it was EXACTLY what she had in mind. I thought it was a little pricey, but what Mom wants, Mom gets. I'm not complaining though.

Dinah and I shared some excellent PEI mussels while my Dad ordered some calamari as an appetizer. The calamari was OK for my tastes. I prefer the leg ends and this was just rings. I was thrilled to be able to get a Caesar salad with real anchovies on top. Oh so good. They had fresh bread with a creamy garlic butter on the table. I can't count how much bread Rose ate.

While I stuck with water with lemon since I was driving, Dinah order a local beer from Lexington, Alltech's Kentucky Ale. She deemed it pretty good. As a follow up she tried what was billed as the very popular Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Ale. This she found repulsive after one sip! I tried it and it tastes just like bourbon. If you like bourbon, this is your beer. I however was not in the mood for bourbon, nor am I a big fan of bourbon, so we just let that glass sit for the rest of the evening.

Dinah got the seared Ahi tuna appetizer for her dinner. It was thinly sliced the way I prefer it. I stole a piece and can attest to its wonderfulness. Mom got some kind of surf and turf, two shrimp stacked on top of a crab cake stacked on top of a Filet Mignon. My Dad and I both treated ourselves to thirty dollar ribeyes. Hey, Mom was buying. I had never thought that "Prime beef from Chicago" ever meant anything that special. I was wrong. My Dad and I both agreed it was the best steak either of us had ever eaten. And we've eaten a couple cows between us in our lifetimes.

Now if you are going to have a fancy dinner like this, you have to have dessert. Rose and Dad had ice cream. Dinah had a creme brule, her favorite but I can't remember what flavor it was. I ordered the chocolate chip cookie. It is worth driving to Lexington to get this cookie. The cookie was about an inch thick, six inches across, hot, half baked in the middle, with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top and a slight drizzle of chocolate sauce. If it doesn't bring you to orgasm with the first bite it will at least make your eyes roll back.

My God it was a great meal, perfect too because unbeknownst to my parents it was our six year anniversary. Mom kept going on about how she thought it was the following week. I just bit my tongue; that was the last one. As an added bonus, Rose stayed with Grandma and Grandpa, so we were able to continue to celebrate our anniversary with a few drinks at the hotel bar before retiring to our room for a child free night!

A friend of mine once asked, why is hotel sex better? I don't know it just is.