Ari's Menu

Little changes making a big difference.


Nourish

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Sunday evening I went out with some of my awesome teammates to celebrate all of our training, and making it all the way to peak week! Well, we didn’t say exactly what it was that we were celebrating other than actually getting to hang out with each other, but those sound like awesome reasons to celebrate to me 😉

Jason, Wanda, Jaime, Tara, Lisa, Stacey, Moi. And after this lovely evening, I will be throwing out that shirt and NEVER wearing it again.

When we were trying to decide what to do/where to go, we all agreed that some awesome healthy food…and of course some wine. 😉 Jaime and Tara eat gluten free, so I suggested Nourish. I first tried Nourish a couple of months ago with Nicole and Emily, and LOVED it! They have a menu filled with healthy options to fit every diet–gluten free, vegan, raw, paleo, you name it!

As soon as I mentioned their air fried sweet potatoes, my friends were all on board!

Heaven.

They have a special air frier that bakes the sweet potatoes at a very high temperature without the potatoes ever touching oil or butter! They do place some oil in the oven, and have a fan that they say infuses the “fries” with the flavor of the oil. They are perfectly crisp on the outside, while soft on the inside–so much better than the kind I make at home! It is kind of magical. The table split a bottle of pinot grigio and an order of the sweet potato fries to start.

I ordered the southwestern rice bowl which was ridiculously good! I don’t know how they get their brown rice to be so soft!!

We ended up spending over 2 hours chatting and talking about, well, running! 🙂

Jaime & Tara

Stacey & Jason

Lisa & my shiny red face

“Ari take a cute picture of me for my blog! And then out me for asking on the internet!” I believe I was successful on both accounts.

Training buddddddies!

What a fantastic night!! I’m so glad we all had the chance to hang out and do something fun with real clothes on, and eat food that isn’t gu!! Also, I haven’t stopped craving the delicious food from Nourish since we left, so I think an other trip very soon is in order!

 

Cheuvront

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Friday night I went out with some of my favorite AZ Blogger ladies to Cheuvront for restaurant week.

Arizona restaurant week is one of my very favorite things! When I was growing up, we didn’t have a huge restaurant scene, but ever since I moved back after college, it seems like new, indie restaurants are popping up like crazy! Or maybe I’m just finally starting to get into the scene? Either way, there are lots of amazing options for people who love food in this city, and I (obviously) really, really love food. Each restaurant has a special restaurant week menu with a set price and a few options for each course–you can choose to order off this menu, or stick to the regular menu.

This was my first time at Cheuvront, but I was super excited as soon as I looked at the menu. I had a really tough time making up my mind because everything looked amazing, but the one thing that was easy to decide was the first course. Goat cheese is one of those items I always immediately scan a menu for, and then I usually choose what I order by which options come with it. Obviously, I started with the goat cheese salad.

It was delicious! Fresh greens, the perfect amount of slightly sweet champagne vinaigrette, and of course the star of the plate–the fried goat cheese! For the second course, everything looked good and I had a hard time deciding, but ultimately went with the half roasted chicken because it came with cranberry apple stuffing.

That stuffing!!! I just kept digging underneath the chicken to try to get more of it out. It was probably my favorite thing I ate all night. The chicken was great too–perfectly cooked and tender. I asked the waiter what his favorite dessert option was and he pointed me towards the chocolate bouchon which is a small, lava-like chocolate cake that was served with dulce de leche ice cream.

Okay, maybe this was my favorite thing I ate all night. The chocolate bouchon had a slightly crisp outside, but the entire inside was gooey, like a half baked brownie, and it paired perfectly with the ice cream which was aaaaaamazing.

I absolutely loved Cheuvront, and will definitely be returning! It was also so great to spend time with some of my favorite ladies, and meet a couple of new ones!

Remy, Emily, me, Megan, Robin, Nicole & Jenn

Thanks for an awesome evening ladies!! Can’t wait to do it again soon!

Blogger Meet Up @ Piestewa Peak & La Grande Orange

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Saturday after our bike ride of near death, Nicole, Carolyn and I met up with Diana, Marisa and Estela for a hike at Piestewa Peak. After the bike ride, I honestly was not really in the mood to hike anymore, but once we got going, I stopped being lame and started to enjoy myself. I’m no expert on hiking, but this one seemed…nice? You know, like a nice uphill walk with cacti 🙂 Haha, if you want to actually hear anything legit about hiking, you should just go to Diana’s blog because she’s basically an expert. In fact, she even knows all of these weird hiking rules–did you know there were rules??? Like she knew what to say to all the people we passed, and talked about things like right of way that I didn’t even know existed on a mountain!

Look! Nicole and I are hiking! And there's a mountain.

Marisa, Carolyn, Estela, Diana, Nicole & Me

**Hike photos courtesy of Marisa**

After the hike, we hopped back on our bikes and headed to La Grande Orange where we met up with Emily, Megan and Stacey. You better believe after a 30 mile bike ride I was ready for some wine! Emily and I split a bottle of pinot.

I have way too many pictures that look just like this...

As soon as we sat down, the manager sent out an appetizer for us to sample. Whooohooo, I think it was my first special foodie blogger treatment! And all thanks to Nicole for slipping that into an email to the manager 🙂

Guac, salsa, and pimento dip. All super delish!

Emily and I also split a salad with oranges, goat cheese and avocado (that I inhaled before it even occurred to me to snap a photo) and a pizza with goat cheese, tomatoes, roasted corn and avocado. Ummmm, yum.

OMG!!!! It's real pizza!!!! Probably my favorite food, but I very rarely eat it, unless it's at home and all skinnified. This was ahhhhmazing.

They even had gluten free crust!

Carolyn got the same pizza on the gf crust. I almost wished I would have ordered mine that way because I love a thin and crispy crust!

Then I insisted we take funny pictures. Naturally.

YAY!!! I got Emily to agree to a silly picture!!!

I also have a lot of pictures that look like this one.

I had such a great time with these girls! We have such an amazing group of AZ Bloggers!

Emly, Carolyn & Megan

Stacey & Nicole

Marisa & Me

Carolyn, Megan, Marisa, Stacey, Nicole, Emily & Me

**Photo courtesy of Marisa**

During dinner, Nicole and Emily announced that they have been hard at work at a super awesome new project!!!

The AZ Bloggers Network!!!

The Arizona Bloggers Network will be a place to organize, promote, and connect with other female Arizona bloggers. You don’t have to be a food/fitness blogger to join–just a woman who lives in Arizona and has a passion for blogging. You can head over and register your blog for free! So all you bloggers out there, come and join us! We like people!

After an amazing evening, Nicole’s husband Lance was kind enough to pick us (and our bikes) up @ LGO, and then we convinced him to that a Yogurtology stop was a necessity.

Husband of the year award--picking up his wife and her 2 crazy friends that were silly enough to bike from Mesa to PV.

Oatmeal cookie, salted caramel and butterfinger with graham cracker, butterfinger and nutella on top. I usually stay away from the candy toppings, but after the riding and the drinking I totally caved, haha.

fro yo shirt.”]fro yo shirt.”]Then we tried really hard to take jumping pictures…for a change.

SUCCESS!!!! Except, apparently Lance was zoned out during my lecture about how snapping a photo at any moment in time where it looks like I may have a double chin is unacceptable and grounds to end our friendship forever. Buuuuttt, we were all in the air, so I am posting my second and third chins for the world to see.

And my chins make an appearance here too, but this picture cracked me up. I don't know what I'm doing or why Nicole is a Charlie's Angel, but I find this picture to be pretty awesome.

I can’t say enough what an awesome time I had!! I’m so excited for the new AZ Bloggers Network, and thanks so much to Emily & Nicole for setting it up, and to Nicole especially for putting this whole meet up together!

 

 

The highlight of my weekend

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I have a confession. Working this much definitely makes me want to drink more. Earlier this week after setting one of the biggest numbers in the show, I felt exhausted and came home, went straight to the fridge and grabbed a pumpkin ale. Then Friday night, I called Steve on my way home and asked if he wanted to get out of the house. We ended up at the Santan Brewery, each had a beer and called it a night. Then last night we had dinner plans with Jason after I got out of rehearsal. First we met up at hise house and I got to see my favorite niece Nico!

Nico, look at the camera!

I was tired from rehearsal and wanted iced coffee in a bad way. We stopped at a Starbucks that closed at 6pm. It was 6:01. Honestly, FML. So we popped into this old 50s-esque shop that claimed to serve coffee. All I saw on the menu was burgers and ice cream. Both things I loved, but we already had a dinner spot in mind. On the plus side, it was connected to this super cute vintage shop where Steve got to be artsy with the camera.

Finally, we went to a different Starbucks (I have a Starbucks problem), I got my iced coffee and we were off to dinner. We had decided to go to The Main Ingredient, a super cute restaurant downtown with fun outdoor seating. It used to be a house and is right on the corner of an old neighborhood. There was this super cool water fixture in the side yard area. We thought it was neat 🙂

The second I picked up the menu, I noticed this baby

White chocolate ale? Are you kidding me?! It might be my favorite beer ever. It is sweet, but still bubbly and not super heavy. Steve was supposed to share with me (it was 22 oz!), but then he took like three sips and gave me the rest. Yeah, thanks for that 🙂

Jason ordered one too. We were both pretty impressed. For dinner, I got a roasted veggie and goat cheese sandwich on focaccia bread. They give you a choice between salad or chips. I ALWAYS choose salad. I don’t know what came over me, but I ordered mine with chips!

Then ended up eating a total of about 4 chips haha. I guess I just wanted the option. But honestly, my sandwich and my beer were so delicious that I was set! Then, we migrated over to Four Peaks because I had never been there and they just recently came out with their seasonal Pumpkin Porter!

Jas and I got the pumpkin (duhhh—SOOOO good!, but white chocolate ale was better!) and Steve got some fruity beer. He cracks me up with his drinks. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him order a wine cooler if it was an option 🙂

On the way there, we had a natural disaster experience when we got stuck in a sudden 90 second dust storm. There were winds of what must have been very high mileage and rain and dust, and then in 90 seconds, it was back to being 95 degrees and still. Oh Phoenix. Once we got seated, it was like we were all 16 again or something. We were being totally immature, but cracking ourselves and each other up. I haven’t laughed that hard in such a long time. Jason seriously has one of the best senses of humor of anyone I have ever met. We always find the same things hilarious and laugh when no one else does. We saw Scary Movie 2 together about 7 times and laughed so hard every single time. Plus Steve always knows how to make me laugh. Jason gave us a fascinating demonstraion of how to smell and taste your beer which Steve captured perfectly on camera.

Then I had a surprise run in with my friends Kelsey, Marisa and Liz. I love those ladies and I hadn’t seen them in forever! It was such a nice surprise! We ended the night by meeting Bethany for frozen yogurt at Yo Love after a navigation experience that was so funny I could never fully explain. Seriously, I just spent the entire night laughing my face off. I really really love my friends!

St Francis

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One of the worst thing about the “dark ages” (otherwise known as my time of obsessing over calories) was that it made going out and enjoying myself nearly impossible. Let’s be honest, in our society, so many social events center around food. And we all know I love food, but I’ve tried to make social gatherings surrounding it either take place at home where we cook ourselves, or a special occasion so I can actually go out and enjoy myself. I am so grateful to be in a place now where I can go out and enjoy myself at a restaurant with my friends, because I think in the dark ages I was probably very little fun.

Now for the sake of money and health, Steve and I try to do all our cooking/eating at home with the exception of 1-2 meals per week. Thursday I had my amazing sandwich from Sacks, and last night we went out to a new (to me) restaurant that I’ve been wanting to try in downtown Phx called St Francis. I’ve seen it in passing and always thought it looked super cute and their menu is full of lots of unique options, including several healthy options. Count me in! We’ve been trying to make our night out be somewhere new so that it’s exciting!

So last night, Steve, Jason and I finally went over to St Francis. As soon as we walked in, I was excited. The atmosphere and entire look of the restaurant was just so cool and different than anywhere I’ve ever been. Steve took a picture when we first walked in, but it just didn’t capture it.

I started with a delicious glass of pinot grigio–my fav in the summer months! In the winter I switch to red, but almost always pinot!


I was torn with what I wanted for dinner. There was a wild rice vegetable bowl that looked delicious, but when I asked the waitress which was better, she enthusiastically responded with the “Roasted salmon super food.” It came with quinoa, avacado, tomato, radish, and soy beans.

I loved that it was healthy AND delicious! I took about half of it home and was so excited to eat it today for lunch until I walked out to my car this morning and realized it had been sitting in the 100 degree heat in my pretty, brand new car that now no longer has the new car smell. Boo. Sometimes my inherent forgetfulness can be so frustrating! Oh well, nothing some Febreeze and fresh air couldn’t fix.

Jason & Stevie’s plates

French onion burger with whipped potatoes and white fish with lots of stuff–I tried a bite of everything (I love to share!) and everything was super tasty! I would definitely go back again!

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