first anniversary celebration

We celebrated for real on Friday night by spending way too much money at Cafe Adelaide in downtown New Orleans. Probably the best meal either of us have ever encountered. Michael's coworker has been raving about it for weeks now, so it was pretty much decided for us. We made our reservations online and under the "Special Instructions" Michael just had to put "It's our first anniversary!"

We arrived to the restaurant early, so we walked around the block and came upon this: the Italian-American Cultural Center. Not sure what it's for, but the mix of modern and classical architecture made for interesting cultural conversation.

Someday I will tell the story of our awkward restaurant experience on our honeymoon. But we had another one of those during our anniversary celebration, so now it's tradition. The waiter brought out two tiny little cups full of gazpacho, "a gift from the kitchen," he called it. We'd never heard of gazpacho, and because the cups were so small we thought maybe it was something alcoholic, like shots, maybe. We were afraid to drink it after I stuck my finger in and it burned my mouth, so we texted my parents to make sure it was alright, but my dad didn't respond in time. Michael finally just asked the waiter (I'm so lucky to have an outgoing spouse), "We don't drink, so we were just wondering if these had any alcohol in it." He looked at us like we were really odd and said, "Um, no. It's watermelon tomato soup." And he's never had anyone ask him that question before, surprise, surprise.

Back to the meal. Michael ordered Muscovy duck (with thinly sliced crunchy carrots and some really good bread-y something on the bottom), and I had scallops with crab, bacon, corn, and grits. We both loved Michael's choice, but I wouldn't order my dish again, though it was yummy. Grinding grits against my teeth just wasn't what I was expecting. For dessert we had White Chocolate Biscuit Pudding with the perfect amount of root beer flavoring.

Afterwards we walked around a seemingly deserted French Quarter (we assume they were all at the Saint's game... but really, it was weird and empty. Fellow Louisianans, is it always like that?) and didn't have any cash to tip our parking valet (and yes, I just said that with the "t" because that's what they do at Downton).

Also, it's been raining nonstop for the past couple of days. And this is the only picture we've got of us together from this weekend. Enjoy!