Playing Catch-up

So it's been a crazy couple of days around here and I keep meaning to get a blog posted but keep getting sidetracked. I've also had about a million ideas for different posts so this might be a bit scatter-brained, but hey, you should be used to that sort of behavior from me by now.

What has kept me so busy? Shopping. Dinner dates. Getting the pictures back from our wedding. Cooking. Movie dates. Skyrim (I'm just being honest here - video games). I'll try to go in that order.

This week we took a trip to a mall we haven't been to before - the Al Wahda Mall, mostly because we heard there was a really awesome kitchen supply store and I needed certain kitchen supplies I hadn't found yet. Al Wadha wasn't like the other two malls I'd been to here, in that to me, it seemed decidedly more mall-ish. This may also be because it's the biggest mall in the area (at least, we think it is). We explored for a while but we were on a mission, and stopped into Lakeland and Thinkkitchen to outfit our cookingware. I mostly picked up baking supplies, because hey, if I'm gonna be spending time at home I'm gonna bake deliciousness. We also took a visit to Al Wahda's hypermarket, Lulu, which is HUGE in comparison to the one we frequent - Carrefour. If I had to rank them in size, biggest to smallest, I'd say Lulu, then Cooperative Society, then Carrefour. It seems to be a mall standard around here that they all have hypermarkets, which is nice because you can get some grocery shopping done too.

One thing I also managed to get into at the mall this week was fast food, Abu Dhabi style. Which, surprisingly, isn't that different from fast food you'd find in the States. My first experience this week being with Burger King, and my second with Hardee's, I can honestly say that I didn't  notice too much of a difference with either - even in the menu. I hear McD's menu is more varied here, but I haven't seen it yet. One thing you will see that would never happen in the States - KFC and Popeye's in the same food court, two doors down from each other. This sounds downright sacrilegious to us, but people here eat a LOT of chicken. Chicken is pretty much the staple, because pork isn't eaten and beef just doesn't seem to be widely, cheaply available (excepting hamburger, of course).

Also this week I got to have a nice dinner date at a fancy local restaurant called Finz. Finz is located in one of the hotels (which had a good seven or eight additional restaurants) and is a seafood joint, situated nicely on one of the little inlets so you can see the water. I've taken a few shots just for reference.

Now Finz isn't right on the gulf, but as you can see, the views aren't shabby. The food was delicious too - all very fresh. I had a cream of crab and corn soup for a starter, grilled salmon for an entree, and a chocolate and cheese plate (which was really a warm chocolate cake, a chocolate mousse, and cheesecake flavored ice cream) for dessert. Jon had a crab starter, followed by a whole red snapper (which was the catch of the day) cooked in a tandoori oven with a mango sauce for entree, and something they called a Raspberry Progression for dessert. We tied this up in a nice little bow with two bottles of a nice German Riesling (between three of us!).I didn't managed to snap any pictures of the food, frankly, because I was much too busy chowing down and having a pleasant chat to bother with it. Plus, this was the kind of fancy joint where they served you lemon sorbet between starter and entree to cleanse your palate. Food selfies didn't exactly seem right.

In addition to dinner dates, I have been cooking some at home - I finally got to test out the slow cooker yesterday to see if I was going to get the same sort of quality results I'd come to expect from my ancient Crockpot, and I have to say, I'm pretty sure it passed the test. Jon seems to think so, anyway. I slow cooked some pork shoulder (a nice butt, for all you Southerners) for pulled pork, using a recipe but improvising a bit on the dry rub and cooking ingredients, and after about 7 hours, it came out pretty fantastic. I also made a peanut butter pie which was a little bit of a challenge, because I couldn't find instant pudding (which was puzzling at first, until you realized that instant pudding is made with gelatin and that tends to be a pork by-product). So that took some improvising with a cook and serve pudding, but I've been told it came out pretty delicious too. You can find pork here, even though locals don't eat it (against the Muslim religion) - we paid about $8 a lb for it, which seems pricey to those of you back home, but honestly is less than we'd expected it to be. One thing I can't find (please feel free to include in care packages) - Mac n' Cheese.

Today was a long, busy day because we went to the mall this morning and after waiting nearly three weeks after the US premiere, I finally got to see Guardians of the Galaxy. Now I love Marvel movies (I love comics too), and the hype surrounding this one and the reviews from friends back home had heightened my expectations a bit. I also dragged along my husband who is not a Marvel/comic book/superhero fan, and was a little nervous that he'd hate it.

"I am Groot." - Jon's new favorite Vin Diesel role.

It was a smash hit. I don't even know where to begin. I suppose I should describe the cinema experience, because it was MUCH nicer than movie theaters back home. One of the first differences I noticed was that you do actually get assigned seats here, it's not done on a general admission basis. Since we got our tickets online two days before, we managed to pick fantastic seats and didn't have to worry about anyone taking them. It cost about the same for two tickets to a 3D movie as it would in the states, and you had to pay a few dirham for 3D glasses, but again, the perks were much better. Once we got there we decided to pick up some movie snacks, because it as about lunchtime but we weren't hungry enough for a full on meal after having morning coffee. Two medium sodas, a medium popcorn, and a thing of M&Ms was the "Couples Saver" combo so we picked one up, for around $13 for everything. Did I mention there were popcorn choices? Oh yes, not just salted, but also Maple and Caramel popcorn (we went for caramel and it was delicious). The concession sizes were just as much bigger-than-normal as they are in the States, too. Then we headed into the theater, where we were greeted with huge, cushion-y leather seats that had adequate cup holders and a little table in-between where you could set the popcorn so you didn't have to awkwardly balance it on your lap and fight over it during the movie. Seriously, I think the Vox Cinemas Max experience just became my new favorite theater.

I could talk for days about how much I loved Guardians, but I'm sure all of you have probably seen it multiple times by now, so I won't. If you haven't, shame on you, it's fantastic. I was a little worried because once the previews started rolling so did the subtitles, and I thought it would be annoying, but honestly, after about 10 minutes of being instantly sucked into the movie, I never even noticed them, and they were well done because they really weren't invasive enough to take away from the experience. If I had to say I was disappointed in one thing, it'd be that after credits scene - I won't spoil it here, but seriously Marvel? THAT'S what we get to tide us over?

I also won't bore you with the details of my Skyrim time. Instead, I'll just end with a picture of us looking cute.

See, we clean up well.