Eating Up Savannah in Style

We are just eating up Savannah...literally!!! We began the morning with Sunday brunch at Rocks on the River Modern Grill. Their chicken & waffle sliders rocked my world! [Belgian waffles, crispy chicken, Boursin cheese, pepper jam, baby arugula, stone-ground Dijon mustard, lightly dusted w/ powdered sugar!!!]

Then I had cornmeal-crusted fried green tomatoes (of course - my fave food on earth) with goat cheese, while JB had Crab Oscar Benedict. Final course: cinnamon-coated dumplings with fresh, bright apple chunks & homemade vanilla bean ice cream...

We didn't eat, again, until 7:30 PM tonight. :-D ...But oh, when we did!!! Ack - getting ahead of myself...

JB checked in for his conference after brunch and discovered we still had a few hours to play, so we headed out 18 miles to Tybee Island, (the closest beach.) We went all-out exploring the Tybee Lighthouse. After climbing a TERRIFYING 178 *slatted* spiral stairs, I managed a smile for facing (although not really conquering) my fear of heights:

(My legs totally felt like jelly - not from the workout, but from fear! :-P I told JB, going to the top of the Leaning Tower of Pisa in Italy was cake compared to this, b/c the steps there were solid marble; that was fun! Open steps are my ultimate heights fear.) The beach view, though, was absolutely gorgeous! With our lighthouse admission, we also got to check out the Tybee Island Museum; I am SUCH a sucker for history museums!!! (Wow - their website rocks!)

When we returned to Savannah, JB went to a few conference classes, while I bobbed in the hotel salt water pool & hot tub (ahhhh...) before getting cleaned up for dinner.

Tonight, I wore something really special. My Grandmommy had an amazing dress that she wore to a lot of my mom's debutante functions 40+ years ago:

Grandmommy just gave *me* her dress and told me to enjoy it! What better place to enjoy than picturesque Savannah?!

I can't tell you how many people complimented me on it tonight, and they were all surprised at its "vintage" status! Everyone kept saying, "It looks so now!" Ah, cyclical fashion... :-)

The Olde Pink House was A.MAZ.ING for dinner!

We began with a fresh cheese board accompanied with berries, balsamic, & a Savannah Bee Company honeycomb, as well as Anson grit chips. I then had more fried green tomatoes, but tonight's were served with a sweet corn cream & topped with applewood smoked bacon and sweet & sour purple cabbage - perfectly salty/sweet/sour, creamy/crunchy = beyond delicious! (And completely different from the fried green tomatoes I had at brunch, which were full of goat cheese and a ranch-style sauce. Nowhere near the same thing! And yes, I plan on having more varieties of my beloveds at every meal possible. ;-)) JB had Cobia Wellington - so good he still can't even describe it with words - and I also had two little pulled pork sliders with barbeque sauce made with Cheerwine! :-D We closed with their signature praline basket dessert:

pecans, almonds & brown sugar cooked down and formed into a basket which held vanilla ice cream topped with mango puree & fresh berries, all on top of a chocolate ganache drizzle alongside a dollop of fresh whipped cream. Yeeeeah. It may not sound like it, but it was so *light*. The perfect way to end the evening! (Next time, I really want to try their "Caramelized Vidalia Onion & Sweet Potato Ravioli w/Savory Pecan Cream Sauce" for dinner...)