WELCOME TO MY TASTY JOURNEY!

Hi everyone!  Well, after a few days hiatus, I'm happy to say I'm back with my 'new' blog: "My Tasty Journey!"  I wanted to change the title to encompass a few thoughts and ideas.  To me, life is a journey: be it in trying new places & different foods, weight loss, and quite literally in my love of traveling.  My outlook on life, in general, could best be described by a quote I recently read: 

"While on a journey, we are sure the answer lies at the destination.  But in reality, there is no station, no 'place to arrive at once and for all.'  The joy of life is the trip, and the station is a dream that constantly outdistances us."

 I couldn't have said it better myself:)  I hope this site continues to inspire you to enjoy your own journey and to make sure you savour EVERY bite along the way;) 

Anyyyyway, let's get back to business.  Since I'm a few days behind, I'll start off with our dinner from Wednesday night.  Now if there's one thing I DO NOT possess...it's green thumbs.  But I could NOT resist this rosemary plant at the farmer's market this weekend!  It was just tempting me to waste $4 on it, only for it to die in 20 minutes!  BUT, I'm proud to say....as of today, it's STILL standing.  Maybe there is hope for a girl after all...;)

And I'm telling you all these confessions about my non-green thumbs because the rosemary plant was an integral part of our dinner last night, as we had Rosemary Shrimp Skewers with a delicious summer side dish: Summer Squash Carpaccio!

I (painfully...they WERE still standing, after all!) trimmed 3 branches from the plant and stripped off almost all of the rosemary sprigs. (I stored the rest in the fridge for later...no way was I letting THAT go to waste!)...

Meanwhile, we let the shrimp marinate for a half hour with some white wine, olive oil, lemon juice, garlic, salt and pepper.  Then Scott threaded the shrimp on the rosemary twigs and grilled them for about 7-8 minutes.  (although he said it probably been better if we laid the shrimp FLAT on the skewer...but we didn't have too many 'skewers' to go around! :)   

The rosemary 'skewer' gave just enough extra flavor to the shimp and the scampi type marinade really made them POP.  Just perfect!

The carpaccio was sooooo excellent!  We mixed up a diced zucchini & summer squash along with olive oil, lemon juice, a sprinkle of grated cheese, some chopped basil and salt & pepper.  Let it sit in the fridge for 10 minutes to soak up the flavor and serve.  This was a cool & simple side that is PERFECT for the dead of summer!  (and for the record, the leftovers are even better!  I had quite a tasty lunch today:)

We also had some fresh Farmer's Market corn to go along with this dinner...but I figured that would be a repetative picture:)

Soooooooooo....I'll show you something new;)  I love visiting different supermarkets from my norm, cause you just never know what you will find.  So imagine my PURE JOY when I was digging through the freezer case of my mystery mart and stumbled on one of my favorite desserts that I NEVER find:  Tortoni!!!

Tortoni is like a rum & almond flavored whipped cream ice cream topped with either almonds or toasted coconut (drats, this one was almond!) and topped with the proverbial cherry on top:)  Delicious:)  The only place I've ever found this was Joe's Maplewood Inn on the way home from Atlantic City!  And since I haven't been there in, oh...TEN YEARS, it was QUITE a happy day indeed to seek this one out:)

So annnnyways!  I hope you enjoyed my first post under my 'new' persona;) hahahahahhaha....I'll have more for you in the AM!  Have a good night:)