Weekend Wrap-Up featuring The Hot Pot!

Saturday, February 22

Jeff and I headed down to Coral Gables to watch the Hurricanes take on Boston College. We got there early, so we grabbed a bite on Campus.

Last time, we went to the Rathskeller and were totally underwhelmed. We did notice a Lime franchise on campus, so we went there and had Burritos.

I had a Burrito with Rice, Chicken, Corn Salsa, Beans and just a little Guacamole. No Cheese, No Sour Cream. I spiced it up with Salsa from their Salsa bar. No photos; I left the camera home.

After the game, I headed over to loretta's house to meet up with her, Samantha and Brian. While we negotiated where to go for Dinner, I had two Cutie Oranges.

We wound up deciding on The Hot Pot down in Hollywood.

We started by ordering two Appetizers: Mussels Dynamite and Dumplings.

The Mussels are baked with a spicy Sauce on them. I order them often; they're good. Katrina delivered them and I ate just over half.

The Dumplings are another story. They do them differently here. They take a long time, so we knew that something  was up. When they arrived, they looked like tiny Tamales.

When you unwrap them, they contain not a Tamale, but some Dumpling Stuff in a Gel-like suspension.

They looked weird, but they were really good. I had two; Brian & Samantha finished off the rest. Loretta doesn't eat meat, so she passed.

Then it was time for Soup. At The Hot Pot you order two different Soup Broths, and then you add the stuff for the Soup a la carte. Our two Broths were Szechuan and the House Broth.

While the Soup came to a boil, the stuff arrived.

We had two different types of Noodles (only one is shown here), Cabbage, Broccoli, Bok Choy, Beef, Pork, Shrimp, more Shrimp, Mussels, Salmon and something that they called  Dumpling Meat, but was more like a Pork-based Meat Loaf. We went to work.

I had five or six Bowls of Soup; Brian matched me pretty much bowl for bowl. Loretta and Samantha ate fairly normally. All of the different Soup Stuff proved popular, but the 'dumplings' were a little disappointing, mostly because they were nowhere near as delicious as they were fun.

We all passed on dessert. I would go to Hot Pot more often, except that they are a schlep, and you have to drive past 869043824 other good restaurants to get there. But it is a lot of fun, and the food is really good.

When we got back to Loretta's house, I had about ten Frozen Grapes.

Brian and Samantha had a snack later that night, but that was it for me.

Here's my steps for the day.

Sunday, February 23

I was pretty much full all day. It was a LOT of Soup.

I had a Bowl of Watermelon.

Later, I went to Joe Robert's house to watch the Heat beat up on the Chicago Bulls. Delightful.

On the way, I stopped at Publix. They had String Beans on sale, so i got a couple of bags. When I got to Joe Robert's house, he put some in a bowl for me to eat raw, but he likes to cook, so he had plans for the rest of them.

What he wound up doing was trowing a little oil in a frying pan, adding some Sriracha Sauce and some Sesame Seeds and tossing the Beans in them quickly.

They did not cook long enough to get soft, so I enjoyed them immensely. Spicy, crunchy, and virtually no points.

When I got home, I had one more Bowl of Watermelon. I am still full from Saturday.

Here's Sunday's step count.