I’m not sure how I’ve missed out on the Patachou phenomenon until now.  Captioned as “A Student Union for Adults,” this Indianapolis-based mini chain features seven different dining locations, each with a slightly different focus.  We headed to the Pennsylvania Street location to check out some fancy French and American brunch offerings.

We were concerned about parking in this area as well as having a long wait at about 9:30 a.m. on a Saturday morning.  In the end, we lucked out on both fronts, and only had a few minutes delay before being seated.  The space at Cafe Patachou is pretty sterile and almost warehouse-like, as I suppose befits a “student union.”  The tasty and healthy food offerings, however, make the experience worth the trip.

Each of my dining companions ordered a three-egg omelet with some combination of “stuff” inside.  Options include cheddar, bacon, salsa, tomatoes, herbes de provence, cream cheese, feta, avocado, etc.  One thing I did find a little chintzy was that every filling after the first costs $1.60 extra, while most brunch joints throw in two or three.  The final verdict?  These $10.00+ omelets were good but, in the words of my husband, “a little too healthy-tasting.” 

In contrast, the sourdough toast served with the eggs was a unanimous hit, as such toast tends to be.  Something actually worth paying extra for is the “all berries” fruit cup filled with fresh raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, and the like.  Delicious, and nice to have an option besides bland melon and overpowering pineapple.

After much debating, I passed up the croissant french toast in favor of a “loaded bagel” with herbed cream cheese, arugula, red onions, cucumbers, and very fresh tomatoes.  Patachou really got this one right.  The bagel was huge and crispy on the outside but chewy on the inside.  The veggies blended awesomely with the soft cheese.  Plus, I felt virtuous with every bite because I basically had a salad for breakfast.

At about $45 before tip for three people without mimosas, Petit chou is too expensive to be a daily breakfast stop, but is perfect for a leisurely, indulgent weekend brunch with friends and family.  Next time, though, I’m going to have to get some of that french toast!

You can see all of Patachou’s locations here.

We recently spent a fabulous fun and food-filled weekend in Indy with a close friend.  Perhaps the highlight, at least as far as our bellies were concerned, was a delicious dinner at Bospherus Istanbul Cafe, a Turkish restaurant situated a few minutes outside of downtown.  I’ve had a soft spot for Turkey ever since we spent two fabulous days touring Istanbul and Ephesus a number of years ago.  This restaurant reminded me of one thing I really loved about that trip – the food!

The restaurant is somewhat oddly situated, in between a couple of businesses but not within easy walking distance of much.  Perhaps that’s why it was largely empty when we visited on a Friday night.  Too bad for the restaurant, but good for us – we got very attentive service!  For some reason I don’t have any interior pictures, but the place is really cute and cozy with woven wall hangings and white tablecloths.

We ate A LOT at Bospherus.  I’m talking an embarrassing amount, starting with all the appetizers you see above.  After we floundered with trying to choose which ones we want, our server cleverly recommended that we order a sampler platter for two containing hummus, stuffed grape leaves, tabouli, babaganush, and eggplant salsa ($12.95) and separately, borek, which is a cheese-stuffed pastry kind of like an eggroll ($5.95). 

Everything was delicious, but my personal favorite thing to do at Middle Eastern restaurants is to mix the tabouli with the hummus and slather my pita bread in the stuff.  This pita bread was particularly good, and our server gladly brought us more after we plowed through the first basket.

Our party ordered three very different entrees, all of which received good reviews.  I had the Chicken Mediterranean which came with tons of tomatoes and onions and had quite a kick to it.  The hubby had the lamb and beef donor, which he also enjoyed.  My friend had an eggplant dish, the name of which I can’t recall.  I’m not much for eggplant but she loves that stuff.  Most entrees cost between $10 and $15.

My only complaint is the completely unfair one that our food almost seemed too healthy for my mood at the time.  I barely touched the green salad that came with mine because it seemed rather dry.  Still, veggies are good for me, so I shouldn’t complain.

In any event, the healthiness ended pretty quickly after our main courses were taken away, when we were served perhaps the best baklava I’ve ever had in my life.  Served hot, it was covered in what had to be home-made whipped cream that melted beautifully into the cinnamony filling.  The hubby and I originally intended to share but after one bite I told him to get his own!

Things are going well with our marathon training.  We’ve run a total of 70.4 miles, with our longest run being 7.5 miles last weekend.  We did that at Fort Harrison State Park in Infy which has an awesome paved trail called the Harrison Trace Trail.  It’s 2.5 miles and hilly with a beautiful lake visible at the beginning and end of the route.  Be sure to go to the left from the parking lot and not the right, unless you are a glutton for punishment!  The hills feel much easier if you go to the left. 

This past week hasn’t been the best week ever thanks to too many food-filled get togethers with friends and families, but I still managed to shuffle around the track a couple of days.  To shake things up, we’re doing a fun, easy, local 5K on Saturday instead of a long run.  I’m actually looking forward to it – it’s amazing how 3.1 miles seems so short now when at the start of this I could barely do it.  Everything is relative, I guess!

We don’t usually venture out on Valentine’s day weekend, but circumstances require us to be out of town this year.  After waiting until the last minute, we (unsurprisingly) had trouble snagging a dinner reservation.  If you’re in the same boat, don’t panic – opentable.com still shows availability for a party of two at quite a few of my favorite midwestern restaurants.

Act fast, as these reservations won’t be available for long!  Keep in mind that some of these places may feature a “special” (i.e., limited and extra expensive) menu, so be sure to call ahead to avoid disappointment.

1.  Scholar’s Inn -  Indianapolis, IN – February 13th and 14th, availability from 8:00 p.m. onward.

2.  La Scala – Lafayette, IN – February 14th only, scattered availability between 6:00 p.m. and 9:30 p.m.

3.  Kil@Wat – Milwaukee, WI – February 13th, availability from 9:30 p.m. onward; February 14th, scattered availability all evening.

4.  1913 Room – Grand Rapids, MI – February 14th only, availability at 6:00 p.m. and from 9:00 p.m. onward.

5.  Cielo Restaurant – St. Louis, MO – February 13th, availability at 5:30 p.m. and from 9:15 p.m. onward; February availability from 8:30 p.m. onward.

6.  Rhapsody – Chicago, IL – February 13th, availability at 6:00 p.m. and from 8:30 p.m. onward, February 14th availability through 7:45 p.m.

In the alternative to venturing out for dinner, you can always do what we usually do and curl up on the couch with a pizza and some movie theater-sized boxes of candy!  One year we even went to McDonald’s, and it was a blast.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

The Indianapolis Children’s Museum has always been amazing, and continues to invent and improve itself.  I personally consider this museum to be the biggest “must-see” attraction in our state for both adults and children.

While the museum is worth visiting year-round, it pumps up its offerings during late November and December.  This year’s “Jolly Days Winter Wonderland” celebration takes place daily (except for Christmas) between November 27, 2009 through January 10, 2009.  Despite having no kids in tow, we bundled up and made the drive to check out this holiday event.

The center piece of the Jolly Days activities is the “Yule Slide,” which is set up right in the middle of the museum atrium.  The line was short for the first half-hour after opening but seemed to hold constant at about fifteen minutes thereafter, so encourage your little one to bring his/her patience.  Adults can go down too although we felt strange doing it without any kiddos in tow.

From the atrium, we headed into the designated “Jolly Days” area, which is located in one of the special exhibit galleries on the second floor.  There are designated play areas for various ages, a tiny pond for “sock-skating,” an ice-fishing exhibit with velcro fish, a play kitchen (above, right) and a “stable” where children can groom fake reindeer.  This area is also home to Santa and a queuing area that leads to his home. 

While we are definitely “kids at heart,” this area was a bit much even for us.  Within an hour of museum opening time it was jam-packed with pushing, shoving, screaming, crying kids battling for space in the too-small exhibits. 

Fortunately, we fared better in the rest of the museum.  In fact, Jolly Days seems to absorb a lot of crowds, so the remaining areas of the museum were surprisingly empty for a Saturday morning.  We started by checking out Dinosphere, which was added to the museum around five years ago.  It has an actual working paleontology lab onsite and the scientist on duty was eager to answer our questions and let us touch a T-Rex leg fossil.  We also took advantage of the uncrowded craft area to create a couple of textured clay dino-heads.

We also stopped by three other major permanent exhibits: What If…, Take me There: Egypt, and The Power of Children.  What If… is one of our old favorite exhibits but, sadly, is currently the part of the museum which could most use a fresh coat of paint.  I wouldn’t be surprised if this exhibit is on someone’s list to be gutted, as several aspects of its displays (dinosaurs, Egyptian tomb) are dealt with elsewhere.

Take Me There: Egypt is promoted as the museum’s newest permanent exhibit, although I could swear some variation of it existed during my last visit a few years ago.  Be sure to take the “plane” into Egypt to maximize your immersion experience.  I think Egypt will be a huge hit with kids, as there are tons of opportunities for active play in model houses and markets.  Adults should be sure to catch the very interesting video featuring different Egyptian women and children discussing their views regarding wearing the traditional hijab.

The Power of Children is quite good, but very sad.  It follows the lives and stories of three children: Anne Frank, Ruby Bridges, and Ryan White.  Proceed with caution if taking young children.  I think the content of this gallery is very important, but parents must be prepared to explain concentration camps, AIDS, and racism which may be a lot for a five year old to handle in a single afternoon.

Finally, art lovers should not miss the very interesting Fireworks of Glass featuring artwork by Dale Chiluly.  Much of the sculpture is tucked away on the museum’s bottom floor, next to the Lilly Theater.

Overall, while the Indianapolis Children’s Museum’s Jolly Days celebration was not entirely a hit with our group of childless adults, the museum’s regular offerings were more than enough to keep us busy and happy for several hours.  If you haven’t been to this awesome museum, or if you haven’t been lately, I highly recommend making the trip.

As a loyal Marriott rewards club member with a particular penchant for Renaissance properties, I have been looking for an excuse to stay at the Renaissance Indianapolis North since it opened about a year or so.  I got my chance last week when visiting the city for a meeting. 

Overall, we had just an okay stay.  The facility was nice but the service was really crappy from check-in to check-out.  Our room was large and clean but oddly arranged so we actually had very little floor space.  We also had an exceptionally terrible breakfast buffet experience that set us back over $30.00. 

Here’s the exterior view.  Fairly ho-hum, but I still had high hopes for what was inside.

The lobby is decorated in the bright, modern style typically used in Renaissance hotels, but the atrium ceiling is lower than usual so the hotel lacks that “grand” feel.

The Renaissance is full of little nooks and crannies like this where people can sit and play cards or have a drink.  Unfortunately, the lobby was occupied by a large group reception for the whole evening on the night of our stay.

The pool isn’t the most exciting in the world, but at least it was clean during our visit. 

Here’s the gym, which is small but pretty fabulous.  The wall not pictured was lined with brand spanking new treadmills.  Marriot hotels almost always have this very nice brand of exercise equipment, but I can’t remember what it’s called.

This is the entrance to the hotel restaurant, Grille 39.  I had high hopes for this restaurant because we’ve had some really fabulous meals at other Renaissance resorts.  In fact, breakfast here is when our stay really began to go downhill. 

The buffet line was pretty barren by the time we visited at 9:30 a.m., but I managed to fill my plate as shown above.  While the food looks pretty good, most of it was not.  The bacon was oddly seasoned and cold.  The pastries were dry and flavorless.  My strawberries had mold, which you can actually see if you look close enough.  The only really yummy dish in the bunch was the cheesy potato casserole pictured at 3 o’ clock on my plate.

Here’s a photo of the hubby’s plate, with more dry pastries and some bland pancakes. 

The grossest part of the meal, by far, was the “made-to-order” eggs.  I asked for scrambled eggs with cheese.  Twenty minutes later, I finally received this half-cooked mess that looked like the beginnings of an omelet.  I couldn’t eat more than a bite or two.  YUCK!  At the end of the terrible meal, we couldn’t even manage to flag down our server so a manager finally ended up bringing us the check. 

Overall, breakfast was a very disappointing end to a somewhat disappointing stay.  The Renaissance Indianapolis North simply failed to “wow” us, so I will likely be heading back downtown on my next trip to Indy.