I had my first ever blogger meet-up today! We had ten bloggers from the LA area come together at Lemonade in West Hollywood. This restaurant is kind of a cafeteria-style place, with non-cafeteria-esque dishes (also known as delicious). Their food selection is INSANE! I looked up the menu online last night to check it out so I wouldn’t waste hours with my indecisiveness, but seeing the food up close and personal threw that out the window. Luckily, it only took me ten minutes to finally make my choice.
How the heck was I supposed to choose???
This was only half of the selection. Ready for my favorite part?
Best prices EVER. I got 1 portion (two scoops) of two different things so I could have some room for dessert and their namesake. My total cost, including drink and dessert was around $8.75.
LEMONADE! I had the hardest time deciding between these. The cashier was kind enough to give me samples of the Watermelon Rosemary and the Cucumber Mint. I went with the Watermelon Rosemary. Sweet and tangy with a warm, Christmas-y flavor from the rosemary. My mouth was confused… and thrilled. I must return to try all the flavors, and try more dishes! I may be completely obsessed…
My plate consisted of: Avocado, cherry tomatoes, and pine nut salad tossed in a lime vinaigrette, and the mission fig, arugula, and blue cheese salad tossed in a balsamic dressing. They were both delicious, but the fig and arugula salad had a little too much dressing, whereas the avocado and cherry tomato salad could have used a little more. Dessert was a mini red velvet cupcake. The frosting on this was to die for!!! The cupcake itself was a little dry and boring, but the frosting more than made up for it.
Random fact: This was the first time that Megan and I had ever tried figs! Not too shabby – light flavor, not too sweet or overpowering. The consistency will take a little getting used to in the future. Kinda slimy in my opinion.
After everyone got their food, we all sat down and got to business photographing.
Megan from Healthy Hoggin’ and Stephanie, a reader who should start her own blog :).
Our lovely organizer Lynn from The Actor’s Diet.
From the far end forward: Ameena from Fancy That, Fancy This, Eden from Eden’s Eats, Lynn from The Actor’s Diet, Katy from Katy Eats…
Again from the far end forward: Andy and Amanda from Two Boos Who Eat, Stephanie (a reader), and Megan from Healthy Hoggin’.
We spent about two hours stuffing ourselves and discussing blogging, food, real life outside of blogging (what’s that?), and more food. Everyone dispersed around 1pm and I headed to my car to drive to work – which I was scheduled to start at 12:45pm. Oops, my bad :).
I had an hour and a half of training for a new product at work, and the representative brought in food from The Cheesecake Factory. There were corn dogs, deep fried artichoke hearts, deep fried mushrooms, and deep fried sweet corn that had been wrapped in dough. I was very, very thankful that I’d eaten well at the blogger meet-up, and had no temptation at all for any of this. I felt ill just looking at the layout.
I spent the rest of the day going around to my coworkers and proclaiming about the deliciousness that is Lemonade, and then had to try to find something that sounded appealing for dinner. Nothing did after that meal, so I went and got the least unhealthy/cheapest thing I could find.
A single serving of beef with broccoli – one of their healthiest options on the menu.
Blech.
What’s the most memorable meal you’ve had? This definitely goes in the books for one of mine – because of the food AND the company!