Weekend Foodie Warriors- Take 23!

Hello hello, again, Foodie Friends 🙂 Hope you had a fantastic weekend! In this edition of Foodie Adventures, we finished off our restaurant week adventures at Fork and Plough, made gluten free bread pudding, and had seafood out with family at Eddie’s Raw Bar & Grill!

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Restaurant Week this year finished out with a bang for us with dinner with the roomie at Fork and Plough. Their menu looked amazing and I had been hankering for some southern food lately, so we headed there on Thursday night after work.

Their butcher section also looked impressive, with marinated and house smoked meats, ribs, and more! They even had dog treats and a little bakery section, which Max already wanted to come back for the chocolate ganache covered brownie that was calling his name 🍫

I decided I wanted to stick with the southern food theme across the board, so I started with fried green tomatoes, house made pimento cheese, and crispy pork belly. I’ve never been a huge fan of fried green tomatoes, but the way they made them here made a believer out of me! Max had their grilled peach salad with balsamic vinegar dressing, goat cheese, and pecans, which was light and really yummy.

This was probably some of the best fish and grits I’ve had. I think this was my first time trying catfish and I loved it! They braised the catfish in the same tomato sauce you see above, which lent a really nice flavor and silkiness to the grits. The coolest thing I noticed was that the fried shrimp had a lemon-y garlic flavor to them, very separate from the flavors of the rest of the dish. I love how it added a surprise to the dish when you ate them. The little blackened okras on the side were super crispy and had a little kick to them spice wise, which was a good touch.

Max had the pork wiener schnitzel, with red cabbage and mashed potatoes. His favorite part was the cabbage! Even though we ended up taking home dessert and dinner leftovers, he cleaned the cabbage off his plate.

Dessert was a hit too, with Max getting the pound cake with seasonal berry compote, which I originally believed was elderberry but figured out they added star anise, which I impressed our waitress in deducing by the time she got back to ask us how we were enjoying it. My dessert was a bourbon bread pudding with butter pecan ice cream. I love bourbon, and while I couldn’t taste a whole lot of it in this, it was still delicious and cinnamon-y, pairing well with the ice cream.

All in all, I would absolutely recommend this place to check out for dinner or brunch, as they source or make almost everything locally and everything we had was delicious!

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To be honest with you all, it’s been a super long and stressful week, so having some family time this weekend was important to me.

So important to unplug and unwind, in fact, that I forgot to take pictures of me actually making this bread pudding 🤦‍♀️ I don’t know what came over me.

This is super easy to make though! I used the Canyon Bakehouse Gluten Free bread, and subbed out chopped figs instead of raisins in the recipe.

It was as simple as tearing the bread into small pieces, mixing in the figs and topping with melted butter. Then you make the milk, egg, and spice mixture, pouring over the bread and pushing the fruit and bread in to coat and soak up the liquid.

Into the oven it went at 350*F for 40-45 minutes and viola! I also made brownies this weekend but it was a box mix, nothing stellar. I did add extra chocolate chips, of course 😋

Look for this recipe edited for our GF folks under the recipes tab tomorrow!

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I love visiting my family. I haven’t been back in a while but it was great to spend some quality time with them, which included lunch at one of our favorite seafood spots, Eddie’s!

Right next to a dock on Lake Norman, people are know to pull their pontoon boats or jet skis into the bay and come to sit at the raw bar for some appetizers and drinks, or enjoy the air and fun atmosphere indoors.

This was a good end to the weekend with family, as we’re all a bunch of seafood lovers. Getting to spend time with them, bonding and talking over a shared love of food is something I’ll always treasure.

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So how was your weekend Foodie Friends? What’s your favorite restaurant you and your family go to together? Sound out in the comments below or let me know your suggestions of what dishes or places we should visit next. As always, feel free to like, comment, & share 🤗