Weekend Foodie Warriors- Take 24!
Hello hello, again, Foodie Friends 🙂 Hope you had a fantastic weekend! In this edition of Foodie Adventures, I detail my weekend travels back to my hometown in Maryland, including visiting my favorite pizza place, Classico Pizzeria, epically defeating an escape room, and I finished off the weekend with a trip to Baugher’s Orchard & Farm for some apples and goodies for the fam!
It’s not every day that your best friend gets married! The first of our friends to tie the knot, I was so excited to hear that Amber was getting hitched in September (whew, almost ran out of marriage synonyms there 😂).
With a nine hour drive under my belt, I was super hungry for lunch the next day. So I grabbed my best friend since kindergarten, Kristen, for a surprise visit and headed to the pizza place my family used to go to every Friday when we lived in Westminster, MD – Classico Pizzeria.
Pepe and Nunzio, the two owners (and brothers), emigrated here from Naples, Italy, and brought their amazing cooking with them! They have become longtime friends of my family with our frequency of how often we were patrons, catering work events for my dad and pizza parties for birthdays or Girl Scout Troop Meetings growing up.
They just renovated the restaurant within the last couple years, keeping their trademark sunny yellow walls and Mediterranean style tile motifs, adding a Terra-cotta style floor and some cool textured tile on the walls.
Classico’s has been in business for as long as we had lived there, so about 20 years, give or take a couple. Kristen and her friend Nathan (also a fellow foodie) were newcomers to Classico’s, but I made pizza lovers out of them! Not that they didn’t love pizza before, but you know what I mean.
Their menu has the classics, pasta, pizzas, and a fantastic seasonal menu that changes weekly.
They have awesome garlic knots, love their penne al’aglio with shrimp, and their pizza is super yummy. Never had a bad thing here, and their food has stood the test of time – this place is a Westminster institution!
Nathan loves white pizza so we had to try that one, and their “summer pizza”, featuring chunky, in-season tomatoes, fresh basil, and fresh mozzarella on a crispy, the almost pan pizza-like crust was amazing.
The best part of course was getting to hang out with Kristen! I haven’t seen her in over a year, and it’s been really hard to be away from great friends when so much physical distance separates you.
Anytime I can make the trip up or meet her halfway I do. I already have a big list of things for her to try when she comes to visit!
I once read somewhere, “Good friends are like stars – you don’t always see them, but you always know they’re there.” 💜
All in all, I would absolutely recommend Classico for anything Italian food-wise, they even do catering!! They have been such a big part of my life growing up and I can’t imagine eating any other pizza if I come back to visit. This is a must-visit for anyone in the area or traveling here.
Instead of getting schwasted and not remembering the weekend, we decided to pig out on Chick-fil-A and goodies, open presents, watch a movie (Girls Trip is hilarious, a great girl power movie), and test our team-building skills in an escape room for the bachelorette party (which was a lot more fun in my opinion).
I obviously couldn’t take pictures inside the escape room for fear of making the team lose, however, they had some cool games and nerdy artifacts in the lobby that helped to pass the time while we waited to go into our room.
These were a list of all the escape rooms you could try, we completed the “Kingdom Quest” version!
We were given the instructions to the room on a weathered-looking piece of paper from the king, which I read in my most stately regal British accent to my friends’ delight, and explained that the kingdom was being invaded by dragons! Only once we helped the woodland creatures complete their quests (the fairies, Rapunzel, Hansel and Gretel, and the dwarves), would we be granted our key to escape.
Without giving much else away, we had to work together to make it through two sets of rooms to finally beat the clock with 16 minutes to spare! We would have beaten it sooner but we experienced some technical difficulties along the way and still had a few hints left over.
We kicked that escape room’s butt! I’ve done escape rooms before, but this is the first one I’ve beat 🙌😁
Even better, I now know more people who will be at the wedding, and made some fun friends that day. We really worked well together and played off each other’s strengths. Girl power 💪
Would definitely go back and try out some more rooms if I was in town, great for big groups or parties!
Before I had the TD Saturday Market or the Mauldin Open Air Market to get my produce for recipes and fresh fruits for baking, there was Baugher’s. I grew up going apple picking in their massive orchards about 3 miles away from the restaurant and smaller market in these pictures, visiting their petting zoo, and enjoying hay rides in the fall.
See below for more pictures of the market and its hidden gems! This place (and the restaurant/diner you can see in the background that bears the same name) are fantastic places to visit, and their breakfast and homemade ice creams are no joke. They even have a mascot, the Apple Man, which you can see displayed throughout the market and playground across the way.
This has always been a family business, which has been around for over 100 years. They have been an integral part of holiday recipes, fun times with friends and family, and a solid place to get anything from baked goods to produce from a local source.
My grandma always requested some Damson Plum jam when we visited her, one of the exclusive jams they only sell in their original location, as well as their famous apple butter. Their pumpkin and peach butter are seasonal and also to die for, love loves those!!
I snagged a couple of jars for myself and my family, and stocked up on some Honey-crisp apples, which were in season and absolutely massive compared to the other varieties they grow at the orchard 💜
This was a great end to the weekend, and even though I was dead tired after coming home, I loved going to visit and can’t wait for the next time I go back!
So how was your weekend Foodie Friends? What is a place or restaurant that’s considered an institution or anchor in your hometown? 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 🤗
