Girls Weekend in Chicago: Recipe for Fun!

This is a break from regularly scheduled programming to bring you a post about girls weekend! Last weekend I spent 4 days in Chicago with three of my favorite girls: Mom, Aunt Rita, and Madison.

We picked the girls up at Midway Thursday morning and headed into downtown. We stayed at the Conrad Hilton (very nice).

Our first adventure was the Wendella Architecture Tour which was very fun and informative. Perfect sunny day activity. Actually our first stop was Bandera for some lunch on Michigan Ave, then the boat tour.

Naturally we did plenty of shopping!

On Friday we spent the day in Lincoln Park and did more shopping and a lot of walking! We had brunch at Nookies (highly recommend, all fresh and delicious) and then shopped on Armitage, and then walked all the way to the zoo and saw some of these guys:

For dinner we went to Chicago Pizza and Oven Grinders, so very good. It is located across the street from the location of the St. Valentines Day Massacre.

On Saturday we went up to Nick and Nicole's new home in Buena Park and then had lunch with them in their neighborhood. Afterwards we came back and assaulted Water Tower Place. Success! Back to school clothes, a homecoming dress, and some jeans.

We began most mornings with girl talk in our room over coffee and muffins, we rounded most nights out with girl talk over dinner and dessert. There is something therapeutic about spending time with dear friends. I had a great time, thanks for making the trip girls!

Chicken Marsala

I feel like I haven't had much time to blog lately with all the travel. While I was on my trip to Reno I went out to eat in Truckee, CA with some colleagues. It is a very cute little western town. We ate at a great restaurant that unfortunately I cannot remember the name of. This was our first meal in 3 days that didn't consist of appetizers, finger foods, hotel coffee, or Starbucks oatmeal so everything on the menu looked good. I needed advice. I asked the waitress if she were hypothetically from out of town and may never have the opportunity to come back and eat here again what she might order.  Chicken Marsala was on her list. Coincidentally it was in my top 3 choices so I went with it.  Excellent decision, it was so very good.  I've been craving it every day since so I decided to look up the recipe online.  I trust allrecipes.com so I went with this one:

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour for coating
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves - pounded 1/4 inch thick
• 4 tablespoons butter
• 4 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 cup sliced mushrooms
• 1/2 cup Marsala wine
• 1/4 cup cooking sherry

Directions

1. In a shallow dish or bowl, mix together the flour, salt, pepper and oregano. Coat chicken pieces in flour mixture.
2. In a large skillet, melt butter in oil over medium heat. Place chicken in the pan, and lightly brown. Turn over chicken pieces, and add mushrooms. Pour in wine and sherry. Cover skillet; simmer chicken 10 minutes, turning once, until no longer pink and juices run clear.

Nutritional Information

Amount Per Serving  Calories: 448 | Total Fat: 26.6g | Cholesterol: 99mg

I would give this recipe a A- for taste and an A+ for prep time. We're talking 15 minutes to a delicious meal. I paired it with angel hair pasta and a glass of Little Black Dress pinot grigio.

I have a lot of leftovers too!

Now as for my trip to Reno. Well... whatever image you have in your head of Reno, it is probably true. It lived up to every expectation that I had before I left.  Here is a picture of my hotel room:

But here is me at Lake Tahoe!

And here is me not getting run over by cars while standing in the middle of the main street in Reno to get my picture taken:

I'm so glad to be home.