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October 21, 2021

Dining Duo

Clowning around

Wedding anniversary celebrations have a tendency to change over a married couple’s life. Gone are the days of a romantic weekend getaway, followed by a candlelit dinner, and dancing till dawn. After 47 years of marital bliss, anniversaries consist of a trip to Wisconsin Dells to contribute to the Ho-Chunk Indian tribe, and seeing a matinee performance of Bello Nok at the Palace Theater.

Belly up to the bar

Nancy heard through the grapevine about a place that had excellent pizza. As it turned out, we’ve all passed by this establishment at one time or another. As you drive east on Route 20, in the middle of nowhere there’s a curve in the road. As you round the bend you will see a crooked post with a sign on it for the Outpost Tavern and Grill in Pingree Grove.

Honestly, the outside of this tavern was not very inviting. It resembled a place that could have been featured on Guy Fieri’s “Diner’s, Drive-Ins, and Dives” TV show. We parked Jim’s Mercedes amongst the pick-up trucks, looked at each other, mustarded up our courage, and sauntered in.

A hidden gem

We received an email from Nola telling us about a restaurant she stumbled upon and thought it was a gem. Being the ever-vigilant food critics that we are, we searched the website of the restaurant she recommended. The first item on the menu caught Jim’s eye. Putting our own concerns for our health aside (we will explain shortly), we hopped into the Mini-mobile and sped out, leaving Del Webb in the dust, and headed northwest to the Tavern on Clark in Rockford.

Don’t mess with seniors

Nancy’s purse can be compared to a black hole in outer space. What goes in, never comes out, and no one is really sure what’s inside of one. We wanted to go out for lunch but our finances were running low. Nancy said she knew she had gift cards somewhere, so she asked me to check her purse while she was rummaging through the kitchen junk drawer. I ventured forth, and boldly went where no man has gone before, his wife’s purse.

La-dee-da it’s Lalo’s

Jim and I have a long list of perspective restaurants to review, or so we thought. We have learned to always “Google” the restaurant before we show up to make sure they haven’t fallen victim to the COVID-19 fallout. To our dismay, we discovered that restaurant after restaurant was either permanently closed, or only open a very limited number of hours/days.

E.T.A. at “EPH”

Nancy and I are in our so called “Golden Years” of retirement. Our kids have grown up and left the nest years ago. It’s just the two of us now in our little home in Del Webb. Old habits die hard. Nancy uses the same recipes to feed the two of us that she used to feed four to six people. Everyone knows change is evil and recipes cannot and must not be altered. This is why she asked me to take a run with her to Sam’s Club to stock up on ginormous containers of just about everything.

A full-service garage

You may recall in a previous article Nancy alluded to the nightmare she was having getting the bocce ball club up and running. Her work was finally finished, and she was looking forward to the first game of play. Mother Nature cooperated perfectly, it was 90 degrees, with 80 percent humidity. The sun was hot and so were some tempers. Twenty minutes into the first game Nancy got into a rather heated discussion with a man on the opposing team. Taking a tip from hockey players, I just let them go at it. They’ll tire out eventually.

Not so eggceptional

Jim had a lot of recording sessions at the radio station one day, so we decided it would be a good idea to have a big breakfast. While trying to decide where to go, we remembered driving down Algonquin Road and seeing signs for a new brunch restaurant. Great.

Crab-nado

May is not a good month for Nancy, especially May of 2021. As you may know, she is President of the Bocce Ball Club with over 700 members. Due to COVID, play was suspended last year and as a result, getting back in the groove was chaotic.

A regional favorite

In our last article, we mentioned we tried unsuccessfully to get into a new restaurant, even though it was 5:30 on a Wednesday night. Not to be deterred from her appointed mission, Nancy asked the host to make a reservation for the following Wednesday at 5:30, and he graciously honored her request. Mind you, this is a week in advance and early on a week night. Our anticipation grew as we counted down the days.

Spring has sprung

Spring is Mother Nature’s time for renewal and rebirth. This highly anticipated event is even more important this year due to the Pandemic of 2020. Del Webber’s are finally emerging from their homes and venturing out. The downside to this is that you realize what has to be replaced around your house.

A ‘special’ restaurant

Nancy is what some people might call frugal. I prefer to call her cheap. Of course, this frugality does not apply to jewelry, but I digress. She is on every retailer’s mailing list, and gets hundreds of emails a day with money saving deals, whether we need it or not, if it’s a deal, she purchases it. This strategy has undoubtedly saved me millions of dollars over the years, at least in her way of thinking.

The Crown-ing Touch

Jim and Nancy do not disclose the fact that they will review a restaurant before they attend, ensuring their reviews are unbiased and uninfluenced by their position with the Sun Day. One night while watching Wheel of Fortune and trying to figure out why Vanna White could possibly be worth her $10,000,000.00 salary, Nancy’s treat …

It’s magically delicious

It’s time once again for St. Patrick’s Day. A time when the aroma of corned beef and cabbage assaults your nostrils, beer and clothing magically turns green, and everyone starts speaking in horrible Gaelic accents. In days gone by, when things were normal, we attended the Celtic Club’s St. Patrick’s Day celebration.

A Barrel of fun

Jim and I received our first and second COVID vaccinations, and it seems like there is finally a light at the end of the tunnel. Restaurants have officially opened up for indoor dining, and we now may be able to keep giving you restaurant reviews instead of rambling on about our dysfunctional life. We do, however, put the fun in dys“fun”ctional!!!

Our ‘Date Night’

Every week for 46 years, Jim and I have done our best to take one night off from our busy schedule and have a “date night.” Honestly, this practice has evolved over the years. When we were first married and struggling, we treated ourselves every Tuesday night to the $1.29 special at Ponderosa Steakhouse while waiting for our laundry to finish up at the laundromat.

Our Christmas staycation 2020

Allow us to paraphrase the great philosopher, Clark W. Griswold in the movie Christmas Vacation. “Where do you think you’re going? Nobody’s leaving. Nobody’s walking out on this fun, old-fashioned family Christmas. We’re all in this together. This is a full-blown, four-alarm holiday emergency here.

Top ‘ate’ of 2020!

Is there anyone out there who will be sorry to see the year 2020 come to an end? We don’t think so!!! Let us recap some of the Dining Duo’s highlights from the past year.

The good, the bad, and the gooey

There are several holiday foods that people either love or hate. The first one that comes to mind is eggnog. This is a slightly slimy mixture of raw eggs and milk laced with enough bourbon to kill the salmonella in the raw eggs.

Back out to the ‘Outback’

Being a restaurant critic has not been easy lately. We plan on going to review a restaurant, and when we get there, the entire county is closed for inside dining. We then drive to another county just as it is being shut down. We are stuck scratching our heads and jokingly we said, “We should go to the outback in Australia, the restaurants there are probably open.”

It’s “Za Za” dahling

Due to this whole crazy Covid-19 situation, Nancy has resorted to virtual shopping. She is becoming quite adept at ordering things she see’s on Amazon, Groupon, and Facebook ads. Who would have thought that some items are not exactly as they appear on the internet? Such was the case with a Local Flavor coupon we purchased for a restaurant. We drove up to what we thought would be a fine dining restaurant, and to our surprise, it looked nothing like it did on the internet.

Cravin’ Asian

Jim and I have been “cravin’ Asian” food lately. As a matter of fact, we are total Asian food junkies. There are not many dine in Asian restaurants that we haven’t been to. After checking Facebook for the 4,322 time one day, a light bulb went off in our pea brains.

New burgers on the block

Some people have a green thumb. Jim and I have the black thumb of death. Every Spring we go to our local nursery, buy some perennial plants, and by the end of summer, they commit suicide. Our landscaping is what our neighbors point to and use as a bad example. This year our lawn caught a bad case of fungus. Along with that, some cute striped little critters, aka Chip and Dale, set up camp under the sidewalk leading up to our house.

The “Village” People

On September 5 you may have noticed signs all around Huntley saying, “Tune Radio to 101.5 FM For Fireworks”. Don’t worry, this did not mean your radio would have exploded if you tuned in. Huntley Community Radio had a live broadcast during the village fireworks display, and someone had to put up all those signs.

Syrup-y Sweet!

Nancy and I have become desperate for entertainment during this Covid-19 crisis. Nancy is convinced she is qualified to be a doctor after watching “Untold Stories of the ER” on TV, and she actually is becoming good at diagnosing the cases. Our Saturday night entertainment is now the Three Stooges followed by Svengoolie. We have also learned from the grandchildren the importance of checking FaceBook constantly. This turned out to be true when we read in the Wildflower Lake neighbors group about a new restaurant called Syrup in Algonquin.

The COVID Zone

Imagine if you will, a world where any dealings with strangers is done through a sheet of plexiglass; where toilet paper can mysteriously disappear from all store shelves overnight; and where wearing a mask going into a bank will not get you arrested. Ladies and gentlemen, you are about to enter the “Covid Zone.”

Getting back to the future of dining

The Dining Duo is overjoyed now that the restaurants have opened up. There are several reasons for this celebration. First, we get to dine out once again. Second, we don’t have to wrack our brains and to come up with some stupid subject for our column. Last, but not least, when we stay at home, we usually dream up some crazy plan and Nancy winds up in a cast or some sort of body brace.

Evel K-‘Nancy’

The “Shelter in Place” order seems like has been going on forever and the Dining Duo is getting bored. While standing outside hoping to see other signs of life, our friend John goes zooming past on his bike. He stopped to talk, and we told him we would like to ride our bikes but it was too much work.

Quarantine queen

This “Covid 19 quarantine” that we are all going through has really been an eye-opener. I have discovered that my loving bride of almost 46 years is a total, raving, lunatic. We all know that she feels I’m the moron, but here is a little look into life with Nancy.