Bo2k9BC: Best Restaurant Experience

If you're looking at this in a reader, click on through to the real thing, baby, because I decorated for the holidays up in hurrrrr. I like the new look so much that I might even keep it around in the off-season.

So here's today's Best of 2009 Blog Challenge prompt: Share the best restaurant experience you had this year. Who was there? What made it amazing? What taste stands out in your mind?

We've eaten out a lot this year. We eat out a lot in general. But I'm going to say that the best dining out experience I had all year was the brunch at the Universal City Hilton. We ate there two times this spring whilst flitting about Los Angeles. I remember four things: the coffee, the free champagne, the pineapple, and the gorgeous atrium in which the spread is set up.

I remember the coffee because I needed it after having been out late (among other things) the previous evenings.

I remember the free champagne because, HELLO, free! Champagne! And drinking bubbly at breakfast feels so decadent.

I remember the pineapple because it was fresh, not canned, and it was so sweet and juicy that it practically melted in my mouth.

I remember the atrium because the ceiling was sky-high and the windows flooded the space with SoCal sunshine. Sitting there with coffee in one hand and champagne in the other, my handsome husband sitting across from me, I felt like the world was my oyster. I felt like we had a glow surrounding us, because for all the people at the tables around us knew, we were somebody. Isn't everyone in LA somebody? Even if it was all in my head, we were that much more important for those two sun-drenched mornings.

P.S. Check out my butt-shroom:



It reminds me of my carrot.