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Weekend Getaway Takeaways

w00tstout 2.0 from Firestone WalkerScott and I headed down to Denver last weekend for The Great American Beer Festival (If you’re interested in beer, you can read my article here).  I was covering the event for the beer blog that I write for so we decided to make a weekend out of it.  There was lots of events going on around town as well, like extra special beer tappings and we spent the weekend exploring and sipping on fantastic beers.

We kept our eats clean while in Denver which is easy to do because Denver has plenty of restaurants that use high quality ingredients.  One of our favorites is Freshcraft which offers up amazing food and great beer.  I had cassoulet, and oh man and it was so rich and delicious.

Many lessons were learned from this past trip down and our next trip will be tackled much differently.

Changing up our approach to dining out

Currently when we go to Denver and Boulder we gravitate towards pizza and burgers because we don’t care for the options here in Fort Collins. It’s hard to find a good grassfed burger!  Yet this past trip, going for those types of dishes left us feeling bloated and crappy.  Bah!  So our focus is going to switch to quality veggie and meat dishes (which thankfully Freshcraft has!).

Going for a rental instead of hotel reservations

LoDo is our preferred place to stay when in Denver but it’s expensive as hell.  The hotel rooms we’ve stayed in have been nice but there’s no fridge and no wifi.  No fridge means we can’t bring back leftovers (along with no way to reheat them) and no wifi means we can’t work while away.

Rentals tend to be cheaper and come with a full kitchen and wifi.  We’d be able to cook breakfast at the rental saving us some cash and frustration (breakfast places in Denver serve horrible coffee for some reason and don’t provide enough creamer).  Along with the ability to bring back leftovers and reheat them.  Plus wifi that doesn’t cost extra.  The tricky part will be trying to find a rental that also offers a parking space.

So the next time we go (which won’t be for a while) we’re changing up our approach!

I was definitely ready to be back home and back with the pups, who were totally pissed off that we left them.  They gave us the cold shoulder for hours when we got back.  I was ready to get back in the kitchen and have control over what went into my food and I wanted a good night’s sleep. Down pillows at hotels are for the birds.  Bah!

Egg sandwich

For breakfast yesterday we had fried egg sandwiches on 365 Whole Wheat bread with romaine, pepper jack, and crispy prosciutto.   On Monday we had huge bowls of oatmeal and even though I added fruit and grassfed butter to it, that didn’t last all of two hours before I wanted to gnaw my arm off.  No more oats for breakfast for a while.

In the middle of the day, I had a small snack of yogurt and granola (just oats, no nuts or seeds).

Dinner was glorious!

Chicken and sweet potato coconut curry soup

I made a coconut curry soup with leftover chicken and some sweet potatoes.  I stupidly bought a rotisserie chicken from Costco when we were there on Tuesday.  I thought it would be clean but after checking the ingredients realized that it is in fact full of junk.  Hopefully your Costco has better quality chicken!

I used the leftovers in soup and this was super easy to make.

Andrea’s Quick and Easy Coconut Curry Soup with Chicken and Sweet Potatoes

  • One small onion, finely chopped
  • One green pepper, finely chopped
  • One jalapeno, seeded and finely chopped
  • 3 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed
  • Leftover roast chicken (I used breast and leg meat)
  • 1.5 QT Chicken Stock
  • 1 Can full fat coconut milk
  • Pinch of salt and ground pepper
  • 1/2tsp Garlic Powder
  • 2.5TBSP mild yellow curry powder
  • 1TBSP Ghee (or butter)

In a soup pot, heat ghee over medium heat and add in the onion and peppers.  Saute for about 5 minutes or until softened.  Season with salt, pepper, and garlic powder.  Add in the stock, chicken, and sweet potatoes.  Stir and bring to a simmer.  Add in the curry powder and stir.  Cover and reduce heat to where the soup is just simmering.  Allow to simmer for 30 minutes then add in the coconut milk.  Simmer for another 10 minutes, remove from heat and serve.

So easy to throw together and transform leftover chicken.  We’re having leftovers tonight for dinner.

Asparagus and tomato fritatta

Breakfast this morning was a fritatta with chopped asparagus and sliced up tomatoes.  I love fritattas because it also provides enough for breakfast the following day as well.   This also had some chopped red onion and a little dijon mustard added in for extra flavor boost.

Loving the eats this week!  How’s everyone doing this week?

 

 

 

4 thoughts on “Weekend Getaway Takeaways

  1. Great post. Agreed… Denver is expensive for just an average hotel room. We also gravitate towards pizza as we are not impressed with the options here in Fort Fun. But even then… they tend to be just slightly better versions of what is available here. We are on a quest to find meals made with fresh, good quality ingredients… and locally sourced if possible. But it is always great to come home and be able to prepare a meal with what we know to be great ingredients which results in a great meal.

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