Dinner: Blue Bamboo again - we went to visit the new house and took Tina's parents along to help inspect the new floor, so that meant we needed to eat dinner somewhere that was not too foreign to the Chinese palate. Of the restaurants near our new home, that would be Blue Bamboo.

Combination fried rice (the rice was a little too dry and chewy)

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What I Ate: November 10, 2009 (Blue Bamboo)

Lunch: Grabbed a quick lunch at Chick-Fil-A on the way home from inspecting the subfloor of the house. Deluxe Chick-Fil-A sandwich with fries and salad.

Dinner: We heated up the chicken soup that Tina made a few nights ago and finished that off.

Dinner: Steak 'n Shake for dinner - I got a Guacamole Steakburger with Bacon. Instead of fries, I decided on trying their Beef Vegetable Soup (which was a bit too salty). After, we ended up getting some fries anyway.

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What I Ate: November 8, 2009 (Hill-Bert's Burgers, Steak 'n Shake)

Lunch: Again, while running errands for our soon-to-be new house, we found ourselves at Barton Creek Square where we decided to have lunch at Nordstrom Cafe Bistro. Tina ordered the special - a Shrimp Risotto (apparently made with Gulf brown shrimp since it had a mild but insistent bromine/iodine taste).

I had the Bistro Club Sandwich. The fries were a bit dry, but everything else was well-prepared. I like being able to dine somewhere and not worry about if we're going to enjoy the food or not.

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What I Ate: November 7, 2009 (Nordstrom Cafe Bistro, Wok on Fire)

Lunch and Dinner: Tina made another big pot of chicken soup and we ate, salted boiled chicken (better than it sounds), unctuous soup, bread, avocado, and pears for lunch and dinner.

Dinner: We ate at South Congress Cafe where we started with the Calamari semolina breaded sliced calamari steaks served with an orange ginger red chile sauce. The calamari was very tender and not one bit chewy - almost like soft gnocchi in texture. The breading was a bit thick - almost like chicken fried batter. I think we preferred the calamari from Vespaio Enoteca a few doors down, but this calamari was quite delicious.

Tina had the Sea Bass Gnocchi a pan seared sea bass filet atop homemade herb gnocchi, roasted fennel, oyster mushrooms, watercress and chive buerre blanc. The Chilean sea bass was perfectly cooked and worked really well with the fennel and oyster mushrooms. We both felt the gnocchi was too strongly flavored to be paired with the light, buttery fish. Even so, only a couple gnocchi were left on the dish when Tina was done and she considered asked for more bread to sop up the buerre blanc.

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What I Ate: November 5, 2009 (South Congress Cafe)

Dinner: We left the house intending to pick up a sandwich at Subway, but ended up driving down to Texas Roadhouse (neither of us really felt like a sandwich) where I had the fried catfish with loaded baked potato and house salad. Last time we got the catfish, I was surprised by the amount. Apparently, I forgot and this time was just as surprised at how high the four cornmeal encrusted fillets were piled.

I really do enjoy the salads at Texas Roadhouse - I'm pretty sure it's the inclusion of eggs.

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What I Ate: November 4, 2009 (Texas Roadhouse)

Lunch and Dinner: We made a rich chicken soup and ate it throughout the afternoon and evening with toasted bread (from the store), sauteed collard greens, and sweet corn. The pictures are sort of boring, so I'm posting close ups.

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What I Ate: November 3, 2009

Dinner: You would think that after finding a hair in our spring roll and being lectured about freshness by the owner, we'd never go back to Blue Bamboo. However, as the closest Asian food to our new home, we wanted to try their pho. I ordered the Pho Tai Chin (noodle soup with rare eye round steak, and brisket). The soup was pretty decent, but felt a little watery - it could have been slightly richer. The solids (noodles and beef) were a bit disappointing - the noodles were flavorless and the round was overcooked when it arrived at the table. I immediately fished it out, but by then all pinkness was gone. I threw it back in for the photo since it wouldn't make a difference.

Lunch: Ate leftovers - tilapia, rice, pico de gallo, pasta with shrimp and crab, and beans.

Lunch: We ate lunch at Nordstrom's Cafe Bistro. Again, we thought the food was excellently executed. During our meal, I posed the question - how can a cafe in a Nordstrom's perform better than many of the restaurants in Austin? If the talent is available, then how come they are working at Nordstrom? The best we could come up with is that (a) the recipes are developed by a sophisticated team with vast resources at their disposal (test kitchens, expert tasters/field testing, etc.) so each location only needs to concentrate on executing the food preparation and not have to worry about menu and recipe design and (b) risk to employees (job stability; restaurant management) is probably a lot lower and benefits (perhaps medical, etc.) a lot better as an employee of a large corporation vs. an independent restaurant which means they can lure some talented cooks who aren't looking for the "glory" and "romance" of running their own restaurant.

Tortilla chicken soup. (The thick soup had really well balanced flavors. The chicken flavor was clearly throughout the entire soup, but a little heat, some cheese, and crispy tortilla chips made this really good.)

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What I Ate: November 1, 2009 (Nordstrom's Cafe Bistro, Schlotzsky's)