Visit with Josh's parents

Josh's parents got into town about 4 Friday afternoon. We hung around the house until 7:30 or so, and then headed over to The Strip Club in Saint Paul. We got there about half an hour before our reservation, and the place was very crowded and noisy. Luckily, we were able to grab four chairs at the bar so the wait was tolerable. Fay ordered an appletini that was more cider than pucker; it would have been nice if they had explained it was not your standard appletini. However, the service was very good and attentive.

For apps we ordered the poutine, and what I would call an upscale version of the corn dog, which was Thousand Hills sausage with corn breading and bacon ketchup. Fay and I ordered the "Love you long time" New York strip, Josh ordered the "Shrimp Trampi" strip and Doug ordered Swedish meatballs with mashed potatoes and lingonberry sauce, which he said were delicious. As good as the steaks at The Strip Club are, it might be impossible to beat their carrots. Carrots come on the side of every steak and I actually made a point of finishing my carrots over the steak - that's how good they are! The four of us were stuffed but still decided to share a dessert called the candy bar that was quite good.

Saturday morning we got up and I made breakfast, with Josh giving me a hard time about cooking the entire time. I had made a hash brown casserole thing since Josh doesn't like eggs, but it still got called "crap". It will be a sad day for him when I stop cooking entirely! Also made honey wheat pancakes (out of a box) that came out pretty well on the griddle Fuzzy gave me a while back. May have to dig that out more often.

First stop was the Japanese Garden at Normandale CC, which is such a great, serene little place. We then headed up to Chisago City to Winehaven, a family-owned winery that Josh and I had never been to. They were having a festival of sorts to introduce their latest batch of raspberry wine. The wine tasting was free, and there were maybe eight fruit wines, six whites and six reds to taste. We tasted pretty much all of it, though later I saw a note that said to limit your tastings to six. Oops. Fay and Doug picked up a couple of bottles they liked; Josh and I didn't purchase any.

We also did the tour. Our tour guide was a Mr. Peterson, who owns the farm/vineyard. He has a great Minnesota accent and you could tell he was really invested in his business. It was fun to listen to him talk.

We then drove down to Stillwater to have lunch at Smalley's Caribbean BBQ. Overall, a disappointment. The apps were good – corn fritters and sweet potato fries – and I had a great rum punch, but I thought the food was blah at best. My pulled pork sandwich hardly had any sauce on it at all, and our server didn’t stop back to see if we needed anything. No one else was overly flipped about their food, either. Josh did have a "Walk the Plank" rum flight, two of three of which were very nasty in my book. On the plus side, we did have a great table outside in the sun, but I can't say I would recommend ever going back there. Which is unfortunate, because it is co-owned by Tim McKee, who also owns La Belle Vie, which is absolutely fabulous. I realize they are very different types of restaurants, but you think the quality would come through on both.

Next stop was St. Croix Vineyard. Tastings were $5/each and our pourer was a young kid named Chris, who was nonetheless very knowledgeable. I didn't think their wines were as good this time as they have been other years, but I still liked the vignole and the raspberry dessert wines the best. But, we didn’t buy any. With the 30 bottles of rioja we have right now, it is hard to justify buying another bottle of wine that we have no room for.

Next stop was home and a quick nap. Josh and I meant to cook burgers on the grill, but we were all too stuffed. We were in bed by 10 and Josh's parents left first thing in the morning. All in all, a nice – if too short – visit.