Twenty-plus years of documenting the South's vernacular art, visionary environments and traditions….plus modern art exhibits, Faulkner and Eudora, and This Week's Various. Welcome.
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Robert Indiana’s LOVE at the Besthoff Sculpture Garden at NOMA
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So, so, so happy to see HuffPo do a piece on Charles “LaLa” Evans who made his Starkville home into a museum of love after his wife, Louise, passed away. They had been married 60 years.
Once Mutemath found out about his story, they made this music video (look for the short clips of his yard show too!). Wonderful — get the Kleenex ready for sad *and* happy tears:
So terribly sorry to hear that Thornton Dial passed away today.
He was a giant.
Dial at the High
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Dial at the Ogden
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also at the Ogden
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…“This is based upon funeral sculpture that was in all the old graveyards. . . . Dial and all the people who grew up in his generation, they went to graveyards all the time that looked like this—stuff all over the place, handmade iron ornaments. Dial’s version is a lot bigger than most. And it’s not like Dial’s trying to copy cemetery art. He is cemetery art. I mean, that’s what he came out of.”
…Dial’s mother, an unmarried sharecropper, had ten other children and sent him to live with relatives in Bessemer, a steel town. …For Dial, school didn’t work out. “I tried to go to Sloss’s Mining Camp School, but the children made fun of me because I was so big…Thirteen in the second grade and stuff like that. . . . They told me, ‘Learn to figure out your money and write your name. That’s as far as a Negro can go.’ I learned that.”
At the AJC:
Dial was the subject of a retrospective show, “Hard Truths: The Art of Thornton Dial,” at the High Museum of Art in 2011-12. Spanning 20 years, the exhibition contained 59 works that ranged from drawings in charcoal and colored pencil to what AJC art critic Felicia Feaster described as “monumental, propulsive and spirited … large-scale paintings coated with tar-thick paint, insight and anger,” that addressed social injustices such as poverty, the war in Iraq and the African slave trade.
Thornton’s works are owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art; the Smithsonian American Art Museum; and the High Museum of Art. His 42-foot sculpture dedicated to civil rights activist Rep. John Lewis resides in Freedom Park at Freedom Parkway and Ponce de Leon Avenue.
In the NYT:
“I make it for people to love.”
https://player.vimeo.com/video/72142303?color=ffffff&title=0&byline=0&portrait=0
Mr. Dial Has Something to Say from Glass World Films on Vimeo.
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Update 1/27: obituary at the NY Times Thornton Dial, Outsider Artist Whose Work Told of Black Life, Dies at 87
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The incredible Fred Scruton took this pic of Joe and me (2013) in one of Joe’s sculptures.
Loving that the Artnet piece, Unexpected Artworks Dominate This Year’s Outsider Art Fair, which is going on this weekend in NYC mentions Lonnie Holley and my sweet friend Joe Minter’s work there:
The fair opens boldly with a two-artist presentation by James Fuentes, of sculptures by Lonnie Holley and Joe Minter…
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a visit to the church we made in 2012
This is how the Baptist church in Rodney is looking, with the Mississippi River flooding now.
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a visit to Pasaquan pre-restoration in 2012
CNN ran ‘16 Things to See and Do in the US in 2016‘ includes the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum outside Birmingham, the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture opening this fall, and EOM’s art environment Pasaquan in Georgia which will reopen to the public later this year.
Kohler, who came in to do preservation on the site, gifted the property to Columbus State University in December.
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Atlanta Food Walks put out a press release about their Downtown Southern Food Walk and Dr. King’s love of food:
“Dr. King’s first memory was standing at the bread lines during the Depression. In his letters, he compared the quality of food at the jails where he was imprisoned; though the conditions at the Albany, Georgia jail were brutal, he wrote that their breakfasts of sausages, eggs, and grits, were generally good. In fact, one of his last conversations on that fateful day in Memphis was about what they would be eating for supper,” Akila McConnell, owner of Atlanta Food Walks, explains. “Our Culinary Storytellers intertwine Dr. King’s story with the history of Southern food, from slavery through the Civil Rights Movement to today’s fusion cuisine.”
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‘Parchman Prison’ Quilt by Hystercine Rankin at Mississippi Museum of Art, Jackson – from a visit in 2013
At Texas Standard: Not Your Grandma’s Blanket: Can a Quilt be Modern Art? A new generation of quilters is challenging the convention that their work is simply a craft. (Really, Gee’s Bend answered this, but the article is about ‘modern quilters’ as well.)
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Sweet Jessie Zenor (who also was with Rural Studio) had her ‘Green House on Porter’ in Ocean Springs featured at Bitter Southerner.
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one of the 20k homes in Hale County
Rural Studio’s partnership with Serenbe to build its $20k homes there for artists to use while in residence at Serenbe turned out to cost about $135k for two of them plus a deck. Sounds like it was completely worthwhile and Rural Studio learned a lot, though, in what it would take to further mainstream their acceptance and construction beyond Hale County, Alabama where RS is based. From ArtsATL:
The houses are not only too small, they are too cheap. Contractors work on commission, generally 20 percent of construction costs. Says Smith, “A contractor won’t get out of his truck for less than $20,000.” That’s kinda hard to do if the house costs less than $100,000. In addition contractors assess costs based on past experience and rely on subs for materials estimates, usually based on square footage. You can bet that nary a contractor has, like Rural Studio, actually counted the number of two-by-fours needed on a project.
Images here at Atlanta Magazine.
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The trailer for The Free State of Jones has been released:
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This 11k sq ft Philip Johnson contemporary in Dallas is on the market for $27.5M.
Robert’s is still carrying the flame for the very idea that you can still play country music in 2015—in front of a live audience, with no cover—and people will be so excited about it that they’ll pay you enough to survive. And as a guest at the bar, you can enjoy all of this while eating a fried bologna sandwich.
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I like to serve aspic in cups…
The New Yorker runs Tatyana Tolstaya’s piece, Aspic:
It’s a special kind of religion, making the aspic. It’s a yearly sacrifice, though we don’t know to whom or for what. And what would happen if you didn’t make it is also a question mark.
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Hanna Raskin writes in the Post and Courier about Edna Lewis’ short three-year stay at Middleton Place and her legacy there:
“It was really Alice Waters on the West Coast and Edna on the East.”
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of course
The Mercury in Australia did a story on travel in the US South (Louisiana, really) with a piece titled, ‘If you’re taking a culinary tour of the American deep south, know there’s more than fried chicken on the menu‘
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From the press release:
A major example of American folk art sculpture with strong Southern history will be presented for sale at the 2016 Winter Antiques Show by Americana specialists David A. Schorsch and Eileen M. Smiles. The one-of-a-kind apothecary trade figure known as “Tom Long” was made to advertise the Athens, Georgia medical office and pharmacy of Dr. Crawford W. Long (1815-1878), famed as the pioneer in the discovery of surgical anesthesia.
The Winter Antiques Show is held at the Park Avenue Armory in New York City from January 22 to 31, http://www.winterantiquesshow.com
The poplar and yellow pine figure stands 58 inches tall and was carved in Athens by Charles James Oliver, circa 1851-1855, and retains a fine old painted surface. For nearly half a century it stood outside Long and Billups Pharmacy on Broad Street in Athens, Georgia, until 1909, when it was acquired by Joseph Jacobs (1859-1929), an apprentice of Dr. Long, who went on to open his own pharmacy in 1884 in Atlanta, where two years later he earned a place in American history by introducing the first Coca Cola fountain drink to the public.
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It’s always complicated. Here, WV Public Broadcasting on Revisiting What Happens When Strangers With Cameras Travel Inside Appalachia
What happens when strangers with cameras go to Appalachia? It’s a complicated topic that many Appalachians have strong feelings about. This week, we revisit our most popular episode from 2015. Since this first aired, Vice Magazine has published another article by photographer Stacy Kranitz. It’s the latest in Kranitz’s photo essay series called, “There Aint No Grave Gonna Hold My Body Down“, which takes its title from the song by Brother Claude Ely.
More of Stacy Kranitz’ series here.
The other Vice photo essay, Bruce Gilden’s Two Days in Appalachia, is here.
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the only two places to eat — Black’s and home
In the Washington Post: Move over, foie gras: The latest rage in Paris is . . . classic American barbecue
In 2013, Abramowicz quit his highflying job as a marketer of luxury goods (think cognac and champagne) to apprentice at the 65-year-old Louie Mueller Barbecue, a famous standard-bearer in Taylor, Tex.
“All wood,” Abramowicz says, referring to the lack of assistance from gas or electricity in the J&R cooker, shipped from Mesquite, Tex. The Beast gets its name from the giant, two-ton smoker. “I had to keep it real.”
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Robbie Fulks’ Meditative new ‘Alabama at Night’ from Rolling Stone:
In 1936, writer James Agee and photographer Walker Evans traveled to Alabama to document the lives of sharecropping families in the Great Depression for Fortune. The harrowing experience was eventually published in book form as Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, which has proven influential for future generations of writers.
Among them are Chicago-based alternative-country pioneer Robbie Fulks, who wrote his new song “Alabama at Night” from the journalists’ perspective. “We were not there to talk, we were only there to see,” he laments, describing the heartbreaking scenes of poverty he sees with empathy.
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Mt Ararat Cemetery in Nashville, where some Edmondson monuments had previously been installed
William Edmondson’s Boxer was the top lot at $785k in Christie’s sale, ‘Liberation Through Expression: Outsider and Vernacular Art’ — it’s a new world record for this genre. Yesssss!!!
from ArtNews:
And yet calling Edmondson himself an outsider at this point is full of problematic implications. He was the child of freed slaves, worked for a time as a janitor in a Nashville hospital, and didn’t start making sculpture until the age of 57. But, as stated in a biographical note on the artist published by the Cheekwood Botanical Garden and Museum of Art in Nashville, which organized an Edmondson show in 2011, he was also exhibiting at the Museum of Modern Art in New York as early as 1937, when he was the first African American artist to receive a solo show at that institution.
HuffPo on Why Big Auction Houses Want In On The Growing Outsider Art Craze:
For Zimmerman, the more eyes on the historically under-appreciated and undervalued pocket of the art world, the better. “I hope it grows and people who are unfamiliar with it now will know it by heart in 10 to 20 years,” she said. “I hope the work thrives. I want it to take on a life of its own and be in every major museum. I want this to be a part of the art world that people just can’t ignore.”
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taken in 2008 — sign in Pontotoc, Mississippi for Barber’s Milk
From the Atlantic:
Milk, Bread, and Eggs: The Trinity of Winter-Storm Panic-Shopping
Why do people reliably stock up on the same things before they get snowed in?
…and one source mentioned that other thing we stock up on for hurricanes: alcohol.
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At Slate this week: ‘In This Impoverished Mississippi Community, Teacher Assistant Is a Coveted Job. It Pays $9 an Hour.‘ (they’re talking about Greenville). Also: Today almost all the students in the Greenville Public School District receive free and reduced lunch.
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4-H exhibit at the Neshoba County Fair
Virginia Willis is developing 13 half-hour shows for PBS for a series to be called “Secrets of the Southern Table: A Food Lovers’ Tour of the Global South” — it’s expected to begin airing in January 2017.
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The new Grammy museum in Cleveland, MS will have as its first exhibit “Ladies and Gentlemen…the Beatles” when it opens in March.
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the banh mi at Le Bakery in Biloxi
Over the last couple of months, media has made much of how some are offended by the history (or not) and authenticity (or lack of such) of food. The bahn mi served in the dining hall at Oberlin wasn’t really (I’ve eaten in the dining hall at Oberlin: leave your expectations elsewhere) plus some dissatisfaction with the undercooked rice there coming across as ‘disrespectful’, Clemson Dining served another ‘Maximum Mexican’ day then the university apologized, and while Whole Foods encouraged people to eat collards there was some upset as to whether this grocery store wasn’t crediting — actually ruining per Ebony — or whether the idea of a dish of peanuts and collards they depicted was even a thing (it is). Food wasn’t the only source of ire: yoga too.
Different but not different, at the New Yorker, Hua Hsu writes Chinese Food and the Joy of Inauthentic Cooking:
…Talde and Bowien’s books suggest a shadow aspiration: to pay tribute to the anonymous genius of immigrants, and to build a “strange and awesome” new America in their honor. Inauthenticity becomes a kind of power, a refusal of someone else’s expectations and tastes. The great lengths that diners are willing to travel to eat their food, the hours they are willing to wait for a seat at the bar, may dramatize a desire to return, impossibly, to something unrecoverable—the “flavor memory” of childhood, the simple ecstasy of a packed family dinner table, a transformative Styrofoam plate of food-court stir-fry. A wish to glimpse highs more common in some neighborhoods than in others. Sometimes it has nothing to do with taste at all, but instead is about the chain of associations triggered when you hear the squeak of a lazy Susan, or the sound of a bundle of chopsticks being run under a faucet, and you remember the rote explanation for why your family has an extra refrigerator in the garage, secreting all the ingredients that make you different—that will one day make you special.
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the Buc-ee’s in Luling
Three years late in seeing Ken Herman’s statement in the Statesman:
If you haven’t been to a Buc-ee’s your life is hollow and incomplete.
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Phillip Ashley Rix of Memphis has been named Official Chocolatier of the Grammy Awards Gift Lounge. From the Memphis Business Journal:
23-Karat Gold Salted Caramel Pecan Praline will also be a featured parting gift for guests of the official Grammy Celebration. The Grammy Awards will be held Feb. 5.
Rix handcrafts each praline using a rare purple bean cacao, roasted Mississippi Delta pecans and Fleur de Sel. Each praline is laced with 23-karat gold leaf, and the 68 percent single origin dark chocolate shell is finished with 23-karat gold dust. Each piece retails for $79.
He’s just finalized a deal that will have his chocolates sold through Neiman Marcus and Horchow — they’ll ship direct from his shop in Memphis.
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a Frank Fleming piece in the Southern Living offices, 2009
Frank Fleming wants everyone to know he’s back in Birmingham and welcoming commissions.
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among these pies for Thanksgiving are a couple of my buttermilk pies
The Daily Meal’s Best Pie in Every State:
Alabama = buttermilk pie
Arkansas = chess pie
Georgia = peach pie
Louisiana = king cake pie
Mississippi = Mississippi Mud Pie
Tennessee = Tennessee Whiskey – Pecan Pie
Texas = Sparkling Grapefruit Pie
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There’s an exhibit on the African-American cookbook collection at Alabama’s W.S. Hoole Special Collections Library, now through early February.
Comprising some 500 volumes, the David Walker Lupton Collection documents everything from the industry’s origin in the 1800s to the celebrity cookbook craze of the 2000s. It is especially strong in cookbooks that look back to Africa, celebrate the concept of “soul food,” or originate within local community groups.
In addition, the Libraries recently acquired the personal collection of one African-American cook, Viola Pearson Ragland. Donated by her son, Rev. Wylheme Ragland, these books sometime focus on African-American foodways but often simply reflect the main currents of American cooking.
Another exhibit going on now, in Maine, is What to Eat and How to Cook It: A Celebration of the Esta Kramer Collection of American Cookery, The author of the piece about it in the Portland Press Herald mentioned:
In “La Cuisine Creole,” published in 1885, I found lots of “gombo” recipes, including Oyster Gombo with filee. Ingredients: “a grown chicken, 50 oysters and a half-pound of ham to flavor the Gombo.”
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frito pie at home – but not tosti elotes
Via Phoenix New Times: La Carreta de Lily serves something like a Frito chili pie, but it’s called ‘tosti elotes’:
The snack is made using Mexican-brand Tostitos (salsa verde-flavored, for an extra layer of salty spice), mayonnaise, melted butter, chili powder, lime, granulated queso cotija, fresh-off-the-cob elote, and, to top it off, a hit of Mexican hot sauce.
…The process involves slicing open a bag of Tostitos, dumping a bunch ingredients over the chips, and finally, planting a plastic spoon into the stiff muddle of chips and creamy goop…
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not biscuits in this sense, but the Uneeda Biscuit sign in Meridian
Garden and Gun had a blind taste testing of fast food biscuits — they made the field *very* small and didn’t even include Whataburger or Biscuitville. Here are the results. Thing is: the really good fast-food biscuits, if we must — and we all must at some point really — are the ones under the heat lamps in tinfoil bundles at gas stations and Piggly Wigglys. Alas, the Pig doesn’t have a drive-thru.
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front yard, Ocean Springs
Leslie and I knew we had a big day ahead of us, so decided to stay close-in for lunch: Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger’s Border Grill was inside the Mandalay, so we made plans for that.
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With all the fabulous experiences we had already had — Gordon Ramsay Steak and Lotus of Siam especially (and we didn’t go in with special expectations for this restaurant), this was just lunch. It was okay but not great and we’ll not be visiting this one again. I do have to mention that Leslie ordered a sangria that was just way off on proportions, so the waitress for whatever reason was a little unkind when Leslie asked for a replacement, even though we sweetly explained we thought the mix of ingredients was just off. It was really bad. She decided to bring Leslie a completely different drink, made with autumnal flavors, and I’d summarize the taste of that one this way: imagine a cocktail equal parts tequila and nutmeg. Right. We considered that perhaps she was ‘punishing’ Leslie with an even worse drink…so she didn’t comment about that one! hahaha!
We had time this day to do more exploring, so we traveled over to the Bellagio and took in their Autumnal displays:
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Jean Philippe Patisserie is also in the Bellagio
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I wanted a little nibble of a couple different things, and they had this sampler available: a tiny raspberry macaron, creme brulee, and a red velvet cake pop on a little chocolate ‘plate’. I saved the plate for later (it was good) and tried the other three – the brulee was terrific, the macaron didn’t seem particularly fresh, and the red velvet wasn’t…well, know when you have a certain expectation of the perfect red velvet (or carrot cake, or…) and anything else just isn’t going to make it? I think it was the icing on the outside. Still, though, this was fun and left enough for a snack later. 
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The fountain show outside the hotel
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We made it in plenty of time for our reservation at Nobu, which was beautiful and everyone was so kind and welcoming — the whole experience just perfect.
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This was a splurge — we both got the best tasting menu, which incorporated our preferences and kept in mind Leslie’s dislikes. The chef completely took care of us. We were impressed with every single dish.
Here, the lighting is dim so these images aren’t the greatest, but…
Truffle toro
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Salmon belly
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Yellowtail sashimi with cilantro and peppers
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Black Alaskan cod
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Wagyu A5, served atop super-heated stones so you may further heat the steak to your liking
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Chilean sea bass
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red snapper and fluke sashimi, tuna roll
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…and by the time dessert rolled around, I forgot to note how the waiter described dessert!
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It would be nonsense to try to describe in any detail to which each of these are deserving, but this was such an incredible experience, with every single dish incredibly special. This is a *must-do*.
We went straight to the Wynn, where we had tickets for their show, Le Reve (The Dream). Thankfully, we had a little time to take in the surroundings
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Preston Bailey’s floral installations
and of all the shops, we fell in love with their Tiny Treasures toy shop
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We made our way to the theater for the show, and…Jeff Koons Tulips!
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We had the *best* seats for Le Reve (though I think they are all good, as it’s a water show done in the round). Photographs are allowed. I only took a few as I really wanted to take in the show
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Leslie liked it even better than the other two Cirque shows we saw this week.
I love America. Sometimes all the pieces-parts come together. And they’re always together, it’s just that certain times it’s so obvious how easy it is to love.
Love Bobby Flay’s story — he dropped out of high school at 10th grade and, well, his success is incredible.
We made friends with the people at the table next to ours, and they were so impressed with Leslie’s quesadilla that they ordered — and loved it — too.
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As gorgeous as everything looked, there wasn’t anything we just had to try.
We made our way back to the hotel to change again for supper, and took a cab. When the driver realized that we were a little bit early for our reservation (we made it for 5:30p, the time they open each night, so we wouldn’t have to rush to our show later that evening) and the restaurant was closed, he actually offered to stay with us, as the shopping center it’s in doesn’t look that great.
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He was so sweet, not wanting to leave us out alone. Leslie spotted a — not sure what it’s called, really — a foot accupressure place just a door or two down from the restaurant, and we explained to them we had 15 minutes. After walking all over the Strip, we were in need of some foot/leg attention and it was just the thing.
So 5:30p, we are ready for our reservation and seated. As the restaurant stays booked, within ten minutes almost all the tables are taken.
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So here we are, at Lotus of Siam, supposed to be one of the best Thai restaurants in the US.
I started with Tom Kah. Leslie and I joke that “Tom Kah” is a boyfriend. We talk about Tom Kah, we want to bring home Tom Kah, we want everyone to meet Tom Kah. Tom Kah is a rockstar.
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We ordered a few things for the table. Not amazing, but good.
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But I want to tell you about one of the best things ever.
This. Crispy duck in red curry with noodles, khao soi, I think. The duck was so perfectly cooked. So moist and the skin crispy/crunchy even with all this curry around. The noodles we could have eaten forever. Every single time from now on, this is getting ordered at Lotus. Yesssssss. 
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Rather than a cab, we ordered an Uber for the drive back to Mandalay after we were in total food-bliss. This is where the whole day, it all crystallized: the app asked if I wanted to choose what to play in our driver’s car during our ride. I didn’t want to specify as we were going to give the deference to the driver, as it’s his car. We got in, are talking about music, and he asks if it’s okay if we listen to Christmas music, that it’s what he’s in the mood for. Of course!! He tells us that he’s an Iranian Christian and some of his story. So here we are, two Jewish girls in the car blasting “White Christmas” by Irving Berlin with a man who came here to enjoy his own freedom with big plans for the future and we’re all enjoying each other and just happy as little clams.
Beautiful, America.
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Lastly, we changed and went back downstairs for the Cirque du Soliel: Michael Jackson ONE show. Before the show, the ‘paparazzi’ came over and picked me out to ‘take pictures’ which was funny and sweet and the show itself was pretty great too with lots less ‘story’ but more acrobatics. We saw the CdS Beatles show the night before and I really liked that one better. Still, though, this was pretty great. xoxo!
This was true birthday love! Leslie and I made reservations for Gordon Ramsay Steak at the Paris the first night we were in Vegas…and she treated me as part of my birthday celebration! How sweet is that!?!
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Our banquette was upstairs, and this was our view of the ceiling installation. The neon tubes are a representation of Gordon Ramsay’s hand movements as he makes a beef wellington.
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An iPad listed the signature cocktails (the HK Antioxident, with Veev Acai Liquer, lemon, and blueberries was smooth and fresh), and almost everything else was listed in the hardbound menu.
While considering the menu, our head waiter brought over the selection of meats (it may be hard to decipher exactly how this is set up, but atop each placement is a mirror so that one may view the marbling of each cut from above as well). The funny part is that as he got done making his presentation, he asked us if we wanted to take a picture. When I asked him about it, he said, “everybody wants to take a picture of this!”. 
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He especially tried to interest us in the tasting menu, but as both of us would have to order it and Leslie didn’t care for a couple of the dishes, we passed. One thing that I found a bit cheesy but, well, cheesy in a sweet way, was that those ordering the tasting menu got to keep the signed photograph of the chef:
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That’s Leslie on the left, and me on the right…and heh, realizing just now I wore those sunglasses the whole time we were at the restaurant.
Chef Ramsay, we’re not going to take your picture home with us, but we did want to include you.
We knew we were having a big supper so we passed entirely on appetizers. You can imagine, though, this bread plate was devoured.
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Leslie’s beef short ribs — red wine braised, with potato puree and wild mushrooms:
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*Of course* I had to have the beef wellington. Not sure how big this comes across here, but it’s big. I had half. Know how people say they ate a steak that was ‘like butter’? This was like butter. It was the most tender piece of steak I have ever had. The mushrooms were delectable. And the pastry was soft on the inside and flaky on the outside. Perfect in every way. I want this for supper every night.
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And it may seem odd, but we completely should have passed on ordering sides. With the vegetables and starches that came on our plates, there was no need for the macaroni and cheese (blue, cheddar, parmesan, truffle, english peas) or the ginger-glazed shiitakes (with scallions and crispy shallots).
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But THIS. I read English magazines — delicious., BBC Good Food, and others, but I have never made or had a real sticky toffee pudding. And where better? Sweet pudding cake, brown sugar toffee, brown butter ice cream. It was so soft and so warm and so comforting. Just the perfect amount of sweet. Yes forever.
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When Av and I go to Las Vegas, this is the first place we’re going. It will make him endlessly happy.
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After our just completely amazing supper, Leslie and I headed over to the Mirage for the Cirque du Soleil show, Beatles LOVE. I have an appreciation for the Beatles and have been to a handful of Cirque shows, but this was a thousand times better than imagined. No pics are allowed inside the theatre, but this is the walkway in:
Happy New Year!
It’s Las Vegas week on DFK!
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There are family vacations and there are date nights and there are girls days.
But of all these, Leslie and I — friends for over 15 years — have never gone off for a few days just the two of us (other than family vacations together, the furthest the two of us have gone afield is the time we took the day to visit Graceland Too, its own life-altering experience).
Leslie’s little one is two so she can, for the first time, get away a little bit now. So it was time: let’s make a grown-up girl trip. Aah-may-zinnng!
The last time I was in Las Vegas was over ten years ago, for a work conference. We stayed that time at Mandalay Bay and although I was open to whatever, it was the hotel we chose to stay for this trip. I think it was several hundred dollars less expensive that some of the more interesting hotels on the other end of the strip and I knew it was nice (plus with tram/walking/cabs/Uber, not a huge concern) so we were great with it.
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Not all of the rooms have been renovated, but we were lucky enough to be given one at check-in:
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We got here right at lunch and although had already made plans for almost all other meals, we wanted something quick, easy, and nearby for lunch. We saw that Hubert Keller’s Burger Bar was in the hotel and headed straight over. Okay, let’s see what Hubert Keller dreams up for hamburgers.
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Leslie had the eponymous burger, which turned out to be under-seasoned buffalo on ciabatta. I had a lamb burger which wasn’t seasoned at all, along with a little sack of fries (though the fries on their own were perfect). Ah, a little disappointing.
But that’s okay — while this wasn’t much, we weren’t looking for much. And the trip turned out to include three of the great meals of my life (seriously.). One of those on tomorrow’s post.
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