Sunday, October 30, 2011

Island Creek Oyster Bar with the Boston Brunchers

I usually blog about food that I make, so reviewing meals is new to me. Here goes.....

I've been pretty active on twitter since moving back to Boston (this also coincides with getting a smartphone) and am following Renee and some of the other Boston Brunchers. When I saw that (1) the anniversary brunch was at Island Creek Oyster Bar (and I follow them on twitter too...) and that (2) Renee was giving away some tickets to non-brunchers I was psyched. Definitely a challenge to myself to win one - and I did, from Sue at Public Radio Kitchen, who I ended up sitting with during brunch in fact (but I was a little hungover and it took us a while to put this together).

We had gone to Somerville Local First's Harvestfest the night before, so I was desperately in need of some coffee when we showed up. Fun fact: Island Creek brews coffee from Jim's Organic Coffee. I met their New England sales rep the following weekend at Head of the Charles, and Mike was awesome enough to give me a bag of coffee to try. They are a local, green company so it's cool to see restaurants using quality local products!

It was great to eat with other local bloggers too (Eating Places, The Economical Eater, Doves and Figs, The Passionate Foodie, and Baking Me Hungry).

First up, we ordered drinks. I went for the bloody mary, sort of a hair of the dog thing. It was definitely good and with the spiciness helped bring me out of my fog.


We also had an amazing pastry basket in front of us. I could have eaten them all, but went for the sticky bun. It was not too sweet which was wonderful, and had good texture, not like a sticky ball of dough at all.


There were 4 choices for brunch, but our table went with either the lobster roll or the french toast with sautéed apples. I went with the lobster roll to get the savory after the pastry basket, but the French toast looked and smelled amazing.


The lobster roll was awesome. It's always a good problem when you can't determine the best way to eat something. I did the slice in half and eat with hands. The rosemary bun on this lobster roll is not to be missed.

The other fantastic part of brunch was our ridiculous goodie bags from the brunch sponsors (below). Renee did a fabulous job getting sponsors, and my mom and husband were super impressed with what I brought home.

America's Test Kitchen
Barefoot Wine
Biba
Biltmore Bar and Grill
Boston Ballet
Boston Center for Adult Education
Boston Food Finds
Cow and Crumb
Cumberland Farms
Dorado Tacos & Cemitas
Dore Creperie
Doves and Figs Kitchen
Eversave Boston
Foodies of New England
The Four Seasons Boston
Haircuttery
Harvard Common Press
iParty
Klout
KO Catering & Pies
Langham Hotel Boston
Phillips Candy House
Pinkberry
Pretzel Crisps
Popchips
Stages of Beauty
Stonyfield
USA Pears


Brunch was gratis, but my opinions are my own.

1 comment:

  1. Great to meet you & hope to see you again soon!

    ReplyDelete