Mississippi Avenue

So far, we've eaten and shopped- a pretty good way to begin a vacation. We had lunch at Flying Pie Pizzaria. Our Miss Piggy whole wheat extra thin crust pizza was, perhaps, the best pizza I've had in my life. Then we went to Trader Joe's and found wine (it's evidently Three Buck Chuck these days), including a lovely muscat, and an almond flavored sparkling wine for this evening (it's chilling, and I don't remember the name. If it's any good, I'll post the name tomorrow).

Then we went to Mississippi Avenue, which is chock full of trendy and hip shops. I generally feel out of place in trendy and hip shops because I am neither (and hever have been), but the people here were great. We visited an interesting place that sold synthetic Owl vomit (with real skeleton). We saw Re-Find, an architechtural salvage place with an amazing entry sculpture. and we went to The Meadow (http://www.atthemeadow.com/shop/ ) to taste and buy finishing salt.

I had seen a piece on the store on CBS Sunday, and was intrigued. The store sells over 80 kinds of salt, including salt blocks and dishes for cooking and serving. The staff was wonderful, walking us through the intricacies of sea salt, letting us taste and smell (yes, smell) assorted salts, and answered all of our newbie questions.

Turns out that salt is not just salt- and that I can quickly rack up as much in salt as I can in yarn.

I bought a largish jar of Cyuprus Silver flake salt (shaped like little pyramids and flakes)- it's very very salty and light (and big). I got a medium size jar of Alaea Volcanic salt from Hawaii for my son and his wife (though we may taste a bit too) that is brown and granular and smooth. I bought a little jar of Barrique chardonnay salt that is light brown, granular, wet (sticks together a bit), and has a light smoky taste that we'll use on the grilled veggies tonight. I also bought a pink Himalayan Salt block for serving veggies and cheeses. We're giving it a workout tonight.

Oh, and we got some chocolates too- a Lemon Pepper white chocolate that is amazing, and some salt chocolate that is interesting.

I'm no gourmet, but it was great fun (and I used to sneak and eat rock salt plain, so it was a treat). and I can still taste the salts, 2 hours later. (yes, that is a good thing).