Sandwich week!

Thursday we hit up sandwich week on the northside. We caught wind of this amazing feat on PBS, a Rick Sebak special of course. He did a show on last year's event and we knew we had to hit it again. The idea - restaurants from the northside all make amazing sandwiches for a competition to name the king (or queen) of the sammich. Two of our favorite restaurants were there :)

 

How often do you get to hang out in an elks lodge? :)

The winner was the modern cafe (never been there) but my three favorites were the James Street Gastropub and Speakeasy (pulled pork sliders with jicama and apple slaw), Max's Allegheny Tavern (corned beef with a sweet and sour red cabbage and Swiss cheese) and Penn Brewery (bacon burger (literally half bacon and beef) with grilled onions and mustard).  

I hadn't had bread in at least a month, so this was a huge treat!

Ever exploring

We had a nice relaxing weekend that included some exploring around town. I enjoy how you can always find new things to see around the city and burbs.  

We started out with a trip to the Three Rivers Arts Festival Saturday afternoon  It was a crazy day downtown - art, jazz, pride weekend, and beautiful weather. We parked downtown and mixed up the Three Rivers Heritage Trail along the Allegheny. The Golden Triangle side could still use a little cleanup and love, but provides great views of the North Shore. We moseyed around the bed at the point to provide me with my first viewing of the fountain! The point has been under construction/rehabilitation my entire three years here, so it was pretty exciting for me :)

We wandered around the art fair, supporting a few local crafters who had some cool work. 

After the Arts Festival we headed over to the north side and picked up Saturday Evening Mass at a newer (yet not modern) church in Deutchtown. We finished up with dinner at The Park House - a neat little bar in Deutchtown. we grabbed a grouping a while back and wanted to use it. This place was cool- an old rowhouse style place on E Ohio street, with an awesome vintage decor.  The bar was original, with gorgeous tin ceiling and amazing woodwork throughout. They had an impressive craft beer selection on draft  (I had the 21stAmendment  Hell or High Watermelon and David had the Anderson Valley Summer Solstice and the Rogue Double  Chocolate Stout) and the food was Middle Eastern/Mediterranean themed with rave reviews online.I thoroughly enjoyed my falafel and potato letkes while David had an amazing smelling chicken sandwich. 

While on the North Side we wandered over to Allegheny Center to pick up a missing geocache near the Children's Museum. For all my potential out of town visitors, this looks like a cool museum. Check out the artwork outside! 

They had some other cool public artwork in the area - can you find David?? Ask him about this one and his days at the Water Authority!

We also got to see the first free Public Library in the US. Thanks Andrew C!

The night ended with our neighbors graduation party!!!  That was just a Saturday. 

Kept it a little quiet on Sunday with yoga for me, grocery shopping, smoking a pork shoulder and some chicken wings for David, and some yard/garden work for us. Soon the pups will have a completes gate on the deck so they can hang with us out there at night, and the local deer are now blockaded out of our vegetable garden. They definitely ate our first tomatoes of the year before we could pick them and while working the other day we went to put some brush behind the garage and David had a staring contest with one for a good couple of minutes.  I ended the weekend with some quality hammock time :)