WIAW #29: What I Ate in Washington

Wow, it's Wednesday already?  As much as I wasn't prepared for this week, it's certainly going by fast!  I think I have a little furry friend to thank for that.

Tequila is so much fun to play with (the dog, not the drink), and she is just so adorable!  Her and Kitty Cat are getting used to each other, but it's going to take some more time before he is comfortable with a dog in the house.

Ok, now it's time for a Wednesday tradition around the blogosphere...

However, today I'm going to call it What I Ate in Washington!  See what I did there? :)

While I didn't take pictures of the specific meals I ate (my family is a little weird about me taking pictures of my food...), I can link to almost everywhere we ate.  It'll still give you a good picture of our Washington DC eats!  Thank you to Jenn for coming up with WIAW and for hosting the link-up every week!  Head over to her blog for more WIAW bloggers and to see what WIAW is all about!

Breakfasts

We stayed with Joe's Sergeant Major, Lee, from the military in his beautiful home.  Lee was such a thoughtful host and purchased Jimmy Dean breakfast sandwiches for us to heat up in the morning.

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The Delights line of these sandwiches are lower in calories and fat, so we were happy that he picked the healthier ones!  Lee also had grapes and bananas for us to eat, and we took those on the go as we headed in to the city on Thursday, Friday, and Sunday.

On Saturday morning, Lee cooked us some delicious eggs and bacon.  I'm telling you, we really had a first class host!

Lunches

We ate at some pretty yummy places for lunch in the city.  On Thursday, we ate at a refreshment stand near the Lincoln Memorial.

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I had a chicken sausage, and it was the perfect way to warm up on the cool and windy day!  At least it was sunny and we had a nice view of the Potomac River as we ate.  Bonus: they had coffee and hot chocolate for us to warm up our hands drink.

On Friday, we met up with Joe and Katherine's second cousin Tyler at BreadLine.  It's located at 18th and Pennsylvania Ave in the heart of the city, and you can tell that a lot of business people frequent the restaurant on work days!  

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It was PACKED when we went in, but after eating there, I can see why.  They had a menu of sandwiches, soups, and salads that changes daily.  All of the ingredients are fresh and the bread is homemade.  I ordered the Tomato and Mozzarella sandwich, and it was DELICIOUS!

We had lunch on Saturday at one of my favorite DC places, Potbelly.  I didn't realize Potbelly was a chain until looking at their website just now, but this place is GOOD.

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I had a delicious sandwich there (grilled chicken and cheddar), and I also tried the PopChips Sweet Potato chips.  

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Those things are so, so good.  If you haven't tried them, you need to ASAP!

Dinners

Dinners in DC were a mix of restaurants and home cooked meals.  On Wednesday when we arrived, we ate at Ruby Tuesday's with Lee and his family.  I hadn't eaten there in a while.  I really enjoyed the salad bar, but my burger was a little greasy.

Thursday's dinner was a home cooked meal from our host.  He had a fresh salad with lots of topping options available (chickpeas, sunflower seeds, etc...it was impressive!) and pasta with chicken alfredo sauce.  Yummy!

On Friday, my parents came up to DC and met us at my aunt and uncle's house for a cookout!  We couldn't enjoy sitting outside while uncle David grilled since it was raining, but we had a great time catching up with everyone and eating some good food.

Our last meal in DC was a good one!  We ate at Boulevard Woodgrill in Arlington with about 17 people: my parents, aunt and uncle, Joe's first cousins Betsy and Lucy, Lucy's husband Knight and son Will, Betsy's boyfriend Kevin, and Joe's second cousins Tyler and Taylor Rebecca (and their boyfriends).  

We had quite a large group!  This is another place that you should check out if you're up in the area!  The menu had something for everyone, as well as delicious daily specials!  For example, my dad got the meatloaf made with turkey, veal, and pork!  How interesting!  Joe and I split Kabobs of tuna, salmon, and shrimp and I ordered a salad to go along with it.

Snacks

I brought some apples and baby carrots along the way as we walked around the city.  Those proved quite handy on some days--walking about 8 miles a day takes a lot out of you!  I also bought some a new-to-me flavor of Luna protein bars: Lemon Vanilla.

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They are really tasty, and I just might be purchasing them more often!

Overall, I think we ate really good while we were up in Washington, DC.  It was nice to have so many connections up there to fill us in on the must-go places.

Question for you: If you've been to DC, where is your favorite place to eat?  If you haven't, how do you pick places to eat while you're in a new place?