Publix Cooking School and Dakin Dairy Farm

 March has been a busy month....lots of visitors and lots of fun. Friend Karen came for a long weekend and we started with a Publix cooking school. If you've never been to one, and you love to cook, or eat...it's a must. We've been to 3 other classes and loved them all...this was Karen's first.

They have demo and hands on classes.....We've only been to demo classes but I'm sure the hands on would be great....

There are usually 3 chefs...one will cook and demo the course....while.....

The other two are prepping the plates for the students to sample.....this was our first course...
Grilled Asparagus. Romesco Sauce, Serrano Ham and Hard Cooked Egg....yum, and we just started

Next came Panko Crusted Grouper, Carrot Puree, English Peas, Radish and Preserved Lemon Oil....with each course there was a wine pairing...lovely. ...

These classes have for sure made us try foods we never would have, and you come home with all the recipes....woohoo. Next was Spring Lamb Chop, Ragout with Rosemary New Potatoes and Fava Beans.

DELISH!!!!!
Our last course was ............Grilled New York Strip, Balsamic Glazed Red Onions, Swiss Chard and Creamy Polenta

When a class has this much heavy food there is not a dessert...but then you don't really need it....and the wine makes you not care!!! It was a wonderful evening, time to head home and collapse on the couch. We'd been to see the Lippizan Stallions, been out to lunch, done a little shopping and ended our day at a cooking school....tomorrow....Dakin Dairy Farm and the Fireman's Rib Cook-off!!!

Leaving the Lippizan show Karen and I saw a sign pointing to a Dairy Farm...so we took a quick detour. We found Dakin Dairy Farm but they wer about to close, but we knew what we were going to do on Saturday. We arrived and signed up for the 1.5hour tour. This is a "sustainable" farm and the tour was great.

We visited the "barns" where the cows hang out during milkings...they are milked 3 time a day....wow!

A few little Cow facts....

Then it was on to the milking area....that's a bunch of cows......

Once all the cows were locked in it was time for a bath.

Then we toured inside a building that allowed us to look down on how and where the milk is made and bottled. We watched a short film about the farm and the milk process....like....just how do you make skim milk......?????
After this we got into a hay wagon for a tour around the farm.....

This little calf was only about 30 minutes old...we alsmost got to see it born....he stood up later and was a little wobbly but really cute.

After seeing the duck pond and a pig race,we got to feed the baby cows. This farm is not in the breeding business so they sell the bulls and keep the cows....they are so cute...

After this we all rested at a picnic table and were able to taste Dakin milk. I got chocolate and it was delish..... then we shook a jar of cream so much that it made butter...I'd have never gussed we cold make butter like that. We were given crackers to spread it on to taste it. For my taste it needed a little salt...but it was very creamy. The tour was over and we were invitied to go inside the country store, grab a basket and fill it with things to create a picnic. Cheese, milk, sandwiches, pizza, hotdogs....then go sit under some shade and enjoy. As cool as this sounded, and we might come back one day to do this, we decided to go across town to the Fireman's Rib Cook-off......wow was that good.

It was $12 pp and you got 8 tastings.....that was plenty....what a great lunch!!!

Another busy day....time to head home and crash.....

Sunday brought a great Sunday brunch at Ophelia's on the Bay after church and then some great beach time. We'd had a few busy days, so some beaching was great.

Karen had to head home on Monday...so glad you came....we'll see ya next time!!!

Disney's Flower and Garden Festival.....March 2014

By now you have figured out I'm a Disney nut....and thankfully Denny indulges my habit....so off we went to spend one night at Disney's Dolphin Resort. 

The entrance to Disney property ....I could feel the excitement......LOVE IT

It's just so nice..and an easy 2hr drive for us. We took our bikes this time and had a blast riding around the Boardwalk area. The Yacht Club and The Boardwalk Inn as well as The Swan and Dolphin are all part of The Boardwalk, so it made for some nice riding and viewing.

Denny on his bike and ready to go

The big Dolphin on top of the hotel....had a great view from our balcony

We rode around the entire Boardwalk and made a wonderful stop at The Ice Cream shop that's in The Boardwalk Resort, we split a grilled cheese and a tomato bisque soup lunch....but I was not into sharing my chocolate shake!! But he had his root beer float so he was just fine.

The lighthouse in the lake....you can ride boats to EPCOT, or downtown Disney

The Yacht Club....a lovely resort


The Boardwalk is built around a lake where they have but sand to create beaches....at The Boardwalk Resort they had a blow up big screen on the beach for movie night....pretty cool. We enjoyed our ride, but it was a bit windy and a little cool so it was soon time to go get some Mexican for dinner. We'd seen a restaurant many times near downtown Disney we wanted to try...Chevy's...so off we went. We had about a 15min wait, but it was worth it. This was amazing food. We even had the guacamole cart make some fresh Guac tableside....YUM....we will be back.
After dinner we headed back to the hotel....we sat in the huge lobby in the comfy chairs and just enjoyed for a bit. Then I decided to do a little shopping. I didn't make any purchases, but I found a piece of Pooh art work that was really tugging at me...but alas I resisted...but it was really cute. We headed to the room and slept like babies....
The next morning was gorgeous....so I took a few pics from the balcony.

There was a wedding happening on the beach across the lake from us.....they had a beautiful day

The pools are awesome, with slides and hot tubs and a lap pool....or you can jump in a Swan Paddle Boat

Now it was time to head to EPCOT.....we like to go in the back entrance since that is the World Showcase side and where the Flower & Garden Festival is held. Disney also started hosting a small "Food & Festival" during this time, so we plan to hit some kiosk for some interesting tastings.
The coolest thing about this Festival is all the topiaries. The Master Gardeners that make these creations are amazing....
Here are some Princesses.....

We went to the French Pavilion and kiosk first and this guy was doing a balancing act using chairs, pretty cool

We ate some yummy lamb and a French Macaroon and kept moving. 

Very soon we saw these from Beauty and the Beast. France had a wonderful theatre with a fantastic film about their country...thoguh we've both been to France we saw some things in the film that stirred some interest to go back.

On this trip to EPCOT we decided to do some things we hadn't ever done....like actualy go into the different countries pavilions....so we headed around World Showcase

China was next ...and these amazing female drummers were performing.....WOW

China has a museum, some shops that carry things from China and some great restaurants, but no film about their country.

This Koi pond was nice and we like the bonsai tree in the middle of the pond...very cool.

Next was the USA pavilion...and some more really cool topiaries ....

We went inside the USA and heard some wonderful music performed by a small chorus of men and women dressed in top hats and hoop skirt dreeses...they were great. Then we went into the theatre to watch a 30min show about the history of America. It started with Mark Twain and Benjamin Franklin and came forward. There were 35 "animontronics" used to portray the famous people in our history and it was fantastic....we'd never stopped to do this before, even though we worked at EPCOT a few years ago...shame on us. We are so glad we did it.

This quote by Walt himself was posted in the pavilion...I thought it was kinda cool

Moving on around....we saw these....Snow White and the Gang...here ya go Shea!!

Sleepy.....is sleepy

Don't ya just wanna hug him???

As we moved towards Japan we came across the Lion King characters...

All along this walk we are nibbling at the different kiosk. We try to get 1 or 2 samplings and share them so we can taste more....We got a frozen mango drink in China...a BBQ sandwich and a Bacon Muffin with maple icing in the USA....YUM....

We were in no hurry and the weather was perfect, so we'd stop, people watch, enjoy the flowers and just being.....was a delightful day.

Making our way on around to Japan....we went inside to see their museum and film. TheseWarriors are known as the "Terracotta Warriors (or Army)"...are a collection of terracotta sculptures depicting the armies of Qin Shi Huang, the first Emperor of China

Very fascinating...then we went in for their film which was a 360 film....so you had to remain standing so you could turn around and see everything. It started and ended at The Great Wall, was very good.

I saw this sign just before going in to se the film......very true...

We'd been in the park several hours by now so it was time for a rest. We wisked past the Mexico pavillion, we've been in there and done the boat ride....and we've done the boat ride in the Dutch area so we kept moving and found a bench to plop on, while we pondered the rest of the day.

We had gotten a few fast passes when we came in, but were not sure anymore of the times, so I went on a mission to find this out and ran into the "man"....or shall I say "mouse" himself....

We made the decision to not even go to the Future World side of EPCOT...so we kept going. We'll catch Crush and Soarin' again next time....

We stopped to just view the beauty of the flowers, and here's my first video...hope it's not too bad.

By this time we'd nibled enough that we were not even stopping at the kiosk..they looked and smelled good, but we were stuffed. It was still fun to see the flowers and just be there. We mad our way past Canada...we've seen their 360 film before, so we skipped it and headed towards Great Britain....saw these guys on the way..

I think Disney could handle The Rose Bowl Parade.....

THEN....the highlight of my day....we heard some music playing so we followed the sound and found a pretty good band playing back in a corner....BUT....in a small room next to them were..... POOH  &  RABBIT......my day was complete...

 What a wonderful surprise....then as we were leaving the area we saw....

What a cool way to end our day at Disney....we went out the back gate, got our bikes and rode around the Boardwalk one more time and then back to The Dolphin to check out....sunset was approaching and the lights had come on around the fountain...pretty cool

We headed to Downtown Disney in hopes of a hot air balloon ride but the wind had kicked up and they had shut it down...

Maybe next time.......so we headed home....what a great day....and tonite we rolled our clocks ahead 1 hour and now we'll have lots of daylight after I get off work to walk the bridge or ride our bikes....I love daylight savings time.

 Enjoy the extra daylight....wherever you are!!!