Food Quest Part #2

Round #2

Next up on the Food Quest to find the best Mexican food in Alaska is La Mex. I saw this one driving down one of the main roads in Anchorage around lunch time and it was packed, so it had to be a good sign, right. Well, cars in the parking lot did not turn out to be a good sign at Carlos, but you don't have much to go off of in this town. It's not as easy in Texas where you just ask your Mexican neighbor or grounds keeper for advice.

As  a reminder the evaluation categories are listed below.

Mexican Review Categories (scale 1:5)

• Margaritas (1 = Watered down Costco Mix, 5 = Cyclone Anayas)
• Chips and Salsa (1= Tostitos Chips and canned salsa, 5 = Chuy's thin chips and chunky salsa)
• Queso and/or Guacamole ( 1= Barely melted cheese, 5  = Escalante's white cheese queso)
• Fajitas (1 =Just meat and veggies, 5 = Cyclone Anayas Special Fajitas)
• Enchiladas (1= Frozen isle special, 5 = Megs Sour Cream Enchiladas

Before I talk about the food, I have to address the name. La Mex, seriously, the only worse name is Mexico In Alaska (which does exist by the way). The name is why we started with Carlos's. Which sounds better to you, La Mex or Carlos' Fine Mexican Food. I know..... Well, names are deceiving especially in this case.

La Mex

• Margaritas =2.5
• Picture below is there house Margarita and I will say it tastes as good as it looks. I was pleasantly surprised with the quality of there margarita, which honestly is not saying much after how bad last weeks was.
• Chips and Salsa = 1.0
• Is it rude to bring our own chips from Costco next time we come since it's right across the street?
• Queso and/or Guacamole = 3.0
• Queso= 1.0
• Or that is what they called it. Which was a good sign that they even had it on the menu, because Carlos did not even have queso on their menu. However, it was about as far from queso as Anchorage is from Mexico City (~5,000 miles). It was like queso colored salsa with watered down football hockey stadium nacho cheese  added. Yea, we did not even finish it, which does not happen with anything cheese related in our household.
• Guacamole = 3.0
• Well done. The guacamole carried La Mex in this category. It was very well done and had good flavor. We will definitely be getting more of it next time!
• Fajitas  = 2.5
• All in all the Fajitas were not bad, but the homemade tortillas carried them in this category. 10 times better than what we had last week. The fajitas also had some Mexican flavor and a good serving of grilled peppers and onions along with it. I'm guessing we may not find better in Alaska, but we are going to try.
• Enchiladas =  2.0
• This category is the only one that Carlos slightly edged out La Mex. The sauce on the enchiladas at Carlos' was better than La Mex. However, next time we are going to try the street tacos. Pictured below. I think we may have ordered the wrong thing.

Next stop Las Magaritas.... will it live up to its name in the Margarita Category? Tune in next week to find out.

In case you were curious, the darkness is starting to get noticable easpecially in the morning. I am not seeing the sun outside of my western facing office until 9am and the sun is setting around 7:30pm. #WestillmissTexas

Xoxo,,
W, M , EK

A Food Quest

Today, we decided to set out on a quest to find the best Mexican Food in Anchorage. Yes, we said Mexican food in Alaska. The largest amount of Alaskan transplants are from Texas so decent Mexican food has to exist in this town.  Well, at least that is our assumption and we will not stop until we have reviewed every Mexican restaurant in town in the following categories:

Mexican Review Categories (scale 1:5)

• Margaritas (1 = Watered down Costco Mix, 5 = Cyclone Anayas)
• Chips and Salsa (1= Tostitos Chips and canned salsa, 5 = Chuy's thin chips and chunky salsa)
• Queso and/or Guacamole ( 1= Barely melted cheese, 5  = Escalante's white cheese queso)
• Fajitas (1 =Just meat and veggies, 5 = Cyclone Anayas Special Fajitas)
• Enchiladas (1= Frozen isle special, 5 = Megs Sour Cream Enchiladas

First up, Carlos's Fine Mexican Cuisine. Calos's was selected because of the consistently full parking lot.  We had high hopes for this establishment when we pulled up because it was 6pm and we had to park in the back of the parking lot, so this had to be a good sign. I mean, first no Anchorage restaurant has a wait outside of tourist season and second, it has a big parking lot. However, we were slowly let down as the food arrived.

All smiles waiting for the anticipation of our first Mexican food in Alaska!

The best way to sum up this Mexican restaurant was that the only thing Mexican about it was the presentation. Somewhere along the way they found out how to sizzle fajitas, but they lost their flavor somewhere North of the Mason-Dixie line. Below is our official review.

Carlos's Fine Mexican Cuisine:

• Margaritas =1 (We had a mix from Costco that tasted better)
• Chips and Salsa = 2 ( Better than what you can buy in a jar, but nothing to write home about especially when your old home is Texas)
• Queso and/or Guacamole = 1.5 ( They did not even serve queso! We had to change the category because all they served was guacamole. However, their guacamole was decent giving them an additional 1/2 point in this category. Avocados are tough to find this far north so we have to give them a little credit)
• Fajitas  = 2 (The fajitas came out sizzling which perked up our eyes, but after the first taste we knew something wasn't right. The meat just wasn't tasting like fajita meat, even though it did have good flavor, but they also had mushrooms and tomatoes that came out sizzling #morelikehibatchi. Then there were the tortillas. I think they just went down to Walmart and picked up the ones on the shelf. And then there was the set-up plate or lack of one. No Cheese. No Pico........#Carlos'sCheeseLessMexicanFood....yea it does not have a ring to it and neither did their steak fajitas.)
• Enchiladas =  3 (Not bad, the item to get if we come back)

Cheese-less, Pico de Gallo-less set-up plate

Check out those sizzling fajitas. Can you spot the mushroom?

Well, one down and about five more to go. Ooooh how we hope that things will get better from here. #WemissTexas

Xoxo,
W, M, Em-Kat

White September?

Have you ever had snow in September? Have you ever had snow before Halloween? Well, if you answered no, then you are in the same boat as us... Until this last week.

We experienced our first taste of winter in the great north this week. We got about 5 inches of snow and I'm not ready for anymore! #snowsnowgoaway #Houstonwehaveaproblem

Seriously? This is September

Should we start hanging our Christmas decorations?

I guess we better get used to this. But at least it looks pretty

We also had a few visitors that came to say hi to us this past weekend. It was the first wildlife sightening on our property with a momma Moose and her baby calf! We had a little fun with it and watched them both for a little while. #theyarecuterthantheyappear #lookbutdonttouch

Loving our grass. By the way, this is the baby calf. The momma was camera shy.

And we are loving that mohawk

Xoxo,
W, M, Em-Kat

Texas comes to Alaska

The fun did not end on EK's birthday. Calee and Mimi stayed the following week to experience some of the last frontier and luckily for us they brought the Texas sun with them.

Our first trip took us down to Seward to show off the Alaskan coast. The weather was INCREDIBLE! Seriously the sun shines this clearly in Seward about twice a year that is a chance of 2 out of 365 and we hit it just right.

Wow, what a fun day to be in Seward

Next stop was Girdwood for dinner at the top of the Mountain and Seven Glaciers! 

At the top of the Alyeska Ski resort. Next time we are bringing ski's! 

Calee and Mimi soaking up the sunset with EK! 

Views come standard for all visitors! 

Only in Alaska do you get views like this! 

Once we had shown the family the Kenai Pensisula it was time to head North.  First stop Palmer!

My incredible Grandmother!

Bouldering at such a young age!

One of our favorite rivers in Alaska. Check out the colors in the trees! 

Our littlest traveler catching some zzzs! 

The family finished their trip with a stop at the Anchorage zoo. Yep, it is becoming a staple to take guests to. It is a great place to see all the cool animals in the last frontier without spending days out in the wilderness. 

It was so much fun having Calee and Mimi in Anchorage. We had a blast with them and hope they will come back soon! #makingmemories

Xoxo, 

W, M and Em-Kat

The BIG 1!

Our little bit turned the BIG 1 this month so we had a big party to celebrate! We had a 1st birthday party/housewarming party because if we are going to have a party you better make it big! #amiright

The theme for Em-Kat's first birthday party was Lilly Pultizer. Her mom loves Lilly and I had started planning the party when we lived in Houston. A September birthday in Houston is like a summer birthday in the rest of the country so it worked. But as Lilly Pultizer always said, "Anything is possible with sunshine and a little pink." So with those wise words we pushed ahead with the theme. It also helped a little that target came out with their Lilly Pultizer line in April so I could pick up a few goodies for decoration!

The birthday girl and her Momma

Being the birthday girl is a lot of work! 

Loving the little tent that mommy and daddy made me

Just a little family snapshot before the guests arrived!

Some decorations

The little picture collage we put together

More decorations

One of my sweet friends from high school gave me the best baby shower gift ever. The cake server and knife are to be used at all of Em-Kat's special events throughout her life. 

Eat up! 

Just having fun at her party

Cake and sweets table. Didn't the cake turn out so cute! 

More yummy food

3 generations - We're not related at all! 

The party was so much fun and we had some many wonderful friends stop by to celebrate our sweet little girl. We can't believe it's already been a year! Time flies when you're having fun! 

Xoxo,

W, M, Em-Kat

Back 2 Back

We had a lot of visitors in September. My parents came back to see us again and most importantly for Em-Kat's Big Par-ty!

We were able to do a few fun things while they were here this time. They got in on Saturday and we went right to having fun the next day. W and M took Pops fishing on Sunday for Silver Salmon. It was M's first time to go fishing and she caught right up to the guys. #caughtherlimit #fisherwomen (How else do you think I married W if I wasn't a good fisherwoman?)


#womenalwayswin #freezerisstocked

Fish #1 - First fish of the year!

Objects may be larger than they appear

You can tell who the real fisherman is... He holds his own fish

Is it just me or are they getting bigger

Fishing squad

Look how big it is!

Look at those beauties! The 3 biggest were caught by M

Me and my dad

The weather was terrible while my parents were in town. It literally rained EVERY. DAY. We tried to take advantage of it anyway. On Tuesday, we decided we didn't care about the weather and headed down to Seward regardless. We went to eat at our favorite place in Seward, Chinooks. It has great fresh seafood to chose from every day and you have a great view of the marina from the restaurant. It is definitely a great choice when you have family or friends in town and you want to show them around. And the kids mac and cheese is legit. 

After we finished eating we headed down to look at all the boats in the marina. They have sailboats, fishing boats, tour boats #imonaboat

She loves her Pops

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And she loves her Gigi too! 

Aren't they just so much fun! 

After lunch and the marina we headed to Exit Glacier. It's another easy little tourist stop to show people. We went on the long hike to go close to the glacier. Unfortunately like every other day it was raining on the hike, but not too bad. We made it all the way to the glacier, which is a little farther than I remember. I don't have any pictures to post, but you'll have to trust me on this one that we were there. 

The only other fun little things we did while my parents were in town is go to breakfast at Snow City Cafe. It's a great little breakfast/lunch stop. We also went to the zoo (think a little more rustic and only Alaskan/Arctic animals). It was raining the day we went to the zoo, but we tried not to let it stop us. #rainraingoaway

And then on Friday, the skies opened and the sun came out! At least they were able to see a little sun! We loved having them back in Alaska and we are already planning their next trip. We love you Gigi and Pops!

Xoxo,

W, M, Em-Kat

Ice, ice baby

Happy Labor Day Weekend! You're weekend probably included lots of sitting around the pool. Ours was the exact opposite! It was a little icy. I will be the first to tell you how much I love sitting by the pool, so for all of those people reading this thinking I am rubbing in the cool weather to you, I'm not! #imisspoolweather #southerner

We had a great Labor Day weekend. The weather was cold and rainy most of the time. But hey we have learned that it is just Alaska weather so we are getting used to it. We still love to get out and enjoy it too! We headed up north in the valley to Matanuska glacier (say it 5 times fast). This glacier was the best one I have seen up close. It's the biggest and most accessible glacier to Anchorage. We were able to get out and walk around on the glacier. It was really awesome and guess what... It checked off one of our bucket list items on becoming Alaskans. 

We loaded Em-Kat in the pack and we were off! #cutesteskimo

Look closely and you can see that fall is upon us in Alaska. Aren't the trees turning yellow just gorgeous! And pictures don't do it justice at all! And look how big that glacier is. There are tons of people on it and you can't even tell. God does pretty amazing work doesn't he!

A great family pic

It was pretty cold on the glacier. I expected it to be colder, but it was a lot colder. And we really weren't that prepared. Check out the pic above a little closer and you can see I only have one glove on. I found it in the jacket I was wearing. #onesbetterthannone I also really needed a hat and yak tracks (they give you traction on your shoes). Next time, we will all be more prepared... Hopefully. Luckily, Em-Kat seemed to be pretty happy and stayed warm. Kenai (ruf, ruf) may have had it the worst. I think her paws went numb after the first 15 min on the glacier. I guess you learn as you go. #becomingalaskans #newbies 

The cutest daddy/daughter duo there is! 

Having fun with Momma

Climbing on a glacier is hard work

After our fun day at the glacier, we stopped in Palmer at one of my favorite restaurants up here, Turkey Red. I have loved everything I have gotten there so far. It has a Greek flair to it and let me tell you the two things I miss about Houston are Greek food (bring me some Hungrys) and Mexican food (anything from Houston is better than anything here)! When I get back to Houston or the lower 48 I'm getting Mexican. 

Then on Monday, we had to get out and do something to celebrate Labor Day. And luckily the clouds parted and the sun came up so we headed down to a local trail, Cambell Creek and took a little stroll.

That's the weekend wrap. Each weekend we are becoming a little more Alaskan and checking a thing or two off the bucket list and maybe adding a few too. Check back in with us!

Xoxo,

W, M, Em-Kat