tegut and beyond

After having a quick dinner last night, hubby and I walked around in the chilly weather for a bit. I wanted to go see what tegut, an upscale grocery store, was all about. We seemed to go the roundabout way to get there, but we found it and it's definitely nice. Tons of great looking dairy, including cheeses, packages of meats for said cheese, bags of small blood oranges (which we totally forgot to grab before checking out, grrr!), alcohol, juice - you name it.

The hubby picked up a box of hot chocolate mix (one thing our hotel room was lacking), so I made him one last night. Yum! We also got him a blood orange juice (his favorite) for work, a Ritter Sport bar (new flavor - cookies and cream), and got me some chocolate cracker/biscuit things. Even their reusable bags are nice.

I've been to one of the other grocery stores, Rewe, and they're also really good. With the few apartments we're looking at right now, I could walk to either of these pretty easily, though I'm sure I'll supplement these visits with trips to the commissary for all the typical American stuff, like peanut butter and frozen pizzas... However, thanks to Pinterest, I've been slowly collecting recipes to make-my-own whatevers, such as salad dressings, laundry detergent, salsa and other various condiments, English muffins, and even yogurt. While yes, it would be easy to just buy these, what's the challenge in that? I could probably do better.  Especially since I'm in charge of food budgeting, the more I save the more we can spend on fantastic trips around the continent.

Speaking of trips, I have been flying through Rick Steves' Europe through the Back Door. It's full of great travel tips for the first half of the book, including suggested timelines, and the second half is a bunch of places that are off the typical travel hit list. Thank goodness our other book arrived in the mail, Rick Steves' Best of Europe. That clearly contains every place that you think you have to go to before you venture into the smaller towns. My brain is on overload with ideas of where to go!

Alright - for the first time in awhile, it's sunny outside, so I think I'm feeling well enough to go to the gym, shower, and then walk around for the afternoon. I also got on Instagram earlier this week and have been posting random things, so if these blog entries aren't enough (you stalker, you!), feel free to check out some more pictures.