All posts tagged: food

Cold Soba Noodle and Pork Salad

Summer Recipe: Cold Soba Noodle and Pork Salad

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It’s not quite officially summer here in Providence, Rhode Island, but it sure feels like it. We live in a cute little Victorian house with no AC so as the days have been getting more hot and humid, our meals keep getting colder and colder with more salads and fruits. It’s a little tough to think of a cold meal in conjunction with date night. When you think of dinner dates, you typically think of a beautiful steak or a fancy fish. But with the early summer we’ve had, being in a hot kitchen and eating a hot meal afterwards sounds awful! We decided to get a little creative on date night and came up with a delicious cold soba noodle and pork salad recipe that we absolutely loved. Yes, I know what your thinking. Noodles with salad? Cold noodles? Are you nuts? But I promise you, this is the best dang noodle bowl combination you’re going to want during the summer. And it’s great for date night because it’s more than just a salad. …

Tonight's Better Togehter Top Ten Posts

Our Top Ten 2016 Posts for Marriage Resources and Date Ideas

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The month of May marks our one year anniversary for our blog. We’ve made it! We’ve gotten through our first year and we’re reflecting on how amazing of a journey it’s been so far. We can’t believe how fast this year has flown by, how many incredible people who we’ve connected with, all of the adventures we’ve been on and the community that’s grown around this blog. In one year, we have an amazing community of 2,000 readers, we’ve written 57 posts, taken 5,208 photos and have spent countless hours planning, researching and learning. A very big thank you to all of our readers, commenters and new friends we met during this process. So in celebration of our one year blogiversary, here’s a round up of the top ten articles that became everyone’s favorite. If you’re not a weekly reader or if this is your first time here, this is a great way to get to know us. We invite you read and join the community. 1. 50 Questions to Really Get to Know Your Spouse …

Summer Cocktail Recipe: Summer Sage and Ginger Fizz

Summer Cocktail Recipe: Summer Sage and Ginger Fizz

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We’re so thrilled to have the opportunity to receive complimentary his and her glasses from Painted by the Shore, a local artist located in Connecticut. We’re including a link to her beautiful Esty shop if you want to see more. Also, Kristina the shop owner has kindly given all of our readers 25% off any purchase. Just enter BETTERTOGETHER25 at check out.     Summer will be here before we know it, which means there will be lots of time to kick back, taking in the summer breeze and lazily chit chatting about life. Living here in Rhode Island has given me a whole new perspective of summer. Coming from the land of endless summer (California) but now embracing the land of seasons (which includes freezing temperatures), I have had to learn not to take the seasons for granted and enjoy every single second. It only lasts for so long before fall comes quickly chasing it’s heals. What is our favorite place to soak it in you ask? On our cute New England porch with …

Fun Date Night In: "Chopped" at Home

Fun Date Night In: “Chopped” at Home

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There are some nights that you just want to do something completely out of the box and have a lot of creative fun. We recently got on a cooking kick and along with some cooking documentaries, we also started watching “Chopped”. For those who have never seen the show, it’s an intense competition between chefs of all kinds of backgrounds given odd ingredient combinations and a time limit. We thought, how much fun would it be to actually have a “Chopped” date night? We set off to the store, got our ingredients and cooked up something that definitely would have never even crossed our minds. After judging our cooked results, we decided that if we were on the show, we would have been “Chopped”! After a fun night of creativity, tons of laughs and a couple of faux pas, we came to the conclusion that this was one of our favorite date nights and had to share the idea with you! Instructions: To start, you can either 1) download and print our shopping list for …

Date night in: sushi kit and homemade sushi

Fun Date Night In: Sushi Kit & Homemade Sushi

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We love sushi. We love the colors, the creativity and the artful combinations of flavors. So we decided to bring the creativity home by purchasing a sushi kit and had a fun date night making mostly sushi Frankenstein’s and sometimes works of art. We stuck to maki sushi (rice on the inside and seaweed on the outside) for simplicity and by the end of it, created two really delicious rolls we had to share with you! Other than the prep, maki is surprisingly simple. It’s fun to cut up all sorts of veggies, fruits (avocado or mango anyone?), protein if that’s your thing and combine all of the flavors and colors in every which way. We made futomaki for this date night, which actually conveniently translates to date-maki. Perfect, right? Futomaki is the larger sushi roll we love to order here in America, with the seaweed on the outside and 2 or more inches in diameter of rice and a whole lot of delicious ingredients. Keep in mind that while we found an amazing combination …

Grapefruit aperol spritz

Winter Date Ideas: Game Night with Specialty Cocktails

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One of our favorite parts of blogging is meeting the amazing, supportive, talented people of the blogosphere and Sofia Clara is nothing short of that. We met Sofia on Instagram of all places and our blogging relationship grew from there. Sofia is based out of Switzerland and has a beautiful blog on all things DIY, recipes, fashion and everyday life tips. My personal favorite posts are her Ikea hacks – nothing short of clever and beautiful. We hope you enjoy today’s guest blogger and definitely go check out her blog.     I don’t know about you, but the short days and grey weather during the wintertime have a big impact on me. I’m a big homebody and even more so during the winter months, but this month I really started missing those more spontaneous summer dates where you can just throw on a summer dress and head out for a drink or a walk by the lake (I live in Lausanne, right by one of Europe’s biggest lakes). I thought it would be fun …

Valentine’s Day for him // Breakfast in bed plus the perfect eggs benedict recipe

Valentine’s Day for Him: Breakfast in Bed

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It’s a known fact that Valentine’s Day is a holiday for women. Turn on the TV and there are a million commercials of men buying women flowers, chocolates and diamonds. Even single women celebrate the day with a girl’s night out or purchasing gifts for their close single lady friends. Most men feel indifferent about the holiday and brush it off as just another day on the calendar. Although I must admit this is a sweet deal for us ladies, it’s not actually the right way for going about Valentine’s Day. I wanted to get a good perspective of what Valentine’s Day is really like for men so I went straight to my most reliable source, my husband. Most of what he reflected on, I could have guessed. For men, the days leading up to February 14th turn into stressful days of planning. There is also a monetary value that’s placed on the holiday. There is an unanimous agreement in American culture that the more money that’s spent on Valentine’s Day, the better the day …

Free date night ideas: camping indoors

Free Date Night Ideas: Camping Indoors

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With the winter holidays fresh in our memories, we’ve been searching for fun date night ideas. If your wallets are a little lighter than normal due to the holidays, we understand you. With that in mind, we wanted to factor both the winter season and our budget into this date idea. We landed on camping indoors because who doesn’t like to build a tent out of blankets? It’s not just for kids anymore my friends. I’m sure most can agree it’s good to mix things up every once in a while, so why not do that with your house? Now you can go the whole nine yards and pull out the sleeping bags, assemble the tent in the house and drag out camping equipment but let’s face it, you are at home and camping can be so much more comfortable. We drug our mattress out of the bedroom and laid it in the middle of our apartment, spread all of our blankets around, hung some of our Christmas lights up to create that “starry night” …

Free date night ideas: how to plan the perfect night in

Free Date Night Ideas: How to Plan a Perfect Night In

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Sometimes finding time for a date night can be harder than planning one. With kids, on top of career, on top of daily tasks, date night can grow further and further away from the reality of actually happening. If you don’t have kids, the financial strain can bring fun nights out to a screeching halt. Even living in New England can put a damper on going out. Last year, we got snowed in 5 times on scheduled date nights. To make it even funnier, we’ve had this article on the schedule for a year now to be released this Sunday, and what would you know, there was a snow storm last night. To say the least, we’ve had to learn how to get creative with date nights. In general, having a special night out with your spouse can become stressful. Who has time to get dressed up and find a babysitter anyway? But the beauty of kids is that they have a bed time. And with the comfort of home, you have everything you need for …

The Butcher Shop Restaurant Review, Boston MA

Date Night at the Butcher Shop?

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We did it again. We’ve headed back into Boston for another date night. This time was a little more low key than the last but after a long week, those are always welcome. For this date night, we headed to The Butcher Shop. No, we didn’t go to an actual butcher shop to purchase meat for a date night. 1) I definitely did not feel like cooking (did you not catch my mention of a long week?) and 2) staring at dead animals is not my idea of romantic. The Butcher Shop is actually a highly rated restaurant in the Back Bay neighborhood of Boston. The food is a combo of French (my favorite) and Italian (my husbands favorite) so it was a perfect match for us. With the name The Butcher Shop, you can expect a lot of well cured, perfectly cut and cooked meat. It is not only a wine bar but also a fully functioning butcher shop. Have no fear though, the restaurant is artfully decorated with a slate wine bar and …

La Voile French Restaurant - Newbury Street, Boston

Date Night on Newbury Street, Boston

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We finally spread our wings and made our way to the beautiful city of Boston for a date night. Although we love our little city of Providence, we wanted to do something with a different scene. We headed to Newbury Street for a night of exploring, roaming, sight seeing and ending the night with dinner and dessert at La Voile. One of the things that we don’t like about Boston is that parking is always a hassle: it costs too much, there’s never any street parking, or if there is street parking, there is a chance of getting a ticket. We know from experience unfortunately, as we’ve gotten many tickets in Boston. With this date we decided to try to centralize it into one area so we wouldn’t have to deal with the insanity of parking in Boston. Also, because we made such a long trek, we wanted to do something that was not just going to a restaurant but also seeing the sights and taking our time. Enter Newbury Street. Part of the Back Bay neighborhood, this …

Perfect Date Night Dinner: Filet Mignon with Bearnaise Sauce, Portabella Mushrooms and Vegetable Gratin

Special Date Night Recipe: Filet Mignon with Bearnaise Sauce, Portobella Mushrooms and Vegetable Gratin

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Some nights call for dressing up, making reservations and going out for a movie. Others call for a quiet night together with no distractions, candlelight dinner and fun talking in the kitchen. Food always has a special way of bringing people together and creating conversation. As usual, we made our usual Saturday morning trek to the Lippett Park farmers market in Providence. First stop coffee to function like a normal human being, second stop Humble Pie for their mini pies to get rid of the hangry then off to mix and mingle, hem and ha over veggies and finally leave with a heavy bag of fresh produce loot. We grabbed the last of the summer squash as fall is finally here and we knew it wouldn’t be long until the root veggies make their 6 month appearance. I’m usually a fan of steak and potatoes, but this time we did something a little lighter and cough, cough healthier.  And like I said, who can turn down the last of the local summer vegetables? Easy Vegetable …

Best Places for Coffee in Providence RI

Best Coffee Shops in Providence RI

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Coffee is an integral part of American life these days. Most of the time it provides the kick we all need in the morning to get our day started. While this may be the typical association with coffee, it can also be a great catalyst for a first date or a laid back date. We have scowered Providence to highlight some exceptional coffee shops that each bring their own flair to the joy that is coffee (for those that do not drink coffee, what is wrong with you? Just kidding, or am I???) New Harvest Coffee and Spirits (@nharvestcoffee) Located in the oldest indoor mall in America, this establishment has a very relaxed atmosphere with ample seating, wonderful coffee and pastries. They roast all of their own coffee and distribute it around Providence to various establishments so you can expect some killer quality. One of the stand out features about this coffee shop is that they offer a large selection of whiskey for those later hours when coffee might not be the drink of choice. …

Personal Chef for the Night

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Usually we write about some amazing restaurant that we’ve discovered in New England, an incredible recipe idea or helpful relationship advice. But not tonight! We’ve gone a little out of the box. Nay, we’ve left the box. There were flames (literally), entertainment and amazing food all from the comfort of our home. How is this possible from home you ask? Easy, a personal chef for the night. Enter Mr. Joe Choi, a professional chef with a flare for complex flavors in what seems like simple recipes. On tonight’s menu he prepared an eggplant caponata appetizer, pan seared scallops with oyster mushroom risotto and s’mores torched right in front of us on our very own dinning room table. He took over our quaint, little kitchen and worked culinary magic on our tiny stove. A personal chef seems like something only for the rich and famous. This couldn’t be further form the truth! Most personal chef’s curve their meal plan based off of your personal preference, dietary need and budget. Doing a quick search on yelp for …

The Farmers Market Treasure Hunt: Fish Tacos, Pico de Gallo & Sriracha Aioli

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Sometimes date nights don’t need to be dinner and a movie. Sometimes they can be something you least expect, like perusing the farmers market. This Saturday, thunder clouds loomed in the distance but the sun shined over Providence. We decided to take advantage of the cooler day and the sunshine by checking out the local farmers market. When we arrived, our first stop was Harvest Coffee for some strong cold brew (the way we like it!). With coffee in hand, the next stop was Humble Pie Co for something sweet for me and something savory for my husband. We took our peach pie and quiche lorraine, grabbed a bench, enjoyed the sunshine and people watched. Once the pies were consumed and the coffee was no more, we took in each booth one at a time, admiring the heirloom tomatoes the size of small cantaloupes, purple peppers and giant sunflowers. In California, farmers markets for the most part carry the same veggies and fruits year in and year out. However, living in the land of seasons …