Altitude sickness is no joke, 1 beer up on the top of the  mountain could feel like 3 beers on the ground. We didn’t experience any of it, but another guest certainly did and needed some oxygen.

The room for the reception was beautiful!

We sat at a table with some other Boston people.

There was a little sprinkle before the ceremony started, but the weather held through the ceremony and the cocktail reception outside on the balcony. It didn’t start to rain until we sat down for dinner. My friend Gabe goes to at least 10 weddings a year. I joke with him that he should stop making eye contact with people so that he can finally use his vacation days for somewhere he actually wants to go. That being said, when  you have been to that many weddings, you know what works and what doesn’t – you’re a pro. So no doubt, the food was going to be delicious.

We started with a baby lettuce salad with strawberries, toasted almonds and chevre with champagne vinaigrette.

Intermezzo was a champagne sorbet.

Dinner was porcini rubbed filet mignon & butter poached Maine lobster with demi glace and lobster beurre blanc sauces, white truffle whipped potatoes and seasonal vegetables.

In lieu of a cake they did a dessert bar. Flourless chocolate mousse tulip.

Blacberry creme brulee.

New York style cheesecake rings.

Raspberry rectangles and mango jalapeno gianduja cups.

Truffles in a variety of flavors.

Pistachio frangipane.

Lemon raspberry towers.

Salted caramel feuilletine cornets.

A delicious way to end a meal. A lovely wedding overall. Simple and understated while being beautiful and classy. Guests danced the night away until around 10 and then the afterparty moved to a bar in Keystone. Congrats Gabe and Jill!

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This  scenery reminds me of our recent trip to Vegas.

Loveland is the highest mountain pass in the world that regularly stays open during a snowy winter season.

Breckenridge feels like one of those towns you see in the movies.

Main street shut down for all sorts of family oriented activities.

People were encouraged to design squares with chalk on an adjacent street.

Some of the artists were very talented.

Isn’t that amazing?

They had a group music session – everyone was given a different kind of instrument – so much fun!

Love the enthusiasm!

The local fire department came out and they opened up the hoses for the kids to run through on the street.

Everyone enjoyed this! Young children, their parents, even the dogs!!

Smart businesses were selling towels!

Rental bikes.

We were going to try and drive to Vail but we ran out of time before we had to get back for the wedding. Another time!

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The ride was about 30 minutes to the open field and homestead.

You couldn’t have asked for a better location – so picturesque. Make sure to pack some bug spray, those mosquitos are fierce – they were biting people’s faces.

The horses always pull with the same partner. You should have seen the size of these horses!! They were ENORMOUS! They can comfortably pull three times their body weight, so somewhere in the neighborhood of 15,000lbs.

Sweet flowers as centerpieces on the picnic tables.

Guests were give cowboy hats and bandanas by the wedding party to get into the mood.

The kids were pretty darn cute, wrangling the metal cows.

Dinner was served buffet style: garden salad, grilled BBQ chicken, smoked ribs, corn on the cob, Durango beans, corn bread muffins and apple pie a la mode.

Entertainment was provided by Randall McKinnon, who has been singing for the last 23 years. Randall had the whole group singing favorites like Sweet Home Alabama, American Pie and House of the Rising Sun.

Guests cooked s’mores around the fit pit.

Randall can be reached at 970.389.1246 or you can email him at mckinnon@colorado.net

Check out Randall in action.

A really great night over all – everyone had a fun night!

For more information about wagon rides at Keystone, see their website.

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The day has arrived! Mark and Bekka are getting married! Bekka had been checking the weather every day for a week leading up to the day and all it kept saying was rain. We all kept our fingers crossed and hoped for good weather – rain on a wedding day is supposed to be good luck right?

They couldn’t have asked for a better day, and there were in a few sprinkles during the day for good luck.

The ceremony took place outside on the lawn outside the Towers in Narragansett.

The Towers were built between 1881 and 1886. It has survived fires and multiple hurricanes, and remained intact when other buildings near by have crumbled.

You would have to know Mark and Bekka, but this was the perfect place for their wedding reception.

The bride is a talented artist. She and her father found a downed tree in the woods, they cut it into wooden discs that became the centerpieces at the wedding – Bekka did all of the artwork. Check out their signature cocktail!

Mark – ever the beer connoisseur, had some great choices at the bar.

And of course,  knowing Mark, I knew the food was going to be amazing! Well, that, and he told me so…

Both gamers, the cake was quite fitting, and they cut it with a sword before feeding it to one another!

We started off with the carrot and mache salad topped with a lemon balsamic vinaigrette.

We had the artichoke chicken piccata in a lemon white wine sauce with a Francaise crust.

And the pan seared George’s bank scrod with a decadent lobster sauce.

Dessert was green tea, salted caramel and lemon macarons from Silver Spoon bakery and the two cake choices were lemon and salted caramel.

And the favors were made by Ziggy from Fox Point Pickling! Mustard, reslish, sriracha and jam!

What’s the best wedding favor you’ve received?

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Workers Comp by Two Roads Brewing Company, located in Stratford, CT is 4.8% ABV and is  a Saison Style beer. Saison beers are traditionally crewed in the winter, have a complex style, and have a fruity aroma and flavor. It has a earthy yeast tone with a mild tartness – a lot of spice with  medium bitterness. It is brewed with a variety of grains including barley, wheat, oats and rye.

Brouwerij St. Bernardus NV is made by St. Bernardus Abt 12, located in Belgium and is 10% APV.  It is a quadrupel Belgian style ale which is a bolder flavor compared to the dubbel and tripel sister styles. It is a full bodied beer with a malty palate and is sweet with little bitterness. The flavor is complex and has a bittersweet finish with a hoppy bite. It has been seen as one of the best beers in the world. It was one of the original recipes from the days of license brewing for the Trappist monks of Westvleteren.

Hell of High Watermelon, made by 21st Amendment Brewery in San Francisco, CA is 4.9% APV and is a fruit beer. It is brewed with real watermelon and has a crisp, dry flavor. It is a summer, seasonal beer that starts by being brewed as a classic American wheat beer and then undergoes a traditional secondary fermentation using fresh watermelon.

Mark was (mostly) surprised and opened gifts while we celebrated.

Mei Mei Street Kitchen catered the shower! Above is the magical kale salad: local kale, Narragansett Creamery sea salt feta, garlic panko breadcrumbs, tossed in a rice wine vinaigrette. Everyone loved this dish, it was gone in about 3.2 seconds. They also offer the salad on their truck and at their brick and mortar restaurant.

Pierogi dumplings: fried hand-rolled dumplings filled with Schartner Farm russet potatoes, local greens & Cabot cheddar cheese. Served with pickles and soy aioli. While I like their traditional dumplings, I thought these were a great twist – such great flavors!

Hummus with Clear Flour crostini.

Sweet corn fritters: local cornmeal batter, Schartner Farms sweet corn, masa, served with Sriracha aioli. These were such a crowd pleaser! Stay tuned for a post about the wedding!

Mei Mei Street Kitchen

506 Park Drive

Boston, MA

http://meimeiboston.com

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The cheese board came with a bread basket, honey and nuts. It was set up in the corner, a lovely spread.

For the dinner, it was $65/person. We started with the burrata salad-which is an Il Casale menu option, but the chef agreed to do it for this party. Buttery Mozzarella from Apulia, Sicilian oregano and pistachios. I love this dish, i had extra pistachios because they are just that good.

The second course was a a choice of the following: Tagliatelle Bolognese-another Il Casale menu option-the traditional recipe, again, one of my all time favorite dishes. A lot of brides (and brides to be) say that they don’t eat at their wedding or rehearsal dinner. Not this girl, this is all my favorite food!

We also offered two other dishes, “pollo” or the chicken dish was chicken scaloppini, marsala, garlic chives, chanterelles, black trumpets and spinach. The “nasello” or fish option was pan roasted New England hake, cannellini al fiasco, cavolo nero.

For dessert we had the option of gelato – malted vanilla and chocolate hazelnut with Italian cookies.

We also had the crostada, a chocolate espresso tart with creme anglaise and chicory gelato. The service was excellent, we couldn’t have asked for more – they were attentive to our guests and kept everyone’s glass full. We would highly recommend this venue for anyone’s next special event. We tried the restaurant 3 times before we went ahead with choosing it as our rehearsal dinner location – the food and service for the regular  dining room was outstanding.

Favors for this event, and for all the events around the wedding, were themed “things we love”.  We did doughnut muffins from Bread and Chocolate in Newton for the rehearsal dinner. We called ahead to order the muffins and assembled them the day before.

I picked these great labels from ErinCondren.com – how great are they? We customized them with our names for the rehearsal dinner. For 23 labels, they are $25. Both labels measure 3.25″ x 4″.

Restaurant Dante

40 Edwin H Land Boulevard (in the Royal Sonesta Hotel)

Cambridge, MA 02142

http://www.restaurantdante.com

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We were celebrating our anniversary, so we went back to the same bakery that made our wedding cake. Let’s just take a refresher of what our cake looked like:

Photo courtesy of MKD Photography

They called us a few days before we were supposed to pick it up and they asked if it had to be exactly the same as our wedding cake. Those pinwheel things were pretty labor intensive, so I said it didn’t have to exactly match…thinking that we would get something similar…or at least in the same color scheme….this is what we got…

All in all, the decorations didn’t matter, it was the memory and the delicious flavor of the cake, which was amaretto. We had it at our wedding, but never got to have a slice The amaretto flavor was really subtle, and not too sweet. The cake was really excellent, moist, fresh and light-just reinforced that we had made the right decision with them for the wedding!

The Icing on the Cake

250 Adams Street, Newton MA

http://www.tiotc.com/tiotc/home.html

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Center pieces-we were really happy at the way these turned out-simple and elegant. (Photo courtesy of MKD Photography)

Catering by Wolfang Puck. We have been told (by Mike and Kate, of MKD Photography that this is the best salad they have had-and they’ve had a lot of wedding salads!) A chopped farmers market vegetable salad with shaved parmesan and balsamic vinaigrette.

Intermezzo as they call it, sorbet.

Steak as the main course, and they were able to do the sauce gluten free for some of our guests. Grilled filet mignon, potato galette, sauteed spinach, roasted mushrooms and shallot red wine reduction.

Wolfgang Puck has some really excellent options for hors d’oeuvres (not pictured). Spago’s signature spicy tuna tartare in a sesame miso cone; black truffle pizza with ricotta and thyme; taro root taco with smoked lobster, avocado and picked jalapeno. In addition we had a selection of artisan cheese including Grafton cloth bound cheddar (raw cow’s milk), Couple aged goat cheese (Vermont creamery), Berkshire Blue (unpasturized Jersey cow’s milk), Camambert (Blythedale Farm cow’s milk), figs, dried fruits and nuts. It was elegantly presented and a big hit with our guests. We also had late night comfort food passed around-mini cheeseburgers on a brioche bun with tiny pickles and tomatoes and truffle mac and cheese served on asian spoons.

Overall, we were really thrilled about the food. We are self proclaimed foodies, and the quality of food really exceeded our expectations. People to this day are still talking about the summer salad and how elegantly everything was plated. We highly recommend Wolfgang Puck catering.

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Saw this on the knot.com and decided  that it was a pretty cake. Paula worked with us and was patient with us as we tasted 5 or 6 flavors.  We picked square cakes, instead of round shown above. We were going to do ribbon on the base of the layers but then though against it. So a 6″ square-the top cake, was gold…my favorite cake. The middle was an 8″ golden amaretto cake, and the base was a 10″ lemon velvet cake! $45 extra because we wanted to square cakes and they are harder to frost because they have edges. It costs extra for a square cake. There is $200 deposit required, in cash or check only. Balance is due a few days before your event.

We were SO thrilled with how this cake came out! Photo courtesy of MKD photography.

We thought it was pretty accurate! The cake served 75 people – we brought TONS home!

The toppers I bought on line, a Husky groom and a terrier bride for our school mascots. They were supposed to be holding up their crossed hockey sticks, but they fell.  Later we come to find out the real reason why they aren’t holing the sticks is because the people didn’t secure the toppers on and the groom went down the back…and fractured…

They offered us a free fresh anniversary cake the following year if we sent them photos of the cake….yay!

Check them out:

Icing on the Cake

230 Adams Street

Newton MA 02458

617-969-1830

www.theicingonthecake.com

http://www.mkdphotography.com/blog/

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