For our second dating challenge (from the 10 Summer Date Ideas I posted awhile back), we decided to venture outside of Logan, which is something we don’t do often (unless we’re headed to Bountiful, but that doesn’t make us any more familiar with the surrounding towns). Here’s the original dating challenge for this particular date:
Drive to the next town over (or, if you’ve been there a lot, drive a few towns over) and stop to eat at the first eatery you come to that’s locally run. Make friends with your waiter and ask him/her to recommend a dessert stop (elsewhere) that you could go check out after your meal. In other words, it’s kind of like a shortened progressive dinner that combines the thrill of new places with the lower expense of only going to two eateries.
We started out around 3:30 PM because we wanted to beat the dinner rush (and because we live in a sprawling valley where the nearest town that doesn’t have “Logan” in the title is over 20 minutes away). We passed fields of purple wildflowers, more cows than we cared to count, and tempting raspberry stands all over the side of the road.
Our purpose was clear though, and we were not to be deterred.
Except the problem was, we didn’t realize that in the surrounding small towns, there really WASN’T much in the way of restaurants and the like (unless you counted the occasional Mickey D’s). We were getting antsy–so antsy, in fact, that we stopped at the Pepperidge Farm outlet for sustenance as we continued our arduous task of finding a new restaurant.
You see, Matt and I are the kind of people that find a place we both like, and we go there for everything. When we were in Bountiful, we went to the Leatherby’s in nearby Salt Lake (where, coincidentally, Matt proposed to me AND where we decided to go when it came to catering our wedding). In Logan, we go to Angie’s, a local diner that serves a killer double-decker burger combo for only $6.99 that includes a drink, hot French fries, and more burger than I know what to do with.
Needless to say, we don’t venture out of our culinary comfort zone often.
However, after driving for about 35 minutes, we saw it: a charming little bistro named Callaway’s that had flowers climbing up trellises and an empty parking lot.
We pulled over, stomachs ripping apart with hunger, when we saw it: they didn’t open for another 45 minutes. We debated and huffed and hawed over the decision, but in the end, the drive home would be almost as long as the wait itself, so we just decided to go exploring around the local town (Smithfield), where we found a deliciously darling flower shop and a hardware/home supply store that basically carried everything where we were able to kill time for the next half hour.
In the end, I was SO glad we waited because Callaway’s delivered up (literally) the best pizza I’ve ever eaten in my life (along with some killer breadsticks). My dish (the ravioli) was just all right, mostly due to its miniscule size, but Matt’s ranch chicken pizza was seriously to die for–the expensive cheese on top alone was enough to make me want to pass out with pleasure.
Of course, when it came time to ask for dessert, we couldn’t even think about it—we were both so stuffed that we just wanted to roll ourselves out of there and lie down in our air-conditioned apartment, and pronto.
(Technically that makes us 0 for 2 when it comes to completely fulfilling the “rules” of the dating challenge, but at least these are pushing us out of our comfort zone, right?)
Couple quick notes: Callaway’s is a little pricey, but totally worth it when it comes to the taste. If you’re looking for the most value for your dollar, don’t get the ravioli (it literally only came with 6 ravioli noodles and cost $16), but DO get the pizza (a medium is more than enough for two people, and it only costs about $14). Matt was highly disappointed in the root beer and actually sent his back in exchange for a lemonade, so I just thought I’d throw that out there for all you RB fans.
All in all?
A winning date.
Are you the type to always visit the same restaurant over and over again? Or are we just boring?
