A Real Date Night!

I love date nights.  They don't happen often, which is why they are so special.  When my children were really really young we use to plan date nights only to have to cancel them because a child became sick the day of our planned date.  So very frustrating!

Finding babysitters has also been a challenge.  Now, we have several babysitters to call upon and it makes the process of planning a date night that much easier.  And the kids love the attention from the babysitters and are very good at going to bed when they should!

Last night was date night for my husband and I.  We wanted to try out a new restaurant that Michael Symon opened up at one of our favorite spots.  The restaurant is called B Spot and the newest location is at Crocker Park in Westlake, OH.  A very simple place - mostly a burger place but he also throws in some extra interesting dishes like fried bologna and brats just to name a few.  His burgers are not the ordinary burger but gourmet burgers with interesting toppings.  I ate the Chilly Willy burger.  It had bean-less chili and cheddar cheese on top of my burger.  The burger was cooked to perfection!  Then my husband and I shared an order of rosemary and sea salt seasoned french fries and an order of onion rings.  We also drank a very interesting beer - it was bourbon beer.  I don't like bourbon but this beer was quite yummy.

Since the B Spot does not take reservations and it is a trendy new place to dine and because it's another one of Michael Symon's creations, the wait is long.  Typically the wait is about 1 1/2 to 2 hours.  When we arrived at around 6:00pm the wait was roughly 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 hours.  We were prepared for the wait, however!

White Peach Sangria

Crocker Park is a mini-city of its own.  They have almost every trendy type of store and restaurants on the lower level of the outdoor "mall" with apartments and a mini-financial district on the second floor.  There is so much to see and do while you wait and the management of B Spot was smart, they managed to acquire "pagers" for tables that go as far as Crocker Park is large - which is probably about 1/4 of a mile from one end to the other.  

We opted to get "pre-dinner drinks" at 87 West - a wine bar and eatery.  They still had room on their patio so we were able to sit and have drinks, chat and people watch.  We still had a few minutes left before we needed to check back at the restaurant so we navigated our way through the crowds of people and checked out many of the shops.  We were probably at close to the furthest point we could be from the restaurant when our pager started buzzing.  We had to high tail it back to the  restaurant and claim our very much eagerly awaited and coveted table!  When we got there we got the best seat in the house!  It was on the patio!  So not only did we get to eat yummy food, but we also got to people watch from the best spot too.

A little about the restaurant, B Spot - We Clevelanders are very fortunate to have wonderful eateries.  I think Cleveland and its suburbs have a well kept secret in our restaurants.  Locally, we all know what we got, but some of our restaurants could go head to head with any of those in larger metropolitan cities such as New York.  Michael Symon is definitely a home grown chef hero!  He has taught me how to expand my palate with interesting food combinations.  B Spot is no different.  Although a very casual place in comparison to his other restaurants, B Spot did not disappoint when it came to unique and flavorful tastes!  I highly recommend at least a one time visit!  And I'm pretty sure, you'll be pleased with the food and service - it's well worth the wait!

When dinner was over we spotted my niece and her friend and had a nice little chat.  Afterwards we took a quick walk to the ice cream and candy store and had ourselves an ice cream cone for dessert.  Then I came up with the brilliant idea to go to the "beach" to capture the sunset and take a little stroll.

Lake Erie at Sunset off of Huntington Beach

Another thing we Clevelanders take for granted, is our lake.  Lake Erie might not be the most glamorous body of water, but it's not too bad.  Our beaches aren't by any means "fabulous" but they do serve the right purpose.  My husband, being a native Philly boy, never took a walk at Huntington Beach - so I suggested we do that.  He was surprised at how "nice" it was.  I'll be honest though, nice, is relative.  Growing up it was not such a nice beach, now I think I could actually let my kids play there.  Still a little "iffy" on the swimming in the water, but I think I could be persuaded to let them swim in a couple of years!

I felt like a teenager again with a teenage like walk on the beach and walk out to the water on the rocks.  Although we had to dodge the bird poop along the way.  We were obviously walking bare-footed so the bird poop sort of "cheapened" the romance a little bit.  It was here on the rocks that my husband pulled out his handy dandy smart phone and took a photograph of the two of us with the sunset behind us.

Jon and I at Huntington Beach
at sunset!

When we got home, the babysitter had the kids in bed and sleeping and it was only 10:15pm.

Despite my really swanky and stylish red patent leather stiletto open toe pumps giving me mammoth blisters and me stepping on an undetermined pointy item while walking barefoot on the rocks, we had a great time and last night will go down as one of my favorite "date nights"!  I think we just had grins on our faces all night long and had a wonderful but simple time.  The best part of my evening was I got to spend it alone, with my best friend in the whole entire world.