3rd House Journal: Noho and snow

Monday, October 19, 2009

Noho and snow

[Viva Fresh Pasta, Northampton MA; 10/17/09]

We took a drive out to Northampton on Saturday, about 100 miles west of Boston, straight out the Mass Turnpike. D had never been there, so I showed him around campus at my alma mater as well as the many shops and restaurants downtown. After our wanderings, we ended up at Viva Fresh Pasta for an early dinner. We'd passed the place a couple of times but ultimately couldn't pass up the sweet potato ravioli with maple walnut saute on the specials menu. At least that's what D chose, quite happily. I started with a bowl of butternut squash bisque followed by grilled chicken with romesco sauce and asparagus, with fresh garlic-parsley fettuccine - all scrumptious. As the name implies, Viva Fresh Pasta makes all their own pasta, but everything else we sampled was excellent as well. We were also lucky to snag a great table in one of the two front bay windows (see above).

[Paradise Pond view, Smith College campus]

It was a rather gray and chilly day, but at least we had none of the rain that was predicted to wash out the entire weekend. On Sunday afternoon, however, it went beyond rain to fat wet snowflakes that fell all afternoon and into the evening, although generally melting on contact, at least where I live. Out in Foxboro, the New England Patriots played at what I first thought was a hockey rink when the game came on the TV because of the white field (a ridiculous blowout over the Titans, 59 to 0). We had considered going to the Head of the Charles regatta in Cambridge on Sunday until we saw first the cold rain in the morning and then the snow in the afternoon. So after running errands by car, we stayed in with the football game and I puttered in the kitchen making a turkey meatloaf (see leftovers tonight for dinner, below), warming up the house with the hot oven.