Toscanini's Ice Cream & Coffee (Boston)

Central Square
899 Main Street
Cambridge, MA
617-491-5877
http://www.tosci.com/

"The best ice cream in the world" - New York Times. With praise like that, we had to find out for ourselves whether or not it was the best in the world. We have yet to travel around the world, so I don't know if we would be qualified to back this claim. Toscanini's is located very close to MIT and Harvard. All of these geeks and geniuses can't be wrong. I think our IQ raised a point just being in this area.
We each ordered a double scoop of ice cream so that we could try a variety of flavor samplings. Toscanini's flavors are not your normal Rite-Aid flavors (nothing against Rite-Aid), but offers unique and strange flavor combinations. On the right is the blueberry and orange flavor and underneath it is ginger snap molasses. On the left is a chocolate and coconut combination and underneath that is hazelnut coffee. We both really enjoyed the flavors that we sampled that night. The ice cream was not as texturally smooth as I imagined it to be. This may be due to the fact that we just had some fantastic gelato at Il Laboratorio Del Gelato in New York and was comparing gelato to ice cream. Overall, the ice cream was very, very good. I don't know about "best ice cream in the world" good, but very good nonetheless.

Neptune Oyster (Boston, MA)

63 Salem St
Boston, MA 02113 (617) 742-3474
neptuneoyster.com

While walking Boston's Freedom Trail and seeing the historical sites, we stopped by Neptune Oyster, tucked in the streets of the North End.


Here's the many varieties of oysters they had to offer...each having its own descriptionThe shucker at work...Shown here, from the left of the lemon slice: Wellfleet, Island Creek, Ninigret, St. Simon, Kumomoto, and the Fanny Bay...Served with cocktail sauce and mignonette, which is vinegar, white wine and shallots. I enjoyed slurping my oysters with the cocktail sauce instead of the mignonette. The white wine in it was a bit overpowering for me. My favorite to this day is the classic mignonette from Hog Island that has cilantro, shallots and rice vinegar. My favorite was the Ninigert... it had a very nice sweet finish to it. If you look closely at the very top oyster in the picture, you will see that it's really two oysters on two connected shells. I guess they gave me a mutated one, but it still tasted good.

Lobster Shack at Two Lights (Cape Elizabeth, Maine)

25 Two Lights Road
Cape Elizabeth, Maine 04107
207.799.1677

Thank goodness for our GPS to navigate us to the Lobster Shack. Nestled past the windy, tree-lined roads of Cape Elizabeth, we arrived at the coastline with one of the two lighthouses overlooking the waters. We walked up the steps to the Lobster Shack Restaurant and was amazed at the site....
I was so excited to be eating at these quaint picnic tables, eating my lobster, experiencing the breathtaking view, taking in the fresh East Coast ocean breeze, and watching the sunset as our dinner comes to an end.My second lobster meal in Maine. I can't get enough! It was quite a jump in prices from Fox's ($36 for 1.25 lb lobster with fries and cole slaw), but the outdoor seating and beautiful views were well worth it!!
The only disadvantage with eating outside in the chilly weather was that my warm lobster was getting cold...so I had to quickly devour my lobster to fully taste the warm, juicy lobster. We are satisfied for now!!! But still hungry for more lobster!