Category Archives: Lexington

UK Football, City Barbeque

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We drove to Lexington Saturday for football and City Barbeque.  Saturday was planned as a great day of good food, tailgating and great football.  Well, we ended up getting two out of three.

We started the day by going to City Barbeque.  My wife had place the order on-line the night before.  This is great tool to take advantage of as you check the menu, select what you want and tell them the pickup time.

tailgating
tailgating

When we arrived our order was packaged and ready except for the fries and pork barbecue.   They wait until you arrive to place them in the bag to ensure they will be hot and fresh for you.  We ordered the family pack which includes: pulled pork, buns, cornbread, and two pints of sides which is enough for four people.

Along with the pulled pork and cornbread, we ordered an extra side of slaw.  With my grandson coming to tailgate with us, we also placed an order of Mac and Cheese and Chicken tenders.

The pulled pork was great.  It is some of the best BBQ I have ever eaten. City Barbeque has different sauces to pick from, but the pulled pork can stand on its own without a sauce.  The chicken tenders were also great.  The meat was tender and juicy  and the breading was perfection.  The fries were hot and good, the slaw was sweet but not too sweet and added to the pulled porks’ flavor.  The Mac and Cheese was good, real good.

tailgating City BBQ
tailgating City BBQ

We enjoyed our time eating and visiting, then we went to the game.  It is always fun to go to Commonwealth Stadium to watch the Wildcats, but sometimes it’s more fun than others.  This was not one of those times.  Florida defeated the Cats in a close game 14-9, but we had great food and a nice visit.

Travinia Italian Kitchen

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While in Lexington, Kentucky Saturday, we decided to try Travinia Italian Kitchen.  Travinia is located 3565 Nicholasville Road  at the Fayette Mall.  The Italian Restaurant looks great both inside and outside and has a large number of friendly staff.

Booth at Travinia
Booth at Travinia

When entering an Italian restaurant you are often hit by the rich aroma of herbs and spices which season the Italian food.  Travinia is not that way.

inside Travinia
inside Travinia

To start our meal we ordered crispy calamari.  The dish comes with banana peppers, sweet peppers, pepperoni, garlic butter and scallions.  What we received was uncrispy calamari with pickled banana peppers.  It appeared that the cook did not have the oil hot enough when he or she put the calamari in, but set the timer as if the oil was the proper temperature.

Calamari
Calamari

For our main course, my wife selected Pollo Isabella, which is an oven roasted chicken breast served with sun dried tomatoes, spinach, goat cheese and a lemon basil beurre blanc. The meal was warm, not hot, but the chicken was cooked completely.  The spinach was not cooked or even wilted from having the chicken placed on it.  The temperature of the plating and the food would lead you to believe that the chicken was precooked and reheated in a microwave then placed on spinach.

Pollo Isabella
Pollo Isabella

I ordered the Italian Nachos for my meal.   At Travinia the nachos come with fried chips, Italian sausage, black olives,  banana pepper, scallions, tomatoes, provolone, and asiago cream sauce.  The sever asked if I would like blackened chicken on it, but I felt that the Italian sausage would be enough.  When I received the nachos, I found the chips to be oily.  The cheese sauce was good but not hot.  If anything I would call it luke warm.

As I ate, digging deeper into the stack of chips, I wondered where is the Italian sausage?  I adjusted my glasses and found it.  The sausage was cooked in the cheese sauce.  The size of the sausage was close to a grain of rice.  If the gray particles had ever had any flavor, it had long ago been cooked out of them and then masked by the cheese sauce.

Italian Nachos
Italian Nachos

The meal was very disappointing. We do not plan to go back to this restaurant.  Maybe we went on a bad day, but there are too many great Italian restaurants in Lexington to risk another disappointment.  If the cook at Travinia, who prepared our meal could taste the calamari at Malone’s or the Italian nachos at Johnny Carino’s, they would never microwave again.