A night out with Natural Delights

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A couple of weeks ago, I was contacted by Gina Melton of Zest in order to extend an invitation to a Holiday Party sponsored by Bard Valley Natural Delights and taking place in one of the most popular spots in South Tampa right now, Pane Rustica.

I did not have to be asked twice, I accepted so fast, I think I did not give her a chance to say another word.

My first impression of Pane Rustica was that it was cozy and was bigger than I had imagined.  They are known for Contemporary American style cuisine and are very popular with the lunch crowd.  At night it elevates its casual lunch atmosphere for fine dining and a great wine selection along with a hopping full bar.

The hosted walked me to a private dining room, where I started to mingle with my fellow bloggers who I have met before and some who I was looking forward to meeting for the first time.  Isabel from Family Foodie, Cara and Megan from Healthy Tampa Bay Living, Mr. Jeff Houck from TBO’s The Stew (love this guy!), Tracy from My Other City by the Bay, Elizabeth from Food Nation Radio Network, Nina From Panache Vue magazine, Jim from Gastroblog and Jodi from HashtagFoodPorn.

This was a serious crowd and I was delighted to share a Wednesday night in their company.

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Nescafe Dolce Gusto Foodie Feed Up Event

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A couple of weeks ago, a fellow Tampa Blogger, Leslie from The Hungry Housewife posted on facebook an upcoming Foodie Feed Up event in Tampa.

NESCAFÉ Dolce Gusto was hosting 8 Foodie Feed Ups around the country for bloggers to check out some of their local chefs’ favorite dishes and also try their yummy new coffee line and they were coming to Tampa.

They’ve already hit up Cleveland and New York City; by the time they came to Tampa and next up, they were headed to Chicago, Seattle, Houston, LA and Denver.

Five fellow bloggers along with myself jumped at the chance to experience this affair at Restaurant BT on a quiet Monday night.

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Food Blog Forum Atlanta – Take two!

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After 2 days of basically living with my Kleenex box clutched to myself and glasses upon glasses of liquid and very good, knock you out, cold medicine - I’m out of bed.  I still do not feel 100%, but there is so much sleeping and bad TV I can take – Bravo I’m looking at you, no more Housewives nonsense and shame on you for getting me hooked to Rachel Zoe.

When I stared to write about the Food Blog Forum Conference, I thought of giving you a long longer post about everything that happen in Atlanta, but with over 100 bloggers in attendance, I’m sure most have already seen plenty of recaps about how much fun we had, how much information we got from all of the great speakers, the amazing food we all ate (I’m so craving those pork belly tacos from chef Kevin Rathbun, which I’m totally going to duplicate) and the great goodies in our swag bags, which I had to ship separately because there was no way I could come up with an valuable explanation for the knife at ATL airport.

But, I do want to give out a shout to the amazing people I had the pleasure of meeting and what stayed with me from each one of them.  Let’s start with the obvious ones:

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