Santa Barbara Axxess Blogging...Year 3 #5 - Empress Palace

I am literally failing at using my Axxess card.  This week I achieved my 5th punch since Oct 1.  That is basically 1 punch per month which is not acceptable.  My mom and I have now made a commitment to use it at least once a week until it expires or we go to all of the restaurants we want to try.

Empress Palace is one of our favorite Chinese food restaurants in Santa Barbara.  They have a really high quality of food that only a few other places have.  And..every dish there is always so good!  The deal at Empress Palace is buy one entree, get one free.  Wahoo!  You also receive 15% off every time you go after the first time.

My mom and I like to order family style.  We chose to order sweet and sour chicken and chicken egg foo young.  All of their chicken dishes are made with white meat which is really awesome!  These are two dishes we hadn't tried there before, and both were delicious.

The sweet and sour sauce was delicious and the portion size was huge.

The egg foo young patties were very large and so delicious and crispy!  The rest of the dish tasted like it was cooked in a slow cooker...it just melted in my mouth!

With our Axxess card we saved $13.99!  I definitely plan to return....after I have been to all of the other restaurants on my card LOL

As a side note...can you tell I took these pics with my phone?  I think they came out pretty nice :)

American Idol - Top 13 Announced

I generally record everything and watch it the next day...so don't ever tell me what happens on American Idol.  I have to say, I am pretty excited about the top 13.  I agree with most of the choices and like (just not love) the others.  My favorites are:

Top 10
*Phillip Phillips
*Jessica Sanchez
*Hollie Cavanagh
Joshua Ledet
*Heejun Han
Shannon Magrane
*Skylar Laine
*Elise Testone
*Colton Dixon
Jermaine Jones

3 Wild Cards
*Erika Van Pelt
Jeremy Rosado
DeAndre Brackensick

The only contestant I was really sad to see go home was Reed Grimm.  I hope he makes it some other way!  I guess there are really only a few boys that I am not a huge fan of.  This is going to be such a good season!

Savannah Smiles Girl Scout Cookies

I love all new things...but especially new foods.  The second I heard about the new flavor of Girl Scout Cookies a few months ago, I knew I had to have them.

As you can see from the above pictures, they are little lemon-flavored cookies.  They are sooooo good.  They are really lemony, like more lemony than my mom or I ever expected them to be.  My only complaint is that you don't get more in a box.  I suggest if you like lemony foods, that you buy a box of these while they are available!

American Idol - Top 12 Girls

Let's hope I like the girls better than the guys.

*Chelsea Sorrell - She sang Cowboy Casanova by Carrie Underwood.  I enjoyed it, too bad the judges didn't!  Yay, good start.

*Erika Van Pelt - What About Love.  Wahoo - two good performances in a row.  Maybe Ryan was right that a girl could win this year!

Jen Hirsh - One and Only by Adele.  I found it boring :(

Brielle Von Hugel - Sitting on the Dock of the Bay by Otis Redding.  I thought it was good.

*Hallie Day - Feeling Good.  I enjoyed it and I genuinely like her!

*Skylar Laine - Stay with Me.  The country girls are doing so well tonight!

Baylie Brown - Lonestar's version of Amazed.  It got a little better as it went on...but it was disappointing. I really wanted to like her :(

*Hollie Cavanagh - Reflection by Christina Aguilera.  I really liked it and my mom thought it was awful.  Hmmm

Haley Johnsen - Sweet Dreams.  Randy Jackson and I hated it.

Shannon Magrane - Go Light Your World.  I thought it was kind of boring but her voice was really good.

*Jessica Sanchez - Love You I Do.  What an amazing performance for someone with swollen vocal chords.  It started off too quiet but by the end she must have been soaring on adrenaline!

*Elise Testone - One and Only by Adele...again.  This was the same song I found boring above???  I loved it this time!

I starred everyone I thought should go on...more than 5...eek!  I definitely thought the girls were better overall than the boys!

Pete's Breakfast House in Ventura, CA

Shortly after my mom bought the Chinese food voucher on her kindle, an ad came up on my kindle for Pete's Breakfast House, also in Ventura, CA.  Since she bought the last voucher, I bought this one.  We finally got to use it last weekend.  Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives has been here, so it had quite the reputation to live up to.

After about a half hour wait to be seated, our order was taken fairly quickly and our food came out at a reasonable speed.

I ordered a meat maniac omelet (you get to choose one meat) and it comes with potatoes and bread.  Yum!

Huge, yummy biscuits!  I put homemade jam on mine instead of butter.

My mom ordered a great Greek omelet, which came with tomatoes, olives, spinach and feta.  She liked it but wished the spinach was cooked more and that there was more feta.

Overall, this place was good.  It probably wasn't worth a 30 minute wait, but it was worth the voucher that we used there.  We enjoyed ourselves, but probably won't be returning since it is out of the area.  If we lived less than 30-45 minutes away, I'm sure it would be different.

American Idol - Top 13 Guys

In the past I have put up huge posts about all of the contestants.  I think this time I am gonna keep it simple and only write about a few of the contestants.

I absolutely love Reed Grimm.  I loved his jazzy rendition of Moves Like Jagger.

Colton Dixon did a Paramore song.  I normally love him but I was unimpressed.

I didn't even really remember Aaron Marcellus from auditions but I loved his Jackson 5 song, even though I had never heard it before.

Phillip Phillips sang In The Air Tonight.  He is another one of my favorites.

Eben Franckewitz did an okay job of an Adele song - but who can deny how adorable he is?

Heejun Han sang Angels.  He is my Asian brother or something...but his performance was only so so.

Jermaine Jones sang Dance with my Father as the 13th guy in the top 12.  It was alright.

Overall, I was underwhelmed.  The judges seemed to love the guys but I just didn't.  We'll see what Thursday night results bring.

Leap Into Books Giveaway Hop

I am participating in another book-themed giveaway hop - yay!

This giveaway hop is hosted by I Am A Reader, Not A Writer and Jinky is Reading.  There are currently over 200 blogs participating!!!  The giveaway hop goes through March 5th so you have almost a week to enter.

I am giving away a $10 Amazon gift card.  After you enter my giveaway, be sure to check out the linky below and enter all of the other giveaways!

Please please please only enter using Rafflecopter.  Blog comments will not count.


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I am sponsoring my own prize.