Our Year in Food: 2014

2014 passed by in such a blur. We cooked more this year than we have in any other year before. We still went out to restaurants but with less time out, we tried to make every visit count. It also meant we went on a lot of food crawls to try to sample as many different things as possible on the weekends. Other than our brief stops at Caribbean island ports on the Quantum, this was another year that we stayed domestic. We missed our big international food trips, but we still had some wonderful food adventures this year. Here's our overview of our year in food.

The first restaurant meal we ate in 2014: New Year's Day lunch at Mission Cantina. All the tacos, tostadas, and sides that we tried are completely gone from Mission Cantina's ever-changing menu, but someday hopefully we'll get around to writing about it.

The first homecooked meal we ate in 2014: A combination of old and new - panko chicken tenders with leftover sauce from the bistro chicken from last New Year's Eve plus a warm black rice and butternut squash salad.

The last restaurant meal we ate in 2014: Late December lunch at Tabata Noodle, our go-to neighborhood place for ramen, to warm up with some gyoza, ramen, and tan tan men.

The last homecooked meal we ate in 2014: A made New Year's Eve dinner - seared scallops with cellophane noodles on a bed of garlic spinach and mushrooms. First time making seared scallops! We love trying and learning new things.

# of different restaurants we tried in 2014 (together and separate): 205. Considering how many meals we ate at home, I was really surprised that we broke 200, but I guess we made the most of our time out!

Cities explored (outside the NYC metro area): Las Vegas, NV; Chicago, IL (and its northwest suburbs); San Juan, PR; Philipsburg, St. Maarten; Trois Ilets, Martinique; Bridgetown, Barbados; Basseterre, St. Kitts.

# of new Shake Shack custards reviewed: 10. Double the number from last year. Our favorites from the new ones we tried were coconut marshmallow and golden sponge creme cake.

Most visited restaurant of 2014 (together): Windjammer Marketplace on Quantum of the Seas (10x, mostly due to limited options on the cruise ship). Runners-up were New Spring Garden (last year's winner, 8x, thanks to family dinners) and fast casual spots near my parents, Panera and Qdoba (both, 6x). From non-Quantum and non-family meal spots, the most visited were Meske, Don Antonio, and Obao, all in Hell's Kitchen (all, 4x). How crazy is it that our most regular spots, averaged out, were visited once per quarter?! So blessed to live in a place with so many delicious choices.

Progress on WorldEats challenge: We revamped the way we document the challenge, so we won't be listing countries here. But by the end of this year, we've blogged about food representing 39/196 countries and eaten even more.

2014 blog series that will someday be completed: Las Vegas winter escape, Chicago long weekend, Quantum of the Seas cruise extravaganza.

Favorite overall meal of 2014: Our anniversary dinner at Cosme. We'll write more about Cosme next year, but it was absolutely incredible and worth the wait to get a table. Fantastic addition to the NYC food scene.

Looking forward to more good eats in 2015!