Group Dinner

We (as in my IBM team at Austin) went out for a group dinner tonight.

"We" consists of - Vasu, Russell, David, Ronald, Xaio(pronounced as Shaio), Kanika, Aloke, Yaju, Manish and Moi.

"Tonight!!"... well it was 6pm here when we set out. I was not comfortable with the concept of dinner, especially when the sun hadn't set. Didn't matter much as I was starved. The sun generally sets at about 8:30 here in Austin during this time of the year.

Ok, coming back at the timing issue, Russell told me that Americans generally have dinner between 6-7pm and 8pm being the latest. Well, no wonder all the good restaurants shut so early. But I guess as long as I am having lunch at 12 noon, 6 or 7 is fine for dinner.

Dinner was great, we went to a place called P.F. Chang's China Bistro

I had extra spicy "Chang's Spicy Chicken". I hate to give stats on food, but here is something interesting about this dish I ordered.

CHANG'S SPICY CHICKEN
Lightly dusted and stir-fried in a sweet Sichuan sauce.

Calories - 990
Protein - 61g
Carbs - 70g
Total Fat - 51g
Saturated Fat - 5g

Ingredients: Marinated chicken, Chang's sauce, white sauce, chili paste, cornstarch, garlic, potato starch, sesame oil, green onions

I have no idea about how much intake should any of the above mentioned be taken. Since when have I started talking about calories? Dino or bobo would definitely take my case on this :-).

The interesting thing which I ate, was the appetizer, CHANG'S CHICKEN IN SOOTHING LETTUCE WRAPS. What I liked was the way it was served, with Lettuce leaves served separately so that we could put the chicken inside that leaf, roll or wrap it around the chicken and eat.

As I was sitting closer to Russell, Dave and Ron, the level of the conversation was just what I was looking for. Talked about traveling, India, Texas, Music, Wines(I will come back to this later), food and family stuff.

Russell (57), is a good man not to mention strikingly intelligent (at that age). It's great how he could relate to a 23 year old and we couldn't stop talking. or was it me up a level ;-)? I ended the dinner with Graham's "Six Grapes" Porto, I can describe it one word, smoooooth.