Sherif and I celebrated our first year wedding anniversary this past weekend (though we completed a year on July 18,2010)! I cannot believe it’s already been over a year since our wedding. Three hundred and sixty-five days… wow.

A mini glimpse into our wedding day on July 18, 2009 :

We were emphatic about having quality Middle Eastern (Lebanese) food at our reception, so we catered from the now-owner of Nora Restaurant (who back then owned Aladdin’s Eatery), Walid Boustany. The food was exquisite, the display was elegant, and his service was highly professional and courteous. (And this review is coming from a critical foodie!)

One of the best vendors we hired was our cake baker – the Swiss Bakery, based in Springfield, VA. Since we had a larger wedding, we wanted enough cake to go around, so we decided on an economical way to make the cake that wouldn’t cost $7 per slice and yet would still look exquisite and taste phenomenal: we decided not to “stack”. The result? A majestic pyramid structure! Oh, and I can’t forget to mention that the filling we chose was chocolate mousse – moist, light, and oh-so-chocolaty!

The outside decorations on the cake were so carefully sculpted too. It almost looked like a work of art:

The best thing about the Swiss Bakery? They gave us a free 6 inch replica of our wedding cake on our anniversary! So no, we didn’t save our top layer in the freezer for a year (I really find this kind of gross anyway). We got a fresh one just a month ago when we last visited Virginia…

In addition to satisfying our sweet craving for decadent wedding cake, last weekend, Sherif took me to Taxim Restaurant in the Wicker Park area in Chicago. Taxim features regional Greek cuisine from the mountains, the islands, the cities and the villages of greater Greece. My baby searched online for hours to find the perfect little place for us to celebrate. I’m not sure if Sherif knew that I was secretly craving Greek food for the past couple of weeks, or if he just took a lucky guess, but either way, I’m glad he stumbled across this place!

Before discussing the food, let’s talk about decor! Taxim is well-designed: soft arches on the ceilings and chic exposed brick are reminiscent of ancient Greek architecture and elegant lantern-chandeliers spread a dim, romantic light throughout the space:

Sherif and I were excited to see replicas of ancient church icons hanging on the walls – pretty cool! Sherif even made a joke about feeling like he’s having dinner in church…

Even though we eat out almost every week, there’s something different and very special about dressing up and being taken out on a date to a surprise location – brings back memories of our first months together…

We ordered a delicious rosé wine from Greece, which we sipped on throughout dinner. For appetizer, we ordered the pureed chickpeas (homemade hummus), which had a nice garlicky touch, and authentic house-marinated mixed olives. Both were delicious. For the main dishes, we ordered the duck: “spit-roasted Gunthorp farms duck breast and leg rubbed with pastourmá spices, mint yogurt sauce, Pontian satz bread, pomegranate, cucumber salad” and the lamb shoulder: “boneless lamb shoulder braised in red wine in a yuvétsi (terra cotta dish) tomatoes, orzo, zucchini, sheep myzíthra”.

The duck dish was my favorite of the two: tender meat and tantalizing flavors that meshed very well together…

The lamb dish was smaller than I expected, but somehow it was still extremely filling (probably because it was a tad too heavy with all the butter on it):

Finally, for dessert, we ordered a vegan chocolate dessert with roasted peach and cherries on top! Dark chocolate gets me every time…

Sherif actually wrote a review of Taxim on Yelp since we both liked it a lot. It was a very enjoyable dinner together, for sure!

Overall, I’d say our anniversary food experience was pretty amazing. What are some of the most memorable celebratory meals that you’ve had?