3 Cups Buys From Local Farmers In Chapel Hill

My wife and I met with one of our friends on Friday evening at 3 Cups in Chapel Hill. 3 Cups is a small retail store specializing primarily in wine, coffee, tea and chocolate from small farms and producers. Their focus is on taste, quality, intimate knowledge of the source of everything on their shelves and in treating everyone involved in the transaction (the consumer, producer and their staff) fairly. Additionally twice a month they invite local farmers in to offer tasting dinners featuring locally grown foods often prepared by the farmers themselves and with our friend Alessandra's urging we decided to meet there for dinner on Friday.

The main purpose of our getting together with Alessandra was to

Wow, 2011 flew by and was a fantastic year personally. I appreciate how fortunate I was to have met and helped so many interesting people either buy or sell a home here in the greater Durham, Chapel Hill area in North Carolina where I live and work. You kept me incredibly busy and I'm certainly thankful.

2012 is shaping up to be another phenomenal year. In the past week alone I got one of my investor clients under contract on a foreclosure property they wanted, met with three new buyer clients and am looking forward to working with them. I've got several new listings I'll be bringing onto the market in the next few months and all and all I'm expecting another great year. I have finally gotten myself a personal assistant to do some of the back

Rue Cler - Downtown Durham

Went out last evening with my wife and had a great time in downtown Durham. We started of with dinner at Rue Cler. Located in the heart of downtown Durham I've been by it countless times, stopped into their bakery on occasion but for some reason I'd never eaten there but after last nights meal, I know I'll be back.

Very much in the style of a traditional french neighborhood local restaurant, their focus is a $30 three course menu. As a former executive chef I was pleased to see that each course only offered three choices. The food is locally sourced and/or produced, the menu done daily, and I can honestly say everything we had was really good.

Sorry, this isn't about UNC Fraternities, Sororities, Undergrads, Medical Students or any thing else related to college life, it's about The Meat House; Chapel Hill's newest butcher shop catering to the area's lovers of fine foods.

I had a few spare moments yesterday and thought I'd stop in and check them out and will admit I was impressed. It's looks great, clean, contemporary and focused on customer service. The staff was friendly and the guys I spoke with behind the counter seemed to know their meat. The prices were pretty good for the quality of their products, certainly comparable to other higher end stores like Whole Foods, A Southern Season, Cliffs Meat Market and others. They had a nice selection of wines, spices, pastas and the usual upscale