I’m recently returned from a whirlwind visit back to Tucson! Friends of ours were getting married on Saturday, so we flew in Friday morning and back to Seattle Sunday morning. It was such a quick visit! So if you’re a Tucson friend reading this after the fact, please forgive me for not being able to see you. I really only had time for dinner with my family and the wedding.

Let’s kick this off with talking about how weird it is to be a visitor in the city you’ve spent most of your life in. Although we still own a house in Tucson, we gave away most of our furniture, so it wasn’t really feasible to stay there. Instead we stayed at Aloft. Chris was already familiar with it because some of their coworkers had stayed there in the past, and it was also conveniently within walking distance of the UofA campus, so they could go attend a lab meeting (yes, that’s right, my partner attends lab meetings while on vacation).

Aloft is a chain hotel that wants to feel like a boutique hotel. It’s got a hip, trendy vibe, as evidenced by the cool ladybug mural in the parking garage. While the quirk feels a bit more forced than it does at a true boutique hotel, it’s still a lot more fun to stay at than say, a Courtyard Marriot. Really though, the important thing was that our room was really comfortable and pretty quiet. Plus all the employees we encountered were really friendly.

Oh, one more thing about Aloft. You know how pretty much every hotel now will exhort you to save the planet by not having your sheets and towels replaced every day? Aloft will reward you for doing so with either a $5 voucher for the snack bar, or 250 points if you’re in their loyalty club. We put up the “don’t change our sheets” door hanger and the next morning there was a $5 voucher card waiting for us, so it was really easy and a great way to get some treats for our flight home.

Now let’s talk about FOOD! Did you know that Tucson was declared America’s first UNESCO Capital of Gastronomy? It’s true. My little city in the desert makes some AWESOME food, and our favorite local restaurants are second on our list of things we miss (behind family and friends, of course). We had to make some hard choices about where to eat, based on time and budget constraints and the knowledge that I don’t have a big desire to go back to Tucson any time soon.

Our first stop was for lunch at Union Public House. Can I be honest with you? I don’t know why we keep going back to this place. It’s not bad, but it’s not the best place in Tucson at the price point. I think it always takes on this patina in our mind of being better than it is, because we’ve had some good times there. And to be fair, the pretzels (shown above) are beautiful and delicious. I love the beer cheese sauce. They also come with stone-ground mustard, which Chris likes but I did not consider worthy of being included in the photo.

Lunch was fine, but my spinach salad was a little wilty and if I had to do it over, I’d probably go somewhere else.

You may be asking why I didn’t eat Mexican for lunch, and the answer is because we already had it planned for dinner. We went to Zivaz Mexican Bistro with my family. This place was so heavily in our regular rotation when we lived in Tucson that if one of us showed up without the other, or if we didn’t eat there for a few weeks, the staff would chide us on our next visit. It’s the sort of budget-friendly, dependable casual place that you go to when your home-cooked dinner plans fall through, or you’re just really craving Mexican.

I had carnitas tacos, because tacos. I also had a Hibiscus margarita, because I was celebrating some good news about my dance life. And I had lots of chips and salsa, because Zivaz is pretty solid in that regard and a lot of Mexican places here serve you stale chips and bland salsa.

We had some more Mexican on Saturday, when I was hit by a wave of hunger before the wedding. Since we were already downtown we hit the classic Tucson restaurant El Charro for some iced tea and appetizers. Although this place is iconic, we almost never ate there as locals because it’s kind of off the beaten path, and we only ended up there because it was within walking distance of the wedding venue.

This plate of mini chimichangas hit the spot. They were a variety of flavors so you didn’t know what you were getting until you bit into them. So not the thing to order if you have any dietary restrictions, but if you’re generally OK with beef, pork, or chicken, these will please your palate.

However, the main attraction for coming back to Tucson was the ability to have brunch at Prep & Pastry. This is our favorite place, where we ate brunch every single weekend. The food is delicious. They have excellent loose leaf tea (none of this getting charged $3 for a Lipton tea bag). And while the wait can be long if you don’t get there early, service is great — especially if you’re there every week.

We haven’t found OUR brunch place in WA yet. I’m sure there’s some places similar to Prep down in Seattle proper, but out here in the hinterlands of Lynnwood, the “brunch” options tend to lean more towards the sort of breakfast place you’d go to with your grandma. The food is decent, but you’re not going to get something like peach cobbler French toast with a prickly pear crumble.

I’ve been seeing this toast on IG for months, so I’m so glad it was still on the menu (the chef’s special French toast changes every month or so). It was rich and sweet and the sort of thing I wouldn’t want to eat every week, but as a special Saturday morning treat, it was delightful.

On Sunday, we went to the other Prep location to meet some of our friends for breakfast before our flight back. Since I knew I wouldn’t have lunch on the plane, I went ahead and had more of a proper brunch… a delicious omelet!

I’m not a big omelet eater, because I’m really picky about eggs, but Prep gets it right. It’s fluffy, not too greasy, stuffed with delicious ingredients, and topped with some fresh herbs and tomatoes. Plus there are amazing potatoes on the side, and I love potatoes. This was just the sort of big, filling — but not too heavy — meal I needed to hold me over until dinner time.

All in all, it was nice to be back in Tucson for a few days. The weather was warm and breezy, we caught up with friends and family, and most importantly we saw two awesome people get married and start the next chapter of their lives together! Although it would have been nice to have more time to see everyone and eat more tacos, I’m glad we were able to be there for the time we did have.