Love holidays. They make titles so easy.
Here are the finished pumpkin seeds:
I don’t want to hear a word about how they look just like the raw pumpkin seeds, okay? I don’t know why they didn’t get brown, but I can assure you that they are roasted and toasty. And sweet and salty. I have to give it up for the brown sugar and salt combo.
Have a fun holiday!
Posted in Snacks | Tagged pumpkin seeds | 7 Comments »
I love pumpkin seeds. I usually buy a bag from Trader Joe’s, but I haven’t seen them because I haven’t actually looked for them. I’m forgetful.
So, I decided to take matters into my own hands. Chris brought home a pumpkin tonight so I could make some seeds. And of course we had to carve the pumpkin. We’ve had a little pumpkin carving rivalry ever since I stomped him in a contest in college. I like to bring it up rather frequently, but tonight I was very gracious about my landslide win.
The ingredients:
Seriously. Nothing goes better with a knife than a little alcohol.
The finished product:
Scary.
Don’t mind that little weird carving on his chin. We were trying to make a nice ’stache for the little guy, and that was supposed to be his mouth, but it didn’t work out. Obviously. That’s why he’s frowning now.
Anyway, back to the point - the pumpkin seeds.
Rinsing off the slime:
Sprinkled with salt and a little brown sugar:
I’ve never used brown sugar on them before, mostly because I haven’t actually made pumpkin seeds since I was about eight years old, but I thought a nice little sweet and salty mix would be nice. They are currently in the oven, so I can’t tell you if I was right, but I’ll report back tomorrow!
Posted in Random, Snacks | Tagged pumpkin seeds | 13 Comments »
I made polenta - from scratch - for the first time ever tonight.
Actually, that’s not true. I made it one other time, a dinner that is frequently referred to by Chris as the “Rosemary Incident of ‘05.” Let’s just say that rosemary is potent. A little goes a long way.
This time, I went the basil route and made some to go along with fish:
It was so easy, I was really surprised. It seems intimidating for some reason. I used this brand, and basically added a bunch of basil to the recipe on the package: 1/2 cup corn meal, 1.5 cups vegetable stock, 1/8 teaspoon salt, and three tablespoons parmesan cheese. I didn’t halve the parmesan cheese. That would be stupid.
And then the other great discovery of the night was Trader Joe’s bruschetta:
Chris wasn’t with me at the grocery store this weekend, and let’s just say there were a few impulse buys. Maybe more than a few. This was one of them, and it’s a keeper. I had a couple tastes straight from the jar, even. Then I mixed about 1/2 cup with a bag of baby spinach and put it over the fish, which was just baked for about ten minutes or so.
I can’t wait to use the rest of the bag of polenta. Anyone want to hook me up with a recipe?
Posted in Dinner | Tagged bruschetta, fish, polenta, spinach | 14 Comments »
After a particularly ridiculous incident yesterday, I decided that I should probably stop dousing my cottage cheese in raisins and honey and pretending that it’s healthy. I mean, raisins and honey are healthy, but you know. It was getting to be a little much on a daily basis.
I’ve seen some people eat it on things like crackers and bread, so I thought I’d give that a try:
Pretty good. I used to like cream cheese on crackers and this was a similar, if chunkier, taste. These are the Trader Joe’s Whole Wheat Entertainers Crackers. They are very good and absolutely enormous, but I can’t buy them again because every time I look at the box I start thinking about how stupid it is that they are called Entertainers Crackers. It should be Entertainer Crackers. Or, better still, Entertaining Crackers. Am I right? Have I put too much thought into this? Do you see why I can’t buy them again?
Posted in Snacks | Tagged cottage cheese, crackers | 9 Comments »
Look at what Chris brought home from Pittsburgh:
An entire box of chocolate covered pretzels and chocolate peanut butter covered pretzels. And it’s deep. There are like fifty packages or something crazy. I already had a pack and a half yesterday, and I’m thinking about another right now. I think it’s safe to say that I am in mucho trouble.
Do you like my Spanish? Just a little word I picked up on vacation. I am quite good at the languages. I took French for seven years and I can just about introduce myself before I start stuttering. Oh! And I know that oui means yes. I know this because in Mexico I kept saying oui instead of si. See what I mean? Awesome at languages.
Posted in Dessert | Tagged chocolate, I am weak | 16 Comments »
Pictures! So many pictures. We stayed in this little resort all by ourselves. There were a few little casitas and then a common area with a kitchen, lots of lounge chairs for napping, and a swimming pool:
I spent a lot of time in the pool doing this:
And sometimes I swapped the beer for one of these:
Which were amazing. Really. As was the food. This woman named Elvira cooked for us the whole time, and I’m a little sad that I couldn’t put her in my suitcase because I don’t think I’ll ever be able to eat Mexican food in New York again. It was unbelievable. Unfortunately by the time dinner rolled around I’d often had too much tequila and forgot to take pictures, but I did get some highlights:
Impatient
Tostadas
Soup
More soup
Soup toppings - clearly I must have scaled back on the margaritas this night
Whole fish! My first. Amazing.
Breakfast
Shrimp! They had heads.
Other than that, we played some dominoes:
I don’t want to brag, my team dominated dominoes. I had no idea that those guys had a use other than lining them up and knocking them down.
It was awesome. I wish I could go back right now. But instead, I have to attend to the 270 emails that were waiting for me when I got off the plane. Yikes.
Posted in Random | Tagged vacation | 26 Comments »
I am back but I let Chris take the camera and thus all the Mexico pictures to Pittsburgh for the weekend. But, do not despair! (I knew you were despairing.) Kate, Betsy and Jaclyn and I are having dinner wine and we have for you our beautiful faces:
Post four bottles of wine
So, there you go. Back on Monday with Mexico pictures. It was the best food I’ve ever had.
Posted in Random | Tagged I like that red wine | 10 Comments »
I was going to post an awesome brownie recipe that you could also find on the back of the Baker’s chocolate box but I am running out of time! I still have to pack, drink wine (I am on vacation, after all), figure out how to set my out of office reply for my email, and get some sleep before my 6:40am flight. So, I’m sorry, but I am leaving you with absolutely nothing. Don’t desert me, though. I’ll be back on the 25th with pictures, I promise!
Posted in Uncategorized | 7 Comments »
Well, I decided to go for it:
I got the whey instead of the egg white, though. I was still a little freaked out by the egg white thing, plus this one has one more gram of protein per serving and it was about thirty cents cheaper. I’m a bargain hunter.
Anyway, I am going to be drinking a lot of protein shakes tomorrow because I’m going to Mexico on Saturday and I need these abs:
What do you think, three, four shakes will do it? Maybe five? I can probably squeeze in five if I have to. I think it’s worth it if I can show up on the beach with the “Jay Robb 6-pack.” It’ll be the perfect accessory for the Old Navy bikini I got last week for $4.
I’m going to have to start tomorrow, though, because tonight I made this:
I had to use extra spinach and mushrooms because I’m a bad planner and I didn’t want them to go bad while we’re on vacation. We have a friend staying here watching poor little orphaned Jack, but I’m sure he’ll be more interested in drinking beer and eating the brownies I plan on making for him tomorrow.
Posted in Dinner, Healthy Products | Tagged protein powder, risotto | 17 Comments »
I switched up one of my favorite recipes tonight to include shrimp instead of tofu:
I also omitted the enormous handful of breadcrumbs that I usually throw on top. Because I didn’t have to coat the tofu in them, I couldn’t justify it. I did miss them, though. A lot.
Other than that, I used:
1 bag baby spinach
8 ounces of shrimp
2 scallions
1 T olive oil
4 ounces soba noodles
6 or 7 chopped up almonds
A ton of garlic powder
Cook the shrimp, cook the noodles, cook the spinach, then mix it all together with the olive oil, garlic powder, scallions and almonds. Done.
This afternoon I had popcorn and chocolate chips as a snack again. This is one of those things that I can just tell I am going to eat over and over again. In fact, it might replace Z Bars if I don’t need something portable. We’ll see. It kind of tastes the same.
Posted in Dinner | Tagged shrimp, soba, spinach | 9 Comments »
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