Mental Musings.

Ta Da! Baking Blog.

2008-03-23T23:08:00.000-07:00

So I finally decided on the name for the new baking blog.

Lick the Spatula.

Cliche? Yeah maybe...but I love to do it while baking.

And it was available on blogger.

Win win.

http://lickthespatula.blogspot.com

Baking Blog & Umm...Cupcakes.

2008-03-21T23:21:00.000-07:00

So I want to start a baking blog. I figure this blog was initially supposed to be a fun thing to help out of town friends and family keep apprised of what goes on in our oh-so-exciting lives.

But as our neighbor points out...it's mostly about FOOD. Which if you know me, really isn't surprising.

Lately it's more about CUPCAKES. Which is my current obsession. Well who am I kidding, I love sweets. Period. And always have. Cupcakes is the latest manifest of my sweet loving tooth....I have always loved cupcakes and always will.

But I figure hmmm a baking blog could be fun. Because I go through the cookie phase as well. And the muffin phase, which is kind of like cupcakes. Honestly, I have always been a fan of 'things made in pans' ...!

So...I've been trying to come up with some names for the blog. I've bounced them off a few friends. A few resonate but of course the ones I really want are already taken on blogger because they are so amazingly cool. Like Glazed Over. I mean I'm sure I'm not the second or 10th person to think of that one. Or Vanilla Bean.

Anyway, the top contenders now are Sugar Nib (does anyone actually know what that is?) and Coarse Sugar. I like Coarse Sugar because I'm a fledgling baker, unrefined. But Sugar Nib is just so fun and cute. I don't want to pidgeonhole myself into a 'cake' or 'cupcake' name but I figure Sugar or something like 'baking' could work. Any other ideas ?!!?! I also had Glossed Sugar but I don't love it. I also liked the Unpolished Cupcake...but that's cupcake specific. Meh!!

So while I've been trying to think up names for the new baking blog....yeah. I made cupcakes.

I'm all chocolated out thanks to the choco-bake-fest I did last weekend and honestly the sight of chocolate cupcakes makes my stomach turn a bit right now. Is this therapy? If so, I kind of like it!!

I went fruity this time. I had some yummy Lemon Pound Cake from Miette in SF last week and it was soooooo overly sugary sweet lemony citrusy sour that I think my mouth was confused. So I wanted to do something lemony but not that crazy puckery sweet lemony. More like a fluffy vanilla lemony. Dug through some blogs...and compiled a few recipes. Came up with this one and it came out really awesome.

Vanilla Lemony Cupcakes
(filled with Raspberry jam)

1c cake flour
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt
3/4 stick softened butter
3/4c baking sugar
1 egg and 1 egg white
1/4c milk
1 tblsp vanilla
1 tblsp lemon juice
1 tblsp lemon zest
raspberry jam

Sift cake flour, powder, soda, salt in a bowl, set aside. Cream butter and sugar til fluffy. Add egg and egg white, whip til incorporated well. Add lemon zest, vanilla, lemon juice, milk, whip well. At this point the batter is not smooth looking but slightly curdled (lemon I guess?). Fold in flour bowl, don't overmix.

Preheat oven to 350. Line up mini muffin party cups or use small mini baking pan with liners. Using a canteloupe baller, fill each cup just partway with batter. Add put small dollop of raspberry jam in center, don't let touch sides of liners. Put more batter into cup, fill 2/3 only.

Bake for 10-12 minutes, using toothpick to check. If using regular flat pan with nut/party cups, put silpat liner down to help prevent blackening. (Next time I might lower temp just slightly as well to see). Let cool on oven rack for another minute with oven open before removing to cool.

This recipe makes 16 mini cupcakes. I would imagine it'd make about 6 large ones.

Frosting was just cream cheese, confectioners sugar, lemon juice all whipped into a frenzy til I liked the consistency. If you want, add some raspberry jam, just a tiny bit, gives it a pale pink color. Frost with spatula or pipe. Garnish with one raspberry on each cuppie (I used frozen).

Note on raspberries, they sweat and esp the frozen ones as they melt, so let them sweat onto a paper towel first before putting them on as garnish. I put them on then they started sweating so I took them off and let them dry out first on a paper towel but a few of the cuppies looked like they were bled on! Thanks raspberries. Also...they sweat LATER as well, so the raspberries are kind of a funny add, but people actually liked the little color they added to the frosting funnily enough.

Also, I think that I need a silpat liner on the cookie sheet next time because the poor little nut and party cups were all brown on the bottom from the heat through the cookie sheet. I need something to help even that out and maybe even raise the rack from the bottom more. Might try these again this wkd to perfect, as I only used 1/2 the cream cheese frosting on these...so I have 1/2 left.

You could omit raspberry jam in the center if you don't want a filled cuppie. Then I'd really use the raspberry in frosting. But even with the cuppies filled and used in frosting, it wasn't too much raspberry, I just used a tiny bit. Also, interestingly enough people LOVED the filling in the cupcake. I have to try another filled one soon.

Lastly, random...but when my husband was eating his tonite I noticed that the jam area was slightly hollowed out as the jam baked into the cupcake. My husband said it was the steam releasing into the cupcake as the jam baked. I thought interesting, could that possibly be why these are so moist as well, from the steam?? Not sure, but it's fun to ponder.

Why am I babbling on? Pictures!

Batter up.

Batter & jam mingling.

Baked and cooling. I overfilled them so some went a little crazee.

Frosted and raspberried.

Dissasembled and dissected. Yum!

Goodies in the Mail.

2008-03-21T22:47:00.000-07:00

I love when stuff comes in the mail. I'm an online shopping whore...so whenever a box comes its like Christmas. Christmas daily works for me. Or at least Christmas 2x a week. Sometimes Greg's Mom sends us these fabulous boxes of brownies...they taste like crack. Seriously. I have to eat them all immediately to save myself from eating them slowly over the next week and prolonging the agony. It's great.

This box was at the doorstep on Thurs night. No wonder I wanted to bake immediately upon opening. Look at the goodies inside.

YUM. I ordered from thebakerskitchen.com thanks to chockylit's blog and got the cutie nut and party cups she uses...figure let's diversify the cupcake liner love a bit. And I like them so far. I need to work on a few things but I figured the most important part...how to get the finished, frosted cupcake out intact...so we're doing pretty well so far.

Let's Go Green...

2008-03-20T08:38:00.000-07:00

For St. Patty's Day anyway.

Here are my masterpieces from Sunday night baking...I'm a lagger on posting as usual.

Chocolate Sour Cream cuppies with Bailey's Irish Cream frosting. The frosting was such a hit...it was crazy. I could just eat the frosting, forget the cake. Sacrilege????

The cake could be any recipe really. I used the one below from Sat and added sour cream, interesting consistency, people liked them.

The idea for Bailey's frosting is one I found online--can't recall where, but I used HowToEatACupcake's whipped buttercream idea...fabulous. Just gotta get it a bit stiffer next time I think. Or dollop it instead of pipe it.

Whipped Buttercream 'recipe'...I never get the quantities right but you get the idea.

1 stick softened butter
2c confectioners sugar
1/2c heavy whipped cream
1 tsp milk
Baileys Irish Cream liquer

Whip butter til creamed, add conf. sugar and milk til you get the consistency you want (might be more or less than 2c), add cream, whip with stand mixer paddle til insanely fluffy. Add liqeur. Frost.

I am still not sure if you have to refridgerate or not but I did anyway due to the small amount of cream. Don't want to give anyone food poisoning...hehee.

Out of what I have made so far, peanut gallery aka hubby's loves is this whipped buttercream and the kahlua cupcakes overall. I guess we like our sweet liquer!!

Cooling. They fell slightly which I wasn't sure about but frosting is fab for covering that up.

Whipped Buttercreamy goodness.

Frosted. Cuter this way I think before adding color.

St. Patty's Day-ified. One sweet coworker said they looked prof. Poor lovely deluded gal!!!

Let Them Eat Cupcakes...

2008-03-16T16:29:00.000-07:00

So the focus of my life most of the time besides my allergic bacterial rat and my cute yet grubby car-working hubby is typically food. How to make it, when and where to eat it. Though lately more how to make it and more specifically cupcake it rather than other types of sweets.

Every time I have yet another cupcake, and it's often since cupcakeries are popping up like rashes around here...I think oh this is lovely, this is divine, and then 5 bites later, ugh this is gross, this is too sweet. I am so over them.

Until the next time...when I spot a cupcake in a window or the word 'bakery' as I drive by. And I perk up. And inevitably I'm eating another cupcake.

So lately I've started learning how to bake them. Anyone can mix up some boxed cake mix and slap on some Betty Crocker frosting (the bomb by the way)..I've been doing it for years. But really baking cupcakes? Like from scratch? With melted chocolate and buttermilk? Whaaa?

My 2nd experiment was already posted below and they came out wonderful...rave reviews from the peanut gallery, aka aforementioned husband and my ladies at work who haven fab with the feedback.

So I've started collecting recipes. When I eat cupcakes anywhere now it's almost more of a taste test. How do they get the frosting to be so buttery? Where did they get this CUTE cupcake paper?

Today was a lazy Saturday and so I decided to put all my hard research to work for me. I combined a handful of double chocolate/devils food/uberrichgoingtokillyou chocolate recipes from cookbooks and the internet and made these.

Double Chocolate Cupcakes.

and then I reserved half the batter and made two variations for testing.

Chocolate Mint Cupcakes
Chocolate Kahlua Cupcakes

The jury is still out on what is the favorite. Got experimental on the frosting too.

Fun baking facts I've learned...the hard way mostly!!
--Mini cuppies only take slightly more than 1/2 the baking time of biggies.
--Test your oven's temperature. No seriously. I thought ours was off by maybe 10 degrees. Try FIFTY. So now when I want 350 I have to put in 400. Crazy huh? No wonder our chicken always took forever to cook.
--When recipes say 17-22 minutes, start checking at 15 and keep testing til clean. Depending on your oven and your ingredients, it might 15, don't learn this the hard way.
--Let cupcakes cool for a few minutes in the pan before removing to cooling rack. Don't leave them too long in the pan or else the heat might continue to cook them a little too much.

So without further ado, the successful end-result recipe and notes on variations.

Basic Double Chocolate Cupcakes

2c hot brewed coffee
1 1/4c unsweetened cocoa powder (Hersheys)
3/4c well shaken buttermilk
1/4c sour cream
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter
1 1/2c baking sugar
2c flour all purpose
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 large eggs & 1 egg white
1 tsp vanilla

in med bowl, mix hot coffee with cocoa til paste forms.
in another med bowl, mix buttermilk & sour cream, whisk til combined.
in third med bowl, mix flour, baking soda, powder, salt in med bowl.
cream butter in a stand mixer, add sugar and beat til fluffy, about 3 minutes.
add eggs to mix, then vanilla, blend til combined.
add buttermilk bowl to cocoa coffee bowl, whisk til liquid and creamy.
add flour bowl and cocoa buttermilk bowls to stand mixer, alternating, til combined. do not overbeat, just blend til combined.

spoon into liners. bake 350 for 17-20 min or until tester comes out clean.

variations:
--add peppermint extract into batter for a chocolate mint cupcake. use any type of frosting.
--add kahlua into batter for a chocolate kahlua cupcake. for kahlua frosting, beat heavy cream until thickened. add kahlua, cocoa powder, confectioners sugar. beat til soft peaks form. don't overbeat or it will turn into butter.

mixing coffee and cocoa w/buttermilk cream

sugar and butter creaming.

mixing cocoa and buttersugar.

in the cups!

frseh outta the oven & cooling..

kahlua variation with kahlua whipped cream.

chocolate cuppies with kahlua whipped w/shavings.

mini kahlua with cream and espresso bean.

Cupcake Me!

2008-03-11T23:09:00.000-07:00

I know I know, my poor blog is languishing thanks to my Yelping.

So recently, I decided that I wanted to take a page from Janna's super-amazing baking book. Bought a frosting gun! Signed up for a cake decorating class with a few friends. But before that...I've been practicing.

Billy's Vanilla Vanilla Cupcakes w/Lemon Buttercream ... Mini Style!
Recipe adapted from a Martha Stewart link...apparently Billy's is some famous bakery in NYC. NYC in my household. Awesome! I would post the recipe link but MS's website is down for now. I third'd the recipe and they came out fab. 24 Minis.

They ARE as good as they look. As I type this, my husband is eating one making loud MMMM noises. Ahhh, gotta love my fan base.

Fraiche Yogurt.

2008-02-17T10:15:00.000-08:00

This one is for Janna.

Fraiche Yogurt in PA...read all about my visit last nite here in my Yelp review. I wanted to like it better but the decor was the only fab thing about it. Wish you had been here to try it with us.

http://www.yelp.com/biz/fraiche-yogurt-palo-alto-2#hrid:-cGx-jIO80-56kiAQK08UQ

Back in the Swing of Things.

2008-02-17T09:51:00.000-08:00

It's nice to be back home and settled in.

Scenes from everyday non-feverish life are fab.

A curly pony.

Bowl of berries in 0% Fage...my new fave 'dessert'

Vday bug love & a Schurra's Dark Chocolate Marshmallow Heart (Lent was postponed on Vday of course)

Protein pancakes with AnyWhey photo up above, our breakkie for this morning (thanks Mike!!)...recipe for anyone interested!!

3/4c whole wheat white flour
1 scoop AnyWhey protein powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp brown or turbinado sugar
1 egg white
3oz fat free natural plain yogurt
1 tsp vanilla
water

Mix flour, protein powder, cinnamon, sugar. Add egg white, yogurt, vanilla, blend to mix. Add water to reach desired consistency. I added frozen blueberries, used real butter for the griddle, and sugar free syrup. YUM. The above makes 2 servings of four 3-4" pancakes; 260 cals and 20g protein each serving. Protein packed punch.Woot.

Sweetless for Lent.

2008-02-16T13:03:00.000-08:00

Lately I've been eating way too much of this...

(fab cinnamon roll in a cafe in Buffalo)

and this...

(the famous Stan's Donuts in Santa Clara..thanks Yelpers)

and this...

(fab cupcakes from Sara Lyn's in SF)

So when Lent came around, I hemmed and hawed for a few days...but then I committed. Mostly.

No sweets/desserts for Lent. I'm a Catholic but never really truly 'practiced'. To be honest...this is more about 'can I really do it for 35 days (it was supposed to be 40 but the hemming and hawing took a few extra days)' than the whole God will love me more if I don't eat as much sugar (probably not since I'm way more cranky!). But really I just needed to reign in the sugar intake. Since I got the evil flu when I started, it's been quite easy actually. Maybe I already went through my 'detox'. But ask me on day 25 how I feel.

I can however have natural tart yogurt...a justification because it's (a) natural and (b) yogurt and (c) the only garnishes are fresh fruit. So I figure it's not really a dessert. Plus it has protein. Bonus.

(yummy tartness from Cafe Delatti)

Scenes from Buffalo.

2008-02-16T11:32:00.000-08:00

We haven't seen Greg's friends Mike and Molly and their kids in almost 4 years, since our wedding in Hawaii. A lifetime ago.

So it was fab to see them again..spend some time with them and their family and enjoy some fun hours in their beautiful house. Hanging out with their kids almost makes us want to have some of our own. Almost.

There was a lot of this going on for the boys...

And a whole lot of this for the girls....

And we all benefitted from a little of this. Wings are much better in Buffalo.

Super cute picture. I like this one because Alex is pouting and Abby looks delighted. HAH!

I don't even know what was happening here...only that I can see Greg's tonsils.

Two pretty ladies...

Silly boy! Tricks are for kids.

Mike and Molly's house was just beautiful and we felt right at home. Thanks for a fab visit!!!

Traveling Fool.

2008-02-16T10:04:00.000-08:00

MIA=Missing in Action.

That's been me for oh...gosh the last month!! But I have such a good excuse. I think it's called Life?

Traveled to Minnesota for work. GAH...Minnesota you ask? WHY? Yeah I ask myself that sometimes too. -13 degree weather. Yes that's a negative sign in front of the 13. I impressed even myself with my lack of reaction to the blistering cold and snow. It was very pretty and bleak at the same time. So incredibly dry that it made California look like a wetland. I was happy to come home and my sinuses were happy to rehydrate.

Traveled to Buffalo for fun. Well the traveling part was not fun, but the visiting part was. One of Greg's friend's from college turned 40 and his lovely wife wanted us to fly in as a surprise. Since we are unfettered by those pesky attachments called children and my parents are only too happy to be pretend owners of a white rat for a few days, we said SURE. While sitting through hours of delays in the airport, I often wonder why that SURE came out, but in the end the visit we had with Greg's pal and his family was so wonderful that it was totally worth all the painful travel scenarios. Suffice it to say we got turned around midair once AND delayed a day on our return. At least we got to watch the Superbowl on a plush couch with pizza, thanks to the extra day delay.

Then gosh...I had all these great plans for updating the blog!! I have a ton of pictures too. But coming back after 2 weeks of traveling...stuff at work was piling up, the house was a mess. Life!!

Then fate intervened in the form of a nasty little germ called the flu. Moi...down for the count for 4.5 full days. 101.5 degree temperature. Body aches, muscles feeling like someone was forcibly ripping them out of my body. Delirium. Was definitely fun times. Forced rest. Another week of work missed. Greg got it but not nearly as bad as me and was only out of work a day. Jealous of those awesome genes that boy has got going on.

So now here I am...fever free and finally catching up on the blog, my email, housework, grocery shopping, whew. It's been a long month. Oh and Valentine's Day? Lobster rolls on the couch with my honey was all she wrote...so much for our awesome prix fixe dinner ressies at The Grill. But damn those lobster rolls were good, and the company was pretty sweet too.

A picture of my miniscule tray table in flight is up above...my life encapsulated on a small square of 8x6 for hours on one of the flights.

A Present! For Me??

2008-01-19T13:31:00.000-08:00

Fun job perk. Every once in a while a vendor sends us something fun as a giftie to thank us for working with them. One of my affiliates has started doing this on what appears to be a monthly basis (I'm hoping).

Got this at work on Wednesday...so pretty. And even better is what was inside...fruity spring goodies. And the non-chocolate kind. Making it super easy for me not to eat them...my coworkers love them though. Love you special vendor.

Caught me a Tuna.

2008-01-18T21:22:00.000-08:00

Trader Joe's being my favorite grocery store...we do about 99% of our shopping there and get the other stuff we can't maybe on 2 trips a month to the bigger stores. TJ's can be hit or miss sometimes re: fresh fish and all that. So imagine my surprise when I saw they had sashimi grade Ahi Tuna. 2 steaks, 1lb of Ahi for $14? Wow that's a bargain. At Whole Foods it would have been more like $30. Red and fleshy, it looked divine. So I took it home.

Decided to get creative with it on Tuesday night. Tuna doesn't keep very well in the fridge like this, esp sashimi grade. And I wanted to do a sear. So it had to be pretty fresh. Even Tues was pushing it. So even though I wasn't feeling like Tuna, I grilled it up.

I wanted a lazy man's version of a flavorful restaurant sear. So I put on some salt, thyme, soy sauce and dried ginger. A lot of fresh cracked black pepper. I love a blackened pepper seared at a posh restaurant.

Heated up the flat grill then dropped it on. Sizzle, crackle, pop. It's lookin' pretty good. Tasted even better. Served it with TJ's yummy little chicken dumpling potsticker things I can never remember the name of. Asian night at the Tylers' on Tuesday. Greg pronounced it fab. I was impressed too. Who knew I could be so good at searing Ahi. Pronounced a success, next time I might get even more creative. Wasabi ginger paste anyone? Owie!

Winter Means Lasagna.

2008-01-15T20:44:00.000-08:00

So last winter I perfected this recipe for lasagna that I originally found on Cooking Light. Every time I made it, I changed something which seemed to make it better. I made it all winter long to Greg's happiness...but I can't seem to find the drive to make it at all in hot weather. So I only pull it out when the weather is BRRisk.

Unfort now I can't find the sauce that I used to use as easily, so short of ordering it online in packs of TWELVE, I am trying to find an alternative. The one I made on Sunday was a very close contender, good in a pinch but I'm still testing.

Funny I never used to be a lasagna fan til I made mine. We both absolutely love it. And I never even bother eating it anywhere else because I don't like it as much as mine. And mine is healthy..so I like it even more. Because while it's way better for you than most lasagnas out there, you cannot tell..because I'm such a flavor whore that I make sure it doesn't taste the least bit non-saturated.

My 'recipe' is loosey goosey...I basically add whatever I want in terms of quantity..aka if you like mushrooms, add a lot. Like it more meaty, add more meat. Like it more saucey, add more sauce. But here is the jist.

For the meat sauce:

1lb ground 94/6 lean beef (or you can do a ground turkey beef blend)

1/2 diced onion

12oz can of tomato sauce

12oz can of diced tomatoes (use regular or basil/garlic or whatever you want)

Jar of pasta sauce (My fave was Emerils Kicked Up Tomato, a nice spicy lift to it, but I can't find it anymore locally so I have been experimenting. This time I used Trader Giottos (TJ's brand)..see picture below!)

6oz Baby portabella mushrooms, sliced

6oz Crimini mushrooms, sliced

Dried Oregano; Dried Basil

Diced Garlic

EVOO for pan/spray

For the 'ricotta' cheese mix:

1 or 2 egg whites

1 container fat free or low fat cottage cheese

1/2c shredded parmesan

1/2c shredded skim mozzarella

For layering/prepping:

8x8 or 11x8 deep baking dish

Lasagna noodles (I love Dreamfields, it's got a ton of protein and fiber and lower in carbs)

1/2 a can of tomato sauce or rest of Pasta sauce jar

For the meat sauce..I sautee garlic in a spray of EVOO til fragrant. Add onion, cook 1-2 min til slightly translucent. Add ground beef/turkey, toss til mostly cooked. Add mushrooms, basil, oregano. Cook for 1-2 minutes. Add diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, pasta sauce jar...stirring each time you add something. I typically only use 3/4 of the jar of pasta sauce. Reserve the rest for later. Let everything simmer in pan for 5-10 minutes, putting lid or screen on to prevent splattering.

I typically make the sauce 4-6 hours before building my lasagna OR let it sit overnight in the fridge. The reason is that I noticed when I did this that the meat soaked up most of the sauce and it became an even richer tasting dish and less 'saucey'. So if you have the time, pour the pan contents into a big bowl, cover and refridgerate. Another option is to pour it into a crockpot at this point and let it simmer on low for 3-4 hours. This will also reduce sauce pretty quickly.

When it's time to build lasagna, mix cottage cheese, parm, mozz and egg whites in a bowl. Put small amount of sauce only on bottom of dish.

Note, I don't use 'no precook' lasagna noodles because you don't have to with this dish. So don't pre-cook your noodles, no matter how much you think 'well there's no way they will soften without a pre-cook'. Trust me..they will. Also don't use those lame no-cook Barilla noodles, they are the most useless flimsy noodles ever and the dish is not the same with them. Dreamfields has those thick deep ridges that lasagna noodles should have. So make sure you use something like that.

Put down Lasagna noodles (I have to break mine 3/4 of the way to get them to fit in a square dish, if you use a 11x8 you won't have to do this) on top of sauce. Pour a bit of the regular tomato sauce over the noodles to wet them a bit (this is where the not-needing-to-bake-lasagna-comes-in. Spoon meat mixture over noodles. Spoon cottage cheese mixture over meat mixture, smooth over to cover. (I use small spoonfulls around the dish to keep coverage even but without building too bulky of a layer). Another pasta layer on top. A bit more basic/plain sauce. More meat. Another layer of cottage cheese. Then on top of the cottage cheese, layer a bit more meat sauce. Meat should be on the top, because the cottage cheese mixture will burn if exposed.

Bake at 365 for about 30 minutes. Pull out, top with 1/4c mozz cheese. Bake for another 15 minutes or until bubbling. My dish is always packed full so I get some boil over, best to cook on a cookie sheet or similar to catch runoff.

Let sit for ~15 minutes to cool a bit before cutting. This stuff is awesome the next day as well. Serve with toasted garlic butter bread...or our favorite, the Moroccan Olive bread from TJ's.

Bellisimo!

Whadd'ya Want?

2008-01-13T12:20:00.000-08:00

Oh the attitude that I get from the fuzzy white one at times.

It's like 'leave me alone will ya? I'm nappin' on Dad'.

Trout...It's What's for Dinner!

2008-01-10T20:55:00.000-08:00

Intrigued by a continuation of the Emeril Healthy Fast episode, made this trout dish on Monday. I am such a slack about updating this blog thing.

Anyway, the dish turned out fab EXCEPT for one thing. The nice guy at the fish counter at Whole Foods lied to me when he said that this trout was boneless. Greg and I spent 1/2 the dinner picking the bones out of the thing. Next time I'll use a nice Halibut or Seabass. But overall flavor was good. And it was EASY. Less than 1o min prep. Schwing!

Emeril's Recipe:

http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/recipes/recipe/0,,FOOD_9936_100267,00.html

Home Cooked Meal.

2008-01-06T23:11:00.000-08:00

On Friday I watched Emeril on the flat screen at the work gym and they had this Healthy in a Hurry show. One of the dishes looked uber tasty, some sort of pasta crab thing. I looked it up online, and invited our neighbors over to partake of the dinner goodness.

However, since it was a light dish, it didn't really turn out the way I was expecting, a little bland for my tastes and I added a wee bit too much pasta. Greg loved it though, he cleaned his plate AND told me to stop disparaging his wife's cooking.

The salad was tasty though, romaine with stinky bleu cheese and candied walnuts from TJ's. Pear gorgonzola vinaigrette.

At least the bowls were cute. And the basil was fresh. A bit of leftover pasta is in the fridge, I might do some experiments on it tomorrow with additional spices.

Relaxing Weekend.

2008-01-06T23:02:00.000-08:00

After the hustle and bustle of the last few weeks, it was great to sit around this weekend and do a whole lot of nothing.

Well not nothing exactly. We cleaned up the rest of the Xmas decor, the house...played a lot of Scrabble.

This morning we thought maybe we'd try this new cafe about a mile from our house for breakfast. But laziness set in...Then I realized I had some blueberries in the fridge...so yeah we didn't go anywhere for breakfast. Instead I created our own.

Tart Creaminess.

2008-01-05T23:16:00.000-08:00

I'm sure by now everyone's heard of the fresh natural tart yogurt craze. Well you have if you are in California. It started with Pinkberry in LA and is slowly making it's way North.

I'd heard of it for a while but wasn't quite sure what it meant. Natural creamy tart yogurt? Like Fage right? Wrong.

This is like frozen yogurt but it's natural yogurt, with active cultures and actual protein. It's a bit sweet but actually tart, a little like a lemon tart kind of sweet tart.

There are multiple places locally that have cropped up and I have slowly been working my way through them...and Yelping them in the process of course.

The other night we tried Cafe Delatti in Los Gatos after hearing about it for a while and I think it's jumped up to the top of my tart yogurt loving list. I just wish it was closer.

They have an amazing mango tart yogurt which I blended with original. Fresh blueberries and kiwi top the beautiful treat. Best of all, only 20 cals an ounce and fresh fruit. Now this is the kind of 'dessert' I could have nightly and my trainer would probably agree!

California Coast New Years.

2008-01-03T08:20:00.000-08:00

Dug out the camera cable last nite and did a little uploading. Many pictures to ensue of our fun little jaunt down the California Coast for New Years. Grab some hot apple cider and keep on scrollin.

sea rock inn. (http://www.searockinn.com/) they were fab.

view from our deck.

our cozy little jr. suite

view from along the road.

amazing old fashioned fireplace. greg had a heyday with this. who knew i married a pyro?

yummy blueberry danish for breakkie both mornings at mendo bakery.

amazing feathery plant alongside road.

barn or house? not sure, but it's cool.

cute little church along the road.

loved this sky shot taken from main street in town. it looks like heaven.

series of sunset pictures, all within a few minutes of each other on the same evening.

spectacular.

where we ended up after a fab 5 star dinner at cafe beaujolais....dick's place.

we were seriously overdressed, but it didn't stop us from ringing in the new year with a drink and a smile.

Hope 2008 is fabulous for us all.

I'm Elite!

2008-01-03T08:00:00.000-08:00

Something happened yesterday that is cause for great celebration in the Tyler household. Well mostly by me...the female half. The male half just smiled indulgently.

I've been really into Yelp'ing lately (www.yelp.com) and got 2008 Yelp Elite status which means..well..that I'm cool? Who knows what it means...I guess that they like my reviews. So now I have this cute little 08 Elite button on my profile and we get invited to local Yelp events where we can partake of food and booze and meet other local Yelpers who like to write. Sounds like fun, huh. We shall see.

Check out my Yelps at http://marae.yelp.com.

Welcome 2008.

2008-01-02T07:35:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year!!

I've been remiss in posting the last week...it's called Time Off and I guess I just took some serious advantage of it...thinking 'oh I really should update my blog' but since most of the time I feel like I am just talking to myself..I thought that 'I' wouldn't really miss much by waiting.

But today's a new year...er well the start of the New Work Year for me anyway now that I am heading back to the daily grind...so I figured why not pop in for a quick post. 2007 was a great year for us...and we are hoping for an even better 2008.

So, I thoroughly enjoyed being off...we hosted a lovely little cocktail post-holiday party for friends on the 28th...it was a small group being that most of our friends were out of town for Xmas and New Years, but it was an awesome time with some yummy punch and foodie items (some of which I actually made).

One of my coworkers brought us these cookies...which let's be honest, I was so friggin cookied out from my cookie love-fest the week before Xmas (and umm during and after)...and I thought I wouldn't be able to eat any.

WRONG. These things were tasty. I asked her for the recipe...turns out she mentioned these to me in a previous convo, basically Peanut Butter cookies with a mini-snickers bar inside. Sounds basic but oh so good. I didn't recognize the Snickers bar, instead I thought she was a fabulous magician for being able to get peanuts and caramel and chocolate inside the cookies. DOH.

So here's the link for the recipe...I am definitely going to try these at some point but figure it's safer to wait given how much we loved them here in the Tyler household, the party was on the 28th and we were gifted with about 20 cookies and now umm there are 2 left.

PB Cookie Snickers Heaven ensues below.

Snickers Bar Cookies
1 cup butter, softened (2 sticks)
1 cup creamy peanut butter
1 cup light brown sugar
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 13-ounce package Snickers Miniatures (about 60 candies)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Combine the butter, peanut butter and sugars using a mixer on a medium to low speed until light and fluffy. Slowly add eggs and vanilla until thoroughly combined. Then mix in flour, salt and baking soda. Cover and chill dough for 2 to 3 hours.

Unwrap all Snickers. Remove dough from refrigerator. Shape about 1 tablespoon of dough around each candy. Place on a greased cookie sheet and bake for 10 to 12 minutes. Let cookies cool on baking rack. Makes about 4 dozen cookies.

Note: You will use 1 bag and approximately half the other bag.

Recipe and notes at:
http://www.post-gazette.com/food/20020905mailbox1.asp

We also took a trip to Mendocino for New Years with some friends, we had a wonderful time and the Mini got some serious breaking in what with all the crazy curves and all, I have some beautiful pictures which I will upload at some point once I can figure out how to magically create more space on my laptop hard drive.

But for now, gotta go get ready for work...have a good one all!

Santa Baby.

2007-12-28T12:58:00.000-08:00

Christmas 2007 was *great*.

Greg was great to me.

I was great to Greg.

Family and friends were great to us.

Throw in three types of tamales, massive amounts of cookies. Candy. Some light egg nog. Spiced apple cider. Snuggles with Portia. Time off.

It was great all around.

Happy Merry!

2007-12-25T09:08:00.000-08:00

Well the day is finally here, MERRY CHRISTMAS from Greg & Mara to anyone reading my little corner of the blogosphere. We are about to get down and dirty opening gifts, I of course took a picture of our overflowing tree, it's always so sad when it's bare and cold and naked after the fact. I don't mind delaying for a while just to live vicariously through wrapped present glory. Hope everyone is enjoying their wonderful day with friends and family!!

In celebration of Christmas Eve, yesterday I pulled out the rest of the rugelach dough from the other day and made more pinwheels. This time with dried cranberries, coconut, brown sugar, cinnamon and walnuts with apricot and these were rockin! Though honestly the first batch was great too, but these were just a little less sweet and more tart but still sweet. Hmm that made no sense. Anyway, rave reviews from hubby, who said 'those pinwheel things are good, i ate a few'...haha. I def think these and the PB cookies are my fave this year. I'm hoarding the PB cookies and trying to eat them sparingly, because how often do I bake with hydrogenated oil Skippy? Once a year.

This 2nd batch of rugelach came out way more visually lovely than the first tries I made. Those were still good looking but nowhere near SmittenKitchen or Janna beauty, now I finally feel like I got more of the hang of it.

rugelach beauties.

ready for it's closeup.

Time for presents!! Have a wonderful day everyone. Hugs and kisses from Greg, Mara and the snow princess, Portia.

Holiday Tradition...Tamales!

2007-12-24T23:05:00.000-08:00

Every year my family makes Tamales for Xmas...well year after year it's been mostly Mom and Grandma making the elements for them and then the grandkids assemble them. I have never really felt all that confident in my kitchen skills so I was never sure I could pull off the tamale makin' on my own. However last year only Mom made Tamales...for whatever reason I don't really love hers, and Grandma hurt her shoulder this year, so I thought well if there was ever a time to step up the plate it is this year.

I had Grandma help me by making her famous sauce (which has 3 types of chilis, garlic, peanut butter, chocolate, pumpkin and sesame seed in it!!) and I did the rest. I went a little crazy because I figure when in Rome so we made beef/pork combo tamales ala family tradition, chicken chile verde tamales ala Mara experimental tradition, and sweet tamales which are kind of rare and unique around here so I was really excited about these. They are basically like dessert tamales.

Like any obsessed blogger, I catalogued the process the whole time with my camera. I started cooking the meats on Friday, and we assembled on Saturday. Greg helped. Started steaming on Sunday and into Monday, each batch takes between 2-4 hours to steam.

Here are the highlights. I am happy to report that every version was received with cheers by the family members and the most important taster, my cute guinea pig husband, who wants to eat tamales and cookies solely for meals the rest of this week. I like the way he thinks!!

crockpot beef with garlic, onion, water, simmered and cooked for 5+ hours.

shredded!!

mixed with Grandma's famous chili sauce....mmm.

prepared masa from a local Guadalajara market (which also has fab greasy burritos). yep this stuff has LARD in it!! yum.

added EVOO, baking powder, sauce for color and whipped into shape!

assembly station.

assembled and ready to be steamed for a few hours.

beautiful steamy goodness.

ta-da! finished product. i think these are actually the sweet ones as the beef and chicken ones are slightly larger.

speaking of sweet, here is the filling for the sweet tamales. hot rum soaked raisins, cinnamon, brown sugar.

done, cooled and cut-up. they ARE as tasty as they look.

Baking Overload.

2007-12-21T08:01:00.000-08:00

So last nite I spent 4 hours baking goodies for my team cookie exchange, which was actually a ton of fun. We put the Christmas music on and I started making a whirlwind of a mess in the kitchen!!! I only needed to make one type of cookies for the exchange but I've been researching them all week, so I got inspired and made three different types. Baking superwomanslashfriend Janna has been waxing on and on about SmittenKitchen.Com so I started checking out that blog and other baking blogs this week. So I had a little pile of 'I wanna try this!' placed in front of me. Oodles of european unsalted butter and light brown sugar later...I had my results and boy were they tasted. I took pictures the whole time, which Greg just finds hilarious and a little crazee, but after seeing those baking blog pictures, you'd be inspired to take photos of your handiwork too. I'm but a novice.

thumbprint dough.

beautiful organic sugar.

peanut butter dough.

finished peanut butter product.

apricot rugelach dry filling.

rugelach dough rolled & filled.

yum yum. solo baked rugelach.

rolls and rolls of rugelach.

cooled & packaged...tasty pretty.

Gourmet Dinner.

2007-12-18T08:00:00.000-08:00

Our fabulous neighbors have family visiting from out of town (way out of town!!!) and her father is a chef...so we jumped at the chance to go over on Sunday evening, and partake of his fabulous cooking and baking. The presentation of the food was so awesome that I had to capture it on camera and it tasted just as yummy as it looked. Greg is a big fan of this Slovakian fruit liquor ... it comes in flavors like plum and apple etc...and Slavka's parents brought a bottle of apple which the boys freely imbibed. The next morning Greg was feeling the pain, but he's still a Slivovitza lover..we went over last nite to take some cookies (and got some fabulous homemade cake in exchange) and he managed to down 2 shots within the 10 minutes he was there. What a pro!

amazing starters, check out the intricacy of the deviled eggs. mine will always seem so cheap & tawdry looking in comparion forevermore.

after a little wine...

the infamous slavovica (or slivovitza to us americanos)

pretty latte.

big fresh fruit platter completed the lavish dinner (which was multi-coursed, i just didn't get great photos of it all...)

Fresh Baked Goods.

2007-12-16T15:18:00.000-08:00

So this weekend I got out the baking goodies and got to work. I absolutely love making cookies but since I don't really eat them that often (rephrase...I would love to eat them all the time but I *cant* eat them that often and still fit into my jeans)...I hardly ever make them. So when the holidays roll around, I am more than happy to bake incessantly and give away 99% of the fruit of my labors so that they expand someone else's waistlines instead of mine. ;) Though really Greg can eat 20 cookies and never gain anything so he's a great guinea pig.

I made some double chocolate peppermint dream cookies and snickerdoodles. When I don't want chocolate, the snickerdoodles are seriously my fave cookie ever. The chocolate ones came out so incredibly rich and I halved the butter in the recipe, so it was amazing to think that the original recipe called for double the butter. I really have no idea where it'd go, they were really rich anyway. And I did the same in the snickerdoodle recipe and they came out wonderful, to rave reviews from my better half (though maybe it was his spiked eggnog talking?).

Fruits of Labor.

Double Chocolate Peppermint Dream:

Snickerdoodles:

Card's In the Mail!

2007-12-11T16:40:00.000-08:00

So I am currently loving Shutterfly right now. Not because of it's super user friendly interface or amazingly bug-free experience (neither of which are actually true...the thing was a PITA to use)...but because you can create cutey little collage photo cards for holiday mailings. Oh...what you say...lots of other online sites do that? How right you are.

HOWEVER, where Shutterfly trumps the others is the ability to select 'let us mail cards for you'...which I swear is like hearing the heavens open up and angels begin to sing. What...no mailing of xmas cards this year? No trauma of looking at them sitting on the cold granite island waiting to be addressed? No buying stamps? Be still my little heart.

I signed right up, spent way too many hours uploading images and playing with our card...and finally hit the button last nite. So who knows when these little gifts from God will arrive to our lucky recipients, but at least *I* don't have to be licking envelopes. And that was worth the exhorbitant price I had to pay for each card. And now...I can concentrate on wrapping presents. Yanno, the fun stuff.

Soooo...if you are wondering why our Xmas cards haven't come this year, wonder no longer. Card's in the mail!! I swear.

Ho Ho Holiday Party.

2007-12-10T21:16:00.000-08:00

Sym had their holiday party on Friday...we went, we whooped, and we came home. It was quite fab actually...they rented out the 'Silicon Valley Computer Museum' which for those of us who have been around the SV longer than a few years remember as the original first SGI building. The original 'Yahoo' of the SV...they had oodles of buildings up and down Shoreline Blvd and everyone would whisper about visiting their awesome colorful, fun, trendy, uber-cool building. Now it's just the SV Computer Museum as SGI is sadly no more. I love the building's history.

Two bands, lots of food, free flowing alcohol and a whole room of desserts. My kind of party. We danced a long while and snapped some incriminating pictures. Not so much on the incriminating part but lots of pictures.

Some highlights.

We clean up nice.

A few of my fabulous teammates and some strange little mushroom shaped ice cream numbers on a stick which we consumed in the multiples.

Me and Vivi...It's so fun to have her working with me again.

Go Elf Yourself!

2007-12-06T16:05:00.000-08:00

My coworkers and I had way too much fun this morning with this little tool that Office Depot puts out.

Our funtastic results..seriously I about die laughing every time we play it. And before you ask, Portia is blue because that was the only photo I had of her here with me...her in the snow in Tahoe haha.

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1197999160

Festive Fun...with Alcohol.

2007-12-04T23:08:00.001-08:00

Holiday fun with the gang...Mike and Jen hosted this year. We had way too much food, amazingly tasty spiked cider and wine, and much merriment. Of course, we have photos.

Highlights...the rest are being uploaded to Ofoto..I'll post the link in a few.

Host and Hostess.

Mara n Jen.

Saucy!!!...Mara, Nic & Shari workin' the hip!

Pretty flowers.

Yummy cider. Halfway gone *hic*

Holiday cuteness.

And again, what party is complete without Kenny hamming it up.

Holiday Overdose.

2007-12-03T23:07:00.000-08:00

Yep, I admit it, I'm a decor whore. Christmas decor whore to be exact. It's pretty bad many other times of the year but at Christmas it just all comes out. My pallet of Xmas stuff that is. Greg pulls it out from under the house and typically grouses about how much I have...but this year he has been quite good natured about the whole thing, quite in the spirit to my surprise. He even put up my snowflakes and the outside lights without me having to ask (typically I do it). So because he was helping out in other ways this year, I had way more time on my hands to uhhh...add more decor to the house. It's a little crazy I admit. Tonite he asked me 'so who's going to be seeing this new masterpiece...' because we aren't planning on hosting any parties this year (that will change)...I said 'US!!!'. Well and now, you too.

So yeah, this last weekend we spent a good amount of time putting the rest of the house 'together'. And it looks quite good I am proud to say! Yay for sparkly holidays, the best kinds.

Here's what I started with. One 6.5' noble fir, naked and cold.

Add countless red, gold, and silver ornaments (who knew I was such a ball collector??)...

Equals super sparkly results, along with a bored looking rat.

The rest of the cheery abode...

Downstairs tree. You can see the outside 'project in progress' with Greg happening.

I've got more pictures (no really...) but have to upload them so check back later for the rest of the pretty sparkly items.

We Live Here!

2007-11-30T21:34:00.000-08:00

Every once in a while something random happens and you think oh that is just so awesome.

Yesterday I was changing upstairs in our master bedroom for my trainer appt (where he seriously kicked my butt with some traps and delts work til I swear I almost cried. Strong back, baby!!!)...and I looked out through one of the windows. With our new shades, they are the top down, bottom up cellulars in a cool shade of white linen...and we put the top down mostly halfway so we can see out into the horizon and the blue sky, since we have no houses that are as tall as our townhouse is. It is an awesome view that we don't really typically have time to appreciate...and now that it gets dark so early, we are hardly ever home when dusk falls. But yesterday I got home a little early to change and I looked out the window and saw this...

(you can click on it to see the larger picture, it's so worth it)

It was so beautiful! I had to get the camera and take a picture. It's times like this that I love our townhouse even more. I know that we don't plan to stay here forever but it's such an awesome place for us and this is just one of the reasons why.

Baby Fuzz.

2007-11-30T19:34:00.000-08:00

I have a new 'first cousin once removed' ! Yep that's what it's called, I looked it up online. And the internet is ALWAYS right.

My cousin just had her first daughter last nite, 3 weeks early yet entirely healthy and ready to come out. The first great grandchild for my grandmother and the first baby to be born into our family for 17 years! As such there was a ton of excitement around the whole thing... everyone loves a baby to spoil, especially when that baby isn't theirs!!! Oh maybe that's just me. I just like being auntie Mara. Or in this case, First Cousin Once Removed Mara. FCOR. There's gotta be an easier term.

Photos below. It really scares me how happy Greg looks holding this baby. In fact, it scares me that I look happy too. Scared all around. But baby...Lily is her name, is SUPER CUTE. Apparently I looked like her when I was born. Which means Mara=Super Cute. I love math!!

Deck the Halls.

2007-11-27T23:39:00.001-08:00

Our first tree went up last Sunday. "First" meaning the downstairs tree that we bought last year, the 7.5" noble fir with pre-strung lights and little pinecones sewn in. Love this tree. Talk about ease of setup. Greg put it together in 5 minutes and then I was left to my own tree decorating devices which suits me fabulously as I get into 'The Zone'. Last year it was just gold but this year I supplemented with red as well and it looks awesome. Did about 1/2 the house decor on Sunday before I cried uncle.

Initial Results!

Next weekend we'll head out into the wild (tree lot on the corner) for our real 'family room' tree which is the one we spend all the quality time with..and the one under which Portia shreds presents while we are away from the house. What would Christmas be without having to re-wrap shredded presents continuously the entire month of December?? Really.

After the decorating I felt all inspired. So I made chocolate chip cookies, with oatmeal and mini chips and applesauce instead of butter and oil. Well I did use 1/2 a stick of butter but that was 1/3 of what the recipe actually called for. They came out fabulous and I liked knowing I wasn't clogging my arteries when I immediately consumed 4 out of the oven. HEY! It's the holidays.

Multiple Thanksgivings.

2007-11-27T23:38:00.000-08:00

4 turkeys in 3 days. That has to be some sort of record right??? That was how our holiday went down last week...and man was it good.

There was a good reason for why I didn't post on here for uhh almost a week. It's called turkey coma. And it's dangerous. Leading to uncontrollable sleeping and continuous pumpkin pie eating.

So yeah...the first one was at our house on Wed night, our neighbors came over and I made our entire dinner including a 15lb turkey (okay in my defense, typically we buy a 10lb for us and we have a ton of leftovers..the whole foods guy said 15 was good for 4 people, LIAR. we had so much turkey it was coming out our ears), dressing, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce with citrus (well i bought this from whole foods, i must fess up), gravy, and the most divine pumpkin cheesecake EVER from Sugar Butter Flour (See orgasmic dessert post below). And my neighbor got a mini pecan pie from WF which promptly made it's way into our kitchen, never to be seen again. Then we had the real holiday at our house with my family. On Friday we went to my uncle's house for a holiday with them and my cousin who flew in from LA. And my other super pregnant-about-to-pop cousin who drove up with us...I swear the whole way up there I was envisioning a delivery by the side of the road kind of thing. And THEN we came home that night and ate a 4th dinner with our neighbors who spent the day cooking THEIR dinner. Whew.

I gotta say that it was awesome to have 4 diff turkeys, 4 diff cranberry sauces, 4 diff stuffings/dressings, multiple desserts, multiple veggies. Not one dinner was 'the same'. Variety to the max. And I'm all about variety.

At this point Greg was ready to swear off turkey forever, but not me. I love me some high protein lean turkey breast. And our breasts on the 15lber were BIG. Portia wasn't left out, she got all the dark meat on the turkey, more than could fit in her little body for days on end.

I managed to actually get some workouts in during the days of gorgefest, and my Dad, Greg and I did the Turkey Troy on the big day, which was super fun. So I had NO GUILT on the 2nd meal at least. Don't know that it carried over at all to meals 3 and 4. Or ummm...when I finished off the pumpkin cheesecake on Sunday night.

Mashed Taters...creamy good and I capitulated and used real butter. Good times.

Sugar Butter Flour GOOD!!!!

2007-11-20T19:15:00.000-08:00

Despite all my best intentions to be 'food good' in anticipation of some seriously crazy Thanskgiving consumption over the next few days, I convinced my coworkers that today was a good day to visit this bakery I'd been jonesing over since seeing it showcased on Yelp almost daily. It became an obsession. It didn't disappoint. They have a small lunch menu which is really just a thinly veiled excuse to visit the place to get DESSERT and yet still have something slightly nutritional as well. I got the Tuscan Chicken Sandwich which was tasty. Grilled veggies. Water.

Boom onto the dessert cases. It was hard to choose but I decided to focus and only get the breads and croissants this time. Save cupcakes, cookies for another visit. Picked up a slice of banana walnut bread, pumpkin bread, sour cream coffee cake. Oh my. We'll be eating yummy breakkie the next few days with some coffee. Then got a pumpkin cheesecake 8" round for dessert tomorrow night for our small early Tday dinner with friends. Coworkers got a bunch of things, we came back and sampled them. OMG good!!!! Really not much else to say other than we will be returning post-haste to sample more sweet treats after the holiday.

Chocolate Pyramid:

Tiramisu:

Oh and 'food good'? So not happening. I'm hitting the gym after work today for penance, it'll be sickly sweet.

Decadent Weekend...

2007-11-19T09:48:00.000-08:00

Seems like all we did was eat this weekend. Oh that's not true. I got some shopping in!

Visited the new La Fondue on Saturday...wow the place is amazing. I heard they spent a fortune redoing the new building and it shows. They practically had to roll us out of there.

Getting ready for Thanksgiving. We're hosting this year which makes me go HMM because really I should have done Xmas...our house will be so pretty and decorated and right now it's not. I mean what can you really do for Thanksgiving? Put some turkeys around the place? I'm creatively stumped. And unmotivated really.

Picking up our organic Whole Foods turkey tomorrow for it's new brining home in the bucket for 24 hours. Our neighbors are coming over for our mini-pre-thanksgiving dinner on Wed, then Greg and I are doing the 10k Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving Day. It's a family affair, everyone is doing it. I figure if I torture myself in the morning then I won't feel an iota of guilt eating dinner later. And multiple pieces of PIE!!!!

Our little home menu...stuffing, mashed potatoes, glazed carrots, rolls, brined turkey, salad, punkie pie. Then the big day of...we have more of a potluck style with the family, so all of the above plus a new brussel sprouts with bacon recipe I am dying to try.

Mmmm. Then also, Mom's famous crockpot pinto beans, Grandma's famous spanish rice, more turkey (roasted this time), Mom's stuffing, a cake and a pie, gosh the list goes on. Gorgefest to ensue.

Also picked up some TASTY looking cranberry pumpkin scone mix at World Market for breakkie on Fri and Sat. I am like a kid in a candy store whenever I head there. I seriously feel my eyes glazing over while walking the aisles. And since all the stores already have their Xmas stuff out, I did a little pre-holiday decor shopping and picked up a few gifts too.

On a fun note, Restoration had their 25% F&F this weekend and I kept meaning to get into the mall but it's so not appealing at this time of year. So last nite at 10pm, I put in my online order. I snagged these faux votive candles that are supposedly going to look real. I am intrigued.

Payoff!!

2007-11-16T09:58:00.000-08:00

So my trainer did another body composition mass test on me on Monday but I had to wait til yesterday to get my results. The last time I did it was August 30 and I was 23.5% body fat, in the normal range for my age and weight and all that. My goal is 20.5% which is in the 'excellent' range for my age and weight and would make me really quite lean. I was so jazzed to find that my test on Monday put me at 21.2% which is awesome! I am really close to my goal. I can visually see I am carrying more lean muscle, but it's nice to have the #'s to validate the visuals as well. So YAY for that. Of course if they did the test yesterday it would have shown donut levels of body fat. Hee.

Speaking of donuts, I got a great workout in yesterday, we did pilates upper body for 40 min along with some seriously painful-yet-effective abs, and then a Zumba class which is so amazingly fun even for us uncoordinated types. You don't even care what you look like. Just dance around!!

Check out Zumba at http://www.zumba.com/ . Warning: The music is seriously addicting.

On a fun foodie breakkie note...if you like oatmeal and you like protein powder (Well, I would imagine no one actually LIKES pp, but it does get you results)...I have been mixing my plain organic oatmeal with vanilla TJ's protein powder and it's quite tasty. Keeps the sugars low, protein high and it's got FIBER. Plusses all around. If I close my eyes I can almost imagine I'm eating french toast. Almost.

Sugar Coma.

2007-11-15T16:09:00.000-08:00

My coworker brought a box of donuts to work today. They looked something like this. Pretty huh?

Hours later, I was crashing down from the worst sugar rush ever. Not even sure how many I consumed...there was tearing and demolishment and tossing of innards and frosting smearing. It was a massacre I tell you!!!

Here's the result...

Now I'm off to the trainer to suffer, cry, and be tortured to pay penance for my multiple sins. Then I'll do a Zumba class as additional penance. ZUMBA!

Fun Foodie Finds.

2007-11-14T21:57:00.000-08:00

Since I'm all into the healthy lifestyle thing lately (okay does a year plus of doing it count as lately ? Not sure but hey...I'll go with it)...I have a bunch of fave finds that are staples in my life. I get bored eating absolutely the same thing every day, but I try to keep it within a range of 'goodness', so I mix it up a bit sometimes. I try to find more protein items with fiber and lower carbs for the most part. It's mostly about fuel for the body, but if it tastes good that's awesome too. It's amazing how many cool, tasty, yet good for you things are out there. I make it my personal mission to find them.

Here are a few of my fave 'good to go in your mouth' things for a healthier type lifestyle. No jokes please.

Lightful Satiety Smoothies. 90 cals, 6g fiber, 6 protein. The perfect thing for between breakkie and lunch or after a workout on the go. The straw thing is weird and does not work. Recommend using strange straw to stab hole in the top and suck like a vampire.

Frozen Yogurt. Wow Cow. Heard of it? 10 cals per ounce. It's non-dairy and it's pretty tasty if you are watching your waistline. I eat it a fair amount but sometimes I splurge and get the 'real thing' as in nonfat froyo. Gotta live a little ya hear!

Light 2% String Cheese. 60 cals per stick, 6g protein and no carbs. Win Win for the muscles.

Designer Whey Protein Powder. 90 cals for a scoop (mega scooper too), 18g protein, like 6g carbs. I love mixing this with low-cal almond milk and regular milk in a sports bottle and doing a little shakie shakie to get it all nice and blended. Pour over a bit of ice in a glass. It's almost like a milkshake. Without the ass-packing fat.

Luna Bars. Specifically the new flavor Chocolate Peppermint Stick. Like girl scout Thin Mints? Don't like how you can inhale a whole sleeve in under 5 minutes? Well me either. This Luna Bar actually tastes like the cookies but is a little more nutritious. 180 cals, 9g protein, 3g fiber. It does have some sugars but WAY less than a scoop of ice cream even. My nutritionist allowed me to have one a day on a lower sugar plan I did. Love them. Other fave flavors: Lemon Zest; Chocolate Raspberry; Nutz over Chocolate; and the Blueberry Yogurt Sunrise (my def fave for non-chocolate!).

Egg Whites. Okay I know this doesn't sound SO appealing so you might be like Whaaa? But they rock. I scramble up a few in the mornings with 2% shredded cheese, cayenne pepper, black pepper, salt..and put them into a Sonoma Tortilla Company Artistan Tortilla (60 cals, 8g fiber, 6g protein!) and whala. It's the breakfast of champions and nets me about 25g protein and I still get a healthy dose of fiber from the tortilla. The best thing about egg whites is that they take on the flavor of whatever you cook them with...so it's easy to make them quite tasty with spices.

Vitalicious Brownies. and muffins, and cakes, and tops. The list is quite long. This company makes a very good faux-brownie..well that's what I call it. It is a brownie but it's not quite a brownie. 100 cals, something like 5g fiber and 3g protein. It's fabulous for heating up in the microwave and then putting a big scoop of slow churned ice cream on top with a bit of nuts and some fat free Reddi Whip. Like a Baskin Robbins sundae sans much fat and cals. I have a problem eating just one.

That's it for now but trust me, I have tons more nutritional goodness up my sleeve. Just gotta find the time to post. Stay tuned!

Oh and I gotta give some props to http://www.hungry-girl.com/ for her amazing website and blog on Yahoo! about similar kinds of finds. Many times I will find a favorite on her blog that I already know about but many times she turns me onto things I never even knew were out there. 100 cal M&M packs anyone?!

Ho Ho Ho...Hum.

2007-11-14T20:42:00.000-08:00

It's that time of year again. Okay not REALLY. It's barely Thanksgiving. But I can't help thinking about Xmas. Because I love it. It's really my favorite time of the year. Food, gifts, home decor....it's all up my alley. I get drunk on it.

So because it's right around the corner, I only have two things on my mind. Decorating the house, and.....PRESENTS. Mostly presents. For other people of course.

But I'll force myself to focus tonite as I head over to the mall and look around for xmas gifts and home decor items for the upcoming holiday season. I am determined to not be at the mall on Dec 24 getting my last desperate gifts. Determined I say!

Thinking of these for my beloved husband..the Bose earbuds. They are smashin'.

Possibly along with some beautiful blue cabachon cuff links that I found on Red Envelope. But I would love to find something that has cuff links AND the button ties as well for the tux shirt. So far no dice.

Already have picked up a few goodies here and there for people on the list. Gotta figure out our Xmas cards. We always talk about doing a photo of us with Portia but the fact is...we're lazy. And then suddenly it's time to mail the cards. So I grab a box from the local store and dash out a message and mail them. Yep, holiday card slacker...that's me! Sometimes I feel like I'm just lucky to get them in the mail before Dec 25.

On a super cute puppy note...we have been seeing this ad everywhere in mags and on TV and we love playing it for Portia, she goes NUTS when she sees it on the screen!! Fun times.

Slacker. Diamond Travels. Holidays?!?

2007-11-12T11:29:00.000-08:00

Wow, it's been a week since I posted? I'm a slacker. I was out of town a few days last week so work was notably insane before the trip.

Where'd I go? Houston baby!!! I met up with a girlfriend who lives on the East Coast and we did the bling thing with our jeweler, WhiteFlash (http://www.whiteflash.com/!) yet again. This is becoming an annual thing! As usual it was a ton of fun, tried on a 5c again, man that thing was so meant to be mine, along with my wannabe NYC penthouse living life. I've got some pictures on my digicam so I'll upload them at some point.

Didn't come home with anything new, though they are scoping out a few things for me in Antwerp this week. Xmas pendant fun is coming to a stocking near ME!

Speaking of Xmas, just started to do my shopping...why does it seem to get harder every year?? Either that or I get less and less creative. I'm sure it's the former. Oh, and on the same holiday note, we somehow got suckered into hosting Thanksgiving...can you believe it's only 9 days away???

This year, I'm responsible for my famous mashed potatoes, a veggie (glazed lemon carrots baby!), and the famous pumpkin pie from The Creamery in Palo Alto (mega yums). And Greg and I also have our own mini Thanksgiving the night before which I love. I'll be brining our turkey again this year...gotta place my order with Whole Paycheck for our small 9 lber. Maybe with this recipe...

Cedar Brined Turkey:
http://www.williams-sonoma.com/recipe/recipedetail.cfm?objectid=04ECE43F-C38C-00DA-5D4A6BD135A6CDDF

And I might try the new Williams Sonoma foccacia bread stuffing...it looked super tasty in the store. We'll see how perky I feel about going to the mall and buying it in the next 7 days. Esp since it's not online. Argh!

Speaking of the MALL (boy I can just digress for days), did you get the 20% Restoration Hardware Friends and Family coupon in your inbox? If not, get your paws on one. It's awesome. I am already planning our home decor for the holiday season, to my husband's everlasting storage chagrin, and every little discount helps. Ho Ho Ho!

On a final note, I'm currently reading a really good book. I picked it up at the airport...I swear I find great things there. It's called Rhett Buttler's People and it's fairly new, and it's the Gone with the Wind story from Rhett's perspective, really mostly about his life and his stories. So far it's quite hard to put down. Highly recommended. Buy it.

Rhett Butler's People:
http://www.amazon.com/Rhett-Butlers-People-Donald-McCaig/dp/0312262515/ref=sr_1_2/105-5511658-0579608?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1194976383&sr=8-2

Birthday Celebration.

2007-11-04T10:03:00.001-08:00

Yes, it happened yet again. My birthday. This year we were in Acapulco when it went down...so the celebrations have happened hodgepodge intermittently all week long kinda thing. Last nite we had dindins with my parents and I ended up scoring a sweet iPod Nano in ProductRED style...spent way too long last nite and this morning loading all my goodies into it. It even holds pictures. Welcome to 2007, hanging with my husband has turned me into a luddite.

New Toy. Along with a fab cup of espresso my better half made me while I was playing around with the Nano.

During dinner numnums.

We have eaten at this place a few times in Los Gatos and this time it just was seriously sucking..the food wasn't as good and the service was horrendous. So we probably won't go back. I'm glad I didn't do a Yelp review yet on the place, for whatever reason I was waiting til last nite.

We did get the most amazing gelato at...of course, Powells, after dinner. They have PUMPKIN right now...hopefully for the rest of the month. Just divine.

Ghosts and Goblins...oh...and a Portia Witch????

2007-11-04T09:52:00.000-08:00

Belated Halloweenie post...but here are our pumpkins in all their drunken carved glory. Just kidding, actually we were stone cold sober when we made these masterpieces. I actually loved how the mouth turned out on mine this year and since that is typically where I start to go seriously wrong, I was jazzed. Maybe after 32 years of carving I am finally getting the hang of it. Call me a slow learner.

Mine:

Greg's:

We also had one for Princess P but the photos didn't come out so good this year.

Speaking of Princess P...here is the most tolerant dog in the world in her Ween-getup. When I see these pictures I can't help but think...one day she is going to snap. And then who's going to get it? Us. That's right. There will be no one to blame but ourselves when we wake up one morning with extremities missing.

After the consumption of WAY too much mediocre Hershey's owned milk-chocolate this year...I am okay with seeing Halloween pass us by. We did have amazing caramel apples from Schurra's which I have convinced myself are health food. I mean after all the Kit Kat's I ate...an apple with some caramel on it and nuts has to be health food RIGHT???

Una mas por favor...

2007-10-30T16:24:00.000-07:00

Finally got some of the pictures uploaded and cropped and all that...so here are some highlights. I'll be uploading them to OfotoslashKodakGallery soon so that people can buy prints...so I'll add the link to that later.

Somehow coming back to the daily grind (which has been grindier than normal the last 3 days with all day meetings *and* playing catch up) seems extra cruel when viewing these photos...ahhh!!! Where's that winning lotto ticket when ya need it.

View from our room balcony...how sweet was this.

Us at the rehearsal dinner...after a few drinkies!!

Some photos from the church where the wedding was held...it was so pretty.

Photos from the reception, we had a smashingly good time and went to bed at 5am. The beautiful thing about vacation you can sleep til noon and it doesn't matter!

Mango drinkie yum.

Palapa prettiness. Lounge area where we hung out before dinner.

Amazing view from the palapa open area just beyond the photo. The whole island was so lush...such beauty.

Verra tasty local place we grubbed at one night in town....mmm authentic enchiladas.

Other random moments captured with my Canon:

One fine morning at breakfast...my handsome husband.

Awesome view from the water on the 2 hour jetski ride we took with the Frenchies. 30 foreigners zipping around on the open water? Scary. Especially since we were riding them on the OCEAN. Yeah.

For those interested in more photos...here is our Ofoto link the wondrous many pictured album:
http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=cdxn47v.80sthcyf&x=0&y=-k2rzye

Home Sweet Home

2007-10-29T14:25:00.000-07:00

We're back!!! Got in late last nite and actually had to work today, what is up with that noise? BUT I came in to a great surprise...my fabulous coworkers had decorated my cube and area for my birthday (our team is crazy about that stuff!) and there were numerous goodies waiting for me.

The cutest cupcake evahhhh!! Thanks Miss Brit for this one.

And the decor made me feel like I was still chillin by the pool in Acapulco...

There were also donuts and homemade cupcakes where the frosting is out of this world....Continuation of the gorgefest experienced on our Mexico trip (I can't even count how many times the words 'Strawberry Daquiri' crossed my lips!!) ....my trainer will see me tonite so I am afraid as to what she'll say!!! She'll probably put me on a lettuce diet or something. According to the scale in our room I 'gained' 2 lbs at the end of our trip (gosh only 2? I was GRATEFUL!), but my jeans fit me fine today so maybe it was just the equivalent of water ala tequila weight?? I can wish.

Massive amounts of travel pictures to come.

Frosting and Tropical Fun...

2007-10-20T22:19:00.000-07:00

We've got cupcakes!! Finally uncovered the USB cable...here are the cupcakes from earlier this week in all their frostingy fabulous glory.

I had one or two of the chocolate frosting ones (with choco cupcake, not pictured here), but actually only ate the frosting part with a bit of the cake. It's all about the frosting...cake is for weenies!

And I yanked out the camera today and got this super cute shot of Princess P sunbathing on the new leather ottoman downstairs in the living room.

Doesn't it look like she owns the place??? When is she going to start paying the mortgage?

Yeah...so we're off to Mexico tomorrow...Acapulco for a week for my 33rd birthday (yikes!) and a friend's wedding. They have 80 guests coming, wowsers! Here's where we'll be staying. And it has a full exercise room. Not sure what that means, a lone recumbent bike from the 1950s? If so, I will burn that thing into the ground!! And it's got three pools. We'll be using those quite often I imagine.

A tan for Thanksgiving? Sweet. We'll be gone for a week..until then, adios!!

Cuteness overdose.

2007-10-19T13:54:00.000-07:00

Going through some old photos on my computer...came across this and went AWWWW. The things that my dog lets me do to her, seriously. No wonder she neurotically bites herself when we aren't around.

I also have some amazing La Patisserie cupcake pictures from a birthday celebration (they are practically done weekly) we had at work yesterday...however I can't find my USB cable to post them. So I just have the memory to share for now. Chocolate buttercream frosting, YUM. Should be part of every diet.

Nesting Instinct..

2007-10-18T12:46:00.000-07:00

Recently I went through a spurt of home decorating...the amazing part is that we don't have visitors coming (which is code for me to realize 'OH CRAP, stuff has to get done around the house!'). So, I am just calling it the 'fall nesting instinct', considering we'll be spending a fair amount of our future months in the house during the rainy cold season in California (don't laugh, it really is rainy and cold!)...I want to enjoy being indoors as much as possible.

So we finally got rid of the monstrous halfway dying ficus tree that has been the bane of my husband's visual existence for the last 3 years in our downstairs living/entry room. It went over to Mom's house to try to survive outside, yikes. Replaced it with a leather chair and ottoman from Macy's after much research...it looks beautiful esp when layered with comfy throws and pillows, but I don't have photos just yet.

Then upstairs in the master, we are replacing our old wood wide blinds which have not held up AT ALL the last 4 years, with Hunter Douglas Duette Honeycomb linen textured shades in an off white. These should be quite pretty, but I'm a little concerned about it being too bright in the room when they are installed on all 4 of the windows. Our room gets so much light...but as G pointed out, not so much in the morning....so as long as it doesn't disrupt my beauty sleep, I am a'ok.

Here's how the master looks now:

New Hunter Douglas Duettes

Then we finally got artwork for the master and the master bathroom...it's only been what ? 4 years? and we'll probably move in the next year or so. But there's no time like the present! The master artwork for over the bed came from, all places, Cost Plus...4 square 15x15 canvas painted mahogany and white swirly floral prints that work fabulously with the dark wood and light blue we have in the room right now. They will go in a square over the bed.

They look a lot like this but imagine the cutouts painted white and the pieces are square not rectangular and there are 4 not two. Confused yet?

And the master bathroom artwork from my absolute fave online shopping decor site ever, Ballard Designs...these will go over our tub in our master bathroom and they will just barely fit!

Further East...

2007-10-18T12:36:00.000-07:00

Since it had been a few years since we last visited the East Coast and Greg's fam...we took a jaunt out there in May of 2007 after our trip to Raleigh, NC...we just kept going. A 6 hour drive later, we were somewhat cranky but glad to arrive. Within the next week we covered a lot of ground and caught up with a lot of people!! While I wouldn't call it a 'vacation' (to me that term is reserved solely for lounging around on the beach with a drink in hand kinda days)...it was awesome, and the weather was beautiful. We even got a freak thunderstorm one day while driving back to Greg's Mom's house....which was REALLY COOL. Sheltered California girl here....!

Photos.

Snuggles with Greg and Lucy

Everyone loves some meat.

SuzyQ, Greg, Mara

Anne, Leon, Greg

Greg w/Tom and Kathy's kidlets. Look at that grin. SCARY!

Greg & Tom...could be brothers?

We visited Greg's college campus, Lehigh University. The most beautiful old buildings and amazing hills to hike. We went up and did two 5 mile hikes while there, gotta burn off all the BROWNIES Greg's Mom kept making for us!!!

Beautiful Campus Church

Winding Drive on Campus (why didn't my college look like this???)

Like Mother like Son.

Trip to the South...er North?

2007-10-18T11:25:00.000-07:00

In consideration of moving out of California at some point (speculation is fun)...we decided to visit North Carolina...specifically the Raleigh area, and determine if we felt like we could see ourselves living there in the near future (code for : does it have enough diversity and fabulous food for us to be happy?)

While we LOVED the area, it's beautiful and quite lushly green, and the food was definitely worth consideration, it's unfort too far from Greg's family for us to consider it any further. The idea is if we decide to move out of the warm bosom of my fam in the SF Bay, we have to go somewhere that is at least fairly local to G's family. Otherwise we'd be too much like a lone ship at sea...we need some connection to a home base.

BUT...while we were sad about it being too far (don't ask why we went in the first place...we thought somehow it was 1/2 the distance it actually was)..we had a wonderful time visiting the area and trying all the fabulous restaurants around there. Who knew the locals were SO DARN FRIENDLY????

And that they had such fabulous BISCUITS? I ...umm...ate a few more than 2.

Other photos...

Us at Mura Sushi in Raleigh, recommended by a friend!

Another great recommend, 115 Midtowne in Raleigh

and yet another recommend @ Second Empire...a beautiful historic house with organic food!

In my internet research on the area I discovered Tyler's Bar and Grill in a small town near Chapel Hill. So of course we HAD to go there. The town also had the cutest co-op market, gosh is this California in North Carolina?!?!

Just one of the many beautiful houses we saw on a long walk through the neighborhoods. This particular home had a stunning rose garden off to the right.

Pictures from Vivian and Bill's Wedding!

2007-10-18T10:47:00.000-07:00

Fun times in Sonoma, June 2007. This was definitely one of the best local weddings we have been to and it didn't break the budget, bonus! Food was YUM, they even had a dessert table *just for me* (scary!) and the Bride looked beautiful.

Mr and Mrs Nuckols!

Num Nums!

After a little champagne...

Budding beauties.

Mr and Mrs Tyler

Tried to move this one up but I'm still learning!

The Gang...can you believe it's been 6 years?!

Aww Vivi is so radiant!

and...what group wedding is complete without Kenny hamming it up?

For Shame...

2007-10-18T10:34:00.001-07:00

So, I'm an internet junkie who loves spending time reading other people's blogs online...why didn't I think of doing this sooner??? Thanks Mrs. Morgan for giving me the light bulb at 7:30am on a Thursday morning when I saw your blog link in my email....ding ding! So here I am. Updates to come....man it's sucky that it won't let me modify the 'date posted' so my updates all have today's date! Whose bright idea was that?