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New York City

Bob is one of the hardest people to buy for. He has pretty much everything he really wants, what he doesn’t have he will buy for himself, and if I do actually figure out a concept of what to get him, I don’t know enough about that thing to actually get him something. So years ago I decided to just focus on trips for his birthday. May is a beautiful month for travel, and if I can swing a day off work, great – long weekend away. He loves NYC, so this is a popular destination for us. Add in good friends to meet, great restaurants and easy travel from Sarasota, and you have the makings of a good, dependable, never boring birthday present.

Normally I plan everything. Shocking, I know. I research restaurants, find hotels and plan the itinerary. This year, I did figure out the flights and hotel, but I did not plan any activities or meals. Big stretch for me and it was done part of of necessity and part as an experiment to see if I could let go and “go with the flow.” Turns out, I can, but I really, really prefer to plan something.

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We were meeting Ed and Erin in the city Saturday and Bob had decided he wanted to see the 9/11 Memorial, so we headed in that direction. With Ed and Erin missing (by seconds!) their initial train, we had some time to use up. Neither of us had ever seen the actual Brooklyn Bridge, nor been to Brooklyn, so we decided to walk it. Yep – we walked over the Brooklyn Bridge (with about a thousand other people that day) and into Brooklyn. We were a little worried that Bob’s pants would shrink and he would sprout a skull cap, but we were not in Brooklyn long enough for that to happen. But I did get some great views from the bridge.

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After some misses, we did finally meet up with Ed and Erin, and wandered the memorial for a bit. It was well done – peaceful, open, and poignant. The original plan included the museum, but we decided to head up into One World Trade and view the city from the observation level. It was really worth doing. The views are fantastic and it gives you a great perspective on the city. (I will admit to various tracks from Hamilton running through my head the whole time I was there, but in all honesty, I pretty much have Hamilton tracks running through my head every day.)

Erin picked the dinner location and she hit it out of the park. Scarpetta was perfect. The atmosphere was formal without being fussy, fancy but not stuffy and inviting enough that we didn’t care we were all in jeans from walking around the city all day. And the food. … oh the food. Ed and Bob got to share meat filled pasta and Erin and I dined on perfect polenta before our main courses.

I’m not sure if I will be able to pull off a non planning trip again, but it was a good experiment and it ended up being a lot of fun.

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It’s what month?

I looked at the calendar today and realized that it is the last week of my second class and the next class starts right after. I can’t believe April is over (Happy Birthday, Vanessa, I am sure I forgot to send a card, but I’m thinking about you – promise) and May is here.

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At the very beginning of April (I may have mentioned in the last post that I’m behind on posts and writing???) Bob and I went to the Wine Walk to Ca’ d’ Zan. This is charity event for the Ringling Museum and one of the (in our opinion) better events they hold. This was the first Friday of April and featured a bunch of wines that can be found at Total Wine, which is helpful as I hate finding a wine I love then not being able to get it again. Best part, once we went to Total Wine, I found that all the wines I liked were under $20 – which is one of my criteria for wine.

As we walked from the museum to the Ca’ d’ Zan, we stopped and had a little to eat and a little to drink and just had a nice, relaxing evening. One of the best parts was watching the sun set over the bay from the terrace of the mansion. It was a prefect way to end my spring break. (even if I am only getting to writing about it weeks later.  Sigh.) IMG_1382

We also did a great cheese class at our favorite cheese shop a week or so later. This one was Cheesemonger favorites, so we knew it would be good. Louise and the girls really know their stuff, so when they say something is good, it usually is. (Blue cheese being the exception for me – still don’t like blue cheese no matter how many times I try it.)
IMG_1378I’ taking today to get caught up on all those little things that fall aside when I get busy – like laundry and cooking and writing posts. If I get my discussion post for the next class written, I may even (gasp) try reading a fluffy romance novel.

The Ca’ D’ Zane has a nice terrace … not as nice as our own backyard, but it isn’t bad.

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Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookies

Sometimes you just want a cookie.

Ok, maybe not everyone gets that craving, but I do. It’s not often – usually I want cake or vegetables – but sometimes I want cookies. I got that craving this weekend, and I was too lazy to go to the grocery store, so I made peanut butter chocolate cookies.

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Yes, I realize there is some irony that I was too lazy to go to the grocery store, but not too lazy to actually make cookies. To me, the store just seems like more effort.

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I had to work with what I had (see above about the grocery) so I went with a basic peanut butter cookie. To that I added chopped German chocolate (again, had on hand) and made peanut butter cookies. These  actually came out really well – they are like the perfect cookie. Sweet and salty and just a touch goo-y.

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Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookies

  • 1 stick butter
  • 1/2 cup peanut butter
  • 1/2 cup granulated sugar
  • 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 1/4 cup flour
  • 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 2 ounces German Chocolate – chopped

Cream together the butter and peanut butter. Add the sugars and mix well. Add egg, flour, soda, salt and baking powder and mix. Add in the flour and mix until no streaks remain. Mix in the chocolate.

Form half inch balls with dough and place on cookie sheet. Refrigerate while oven heats to 375. Once oven is heated, bake for 10-12 minutes. Let set on cookie sheet before removing to wire rack for cooling.

Makes 2.5 dozen cookies

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Kitty picture – just because 🙂

 

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Heath Bar Cake

Over Spring Break I frantically wrote three papers and drafted a presentation for school. I wanted to get as much done as possible since I figured this month would be full of long hours at work and ACT testing. (I wasn’t wrong – I started this post two weeks ago) My schedule for April was suspiciously full. But as my boss commented the other day, I find my balance in the kitchen. So while I was trying to figure out how to phrase things, or which statistics I wanted to use, I managed to make a cake – Heath Bar!

I love Heath bars. The chocolate over the sweet toffee is just an almost perfect treat for me. Strawberry shortcake is better, but heath bars require no work on my end except finding them at the store. Much easier.

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Chocolate cake isn’t my favorite, but I thought this cake had to be chocolate. It just wouldn’t work with a vanilla cake, so I found an old German Chocolate cake recipe and used the cake portion, leaving out the filling and frosting. I cut the recipe in half too – the original recipe calls for making three 9 inch round cakes to layer and I didn’t want that many. Cutting the recipe in half and using two  pans worked just fine – I just kept an eye on the cooking time and they came out perfect.

For the icing, I went with buttercream. I thought about going half cream cheese, half butter, but decided to go for straight butter as I wasn’t sure the tang of the cream cheese would work here. I added some caramel that I had to the butter while whipping it up and ended up with a nice base. It was still a little too rich for me, and a little too sweet, but overall it was fine.

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To really get a Heath Bar cake I needed more than a chocolate cake and some caramel buttercream. I mean, those would be fine, but they wouldn’t be Heath Bar cake. So I crushed several mini Heath Bars and sprinkled the pieces both between the layers and on top of the cake. There you have it – Health Bar Cake. This wasn’t my best cake ever, and it certainly wasn’t the chocolate pie, but it worked and gave me a chance to play in the kitchen.

 

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Eggplant Bolognese

I will never be a no carb person. I love pasta, in almost all forms, and pasta with a good tomato based sauce can be pure heaven. I had a craving for eggplant this week and decided to combine the two for a nice little meal.

I found a recipe that looked good, was doable with what I had on hand, and would not take up too much time. I didn’t make the recipe exactly as they said – I didn’t have dried basil, and I used one 28 ounce can of tomatoes instead of three 15 ounce cans (yes, I know those are two different amounts – I didn’t care). But otherwise, I did follow the recipe fairly closely.

For the noodles I used lo mien noodles or Chinese egg noodles. I like these more than basic pasta as I think they absorb more sauce than traditional pasta. When I make this again, I’m going to use the same noodles, but I’m going to change the tomatoes to crushed tomatoes as I think it will make the bolognese more saucy. The original recipe has the tomato sauce as more of a topping – it’s good, but I really like sauce.

And, of course, a gratuitous kitty picture.

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A Day Off

I had a plan. I had a schedule and then … I decided to take a day off of everything. No school work. No work-work. Just one day to relax and do things that I wanted and just made me happy. It came about in part because every time I went to do reading for school, Gracie or Tigger was laying on what I needed to read.IMG_1356

I hadn’t gotten down to Mom and Dad’s as much as I wanted over the last few months, so it was a nice way to start my day there.  I had spent some time Friday with my cook books, so I had a list of veggies and such that I wanted from the farmer’s market. On that list was also some fresh herbs. I really miss having an herb garden, but I am letting the garden go fallow this year. So … pots. I had pots in the garage and picked up some herbs at the farmer’s market to plant in them. Bob and I went to Home Depot and I got some soil, and a few more plants.

Gracie really liked my idea. She especially liked the catnip I picked up in an attempt to keep Leia from eating my chives and parsley. Leia has been known to eat entire plants of herbs, so this was my hope. Leia has not tried to eat my herbs, but she also isn’t going for the catnip much, but Gracie … Gracie just really got into it.

So after planting my herbs, I actually made an experiment. I saw this recipe for squash and roasted garlic galette. Oh it looked pretty perfect, so I wanted to give it a try. I made a pastry crust, roasted butternut squash and garlic, and put together a pie.

The base has a ricotta and roasted garlic spread with some roasted butternut squash on top. I grated some sheep’s cheese on top and baked it. My only complaint was the crust – it needed to be just a little sweeter, so next time cut the semolina flour and add a teaspoon of sugar. I think that would work well. Because I thought it needed a little green, I served it with the cabbage and apple salad from the night before. It made for a really nice little dinner. IMG_1362

So one day of no school work, no work work and just hanging out at home and having a little fun. It was worth it – even if I am now off to get back on track with my school work.

 

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Chickpea Salad with Apple and Quinoa

The last few months have been a whirl-wind of work and school. When I do get a little down time, the last thing I want to do is log onto the computer. So far I’m doing well managing both work and school, and Bob hasn’t run screaming, so I think I’m balancing everything fairly well. We did get up to Tallahassee for a few days to see Bob’s parents, and I managed to sneak out for an afternoon to see the panhandle side of the family. Little Miss Violet is growing up fast, but is still an absolute delight.

With Spring break here, I’m furiously working on completing a project for school so I have it done when ACT madness ensues in April. It’s slow going (Curriculum is not my favorite topic in education, at least not curriculum development, but I can do it … I just don’t like it). Like anyone doing something they would rather not do, I plan small rewards – bike down to Main Street and have a soda while Bob has a beer, have dessert or watch an episode of Friends (which holds up surprisingly well). I would love to be a little more creative in the kitchen, but reading cookbooks and menu planning and grocery shopping for odd items is just not in the cards right now.

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But, that doesn’t mean that I haven’t cooked and I may have found a new favorite lunch dish. My typical cheese and carrots isn’t going anywhere, but this one has a place in the rotation. This is taken from a Plated box we got a few months ago and I just love it, so I made it workable with regular items around the house. (Full disclosure, that only works if you are like me and keep chickpeas and quinoa in the pantry.)

Chickpea Salad with Apple and Quinoa

  • 1/2 cup quinoa (I like the mixed quinoa, but any will do)
  • 1 shallot, chopped
  • 1 lemon, divided
  • 1 apple, chopped
  • spinach (an ounce to more depending on how much you like)
  • 1 cup cooked chickpeas
  • 1/4 teaspoon (or less depending on taste) chipotle chili powder (go for the chipotle version for the smokiness)
  • 1 tablespoon honey
  • 1 container greek yogurt (non fat, low fat, full fat – whatever your taste)
  • 1/3 cup walnuts (or whatever you have on hand)
  • 1/4 cup dried cranberries
  • 1/2 cup crumbled feta
  • olive oil
  • water, salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 400. Toss the chickpeas in about 1 tablespoon olive oil and season with salt and pepper. When the oven is hot, roast for about 20 minutes.

Combine quinoa, 1 cup water and some salt into a pot. Bring to a boil and the reduce heat. Allow to cook for ten minutes or so then turn off heat, keep covered and let sit 5-10 minutes more until all the water is absorbed.

In a large bowl, combine the honey, chipotle chili powder, juice of 1/2 lemon and about 2 tablespoons olive oil. Mix well, season with salt and pepper. Add apple, nuts, cranberries and shallot and mix to coat.

Mix the remaining lemon juice (of 1/2 lemon) with the yogurt. Season with salt and pepper.

When the quinoa and chickpeas are cooked, add them to the bowl with the apple salad. Add feta and toss together. If serving immediately, toss the spinach in also. If not serving immediately, leave the spinach out so it does not get soggy. Serve with a dollop of lemon yogurt dressing and enjoy.

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One of my favorite parts of this salad is how nutty and crunchy it is. The apples and the nuts offer some texture and the yogurt dressing doesn’t take away from the chipotle honey that the apples and quinoa are tossed in. It all works together. For easier transport, leave the spinach out, but I like the greens in the salad. If you don’t like yogurt (and I don’t but I do love the dressing) leave it off – there is enough flavor in the rest of the salad to be just fine.

I am hoping to be a little creative this weekend – I gave up cake for Lent, so I’m planning to try a Heath Bar Cake (or my version of such) for Easter Sunday. Not sure what I’m going to make for an actual meal, but I have dessert all planned.

 

 

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Where does the time go?

It’s been a while since I’ve posted and with good reason. School, both the back in school and the work kind, are going well, but they are keeping me busy. I’m almost done the first class and am about to start the second. One good thing about the compressed format is that I don’t have time to obsess over every word I write. I don’t have time to restart a paper multiple times, so I draft and then edit the heck out of it. This is sometimes more difficult than it would seem.

Try writing with a cat half on your lap, half on the keyboard until you move the keyboard far enough that you have trouble typing. Gracie has a nack for being in the most inconvenient spot at the most inconvenient time.

I have managed to play in the kitchen, just a little. I haven’t made anything amazingly exciting, but I did do a homemade lo mein and a spinach lasagna. Both were pretty darn good.

Bob and I are off to a dinner at the cheese shop tonight. I love these and can’t wait. We are even taking Mom and Dad as Mom’s birthday present. It is close, good food and I have to eat anyway, so all the better.

Until next time.

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New Year, New Adventures

It’s been a while since I posted, and this one is s little over due. I have had one adventure in the kitchen this month (corn and potato soup) and it turned out well, but I forgot pictures. It’s been a little busy. 

  
My adventure this year is grad school. Again. Yes, I have one masters, but I decided to go for another. My boss wanted me to go for a Ph.D or Ed.D, but I’m not willing to sacrifice half a decade to being in school again. I found a great program, totally on-line, that I can complete in two years. I officially started a few weeks ago (hence the lack of posts) and am getting into a good rhythm. In addition to now juggling full time work and part time school (which is way harder than full time school and part time work it turns out) I’ve gotten a few projects at work. My bosses like that I’m going for administration, so they’ve given me a few things that are more administrative tasks. Presentations, trainings and another thing that would take too late by to explain and I have homework I’m putting off to write this. 😇

  
Bob has been great about how busy I’ve been lately, but we did find an hour to check out the new beer place that opened near us. Bob drooled when he saw it, and I was pretty happy because they have cider and sodas. Yes, good cream soda and incredible root beer. 

  
Last month, before the craziness started, I got myself a present. I take a ton of pictures, but they always end up just in my phone. A new little device changed this and I love it. I can hook up my phone and then print actual pictures. They aren’t big, but when I get a cute picture of the babies it’s nice to be able to print them out. 

And that’s about it. I’m going to try to post, but they may be sporadic for the next two years. 

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Caramel Pecan Cheesecake

We had Mom and Dad over for dinner last weekend so I asked Bob what he wanted for dessert. He debated between pecan pie and cheesecake, so I decided to combine them and make a caramel pecan cheesecake. 

  
I started with a basic cheesecake recipe. Because I can’t ever follow a recipe exactly, I tweaked it and crossed my fingers. The most difficult part of this was beating the cream cheese. I don’t have a paddle attachment for my mixer (nor do I have a stand mixer because I know I have no place to put it) so I used regular beaters; this made mixing the cream cheese very difficult, but once I started adding the eggs, it got much better. I also just used 4 eggs and added some vanilla extract to the mix before baking. 

  
The caramel is more straight forward. Caramel is caramel and most recipes don’t change very much. I did add some salt to this, because I thought it needed it, but for the most part, it’s a basic caramel sauce. 

  
Once both have completely cooled, I poured the sauce over the cheesecake. I was careful to not over top the cheesecake then added the pecans. 

  
Bob liked this cheesecake better than the other recipe I have. It does have a creamier consistency, but I still think it is a little heavy. I also prefer the camel sauce that has bourbon in it, but that is just me.