It’s been awhile …

Well, after many a nostalgic read-through of this blog, I’ve decided to make it a point to actually post here. Because yes, my Tumblr is the place for all things spur of the moment (and man, oh man, is it just ever so convenient to post straight from my phone instead of laboriously downloading all of the photos onto my laptop), but the real memories were on this blog. I don’t know if I’ll ever go back and fill in the missing pieces and days on here (I might for my Europe trips though, just to have a record for posterity), but in terms of moving on, I think I’ll start with today.

Today was one of those wonderfully normal days. A Sunday, and as all Sundays are, it was full of that vibrant joy that comes with trying to seize all of the weekends of summer by the balls, and the bittersweet anxiety of finishing the weekend with, goddammit, something to show for it.

Well, here’s what I have to show.

 

I’m a water baby. And so, it pains me terribly to be in Manhattan during the glorious days of summer, when my choices for immersing myself in a body of water are:

• a) 100$+ a month fancy club with tiny pool
• b) 200$+ a month fancy club with somewhat larger pool
• c) completely free public pool where children pee to their heart’s content
• d) completely free … Hudson

Anyone who has ever been to New York will have remarked that the Hudson is not exactly the clear and pure. In fact, an article recently described a study that found that the sewage treatment plants at 125th Street were leaking some madly infectious bacteria that, were you to ingest it or were it to come in contact with blood, would pretty much cause you to drop dead.

So you can see my dilemma.

But this weekend, my predilection for all things free and water-related led me to the Downtown Boathouse’s free kayaking program. This outpost of the Downtown Boathouse was, ironically, uptown – by 72nd Street. And you get what you pay for. That is, a couple of volunteers who take your signed waivers (the usual – death, etc, etc not the fault of anyone but your stupid self; although they didn’t mention flesh eating bacteria so  … hmm); a rusted row of lockers and … the docks. So come fully changed or be prepared to entertain your fellow river-path users (of which there are a ton) with your in-the-process-of-changing bod.

But my friend Victor and I managed swimmingly. Or … well enough that we didn’t need to swim. Our eye-smarting boating gear must have endeared us to the spirit of the Hudson, because we managed to not capsize ourselves and had a quite wonderful day. Also a hell of a workout, and for some unknowable reason, my hip flexors hurt the most. Arms (aka the body parts that do the work) – just fine. But legs (aka the body parts that relax and do nothing) – throwing a fit.

Well, as if that weren’t enough, we then traipsed up to 114th for brunch. Now brunch is the mainstay of any true New Yorker. You pretty much get evicted if you don’t like brunch. Luckily, I fit right in and would eat brunch for every meal of the day if I could. Speaking of …. further planning required.

Victor introduced me to Community, which I CAN’T BELIEVE I DIDN’T KNOW WAS THIS AMAZING, because I walk past it everyday. SO MUCH WASTED TIME.

The only thing to say – it was MOUTH.GASMIC. The menu was great -  so many choices that I was pretty much on the fence between, oh, everything. But the waiter recommended the Brunch Special – 7 Grain Waffle with Blueberries and Lemon Creme Fraiche. And boy, was he right. I was pretty much making love to this waffle in front of the entire restaurant, and I’m not ashamed to admit it.

Look at it! I mean, LOOK AT IT. The waffle was crunchy on the outside, yet soft on the inside. The blueberries had been lightly cooked, so their juices were extra sweet. The heavy cream wasn’t some weak-ass Starbucks whipped cream – it was real heavy cream, like the kind you have with biscuits in Britain. And the lemony sauce was some orgasmic combination of lemon and butter and altogether it was nothing short of sublime.

I’m pretty much dreaming about it right now.

Sweet dreams to me.

(Seriously).

Recipe Time Again

Who is this person? I don't cook! I swear I don't! But something about the marinade I used on my grilled vegetables stuck in my brain, and so I set out to create a stir-fry using the same sauce for my weekday dinners.

Now I'm a fan of cooking rarely and having dinner ready to be microwaved as soon as I come home. There is absolutely nothing worse than coming home from work, tired and hungry and maybe even a little bit hangry and having nothing ready to eat. That leads to (A LOT OF) mindless snacking and other unfortunate occurrences. Such as late-evening cookie and brownie runs. Just ... bad.

And I have to say, this stirfry is AMAZING! It's quick and easy and I think the portions that I used should be enough to last me a week. Perfect!

Veritably Amazing Vegetable Stir-Fry:
- 2 bunches of broccoli
- 3 green peppers
- 2 whole portobello mushrooms (or you can just use the tops)
- 2 cups of white mushrooms
- 3 cups (or more) white sprouts

For the sauce:
- 0.5 cups olive oil
- 0.25 cups balsamic vinegar
- 0.25 cups soy sauce
- 3 cloves of garlic crushed (or chopped)

Basically - cut your peppers into long thin strips, separate the broccoli into the little heads, cut up the portobellos into thin slices, cut the white mushrooms into quarters, and pile on the sprouts all in a big bowl (or two - it takes up a lot of space!)

Mix the ingredients for the sauce and whisk them a little bit to make sure the oil and the vinegar mix together.

Pour over the prepared vegetables and use your hands to really mix the veggies in with the sauce. Let stand for 10-15 minutes, periodically using your hands to mix all the veggie bits with the sauce.

Get your giant wok out and dump it all in there (I found it works best if you only put in enough vegetables to fill the wok halfway, so you might have to do two portions separately). Cook for 15 minutes, until the peppers are soft (time depends on your stovetop). Make sure to use a spatula to stir and flip your veggies - you want it all nice and juicy!

For some extra fun, I chopped up an apple-chicken sausage (actually 4 of them) and cooked them separately on a frying pan before adding them to the wok in the last 5 minutes of cooking.

In any case, this stir fry becomes EVEN BETTER after a day or two in the fridge, because the tangi-ness of the balsamic really comes out and you end up having a party in your mouth!

The Most Amazing Vegetables EVER

I am SO excited about my dinner today, you have NO idea. I mean, everybody who knows me, knows that I HATE to cook. As in, I'm perfectly fine eating the exact same thing every.single.day. (Which is what happened last year. I would switch up my menu every 3 months or something, and that's it).

But yesterday, I had orientation and I was STARVING during break, so I ran next door to Milano's Market (on Broadway and 112th).

Source

I got their Grilled Marinated Vegetables and I literally wanted to lick the container they came in (and I was eating in the full-to-the-seams auditorium. So you can see how much I loved them. And this was all happening while some lady was droning on and on about academic integrity. I mean, we. get. it. Don't cheat, don't plagiarize, blah, blah, blah. You'd think that since we've already completed one degree, apparently without any academic felonies, that we kind of know what's going on. Anyways, that's beside the point).

These vegetables were SO delicious that I, proclaimed non-cook and hater of innovation, had to try making them IMMEDIATELY.

Recipe:
- 1 eggplant
- 2 red bell peppers
- 1 yellow bell pepper
- 1 green bell pepper
- 0.5 onion

For the marinade:
- 0.5 cups olive oil
- 0.25 cups balsamic vinegar
- 3 tsp soy sauce
- 2 cloves of garlic, crushed
- 0.25 cups onion

Cut up the vegetables into medium sized pieces. I love me a nice long piece of eggplant and pepper, so I sliced peppers lengthwise only, and the eggplant as well (although I cut it into two parts first).

(Note, with the eggplant, I rinse the pieces, then layer them in a saucepan, putting salt onto the pieces in between the layers; I let it rest for 15 minutes and then rinse the pieces thoroughly. This takes out the bitterness that cooked eggplant can sometimes have).

Combine everything for the marinade, and whisk it up a little bit (to make sure the vinegar and the oil mix).

Then pour the marinade all over the vegetables and really dig in with your hands to mix it up together. I left mine in a bowl; some recipes suggest ziplock bags. Mind you, you'll need a giant ass bag for all of these delicious veggies.


Leave to marinade for 1-2 hours. (You can even leave it longer, I'm sure that'll make them even more delicious. Not that it's possible).

Note: I don't own a grill, so these instructions are for a frying pan. I'm sure actual grilling would be even more amazing.

Fry the veggies up in a frying pan on medium heat (cover with a lid to make sure the veggies get soft enough). Make sure to put only 1 layer of vegetables onto the pan at a time. Cook for 10 minutes.

Put in tupperware and let chill for a couple of hours.

YOU'RE DONE.

These veggies taste amazeballs when cold, you don't even need to heat them up.

GOBBLE GOBBLE GOBBLE.

Well, what are you waiting for? You need these in your life RIGHT NOW.

Wherein I conquer new heights

After all the museum traipsing I did in the Netherlands (oh … well, the 2 museums that I visited; but I was thorough, so it was exhausting), I wanted to do something exciting in Germany. My cousin suggested we visit the two museums of her tiny town, but I wasn’t up to it, so instead we went shoe shopping and tree climbing. I’m not sure which one took longer.

In my defense, the shoe shopping was for the tree climbing, and thus totally justified. Plus a 10 Euro pair of cute Keds was called for. Now the reason one of the reasons I love my cousin is that she is always up for something active. That makes her pretty much the only person like that that I know. The rest of my friends are less … fitness inclined. I wonder if that’s a coincidence …. Hmm.
Anyways, instead of staring at another set of old relics, we went to climb some trees.

If you can’t see, it was a pretty extensive operation. And the harder ropes courses were up SO fricking high. And when you have to swing across a 5 meter gap at what feels like 20m above the ground, well, you, along with your adrenal gland, get plenty of exercise. Seriously, I don’t think I’ve ever had as nerve wracking a three hour shift as this one. Also, my arms were hard-core shaking by the end, and the next day, my lats basically refused to work. Which made, for example, raising my arms and putting on clothes pretty darn hard.

Some of the more terrifying examples? In one course, you basically had to jump straight down off a platform at the end. Bungee-jumping and all that. Except that we pulled on the rope to test it, you know, to see that if you pull hard on it, it doesn’t come as easily, but nope – we just kept on pulling and pulling and it just kept on coming and coming. Not too reassuring. The hardest part was just taking that first step off the platform of course.

There were other parts where fear literally seized my body and I couldn’t move. It’s this racing feeling in your veins and in the pit of your stomach and you’re just so, so scared. Maybe it seems silly to write about fear when I was in a controlled environment with a heavy duty harness attached to a support rope that would never let me actually fall. I’ve probably never been safer (unlike that time that I was 6 and my mom and I were on a climbing trip in Crimea and it was pouring rain and we were stuck on a little ledge on a vertical cliff face and had to wait for the rain to stop … oh yea, there, I just fell asleep and slept through the whole thing without a thought of the danger). But fear is something that is irrational and can be experienced in any environment whatsoever. There is not right or wrong place where it can occur because you can’t really talk yourself out of it. It’s like trying to talk yourself out of sweating. Or feeling in love. Both equally iffy enterprises, of course.

But what I realized is that my philosophy for things I fear in general is to face them head on. I knew I was scared to step off that platform but I also knew that there was absolutely NO WAY I wouldn’t step off the platform either. And that’s what I try to do in life as well. If I feel like I am too scared to try something and the reason is something silly like I’m afraid of what people will think, or I’m afraid that I will fail, or I’m afraid because I don’t know what will happen, which it usually is, I try to just leap straight into it.

Now all this deep metaphorical thinking above ground definitely exhausted me, not to mention the little climbing-on-a-itty-bitty-tightrope-excessively-high-off-the-ground bit, so my cousin and I trooped into town to grab a bite to eat.

It was a cute little place, and OF COURSE it had a big screen TV to show the Germany-Greece soccer game that was happening. Because, duh, it was a soccer night. My cousin and I almost bought matching Germany-coloured dresses just to fit in to the young crowd milling around. But the fact that I initially thought those dresses were shirts (happens to me ALL THE TIME!) … well, I think it’s a good thing we opted out.

I was surprised that beer cost less than water here, but wasn’t feeling into alcohol after such an active day, so instead, I ordered another German specialty – schnitzel.

Yes, Mr. Schnitzel, that you were.
 
By the time I finished salivating and raving about my schnitzel, and obviously taking a million photos of it, like the (fake) food blogger that I am (not), it was getting a bit late, so I actually had to gobble it up pretty quick so that we could make it home in time to fix the projector up for the game.

I wish we could’ve gone to a, you know, German pub, during the Greece-Germany game, but my cousin’s boyfriend was excited enough for a crowd. We watched it at home and it was still pretty rad.

Germany won, obviously.

Of the Oft Forgotten Holiday

In our household, we don't really celebrate Mother's Day or Father's Day. Because we emigrated from a country that has similar-ish holidays on completely different days ('Father's Day' would be end of February and 'Mother's Day' would be March 8th), we somehow just stopped celebrating any of these days. That blows of course, because I am a huge fan of celebrating and presents and all that jazz, but with just the 3 of us, it's not as fun anyways.

But this Sunday, Vancouver has continued to bust out its beautiful SUNny streak, so I knew we had to do something special. It just so happened that we were hungry when this idea came around (haha, when am I not hungry?), so brunch it was.

That might not have been the smartest idea, what with us not booking anything in advance and going at 12:30, which is prime brunching territory, but you gotta give us credit for trying.

My absolute favorite place in Montreal to have brunch is Chez Cora. So you can understand my enthusiasm when I found out they opened a branch basically in my own backyard! SO much excitement. Because brunch is hands down the BEST meal of the day.

And yes, those are my own captions. No, they don't put 'drool' on their logo. But they should. Just look at the pretty menu.

I'll be the first to say that I'm a visual person. A lot of the time at restaurants, I just want to sneak a peak at what the dish will look like before I order it, but people tend to take it the wrong way if I start looking over their shoulders while they're eating. So obviously this menu is my idea of heaven.

The giganto pile of fruit with the panini-crepe

This crepe was about 2-forks long. Because hey, if the English can measure in feet (based on some long-dead British monarch), I can measure in forks!

Now everytime I go to Cora's, I swear I'm going to get the pancakes, but when it's actually time to order, somehow I always end up getting something else. This time ... same thing. I split a panini-crepe (imagine ham+egg+cheesy goodness ... but rolled in a crepe and toasted. O.M.G.) and the 'April 89' fruit+custard-stuffed crepe. The food was delish ... the only downside was that because it was Mother's Day, the place was packed and so we had to wait forever for our food. Which meant that by the time it arrived, I wished that I had ALSO ordered the pancakes because I was starving. STARVING. I am not a pretty starving person either. I get these tension headaches and I can't think (haha, except when is that not the case?) and all I can do is stare moodily at the other people who are eating. Thankfully, they had those little game-mats that they give to kids, so I could distract myself for a while at the 'Spot the 5 Differences' game. Then I spent the rest of the time trying to convince my dad that one of the differences was between the grey circles in one picture and the blue circles in another, but apparently my dad is colourblind.

My momma busted out a smile once the food came, but the wait was a tense tense moment. We were basically waiting for Jack Bauer to come diffuse the tension-bomb. Because we were 3 hungry bears.

So the wait sucked. But that meant that despite devouring the equivalent to a whole-days worth of calories, I was at the perfect amount of fullness - aka ready to have a latte and a cookie on our way to the beach! (Side note - I am ALWAYS ready for coffee.)

Since we didn't have any plans for the day, we went to Whytecliff, which is this awesome little picnic/beach area that is usually not as full as all of the popular Vancouver beaches. Unfortunately, it's so awesome that people keep telling their friends and they keep coming so it's usually quite hard/impossible to find parking. My dad recounted his harrowing tale of parking between two trees and 3 cars. Thankfully my mom and I are brats and we told him to just drop us off at the prime picnic/lawn spot before he drove off on his parking adventure, so we didn't have to experience those funtimes.


Can I just say how beautiful it is there?

GORGEOUS.

 Haha. Oh, you wanted to see the scenery? Well I guess that was gorgeous too ...

Of Fancy Breakfasts

So the main reason for my being in the Chicago area was to visit the campus of Northwestern University. Well, my brain being the bizarre thing that it is, I woke up at 6am (despite crashing, slightly tipsy, at 11:30pm the night before ... 6.5hrs of sleep is NOT my idea of a good night). Waking up in a comfy Queen bed ... at a hotel ... with the sun shining through your windows? Well, it was perfect :)

Of course sleeping is great and all, but the best part of the day is always (and will always be) breakfast.

 
Starting off with coffee of course. The first of many ... (and yes, even though it was brewed coffee, it was delicious - smooth and without that bitter aftertaste that bad brewed coffee has). Cup 1/5.

I wanted to kidnaps these cute jam jars. I love cute tiny things (re: my obsession with travel sized accessories). I love jars. So obviously I spent a good 10 minutes photographing these little jars of jam. I bet the waiters thought I was cray cray.

I had my usual oatmeal, but I swear, everything tastes better when it's fancified. I also bet they didn't make it in the microwave like I do. I keep telling myself that eventually I'll make proper stove-top oats with milk at home, but then I get lazy just thinking about all that work and pop them babies in the microwave with some tap water. I am one classy lady.

Of Happy Accidents

Apparently all the best ideas happen by accident.

I was feeling lazy on Thursday but I knew I had to eat something before taking the taxi to the airport. I WAS going to having an omelette, but I just wasn’t feeling up to scrambling the eggs … you know, whisking and then cleaning the whisk … so I just plopped them onto the pan.

(Yes, I realize my laziness knows no bounds).

Anyways, then I was feeling all undernourished and deprived (and kinda starving), so I dumped half a jar of salsa into the pan as well. Then I sprinkled some rice (maybe 1/8 cup at the most) in there. And then topped it with some cheese. (Because everything is better with cheese, amirite?).

It. Was. Ah-mazing.

I put it on a bed of lettuce and dug in and it was like having a cheesy mac and cheese, guilt-free. So I’m just putting it out there – apparently laziness is the mother of awesome inventions.

I’ll be improving this recipe (cook for less time; maybe have a different kind of green  - I didn’t like that my lettuce was extremely crunchy; instead of rice, try bits of toasted oatmeal?), and when it’s utter perfection, I’ll post it.

Of Small Indulgences

I like to eat pretty much the same things everyday. (A detailed post on that at a later date). But there are little indulgences I like to allow myself to stay sane.

Like that medium single-single Tim Horton's coffee.

And the I'm-not-counting-the-calories-of-my-10%-creamer coffee.

Coffee in general. (It's like hey - if I just keep refilling it, it still counts as one cup, right?).

But my favorite has to be my oatmeal and nut butter combo.

So I may have gone a little crazy ... and purchased seven different kinds all at once. Whoops. Well - some people have their clothes shopping and their getting drunk and their smoking - my catharsis is nut butter shopping.

Plus the jars were just too cute. I can't resist anything in jars.

So over the next few weeks (let's hope they last that long), I'll be trying all of the nut butters and I will report back on my favorites at the end. Although we all know that Kraft's Smooth Peanut Butter is my one and only love forever and ever and ever. But shhhh, don't tell anyone that. I just want to make sure that no other nut butter can come between us before I get one of those giant 2kg jars of PB.

Of One Girl Going Crazy Over Food

I expect air ports to have crappy food.

That's why I pack up snacks (although I'm always worried that they won't allow me through customs ... any clues about what's allowed and what's not?).

But the Orlando airport has redeemed itself and mayhap even all of the other airports.

Why?

Because I found the mecca of all pre-departure stores.

Excuse my tired, non-made-up face. I don't do 'stylish-airport-wear'.

It was called CIBA (?). But they had hard-boiled eggs in little containers, and fresh fruit (bananas, apples, oranges), and greek yogurt, and milk, and water and coconut water, and all sorts of other healthy goodies. I was over the moon! (Perhaps too much so ... probably because I just had a large coffee after a decaffeinated week ... but that's another story). My friends didn't quite share my enthusiasm, but my day was made.

Of Home Cooked Meals and Heart Warming Nights

How do I usually spend my Saturdays? In a cafe, studying. I think it's become such a routine at this point that none of my friends even need to ask me about it. And this past Saturday, I was all ready to camp out at my cafe table until late evening ... when my friend Jill swooped in and saved me from the misery of summarizing readings.

I have to say, I'm very easily convinced to give up studying and do something fun. So after (very little) persuading, we set off to have dinner at her house.

Jill's mother was nice enough to cook a delicious (and healthy!) meal for us while we "studied" (a.k.a. did some readings and then blogged). It was absolutely amazing to have a home-cooked meal (adds a little variety to my everyday diet, that's for sure) and it was also great to relax and chat and not think about all the work I have to get done.

Crazy delicious spread of Hot Broth Shrimp, Avocado Salad, White Bean Paste and Carrot Salad with Honey Lime dressing. There were also some fresh tomatoes on the side that I forgot to photograph. Seemingly simple, and yet, so filling and heart-warming.

 

Of course there were other things to warm up the heart.

Some white table wine. We're not snobby about wine here. I mean, we certainly will not buy a 6$ bottle of wine, but 9$? Totally legit.

Overall, a fantastic evening of good food and conversation (it's just lovely when you have all the same opinions on issues :). Thank you Jill and Diane!

Of the Attainment of the Most Noble of Goals

This month, I have finally achieved my long sought dream ... A goal that has long evaded me and puzzled me and frustrated me and just always seemed out of reach.
Well, no longer! I have now achieved it not once, but twice (although not consecutively, so it still needs tweaking).

Is it running a 6 min mile? (Nope, haven't even tried.) Is it lifting something ridiculously heavy? (No ... do shopping bags count though?)

No. It is something much more EPIC.

I have made the perfect omelette. 

And then I flipped it. And it folded. Perfectly. No little bits falling off, no burnt parts, no messiness.

Just a beautiful crescent moon shape of delicious eggy-ness.

 

 Wait, no, we have to get another look. This glorious creation deserves all the admiration you can give.

Three times a week with this baby. Three times a week. 

Sometimes four. 

Oh yes, my gastronomic-love-life is all hot and heavy. And delicious.

Of Food Related Woes

So since this is turning entirely into a food blog, I thought I'd take you inside our (my roommate and me) fridge. Slash vent about the state of our fridge at the moment.

I've divided into 2 sections to show you my side of the fridge and my roommate's. This is what it looks like anytime my roommate buys groceries. Which she buys at Costco. In gigantic sizes. (You should see our freezer - my lonely bag of frozen veggies and then stacks of taquitos, chicken wings, pizzas, frozen waffles and frozen chocolate cake belonging to my roommate).

Now she has all the right in the world to buy things in bulk ... But man, does the junk food call my name ... And exercising all that willpower is VERY exhausting. I wonder how many calories I burn just resisting all this food. Hmm ...

Fridge. And I'm not even gonna TALK about the pantry. Think chips and cookies and peanut butter and bread. SO. MUCH. BREAD.

Of My Updated New Food Obsessions

I was going to title this post "Of My New Food Obsessions" but then I realized I'd already had a post like that last week. So needless to say, I go through obsessions pretty quickly. But while eggs are and have been a permanent fixture on my food plan for years now, these two things are new additions.

Kalamata Olives

I was never 'obsessed' with olives before, but I think this new love is on par with my Great Radish Obsession of 2009, during which I ate a bushel of radishes every. single. day. I think what adds to this big love is that I get these olives from a super-sketch grocery store, wherein they're stored in something resembling a garbage bin. I think the danger adds to the excitement. That, or some strange disease from the bins is addling my mind.

And back for a return appearance - Peanut Butter.

I never had PB as a kid, and actually, the first time I tried it I thought it was kinda gross. I mean, it was like eating butter out of a jar. Who eats plain butter? But then my freshman year in university ... boy oh boy. Let's just say, peanut butter definitely became a trigger food. It was exciting, it was foreign (to me at least) ...

 

Nuhuh, peanut butter, I will own YOU, for a wonderful price of 3.99$ for 1kg. A spoonful of PB in my oatmeal every morning is exactly what I need. The foreign-ness and forbidden nature of PB has passed, and now, it's what makes me look forward to breakfast. A LOT. 

I wonder if it's the motivation for me going to bed at 9:30pm for the past couple of night (Grandma Alert! Grandma Alert!). I mean, if I go to bed sooner, I can wake up earlier ... so I can have breakfast earlier (and be productive, all that other unimportant life stuff) ...

Of My Culinary Triumph

I fear this may be turning into a food blog. Because peeps, I've been cooking ... and I've been liking it! Well, not the cooking process, but I've been actually liking the food I'm cooking. Until yesterday. Since then - I've been LOVING it.

You know why? Because I made katlety (Russian meatballs). Now as we all know, a good Russian girl must know how to cook Borscht (but ew, I don't like that kind of soup), plof (which is rice pilaf and all sorts of delicious and bad for you) and ... katlety. She must also listen to her parents and take care of husband and all other sorts of crap, so I'm not calling it my go-to guide to living, but let's focus on the katlety.

Before I fall over myself praising these meatballs (and myself, for making them), here's the recipe that I used:

(Oh and side note - if I can make these and they turn out DELISH, absolutely ANYONE can make these. So go and make these. DOOOOO IT.)

Ingredients:
2lbs ground beef (extra lean - but of course, you can go as fatty as you like!)
1/2 cup chopped onion
3/4 clove of garlic (you can use a whole clove for extra flavour)
1 egg
2 slices of bread
1/2 cup milk
1 tbsp of flour

Directions:
1. Take the 2 slices of bread and shred them into crumbs (don't worry, they don't have to be extra small, that's what the next step is for!).

2. Put the crumbs in a big bowl and pour the milk over them. Let them sit for ~10 minutes, and then use your fingers to really make it a smooth mixture (i.e. shred the bigger chunks of bread into smaller bits. It should be easier now that they are soaked in milk).

3. Pick up the glob of bread crumbs you have now and pour out the remaining milk from the bowl. Also, squeeze a bit of the milk out of the glob of bread crumbs too, so the meatballs aren't too soggy.

4. Put the glob of bread crumbs back in the bowl. Add the egg, the onions, and the meat on top. Grind the garlic clove on top of that

5. Now get down and dirty and really mix it up with your hands. Ooooh yea.

5. Dust a cutting board with a bit of flour. As you make the katlety shapes (it's really a shape between a flat hamburger patty and a meatball), roll them a bit in the flour.

6. Cook on low heat in a frying pan with a bit of oil (you don't need too much, because the meatballs will release their own juices).

7. Cook until the insides aren't pink anymore.

8. EAT ALL THE MEAT!

Of My New Food Obsession

Random food related post ...

Guess what I made?

Eggs. Eggs are my new obsession. I think I eat at least 2 a day. Oh well, better it be eggs than cookies. Which I also love.

In any case, I made my egg in my new, MEGA-CUTE egg pan. It was perfect. And I was worried that the spatula would be a dud (it's not quite as bendy as one would hope), but NO, it totally scooped up the egg without rupturing anything.

Success. I love cute things that actually work. Be jealous.

Of Social Lives and Egg-Related Fights

So let's just say that when midterms/finals/assignments/life roll around, my version of socializing is sitting and working in a cafe that is full of people. I mean, I'm near people, right? So that's almost the same as actually socializing. My new idea is to bank some socializing time. Basically, the plan is to hang out with a lot of people now, so that when I'm a hermit later, my 'average amount of time spent with other people' isn't embarrassingly low.

Yea, I'm cool like that.

But in the spirit of seeing old friends and reconnecting after the Christmas break, my friend Jill and I hit up our favorite diner for the breakfast special.

I love breakfast. It is the BEST meal of the day. I will fight you over eggs. I'm serious. Breakfast is the only thing that makes me a decent person to be around. Also, hating all of my classes this semester is very exhausting, so of course I need to refuel.

And since that's about the most noteworthy thing I did yesterday, I figure I'll round this post off by complaining about the weather.

Why is it that when the Weather Network tells me it's -8C and windy, and I dress in my warm coat and hurry off to campus, I arrive a big sweaty mess (and let me tell you - sweaty puffy coats aren't pleasant!)? And yet, when I leave campus and it's supposedly 'only' 0C, I'm freezing all the way home? What is this madness?

I also get cold allergies when it's too cold or when the temperature changes. So why I chose to live in a city that's as temperamental as Britney Spears (during her shaved-head stage) and freezing cold pretty much 6 months out of 12 is beyond me.

I probably made that decision on an empty stomach, before the eggs knocked some sense into me.

Groceries

I somehow managed to drag myself from my cozy, warm bed at 7am to get ready for an 8:30am class that I wasn't even registered for (waitlisted ...), only to find out that I hate the class. So I dropped it.

Talk about pointless.

To make something of the day (because let's be honest, I couldn't just blog about how my class sucked ... and most importantly, I couldn't get pictures of it. And what's a blog post without pictures?), I decided to get everything else done. Cue advising appointments (once again, just confirming what I already know ... when will you actually give me advice?!), meetings with friends, and most importantly, grocery shopping.

I really enjoy grocery shopping. I like walking the aisles with my little cart and looking at all the choices and picking things. It's the small pleasures in life. Seriously, I'm not weird (all the time).

Now my goal for January is to eat cheap and healthy. So cue the vegetables (the meat's already in the freezer) ... and more vegetables.

How delicious is that? I should be a professional food arranger or something. Now let's hope I don't crack from all this healthy deliciousness and buy a pizza by the end of the week.

P.S. - that cottage cheese is AMAZING. I never used to like it, but I couldn't get enough of it today and it was the only thing I was craving after my run. I might have to get a new pack of it tomorrow ... because it's almost gone now. *shifty eyes*

Of Gastronomic Debauchery (Part II)

On my last day in Vancouver, my parents and I continued our gastronomically debaucherous streak by randomly dropping into a restaurant on the way back from our secret morning endeavour (more on that later). Since my dad is a vegan (definitely more on that later), it makes it kind of hard to go out. Because, let's face it - I enjoy nothing more than a good medium rare steak. And tofu just doesn't quite hit the spot in the same way.

But this time, we literally ended up parked across from an Asian Vegetarian restaurant, so I guess it was meant to be.

We had this green soup (supposedly made of spinach and coconut milk and enoki mushrooms) which looked like one of those monstrous health/detox shakes, but was TO DIE FOR. Now, we mistakenly thought it was a normal restaurant, and hence, ordered individual plate(s) of what we wanted. But we forgot the crucial fact about Asian restaurants - they are family-style. Meaning our individual plates were heaped with enough food to feed a third-world country. That cramped our style a bit (but certainly didn't stop us from polishing it all off).

All in all, it was a great meal (I simply ate my weight in mushrooms ... #noregrets). The only thing I had to complain about ....

Of Gastronomic Debauchery. And that's about it. (Part I).

So while I was visiting, I decided to forego any semblance of 'healthy' eating because my parents seemed to be intent on visiting every restaurant. Every. Restaurant. Eating in was not an option.

Not that I'm complaining. I love spending time with the 'rents and well, who am I to turn down an array of delicious food, right? Right. This time round, we hit up the Mongolie Grill. Basically, there's a whole buffet of veggies and meats and sauces and you pile them all up (raw) in your little metal bowl and hand it to the cook.

They also have this contest where if you guess the price of your meal, you get ... Actually, I don't know what you get. I don't think that anyone's ever guessed right. But they keep asking you to guess and of course we guess, because how can we resist. Gotta play the game. In any case, this time around, I was 7 cents off, my mother was 15 cents off and my father was 26 cents off. We are just one crazy lucky family. Now we just have to win the lottery, and then we're set.

And we also had some beer, because for some reason I turn into an alcoholic fiend when I'm out with my parents. Cocktail? Sure. Wine? Sure. Beer? Eh, why not. It was nice ... and then I got cold, and then it wasn't as nice any more. I only finished half the glass. Lamesauce. My lovely mother however fully enjoyed her beer. And then we both laughed our asses off at insignificant little jokes and the staff at the restaurant thought we were crazy. But the food was delish.

Also, besides the food you get at the buffet table, they also bring you free soup (win!) and brown rice in this metal tin can and bread. Except the bread is not like bread, it's like a napkin. I swear, the first time we went to this place, I wiped my face with it and then crumpled it up and threw it away. But no. You actually eat it. This is no bueno for non-street-smart people like me. Too confusing. Next thing you know, I'll be munching on real napkins and toothpicks, because I can't tell food and non-food apart. Scary.

And because no day of gastronomic debauchery is complete without dessert (you've gotta hit all the food groups - carbs, starchy carbs and sweet carbs ... and then some more carbs), we got ice cream. At Costco. Because, holla, Costco is THE BEST. You can buy anything there (I swear, they'll start selling babies soon or something). And their ice cream sundaes are 2$ and they. are. divine.