[A May weekend in 10 photos.]

1. & 4. Spent part of Saturday afternoon at a fun festival at the National Cathedral. Was dying to ride the carousel, but didn't have a child to accompany me. Failed to realize until later that my height would have allowed me to pose as someone else's child.
2. & 3. Two of about 53248 photos of us trying on ridiculous hats (shoutout to bff Lauren, who visited DC for the weekend!). Hats may or may not have inspired the idea to throw a tea party, coming soon to a living room near you.

5. Candles in the National Cathedral. Light one for me, won't you please?

6. Spotted: neighborhood church sign promoting #churchtweets. Well, okay, if I must...

7. Belated birthday prezzies from Lauren! Basically, if you could assemble a still life of Milan, this would be it. Magnolia cupcakes, Laduree macarons, New York photography, and a Star Wars moleskin...it's like she knows me or something. 

8. Go out. Meet pretty boys. Receive roses. Become twitterpated. Next day brunch. Still twitterpated. Weekend ends. Boys -> Iceland. Girls -> normal life. check check check
9. My Seis de Mayo dinner party. Because celebrating Cinco de Mayo on the 5th is so 1862.
10. Making Mexican wedding cookies. Celebrating Mexican-ness and subtly promoting marriage? Done and done, thank you very much.

[Pancake hearts.]

Slowly but surely making my way back into the kitchen...this time with heart-shaped lemon ricotta pancakes. I don't really like pancakes or lemon-flavored things, but I do like heart-shaped food, bowls, and baking utensils. And I was cooking for someone other than myself, AND it was February, so...it all made sense at the time. It was a lovely dinner and evening, but guys...it felt so forced... I only cook for the ones I love, you know? (You know. You've seen.) I guess I don't yet love cooking just for the joy of cooking. Won't be trying that again anytime soon. Regardless, the pancakies were delish, and now that they are tucked away in my teeny tiny cooking repertoire, they will be replicated this weekend for Shannon, a lady I do love, in celebration of her recent engagement!! Aaaaah!

 


n.b. I should clarify that baking with someone is not the same as cooking for someone. K?

[Baby's first *S'more* pie.]

A Q&A with myself:

Did I make my first pie ever? Yes.
Was it a S'More Pie? Yes.
Was it delicious? No. I'm really modest. It was okay. (YES! obvi.)
Am I wearing a hot pink maxi dress, which I affectionally call my muumuu? Yes.
Are those burn spots on that one marshmallow? Yes.
Were those caused by Chad holding a lighter to the marshmallow attempting to evenly brown the top, as seen in the recipe's picture? Yes.
 Was this kind of a bad idea? Yes.
Was it my idea? Yes.
Is Chad very patient and cute and helpful in the kitchen? Yes yes yes! (usually)
Is that Mexican hot chocolate, courtesy of Mom's fall care package? Yes! (Thanks Mama!)
Did you really call yourself Baby in this post title? :)

 

 

 

 

 

Also, unrelated, but for your consideration:

Did I walk into a spiderweb yesterday, and do I continue to feel creepy crawly spiders all over me today as a result? Yes.
Do I keep eating things, then five minutes later wonder, "Hey, who ate my ____?!?!" only to realize that it was me, every single time? Yes.

[Two Tunes Tuesday: Run.]

As in, my nose is running.

My body is basically trying to be as icky and malfunctioning as possible today, so I've been in bed pretty much all day. Highlights of my day were the two times I've dragged myself out of my ruffly Anthropologie comforter heaven and descended from my cave to the kitchen. First trip: got my Fall on and baked some pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. Second trip: Since chewing with a locked jaw is a tad impossible, I can basically only eat soft, ideally mushy food, so I scavenged a few slices of turkey from the depths of my fridge for lunch. Then for second lunch (it's a thing) I made myself a little strawberry shortcake with a homemade biscuit leftover from yesterday's breakfast, topped with strawberries mixed with maple syrup and a little sugar, and whipped cream. (Mom: I know this is really overly sugary and unhealthy, but the maple syrup and whipped cream were necessary to make it mushy enough to eat. And maple syrup is natural, so it was basically like eating vegetables.) Sometimes I dazzle myself with my new, magic, "let me just whip something up" abilities, even in the face of a sickness that addles my brain to the point that I think watching a Nicolas Cage movie is a good idea.

Anyway, to get to the point, here's the oldie but goodie Snow Patrol song, "Run," followed by Leona Lewis' really pretty cover.

For those interested, I've traced my sick lineage: Roommate Ginette -> Roommate Domineau -> Me. But Chad was also mildly sick this weekend, so I was hit from two angles. Basically, everyone's out to get me, and I despise the world right now. Enjoy your evening.

[Dessert monster.]

**Warning: Reading this post may lead to unhealthy amounts of cookie dough consumption. Proceed at your own risk.**

The pictures speak for themselves. A lethal combination of chocolate chip cookie dough, oreos, and brownie batter resulted in this decadent dessert monster. If I do it again (read: when I do it again), I'll probably take it out of the oven a few minutes earlier for optimal gooeyness levels, but other than that it was pretty much perfect.

It doesn't slice very well, so it isn't the prettiest dessert to photograph, but I hope it encourages you to get your bake on anyway.

Side note: Everyone please feel very, very bad for me, as I am basically on my deathbed, sick at home with a nasty head cold and a locked jaw. I've hypothesized that my icky congested state led to tense face muscles, allowing my TMJ to finally get the best of me, and now I can no longer open my mouth more than like 3/4 of an inch. Not really sure how to proceed other than mope around, make really weird, stretchy jaw faces, and watch daytime TV, but if anyone knows the key to unlocking a jaw, please fill me in.

[Magical meal (+ McD's).]

On Sunday night I made garlic rosemary chicken, with brown butter and balsamic four cheese ravioli. (Did you know it's spelled balsamic, not balsalmic? You probably did. I didn't. I learned that about 27 seconds ago when I wrote that sentence. Columbia education fail.) This was one of the easiest and fastest meals I've made since the beginning of my domestic revolution, and yet it received some of the highest marks by my taste tester/victim/boyfriend. Furthermore, it was like almost pure dairy (four cheese ravioli. brown butter sauce. liberal sprinklage of parmigiano-reggiano), but my severely lactose intolerant insides didn't reject it. In fact, they embraced the meal, with no detectable signs of revolt...so it was magical.


And lest I fool you into thinking I'm anything close to legit... This is me, at 11pm last night, devouring McD's, brought to me by Chadwick for a late night bedroom picnic. As he watched me inhale the large order of friends*: "Wow, I'm glad I didn't get you a medium..." Hmph. (Me too.)

*I just noticed this hilarious/embarrassing typo, hours later. And it will remain, because who doesn't think of fries as friends?

[Pizza & Whoopie Pies.]

Saturday night was a big night for Chad and his fellow BYU alums, as the BYU football team played its mortal enemy, University of Utah. I have, like, negative interest in BYU athletics...in fact, out of principle, I tend to root against them. But since I don't really have a college team to root for (I only paid attention to Columbia football the year I was hooking up with a defensive lineman) (a glorious Milan era, I must say), I made an exception for the Game and hopped on the BYU fanwagon for the night. To celebrate, we made pizza and whoopie pies...well, he made pizza with significant input from me, and I made the whoopie pies. I'd never had a whoopie pie, much less made one, so this was kind of a baking adventure. I misjudged the size a bit, and they ended up being more like whoopie sandwiches, but they were kind of delicious and have lasted us well into the week. I'm not going to say we both had two yesterday, but I won't deny it either...

PS - Yes, that is a BYU logo and slogan on my chest. I know, I never thought I'd see the day either, but Chad needed a present this weekend, so I broke every one of my rules and ordered us matching shirts to wear for the game. Girlfriend of the year? I think so. ;)

[On cooking and chili. *and a blog makeover!*]

Since we knew we were going to be cooped up all weekend braving Irene, I wanted to make something that could last us a few days. I've never touched a crockpot, and I didn't grow up eating crockpot food, but Chad owns one that has literally never been used so I thought we'd try it out this weekend. I've always kind of had a bias against crockpot cooking...I guess I sort of think it's a little lazy and low, kind of along the lines of casseroles (blech)...but it produced a delicious main dish for us, so maybe I'll try to incorporate it into my tiny {but growing!} cooking repertoire.

I know these posts are kind of goofy, lame, boring, whatever...I obviously don't know what I'm doing, so when I manage to turn something unedible into something delicious, my proud little self turns into braggy mcbraggerson, and I like to share my triumphs with pretty pictures. Whether this cooking kick I'm on extends into a hobby or maybe even an actual talent, or fizzles into something I do only when necessary to keep myself (and significant others) alive, I'm really enjoying my weekly learning process. Beyond the tangible benefits (and accompanying weight gain, gross), I'm learning how cooking can really enrich my life and my interactions with others. I'm sort of a hermit, so spending so much time in Chad's or my kitchen forces me to get out of my bubble and interact with all the people who seem to pass through our homes, including my roommates with whom I spend, like, zero time. It's also provided opportunities for Chad and I to serve others in new ways, like this past weekend. My boss was struck by a car last week as he crossed the street and is now at home recovering for the foreseeable future, unable to move without intense pain and effort. My huge batch of chili was may more than Chad and I needed for the weekend, so we were able to take some over to my boss' house along with a pan of cornbread so that he could have some homemade comfort food during the weekend storm. I started cooking for a variety of reasons, and one of them was because I thought it would be kind of fun and nice to cook for Chad. It was recently pointed out to me that, though he appreciates the things I do (or attempt to do) for him, they aren't really that selfless, because in my mind we've kind of morphed into a unit. So I'm glad for the opportunity that cooking is affording me to reach out to individuals beyond my immediate sphere, and I hope that I can continue to help others when these occasions present themselves.

And, um...the end.

**Unrelated...I changed up the look of the blog, and my eyes are killing me from all the HTML tweaking I did for hours yesterday. What do you think?**

[Can we do this every weekend?]

Hurricane Irene was exactly what I hoped for. We were fortunate to be relatively unaffected by the storm, but it was still a fun excuse to stay curled up inside all weekend. Aside from a short power outage on Saturday night (which had me panicking on the inside, as I obvi canNOT survive in the wild without TV or air conditioning, plus we had just watched a very scary movie called "Don't Be Afraid of the Dark," which, of course, caused me to be a lot more afraid of the dark), it just felt like a relaxed, lazy weekend. A lot of TV and movie watching punctuated by a little baking, cooking, and kissing. On Sunday night, Chad said he kind of wished we could have another hurricane next weekend...and I was like, um, I don't need a hurricane to have another weekend like this...I'm not the one who has to coach Little League and go in to work every weekend... just sayin'. :) Seriously, though, we've both been crazy busy with work (I don't think either of us has left work before 7 p.m. in weeks!), so it was a much needed break from life. I know a lot of people up and down the coast were and continue to be affected by this storm--here's hoping to a speedy recovery for everyone!

*I love this picture of Chad. I came up to my room after dinner clean up and found him curled up in my bed, reading a science magazine, surrounded by his favorite little snacks, with a mischievous, boyish grin on his face. Caught!

[this week's meal was...]

Really proud that I somehow managed to make a healthy meal entirely unhealthy. My heart-healthy salmon was defeated by the artery clogging butter sauce I smothered on it, resulting in a really delicious (if I do say so myself...) Sunday family dinner for me, Chad, and his cousin. I obviously had no idea how to make salmon, and my repeated calls to Mom (and Chad's mom) were unanswered, so I basically stuck it in the oven and hoped that it would come out alright in the end. Completely miscalculated the potatoes though, which I put in at the same time--turns out potatoes take twice the amount of time as salmon, who knew? Amateur mistake, yet again. All's well that ends well, though...the boys loved it, and both of them cleared the table AND did the dishes while I rested. Success!

[National S'more Day!]

:: obscure food holiday ::
:: stay at home date night ::
:: ghiradelli chocolate ::
:: urban campfire ::
:: accidental fiery marshmallows ::
:: someone likes the camera ::
:: a lot ::

:: and i like him ::
:: a lot ::