The Twenty-Something Review

Repost

2011-09-07T03:58:00.000-07:00

It's back to school time, and I'm going to be a cluster teacher (one subject traveling to classrooms instead of having my own class) for the first time in four years. The last time was my very first year of teaching, and now I'm entering year five. When I finish this year, I'll have outlasted at least 50% of my peers in this career, though I strongly suspect that the current statistic is higher. This doesn't mean that I qualify as a "veteran" teacher or that I have all the answers. I'm still nervous going in to work today and will likely be even more nervous meeting my new classes tomorrow! Still, it's important to look back from time to time and see how far I've come in the past few years. I found something I wrote after my very first week of teaching and I thought I'd share it here. It's hastily written, but I was inspired by it and I hope others will be as well.

So, I've officially made it through my first week as a teacher! I'm not sure how to describe it because I could go on for pages and pages and still wouldn't be able to paint a complete or accurate picture of what it's really like. I will say that it's been insanity, but in a mostly good way. I knew I was going to have to do more work than I've ever done in my life, but I've been managing to do it and to get almost enough sleep, but I wasn't really prepared for what it would actually be like. I wake up and everything is a blur and I'm just running and running everywhere and everything is so fast and I run to my classes and I run to the cafeteria to pick up my next class and I'm still a minute late and I run to my room to print out worksheets for my next lesson and I run to the grocery store to get something that I can cook before it closes and I run to this or that bar with this or that teacher because teachers work hard but they party hard too and the only thing I haven't done is had time to sit down and breathe and reflect. Because in those rare moments that I do, like between putting my head down on the pillow and falling quickly asleep, or on the subway ride home, those are the most wonderful moments because I remember the look of concentration and pride on Winston's face while writing the sentence "My favorite color is blue" or how Daniel put his arm around me and said I was going to be his "teacher-friend" or how, in a moment of stress, David took my hand and said "Miss French! Miss French!" and I said "Yes David?" and he said "Smile!" and flashed me the most adorable smile I've ever seen. So it's been good. I still can't believe that I'm a real teacher and that I'm a full-fledged adult I guess, it's crazy that this is my life and I know I could do better, sometimes I don't know if I'm doing a good job, but the important thing is that I'm doing it, I'm in there now and there's no going back.

Last Wedding Review: Stan Wiest Music

2011-07-29T14:35:00.000-07:00

This is my last wedding review post before I get my photo album! Today I reviewed my reception "musicians" and cake bakery, but I'm only posting my comments about the Music company because I had the most to say about them. Not much to say about the cake; it was yummy and looked beautiful. Hats off to The Rolling Pin! Okay, okay, I'll post another one of Igor's awesome photos:

Now, onto the controversy! I had sort of a mixed opinion of my experience with Stan Wiest Music. Don't get me wrong, I had so much fun at the wedding and I don't regret choosing them, but this guy promised perfection. I mean, check out his website. For all his dorky boasting, we trusted all the experience he had and all the excellent reviews we found. But if everything was perfect, where would all the interesting stories come from?

First, the positive: Stan made himself available to address our questions and concerns and answered emails and calls very promptly and professionally. He was always quick to say that his company was the best in the business and that he would not disappoint. It definitely made me feel comfortable when booking his company for a DJ and a pianist for our wedding reception. I also liked that he had a seven-page questionnaire, which really made me feel like the company cared about our personal choices. The pianist who played during the cocktail hour was excellent, and the DJ had a lot of energy. He managed to make sure that people were always dancing (except during dinner), without having to ask them to get up like some DJ's do. The price of the service seemed like the fairest in the area.

The negative: For all the boasting Stan did about his company, and for all the time I spent filling out the questionnaire, I expected the evening to live up to my admittedly high expectations. As I said earlier, it's not like I had a bad time, but it was my wedding after all, and I figure I'm allowed to be picky. First, the DJ was not available to meet with us in person before the wedding. We talked to him on the phone briefly and agreed to have an email conversation, but he never emailed us back. Perhaps if we had met beforehand, he would have gotten more of the details right! Our first dance song and the song for the groom and his mother were both incorrect versions of the songs we requested. He also didn't play any of the genres of music I asked for in the questionnaire, except for the usual Top 40 music you'd expect to hear at most Long Island clubs. One of Stan's big bragging points was that the music would never be too loud. It's all over his contracts and website. Well...the music was too loud. Finally, some of the DJ's behavior was less than professional, such as his use of bad language.

Overall, I can't really complain about the experience. My husband and I had a great time at the wedding as did our guests. But I wish our DJ had been a little more accommodating of our wishes. If you're considering Stan Wiest, I would recommend meeting with your DJ in person before the wedding, to make sure that you communicate exactly what you want and figure out if you're a good match. Our DJ made sure that our reception was fun and lively, but we might have been able to find someone better suited to our personalities.

Wedding Review: David's Bridal of Massapequa and Bayport Flower Houses

2011-07-25T08:34:00.000-07:00

Here's some more Long Island wedding flavor for you all. After this, I just have to review two more vendors and that free photo album is mine! (Let's hope it's nice!)

Today, I'm reviewing David's Bridal of Massapequa, NY where I got my dress, veil, and shoes, and Bayport Flower Houses, who did the bouquets, boutonnieres, ceremony flowers, and cake design. First, the photos! (Copyright Dorothy Bandura and Igor Bass.)

A closeup of some of the beading detail on the dress.

Coming down the stairs.

The back of the dress.

Bridesmaid bouquets (mine is in the background!)

I've heard David's Bridal described as the Wal-mart of wedding dress shops, but I don't care what people say. My dress was gorgeous, and I got so many compliments on it. It was exactly what I wanted. I was also impressed by the shoes and other accessories available at the store. If everything looks beautiful, fits nicely, and holds up through the day, who cares if it came from David's or some snooty "Say Yes to the Dress" store? I paid less than $1,000 for a dress, veil, and shoes, but I did get my alterations done elsewhere, because the Massapequa location was sort of a far drive from where I live. Thank you, David's Bridal, for helping me find beautiful, recession-proof wedding attire!

Bayport Flower Houses was also a great choice, but for different reasons. It's a family-owned establishment that has served the community for years. The staff there are kind, knowledgeable, and professional. It was the perfect place for me, who had no idea what I wanted my flowers to look like, and only brought a color palette to work with to my first meeting. Within minutes of talking and sketching, Christine had whipped up a sample bouquet that blew me away! She and the other staff members worked with the church and the catering hall so I didn't have to worry about a thing, and they were on top of all the little details that I would never have thought of. All this while working with me to stay in my budget. (Although it did help that we were using non-floral centerpieces. The cost of flowers can add up quickly, and this place is no exception.) On the day of the wedding, the flowers arrived on time and looked impeccable. Even the tossing bouquet managed to look great after being nearly torn in half. But that's a story for another time.

Wedding Review: Smithtown Landing

2011-07-22T11:37:00.000-07:00

The Knot has promised me a free photo album if I review at least five of my wedding vendors, so in the spirit of this blog, which was originally intended to be a review blog, I figured I'd enhance and re-post some of my opinions here! If you're considering getting married on Long Island, they may be helpful! If not, well, you're getting my honest opinion of the way things went on the fateful day, 7/2/11.

Smithtown Landing Country Club is the venue where the reception took place. Everything about the hall was as close to perfection as anything can be. Here are a few photos (Copyright: Igor Bass for the first two and Denise Polley for the third) that may give an idea of what the space is like:


One of the tables in the ballroom.

Best Man/Maid of Honor Speeches

Some fine-looking individuals on the outdoor deck during the cocktail hour.

Willie and I originally wanted a beach wedding reception, but we were on a budget and weren't finding any venues that were both beautiful and affordable. Some of the places we visited had beautiful beach views but little to offer in their indoor areas or in terms of food. Others just reeked of the Jersey Shore vibe. We hadn't even considered Smithtown Landing, but when we checked it out on a tip from my aunt, we were so glad that we did! Although it's not on the water, it has a picturesque outdoor deck, unique and beautiful details inside and out, and a spacious interior. The price was also right for our budget, and included an extra "enhancement" if we booked within a week of our visit. (We did, which is how we were able to have the table of dessert liquors and pastries.) Rich, the General Manager, handled all of our requests and emails with timeliness and care, and helped us create little extras to add our personality to the reception, including the Pimm's Cup and Bourbon Lemonade as our specialty drinks. His flexible and friendly demeanor really helped decrease the amount of stress that can go into planning a wedding. The food was memorable (lobster rolls at the cocktail hour!!) and the Maitre'D and Bridal Attendant were attentive without being overbearing. Overall, I couldn't be happier with my experience at Smithtown Landing. If you're planning a wedding on Long Island, do not let this place slip under your radar! It was almost an afterthought on our list of possible venues, but I'm so glad that we didn't pass it by.

Summer Cooking 2: Mediterranean Meal

2011-06-19T07:02:00.000-07:00

Summer's just about here, but luckily the heat wave of early June is over. Life has been so busy with the wedding now less than two weeks away! I started this post on June 9, which I remember because it was the hottest day we've had this year and I agreed to walk to my coworker's apartment for lunch which was "only a seven minute walk." Well let me tell you, fourteen minutes in 95-degree heat walking in platforms that haven't been broken in yet was complete agony.

Shoes. Omigod shoes. Aren't they cute, though?

Anyway, after a day like that, I needed a quick fix for dinner that required as little cooking and as little time on my feet as possible. I headed to a source that I often use for seasonal cooking, the blog CheapHealthyGood. Although they seem to be on a vacation now, a quick search through their archives lead me to what I needed--a no-cook summer wrap. I tweaked their recipe only slightly, adding fresh mozzarella cheese to turn it from vegan into vegetarian, although in retrospect, I bet it would have been awesome with a little drizzle of balsamic vinegar at the end. Also, if you read that blog post, please be aware that "Funhouse" is a much better episode of The Sopranos. Just saying.

Next, I needed something to serve on the side, and the Mediterranean feel of the wraps made me think of tabouli. If you're not familiar with tabouli, or tabbbouleh, it's a flavorful salad in which bulgur wheat is the main ingredient. Bulgur wheat is a delicious whole grain packed with fiber and protein, that can be substituted for rice or couscous. You can probably find bulgur in the "organic" or "natural" section of your local grocery store, but if you have any ethnic groceries around, particularly middle-eastern, you will likely find it cheaper there. Come to think of it, if you're lucky enough to have a Trader Joe's near you, that might be a good place to look. Also, I'm jealous of you! But I digress...

The tabouli recipe comes from The New Moosewood Cookbook, which I cannot recommend highly enough if you're vegetarian, know and love a vegetarian, or just don't feel like eating meat sometimes. The recipes are satisfying, full of flavor, and emphasize simple, natural ingredients. I particularly like the tabouli recipe because it can be adapted based on your mood or tastes. This time, I branched out from the way my mom usually makes tabouli because I wanted to use up some edamame that's been living in our freezer for a while. You can make the tabouli ahead, as it's one of those dishes that tastes better the next day when its flavors have had time to meld in the fridge for a while. You can serve it hot, room temperature, or cold, but cold is my preference, especially on a hot day.

These are the recipes as I made them, but as always, they can be altered to your tastes and preferences. I should also mention that the only cooking time needed is for boiling water on the stove. How great is that on a 95-degree day?

White Bean Red Pepper Wrap and Tabouli

Ingredients

1 (15 oz.) can white beans, rinsed and drained
1 (7 oz.) jar roasted red peppers, drained thoroughly
baby spinach
fresh mozzarella cheese
tortillas or wraps
3 cloves of garlic
1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon olive oil, divided
1 large bunch of fresh parsley
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons lemon juice, divided
zest of 1 lemon1 cup bulgur
1 pint grape tomatoes, halved
2/3 cup edamame, shelled
4 scallions, finely minced (whites and greens)
salt and pepper

Instructions

1. Boil 1 1/2 cups of water on the stove. Add bulgur and remove from heat. Cover and let stand at least 20 min., until tender.
2. In the meantime puree the beans, peppers, 2 tablespoons lemon juice, 1 tablespoon olive oil, 2 cloves garlic, about 1/3 of the parsley, and 1/2 teaspoon each salt and pepper in a food processor.
3. Spread about 1/4 to 1/3 cup of the bean mixture on each tortilla or wrap. Top with a few handfuls of baby spinach and sliced mozzarella cheese. The wraps are done!
4. Mince the remaining parsley and the last clove of garlic.
5. In a large bowl, combine bulgur with 1 tsp salt, parsley, garlic, lemon zest, the remaining 1/4 cup of lemon juice and olive oil, and black pepper to taste. If making ahead, cover tightly and refrigerate until ready to serve.
6. Add the tomatoes, edamame, and scallions and mix well.

As written, the recipe makes 6+ servings of tabouli and can yield 6 wraps, although we ended up saving the leftover bean and pepper mixture in the fridge and using it as a dip with crackers, which is also delicious. One serving of the tabouli contains about 210 calories, while one wrap contains about 360, depending on your choice of wrapping implement. (I used Mission whole wheat tortillas, which are 130 calories each). So for under 600 calories, you can have a fresh, hassle-free summer meal that is packed with nutrition. And since it's such a snap to prepare, you'll have plenty of time to soak your aching feet. Oh, the things we do for shoes!

Summer Cooking from a Non-Lettuce Lover: Tuna Burgers and Black Bean Salad

2011-06-01T10:45:00.000-07:00

Summer is not technically here, but it sure feels like it's already arrived! I'm home sick from work today--nothing to worry about--but the effects of a potentially allergy-induced cold and cough have finally caught up with me, and I definitely needed some extra rest. Anyway, as I sit here with everyone's favorite sick day staple playing in the background, the temperature inside the apartment is a balmy 82 degrees, and the funny thing is, I wish it would stay that way. I love my air conditioners, but it's expensive to keep them on all day, like I did most of the time last summer, as my job required a lot of at-home hours. (Anyone in NY or the surrounding areas remember how hot it was last summer?) This summer, as many of you know, I will not be working because I'm getting MARRIED, so although I plan to escape the apartment as much as I can, I have to start thinking about two factors that may keep me at home more than I'd like to be: my love of cooking, and the inevitable post-wedding poverty.

Thus, a new mission is born (well, at least for this post): summer cooking! If the weather this summer is anything like a year ago, I need to adjust my regular dinner rotation so that what we make at home is super fast and uses as little heat from the oven or stove as possible. Bonus points if our recipes are healthy and require a minimum of cleanup. And there is one more thing: no lettuce. I enjoy the occasional green salad, but I don't believe they should be automatically equivocated to summer cooking. Personally, lettuce doesn't taste like anything to me, and nutritionally, eating lettuce is like eating air. Other greens like baby spinach and arugula are better, but still not what I love to eat and are disappointingly overpriced where I'm at. So, like the pasta salad I posted a while back, greens can be added, but will not be mandatory.

Ideally, I'd like to update regularly with new summer recipe finds, but honestly, I don't know if I'll be able to, seeing that this is only my second post since February and happens to be on a sick day...but in the meantime, here's a perfect pairing for you to enjoy, should you attempt it in your kitchen this summer. I'm pretty slow in the kitchen, but this dinner only took about a half hour for me to complete for both recipes, with only about 8-10 minutes of the stove being on for actual cooking. I made the salad while the burgers were cooking. Both of these dishes are very easily adaptable, which makes them great staples for the summer.

Tuna Burgers and Black Bean Salad

Ingredients
1 can tuna, drained and flaked (the recipe says a 6 oz. can but I don't think those exist in my area, so I use 5 oz.)
1 egg
1/2 cup seasoned breadcrumbs
1/3 cup finely chopped onion
2 sweet bell peppers (I used a red and a yellow)
3 tablespoons mayo (I use light, much to the chagrin of Husband-elect)
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1/2 tsp dill weed
dash of hot pepper sauce
dash of Worcestershire sauce
salt & pepper (to taste)
cooking spray (or oil for cooking)
buns or rolls for serving
1 can (15 oz.) black beans, drained and rinsed
1 avocado, pitted, peeled, and chopped
1 cup of your favorite salsa

Instructions
For tuna burgers:
1. Finely chop about 1/3 of one of the bell peppers and add to a large bowl with tuna, egg, bread crumbs, onion, mayonnaise, mustard, sauces, and seasonings. Mix well and shape into four patties.
2. Fry patties in a skillet coated with cooking spray on medium heat for about 4 minutes on each side, or until browned. Resist the urge to flip them too soon!
3. Serve on buns/rolls with whatever toppings you'd like. I won't judge you if one of them happens to be lettuce.

For black bean salad:
1. Roughly chop the remainder of the bell peppers and stir together with the black beans and salsa.
2. Gently mix in the avocado and season to taste with salt and pepper.

The salad makes about six servings for four burgers and contains about 160 calories per serving. I figured out the nutrition values for the tuna burgers using the variation I described, including Dijon mustard as the topping and served on an Arnold Sandwich Thin. One sandwich the way I made it contains about 250 calories, so you could have this quick, fresh, and tasty summer dinner for only 410 calories and still have room for ice cream!

If you like this recipe, maybe I'll be motivated to post more. For now, though, The Price is Right has long since been over. Time to switch to the Food Network.

Reviews in General

2011-05-08T10:57:00.000-07:00

I've been very uninspired to write lately, and I'm not sure that I can attribute it to my usual excuse of life being busy. I'm just not excited about reviews. I think that I experience some pretty fun and cool things, but for whatever reason, I find that I'd rather just recap the event than put some sort of opinion across that others might find useful or interesting. Perhaps I need a change of theme. Gale and Bob share their art. Willie writes semi-fictional accounts of events with his own brand of witty flair. I feel like I'm sort of all over the place which makes it hard for me to begin when I want to write.

This summer, I'm going to have a good deal of free time, and I'd like to spend some of it writing, so I'm calling on my four or so readers for ideas. Should I stick to reviews? Start an all-out food blog? Amusing stories from the teaching world? An ordinary journal-type blog? Something completely different? Please share.

Review #34: Planet Fitness, Downtown Brooklyn

2011-02-05T15:21:00.000-08:00

If you live in NYC or its surrounding area and like TV as much as I do, you've probably seen (and may even have gotten sick of) this commercial this past month. I actually joined this gym based on a similar ad campaign in October. It was an easy decision for me: I like being a gym member but it had been a long time since I could afford the $65 per month membership at the NYSC to which I used to belong. $10 a month, however, was too good of a deal to pass up. Plus, the Downtown Brooklyn location is convenient for travel to and from both work and home. Done. Awesome. But how does Planet Fitness stack up to my other gym experiences?

The equipment in the gym is up to date and there are a variety of different machines. Treadmills, ellipticals, bikes, and weight machines are aplenty, with some fancy-looking "Arc Trainers" thrown in. There is a special "Strength Circuit" area that moves people through the various weight machines featuring a "red light/green light" system that tells you when to do your reps and when to rest and proceed to the next machine. There are televisions at the front of each room tuned in to six different channels, and each cardio machine is equipped with a headphone jack and controls for which television or radio channel you'd like to listen to. It's nice that they have TV's, but the layout is such that if you are running on a treadmill near the TV that's tuned in to "Channel 6" and you want to watch the program on "Channel 3," you might have to crane your neck a bit to see it.

The locker room also comes with the amenities of most locker rooms, including two stalls just for changing clothes if you want to be more modest or have more space to put your junk while you change. There is a sufficient amount of lockers, but most of them are pretty small. If you're lucky, you can snag one of the tall lockers which is about the size of the ones we had in high school. My major complaint is that there are only two benches (other than the ones in the changing stalls), so if you need to put your shoes on, your options are limited. They also don't have towels, so if you want to take a shower or have a small towel for your sweat, you have to bring your own.

I can't honestly speak about the classes offered at the gym, because I'm not interested at all in taking any, but the impression I got from my brief glance at the schedule is that they're very limited. When I took the tour of the gym, I wasn't shown any separate studio rooms, so if you're looking for zumba or spinning classes, this is not the gym for you. What they do offer are private and small group sessions with a personal trainer. They also host weight training classes based around their machines that focus on one or more areas of the body.

Planet Fitness is geared towards average people looking to increase their activity level and get healthy, or at least, that's what the guy told me when I was taking my tour of the facility. As such, their clientele range from the athletic type to people trying to lose weight to those who are inherently lazy but feel like they should probably work out every once in a while (me). The demographics reflect the surrounding area of Downtown Brooklyn, and something that I like is that there isn't an overwhelming majority of one gender--you see men and women using the weight machines, stretching on the mats, and doing cardio. When I was researching the gym, I read a lot of negative reviews about the gym being crowded, but since my job requires earlier hours than most, this hasn't been a problem for me. I admit, I was nervous to go back after New Year's Day, especially with the influx of commercials, and it was significantly more crowded last time I went, to the point where a line had formed at the check-in desk when I left around 4:30. Still, I've never had to wait for a machine, and the only time I've felt like the gym has been crowded is when I'm in the locker room.

The neat thing about Planet Fitness is their "judgment free" adage. As portrayed by their commercials, they do not cater to the empty-headed, beefcake type that like to admire each others' muscles in the mirror. The phrase "You Belong" is stamped on the side of each weight machine, and they actually have a huge flashing alarm that they supposedly ring when someone is being a lunk (one who throws their weights down on the floor, grunts, or judges). I've never seen it used, but it exists. They also maintain that just because they are a gym, it doesn't mean that they are health freaks or that their members should be either. The proof is in the sodas and candy for sale in their vending machines, the free pizza afternoon and free bagel morning that takes place each month, and the tanning booths set up at various locations throughout the gym.

Wait, what? Tanning booths? Is this some kind of trend that I'm not aware of? Aren't you trying to steer clear of the "everyone should see how jacked and tan I am" crowd, Planet Fitness? Maybe it's just me, but other than that video, I fail to see how the two are related. You can upgrade your membership to include unlimited use of the tanning booths and massage chairs (tempting) for a still-cheap $20 per month, which also includes access to any of their locations, a price reduction at the vending machines, and free guest passes.

All in all, you get what you pay for at Planet Fitness. I'd prefer to be at my old gym, but the price is the top factor for me, and the price is too good here. If you're looking for a no-frills opportunity to do some repetitive cardiovascular and strength training on machines for a low cost, then Planet Fitness is right for you. It's not a Crunch or a Lucille Roberts, or some fancy shmancy health club in Rockefeller Center. It's a place where you get in, sweat, and then get out. Or shower, but only if you've brought your towel.

Review #33: A Roundup of Remedies

2011-01-22T13:51:00.000-08:00

Sadly, it has not been a healthy start to 2011. A stomach bug of sorts made its way around the homes of my loved ones over the holiday break, and the cold started a few days later, accompanied by the usual cough. Only, it wasn't the usual cough because it didn't go away in a couple of days like I expected it to. Then I noticed that CVS was having a sale, and I figured what better way to beat an annoying cold than to man up and buy a bunch of drugs to deal with the symptoms until it goes away?

Here is a sampling of some of the medicine I tried:

Name: Advil
Type of drug: painkiller, anti-inflammatory
+: I've always found ibuprofen to be better at killing pain than asprin, and it doesn't contain acetaminophen, which makes me feel light-headed. For the common headache and pain, this is my painkiller of choice. I also have never experienced a side effect of taking Advil, so I don't feel afraid taking it when I don't have a headache but feel like I might get one, or taking an Advil PM to help fall asleep.
-: For more intense or persistent pain, I feel like I have to keep taking more every few hours.

Name: Aleve
Type of drug: painkiller, anti-inflammatory
+: More potent than Advil, good for cramps.
-: For me, even though it lasted longer than Advil, I'm not sold on the "all day strong, all day long" mantra. The recommended dosage is one capsule every 12 hours, but I felt the pain coming back well before the 12 hours was up. I'm not sure if it's worth the difference in price.

Name: DayQuil
Type of Drug: painkiller, decongestant, relief of cold symptoms
+: It comes in a liquid! As many of you know, I have an aversion to swallowing large pills that started in my childhood, so this is a huge positive for me, but as an added bonus, the liquid coats my throat which helps with the cough. It lasts as long as it claims to or longer, and it actually makes me feel less of that run down feeling that comes from being sick. Although the painkillers are less powerful, if I don't have a headache or muscle aches, I often feel like I only have to take half of the recommended dose to get results.
-: It runs out too quickly. It's also not as effective at relieving the sore throat and cough at night, so you feel like you have to buy NyQuil as well, which can run into more money.

Name: Mucinex DM
Type of Drug: cough suppressant, expectorant
+: I guess it did feel like the mucus was leaving.
-: This simply did not make me feel better. It didn't help with my cough and although I didn't feel as much mucus in my throat, I still was kept awake at night by nasal congestion and the dry, itchy throat. Plus, this stuff is really expensive! For what I paid for it, I definitely expected better results. Don't get hooked by the commercials like I did. Stick with DayQuil.

Name: Robutussin
Type of Drug: cough suppressant, nasal decongestant
+: Available in a liquid! Not very expensive.
-: It doesn't work. In fact, I don't think that I felt any different at all after taking it.

After a week of using each and every one of these over-the-counter remedies in various combinations, I still found myself with the same symptoms. Turns out, the best remedy for me was a prescription for amoxicillin, because it ended up being a bacterial infection. I'm pretty stubborn when it comes to seeing the doctor: rather than pay money to sit in a waiting room for an hour or more only to actually see the doctor for a total of about 15 minutes, I prefer to just rest, drink fluids, and hope that whatever it is will go away. Still, I'm glad I did this time, and I'm feeling much better now! I'm only disappointed that I wasted a week and a half moping around the apartment. Hopefully, I've gotten this all out of my system early and the rest of 2011 will be happy and healthy!

Recipe: Main Dish Collard Greens

2011-01-04T17:31:00.000-08:00

You may remember this post from August that detailed a recipe for a certain white bean tuna pasta salad that I had put my own spin on. Or you may not remember it. That's okay. The important thing is that I can now go back and look at that entry whenever I want to make that pasta salad and it will come out tasting delicious every time, which is the point of tonight's post.

Tonight I had planned on making a recipe for a hearty-looking main dish consisting of collard greens, leeks, beans, and tomatoes. When I found the recipe the other day, I reviewed the ingredients, skimmed the recipe, and made sure I had everything I needed. However, when I reread the recipe this afternoon, the cooking method didn't sound too great to me. The recipe instructs the reader to simmer the entire dish, collards and all, for an hour. While this might sound perfectly fine to many, I prefer my collard greens to stay somewhat crisp. I improvised, using the recipe's ingredients but my own cooking technique. When I was just about done, I had my handsome fiancé and his discerning palate come in and taste test for seasoning. Shockingly, he said it was perfect the way it was! Such a success deserves documentation and here it is:

Main Dish Collard Greens (photo is courtesy of Food Network and is not of the actual recipe)

Ingredients:
1 cup dried Great Northern beans (although I'm sure a 14.5 oz. can of Great Northern or any kind of white bean would work just as well and take up far less time)
1/4 cup dried pinto beans (I'd use half a can if using canned)
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 cups thinly sliced leeks (about 2 large)
1 tablespoon chopped fresh or 1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 1/2 teaspoons salt, divided
3 large garlic cloves, minced
1 large bunch collard greens, chopped
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 (14.5-ounce) can diced tomatoes, undrained

Instructions:
1. If using dried beans, soak them according to the instructions on the package. Make sure to rinse them after.
2. Simmer the beans in roughly a quart of water, partially covered, for at least an hour or until tender. Drain and reserve the bean water. Set aside.
3. In a large pot or dutch oven (our dutch oven was sadly not big enough and now has to be washed along with the larger pot), sauté the leeks, garlic, oregano, and 1 tsp of the salt in the olive oil for about 5 minutes or until leeks soften.
4. Add the collard greens, remaining 1/2 teaspoon of salt and pepper, and about 1/4 cup of the reserved bean liquid (if you're using canned beans, you can just use water or veggie/chicken stock if you have some on hand). Stir everything together to combine the flavors, and sauté for about 2-3 minutes.
5. Add the tomatoes and beans and cook on medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, for about 10 minutes or to your desired degree of collard green-doneness. Serve over rice.

The recipe makes about 4-6 servings and is super healthy. For those interested in nutrition facts, 1/4th of the recipe has only about 300 calories and is high in fiber and protein while being low in fat. As an added bonus, it's vegetarian and vegan-friendly! (Don't tell Willie!) Actually, if I make it again, I might chop a few slices of bacon and use the fat to sauté the leeks instead of the olive oil. Mmm... Bacon...

Review #32: What happened to the rest of the year?

2011-01-03T14:24:00.000-08:00

Like several of my friends around me, I have not updated my blog in quite some time. My last post was in October and the few I posted before that this fall were short and not very well-crafted. For me, fall has always been a whirlwind. I'm sure that the teachers, parents, and students out there can relate. School starts and it's hectic and maybe even exciting at first. There's a deluge of deadlines and paperwork from scheduling IEP and Parent-Teacher meetings to making your bulletin boards look nice to setting up insurance plans. You want to spend more time with the friends you haven't seen all summer and enjoy what's left of the sunny weather, so your social calendar fills up. You have the energy and enthusiasm to put extra effort into your projects--plan a field trip for the kids! Add some footnotes to your 8-page paper! Set up a behavior plan for your unruly student! CLEAN ALL THE THINGS!

By the time the fast pace of the fall slows down, you find that you've been unceremoniously thrust into mid-November with Thanksgiving about a week away. You remember that you haven't checked in with your girlfriend in Boston or washed your bedding or written in your blog in a long time, but that energy and enthusiasm from last month has waned. You figure that if only you can make it to Thanksgiving, you'll have time to relax and catch up on life. Turns out, you're too pooped from all the turkey to actually catch up, unless catching up on napping counts. By the time December rolls around, it's too late to do pretty much anything except work, sleep, and try to please your rapidly growing family by purchasing and gift-wrapping the right combination of trinkets.

So that's what happened to the rest of my year, but I apologize if I made it sound bleak or tedious. In fact, I had a good fall and early winter, and the lack of writing isn't due to a lack of things to write about, although when you're caught up in the midst of work and holiday planning, it can seem that way sometimes. Here are some things that Wille or I could have written about...but didn't:

10/31/10: In which we attend Fright Fest at Six Flags and ride roller coasters in the dark (Don't make fun! I had a good time!)
11/10/10: In which we become domestic partners recognized by the City of New York
11/12/10: In which Maria, Robin, and Amanda have a Triple Bachelorette Party and hilarity ensues
11/20/10: In which we host a pre-Thanksgiving celebration for our friends, everyone brings delicious things, Willie cooks his first turkey, and no one gets food poisoning!
11/25/10: In which our families spend Thanksgiving together and everyone gets along!
12/5/10: In which we attend our first (and probably last) NFL game and the Giants beat the Redskins! Also, tailgating is fun.
12/11/10: In which the "Christmas Gay" is visited and "Most Honorable Company" business is discussed with the illustrious Helen and Varun
12/19/10: In which the Giants ruin Christmas in what can only be described as the biggest failure of all time
12/25/10: Christmas (or In which Willie spends too much money spoiling Maria)
12/26-28/10: A blizzard happens, we mostly stay inside only venturing to Chelsea's Boxing Day fete, and getting back home is an adventure
12/29/10: In which we visit the Museum of Natural History and Willie plays with his new camera
12/31/10: A Very Special New Year's Eve featuring the vocal stylings of Jon Meier

That's all for 2010, folks! With any luck I'll turn some of 2011's headlines into actual blog posts.

50th Post!

2010-10-29T06:36:00.000-07:00

...and nothing special to say. I just thought that it might be interesting to note that this is the first time in my teaching career to date that I've made it through the entirety of September and October without taking a sick day. And it's not that I've been any less healthy in years past (except my first year teaching--that was a shock to the system!) You know what I mean. I haven't needed a day off.

I don't know what's different about this year that is making me feel happier and less stressed. Maybe it's a combination of a lot of things. Or maybe it's nothing. Maybe it's just comforting that things are the same, at least at work anyway. Then again, maybe it's tenure.

YEAAHHHH

Review #31: Final thoughts on the CSA (with contributions from a guest writer!)

2010-10-23T14:42:00.000-07:00

It should come as no surprise that I've been remiss in my updates for the past two months, as the beginning of the school year is always very busy. With this post, I hope to sum up my feelings about the CSA, as the season comes to a close in a little under a month. Perhaps then I'll find something to review that doesn't have to do with food! The CSA season had its peak, in my opinion, in the early fall, with more delicious heads of garlic, sweet potatoes, bell peppers, and even broccoli (in addition to the familiar truckloads of beets, numerous varieties of choy, and the ever-present lettuce). Now, we're starting to get some winter squash and the weekly head of lettuce has changed to a weekly head of cabbage. As usual, we've made valiant attempts to use the produce in exciting and delicious ways, and as usual, we've had mixed success. Really, how many different ways can you prepare a beet?

The "end of the season" survey, oddly enough, came nearly two months before the end of the CSA season. When Willie and I finally had the time to fill it out, we decided to sit and do it together. However, although our general feelings about the CSA are the same, one of us was particularly full of snark that day, a mood which should not be wasted, regardless of the feelings of whoever happens to read the survey. The result is recreated here for your enjoyment.

1. How satisfied were you with your vegetable share? (very/somewhat/not) Please feel free to give more explanation.

Me: I did enjoy getting to sample vegetables that were new and exciting to me and to experience the freshness and flavor of some of my favorites. However, I think that there could have been more of a variety in the weekly pickup, and I was disappointed a few times when I arrived in the afternoon only to discover that one or more of the vegetables that were listed as part of the week's share in that morning's email had been replaced by something else, or were simply unavailable, perhaps due to people taking more than their fair share.
Willie: Boy... how do I even begin to answer a question like that? There was a time in my life when I liked beets, but I feel that I will never again know the joy of a spoonful of spicy borscht ever again. We were loaded down with so many beets that there were times when I awoke in a cold sweat convinced that I was a Soviet pauper on the cold, lifeless Gulags on the steppes of Russia. And let us discuss another thing: BOK CHOY. Bok choy? BOK CHOY? Really? REALLY? Sigh... If I ever see a bok choy or any of its cousins (whatever the hell U-choy is) ever again, it will be far too soon. Perhaps someone needs to inform Farmer Fred that this is America and in America we don't really care for bok choy. What are you supposed to do with 3 bunches of bok choy per week in an American kitchen? And THREE HEADS OF LETTUCE? Oh sure, one week it's red oak or Boston or iceberg or romaine - BUT IT'S STILL LETTUCE! No person in his or her right mind needs 3 heads of lettuce in a week! Oh sure, there were nice weeks replete with watermelon, and that one week where we received the most delicious cantaloupe that has ever caressed my tastebuds, but I think you owe me one for destroying my love of beets and reinforcing my utter contempt for bok choy.

2. Do you order meat, eggs, coffee, bread or cheese from the CSA? Why or why not? If you did not know that these items were available this year how can we better convey the information next season?

(We actually just ordered a duck from one of the farms that we work with, which we will pick up on Tuesday. Excitement!)

Me: Not regularly. I'm already spending more money than I normally would on vegetables from the CSA, so until these items can become cheaper, I can't afford to purchase them unless it's a treat. I think that it was very clear that these items were available.
Willie: You want me to give you MORE money? We did know they were available, but we chose to pay for electricity instead.

3. Do you see yourself joining again next year? Please feel free to give more explanation.

Me: I don't think so. I'm glad that I joined this year, but I'm not sure if Sang Lee farms is the best match for me, so I'd rather explore other options for organic, local produce.
Willie: Short answer: not likely. Long answer: promise to never grow bok choy again and we'll talk.

Questions 4-7 did not include the opportunity to comment. Basically, the circles we bubbled in indicated that we can't afford to pay more to subsidize a share for a low-income family (sorry guys but it already costs a lot), that we didn't have and don't really care about a fruit share, and that we prefer not to attend social events organized by the CSA.

8. Is there more you think the CSA could be doing to build our community, either between CSA members or with the local community? If so, please share your thoughts on this.

(I didn't comment on this, because when I go to pick up my vegetables, I like to get in and get out. Maybe some people saw this as an opportunity to meet others, but I was only interested in the food. They did send out some emails and hand out fliers about social events which I ignored.)

Willie: Oh, like I'd be caught dead with a ragtag bunch of icy hipsters and hippies. And here's an idea, perhaps instead of wasting reams upon reams of paper for little fliers to distribute at the pickup site, why not try this miraculous new invention called "electronic mail." I still won't show up, but hey, at least I'll feel less guilty when I throw away another poor dead tree in the nearest corner trash can.

9. Do you regularly read the weekly e-mails the CSA sends out on Tuesdays? If not, what would make you more likely to read them?

(I also didn't have much to say about this. I do read the emails because they tell us what we're going to get each week, but I generally only read the list, then skim the rest.)

Willie: I read them, but I can't say I enjoy them. This is especially true of Farmer Fred's snarky and poorly written letters wherein he attempt to "humorously" explain his failures as a agriculturist (see: the email when he said we should pay him extra for his slug-eaten BOK CHOY because the slug holes indicate the vegetables are healthy).

10. If we need to move to a new space next year, do you have any ideas for spaces that might be willing to host the CSA?

Me: No. Willie: Not in my backyard.

The final question was an opportunity for us to give our contact information if we were interested in being part of the core volunteer group that organizes the CSA. We just laughed about that one.

In closing, I really am glad for this experience. I learned to love some vegetables I would have never tried otherwise, like kohlrabi and Japanese salad turnips. I also incorporated more vegetables into our diet, which makes for a healthier lifestyle. I'm still not a huge fan of salad, though, and there are some veggies that I just couldn't learn to like, such as snap beans and yes, bok choy. I want to continue to support local farmers, but I think that I might be better off going to a farmer's market. I've actually been keeping a close eye on the money I spend each month as part of the AGGRESSIVE SAVING we're doing for the wedding, and I think that's good, because now that I have an idea of what our food budget can/should be each month, I'm confident that I can make room for some quality produce. So even though it's an experience that I probably won't repeat, joining the CSA has been an experience that has taught me a lot, and I'm glad I tried it.

So!

2010-10-03T18:45:00.000-07:00

I'm going to do it. Even though it's a commitment, I think it will be an experience that will end up opening more doors for me than it will shut. It might end up leading me somewhere that I can't even imagine yet. And it's true, three years is not forever, and when it's over, if I want to just be a teacher (or a stay-at-home mom, or an astronaut), there's nothing that says I can't do that!

So even though it's been pretty nice being able to sit on my butt after work and be lazy, in January of 2011, I will, like many of my friends, become a student once again!

Stress!

2010-10-01T10:20:00.000-07:00

I just found out that I got accepted to a very prestigious advanced graduate studies program at Pace. It's called the TARA program and it's a research-based program focusing on educational methods and interventions to serve students with autism. They only accept 10 people per year, they'll give me a full scholarship, and by the end of it, I would most likely be published in a scholarly journal at least once.

However, it's a big commitment. A three-year commitment. I'd most likely have to miss the wedding of a very important friend of mine this summer, which would make me sad. And it would most likely guarantee that I would keep working with students with moderate to severe disabilities, maybe for the rest of my life. (Because why switch careers when you've gone beyond a Master's Degree in your field?)

I told them I'd make a decision by Monday.

None of this is bad (except missing the wedding), but it's scary. It's basically like being told that I have three days to decide what I want the rest of my life to look like. This could be awesome, but what if it's not the right path for me? What is the right path for me?

And with that sentiment, I wish I didn't have to work for another hour and a half so I could go home now and pour myself a stiff drink.

Words of wisdom/encouragement/off-topic distraction would be greatly appreciated.

Not a review, but here's a bento!

2010-09-12T07:06:00.000-07:00

(Or in which I get tired of writing about the same stuff, so you all must be tired of reading about it...)

Our veggie selection has remained relatively similar, and now that we've reached weeks 12-14 of the CSA season, I feel like it's okay to repeat recipes, but I don't really feel like posting about them...again.

So, until I figure out something to write about, I'll leave you with a few things of note from the past few weeks in food:

We were lucky to receive an entire bulb of garlic one week. The cloves were enormous, especially when compared to my tiny hands.

And in (slightly) more exciting news:

School started again, so I made a bento for the first day. Things are hectic in the beginning of the year, especially for teachers, so it was definitely nice to have lunch all packed and ready to eat at lunchtime, instead of having to run out and look for something to eat. My only wish was that there was more leftover couscous! In addition, you can see a couple of homemade turkey meatballs as well as some CSA veggies: lettuce, the ever-present beets, and cherry tomatoes. The broccoli was not from the CSA, but rather from a frozen package, because we have to cut corners in some areas.

I hope everyone enjoys the rest of their weekends!

Review #30: Vacation-- all I ever wanted? (with a brief mention of CSA Week 11)

2010-08-24T12:10:00.000-07:00

Grownups go on vacations to remove ourselves from stress, but according to many lists of top causes of stress, planning and taking a vacation can be very stress-inducing in and of themselves. When I was a kid, I loved going on vacation, but now that I've planned and taken quite a few in my adult life, I still love going, but I'm always very relieved to come back home. Willie and I just got back from a vacation to Northampton and Salem, MA, which was a lot of fun, but left me surprisingly mentally and physically exhausted. I'm definitely glad that I have these next two weeks to bum around at home before I go back to work.

For me, there are several reasons why vacations are now more stressful than when I was a kid, which mainly stem from taking on the responsibility of planning them and, of course, from the money involved. First, you have to decide how you're going to get to where you want to go. Will you take a car? If so, you need directions or a GPS. You have to figure out what tolls you have to pay and where you will stop for gas or rest areas along the way. Driving for long distances can be very draining, especially in bad weather or heavy traffic. Furthermore, there might be traffic rules you might not be aware of in your destination. For example, you can't make a right turn at a red light in NYC, but you can in many other areas. If you rely on public transportation such as buses, trains, or airplanes, you have to figure out schedules, routes, and timing and may be limited in where you can stay based on proximity to mass transit.

Speaking of a place to stay, finding a hotel might seem relatively simple, especially now that we have websites with customer reviews. However, I've noticed that I've grown pickier in my adult age. I can't afford 4-star accommodations, and even 3-star lodging can be a stretch, but now that I'm older, there's a certain comfort level that I expect to enjoy. The hotel we stayed at on this particular trip had somewhat of a funky smell, an air conditioner that was only semi-functioning, and a TV/Radio Combination that looked like it could have been from the 70's. The beds and pillows were like sleeping on cardboard and left our backs and necks sore. Still, the free breakfast was adequate, the outdoor pool area was clean and pretty, the TV/Radio got all of the important cable channels, and the location and price were right. Plus, you don't spend a lot of time in the hotel when you're on vacation.

This brings me to food and activities. Even when you can get a "deal" on fast food "meals" at places such as Dunkin Donuts or McDonalds, you might still find that you're wasting your money, or at least spending more than you're used to at home. You can use the grocery store, but without a refrigerator or cooking implements in the hotel room, this can somewhat limit your options, or give you more work than you wanted to do while on vacation. Choosing a restaurant can also be tricky when you're in unfamiliar territory, or time-consuming if you're sifting through websites like yelp. Planning activities can also be somewhat challenging. You want to plan enough to do so that you're not bored, but you also want to have time to relax. You also have to make sure that your activities are appropriate and worthwhile for everyone in your party, which I can only imagine can be nearly impossible if you have young children.

Still, even after considering all these factors and stresses, people still keep taking vacations! In spite of the stress, our vacation was a lot of fun. I got to introduce Willie to some of my favorite places in Northampton and accompany him on his very first hike up a mountain! We were able to see some very dear friends who we don't get to see as often as we'd like. We were resourceful with our money but still able to splurge on a few adventures and indulgences. Just looking at this picture of my intrepid explorer will make me happy enough to last me until we can afford another vacation:

P.S. As promised, I will make a brief mention of CSA Week 11, because I can't get through a whole post without talking about food. We picked up the veggies the night before we left, so we didn't get to use everything as interestingly as we like to, but we did manage to get at least one picture of the bounty:

As you can see, were lucky to receive some pretty awesome stuff this week! The obligatory head of lettuce (far left, used in bento salads for Willie and I on Wednesday) is accompanied by 3 heirloom tomatoes (used in a homemade mac and cheese recipe Tuesday night before we left on our trip), a plethora of snap beans and cherry tomatoes (which we hauled with us on our trip and ate raw), one half of the best cantaloupe I've ever tasted in my life (devoured between Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning), and finally a bulb of fennel and a bunch of multicolored carrots (stored in the fridge and made into an improvised fish dinner by Willie last night).

Review #29: CSA Weeks 9 & 10

2010-08-17T18:51:00.000-07:00

It's hard to imagine that a week and a half ago, during Week 9 of the CSA, I was still working. The whole week was a blur, and it already seems like so much time has passed since then. Even though I didn't have much time to cook, things are definitely getting interesting in the CSA now that it's tomato season! To be honest, I usually don't care much for raw, sliced tomatoes. I'm always picking them out of salads and putting them on Willie's plate. The one exception to my tomato ambivalence, of course, is when they're garden-fresh. I have to say that the cherries, grapes, and heirlooms we've been getting these past few weeks are absolutely divine.

Here's the breakdown:
1 bunch of mixed-color carrots
1 onion
1 bunch of cilantro
1 head of Red Boston Lettuce
1 bunch mixed beets (we had a break from them for a week but I guess they're still going strong!)
a bunch of basil
1 head Green Romaine
1 lb Norland Red Potatoes
1/2 lb. Snap Beans
red and yellow cherry tomatoes
red and yellow tomatoes
2 "Fairy Tale" Eggplants
1/2 lb.Ong Choy (or, "Crap Choy" as Willie refers to it, because when we got it, it looked like crap so we threw it away)

I've definitely grown accustomed to and even enjoy eating salads now that we're down to one head of lettuce per week. In addition to the White Bean Tuna Pasta Salad from my last post, we made one more salad of note in the past few weeks, using the colorful carrots. Cool, right?

We also had an encore presentation of the lentil, beet, and ricotta salad from this post. Speaking of cool-looking veggies, check out the striped beets (pre-roasting):

The fairy tale eggplants were also really cool-looking. Unfortunately, I didn't take a picture of ours, but here's one to give you an idea (and yes, it's a much nicer picture than the ones I usually take. I guess the lighting in our kitchen is just sub-par...sigh):
This is pretty much exactly what they looked like, except that you'll have to picture that we only got two of them. Sad. All of the recipes I found required at least a pound of these beauties. What to do with only two? Willie, of course, had the answer: bread them, fry them, and serve them with a horseradish mayo dipping sauce. I'll take it! That'll be our new answer for any vegetable we don't know what to do with: fry it!

Once the job was finally over, I regained my energy and enthusiasm for cooking. My return to glory, however, was not as glorious as I would have hoped, thanks to that bunch of cilantro. People can get pretty heated about their opinions of the herb, but I generally have no problem with it. I think that when you add it to guacamole or couscous, it gives it a fresh taste, and so I decided that in addition to making guac (which in my opinion, turned out spectacularly), I would make a recipe for Cilantro Lime Cod (tilapia) found in my Taste of Home cookbook. But unbeknownst to me, the"fresh" taste of raw cilantro turns bitter and soapy when cooked past a certain extent. The Cilantro Lime Tilapia was a failure, and so would dinner have been as well, if not for Willie's side dishes: a Mediterranean-style bulgur salad with feta, onion, and cherry tomatoes and sauteed snap beans (though I still can't seem to bring myself to like the snap beans, at least I had my guac--not pictured because it went in my belly too quickly--to fill me up):

Even the best twenty-something chefs have their off days, but would that bring us down? Of course not! The next day, we worked through some of our lettuce and tomatoes as well as all of those delicious red potatoes with some old standby recipes. Goat (feta) cheese and turkey burgers from this recipe paired with Willie's famous roasted potatoes. Life is good:

And that's all for now! We picked up this week's share this evening and are trying to figure out how not to waste it as we head off on a hard-earned vacation to New England.

Stay hungry, my friends!

Recipe: White Bean Tuna Pasta Salad

2010-08-11T10:41:00.000-07:00

When I cook, I follow recipes about 90% of the time. To me, nothing is better than finding a great recipe and knowing that I can follow the instructions to duplicate it whenever I want. The other 10% of the time I'm either cooking what I know (read: anything smothered in marinara sauce, breakfast burritos), using a recipe as a loose reference, or combining recipes in a way that I hope will work. When the latter two scenarios occur, I always tell myself to write down what I've done so that I can replicate a successful dish. Of course, I'm always lazy and/or busy so this rarely happens--until today.

Today, I present to you a combination of a weight watchers recipe with a Giada de Laurentiis recipe: White Bean Tuna Pasta Salad.
For some, this might not be the most exciting or novel dish, but for Husband-elect and I, there's just something special about it, perhaps the freshness of the tomatoes and onions in the red wine vinegar-based dressing combined with the satisfying texture of the white beans and pasta. It's also super easy to make, it's relatively healthy, and this week it gives us a chance to use some of our CSA bounty!

Ingredients
8 oz. pasta
1 can white beans, drained and rinsed
2 cans tuna (regular 5 or 6 oz. size cans, depending on what your store has), drained
1/2 pint cherry or grape tomatoes, halved
1/2 red onion (the ones at our grocery store are typically gargantuan), diced
1/3 cup capers
3 T. olive oil
3 T. red wine vinegar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
*Optional: generous handfuls of chopped fresh basil and/or parsley, salad greens

Instructions
1. Cook your pasta according to the directions on the package. When it's done, drain and rinse with cold water.
2. In the meantime, use a fork to scoop out the tuna into a large bowl, flaking it into small pieces, and add the white beans and the capers.
3. In a small bowl, combine the olive oil, vinegar, salt and pepper. Add to the large bowl and mix everything together, allowing the flavors to meld together while you chop the vegetables.
4. Add onion, tomatoes, pasta, and fresh herbs if you got 'em to the mixture and toss gently. Season to taste with more salt and pepper if you like.
5. Serve over a bed of salad greens if desired. Bask in praise from dinner (or lunch) companions.

Average people, I'm sure, could get about 6 servings out of this. Willie and I are hungry people, and usually get about 4. Depending on how much you eat, one serving could contain about 370 calories (for 1/6th of the recipe) to about 550 calories (for 1/4th of the recipe), which is really not bad for dinner or a big lunch.

Review #28: CSA Weeks 7 & 8

2010-08-09T10:07:00.000-07:00

As of Saturday night, I'm finished with my summer job, which means I'm free until school starts again in September. I'm so happy to have a month of vacation where I can get back to some hobbies and hopefully get some wedding planning done!

Technically, we're wrapping up week 9 of the CSA, but I've been behind in posting and I have a lot of photos from weeks 7 and 8 (and not so many from week 9), so I'm going to combine 9 and 10 in next week's review. As you can see, we decided to see the CSA through for the rest of the season, and I think that the next month or so will be worth it, as we're finally starting to get some variety (although that may not be reflected this week).

Here's what we got over two weeks:
2 bunches Mixed colors of Beets (good thing we like beets!)
8 oz. Mesclun
1 bu White Hakurei Turnips
1 Bulb Kohlrabi
4 oz. Baby Squash
1/2 lb. Fresh Snap Beans
1 bunch baby Cippolini Onions
Red and green scallions
1 bunch Basil
1 head of Green Romaine
1 bunch Purslane Greens

I'm not a fan of snap beans, but luckily, Willie was more than willing to devour them. I think he ate them raw! The baby squash is really not worth mentioning. They were really tiny, and I think they only throw that kind of stuff in the box to make it look like we're getting more stuff than we actually are. To supplement our usual boring salads made with the greens (and yummy turnips), we decided to try a few more exciting ones using the purslane greens.
This pasta salad also contains spinach, a lot of basil, prosciutto, and cheese. Yum!

We also used some of the purslane greens to add to Willie's famous roasted potatoes:
This photo also contains a salmon fillet (hooray for sales at Pathmark) and a peach and tomato salad with basil. The salmon and potatoes were delicious. The peach and tomato salad was a learning experience, in that we learned that we never have to make it again! I wanted to try one of those enticing salads that mix sweet fruits with tomatoes and other interesting flavors, and it did not live up to my high hopes.

Other than that, we had a surplus of two items: scallions and beets.

When life hands you lemons, you make lemonade! When life hands you scallions, what do you do? If your answer was, "make scallionade," you're wrong! Who has ever heard of such a thing? Scallion pancakes,on the other hand, would have been an acceptable answer.So the photo isn't ours, but we did make scallion pancakes, served with chinese-style pulled pork for a surprisingly easy and scrumptious dinner.

Next, we had to put a dent in those beets. Look at the variety of the colors we got in one of the bunches:

We've been perfectly happy, so far, to eat our beets two ways: in soup and thrown into salads after being roasted. However, this week I was ready to branch out. I didn't want to get tired of beets, after all. By a stroke of luck, I stumbled upon this recipe for kohlrabi and beet "hash" (scroll down). Two veggies in one dish? I'm all for it. I decided to make it with healthy breaded chicken tenders.
I was originally concerned about the "hash" because I didn't know how the flavors of the beets and kohlrabi would work together, but they ended up just blending together perfectly. I keep putting "hash" in quotation marks though, because it didn't really hold together as well as I expected, most likely because of the high water content of the veggies. It's not the same as the hash browns you make out of potatoes, but it was still very good. Willie enjoyed it, but he would have liked it more if he didn't have to grate all of the veggies by hand. I guess a food processor with a grating attachment is one thing we can put on our registry!

The other way that we used the beets was to make a fancy potato salad consisting of beets, regular and sweet potatoes, the adorable baby Cippolini onions, and a dressing of mayonnaise, mustard, and Willie's secret blend of herbs and spices. We didn't get a photo of that, though.

And that was it for those two weeks. I haven't really cooked at all in the past week due to the job being very busy, but now that it's over, I'm looking forward to what's ahead!

Review #27: Gyu-Kaku

2010-08-04T06:24:00.000-07:00

I'm a member of a website called Groupon, which offers daily deals at places around the city, provided that a certain number of people go in on the deal. Each day, you can register to buy coupons for stores, gyms, restaurants, services, or basically anything else on the site, and if enough people also sign up, you get the coupon. If not, the deal is off and you don't get charged. I've used this website for several deals including a two heavily discounted year-long memberships to the Brooklyn Museum, located a mere few blocks from our apartment, a coupon to the City Crab restaurant where we enjoyed our 2-year anniversary dinner, and a coupon to a high-end pharmacy/beauty store. So when I saw an add for $20 for $40 worth of food at Japanese restaurant Gyu-Kaku, I took the deal. Husband-elect and I needed to go somewhere to celebrate our engagement anyhow. (Again.)

If I remember correctly, we went on the 5th of July which was a Monday evening. They asked if we had reservations (we did not), but they were still able to seat us right away and it looked like there were only about half the tables filled. I knew from reading ahead that Gyu-Kaku had a comprehensive do-it-yourself grill menu, but I was still surprised when I sat down and saw that the grill was actually built into the table!Willie was not as impressed.

The server came and gave us a tutorial on their menu, including recommended portions, package deals, and special marinades. The explanation was a relief to both of us, as their menu was literally, a binder with roughly a dozen pages. The dishes all seemed like they were at a pretty low price but do not be fooled! They recommend that you choose at least two proteins per person in addition to a vegetable and rice. When you're buying 4 items per person at $3-$10 each, the money adds up quickly. We glanced over the dinner packages and had just about decided on the "Geisha Course" for two, when we found out that we couldn't use our coupon for any of the dinner packages. Great, more work for us. Following our server's recommendations, we browsed the menu and decided to choose 2 different kinds of steak for the grill, a shrimp order and a scallop order for the grill, mixed vegetables for the grill, salads for each of us, and a dolsot bibimbap rice dish which I was attracted to because I had never tried it but kept hearing about its crunchy goodness. (Also because they had many variations of it, including one with eel. Yum!)

After a short while, our food came, and our server explained to us the grill times for each. Here's what some of it looked like on the grill:
They also gave us some dipping sauces to try.

All in all, the food was good. The marinades were perfectly chosen for the steak, which didn't need any dipping sauce. The scallops were big and I liked that I got to grill them to perfection instead of having to deal with someone over- or under-cooking them. The shrimp and vegetables were sort of boring, but what do you expect? I'm the type of person who likes to mush my food around on the plate and get all the flavors together, so eating one piece of meat, then one piece of vegetable, then one piece of scallop, and so on until the end was a bit anticlimactic and bordered on tiresome. I guess I'd rather have someone cook my meal for me if I'm going to pay that much for it.

The dolsot bibimbap was the star of the night. It already smelled good when it got to our table in its hot stone bowl, but we were told to let it sit for a little while so that the rice could continue cooking to its crispy perfection. I'm glad we waited! Being from an Italian family, pasta was always our staple grain and we ate rice far less often. However, I could eat this crispy, yet somehow creamy rice every day.

Dolsot bibimbap aside, all in all, I just wasn't blown away by this restaurant. It was pretty average. The food was fine and some of it was great, but I expect better quality if I'm shelling out $65 (and that was after the $40 coupon, so the meal itself was really over $100). I think part of the reason is that you're paying for a gimmick, to grill at your seat. If $50 per person for an average restaurant meal sounds fine to you, then by all means, visit Gyu-Kaku. I'm glad that I tried something new, but I'd rather stick with some of my well-known $10 dinner venues and use the extra money I save at Delmonico's.

Review #26: CSA Week 6

2010-07-20T08:20:00.000-07:00

Once again, life gets in the way of me posting anything novel, but at the very least, I'm keeping up with the CSA. That is, if we don't throw in the towel on the whole experience. Allow me to explain. This week we really started getting frustrated with how poorly run and unprofessional everything seems to be. Two things, in particular, got me feeling irate. First, this is the list of what we were supposed to get last week, edited to show what we actually got:

1 bunch Red Beets
~~1 Bunch Red Scallions~~ (never got 'em)
Bunched Green Scallions
~~1 Bunch U-Choy Greens~~ (Got 'em, but didn't eat due to massive amounts of bug holes chewed through. I wish I could show you a picture of the bunch of greens we got. They were mostly air.)
Red Oak Lettuce
Green Boston Lettuce
1 Small Greenhouse Cucumber
2 1 Field Cucumbers
~~1 Regular Bok Choy~~ (never even saw it)

Imagine my disappointment when I came home from work to find that all we got this week, essentially, was lettuce, cucumbers, scallions, and beets.

The second thing that annoyed me was the letter from "Farmer Fred," the local farmer that supplies us with our veggies each week. In the letter, he attempts to explain the bug infestation, but in a completely unapologetic way. He cites the warm weather and ample food supply for the increase in the bug population and that as a result, "you may notice a greater amount of 'air space' on the leaves of your Veggies. Rest assured that this 'Quality Taste Testing' on their part is just a reminder that they are keeping an eye on your veggies. The best part of this great service is that there is no extra charge for this quality control." Wait, I'm sorry, but it just sounded like you think I should pay you more to have bugs eat through half of my U-Choy? Considering that I pay about $16 a week to be a part of this CSA and that my $16 this week bought two heads of lettuce, two cucumbers, a bunch of scallions, beets, and some U-Choy greens that something else already ate, this letter just added insult to injury.

I know that there were risks involved in joining this share, both due to the weather and other factors. I also know that $16 per week of share veggies is not going to give me as much as $16 would at the Key Food down the street. The extra money is an investment in local, natural farming, which is a cause that I support, but I also expect to get some better quality produce out of the deal than I can get from Key Food. That is, after all, part of what the CSA is advertising. I also expect that if they post a list of what's included in this week's share on the web and in an email, that I will get what's on that list. What happened to those red scallions and bok choy? Did greedy people take more than their fair share? Or were they never there in the first place?

Husband-elect Willie gallantly procures the vegetables each week while I'm at work, so today, I'm writing down exactly what's listed on the website for him to bring over there. If they don't have everything on that list for him to bring home, they better have a darn good explanation as to why it's not there. And if they don't even have that, it might be time for us to see if someone else will buy up the rest of our share from us. It would be a shame, because we have gotten some good produce out of the deal, and sometimes I think that maybe I'm being too whiny and I should just accept that there will be ups and downs to this whole thing. Still, it's hard for me to justify spending that much money on something so unfulfilling, especially now that we've got a wedding to plan and are commencing a regime that I like to call AGGRESSIVE SAVING. (More on that later).

Anyway, there are not very many photos to share this week, but there were two saving graces this week. First, we have the beets. Husband-elect made a steak and roasted beet salad one night that was delicious, although not particularly photo worthy. And this time, we actually saved the beet greens and cooked them just like collards. Yum!

The photo isn't the best, but I do like how you can see the steam rising from the deliciousness we are about to consume. I also love how colorful the beet greens are (although part of that pink color is, of course, bacon). We ate them with grits and crab cakes.

The other good thing about this week was the cucumbers which are sweet and delicious all on their own, but because we weren't eating them quickly enough, we decided to make some more fridge pickles from the rest. Behold:

These have only been in the brine for a couple of days, so they'll become even more wonderful over time, but I like them as they are right now: crunchy and sweet with a little bite of vinegar.

So there you have it! Although we ended on a high note, we've reached a low in our CSA adventure. But have we gone low enough to call it quits? We'll find out!

Review #25: CSA Weeks 4 & 5

2010-07-12T19:55:00.000-07:00

I know I posted already today, but I have somewhat of a backlog of what I wanted to talk about, and I know you all want to see some of the deliciousness we cooked up these past two weeks. (Right? Yeah, that's what I thought). I think we're getting the hang of using all the veggies in interesting ways (except maybe the lettuce) and we've finally stabilized the fridge situation!

So here's what we had to work with over two weeks:
a bulb of kohlrabi
two bunches of radishes
tons of lettuce
a bunch of beets
a few cucumbers
Baby Bok Choy
scallions
red salad turnips

And here's what we made! First, a yummy pasta salad based off one of those famous O-H family original recipes, using the salad turnips, some cucumber, and some of the radishes:
We shared the pasta salad with our friends at that fateful picnic, yes the one where we got engaged.

Next, another stir fry, with the baby bok choy and kohlrabi, to accompany a tasty orange chicken recipe we tried for the first time:

And then another salad! I'm trying to at least make the salads a bit more interesting, even though I've gotten used to all the lettuce. This one is from a free cookbook I downloaded from this site, in which all of the recipes contain a maximum of 5 ingredients and supposedly take 10 minutes or less to make. This one lived up to its promise, but I did roast the beets ahead of time. In addition to the beets, the salad has lentils, lettuce, and ricotta cheese with a simple olive oil and balsamic dressing.

Finally, tonight's recipe was one that I wanted to try for a while, even though it seemed a little weird. It was for a citrus radish confit, which was amazing. We had it on top of tuna steaks, although I could have had it all on its own, several times over. In fact, if we get more radishes, I'm making it again.

And that, friends, is all for tonight. My next review might be of a restaurant, at risk of turning this into almost entirely a food blog, or I might decide to try to shake that reputation and make it a review of Toy Story 3! Or maybe something else entirely, you'll just have to keep reading!

Review #24: Three Coffee Shops

2010-07-12T06:31:00.000-07:00

I've been remiss in posting lately, mostly because whenever I sit down at my computer, I'm doing something work-related. The bulk of my summer job is work done from home, so after I'm done reading my webcomics and looking at facebook, when I'm ready to focus my energy on something, it's work. I think that if I do this job again next summer, it will be a lot easier because I'll already have lesson plans and teacher resources neatly organized together on my computer. But for now, putting those plans and resources together is hard work! I can't wait until my month off!

The other part of the reason why I haven't been posting is because when I'm not working, I've been doing a lot of celebrating, because for those of you who still don't know, I got engaged on the fourth of July! Husband-elect and I are extremely happy and will share drinks with anyone who can bear to look at our sickeningly cute grins.

Anyway, I decided to take the time to post today because I'm in the middle of doing one of my least favorite chores: laundry. I hate going to the laundromat. If you're in a laundromat, your one mission is to get your clothes done as soon as possible so you can get out of there as soon as possible, other laundry patrons be damned! This cranky, self-preserving attitude can turn even the sweetest people into ruthless cart-grabbers. Because of my laundromat aversion, I procrastinate doing my laundry for as long as I still have a pair of clean underwear, and because I procrastinate, I can't bring myself to stick to the same day and time to go to the laundromat. Thus, I can never tell if it's going to be crowded or not. Last night, as I looked in my drawer to find nothing but the absolute last resort pair of holey underoos, I figured it would be a good idea to go to the laundromat first thing in the morning, to get it out of the way. Good idea, right?

Wrong. Apparently, every stay-at-home mom and elderly person in the neighborhood had the same idea. I managed to find the one washing machine that didn't have clothes in it, load it up as quickly as I could, and make a break for the exit. There was no way I could stay in there today, not without a nice, strong cup of coffee.

Now, they say that the first telltale sign of a neighborhood becoming gentrified is that banks will start springing up all over the place. I say that the telltale sign that your neighborhood is finished becoming gentrified is that overpriced coffee shops start springing up all over the place. It's completely logical, when you think about it. When a previously questionable neighborhood becomes safer to live in, the middle class starts moving in before the rent gets too high. Among this middle class, you'll surely find young, white people with no children who are just beginning their careers. (Read: hipsters.) And what do these people want more than anything, but a place where they can plug in their MacBooks, sip a latte, and talk about organic produce for hours on end. (Husband-elect Willie and I fear more than anything else that we might be clinging to our last vestiges of sanity before we finally turn into these people.) In the past year or so that we've lived in our little area bordering Prospect and Crown Heights, FOUR new coffee shops have opened up between the farther grocery store on Park and Washington and the Franklin Avenue subway stop. In the past week that my french press has been broken, I've visited three of these coffee shops, and I will share the experience with you (quickly, though, because I'm already starting to feel a panicked guilt about not working).

1. The Glass Shop, Classon Ave between St. John's and Sterling
Pros: ample outdoor space with a garden in the back and a few tables out front; simple syrup used to sweeten coffee is made from raw sugar which gives it a nice flavor; closest to apartment
Cons: doesn't open until 8; I have to look at ugly outfits and bad haircuts
This is probably the most pretentiously trendy of the three places I visited. If you want to get anything other than coffee or tea, your options are some sort of exotic soda, hard boiled eggs, an inadequate assortment of pastries and muffins which is usually gone by the end of the day, and a sardine sandwich. The decor is minimal with a sort of industrial vibe. The iced coffee was good, especially with the raw syrup, and cost $2.50.

2. Breukelen Coffee House, Franklin Ave between St. John's and Lincoln
Pros: friendly staff
Cons: poor layout
This was the most forgettable of the three places. Although the woman behind the counter was very nice, all I can really remember is that the iced coffee was mediocre (also $2.50) and that there's an awkwardly placed step up to get into the joint. I stubbed my toe on said step on the way in, somehow still managed to forget it was there on the way out, causing me to almost fall down.

3. The Pulp and the Bean, Franklin Ave between Lincoln and Eastern Pkwy
Pros: strong coffee, good food selection, good mix of customers
Cons: slow moving when it's crowded, not a lot of space, you don't add the milk and sugar yourself
P&B attracts the longtime residents of the neighborhood as well as the aforementioned hipsters, although with all of hummus and greek yogurt in their refrigerated case, it seems like it caters more to the latter. You can also get a nice assortment of bagels and pastries if you're hungry. I honestly don't know how much the iced coffee was, because I was tempted by a cranberry scone and a cheese danish which I brought home to share with H-e. Altogether, my order was $7.75 for the three items. I was initially worried about the quality of the iced coffee because it's not a do-it-yourself kind of place, but my barista followed my instructions perfectly. This is my favorite place of the three and since it's right near the Franklin Avenue subway station, it'll be a frequent stop for me, at least until we get a new coffee maker.

In conclusion, while I will probably continue to visit The Glass Shop and The Pulp and the Bean from time to time, I definitely prefer getting my coffee to go than sticking around any of these places. I also desperately miss being able to make my own coffee, because if I had been able to do so, I wouldn't have been late coming back to the laundromat to switch my clothes to the dryer, meeting annoyed stares by the other patrons. Luckily the owners of the laundromat have my back!

Review #23: a somewhat truncated account of CSA week 3

2010-07-01T08:52:00.001-07:00

The very day we received our vegetables for Week 3 marked the day I started my job with NYCTF, and for the duration of the week, I was working two jobs. Not only was I extremely busy, but we continued to have difficulties with our fridge's sub-zero temperatures. Most of our stuff from Week 3 had to be thrown out from being frozen, which made me sad. After an experiment (in which I attempted to figure out if the thermostat itself was shot by turning up the level to between "medium" and "maximum" and was met with the result of EVERYTHING becoming frozen), we decided that the best course of action was to shuffle the placement of the contents of our fridge. For some reason, the closer an item was to the bottom of the fridge (aka the precise location of the vegetable drawer), the more likely it was to freeze. So our vegetable drawer now contains all of the stuff we use the least, has less of a likelihood of freezing, or will suffer the least from being frozen (i.e. parmesan cheese, steak sauce, etc), and the fresh veggies are in a bag on the top shelf. So far, this has been working out great.

So anyway, let's get to the important stuff: the food! Willie worked the late shift at Week 3's distribution, which meant he was able to obtain some extra stuff that got left over at the end of the night. We got:
1 Head of Deep Red Leaf Lettuce
1 bunch of Hakurei White Salad Turnips
1 Head Green Iceberg Lettuce (ruined by fridge)
2 pieces Baby Bok Choy (ruined by fridge)
Rhubarb!!
1 bulb of kohlrabi (ruined by fridge)
2 cucumbers
mixed colored beets
more squash blossoms

We were also supposed to get garlic scapes, which I was excited about, but apparently some people took more than their fair share, because there weren't any left for Willie at the end of the distribution. Greedy hipsters. We did end up with more than our fair share though, so I guess I shouldn't complain.

On Tuesday night, Willie made a salad that contained the red leaf lettuce (which was pretty bitter, not our favorite), the cucumber, and the white salad turnips. Here's what the turnips look like (photo not mine):

They were really tasty! I've only ever had turnips in the ever-present "Roast Root Vegetable Medley" in the Smith dining halls, so these were a new revelation for me. They were crisp and sweet and made for great variety in the salad, but if there were any left over, I'd have probably eaten them plain!

On Wednesday, Willie improved on his squash blossom recipe by substituting the red wine in the batter for some balsamic vinegar and water (we were out of wine) and by adding bacon to the filling (everything is better with bacon). I still can't believe that restaurants can charge $10 for these, but I like them.

Willie was definitely the star chef this week, and the highlight of the week was his strawberry rhubarb pie! I'm sure you all saw that coming from a mile away. I mean, what else is there to do when life hands you rhubarb, other than this:

It was so good that we forgot to take a picture before we began to devour it.

That was pretty much it for the week, due to the freezing. I was disappointed about the loss of the rest of the produce, but the pie was good enough to make me forget about it. I've come to terms with the increase of salads in my life, even though they might not make for the most interesting blog entries, but I will continue to strive to use my CSA veggies in interesting ways.

Review #22: CSA Week 2!

2010-06-21T16:32:00.000-07:00

Well, if there's one thing I can look forward to on a Monday, it's the end of the CSA week, which means I get to talk about the food I ate this week. Did I mention I like food? I might have. ^___^

This week, our share contained an unexpected item to go with what seemed like another lettuce-fest. We got:-8 oz. Sugar Snap Peas
-1 Head of Green Romaine Lettuce
-1 Head Green Boston Lettuce
-1 Head of Bok Choy
-1/2 lb. Asparagus

and

3 pieces of Squash Blossoms!?
Apparently, these flowers are a rare treat, and when stuffed, battered, and fried, can go for $10 as an appetizer at a high-end restaurant. ...yay? Well, we were about to find out.
But first came Tuesday night. Without a lot of time to shop and prepare, we still managed to throw together a yummy steak salad with gorgonzola cheese, red onion, grape tomatoes, and the green Boston lettuce.
I actually really liked this type of lettuce. It wasn't as crunchy and didn't have that crispiness-yet-juiciness that romaine or iceberg lettuce has. I guess it was more like a mild-tasting leafy green than a lettuce. Not being the biggest lettuce fan in the world, it suits me pretty well.

On Wednesday, I put Willie in charge of the squash blossoms. He stuffed them with some cream cheese and garlic with a mix of spices, then at the advice of Farmer Fred, fried them in a batter of equal parts flour and red wine. This is what they looked like in the pan:
And this is what they looked like all plated up nice:
They were pretty tasty! The blossoms themselves sort of tasted like you would think zucchini might taste like if it were a flower. When stuffed with the cheese all nicely, they tasted like high end jalapeno poppers (only not spicy). We had them as an appetizer to this recipe, one of our favorite ways to make chicken.

On Thursday, we used the bulk of our haul in one tasty if not cliché dish: stir fry. Here it is in the skillet:
In it, you'll see half of the bok choy and all of the snap peas. We served it with sticky rice and some meatballs that I made from leftover gyoza filling that I had been saving in the freezer for just such an occasion.
Ah yes, and now I'm always thinking of new ways to use up some lettuce. That's a piece of the romaine right there! Lettuce is also good to use as a divider or to add visual interest in a bento. I put a piece in Willie's lunch on Friday.

On Saturday, we awoke to find that our refrigerator was up to its old shenanigans of freezing choice items. This annoys me to no end, because I've already turned the power down almost to "minimum." I can't make it any less cold! It also annoys me when the food that gets frozen is ruined by the freezing process. Many edible items will remain just as edible when frozen and thawed: Strawberries. Grapes. Water. Lasagna. Unfortunately, the freezing process is not so kind to other foods, namely, lettuce. When I unwrapped the romaine, I was dismayed to find that it was half frozen. I salvaged what was left to make a salad for lunch but I had to throw a lot of it away. Boo!

On Sunday, we made a plain but delicious dinner of steak and potatoes with the asparagus from the CSA haul. Here it is:
The asparagus was really good.

Which finally brings us to today, Monday, when all we have left from the CSA box is the remaining half of the bok choy. And even though we're in the midst of 90-degree weather, I could think of no better use for it than ramen! It must be all time I spent looking at Greg's pictures from Japan. Actually, some people say that drinking hot tea (or perhaps eating hot soup?) makes you feel cooler. I'm not sure if it worked, but the air conditioner is definitely helping. Here's the soup:

And there you have it! Maybe next week I'll get the hang of making a more neat, concise post. Maybe there will be some more exciting new revelations. Or maybe there will be lots more lettuce. Only one way to find out!

Review #21: CSA Week 1

2010-06-15T14:20:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned in my update, William and I have joined a CSA and after weeks of hopeful anticipation, it was finally time to pick up our first batch of produce! To give you some background, we are part of Crown Heights CSA, where we have a partial share. Veggies are picked up in the neighborhood every Tuesday from now until November. More details are on the website, and if you're interested in joining a CSA, head on over to Just Food (if you're in NYC) or Local Harvest (if you're elsewhere) where you can find more information about Community Supported Agriculture in your area.

I should also say that the reason that we wanted to join the CSA is mainly because we are becoming more interested in where our food comes from and how we can use part of our very modest surplus of funds to eat more responsibly for ourselves, for the environment, and for local farms. I think I first became interested in eating responsibly in college, when, finding myself in a sea of liberal, over-educated, yet sheltered hipsters, I dabbled in vegetarianism and even thought about being vegan for a few hours. Each year I've learned a little more and been able to do a little bit more to support local, natural (I'm not going to say "organic") farmers. Willie recently finished reading "The Omnivore's Dilemma" as well as watching "Food, Inc.," so he's still not quite over the shock of learning exactly what goes into the process of bringing our food from the farm (or darkened, overcrowded, slaughterhouse) to the grocery store. I could write an entire entry about the value of eating locally and naturally, but my intention was to actually talk about the food from the CSA, so I'll get to it.

This past week's share surprised us, and unfortunately, not in the best way. We received:
-1 Head of "Red Oak" Lettuce
-1 Head of Green Romaine Lettuce
-1 Head "Red Boston" Lettuce (this was the only one that was actually red)
-1 small bunch of French Radishes
-2 Red Beets with greens attached
-8 oz. Sugar Snap Peas

Yes, that's a lot of lettuce.

I consider myself lucky to be in a household in which both members truly enjoy most types of food and are not afraid to try new things. Willie and I love our vegetables. We're just not really salad people. However, we're also people who hate wasting food, so we accepted the lettuce challenge. Want to know what we ate this week? Good! Because I'm going to tell you, and when I'm not too hungry to take out my camera, I'm going to show you. Allons-y.

On Tuesday, Willie made shrimp etouffée (not using CSA ingredients, but worth note because it was off the hook) with a salad which included the smallest head of lettuce as well as some of the radishes. The dinner was divine with the addition of Willie's famous homemade bread.

Since we had beets, Wednesday was devoted to an old favorite: beet soup. I made a "fancy" salad of pears, more lettuce, walnuts, and feta to go with it.

On Thursday, I made a taco salad which was both incredibly easy to make and incredibly satisfying. All I did was cook some ground turkey with bits of leftover onion and bell pepper and spices. When the mixture was done, I added a can of black beans, drained and rinsed. I put the meat over some lettuce along with some chopped tomatoes, avocado, salsa, cheese, and sour cream. I have a feeling that taco salad, with some varieties of course, is going to become a staple of our diet as long as we keep getting tons of lettuce. Given the popularity of "Taco Tuesdays" in the O-H household, I don't think Willie will mind.

Over the weekend, we were in Sayville, so we didn't use anything else, but in three days we had successfully gone through all but half a head of lettuce. We also had the snap peas and some radishes left over as well as the greens from the beets.

On Monday, Willie made this recipe to use the snap peas, which was essentially a sophisticated mac and cheese using gorgonzola. No complaints by me! He also ate the rest of the radishes for lunch, which was fine with me because I'm not the biggest radish fan.

So at the end of the week, I'm satisfied with the meals we were able to cook. We got to try some new things while also using some staples or variations of the familiar. We did have to throw out part of the last head of lettuce, which didn't last the weekend, but the beet greens are still looking fine, and we'll most likely cook them tomorrow. We've already gotten our haul for this next week, and I can already say that it's going to be interesting. Want to see us attempt to eat flowers? Tune in next week!

An Update

2010-06-10T15:29:00.000-07:00

It's been over a month since I last posted, and a lot has happened in that month, so it's high time for an update.

First off, I graduated from Pace! Of course, I'm still in negotiations over actually getting my diploma, but it was so nice to see all my NYCTF friends for the first time in more than a year, and I even enjoyed putting on the cap and gown. My parents came in and saw the apartment for the first time, so that was nice as well.

Next, I joined the curriculum planning team at my school, so basically, I'm working overtime. It means I'm busier, but the money will help...when it eventually gets here... Not much else to say about that.

I also got hired as a Fellow Adviser for the summer, which means I'll be leading workshops for new Teaching Fellows to help them get ready for entering the classroom in the fall. I'm really excited for the opportunity to work with adults, and I hope that it's something that I enjoy. Either way, it will look good on my resume. It's been making me think a lot about the future and what I want out of my career. I'm content where I am for now, but in two years...in five years...? It's nice to start thinking about the possibilities, but it's also kind of scary. Looking forward to the more immediate future of the summer job as well as dreams of the distant future have been dominating my thoughts lately. It's hard to find the motivation to stay in the present.

Another bit of news on the job front which most of you have heard is that Willie finally got his substitute license! Of course, we're very happy about that.

We also joined a CSA for the first time and got our first box of produce on Tuesday. I hope to chronicle the CSA experience each week in this blog. I still have to do my literary review, though. I really didn't want to neglect this blog, but times ahead will continue to be busy for a little while...in a good way, though.

Review #20: Aller-what?

2010-05-06T16:29:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned in my last post, I was sick with a bad cold for about a week in mid April. As long as I can remember, I've always been pretty susceptible to colds and sinus headaches, and I remember hating winter as a child because it seemed like I had a constant post-nasal drip from November to May. It never really occurred to me that I might have allergies because what I thought were the main culprits of allergies, dust and pollen, didn't seem like the reason why I was getting sick. BUT THEN: after this most recent nasty cold, I was lamenting to Willie that I rarely feel good when I wake up in the morning, even if I get plenty of sleep. I'm always feeling dehydrated or congested or exhausted. He suggested I take an "Aller-Clear," a generic drug that treats seasonal allergies. I decided to give it a try. I've taken one pill each night this week, before I go to sleep.

I'm still reluctant to accept that I have seasonal allergies, but these pills are doing something. I've woken up each morning this week feeling, if not bright and chipper, at least like I slept. I might have to clear out my nose once or twice or have a few sips of water, but there has been quite an improvement. Also, I think that if my theory is correct, I might be building up an tolerance to these new pills. "Aller-Clear," like Claritin or Zyrtec, is meant to work for 24 hours to relieve symptoms of seasonal allergies. On Monday and Tuesday, I felt pretty good all day. Yesterday and today, however, I started feeling congested a few hours before bed.

Is this just a big coincidence? Maybe. Am I slowly developing a dangerous addiction to allergy pills? Perhaps. But as long as I continue to feel good when I wake up, I'll buy it. Another score for Costco's cheap knockoffs.

Tomorrow's Friday, everybody!

Rough Afternoon

2010-04-28T14:43:00.000-07:00

I know it's been a while since I wrote a real review and it's even been a while since Willie and I updated our Disney song poll. Apologies. We were both sick with colds for essentially all of last week and are just starting to feel better. Unfortunately, I was only able to take one day off of work, and I really need a break. Yesterday was particularly rant-worthy, so allow me to indulge myself by sharing the afternoon's events with you:

One of my students has been testing out the theory that if she throws a screaming temper tantrum, maybe she won't have to sit in her chair and do work. Why she decided to pick April to try and test the limits is beyond me, since she had no problem up until this point. Behold one of the mysteries of autism. Anyway, as I'm sure you can guess, I'm not going to allow her to get out of doing work just because she cries. However, her tantrums have only gotten worse over the past two weeks to the point where she is now, in fact, shrieking as loud as she can whenever she is asked to sit in her chair, which is not only frustrating to me but to the other students as well. Thinking back to my grad school work, I know that any of my professors would say that when a student is testing you, he or she will take the behavior to the extreme before they eventually give up and comply with your demands. In other words, it will often get worse before it gets better. They would tell me to stay consistent. If I were still in grad school today, my comeback would be, "YOU try spending two hours listening to a screaming child. Then we'll see if YOU can be consistent." I'm trying the best that I can with her, but I'm afraid I may snap. Before you say anything, I've already had a meeting with her mother and talked to the counselor as well as seeking advice from my coworkers. So if I haven't been very present or very lively these past two weeks, now you know why.

To make matters worse, I couldn't even leave the drama as I left the building yesterday afternoon, because no sooner did I step outside then I walked into the middle of a fight between two of the older kids from upstairs. Picture this: Student 1 is running across the street with a bloody nose. He then jumps a fence into the yard of one of the brownstones near the school, grabs a two-by-four that just happened to be lying around, and hops back over the fence in an attempt to chase down Student 2. Adults all around are running after him, yelling, calling other people to come out and help. Two of them manage to intercept the fighters. One is restraining Student 2 on the sidewalk. The other has managed to get hold of the wooden plank and starts pushing Student 1 back towards the building, but she is clearly past her breaking point and is screaming at Student 1, brandishing the plank in the air. Student 3, who up until this point is watching the scenario unfold right next to me, decides to pick up a grapefruit-sized rock from the dirt and threaten to throw it at somebody. After a failed attempt to convince him to put it down, I figured the only thing I could do was to try and persuade some of the bystanders to either go back into the school building or go home, that it wasn't worth it to get involved in the fight. Of course, none of them listened to me, or even acknowledged I was there, save one "F--- you!" Luckily, this is when the security guards come out and manage to diffuse the situation quickly.

I have never seen anything like this in my life. These are middle school students. They're the same age as my little brother. I don't care if they're diagnosed with EBD ("Emotional Behavioral Disability," which, in my opinion, is another can of worms on its own)-- THIS SHOULD NOT HAPPEN. Period. I was horrified to learn today that the students were actually planning to jump Student 1 after school to the point where several adults knew about it. So why was it allowed to happen? The unfortunate fact of the matter is that there are no consequences for these kids. I wouldn't be surprised at all if the bozos involved in the fight showed up in school today like nothing was wrong. Our school doesn't hold students for detention after school, and suspensions are extremely rare. But why? Why are we allowing our students to run wild?

I suspect that there are several contributing factors. First, under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, a student cannot be suspended for actions that can be attributed to their disability. This makes it difficult to administer consequences consistently when you have parents (or whoever) complaining that so-and-so is an angel at home and anything he does in school must be because the staff isn't effectively dealing with his disability. Second, we are sadly living in a society where test scores reign supreme. NY State ELA tests happen to be this week. We want our students to do well on these tests. Maybe if we act like nothing is wrong, they'll all get 3's and 4's. In that same vein, each incident that occurs at our school brings us one step closer to the "dangerous schools" list, which no school wants to be on. Sadly, incidents like this get covered up all the time to keep up the false yet oh-so-valuable appearance of order. Finally, to play devil's advocate for the teachers who knew something might go down, who wants to put themselves in the middle of something like that? We as teachers are not given training to physically restrain kids, and any physical contact with students is frowned upon. If we get hurt trying to break up a fight, our insurance won't cover it because in their opinion, we shouldn't have intervened physically. If someone had gotten hurt yesterday even without physically intervening, the insurance still wouldn't cover it because it happened after school hours.

I'm not blaming any one individual here, but there are clearly some flaws in the system. Something needs to change, and that's a belief I have no problem publishing on the internet.

To find the one bright side in this awful day, I think that maybe God was trying to show me that no matter how bad things might get in my classroom, I should still appreciate what I have. I love my students, and I am confident that I can put an end to the tantrums, even if it takes some trial and error. If I had to deal with cursing and fights every day, I might not be so confident. The teachers upstairs, to me, are truly heroes.

Round 2 of The Disney Bracket Challenge

2010-04-13T17:09:00.000-07:00

Sorry I forgot to link to the Fourth bracket, but that's over now, and we're on to bigger and better things: Round 2! The...um..."Thrilling Thirty-Two"? So yeah, help us narrow it down to "Sweet Sixteen"!

http://billchas.blogspot.com

Disney Bracket #3

2010-04-04T19:58:00.000-07:00

Vote vote vote and vote some more! Next up are songs from the live action Disney films!

Also, I messed with the blog design. As much as I love pink, I think it's an improvement.

Disney Bracket #2

2010-03-31T18:36:00.001-07:00

Maybe you voted in our Disney song poll and are DYING to know the results? Maybe you didn't see your favorite song in our first bracket and want to know if it will be in the second? Maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about?

Either way, head to http://billchas.blogspot.com/ and join in the fun!

A Delightful Diversion

2010-03-27T20:47:00.000-07:00

This morning I discovered a shocking truth: I don't have a favorite Disney song! Luckily, my initial horror turned into inspiration for a March Madness-esque bracket extravaganza to find the BEST DISNEY SONG EVAR! For the next few weeks, I'll be helping Willie with the contest on his blog, so if you love the magic and music of Disney, go check it out and share your votes!

http://billchas.blogspot.com

Still not a review...

2010-03-25T12:49:00.000-07:00

...I'm working on it, but I got distracted with applying for a summer "Field Visitor" position for the Fellows in which I had to submit two writing samples of roughly 500 words each. Believe it or not, that took a lot out of me! But I am working on the book review, I just have to finish reading the book...heh.

I felt guilty not posting anything in the interim, so here I am stopping in briefly to share my two favorite TV commercials at the moment. This week has been pretty rough at work, but luckily there are always a few go-to videos on youtube that cheer me up. These two commercials fit the bill. The first (one of the only good commercials from the Super Bowl, in my opinion) makes me smile...

...particularly when they roll into Vegas.

This commercial has been around for so long that they eventually replaced it with another, and now both permutations are pretty much gone from the air, but I still love it:

The tugboat gets me every time!

What are your favorite online videos (ones you never get tired of)? Do you have any standbys that make you feel happier if you're in a bad mood?

Back Story: A Precursor to Review #19

2010-03-14T13:18:00.000-07:00

This blog post is dedicated to all the other blog authors out there. Whether you are sharing your artistic talents, a personal journey, or an academic endeavor, you are courageous and inspiring! I admire you all.

A large part of the reason I started this blog was to improve my writing skills. I used to love to write when I was in high school, a love which was transformed in college into a love of translation, of trying to make my thoughts sound just as good in a second language as they did in English. In college, I had lofty dreams of translating novels (greatly influenced by one of my professors, who introduced me to the nuances of the French translation of Harry Potter), or translating movie subtitles (which came from watching a great deal of American movies while I was in France with very mediocre, roughly-translated subtitles). Even though my skills in French have faded over time, translation is still a dream career of mine.

However, reality doesn't always open the doors we'd prefer to go through, and I found myself inevitably pulled into the teaching profession. And though I am growing to love teaching and will never regret choosing this path, I still feel like I want something more. Teaching monopolizes my time and energy, and sometimes it seems like there's nothing left over for my own life. Of course that's melodramatic and untrue, but it's still easier to come home and loaf around for the remainder of the day than to muster up energy to do other things. Still, I know that doing just that will help me become a happier person in and out of the classroom. Last year, I mastered the art of time management, or the ability to get everything for work done during the day, freeing up time I used to spend working late. This year, the challenge is to actually do things with that extra time. My hypothesis is that blogging will help me tap into my creative energy while rekindling a love of language and writing.

This all sounds pretty rad, I'm sure, but it's easier said than done. Why? For one, it can be hard to find a topic to write about. I didn't want to write a blog that was exclusively about one thing (like food), but I might have chosen something too broad. I'm not sure. It's still taking shape. The other, more discouraging roadblock is all in my head: fear of inadequacy. As I said before, I used to love to write when I was in high school. Well, it helped that in high school I was always told that I was a good writer. Now that I'm out of practice and outside the small pond of my high school to the biggest pond there is (teh interwebs), I'm afraid that I won't be able to write as well as I once thought I could.

I'm not fishing for compliments. I'm just trying to get over my silly insecurities, and in order to do so, I'm going to borrow a strategy my friend used before committing to run her first 5K: declare it on the internet. That way, you can't back out. My internet promise is that my next post will be a book review, something I haven't done since high school, something that probably scares me as much as running that 5K scared my friend. I'm going to write a book review, and it might not be the best book review ever, but gosh darn it, it will be a start. Or it might just be a continuation of a sparse, uninteresting blog...but you never know until you try.

B.O.M.B. Entry #1 for March

2010-03-10T16:27:00.000-08:00

Prepare ye for another bento post!

Debra, the lunch-crafting extraordinaire of Hapa Bento, holds a monthly contest called the B.O.M.B., or "Best Of the Month Bento." Contestants must post a bento that fits into a theme that she chooses each month. The winner is selected randomly, and gets a nifty "badge" to put on their blog. I wasn't quite up to the challenge in January or February, but now I'm finally ready to throw my hat in the ring with this guy here:

The theme for March is to use only "green," (non-artificial, edible) items as baran, or dividers between different foods. My bento contains leftover pork with salsa and cheese in a tortilla, and some raw vegetables for salad. The tortilla acts as a baran separating its contents from the baby carrots next to it and the spinach underneath. There are also cucumber slices which I used as an edible container for salad dressing. (I may have "borrowed" that idea from somewhere, haha). The bento is held in a recycled Chinese takeout container.

Anyway, I was really proud of this bento because it was completely last-minute. My pride lasted until, after photographing it, I put the lid on and it seemed a little bare. I wondered if it would be enough to tide me over until dinner, even with the yogurt which can be seen in the background. So, after I took the picture I crammed some sliced mushrooms in between the carrots and the cucumbers. By then, I was definitely running late for work, so I didn't take another picture, but all in all I don't think it's bad for a rush job. You can enter the contest as many times as you want, so hopefully I'll be able to use some of my new bento gear to make my next entry even better.

Review #18: Walk Me Through it?

2010-03-06T06:32:00.000-08:00

Wait, it's March already? What happened to February? Instead of the usual winter doldrums, February really did feel like the shortest month of the year. First, a few days after I wrote my last post, my computer decided not to start up any more. I made some efforts to call around trying to diagnose the issue and get estimates on how much it might cost to fix it, but it was only a few days before the February vacation from school, so I just left it to deal with when I got back. The vacation was nice and gave me an opportunity to relax and clear my head of everything that usually stresses me out. I need to allow myself to do that more often. When I got back, I tried tinkering with the Windows recovery console for a while before I realized there wasn't anything I could do, so I gave it to my friend who aptly declared, "Windows is borked." Luckily, I have a few computer geniuses in my group of friends, who worked very hard to save my files and probably get the computer up and running again (for which I must remember to thank them with baked goods), but I did decide in this whole ordeal that it was high time for a new laptop. The old one was five years old, probably set my parents back more than a grand at the time, and had one-twelfth of the capabilities as what's out there today. My new computer is hardly top of the line, but it works extremely well, was a good price, and I love it already. It's amazing how far we've come in only five years!

But before the computer fiasco occurred, I decided to play Final Fantasy VI, a favorite video game from my high school days. Many of you are familiar with the Final Fantasy games and know that playing through any one of them is a marathon, taking days to complete. (I can't look it up as my old computer is dead, but I believe it took me roughly 50 hours to complete the game from start to finish this time around.) I've played FFVI several times to completion, mostly on my own merit but with occasional hints and help from my brothers and friends, but this time, I wanted to play the perfect game. It was time to do something I've never done before, something I'm slightly embarrassed to admit. It was time to use a walkthrough.

Video game walkthroughs, guides, or FAQ's became popular when people realized that they could use the internet for literally, anything, from sharing information ("If you use sword x on enemy y, you'll beat it in half the time") to downloading games from old systems to be played on their PC. There's a wealth of knowledge out there from sweaty teenagers spending years in their parents' basements, and we can all reap the benefits. Still, there's some stigma about using a walkthrough for gamers such as myself who grew up without the internet until high school. Yes, folks, when I was growing up, this was literally what we called a computer:

I had one of those at home. And if you think that's scary, wait until you see what I used to type my papers:

Ok, maybe not this exact model, but I honestly used a typewriter that was probably from the 70's.

What I'm getting at here, is that in the olden days of video games, in the days of Atari and Game Gear, we had to rely on our own cunning to beat a game. With no internet to show us the way, we had to take hints from watching friends play, or just muddling through on our own. Nowadays, it seems like kids use cheats or FAQ's on everything. What, I wondered, was the appeal of playing a game when you knew you weren't actually the one doing the work?

For me, the walkthrough served two purposes. First, although I had enjoyed playing FFVI in the past, it's such a complex game that I knew there were things I had missed along the way, or items I had acquired that I didn't understand. A walkthrough might help me enjoy the game to its fullest. Second, when I decided to play the game again, I really just wanted to do it for the story. I hadn't played it in a while, and I wanted to remember the details of what was one of the first and still the finest video game plots of all time.

At this time, I feel obligated to warn that what follows contains hints that I learned and minor spoilers, so if that bothers you, feel free to skip to the end, although I didn't include anything major that would impede enjoyment of the game if you were to read it.

The walkthrough did not disappoint. It helped me beat the game quickly and efficiently by giving me tools I had missed previously, such as the Tintinabar relic, which when equipped to one of your characters restores health just by walking around. It showed me some fun shortcuts, like how you can use a Phoenix Down to defeat the Doom Train in one shot. All of the bosses were easy, instead of taking several attempts to defeat, and when I needed to level up or learn a magic spell quickly, the guide showed me the places that have the best enemies. Even the fight with Kefka seemed like it was over too quickly. (Not in a bad way, though).

The best thing about the guide, however, was learning little snippets of trivia along the way. I apologize to those of you who are not familiar with the game or the character "Gogo," as the following will not make much sense, but it really made me laugh when I read it. My favorite bits are taken out of the walkthrough I linked to above:

" Because of the mysterious nature of Gogo, many people have taken to
conjuring up one speculatory "theory" after another...
The more recent (and even more popular) theory is that Gogo is Adlai
Stevenson, a long deceased politician. Before you burst out laughing,
read this piece (from a post on the GameFAQs Final Fantasy III Message
Board [I do not know who originally posted this information, though]):
'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
I have tried, over the months, to convince you people to stop arguing
over who gogo is accept the fact that he is Adlai Stevenson, former
governor of Illinois and failed Democratic presidential candidate in
1952 and 1956.

Here is ALL the proof, and if you need more, you're sick.

Quote #1
I am always amazed by the resistance offered to progress, even the most
inocous progress. Imagine, if you will, jumping from one rickety bridge
to another, with blind men running back and forth trying to push you
off, and you will have some idea what legislating progress is like. The
good news is that if you're pushed off, you can always climb back up
and try again.
- from his book ''What I Think''

Quote #2
I suppose I could wear a hat, but them my teeth would fall out to spite
me. I could get false ones, but doubtless then I would get fat just to
prove my teeth work. The easiest course is to drape my whole body in
robes and shawls and hope no one recognizes my eyes.
- Commenting about his baldness to an NBC reporter in 1952

Quote #3
President Eisenhower continues to amaze me. He appears to be an
ungainly and graceless man, but when [senator Robert] Taft makes a
move, no matter how ridiculous, Eisenhower copies it with the skill of
[French mime] Marcel Merceau. I haven't achieved such levels of mimicry
with my own party, but I'm working on it.
- 1952 interview

Quote #4
The legislature is a frightening thing. To this day the state capitol
building seems to me a beast ready to swallow me up; the very walls and
cielings seem to crush you as you walk through it.
- from his book ''Friends and Enemies''

Quote #5
Today we are plunged into a battle that is familiar to us. the enemies
and the problems are the same. But the terrain is different. The world
around us has changed and shifted so much we no longer recognize it.
- Giving a speech at Charlottesville, 1960

Experience Egg
Stevenson's ex-wife once wrote a book about him called The Egghead and
I. In 1952, one of his campaign slogans was "Stevenson - The
Experienced Candidate."

When you first meet Gogo, he says "I have been idle for too long."
Possibly referring to the fact that Stevenson had been dead for 30
years when Final Fantasy VI came out.

A number of years ago a bill was passed regarding the transfer of funds
among government-owned, government-operated (GOGO) laboratories. What
was the name of this bill? The STEVENSON-Wydler Act, of course.
'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''

If you've stopped reading by now, that's okay, but I'm almost done, I swear. The rest of this is short and spoiler-free.

Ultimately, I'm glad I used the walkthrough. I think that in my youth I had more of a tolerance for failing and retrying parts of games over and over again, while in my adulthood, I'd rather just get to the point. Also, I think that certain video games are meant to be a triumph of your own will and skill, whereas others are now made for the storyline and the hidden "Easter eggs." Finally, since I've beaten the game before in the past, I don't think that using the walkthrough detracts from my gamer cred.

So let's get really nerdy and discuss this! What do you think about walkthroughs? Do you love them? Do you hate them and now hate me because I used one? Are you confused by this whole entry and are headed to Facebook to delete me from your friends page as we speak?

Review #17: Getting Older

2010-02-03T09:00:00.000-08:00

It's my birthday, it's my birthday! Another year older, another year...however that goes.

What changes when you get older? Birthdays are the perfect time to ponder such things. For now, I feel good about getting older. I'm still young, and every year that passes feels like another year that brings me closer to my goals. In my 24th year of life, I got my Master's Degree, which brings me closer to my career goals. I moved in with my boyfriend, which is a large step in the direction of hopefully starting a family someday soon. I forged stronger bonds with old and new friends. I got a new hobby (bento). I tried something that scared me (skiing), and had a lot of fun!

And yet, I still feel like I'm getting old. Since I love Top Ten lists so much, let me count the ways:
1. My idea of a great "night out" involves going to happy hour, coming home, and being in bed by 10.
2. Whenever I buy new clothes, I ask myself, "Could I wear this to work?"
3. When's the last time I went to a club? I seriously can't remember.
4. I stole this from a list of Random Thoughts from 20-30 Year olds, but it rings true: "I can't remember the last time I wasn't at least kind of tired."
5. I can't think of anything I want for my birthday that isn't money, a household appliance, or pajamas.
6. I watch Jeopardy almost every night.
7. I take cabs more often, instead of saving my money and braving a long train ride.
8. I got upset when my little brother didn't know what "Rocky and Bullwinkle" was.
9. I'm constantly "losing" my keys, only to find them in plain sight.
10. Some guys came into work the other day to talk about retirement plans, and I was at the front of the line to speak to them.

I may be an oldster at heart, but I embrace it. I also wonder what I'll think of this list in ten years. What will "getting older" mean to me when I'm 35?

Review #16: Fun with new bento gear!

2010-01-21T16:38:00.000-08:00

As a follow-up to the bento contest in which a bunch of you kindly voted, I'd like to share with you a review of my new bento supplies and some of my creations. I've been able to pack two or three bentos each week, thanks to a new strategy of making larger quantities of food for dinner, then packing a portion into the bento before I even eat dinner. Unfortunately, not all of these bentos have been photo-worthy, but I managed to turn out a few good ones.

This was my first attempt at onigiri, a rice ball that can be shaped, filled, and/or decorated to your liking. I made one plain one (the one with the crudely-fashioned "face" decoration) and one filled with furikake, a seasoning that comes in many different varieties. This one contained mainly kimchi, seaweed, and sesame seeds, and it was pretty tasty, but you can't see it, because it's inside! Also featured in this bento are salmon, carrot sticks, and a few kale leaves. I like the red box, but it's similar in proportions to my owl box, and I'm more partial to the oval shape and the pretty, dark brown color. It's always nice having a change, though! It was getting sort of boring taking pictures of the same box every day. Which brings us to the exciting part:

This is the coveted four-compartment box, in which I've arranged many of the products of a trip to Chinatown: Another onigiri! (You can see the furikake on the outside of this one). Gyoza! (Made with ground turkey for a low-fat yet scrumptious alternative). Orange chicken with sesame seeds! (This was a Weight Watchers recipe. It was...not really worth sharing). Fruit! (Well, that came from the Key Food down the block). I think this is the nicest-looking bento I've ever made, which might not be saying a lot, since I've only made about 15 of them, but I was proud. I am in love with this box! It makes me feel like a pro. I also like that I can take out each container individually and snack on my fruit or other items. The only downsides of this box are having to wash all those compartments and its large, square size, which does not fit neatly and flatly into my bag like the smaller ones do. But I was careful when I brought it to work, so there was no leakage.

I haven't used the skewers or the heart-shaped punch yet, although I'm excited to eventually do so. The final piece of the bento bounty has me stuck for now:

I'm not sure I could make anything look pretty in the large compartment. It's meant to hold onigiri, but as I learned in my red bento, even two is A LOT of rice! Furthermore, the bottom section is tiny, so I'm not sure what I'd put in there either. Well, maybe one day I'll figure it out. If I do, I'll be sure to share the results!

P.S. Hapabento is having another bento box giveaway contest, so if you're interested, go check it out! This one is randomly chosen though, otherwise I'd be more than happy to support you with my vote! Oh, and the mystery "Frank Sinatra" voter ended up being my dad. Gotta love the man. :)

Review #15: New Year's Resolutions (not quite ready to tackle SAILSH yet)

2010-01-18T06:05:00.000-08:00

Hello, everyone. I know it's been a while since last we spoke and I apologize. I got into somewhat of a funk after returning from such a fun holiday where I spent a lot of time with my family and friends, and went skiing for the first time! When the weather is deathly cold, the end of the marking period and its deadlines are drawing near, and your students are getting sick, it's even harder than usual to go back to work. I've been feeling lethargic, apathetic, and none too clever these past few weeks. I needed something to jolt me out of my bad mood, and it finally happened on Saturday night, the details of which will come in a further review. But as blogging about Saturday night will undoubtedly be a challenge, albeit a delightful one, I'm choosing instead to ease back into the habit of blogging with a post about New Year's Resolutions.

A while ago, I found out that yesterday, January 17, 2010 is "National Ditch Your New Year's Resolution Day." The invention of such a day made me smile as I remembered my frustration in January 2009 as I struggled to find a machine at the gym (that I had been going to at least twice a week since October) among all the unfamiliar faces with new bike shorts and T-Shirts unstained by sweat. These were the people that joined the gym as a New Year's Resolution, and they were crowding my space! Of course, it really only lasted about a month or two. I remember coming back from my February vacation and finding things at the gym back to normal. I groaned as I thought of all that wasted money on a year-long membership and new gym clothes that would for the next ten months, remain unused.

But then I thought, Does anyone actually stick to their New Year's Resolutions for an entire year? Do people even make them anymore? I don't think any of my family members or friends have shared even one NYR with me, and I think that the reason is that people have just stopped making them. The prevailing attitude nowadays is an embracing of one's imperfections--if anything, we want to show the world that we don't have to change. Why should we? The other trend I've noticed is that the people who are making NYR's are making them fun and/or self-indulgent. I stumbled across one woman's weight-loss blog back in October or November in one of my many online searches for new and healthy recipes, and somehow got hooked into reading her blog. After a lengthy, bulleted list of NYR's such as going canoeing more and dressing nicer, she writes, "I just want to experience life to the fullest. You'll notice I didn't include losing weight. I figure that if I change my lifestyle, the weight will naturally come off as I get in shape. I don't want it to be the focus of my life."

...THEN WHY ARE YOU WRITING A WEIGHT-LOSS BLOG?

I understand the shift in attitude towards NYR's. In our society, people frequently get caught up in trying to work their way to the top in their careers, in striving for the "ideal" body (of course, "ideal" in this sense, is dictated by the media and Hollywood), or even in being "green." These goals can become obsessions. Many hold themselves up to impossible standards and many forget to take the time to appreciate themselves for who they are. In this case, I find it fitting to have a day to ditch your resolutions. But does that mean that we shouldn't set goals for ourselves, that we shouldn't strive to be better? As much as we need to love and respect ourselves, we also need time to reflect on anything that we might want to change. One of my past NYR's was to try to be more assertive with my coworkers and supervisors, and every time I've done so since then, I've felt like a more confident and capable person in the workplace. Self-examination is important, and setting realistic goals for yourself is a way to keep you motivated throughout your day. I think that the key is to keep your resolutions to things that you actually want to do. For all the weight-loss people out there, I know you want to lose weight, but do you really enjoy going to the gym? I thought not, or else I would have seen you there after February. A more appropriate goal would be to ride your bike or go for a walk a few times each week, if that's what you prefer. What it all boils down to, in my opinion, is that we need to have a balance between trying to better ourselves and loving ourselves and enjoying life. That's what NYR's are about for me.

So, a little late, here are my three New Year's Resolutions:
1. Read at least 10 books this year, preferably by at least 10 different authors (which will prevent me from reading 10 books by Neil Gaiman and calling it a day)
2. Eat more earlier in the day and less for dinner
3. Channel the energy I usually use to complain (about work) into doing something productive

Feel free to share your NYR's if you have any, whether they're being kept or being ditched, or your thoughts on NYR's in general.

Review #14: Best of 2009

2009-12-29T10:06:00.000-08:00

Inspired by my friend Laura, then re-inspired by happening to catch part of a Vh1 program this morning, I decided it was time for me to make a "Best of 2009" song list. Laura included 20 on hers, some of which I can't wait to download. Vh1's list had 40. Sadly, mine will only include 10, because I just haven't come across much new music this year, and I'm realizing that my tastes have been changing over the past two years as I lose the indie hookups of my college days and shed the skin of musical snobbery under which I dwelt for most of the decade. While Pandora has given me the vocabulary necessary to describe elements that I like in music (namely melodic lines, vocal harmony, and anything electric), it hasn't helped me narrow it down to a genre. The result is a somewhat eccentric, somewhat fluffy list of music that I liked this year.

10. The Fray - "You Found Me"
Can't...resist...powers...of the Fray...

9. They Might Be Giants - "Why Does the Sun Really Shine?"
Off their new children's album "Here Comes Science," we finally have a follow-up to the song I loved in my middle school years, "Why Does the Sun Shine," that exposes the TRUTH about what really goes on in the center of our solar system.

8. Keri Hilson/Kanye West/Ne-Yo - "Knock You Down"
This song is connected with the memory of driving to and from Montauk over the summer and having nothing to listen to but the radio. Have you listened to any Long Island-area radio stations lately? They have a playlist of about 10 songs that they repeat over and over and over again. While most of the popular songs of this past August quickly became offensive by the fourth or fifth time, especially to Le Boyfriend (I considered putting "Battlefield" on this list as a joke specifically for that reason), I kept enjoying "Knock You Down" for all of its catchy, upbeat goodness.

7. Muse - "Uprising"
I like when an old standby band of mine comes out with new music, and this song does not disappoint. It has enough of their trademark angst, while shifting to a tougher stance. Instead of you will be the death of me, this song proclaims we will be victorious! I can get behind that.

6. Royksopp - "The Girl and the Robot"
At last, the indie cred comes out! Royksopp is a Norwegian duo who work primarily with keyboards and synthesizers. "The Girl and the Robot" features the vocals of Sweedish pop singer Robyn.Remember Robyn? "Show Me Love"? 1997? Good times.

5. Owl City - "Fireflies"
I wish this guy's voice didn't sound so much like Ben Gibbard's, but since Death Cab is going in a direction I'm not particularly fond of and The Postal Service hasn't come out with any new music in years, I've decided to deal with it. The video for this song is a lot of fun, which helps its case.

4. Passion Pit - "The Reeling"
A few people have recommended Passion Pit to me this year as new music I'd like, and their album really is right up my alley, although I find a few of the songs, like "Sleepyhead," to be a little weird for my tastes. I'm always glad to find new music that isn't mainstream, though, not because I'm an elitist (or The Fray wouldn't have made the list), but because I actually might be able to afford to go to one of their shows.

3. Beyoncé - "Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)"
Imma let you finish, but Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time! Of all time! I might not get riled up enough about this song to storm a stage, but when all is said and done, this song really and truly does deserve a spot on any lady's Top 10 this year. This is another case where the video bumps the song up a few spots on the list--that dance is going to live on for years as an icon of this decade.

2. The Temper Trap - "Sweet Disposition"
If you missed the movie "500 Days of Summer," you weren't missing much. The movie was a pretty average romantic comedy, but as I was watching it I felt like they stole the soundtrack right off my iPod, with songs by Regina Spektor, Carla Bruni, The Smiths, and The Pixies. Of the few songs I didn't already know, "Sweet Disposition" by The Temper Trap, was the most wonderful revelation. It's mellow without being whiny or melancholy. If this song had come out 4 years ago, it would have fit right into my "Walking Around Paris at Night" playlist right in between Stars and The Magnetic Fields.

1. Lady Gaga - "Bad Romance" (but really everything she's ever done)
GA GA OH LA LA - You knew this was coming! I'm not going to go into how much I love Lady Gaga. She's super talented, does everything for herself, and is just the right amount of crazy. You may be wondering, however, why I chose "Bad Romance" as my number one song of 2009, when others have clearly chosen "Poker Face" as her defining single. "Bad Romance" was released late enough in the year for it to come up on next year's countdowns, and I'm sure it will. Still, I chose "Bad Romance" because I just like it the best out of all Gaga's songs so far, other than "Just Dance," which came out too early to make the 2009 cut. Plus, once again, the video put it over the top. Observe, then check out the rest of the list on grooveshark! Happy New Year!

Review #13: Kings Plaza

2009-12-24T07:21:00.000-08:00

As I may have mentioned earlier in this blog, I much prefer shopping on Long Island to shopping in the city. Even though stores out on the island get just as crowded and hectic this time of year, there's something comforting about being able to go to the mall and get all of your shopping done in one place. Indeed, what the city needs is a proper mall.

Luckily, I've found one. If any of you are familiar with Brooklyn or the area of it in which I've been living for the past year and a half, you know that the closest shopping conglomerate in the area is the Atlantic Center "mall," which includes such stores as DSW, Target, Old Navy, and Marshall's, making it somewhat of a desirable locale for shopping, without it being an actual mall. Call me a spoiled Long Island girl, but just because you have a Victoria's Secret, doesn't mean you can start comparing yourself to Roosevelt Field. No, sir. Furthermore, the condition of the stores in Atlantic Center is deplorable. The lines in Marshall's and Target are always held up by someone arguing over price differences of mere dimes, while the Old Navy looks like a tornado hit, and you're lucky if you can find anything in a size smaller than XXL. When I struck out on several Christmas shopping attempts at Atlantic Center, I decided to give Kings Plaza a try, hoping to do better, but not expecting much difference.

Imagine my relief when I stepped into Kings Plaza and was met with shiny white floors, escalators to multi-level shops, and directory signs pointing the way to the food court and the Sears. This is a mall by any suburban standards. I got everything done that I needed to do in less than two hours, even hitting up the Toys R Us for presents for my kids so that I wouldn't have to make an extra trip out to Amazing Savings. After I was done, I had to restrain myself from visiting the H&M and the Forever 21 to do some unnecessary shopping for myself. I probably looked like a child on Christmas morning, with an awed smile on my face as I entered the pristine Old Navy with its folded sweaters and two-person-length register line and wondered why I hadn't come to this place earlier. Wait. Why hadn't I come to this place earlier?

Once again, if you're familiar with Brooklyn or the area of it in which I've been living for the past year and a half, you know that Kings Plaza located in one of those parts of Brooklyn that you just don't want to go to. It's far away, no trains service the area, and it's in an unfamiliar neighborhood (which automatically makes me suspicious of how safe it actually is). If you don't have a car or the roughly $20 a cab ride there would cost, your one option to get to Kings Plaza is the bus, and mark my words, it will be a long bus ride, crowded with loud teenagers and mothers with strollers. There isn't even much to look at out the window as the bus slowly makes its way down Utica Avenue, though I was amused by the sprawling "Utica Buffet," whose palatial exterior filled me with nostalgia of the many trips of my youth to the Chinese buffet for minor celebrations like eighth grade graduations or field hockey awards. But if you don't mind the bus, it's not a terrible option, as the mall is serviced by several bus lines that run surprisingly frequently. Having just missed a bus from work going towards the mall, I was annoyed until I looked up and saw that another one was only a few blocks away.

All in all, I'm glad I finally discovered Kings Plaza, but I probably won't go back there frequently, unless by some weird circumstance a car happens to fall into my lap. I was lucky that I was in a good mood on the day that I went and that I wasn't exhausted after work like I usually am. I would definitely have to be in a good mood to endure the bus ride there in the future. However, I can see myself going back there occasionally when I'm in the need of some good ol' fashioned mall shopping but can't make it out to Long Island. Maybe I'll even stop at the buffet for dinner on the way home.

I hope everyone else got their Christmas shopping done with as few headaches as possible, and that you all have a wonderful, safe, and healthy holiday week!

Review #12: Age-appropriate Celebrity Crushes

2009-12-13T17:43:00.000-08:00

Although I only have eyes for one man, my subconscious still finds ways of reminding me that there are still other attractive men in the world, and the other day I awoke from a dream about a celebrity. There's nothing wrong with that, right? The only problem is that I was dreaming about Alec Baldwin. Yes, Alec Baldwin, born just one year after my parents. Without any disrespect to a man who is very talented, was very attractive in his heyday, and is aging relatively gracefully, I can say that there are probably several more appropriate celebrities for me to be dreaming about.

In our twenties, thirties, and even later on, we women still find ourselves daydreaming that certain celebrities will somehow come sweep us off our feet and whisk us away into cushy lives of all play and no work. I know this from a conversation I had this past week with a few of my female coworkers, who happen to be in their thirties and forties. The topic of our conversation was the alleged rockiness between Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, and how all of us hoped that they would split up so that Brad Pitt would be on the market again.

For as long as I can remember, my celebrity crushes have been Brad Pitt and George Clooney, and not without reason. But while talking to my coworkers the other day, I realized that it's probably time to move on. George Clooney is now 48, and Brad Pitt is not far behind him at 45, and was recently seen looking like this:

Ew.

Clearly, it's time for a change. The unfortunate obstacle in choosing an appropriate candidate, however, is the way celebrities in their twenties and thirties are marketed. They're either making movies for teenagers, like 23-year-old Robert Pattinson of Twilight, or making really deplorably dumb comedies like I Love You, Man. Not that there's anyone remotely worthwhile in that movie. There is a dearth of eligible celebrity bachelors for the intelligent, self-respecting twenty-something, but I will try to wade through the mediocre to compile a short list of the top three age-appropriate men worthy of my affections, or at least the occasional dream.

3. Peyton Manning, age 33.

Yeah, those Manning brothers are pretty great. Peyton is having an awesome season, too, leading the Colts to an undefeated season, where they've already clinched the division. Three MVP awards and a Super Bowl win make Peyton Manning an obvious favorite on my list.

2. Justin Timberlake, age 28.

N*SYNC became popular just as I was at that impressionable middle school age, and although he faded from the scene for a while, he brought Sexy Back with his solo career. I can honestly say that FutureSex/LoveSounds is one of the best albums of the decade, with hit after hit after hit. It's a funny coincidence that Justin and Peyton are on those Sony commercials together...two attractive men, but neither of them are actors, which brings us to my number one celebrity crush, rekindled from my youth...

1. PACEY--Erm, Joshua Jackson, 31.

Since I don't watch Fringe, I forgot about Joshua Jackson for a while, but he's still out there keeping the career alive. Joshua first stole my heart as Charlie in The Mighty Ducks series. Then again, at that impressionable middle school age, he came back in Dawson's Creek, a show which, admittedly, I watched for quite a while. Since then, he's been in a plethora of TV shows and movies, and although he is a good seven years older than me, he's not married, although I think he's still dating Diane Kruger, who, sadly, is gorgeous.

Well, I finally think I can finally put Brad Pitt and George Clooney behind me. It's tough letting go, but I think I'll survive, and I urge my fellow young women to join me in the quest to support the talented and good-looking men of our generation (who don't make crappy vampire movies.) I welcome any suggestions of eligible celebrities to add to the short list. For now, it's time for bed!

I won!

2009-12-09T03:37:00.000-08:00

Thanks to everyone's votes, I won the bento contest! I can't believe how many people came out to vote, particularly Frank Sinatra (Who WAS that?). I love you all, and to show my love...

I made Will this bento on Monday, but the sentiment stretches to all my voters, and I will find a way to share my mini quiches with you all! (They're delicious, btw.)

Unfortunately, I can't stick around any longer, because I have to get ready for "OPERATION: SANTA CLAUS." Ask me about it next time you see me because it's sure to be an interesting day.

I made something!

2009-12-05T15:01:00.000-08:00

This is less of a review and more of an opportunity to share something cool that I made! About a year and a half ago, I joined a knit and crochet community called Ravelry, which contains a database of patterns, and where users can share patterns, create groups, put their yarn up for sale, and ask questions. Through the site, I found a pattern for a winter headband that looked cool. I knit a prototype last year, which ended up being a bit too big for my liking, and played around with the proportions of the second model, which I gifted to my friend Dorothy last Christmas. I also added a crocheted flower I bought from the yarn store. However, I still wanted one for myself, so I started making one...and stopped to make a scarf for Willie's birthday...and finally picked it up again and finished it a few weeks ago.

The finished product is a cute headband that keeps my ears warm even when I want to wear a ponytail.

Off Topic: Bento Contest 2

2009-12-02T06:31:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone, I made it into the bento contest finals!! Debra is giving away a lot of stuff, so I'm hoping that even if I don't win, I'll get a little somethin' somethin' just for making it to the top 3, but the real prize is a four-compartment bento box, which I can use to pack even niftier lunches than the ones I shared already.

Anyway, in order to win, I have to get the most votes, so if you're reading this, please take about 30 seconds to go and vote for me!

1. Go to http://www.hapabento.com/2009/12/01/bento-contest-finals/
2. Scroll down to the bottom where you can enter a comment.
3. Enter your name and email address and write "Bento #2" in the body of your comment (that's mine!).

You can vote once per day until December 8, so if you really love me, you can go back and vote again! And again! And again...

Review #11: Last Day Before a Break

2009-11-28T14:51:00.000-08:00

I started writing this entry on Wednesday, the last day of school before a very welcome Thanksgiving break. I definitely needed to spend some time to myself and with my family, just relaxing and not thinking about work, so that is what I was thankful for this year on Turkey Day. Still, I think I've been doing okay at work, especially under the circumstances (new administration). Normally, the last day before a break is very stressful, but I felt pretty good on Wednesday, and I think the reason behind it is that I've figured out what to do with my kids on the day before a break: don't celebrate.

It sounds mean to say it that way, but it works. Don't celebrate. Why? Well, let's just think about what a celebration entails:

-A celebration has to have food. It usually also has to be relatively high in sugar content, or else how would it be special? I'd rather not use my hard-earned money to go out and buy students food just so they can get a sugar high. They're also most likely going to be eating said sugary food in my classroom instead of in the cafeteria, where I have to clean up whatever mess gets left behind, because eating time is highly unstructured, so the kids are sure to get into trouble somehow. If I'm going to bring in food, it's going to be for a small snack at the end of the day that I can incorporate into a lesson plan (such as making cookies look like pumpkins for Halloween) that has them naming the ingredients and actions, sharing with their classmates, and taking turns. They need structure or else they're going to be all over the place.

-After the food is consumed, many celebrations consist of allowing students to watch a movie, which would be fine if my students could actually sit and watch a movie under normal circumstances, let alone when they're hyped up on sugar. I tried to show them a five-minute cartoon clip explaining the first Thanksgiving the other day and they couldn't sit still for it. Whether it's their age, their temperaments or their disability (if I didn't mention it before, I teach 1st-3rd graders who have all been diagnosed with autism), my students prefer to do the same thing day after day. I can see why. It's comforting. Thankfully, I'm never bored at work, so I'd much rather have the same, predictable routine on a day before the holiday than having to shake things up. Thinking about how I'll get home is stressful enough as it is.

I don't want to be a "mean" teacher, though, and I try to let my kids have fun. So, instead of celebrating on Wednesday, we did a "fun" project that ended up taking all day: we traced their bodies on chart paper, drew on their faces and clothes, and decorated. We then had the kiddos label body parts on the pictures so that it could be tied back into the curriculum--our theme for Science this marking period is parts of the body. The activity was in no way a novel or particularly creative idea, but a huge part of teaching is borrowing ideas from others. Why reinvent the wheel?

The pictures turned out to be amazingly cute and the kids had so much fun. We put the papers on the floor and had them lie down for us to do the tracing, and one of my students kept lying back down on his paper even after he had finished, trying to fit himself back into the outline. When I get back home and find the cord for my camera I will post photos, but until then I hope everybody had a wonderful Thanksgiving and a safe "Black Friday." Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

*ETA: Here are some photos of our wonderful work!

Off-Topic: Bento Contest 1

2009-11-26T22:10:00.001-08:00

Since you guys already know how much fun I'm having dabbling in the art of bento-making, it probably won't come as any surprise to know that I'm entering a contest to win an awesome four-compartment bento box. The contest is on hapabento.com, one of the bento blogs that got me inspired to buy my own box in the first place. Her boxes are always colorful, nutritious, and beautifully photographed. The bento she's giving away is more spacious than the one I have, and there are also some adorable accessories up for grabs, so I'm very excited. In order to win the bento box, contestants must post what food item they would pack in each section, complete with recipes. I'm posting the recipes here, tried and true, adapted from a family favorite, the Moosewood cookbook:

Tabouli

1 cup dry bulgur wheat
1 1/2 cups boiling water
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup olive oil
2 medium cloves garlic, minced
black pepper, to taste
1 packed cup minced parsley
*Vegetables, optional and to your liking, include but are not limited to:
1 small cucumber, seeded and diced
1 medium bell pepper, diced
2 medium ripe tomatoes, diced
4 scallions, finely minced

1. Combine bulgur and boiling water in a medium-large bowl. Cover and let stand until the bulgur is tender (20 to 30 minutes, minimum).
2. Add salt, lemon juice, olive oil, garlic and black pepper and mix thoroughly. Cover tightly and refrigerate until about 30 minutes before serving. We've found that it's best if it sits overnight so that the flavors can mix together, but you can eat it right away and it's good too.
3. About 30 minutes before serving, stir in remaining ingredients and mix well. Serve cold.

Felafel

2 15-oz. cans cooked chick peas (or 4 cups)
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp cumin
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup finely minced onion
1/4 cup (packed) minced parsley
1/4 cup water
1 Tbs lemon juice
a few dashes cayenne
1/3 cup flour
oil for frying

1. Rinse chick peas and drain well.
2. Combine all ingredients except flour (and oil for frying) in a food processor or a medium-sized bowl and process--or mash--until you have a uniform batter.
3. Add flour and stir until thoroughly combined. You can cook the felafel right away, or store the batter in a covered container in the fridge for several days.
4. Heat a heavy skillet and add about 3 Tbs oil. When it is hot enough to sizzle a bread crumb on contact, drop tablespoonfuls of batter into the pan, flattening each slightly, like a small, thick pancake. Saute for about 10 minutes on each side, until golden and crisp. Add small amounts of extra oil to the pan as needed throughout the cooking.
5. Place the cooed felafel on a plate lined with paper towels, and, if necessary, keep warm in a 300F oven until serving time.

I love being Greek!

Review #10: Parent-Teacher Conferences

2009-11-18T13:27:00.001-08:00

I'm having a hard time deciding which feelings I want to make public in terms of my job in general on this blog. It's difficult for me to write about my job without knowing what might be regarded as inappropriate or offensive, what might be misconstrued, and what the consequences might be. It's equally as difficult for me to not write about my job knowing that I have the right to freedom of speech and that I shouldn't have to censor myself, at least not according to the US Constitution. I don't want to exclude my job completely from my blog entries because it is such an important and huge part of my life. I enjoy teaching and love my students. I probably expend most of my day's energy trying to do my best for my kids and for my career. However, with any part of life, there are struggles, worries, and even complaints. As a dear friend and colleague of mine would say, "It's a tough business." Nobody can pretend that every second of their work day is perfect and awesome and filled with sunshine and butterflies, especially if they've ever had to clean up poop.

Ultimately, since I do not yet have tenure, I will be very judicious in any postings regarding my job, and if anyone would like to know my true feelings, they should probably just ask me in person where there is no paper trail.

I did want to write a post about Parent-Teacher Conferences (something that is NOT food related!), but after all of that I'm not sure what I want to say anymore. They happened, and now they're over. I'm glad I got to talk to the parents that came, but I feel very drained, particularly because they took place on a Tuesday, with the majority of the week still to come. Also, I always feel a little anxiety when I talk to my students' parents. It's not a matter of nerves, it's just that I always want to appear polished, energetic, and composed, which is not always easy, especially when I'm still at work at 8:00 at night. Basically, I'm glad that Parent-Teacher Conferences only happen once a semester. I'm also glad that I didn't miss any good TV last night. Tonight's episode of Glee is supposedly featuring a version of the following old favorite by The Police tonight and you can bet I'll be right here on my couch.

The Police |MTV Music

TWO CAN PLAY AT THE VIDEO EMBEDDING GAME, WILLIAM!

Review #9: An ode to vegetables and a second attempt at embedding photos

2009-11-15T07:14:00.000-08:00

For a while now I've been trying to lose a little bit of weight and become healthier and more active in general. I was doing well back in the spring before I moved, but since then I feel like that train has derailed, especially lately. Last night I felt particularly guilty when, after devouring a scrumptious piece of homemade meatloaf at a friend's place, we started browsing "This is Why You're Fat", a website dedicated posting pictures of all things decadent and sometimes downright disgusting. So, to motivate myself to get back on track, I'm going to post pictures of a different kind. Behold, the vegetable!

Though not traditionally a comfort food, there's a special something I can't quite explain about eating fresh, simply prepared vegetables. They always make me feel better after a regrettable fried food binge and can actually enhance a main dish, rather than playing second fiddle. I think that part of my affinity towards veggies comes from my childhood. My mom is a vegetarian and although she always made sure my siblings and I had enough meat and protein to grow up big and strong, she also exposed us to a variety of vegetables, legumes, and grains that were foreign to most of my friends when we were young. Most kids did not grow up eating escarole, bulgur, lentils, and swiss chard. I had that privilege, and as a result, I was never a picky eater.

Still, there were some vegetables I didn't like as a child. Some of these I still don't care for today, such as broccoli rabe, string beans, and celery when it's not slathered with peanut butter, but there are others that I've learned to love, and cannot believe that I didn't like before. These are the top five vegetables I did not appreciate as a child but could not live without today.

5. Tomatoes.

What? you say, How can a woman who proudly proclaims her Italian heritage to the world possibly dislike tomatoes? Allow me to clarify. As a child, I knew that tomatoes were key ingredients in sauces and condiments I enjoyed such as marinara sauce and the ever-present ketchup. However, I detested eating them plain or raw. I even disliked sun-dried tomatoes, a variety that now makes me salivate just from typing the very word. I would pick them out of my salads and omit them from atop my hamburgers. It was only when I became an adult that I realized how essential the tomato can be. Tomatoes can add a sweetness or an acidity to many dishes as well as a bold splash of color. One of our summer staples is a couscous salad with turkey, olives, cheese, and cherry tomatoes. The dish would lose something without the tomatoes. Although I must admit that I'm very picky when choosing tomatoes from the grocery store and I still do pick tomatoes out of my salads at a restaurant if they are anything less than fresh, I can't deny that tomatoes are a yummy staple in my diet.

4. Peas

I can't remember being served peas all that often as a child, but as I grew up, I know that whenever I was served peas, I would politely eat them, but they were never something I would actively seek out. In college, I began to warm up to peas. Just adding a bit of salt, pepper, and butter completely transformed the flavor. Today peas are still an occasional purchase, but I felt that I had to mention them because of split pea soup. Split pea soup was something else that I never really liked as a child, and I was actually nervous when I made a big batch of it about a month ago, that I wouldn't like it and it would go to waste. NOT SO. That soup was probably the best thing I've ever made in the kitchen. In fact, we can't wait until ham goes on sale again so that we can buy it and use the bone to make our next batch. There's something magical about split pea soup on a cold day, and it really makes me appreciate the tiny pea for being the star.

3. Kale

Kale was one of those leafy greens that for some reason just got passed over by my family, in favor of greens such as swiss chard, escarole, and the ever-popular spinach. While I do enjoy those greens, they can sometimes have a bitterness that I have yet to taste in kale. Plus, kale is packed with vitamins A and C, and is a good source of iron as well as lutein, an antioxidant that promotes eye health, which is always a good thing for someone like me.

2. Beets

I don't have a whole lot to say about beets because they are just plain yummy. I can't believe I detested them when I was young. They are appetizing not only to the palate but to the eye, and they are unlike any other vegetable.

1. BRUSSELS SPROUTS!

Brussels sprouts have earned their place on the top of this list. Long feared by children, I tasted my first brussels sprout less than a year ago, and now I will eat them any chance I get. If my mom had cooked these for me the way that my boyfriend does now, roasted in the oven with salt, pepper, olive oil and balsamic vinegar, I would have loved them. Instead, she just avoided them, much to my relief as a kid. These little green guys get a bad rap, and so I expected them to be bitter or bland, but they are very flavorful and actually have a tinge of sweetness when roasted. I just wish they weren't so expensive. I can say that for any of the above vegetables though, except for the peas. Even tomatoes are expensive if, like me, you're a bit picky, passing up the industrially-grown, pale looking ones for the ones still attached to the vine with the healthy red hue. Indeed, I would have no problem losing weight and while still eating like a queen if quality produce was a little cheaper. Unfortunately, though people like to argue otherwise, meat is often the more economical way to go, especially when it's on sale.

It's been tough for me not to turn this whole blog into a food blog, since I love food so much, but I will be vigilant, and next time I will write about something else!

An Addendum

2009-11-11T08:02:00.000-08:00

I found it very difficult to insert the photos into this last entry without messing up the text and the layout. I think I finally got it right in my own layout, but if you're reading it in yours and its messed up, please let me know. Also if you can help me fix it without having to go through the long and difficult process of teaching me html, please let me know.

Review #8: A new concept of lunch

2009-11-11T06:43:00.000-08:00

Bento, ever-popular in Japan, is essentially an aesthetically-pleasing boxed lunch. Many parents in Japan pack lunches for their children to take to school, just like they do here in the states. Some people take bento-making to the next level, arranging them in a style called kyaraben. Think apples sliced to look like bunnies, or sandwiches in the shape of Hello Kitty. It's fun and delicious.

Of course, like many things Japanese, the art of bento-making is becoming more popular in the US, even among adults. According to this article from the NY Times, "For dieters, they are an eye-popping form of portion control. Artistic preparation of ingredients can act as a pleasant distraction for health-conscious parents. For others, bentos are a way to make lunch pretty or indulge their love of things Japanese." It's also an exciting opportunity for people to spend their money! Those Hello Kitty sandwiches don't shape themselves, you know, and there are many adorable accessories people can purchase to add flair to their lunches such as miniature soy sauce containers shaped like pigs.

I became a little obsessed with bento through the Bento Lunch livejournal community, which I found through the always helpful and inspiring Cooking community, where several successful dinners have come from. As I browsed the site over a few weeks, my thoughts quickly morphed from "I can't believe people actually want to do this" to "I can't believe people can actually do that with cherry tomatoes, rice and seaweed (nori). It's adorable!" and finally, to "This is awesome. I need to start doing this."

Long story short, I found a bento box with some insanely cute owls on the lid and decided I had to have it. When the box arrived, I embarked on the quest to make my lunches pretty, satisfying, and low-calorie. Easier said than done. If you have time, browse some of the photos featured in the slide show of the NY Times article. You will be amazed at some of the things people can do with food. I still have a long way to go. First of all, making bento is time consuming. I've only been able to assemble four of them so far, in a little over two weeks, because, never having been a morning person, I can't bring myself to wake up any earlier than I already do, just to have a lunch that is pleasing to the eye. Second of all, the only bento-related item I own so far is the box. No tiny cookie cutters shaped like flowers to make pretty creations out of carrots and cucumbers. As I will show you, it's hard to make your food look like a desired shape with just a knife. Finally, it seems like a lot of the bento boxes featured in the article (as well as many that I've seen on livejournal) contain lots of colorful fruits, vegetables, and other items that I don't normally buy and would rather not spend the extra money on. Quail eggs? Nori? Seven different kinds of veggies? No, thank you.

Nevertheless, I've had fun making and documenting the few bentos I've managed to create in the past few weeks. I'm not sure that my recent enthusiasm with bentos will last, but in the meantime, I've been growing more and more successful in making lunches that are fun to look at and to eat. Here are a few:

This is the first bento lunch I ever made. You can see the adorable owls on the lid. The bento is basically polenta with tomato sauce and vegetables with swiss cheese crudely cut into shapes. The top layer (Yes, it has two layers!) is simple apple slices with peanut butter. This one looked okay, even with the rudimentary cheese shapes, but I was hungry by the time I got home from work.

The second attempt was slightly more utilitarian, though still colorful and more filling. I had pasta, red pepper slices, olives, and tuna with balsamic vinegar.

The third bento I'm not even going to show because it was a visual failure. It tasted good, though, and that's really what matters.

My fourth and final attempt to date is, in my opinion, the most successful. It's a roast beef and swiss cheese wrap with leftover brussels sprouts to fill the space. On top are some baby carrots with more brussels sprouts and two leftover meatballs.

I may never have the time and dedication it takes to dye rice green, mold it into an oval, and add shapes out of egg, nori, and peppers to make a Frankenstein face to put in a Halloween-themed bento. But for me, bento is, like listening to dance music during my prep, a way to infuse some fun and self-indulgence into a work day that is otherwise all about everybody else. I think I deserve it.

Review #7: Young people's fashion choices in my neighborhood

2009-11-04T12:50:00.000-08:00

Being a teacher, I get out of work at the very same time that all the middle school kids get out of school. This frequently makes for quite a noisy, obnoxious subway ride home. In an attempt to distract myself from the mounting frustration of having to wait for the shuttle on a tiny platform crowded with "tweens," I started looking at the things that they wear. Sometimes, I'm jealous. Other times, I'm disgusted. Let's discuss a couple of the trends that are developing:

1. Plaid. I love that plaid is back in style. I wish it meant that I could pull out some of those flannel shirts I used to wear back in the 90's and we could all listen to Bush and Nirvanna and be cool. Sadly, it's not the same kind of plaid. The types of plaid shirts the kids are wearing these days are cut long (to be worn with skinny jeans or leggings), often have some sort of embellishment such as ruffles or built-in belts for the ladies, and come in very bold colors such as chartreuse or purple contrasted with black. It's almost like a fusion of the 80's and 90's, and I think I like it.

2. Skinny jeans. I tried on a pair of those one time and couldn't get them off fast enough. I consider myself to be a lady of average weight (at least the Wii Fit tells me I am), and the skinny jeans looked atrocious on me. So why do so many girls think that they can get away with them? Please, can this trend be over now?

3. Non-functional clothing. I saw some kid today wearing baggy pants that went down to below his fanny, exposing his boxers. The pants were complete with a belt which was clearly not serving its purpose. He carried a backpack that was barely held up by one strap around the shoulder. The other strap slipped carelessly down his arm. On his head was a winter hat that was carefully sitting just atop his ears. What's the point, I ask you? Why even wear a hat? Your ears will still be cold. Why even wear a belt? Your pants are practically sitting at your knees! In fact, why wear pants at all? Yuck. The biggest culprit on the girls' side is the "hippie headband," made out of some sort of shiny braided rope or string, which is then placed over the hair and sits about an inch or two above the ears, all the way around the head. PEOPLE CAN WE PLEASE FIGURE OUT WHAT DECADE IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE.

4. Name brands. Teachers can try all they want to get their ninth grade students to remember key elements of the Mesopotamian civilization, but unless Hammurabi wore Timberlands, they couldn't care less. Timberland, South Pole, and Converse are the most popular brand names I see, and kids and adults alike get respect for sporting brand names.

To me, looking at what middle schoolers are wearing these days is fun because it's so different from what I used to wear. The big name brand of my day was JNCO, and the baggier your pants were, the better. The "Smiley Face" allegedly invented by Forrest Gump was also very popular, as were the colors orange, lime green, and periwinkle. I guess I can't begrudge the teens and tweens of today a few awful trends. After all, I did own a zipper shirt.

Review #6: Parties--to go or to throw? Also, my arm hurts.

2009-11-01T08:23:00.000-08:00

I love having friends over, but the circumstances of my early adulthood have not exactly been conducive to hosting gatherings thus far. My first apartment was a tiny, roach-infested studio in a less-than-ideal location. My second I shared with a roommate with whom I got along for the most part, but tended to tread lightly around, rarely if ever inviting more than two or three people over at a time. My third and current apartment, however, has none of these roadblocks. The neighborhood is decent, there's a reasonable amount of space, and I have mostly the same friends as my rather handsome "roomie." We've been able to throw a couple of fun parties since moving in, and I'm always glad to do so, though it always ends up being a lot more work than I bargained for. So here are some pros and cons of throwing a party as opposed to going out to one.

Pro: You're forced to clean your apartment beforehand. Unless you really like to clean or have pets and/or children, how often do you actually go through your home and clean everything? Whenever you have guests, of course. If you don't have guests very often, the pre-party clean is a very welcome clean indeed.

Con: You're forced to clean your apartment afterwards, which is not a terrible thing, because you'll still be left with a clean apartment in the end. However, cleaning up from your party the next morning is probably the most revolting yet unavoidable part of the whole process. Most of us don't want to deal with collecting bottles sticky with residue from spilled beverages first thing in the morning, but it's much better than waiting around for the smell of said beverages to eventually waft into your one safe haven, the bedroom. And has anyone ever noticed that the amount of cleanup you'll have to do in the morning is inversely proportional to your presence of mind when you go to sleep? The clearer your head is at the end of the night, the more likely you'll be to at least contain the mess making for a much easier cleanup the next morning.

Pro: You don't have to deal with a train ride home at the end of the night that might take two hours when all you really want to do is go to sleep. I've already talked about how much I hate mass transit in NYC. Enough said.

Con: You can't leave if it's not fun.

Pro: You're in control of everything: the food, the drinks, the entertainment, and the guest list. If it's a good party, everyone will remember that you threw it.

Con: You can never invite as many people as you really want to, but still somehow end up inviting too many.

Pro: Even though you're buying extra food and drinks for your guests, it still costs less than food and drinks at a restaurant or bar. Although this is even more true if you're going to the party. Everyone saves!

Pro: You get to keep the leftovers. This actually hasn't been all that advantageous for me so far, as it seems like I only wind up with chips and soda at the end of the night, but they're my chips and soda now!

Throwing parties is a lot of fun. It's not something I would do every weekend, but I'm glad that I have the opportunity to be a hostess more often now.

On an unrelated note, my arm is killing me. I woke up Friday morning with what looked like two mosquito bites on my upper arm, but by the afternoon they started blistering and swelling. Now my entire upper arm is swollen and red, and in addition to the skin itching like mad, the muscles are sore like I just did an entire day of bench presses. It's also hot to the touch. I think I inadvertently cooked the bag of frozen peas I was using as a cold compress. Common sense is telling me I should go to the doctor, but I don't want to even think about how to do that on a Sunday. If it doesn't improve by tomorrow morning, I'll go, but otherwise I'd rather not waste a sick day. This is the worst.

An Addendum to the salsa post

2009-10-27T14:14:00.000-07:00

Neither of my stores had the Farmer's Garden salsa this week. Dejected, I decided to try Newman's Own Black Bean and Corn instead. Great Odin's Raven! I can't stop eating this stuff. Paul Newman, you've done it again, even posthumously.

Review #5: The Mediocre Steer

2009-10-24T20:32:00.000-07:00

This weekend I'm out on Long Island visiting my parents and doing some shopping around for my Halloween costume. I find it easier to shop out here than in the city. There's something comforting about the mall, where all the stores are in one place. Not to mention you get there by driving as opposed to waiting for a train, hopping out in SoHo where there are a few stores, getting back on a train to Union Square where there are a few more stores, and then realizing that the day is pretty much over, only it's not really over because there's still an irritatingly long train ride home where you'll inevitably have to wait around forever only to get on a LOCAL train because it's the weekend, then find out that it's being rerouted to somewhere that isn't your stop and you'll have to take a stupid shuttle bus. Indeed, as I said in my Zipcar review, it's nice to get out of the city every once in a while.

Getting back to the topic at hand, I had a lovely day today. Le boyfriend and I met up with my friend from work, her husband, and their adorable toddler for lunch and shopping. She suggested we go to The Good Steer, a meat-lover's paradise that has been a Long Island institution since 1957. People love this place so much that they nearly go into shock if you tell them you grew up on Long Island and have never eaten there. I was so happy just to hang out with friends, go shopping, and meet up with more friends for an awesome Rock Band session later on, that I hate to give the restaurant anything less than a stellar review. Unfortunately, for such a beloved Long Island eatery, I simply wasn't impressed. It didn't put a damper on my wonderful day, but I wasn't impressed.

We ended up arriving a few minutes early, so we waited in the extensive lobby and perused a copy of Food and Wine from May 2008 for a few minutes. The server was very friendly though somewhat forgetful and gladly gave me a few extra moments to study the somewhat overwhelming and disorganized menu. Why were the appetizers on the second page? Why were there so many fonts? I decided to play it safe and order a burger, the "Musharoomaroom" with their famous onion rings instead of french fries for a side. I should have looked over the description a bit more thoroughly because that burger was weird. Mushrooms, caramelized onions, cheese, and Canadian bacon top the burger, which spills over the edge of an English muffin. I had to eat it with a fork and knife. I also had to remove the Canadian bacon and eat it separately after which the burger was quite good. I just think that for a $10 burger, I should have at least been given a portion that would have left me feeling more full. My main complaint, however, was with the "famous" onion rings. The super-thinly sliced, generously battered shoestrings of onion barely gave me any onion flavor at all. Give me an onion ring with substance! Also, while half of the batch was at least cooked to a nice, crispy golden brown, the other half was undercooked, tasting like goo with a texture of goo. I should have just ordered the fries. They looked good.

Overall, I've had worse food and I've had better: the burger was good, albeit strange, and at least half of the onion rings were edible. I will still look with fondness at their angelic cow logo as I drive home from the mall. I would try The Good Steer again (if one of my friends really wanted to go), but if I do go back, I'm going to order something entirely different.

Review #4: Leaving the city comes at a price

2009-10-20T13:26:00.000-07:00

In case I didn't mention it earlier, I live in Brooklyn, New York, home to one of the most extensive (if not inherently dirty, intermittent, and obnoxious) systems of mass transportation in the world. Couple that with the roads crowded with drivers who seem not to value their lives and it should come as no surprise that I don't own a car. However, I do have a driver's license and an affinity for the great outdoors, so when I received an offer for a discounted Zipcar membership, I decided to jump at the chance.

For those of you who are not familiar with Zipcar, they are essentially a trendy rental car company with a few quirks. First, they have rentals available by the hour, which is convenient, say, if you want to go to Ikea and buy a desk. You can't take the desk on public transportation, but you don't want to pay more than double the cost of the desk to have Ikea deliver it. Zipcar saves the day! Then again, so would a U-Haul, also available hourly. But lo, Zipcar's rates include gas and insurance! That got my attention. They also have an EZ Pass in most cars, but you'll be billed for the tolls. Yet another particularity of Zipcar is that everything is controlled by a card. You use the key to drive, but upon arriving at your destination, you leave the key in the car and lock up with the card. Nifty, but unnecessary. Finally, each day of driving comes with 180 miles included for free, with additional miles costing $0.45.

I used my Zipcar membership for the first time last weekend when le boyfriend and I took an overnight voyage to Northampton, Massachusetts, home of my alma mater. It was a delightful trip complete with apple picking and fighting old ladies over the last bag of cider donuts at the market, but when the bill came, it was a little steep, even though I had a $50 driving credit from my special offer. I wondered how the Zipcar bill would stack up to a similar trip using an average rental car company.

Here's what I found out:

The Zipcar bill came to $276.72 (without the driving credit), which includes two days (and 360 miles), tolls, the 10 extra miles I ended up driving over the duration of the trip, and taxes. It also includes the gas and insurance. The car I drove was a 2007 Volkswagon Jetta, which fell into the cheapest category of vehicle available. How does that stack up to an average rental car? My estimate, using the Enterprise website and a little internet savvy, gave me the following estimate. Two weekend days for an economy car with unlimited mileage plus taxes (and a surcharge because I'm still under 25 for a few more months) amounts to $186.86. Add $9 for tolls, roughly $40 for what I spent on gas, and an estimated $25 for insurance (to make it comparable) and we get $260.86, which is only slightly lower than what I paid for the Zipcar, without factoring in the driving credit.

My conclusion? Unless you have a really generous friend or relative who will lend you their car, renting a car is expensive no matter what, especially in NYC. I think that I came out ahead in this situation, but I learned that Zipcar might be better used on shorter trips. Had I not driven over 360 miles, I would have been charged for a day plus three hours instead of two full days, which would have made it a lot cheaper. The $50 driving credit also knocked down the price a bit, which was nice. I also have to admit that it was fun to drive a Jetta, which is probably nicer than an "Economy" car you'd get from a rental company. The reservation, pickup, and return were very pleasant and convenient transactions. I'd recommend the Zipcar to anyone who doesn't have a car but would like to have access to one every once in a while. That is, as long as you're willing to pay.

Review #3: Say it, Don't Spray it

2009-10-17T08:13:00.000-07:00

One of my many foibles is that I give most things (or people) a chance, even if it turns out to be a pretty silly idea. So let's talk about me being dumb:

I bought a couple of empty spray bottles a while back. The first I filled with salt water because I read in a magazine that if I sprayed my damp hair with salt water I would get a nice, "beachy" look. Seduced by the possibility of having curly hair without making it crispy from hairspray, I decided to give it a try. My hair did stay nice and soft, but it looked nothing like the tousled, somewhat wild look that I enjoy after a day at the beach. As it dried, my hair began to curl up nicely, but fell flat by the time I got home from work. Was I doing something wrong? My second attempt met with similar results. The magazine must have been lying to me.

Spray Bottle 1: failure.

The story of the second spray bottle is slightly more humorous. I kept on reading these recipes that called for a cooking spray such as Pam, but I had never tried one. My curiosity was piqued after a visit to my friend Beth's where she made some sort of delicious egg concoction that was not quite an omelet but not quite a frittata, using a cooking spray which made the eggs taste light and fluffy as opposed to my usual greasy scramble. I brought this idea home to my boyfriend who, though loving, wonderful, and talented in the kitchen, is very set in his cooking ideas. No way was a cooking spray ever going to sully his prized cast iron skillet.

You can probably see where I'm going with this. Do you ever have an idea that seems brilliant, but with a little time and hindsight, you realize is just plain dumb? Thus was the notion of simply filling a spray bottle with regular olive oil. I thought there was something to the whole spraying process that would somehow magically make the oil coat the pan evenly in a thinner layer. No. First, it did not come out in a spray, but rather in a jet of oil. So much for my even coating. Second, if you're frying a delicious item of food, there's a certain amount of oil or fat required for said delicious item to not stick to the pan and burn. That amount doesn't change based on the way it gets into the pan. Pam somehow gets away with using less grease, I guess because it has added ingredients or perhaps something about the way the spray bottle is designed. What it all comes down to is that olive oil in a spray bottle is not the same as Pam. Most of you probably wouldn't need 300 words to figure that out.

Spray bottle 2: failure. Luckily, my only real losses in this situation were the cost of the spray bottles (about $3) and a little bit of pride.

Review #2: A love affair with salsa

2009-10-10T11:50:00.000-07:00

Tortilla chips and salsa make up one of my favorite snacks: texturally satisfying, flavor-packed, and low in calories. While I have yet to find a favorite chip, I did manage to stumble across the very best salsa I have ever tasted.

I have for a while now been a proponent of Newman's Own ®. In general, their food is pretty high quality, and I enjoy being able to afford a brand that gives its profits to charity. It makes me feel better about passing up the organic, locally-grown vegetables at the green market in Grand Army Plaza because they're twice as expensive as the ones in the grocery store. About a month ago, I found myself once again hungrily picking through the jars of Newman's Own at the grocery store looking for one marked "medium," when I came across a variety I had never tried before: the Farmer's Garden salsa.

As a novice food blogger, I can't think of how to describe the way this salsa tastes other than the word "delicious." The peppers lend the right amount of spice to the salsa, while the additional vegetables and lime juice give it a slight tang that makes it interesting. Besides the usual tomatoes and jalapenos, the salsa contains both red and yellow bell peppers, red Anaheim peppers, onions, and garlic. These flavorful ingredients are blended to a consistency that has just the right chunky-to-juicy ratio. All in all, this salsa rocks the house. Paul Newman, you're a hero.

Review #1: My Return to the Blogosphere

2009-10-08T19:02:00.000-07:00

Ladies and gentlemen, I have an internet addiction.

Sometimes, I need to look at pictures of cats. Sometimes, I need to watch something silly on youtube. And sometimes, I just need to share my thoughts with the faceless masses behind the computer screen, all of you zeros and ones floating around out there in the nebula of cyberspace.

So, here I am: ready and willing to impart the wit and wisdom (or lack thereof) of my twenties to, if no one else, my future self.

And what kinds of reviews does my future self have to look forward to? Well, I like to cook and eat, so a lot of recipes and food-related products will most likely show up. I also like to knit, read, and do crossword puzzles, although I haven't done much of any of those three things lately. I like to save money, especially while doing any of the aforementioned things. My guilty pleasures include fashion, gossip, pop culture, and the television (I could write a review of my DVR but it would be more like a love note than anything else so I'll spare you), but I don't feel too guilty about enjoying them, as they all seem pretty normal and appropriate for a lady in her twenties. Finally, I just like to live and enjoy life. I hope my future self can say the same.