June Day BBQ

It's that time again...PARTY!

This time the weather was nice so we decided to have a BBQ, vegetarian of course!  The (facebook) invitations were set, the calendars marked and the planning began.  S. really wanted veggie kabobs and I wanted corn.  We also decided to get some veggie burgers and iced tea!  Luckily our boss took us to Costco the week before so we stocked up on Boca Burgers, cheese, contact solution and other necessities.

The day of the party S. and I got started on making the veggie kabobs.

It was a long process but we did manage to throw our porch table down into the yard and V. helped us take the silk out of the corn.

Soon guests were arriving, beer and watermelon in hand.

Right as we were about to try and light the grill D. walked in and, since he is evidently some sort of West Coast BBQ god, took over the cooking.  S. and I played sous chef for a while grabbing foil, matches and spices but all of the cooking was kindly taken over by D. and J.  

Iced tea was drank out of jars and we even made s'mores, treating M. to his FIRST EVER S'MORE in the process.  

 

After eating most of the group moved towards playing wiffle ball, frisbee or trying to learn to skateboard.

Some of us still have wounds healing from the latter.  Towards the end of the night a guitar emerged and I could feel the JP hipster-ness oozing from our yard.

Party complete!

-N.

Restaurant Review: The Real Deal

I bought a Living Social to The Real Deal a while ago!  It was $15 for $30 worth of food, a fact I had forgotten when P. and I decided to go try it out.  When we arrived I actually looked at the deal and we began compiling what we were going to order.

The menu at The Real Deal is extensive.  SO MANY OPTIONS.  P. and I had to go sit down to formulate our plan:

• The Zombie Burger (P.)
• Carmela Soprano (Me)
• Spicy Curly Fries
• Mozzarella Sticks

We placed our order and asked what our total was.  $26!  In a pinch we added on two cupcakes, chocolate cake with white icing for me and chocolate on chocolate for P.!

When our food was ready we brought it back to the table and stared at it in amazement.

S. insists that the curly fries here are the best, and since the grease was already soaking through the bag it seemed promising.

This shot shows almost all of the food, you can see the cupcakes in the plastic container.

P. and I focused our energy on the fried foods as they tend to not heat up well.  We polished off the mozzarella sticks with only a little trouble and ate a decent amount of fries although both of us only took about two bites of our paninis/burgers.

We then walked the leftovers home and ate the cupcakes.  They were GOOD!  Like really good, surprisingly tasty!

The next morning I used S.'s cast iron panini press to warm up my sandwich and stuck the remaining curly fries in the toaster oven topped with BBQ sauce.  I would say that the food was even better left over.  Initially I hadn't been too taken with my Carmela Soprano but reheated it was delicious!

Overall I would definitely return to The Real Deal.  I'd love to try their pizza and would definitely reorder the Carmela Soprano if only to let it sit in the fridge for a day before eating.  If I saw another Living Social I'd buy it but then bring maybe 5 people versus only P. so that we don't have to look like such pigs!

-N.

S.'s Birthday!

That's right I finally turned 23 18. So young! 

Friday night we had a ragin' party at our house. We made cupcakes with Bailey's frosting and a chocolate trifle. 

N. made me a brownie peanut butter cake! Which I ended up baking 2 days after the batter was made because our oven was broken for a while, then N. had to work. But she did this awesome frosting job when she got home!

Our friends also brought candy, more cupcakes, and a whole lot of liquor. There was also a cantaloupe filled with vodka and a bowl of jello. We have great friends. I think roughly 20 people showed up throughout the night.

The next morning, N., G., Z. and I went to Sorella's for breakfast. They have the best pancakes. N. never orders pancakes and then she is disappointed. When will she learn? Mine had chocolate chips, granola, and nuts.

After breakfast we watched Extreme Couponing then took a nap.

Later that night we went to the new Harpoon beer hall. It was larger and more crowded than expected, but they had the best pretzels EVER.

The night ended at New York Pizza, as all good nights should. We got there 5 minutes before closing and the place was a madhouse! When we left, one of the employees was physically blocking the door to keep people from coming in, and some girls outside were begging him for pizza. 

I certainly did not fall off my bike on the way home or do anything embarrassing...

Restaurant Review: Bhukara

A while ago N. and I went to Bhukara, an Indian restaurant near our house, for lunch buffet.
It was a pretty good deal - we ate garlic naan and some sort of fried vegetable thing many other delicious items I don't remember the names of.



We ate soooo much.

I tried rice pudding for the first time, and it was not too terrible.

I would definitely go back again, if I ever have a week day off of work again. It was pretty much all I needed to eat all day.

Banana Bread

For some reason I decided Thursday was the perfect day to make a ton of banana bread.  Don't ask me why, maybe it was because it'd been a frustrating day at work and S. was out of town and I love banana bread, but either way I soon found 8 disgustingly soggy defrosting ripe bananas on my kitchen table.

So I had to move quick.  We were out of eggs but from my search on egg replacers a day earlier I knew my plain yogurt should be a good replacement so I searched for some recipes and came across this!  My mom also gave me her delicious Banana Snack Cake recipe so I decided to try and make an egg-less version of that as well.  Finally my plan was to make these because I had a weird idea that I needed to use up all the bananas RIGHT NOW!

I put P!NK on repeat, started singing and began baking.  It was actually one of my cleaner baking experiences.  I used two bowls, one for the dry ingredients and one for melting the butter and for the wet ingredients and then reused them from recipe to recipe!  I think I'm finally learning.  I did forget to take pictures though, so that's a slow process.

First I made the Eggless Banana Bread subbing out plain non-fat yogurt for the applesauce, doubling the vanilla extract and with dried cranberries!  Into the oven that went.

Next up was my mom's Banana Snack Cake (see below).  Yogurt for eggs and with chocolate chips and crushed walnuts.  I failed to read that I should press the nuts on top and instead mixed them in with everything.

I then realized that I didn't have enough oats for Sally's Peanut Butter Banana Oat Bars.  Let's be honest, it's a good thing.  I put the remaining 2 bananas back in the freezer.

Unfortunately I think our oven might be broken because both recipes took forever to bake and I ended up turning it up to 400 since it didn't feel hot.

After a while a toothpick came out clean and I went to bed!  Who wants banana bread?

Banana Snack Cake

Eggless Banana Bread with Cranberries

---

Banana Snack Cake

(Mom’s Recipe)

Ingredients

            1 cup softened margarine or butter

            1 cup sugar

            2 eggs

            1 cup buttermilk (or 1 cup milk with 1 Tbs vinegar)

            4 mashed medium bananas

            1 tsp vanilla extract

            2 cups flour

            1 cup quick-rolled oats

            1 1/2 tsp baking soda

            1/2 tsp salt

            6 oz. chocolate chips

            1/2 cups chopped pecans (or a different type of nut)

Directions

            1. Preheat oven to 350⁰F

            2. In a large mixing bowl cream butter and sugar together with a mixer until fluffy.

            3. Mix in eggs

            4. Stir in buttermilk and vanilla, mixing well

            5. In a separate bowl, stir flour, oats, soda and salt to mix

            6. Gradually stir flour mixture into butter mixture; mix well

            7. Stir in bananas

            8. Spread in a greased 9” x 13” baking pan

            9. Sprinkle nuts on top and press lightly

            10. Bake for 30-35 minutes

Mini Quiche!

Day off!  Today I decided to go to the annual meeting of the Boston Area Gleaners, an AWESOME organization I interned for in 2011-2012.  They were having a potluck so I spent some time thinking about what I should bring.  Originally I was planning on making Peanut Rice, this rice/peanut butter/veggies/hoisin sauce thing I made for our last potluck but I didn't make it to the store to get the necessary veggies.  I'm also running low on peanut butter.

Then I thought I'd just beef up the chickpea salad I have in the fridge.  But I thought that was kinda weird, giving people something I'd made a while ago and just dumped another can of chickpeas into.

Then I thought a baked good.  And then I decided a quiche!  I do have plenty of eggs after all.  But I realized I'm biking there, how will I carry a pie pan without putting it vertically?  Luckily the internet exists and I soon learned about these.

The above describes basically how my mind works.

Alas, no crescent rolls in the house and no time to make a crust!  Luckily we are 5 minutes away from a grocery store so I picked up a refrigerated crust and got to work.

Unfortunately my roommate and her boyfriend we're having a romantic omelet breakfast in the kitchen so I had to cook on the stove.  In the process I slightly melted my egg container from the heat of the oven.  But life goes on.

I made one muffin pan and 4 mini pie pans of quiche!  But I don't know how to tell if quiche is done so I had to get S. out of bed to help me.  She was not happy.  I gave her a quiche.

Overall I thought they were pretty tasty although I failed to follow the recipe (I was only half following it anyway) and didn't put any cheese on top, and omitted the mushrooms, and no feta...

3/13 De Facto Roommate Day

Another Wednesday off for me and S.!  We agreed to go for a lovely walk to Franklin Park rather than go to yoga.  Save $10 and get Vitamin D?  Sign me up.

From our studies of Google Maps we knew that Franklin Park was not far from our house, yet despite this knowledge we'd never gone there!  Today was a day of change.

On the walk we saw two abandoned shoes and a cool looking tree covered with crocheted mushrooms.  Once in the park we randomly chose a path, started walking and ended up stumbling upon a seemingly abandoned stone building.  Here we practiced our Parkour, did some sun salutations, talked about life and climbed a boulder.

We also 'muploaded' a few pics.  A new term that S. learned from her friend, supposedly it is short-hand for 'mobile upload.'  I have my doubts that it will catch on but nevertheless instagramed the following of S.

After we returned home S. made some of the best waffles ever and we headed off to Harvard Square.  There we visited a shoe store and Follow the Honey, a cute honey store on Mass Ave!  The kind lady there gave us samples from all over the world including a white honey from Hawaii that was amazing.  If I wanted to spend $32 on a small jar of honey that would be my choice.

A beautiful bike ride across the Mass Ave. bridge back into Boston completed our wonderful day!

Potluck

We had the idea to do a +1 Potluck party, where everyone is supposed to bring a friend who has never been to our house before. That way we get to meet new people and eat delicious food! 

We didn't think it through though, and ended up having the potluck during spring break and right after a big snowstorm, so a bunch of people unfortunately had to cancel. 

Even so, we had 7 guests, plus me and N.

C. made sushi in the living room. 

We forgot to take a picture of the table but it was full of delights. Potato balls (aka Savoury Squirrel Bakes), pasta, bread, rice with peanut sauce, cookies, and more! Mostly starches.
We succeeded in using up most of the odds and ends from our liquor cabinet, which was accomplished by serving everyone "mystery drinks."

The original idea was to also make it a craft night, but people didn't seem too enthused about crafting. So I set up a friendship bracelet station! Only a few people made them, but I still think it was a brilliant idea.

Z. wore his hat, as he must always do when he enters our house.

After we ate we went outside to enjoy the snow! We went sledding, buried each other in snow, ran around, walked to the pond, practiced tackling each other, built a jump, spun in circles, and somersaulted downhill. It was a fantastic evening.

Then came back and ate more food!

What is happening here?

3/6 De Facto Roommate Night

S. and I are now both off on Wednesdays!  I really love having a weekday off because I can do things that require normal business hours, plus it breaks up my work week.

We both woke up pretty early and did some computer work/reading before heading to yoga at the Blissful Monkey for their $10 lunchtime yoga.  Now it has been about 9 months since I last did yoga and I was fairly nervous to fall from downward dog or something, but it ended up being just fine!

Next I dragged S. with me to the library and then Polka Dog Bakery for a cat treat.  I love that I can complete all my errands by walking here in JP!

After eating lunch we headed out by bike to Trader Joe's.  Unfortunately it decided to start raining midway but luckily it was more of a refreshing sprinkle rather than a drenching downpour.  We parked, picked up our ceramic creations and then commenced grocery shopping!

The 'quiche pan' that I painted at the Clayroom!

If you have ever been shopping with S. and I you know it is a fairly long process, and when the wealth of Trader Joe's is in front of us it is even longer.  Plus you have to figure in we are carrying everything by bicycle.  Thus we made a couple rounds in the store, picking things up and dropping them off, contemplating organic or not and in general figuring what we need to live off of for the next week.  Eventually we checked out and departed!

Unfortunately S. had gotten a flat tire somewhere on our journey and with no tools on us we decided to walk our bikes to Landry's and get it fixed.  Everyone there was really nice and we were soon on our way, with a new ladybug bell for S.'s bike Francine!

I also downloaded the app Runtastic Roadbike in an effort to track my cycling journeys!  I actually haven't biked since Wednesday due to the snow, but I was pretty impressed by how well it worked on our return journey!

Despite our plans for a lazy night due to such a productive day, Z. managed to convince us to join him for dinner.  We ate at the Miami Restaurant in Hyde Square.  S. and I weren't really hungry so she got fried plantains and I had rice and beans.  Z. got goat stew which came with fried green plantains, rice and beans.  So much food!  The rice and beans was really good and I'm sad we forgot the leftovers!

Convincing us to leave the house took some work.

Mmmmm plantains!  (Maduros)

Z. enjoyed his goat tremendously.

This may look bad but it was delicious.
So delicious I have a suspicion that chicken
broth was used in the rice...

Sally's Soft-Baked Peanut Butter Chocolate Swirl Cookies

I made these cookies as a gift!  I needed something to give to my friend J. who was helping me create a bike, and Sally (S.'s new blog obsession) put this recipe up.  So I figured it was fate.

I don't have any pictures from the first batch except this one that was sent to me by J. in his request for more cookies.  I'm pretty pleased that must mean they were liked!

So, on Wednesday I settled into our kitchen and started making another batch!  For these cookies you have to make 2 separate doughs, one peanut butter and one chocolate and then both of them go in the fridge before forming the cookies.

I've decided the quality of chocolate really makes a difference, so I splurged for Ghirardelli's unsweetened (they were out of Dark) which is pretty darn tasty.

After the fridge time you form small balls out of each dough and then roll the two together.  I have learned that it's best to really squish and intermingle the doughs to ensure the cookies don't fall apart when baked.

Here are some of the unbaked cookies.  You can see how they are yin-yang-y in shape, I think it helps them meld together!  I also suggest smashing them down slightly before baking since I prefer cookies that spread rather than stay vertical.

You only bake them a short while and then let them cool on the pan.  We have a limited number of pans so this is the hardest part for me because I really want to move them so I can finish baking them all!  But you shouldn't move them.  I also somehow made this batch really large so they are a bit more fragile than the first round.

Overall these are not my favorite cookies, but they are ADDICTING.  The peanut flavor isn't that strong, and I think I preferred round one when I used crunchy peanut butter but they are good.  The chocolate is quite rich which is good, although I think the two doughs are best together since when I had excess of one dough (PB for batch one and chocolate for round two) they were not as good independently!

Roomie Night 3/4

N. and I had some grand roomie night plans for this week. Unfortunately, they involved biking around the city and when we got off work it was snowing, windy, and cold.

So like any sane person would do, we cancelled our plans and went to McDonalds instead.
Because it is Shamrock Shake season!!
Warning: If you plan to eat a shamrock shake, take care NOT to look at the calorie count. It will make you sad.
We drank them with joy while listening to the crazy and homeless population of the city yell and get into fights around us.

Then we headed home and got dinner on the way back. I had to resist the lure of New York Pizza (the best pizza ever anywhere). We passed both of the locations on the way home, but I held out until we got to Acapulco.

We had never been before, but we greatly enjoyed the decor. We were cold from biking in the snow, and I considered asking to borrow a mexican hat and a poncho from the wall to wear.

This painting of a bullfight was great.

Up close, the people look like skeletons. 

There were only a few other people there, and only one waiter. And free chips and salsa! We didn't have to wait too long, which was good because we were cold and we had other important things to do that night (aka blogging and watching TV).

I got nachos with refried beans and cheese and N. got a enchilada/tortilla combo. They were both pretty good, but not spectacular. We agreed that they were lacking in flavor. We have the theory that you could order anything off the menu and it would taste pretty much the same, but who knows.

The best part of the meal was when N. whipped out her jar to put the leftovers in.

And then some tupperware to bring the rest of the chips home!

\

(The waiter was occupied and the other diners didn't notice, so we got no strange looks. A first for us!)

When paying the bill, N. wrote the most beautiful "3" she has ever written. She would not let me take a picture of it.

N: It was a beautiful 3.  And here's Sadie!  We are definitely becoming pro-bloggers.