Great Night

I had a great night as the title implies…

Awesome sushi and sake bombs followed by Arlo and Esme’s dungeonesque lower floor.  Too bad someone was very kindly asked to go somewhere else by the large bouncers

Slacker

Hey darlings! Well I have LOTS to catch you up on since I’ve neglected you for a whole 3 weeks… Work has definitely been crazy, especially right before and right after the Thanksgiving holiday, so that is partially why I haven’t been writing lately. Everything got so crazy that I even contemplated on forfeiting the blog all together…I felt like I wasn’t concentrating on work enough and I started to get discouraged, thinking do people really care what I’m writing about? So, I wasn’t sure if it was good for me to keep up with it, BUT I’m here to say that I decided to not forfeit!! I’m going to stick with it and keep on truckin’ 🙂

Just to get me back on track, here are a few updates of the past few weeks!

I came home one night after work and felt like we didn’t have much food in our fridge, but knew we had some frozen shrimp in the freezer and tortillas. I immediately think…SHRIMP TACOS! I loooove fish and shrimp tacos. If you live in NYC and you love Mexican food, you HAVE to go to this place called Toloache (on 50th btwn Broadway and 8th). They have this fruit guacamole (called Frutas Guac with avocados, pomegranate, Vidalia onions, mango, apples, peaches, Habanero and Thai basil)  that is to die for and I highly recommend the shrimp tacos. YUM! Anyways…I keep digressing. So, I decided to make my own version of a shrimp taco with my dill Greek yogurt sauce, tomatoes, black beans, arugula and a sprinkle of shredded white cheddar cheese, all wrapped in a warm flour tortilla!

It was delicious and so colorful! See what I mean? What a beauty!

A few days later, Dave and I were walking around Hoboken..trying to check out the neighborhood and we found a self-serve frozen yogurt place called Koa Koa! SO COOL!

I like trying new things, so I got 3 different flavors to try. There were a bunch with all different kinds of toppings too…fruit, granola, candy…lots! I decided on the pumpkin, pistachio and cappuccino frozen yogurt. The pistachio ended up being my favorite and I actually was not fond of the pumpkin. The spice flavor was too overwhelming and the cappuccino was just nasty! I was not a fan. Next time I might just get the plain yogurt and fill it with fruit. I love fruit!

Later on during the week I went home for Thanksgiving (which was AMAZING! My favorite holiday by far 🙂 ) I love being able to spend time with my family in front of a stacked plate of comfort food accompanied by a soothing glass of red wine. There is never any pressure involved with Thanksgiving (aka getting presents for everyone and going broke doing so :)) It’s simply a time to be thankful for what you have with the ones you love.

I decided that I HAD to make something for Thanksgiving since I have this new found obsession with food. So, the afternoon before the big day I relaxed and did absolutely nothing but bake my dish. I’ve been dieing to make it, but haven’t had the time, so I was pretty excited! I was looking through the November issue of Gourmet at work one day and saw something called a Fig Crostada. It sounded SO good to me. Lately I’ve been on this fig craze…not sure why, but I absolutely love them! Thank god I only had nothing to do because it took me ALL day to make!! Every last bit of that Crostada was homemade. I made the pastry dough and even fresh squeezed the orange juice it called for! Now that’s dedication!!

It turned out great! I probably won’t ever make it again, just because it took SO long, but it was very good. Kind of tasted like a giant fig newton however, so it wasn’t to die for, but still very yummy.

Another awesome fig dish, if you like appetizers are figs sliced in half with a spread of goat cheese on top, wrapped with prosciutto. Super easy and verrrry yummy!

Well, I’ll be back to talk about my awesome weekend shortly (Ash came to visit and we met up with some fellow bloggers!), but wanted to give you the quick recap. Thanks for baring with me!!

Funday Sunday

What a fun day!! I went for a run outside yesterday morning because the weather was perfect! I didn’t realize how much more I enjoy running outside opposed to the treadmill in our gym downstairs. I saw more of the town on the half hour run than I have the entire month I’ve been here. Plus, I didn’t calculate our distance at all, so I mapped my run out on http://www.mapmyrun.com and without even realizing it I ran 3.5 miles. I literally thought I ran 2 at the most! Pretty cool 🙂

By the way, if you haven’t used that website…it’s awesome! I go on it all the time. If you always run the exact same trail, it’s nice to use this to figure out other routes or if you want to just go for a jog and not worry about calculating the time or distance, you can map out where you ran when you get home to figure out how far you actually went. Nice little tool I think…

Well, as always, I felt great after the run and my back actually felt much better today then on Friday. Once we got back we had to hurry and get ready because Dave and I got invited to go the Jets game! I figured we should probably eat something substantial since we were going right to a tailgate, so I reached for the Jiffy corn meal mix! SO GOOD! Time for corn cakes!! Have you ever had them? They are like pancakes, but 10 times better I think. I don’t even think you need butter or syrup on them…they taste THAT good 🙂 Next time you go to the store, look for this…

The game was SO fun! The Jets lost, but it was definitely a good game and what better than a beer and hotdog in hand for an afternoon of football 🙂

Dave and I on our way to the J-E-T-S game!

Go Jets!

After the game, we took the train back to Hoboken and decided to go to dinner at this Mexican place I’ve been dieing to go to!! CHARRITO’S. It’s this little Mexican restaurant, thats BYOB and every time I use to walk by it, it was always packed. Dave and I sat down right away and ordered the guacamole and salsa. They brought the guacamole over, but it was the kind where they made it infront of you!! We got the medium flavored guac, so they threw in some jalapenos, onions, cilantro, some lime juice and salt…ground it all together and spooned out fresh avocado halves to mix in with the other ingredients. It was innncredible! I think the secret is to make sure that you grind all of the ingredients up first to release all the yummy flavors before you put in the avocado.

After that I ordered enchiladas and Dave got a chicken borrito…both again, amazing! By that time, we were both absolutely stuffed, so we got the check and headed out.

I was so upset because I completely forgot to take pictures! I think I was so hungry and excited that everything else escaped my mind! haha. I’ll have to go again anyway because we didn’t realize it was BYOB, so we asked for sangria and they totally shot us down! Next time we’ll know to bring the wine 🙂

I just love Funday Sundays 🙂 Don’t you??!

Surprise Breakfast!

Already back again!! I got out of bed a little late this morning and woke up to this! Look at the “B”. haha. SO YUMMY!

We just bought a waffle maker, so Dave made waffles with strawberries and whipped cream! They were ammmazing!! Dave  was so sweet and came home the other day with a mini rolling pin he bought me. It’s so cute!! I love it! 🙂

Maybe I’ll make some cookies or a homemade pie soon…I was thinking about making something for Thanksgiving anyway.

I made him pose. haha.

Enjoy!!

Sometimes you need a little push…

I finally got back into my groove last night! Let me be honest..it took awhile for convincing. I was still not feeling 100% after work and Dave was going to go work out so he asked if I wanted to come along. I made a handful of excuses and he just looked at me and said…you would feel MUCH better even if you just walked on the tredmil…basically he wasn’t letting me not go. It got to the point where he would force my tennis shoes on and I would pull them right off after he tried so hard to stuff my feet inside. Eventually he quit…

After the chaos, I watched him get ready for the gym and knew I would feel better if I went…even just for a little. It shows that it’s really all in the mind. So, I immediately got up, put on my running gear and headed to the gym. Once I got there, I actually started getting excited about working out. I was jamming to my Ipod and ended up running 3 miles, doing crunches and back work outs too!

Let me step back a little….I’ve had back problems for almost a year now and I’m not sure how they started. Some doctors say it’s Sciatica, some aren’t really sure. It’s a sharp pain in my lower back, that spreads to my hip/hip flexer and sometimes all the way down the back of my leg to my knee, when it’s really bad. If I walk a lot or run on it for long periods of time, my hip flexer starts to hurt so bad that I can’t walk on run on it normally…I’m usually always limping on it. The best thing I can do is make my back stronger, so I do a few back exercises to strengthen it and  pray that eventually it won’t turn into a bigger problem.

Anyways, I did finally work out after a week of feeling sick and I felt awesome afterwards! Evertime I go now I need to just think of how much better I feel when my workout is finished.

After I worked out I was STARVING, so it was definitely time for dinner! We had some salmon in the freezer that Dave got at TJ, so we took that out, seasoned it with a little salt, pepper, EVOO and I had dill left over from my swordfish, so I sprinkled a little bit of dill ontop as well. We had some sweet potatoes, which I LOVE and they are so good for you, so we sliced them into thin circles, seasoned them with a little bit of salt, pepper, EVOO and rosemary. We stuck them on a baking sheet, preheated the oven to 400, threw them in the oven for 25 to 30 minutes and they were done and absolutely DELISH!

While the salmon was cooking, I whipped up some dill flavored yogurt sauce to put ontop of the salmon, which consisted of greek yogurt (so yummy!), lemon, horseradish, pepper and chopped up dill. It’s soooo yummy 🙂 Last but not least, we made a garlic bread, which my best friend Ashley taught me how to make! It was innnncredible!

Since last night was rainy and cold, we decided to stay in, watch a movie and relax…sometimes that’s my favorite thing to do on rainy days. Hope you all had a good night and I’ll be back soon!!

Thanks again for everyone who reads and who’s posting comments on my blog!! It’s all SO exciting!!! I can’t wait to keep writing more!!!!! xoxo

Here Goes Nothin’

Sorry I left you guys hangin’ last night! I’ve actually been sick lately (had to call out sick from work 2 days this week), so by the time I finished dinner I was exhausted!! After I FINALLY finished setting up the blog, I wanted to figure out what delicious meal I would make for dinner. My boyfriend Dave has been taking care of me while I’ve been sick, so I wanted to thank him and make something special. I think he was pleasantly surprised!

We had swordfish in the fridge that Dave bought at Trader Joe’s and I’ve actually never cooked it before, so I was excited to try something new! It was SO good and SO easy to make! I made lemon herb crusted swordfish on top of a bed of arugula lettuce with fresh grated parmesan cheese. Deeelish!

All you do is spread a light amount of Dijon mustard over one side of the fish, then chop up fresh dill, parsley and chervil (I know I didn’t know what chervil was either, but it’s really good! Has kind of a woodsy flavor to it). Mix all of those herbs together and add some lemon zest to the mixture, press the fish, mustard side directly down into the herbs and make sure the herb mixture sticks..it’s the best part. Heat up a skillet and cook the fish on each side for about 3 to 4 minutes each. That’s it!

To go along with the Swordfish, I saw some Manchego cheese at the store, which I absolutely love, so I decided to make something that I use to eat when I studied abroad in Barcelona. Tomato bread! You cut the bread in slices and then actually squeeze the juices from the tomato onto the bread. Then, drizzle a bit of olive oil over top, season with salt and pepper and place a think slice of Manchego cheese ontop…I’m telling you its the best bread you’ll ever have!! Everytime I make it it’s gone in seconds!

Then, one last dish! Have to indulge a litttttle, right? I saw this angel food cake in the store and had to get it. It’s one of mine and Dave’s favorites. I chopped up some strawberries and put them on top with a little squirt of whipped cream. Perfect ending to a scrumptious meal!

Well thats all I have now, but I’ll be back later on this week. I need to start running again soon, but since I’ve been feeling sick I had to rest of my bug first. Hopefully I’ll get back into the swing of things soon. Have a great night!!

Newbie

Welcome everyone!!

Well, I just figured out two new things. How to start a blog and how absoutely indecisive I am!! I knew what I wanted to write about, but I couldn’t figure out a name for the blog! Ashley Spencer, one of my best buds and I chatted on IM coming up with one name after another. I liked them all..but this one finally stuck! Well anyways, I will be cooking up something tonight, so I want to save the real blog for later. So excited to be a part of the blogging world! Stay tuned…