Archive for January 1st, 2010
Us vs. The Cookie Dough
For lunch Adam surprised me with Annie..well, Annie’s organic mac and cheese.
What’s a classic partnership with mac and cheese? Well, hotdogs..duh!
I managed to make this a colorful meal by munching on carrots and half a bag of cooked spinach. Mmmm..
I cooked the spinach with a very small amount of EVOO, onion powder, garlic powder, and S&P.
We used the all-natural hotdogs I had scrounged for at the grocery store. I never read labels before but I got chills, hotdog is the notorious “stuff what you can into a meat product” item. The organic meat hotdogs were three times the price of regular and well, Adam is harder to convince on that subject and I couldn’t blame him. For a dollar more I found an all-natural hotdog that, while not organic, did not use hormones in their meat and had some pretty good stats. Lesson learned: READ LABELS!!! You can find decent alternatives to notoriously “bad” foods. Plus these hotdogs were DELICIOUS! Sooo good.
I was going to meet Adam at a coffee shop down the street but given the torrential downpour, I stayed home and rested. I did not sleep well last night AT ALL. I had read once that alcohol may keep you awake, I researched and found this on Women’s Health magazine’s website which told me that while alcohol makes you drowsy, it keeps you from falling into deeper levels of sleep. Hence, why I was tossing and turning all night! I only had a couple glasses of wine and a glass of prosecco but that’s more then I usually have at once and I think it was definitely a factor.
For dinner, we headed to Adam’s parents house. I spent time with my mother-in-law Kay, while Adam headed out to do some work.
I had a sweet potato with a little butter and S&P, green beans with slivered almonds, mushrooms, and steak. Steak isn’t my favorite, I ate about half of this. I love filet, but most steak is too fatty for me. I just had the texture. This was delicious, but I still only need a few bites of it.
When the boys headed out, Kay and I set out to conquer this:
My mom made this for them, it’s a cookie mix. She then hand wrote the recipe out.
She found this on Food Network’s website. There were a whole bunch of recipes, cute huh?
Problem is, they sort of described the directions wrong. Or they didn’t explain them enough. See, there is cocoa powder in the mix. Well, they called for Dutch-process cocoa powder which has baking powder included. Most people just use regular and I’m not sure if my mom did this but the first batch didn’t spread or rise AT ALL. They ended up being “Super Chunk Balls” which sound fun, but they were too crumbly. I googled(TGFG..thank goodness for Google) and found the reviews which told me that lots of people had the same issue. The dough was SO dry and dame out crumbly.
I added another egg and a splash of milk, if you’re a baker you know that you mix the wet first and the dry first and then usually combine in some order. So this was risky, but it was that or stick with what we had which were yummy, but missing something.
The second batch was SUPER tasty, even if they didn’t look too appetizing.
Kay and I then watched (500) Days Of Summer:
I LOVED this movie! The music, first of all, LOVE! I need this soundtrack. It’s also very different, which I really like but not done in a cheesy way at all. It reminded me of one of my favorite movies, Garden State. Although they were nothing alike, if that makes sense. Just very creative and funny. I love Zooey Deschanel too. I highly recommend this movie!
I am now typing from the dining room table. Aka the “office/dining room/flower holder” Adam bought me flowers, he apologized that they were carnations but there are some daisies in there. Either way, he bought me flowers and no matter what kind they are I am so thankful. 
One of my goals is to do blog work here so that I am not always on the computer, which can happen when I blog from the couch, which I usually do. This will help me focus. So yay.
Oh and tomorrow is my Dad’s birthday!
{Happy Birthday DAD!! <33 Love you!}
Goodnight!
Katy
6 comments January 1, 2010
The Final Meal of 2009
Well, my final meal of the year was a four-courser and I delighted in it to the fullest!
Before I dive into the feast, I will recap my breakfast this morning.
I could NOT sleep for the life of me last night, I tossed and turned SO much! A nap may be in store very very soon!
Breakfast this morning was…what I could find. I wanted eggs but we were out. 
It’s the beginning of the month so our budget is replenished. Grocery shopping will commence this weekend!
I had a half-cheese sammie. I toasted a piece of bread and spread a little smart balance on but once I realized we didn’t have eggs, I microed it with a slice of reduced-fat provolone cheese and folded in half. I also had three pieces of turkey bacon and a clementine. This clementine was pretty dry though and I didn’t eat much of it.
I did drink the yummy glass of 1/2 white grape/pomegranate juice and 1/2 H2O though!
Onto last night! We met up with my in-laws at Roy’s. I love the atmosphere of this place. It’s Hawaiian fusion cuisine. I love it!
One of the things I love about this place is that instead of bread, they serve complimentary edamame! It’s salted and, according to their website also has a little sugar and japanese red pepper seasoning. So yummy with a slightly spicy kick. I snacked on a lot of these. We ordered another plate after this one.
My first drink was my signature favorite, an amaretto sour. It’s super sweet and tastes just like candy. I limited myself to this one, since it was so large!
With dinner, we brought our own wine. (Great money saving tip) It’s only a $15 uncorking fee! Adam brought back tons of wine when he lived in Italy and times he visited, this is at least worth $100 and he spent probably the equivalent of $40 on it. Pretty good deal!
We drank a 2003 Barolo. Oh..my..gosh. Unbelievably good! The aromatics were incredible, and it was just the perfect red wine. Not too heavy for the seafood we ate and not too dry either. It was wonderful.
They had a special menu for New Year’s Eve and a welcome note in the menu for the evening..
I was so ready for this culinary journey.
My first glass of wine.
We got to choose one item from four sections. I started with the crispy duck spring rolls. The four of us shared mostly everything!
I ate two of these.
Adam ordered froie gras which is goose liver. I have never had it before and these days I won’t say no to trying much. It was amazingly buttery with a light crispy sear on it. Really good.
This was my sample plate..I had some shrimp with a little bit of white cheddar grits with roasted pepper as well as half a duck dumpling.
I chose the lobster bisque which was a lot thinner then most bisques BUT it also had large chunks of lobster which you won’t find in many lobster bisques. It was good but I barely made a dent in it. It was made with chive oil as well as applewood smoked bacon which I got bits of as I ate, the salty smokiness worked so well with the cream and buttery taste of the lobster.
Adam ordered a mushroom consomme which was so meaty and delicious.
For my main course I ordered the “Mochi dusted Hawaiian Opakapaka” which was served with a sweet potato puree, bok choy, and carrots in a “macadamia nut garlic Meuniere sauce”.
According to “The Gutsy Gourmet” a meuinere sauce is brown butter, parsley, salt, and fresh lemon juice.
It was incredibly good.
The fish was a very mild, pacific crimson snapper. The sweet potato and bok choy sold me on this dish and nothing on this plate dissapointed. I couldn’t make a huge dent on it, because I was getting so stuffed! I ate about 1/3 of the fish, all of the sweet potato, one half of the bok choy and the carrots. The sauce was delicious.
I also had a bite of lobster risotto. Yum!
We were feeling sleepy from all of the food, so before dessert I ordered an espresso..mmm..
For dessert, I chose..
“The Study of Chocolate Decadence”
I mean, can you say no to a dessert with a name like that?
A chocolate truffle, a chocolate torte with a peanut butter center, and both white and dark chocolate fudge in a raspberry sauce.
I ate half each. It was SO rich!
I also had a few bites of Adam’s dessert..
“A Macadamia Nut Financier Cake” which had vanilla ice cream, and a fig syrup.
His was super delicious as well, I enjoyed a taste of the cake and fig syrup as well as a few bites of his ice cream. So nice of him to share! 
After dinner we headed to a local restaurant that Adam’s father and brother play at and I had a glass of prosecco to celebrate the New Year.
We went to a party afterwards but we left when some of our friends did since we didn’t know many people there and were home by 11:30.
We were exhausted and I was happy to be with Leo and my husband and watch Friends. We watched the ball drop and stayed up a little bit longer.
What a great last day of 2009. The first day of 2010 is feeling like a day of rest, hey I have a WHOLE YEAR to get ready for!!
Katy
4 comments January 1, 2010
