food

cooking pet peeves

by Lara on February 23, 2010

in decor

Damn food posts! I have nowhere else to talk about food though!

I have some serious cooking/kitchen pet peeves and here they are.

Not using teflon-safe cooking tools on non-stick pans. If you are going to spend good money on non-stick pans, then treat them with respect! There are a ton of fancy silicone coated whisks and tongs out there now for dirt cheap. I got a pair of tongs at IKEA for a few bucks and a nice Italian coated whisk for $3 at Marshalls. Heat safe spatulas are awesome. Wooden spoons are a dime a dozen and come in a ton of sizes. For god’s sake, you can even use chopsticks that came free with your take-out. Just never never never use metal utensils on your coated pots and pans! (Don’t get me started on cutting things inside your non-stick pan. I’ve seen it and it broke my heart.)

Not using a splatter screen when frying or boiling a sauce. Who cleans the kitchen? If you don’t use a splatter screen, you’re probably not the one cleaning the kitchen. Make everyone’s life easier. You can get the damn things for $1 at the dollar store. Seriously. Get one.

Splatter screens lead up nicely to not cleaning up after yourself. This is of course especially important when you live with others* or… you just don’t want to be a filthy pig. Of course, you don’t always want to go clean the kitchen and dishes after a big meal and you’re just wanting to relax but, get on it the very next day for crying out loud. When you cook, there are a lot of spaces in between the process when you’re standing around doing nothing. This is when you should really be cleaning up after yourself. It’s called being efficient.

Not following the slices. What? Okay, say you’ve baked a ham and it’s sitting in your fridge. You’ve been cutting nice cross-section slices for sandwiches and someone comes along and hacks a chunk of ham off the top. Or, you have a stick of butter in a dish and while you cut normal pats, someone decides to scrape butter off the top (and leave crumbs! oh the horror)! This is annoying. If you didn’t cook it or buy it, follow the slices.

Not closing or sealing up something you open. I bought a box of crunchy cookies and a bag of chips. I would like them to be fresh and crunchy tomorrow as well. You can buy a sack of 50 clothespins at Target for $1.50. No lie.

Not throwing away an empty container. Did I just try to pour milk from an empty carton?! You lazy jerk!

*Note: This is in no way passive-aggressively directed towards my bf, whom I live with. He is incredibly clean and considerate and that’s part of the reason why I love him and can live with him w/out wanting to kill him.

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Happy New Year!

by Lara on January 5, 2010

in art,decor

Hey there! Phew! The holidays are OVER! I hope everyone survived unscathed and is ready to take on this great new year!

My blog posts have been few and far between lately with all that’s been going on. Here’s what I’ve been up to this past month.

First off, if you didn’t know already, I am my mom’s primary caregiver. She has M.S. and I also help run my father’s construction company and take care of their home, the house I grew up in. So, not only did I have to get my own apartment ready for x-mas and keep the cheer alive there, I had to do it at my folks’ house as well. Taking care of two homes is exhausting enough as it is but during the holidays, I go into this insanely hyper-efficient Martha Stewart mode and it takes a toll on me once it’s all done.

So, yeah, I cleaned and decorated 2 places which meant that once I opened the storage closet, I had to organize that as well. I had to haul everything to my place and then haul it all back after I took it down (since we don’t have enough storage space).

I baked 7 dozen mini pecan tarts, 12 dozen oatmeal cookies and 6 pounds of fudge. That all went in a bunch of tins to give away. I don’t know how I managed to lose weight this month but I did. I guess running around like a maniac will do that to you.

I painted a blatant rip off of this painting by Hannah Stouffer, only I used oranges, reds and browns, which is now in our livingroom.

Then there was shopping… well planned out shopping spread out over 2 months so I wouldn’t be broke come Christmas. Since we were going up to NOVA the day after Christmas to see the bf’s family, I had to add them to the list as well. We had a really nice visit and I finally met his sister after a whole year! She’s awesome.

I got the bf a Navy issue peacoat and books, and treats and tshirts, some xbox thing, and more silly treats. He got me those flashy Onitsuka Tigers with the gold on them that I have been coveting for months as well as a Marimekko shower curtain and fabric panel I plan on stapling to a canvas. Oh, and he told his sister to get me this sweet sweet mounted deer head wall decal from Decor Designs on Etsy. The one I have is like the center one. It’s above a door so along with the painting, we’re getting a real ski lodge effect in there!

“Hetkiä/Moments” shower curtain

“Pelimanni” fabric panel designed by Iiro A. Ahokas

Since my mom can’t shop, I pick out things I want (which is sad and awesome at the same time) so, she hooked me up with a bunch of matching bra and panty sets which I was in desperate need of, a fresh bottle of Kenzo Amour, a handbag, and a few things I’ve mentioned already.

My father made us a round wood kitchen table. Six months in our apartment together and we were still eating on the sofa. My dad makes reproduction Chippendale style furniture and truly hates clean modern design so, he had to put his stank on the base, which really isn’t our thing but oh well, it’s a table and I’m thankful.

We ordered 2 of these chairs and just got them on Monday, from of all places Sears! Seriously, they have a line that’s attempting to compete with Ikea-style design. They’re completely awesome and we’re ordering 2 more this week. They go great in the living room as well so, we will probably keep 2 in there until we have people over for dinner.

It snowed about 10 inches the weekend before Christmas. So there were magical walks and lots of cozying up and staying in. I loved every minute of it!

my neighborhood

New Years Eve, we decided to keep it low key and avoid the insanity. I fixed a big steak dinner and we took a walk around our neighborhood with a giant mimosa in a plastic container and shared earbuds, listening to music and looking at Christmas lights. It was magical until we witnessed a 3 car accident right at the intersection we were about to cross. Luckily, the bf grabbed the back of my coat before I darted out. My hero!

This past week, I got a wild hair to tackle my parents’ basement, again, but way more seriously than I ever had before. I swear, my father should be on Hoarders. Only, he actually collects antiques with inherent value and they are over running my parents’ home. I have sorted, organized, wrapped and boxed tons of stuff in sturdy plastic boxes instead of the open dusty torn cardboard boxes everything was thrown in. Old toys, trains, antique tools, pottery, old kitchen gadgets, you name it. Then the closets down there needed to get cleaned out so I could get the boxes in there. Holy crap. I filled a huge trashcan in one afternoon and there have been two enormous car loads to the Goodwill truck this week already and it’s just Tuesday.

This Spring I plan to start painting the entire interior of my parents’ home and convince my father to redo the outdated bathrooms and replace my mom’s bedroom carpet with hardwood flooring. It WILL be done.

Oh, and have you seen the Valentine’s Day stuff in the stores already? OMG.

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+ & -

by Lara on October 30, 2009

in + & -

Comments! I love them! Leave one and introduce yourself! When you comment, I get to see YOUR blog if you have one, and this my friends, is how great relationships begin! I just recently received a comment from Sarah whose blog yes and yes, I had never seen before and well… it’s awesome… and I’m mentioning it here! So there you go!
The Botany of Desire was on PBS this week and I loved it. It’s a documentary based on the book by Michael Pollan. It talks about how 4 plants that have satisfied humans (apples, potatoes, tulips and marijuana) have thrived and expanded across the world because of our efforts. If you’re into plants, into history, into genetics, into evolution, into the world, check it out. You can watch it online.
This is both a plus and a minus – I’m not dressing up in a costume this Halloween. It’s a plus because the planning, expense, and usually the sewing can get to be a little overwhelming. It’s a minus because costumes really bring out the nut in me and they’re soooo much fun! Here are some pics from Halloweens past -

This was a zentai tiger suit I ordered off of eBay in 2006. I cut the face out of it but was constantly having to readjust. This costume got a lot of milage at a lot of super fun parties. The nose was a pain but I loved the annonymity. It was skin tight and some chick came up and told me I was “really brave” for wearing it. Compliment? I hope so.

In 2007, I repurposed an old bridesmaid dress and made the Bjork swan dress. Such a pain to sew! Miles of various types of white tulle strips and at the last minute I magically found a yard of white feather ribbon edging for the bodice part. That really made it. It was great going to parties and everyone running up to you knowing who you were.

Last year, I finally made a super cuddly hamster costume after talking about it for forever. It was beyond comfortable and I loved wearing sneakers all night. I also made a blinding pink bunny suit for a friend out of the same pattern at the last minute one evening. We took over the town. Everyone wanted to hug me and I wanted to hug them back!

I have had this first pair of Givenchy shoes from the Spring 2010RTW collection bookmarked for almost a month but hadn’t had the time to look at the rest of the collection. The clothing (and those god-awful hats) didn’t do a thing for me but holy cow these wedges! So ideal. Have I told you before how much I love a wedge? Like a million times! I wish affordable amazing wedges were more readily available!

via style.com

Grilled Romaine lettuce just seems so wrong to me! I hear it’s very good though.
After getting my laptop back from being repaired, my external hard drive (that I backed everything up on) won’t work. (Something about partitions and all this other computer garble that I don’t plan on teaching myself.) Well, I tried to hook it up to my folks’ desktop and it too is saying that it needs to be reformatted – meaning I will lose everything. So, I downloaded a freeware version of a data recovery program and everything was working well. The items on my external were being recognized, I could see it all in front of me, then the error reports started popping up (something got corrupted which explains why it wouldn’t work on the desktop either) and just when I was ready to transfer all the items I had painstakingly hand clicked on… the “freeware” program directed me to a website to pay $50 to complete the transfer. What a flippin crock!
Twinings African Rooibos red tea tastes like bug spray. It seriously tastes like Raid!
Zombieland was a huge waste of time. The previews were incredibly misleading. There was hardly any zombie killing. Who goes to a zombie movie not wanting to see excessive zombie violence? The female characters (I hate to say it) were unnecessary - very cunning at the beginning, emo in the middle, and pathetically stupid and needing a man’s rescue at the end. The awkward emo guy was obviously cast as some poor excuse for a Michael Cera wannbe. Bill Murray’s bloated self-indulgent cameo was terrible. Weak. So weak.

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cats and fat

by Lara on October 15, 2009

in beauty

I’m going to take a break from sharing awesome things with you, to talk about food.

First, let me tell you about my 2 cats. Ringo is about 9 years old. I received him when he was 2 weeks old, abandoned by his mother. The vet said he wouldn’t make it but we showed ‘em what was up! I bottle fed him every 4 hours for 6 weeks and he was my little champion. Ringo had and still has a love affair with food. He wanted to try everything I ate and I did the huge mistake of letting him have little tastes when he was young.

He is constantly hungry. He begs when I eat like he’s a dog. He cries all day and night for more, for treats, for tastes, for anything! This is all my fault.

Years ago, he got a terrible urinary tract infection… and another. He was placed on prescription cat food that he must remain on for the rest of his life. (He is susceptible to a type of crystal in his urine and has some anatomical issues.) The vet was negligent and kept him on the first treatment phase of Rx cat foot for way too long and he gained a TON of weight that he has been unable to get rid of. When I finally got him onto the 2nd phase of lifetime maintenance food, it was too late and he was and still is almost 30 pounds. Blood work has shown that he’s healthier than I am. He’s just a fat cat. I have tried to cut the daily intake of his cat food but that led to a big scare with some blood in his urine so he went back to the full portions and we just have to let him be fat and happy instead of trim and sick.

Now, my other cat Nibbles is different story. I got her from a rescue organization when she was completely weened at 8 weeks old. I learned from my mistakes in creating a food beggar and never offered her tastes. Her own cat food is sufficient. Her life doesn’t revolve around eating. She eats when she’s hungry, absolutely refuses human food, and her own kibble is simply a source of fuel and she gets on with life. I think there’s a lot to be said for this.

I have always been a petite person and I was able to eat whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted and nothing seemed to phase me. I was tiny and I made everyone around me sick. Then, as I approached 30, I noticed my metabolism changing a bit and I gained about 15 pounds that I’m totally fine with. I’ve held steady at about 120-125 (give or take depending) for about 4 years. I’m only 5’1″ but I feel like I look healthier and I feel more womanly. Sure, I think about shedding 5 vanity pounds once in a while but I haven’t really tried to do anything productive about it and as long as my size 27 J Brands still fit me, I’m okay. My body image is just fine.

Well, last year, I had my annual physical and my triglycerides were a bit high. I went nuts and all at the same time, I addressed my insomnia with meds (quit taking them), I quit smoking on Chantix (lasted 3 months), joined a gym (went a few times), saw a therapist (twice) and started eating healthier (for a while). I did too much too soon and lost momentum really fast. A few weeks ago I went for my latest physical and found out that my cholesterol (LDL-P to be exact) was at heart attack levels… seriously through the damn roof! It has scared the living hell out of me!

I guess for a good third of my food intake, I have eaten like a fat man at a Super Bowl party. Cheesesteaks, hot wings, cheesecake, hawaiian burgers, cheese, rare steak fromage, BBQ, more cheese, big bacony weekend breakfasts, blue cheese dressing, butter, whole milk, goat cheese pizza, mindless snacking, late night eating… oh my god cheese! Well, it’s all had to change. I was told I can’t exceed 30 grams of total fat a day for the next 6 months, until I get a follow-up test to determine if diet alone won’t work and I can thank my parents’ genes and get put on Lipitor like a friggin old person.

Do you know what 30 grams of fat a day looks like? 1 slice of cheese is about 8 grams. 3 slices of bacon is about 12. 2 tablespoons of peanut butter is 16. One lousy hotdog or a boneless skinless chicken breast is 15. This is not taking into account the gram here and the 2 grams there in just about everything else, which really adds up fast.

So yeah, I have to familiarize myself with all of these numbers and keep a running tally in my head all day long. I have to get the most nutritional bang for my bite. Why would I shove a piece of string cheese in my mouth at 6 grams of fat when I could have a filling, more nutritionally sound Morningstar Farms black bean burger on a wheat bun with bean sprouts, mustard, and a slice of low-fat provolone for about 10 grams? This is now my life. I’m okay with this. Really I am.

I started thinking about my cat Nibbles. Food is fuel. Plain and simple. Using food as a cure for boredom, or as a way to comfort myself was obviously killing me. I’m not a nut and I’m certainly not going to deny myself treats every now and then (because I would hate life) but instead of the entire Tiramisu (once in a blue moon), I will allow myself a few indulgent bites, savor them, and take the rest home for later. I have to make better choices when eating out and watch my portions. Doggie bags and leftover lunches will be my new best friend. I have to quit eating so quickly, quit eating until I’m uncomfortably full, and quit eating just because someone else is and I’m really not even hungry.

I have to find low-fat replacements for the things I love and simply eat less of it. Poultry instead of red meat, low/non-fat versions of everything, more fiber, oatmeal cereal oatmeal, fruit veggies fruit, vegan/vegetarian options, baked not fried, good fats over bad fats, grass-fed beef instead of corn fed beef when I HAVE to have a steak.

All of these choices are things I should’ve been doing a long time ago. I don’t know who I thought I was kidding. The lab tests don’t lie. They revealed my dirty little secrets of bad eating and now it’s time to take my heart back-considering heart disease is the leading killer of women, killing twice as many women as all forms of cancer combined! And it’s a silent killer. You can feel fine, be skinny as a rail, and drop like a sack of potatoes… a sack of buttery sour cream and bacon laden potatoes.

I’m not even going to get preachy and go into the ethical issues I have been battling with in my head in regards to food, well before the bad news hit. My whole life, I’ve been surrounded by vegans here in Richmond, some more aggressive than others in urging me to see videos of factory farm conditions, and the truth behind the food we eat. Let’s just say that I am going to try my best to avoid high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated anything, antibiotic and hormone riddled meat, and animal products in general. I am going to be more open to educating myself about the better treatment of animals and stop living in denial simply because I love a good pork chop, and I’ll make better choices accordingly.

So, there it is. Nibbles is my hero and I will now look at food as sustenance rather than a source of entertainment and piggish indulgence.

Oh, and it’s time to switch up the food blogs in my RSS reader. Here are some healthy food blogs I have found:

The Healthy Snack Blog

FatFree Vegan Kitchen

The Heart of the Matter

The Expanding Circle

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food genius

by Lara on August 6, 2009

in art

I love to cook and bake and I have often wondered if I should post about this hobby but, I have been reluctant to since there are already so many great foodie blogs out there. Other than mentioning the occasional wondrous eating experience, I can only put my finger in so many pots (hahah) when it comes to this blog.

Finally, Ji from Luxirare has been getting some coverage on one particular food adventure – “pie pops“. Of all the genius culinary creations this girl whips up, it’s her pie pops that are driving people wild. So silly. (Her style is also ballsy as hell, and she designs most of her own insane clothing.) (an interview)

Be amazed at her flawless execution and beautiful photography. Salivate.

Breakfast Tea & Pastries