Restaurant Week in Charm City!

Restaurant Week and my sister's birthday are both this week. In honor, we will be having dinner at Jack's Bistro.  Unfortunately, when I looked up the special menu for this week I found this picture.  It looks like some kind of George Orwell nightmare. Now I'm just scared.

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Strawberried Peanut Butter

I wanted to offer you my thoughts on New Moon today but I need to get it straight in my head first. So I thought instead I would offer you my thoughts on the candy I ate while watching New Moon. We all know that concession stand prices are out of control; we all bitch about health care price gouging but this is were those of us on "Main Street" are really getting screwed. Seriously. The cost of popcorn alone at the movies is more than my last co-pay.



Since my husband and I are brilliant, and since we had to stop at the store anyway, we picked up some candy while we were there. I was scoping out the rack for some Reese's Sticks (because they are like little packages of gold) but couldn't find any so I decided to just settle for anything with peanut butter. I saw some peanut butter m&m's and grab them. It wasn't until we left the store that my husband made a disgusted face and asked how I could eat "those." I was taken a back at first but just thought it was because he is a weird foreigner.



NEWSFLASH: Dutch people (and possibly all europeans) think we are freaks for thinking that peanut butter is candy. Peanut butter and chocolate together is just totally strange to them. I made his mother try a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup last year when she was visiting us and she totally didn't understand it. Their candy of choice ... wait for it ... black licorice. I truly feel sorry for them.



He eventually pointed out to me that these were not peanut butter m&m's but rather "Strawberried Peanut Butter." I had never heard of such a thing! But decided it would probably taste like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in a chocolatey morsel of candy coated goodness and I was all for it.



Let it be known that they were fabulous and I would not only buy them again if given the chance but highly recommend them to all I know.

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Simpson's Pumpkins

Speaking of pumpkins ... check out the brilliant pumkpins my friends made last week. They aren't really very "Spooky" and they aren't really "Carved" and they aren't really even "Pumpkins" but still.





I don't know where they found the idea but they were executed perfectly. Marge's hair is cotton balls spray painted blue. Love it.

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Sorry, We Got Old

Yesterday I had planned to carve pumpkins for Halloween with my husband and our friend Will (yes, this is the Will of "SMORES" fame.) My husband had never carved a jack-o-lantern in his life ... can you believe that tragic shit? In his defense they do not celebrate Halloween in his mother-land but still. Luckily we had just watched the Food Network Challenge - Pumpkin Carving so he was all set. Our first order of business was where to buy the pumpkins. Will wanted to punk out and buy them from the grocery store but I wasn't going to stand for that. Even though it was a bit drizzly and gray outside I got the boys to go to the family farm down the street. Unfortunately, when we pulled into the drive-way and made our way down the long gravely road we ended up in front of a sad little sign made with an old piece of cardboard and a sharpie that read:

"Sorry, We Got Old. We're Out of Business"

Gotta love the honesty. So we pulled a u-turn and decided to go to another family-run farm a little further away. Once we got there the boys got pretty into it; we took about 20 or 30 minutes picking out our pumpkins and then hauling them back to the car. At this point my husband decided we needed a meal break (even though we were only 10 minutes from our house and had only been out for less than an hour.) So we took a detour and hit the IHOP before going home. I must admit it was a good idea though, the pumpkin pancakes were delish. Once back to the house it was several hours of slimey-bliss. Both boys ended up with cuts that probably should have ended them up in the ER for a few stitches but we were way to focused on the pumpkins so they decided to just walk-it-off. Will spent about 4 minutes actually "carving" his pumpkin and the next three hours staring at it. Edo and I had slightly more intricate designs that took quite a bit longer, especially considering we didn't have any of the proper utensils. Will didn't even have a vegetable peeler! Who lives without a vegetable peeler?? So Edo spent an hour scrapping the top half of his pumpkin with a big old cheese grater and I spent the majority of my time scrapping mine with a dinner spoon! Let me tell you, I was working up a serious sweat too; you can't even imagine how much elbow grease it takes to scrape the skin off a pumpkin with a freaking table spoon. In the end I think they all turned out great. I'll get more pictures on Halloween with them actually lit but for now here they are in all their glory.

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A Boy Named Lynn

This week's episode of Top Chef was the BEST EVER! My favorite chef-testant (yes, I said it) was once again the winner. Kevin has the best beard ever seen on this show so he was destined to be my favorite - plus he cooks okay too.

The challenge was to prepare food for the Pork & Pinot festival. The winning dish was Pork Leg Terrine with Pickled Cherries. I have no idea what the hell terrine is and it looks kinda like spam but if you're into that kind of thing or if you're into hot Italian accents check out this video of season 7's Fabio preparing the dish.

But the best part of the episode was the guest judge ... who knew that Mr. Belvedere went on to become a James Beard Award winning chef!?!?!?! Seriously that blew my mind right there. I knew this guy was a top-notch thespian but a great chef too? Talk about a modern day renaissance man!

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The Great Salsa-Off 2009

The girls in my office have an addiction to Chipotle. I was never a big fan myself but they have converted me (it wasn't really an option). They also love to bring in food to share so for several weeks now I've been talking about bringing in my homemade salsa. Finally last weekend I bought the ingredients. Of course it was going to have to wait a few days because Monday we were having lunch catered by Physician's office again, then Tuesday we had planned on ordering pizza because a local place has a super cheap Tuesday special. Wednesday I couldn't do it because I was leaving early for a doctor's appointment (that's a whole story on it's own). So finally Thursday I was able to bring it in.


That morning I was riding up in the elevator with the office accountant, she commented on the big lunch I had brought in. I explained that it was salsa and chips for the department and she said "Oh! I brought in salsa that I made too."

Bitch was clearly trying to steal my thunder.

So I decided it was going to need to be a Salsa-Off. Each of our containers were placed on a desk with a bowl of chips and a score card. Another girl in the office proceeded to send an email around letting everyone know there was salsa available in the negligence department for anyone who would like to participate in the judging.

Now, I don't know what your workplace is like but the people I work with are no joke when it comes to free food. It was literally impossible for me to get any work done for the next hour (not that I minded) and keep in mind this was at 8:30 am.

I'm pleased to announce that my salsa won by a landslide MWUAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

And the recipe couldn't be easier ...


Equal Parts:
Black Beans
Diced Tomato
Chopped Red Onion
Corn (preferrably white not that nasty yellow business)
Seasoning to taste:
Red Wine Vinegar
Cilantro
Salt & Pepper

While we're on the topic of chips & dip I'd like to share one of my favorite definitions from Urban Dictionary ...
Rescue Chip (noun): A rescue chip is the chip you use to fish the bits of the first one that broke apart in the dip.

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Bits & Pieces

I've been uninspired lately with the posting - I apologize. I thought I would throw out a few highlights (or low-lights in some cases) of my last few days. So, in no particular order:

1. My office had a party planned for Monday afternoon this week. Well, to be fair, they called it a "Meeting" but lets be realistic; it was from 12:00 - 4:00, it was being catered, there were games planned and it was AT THE FREAKING PARK, so I'm going with party on this one. For some reason though, the partners decided to take up about 3 hours of our party time talking about the firm's "Core Values" and "Case Goals" and new "Attorneys" and new "Office Locations" and all kinds of other nonsense that did not involve the word "Cake" so I was pissed.

2. Once we finally got to the games it was a hot mess. The highlight of which was "Marshmallow Golf" no surprise, it was one of the favorites. A bunch of lawyers gathered in a park with golf clubs and tees and a crowd of amateurs - they were in Hog Heaven - everyone of them felt like Tiger Woods when they hit the living shit out of those poor marshmallows. The rest of us pretty much just took our turns swinging and missing but we were fine with it. Somehow my friend Will actually won - he credited the fact that he had played mini-golf with his girlfriend the night before. I don't think the partners were too pleased that this was all it took to overcome their endless hours of schmoozing and putting on courses like Pebble Beach for the last 25 years. I say - SUCK IT GENTLEMEN!

3. Highlight of the highlight - when Will stepped up for the game winning drive he yelled "Smores!" Get it? Smores? Like "Fore" but b/c we were hitting marshmallows he said "smores" ... like the campfire treat ... get it ? it rhymes! You might not think its that funny but damn it if he didn't make me pee my pants.

4. After work I had to go pretty much straight over to a funeral service for my friend's 92 year old grandmother. It was the nicest service I've ever been to - not depressing like they usually are. Probably b/c she was 92! She lived a good long life; most people can only hope for that. But I was tired as shit after my "meeting" that day and I couldn't wait to get home and go to bed. Sleep is good.

5. I was so tired this morning that I forgot to bring a lunch to work with me. And I have a 45 minute commute so going home for lunch is not an option. Plus, I carpool with the above mentioned Will, so I wouldn't be able to leave the office and pick something up either. I was stuck with eating a blueberry pop-tart from my bottom desk drawer. But I got lucky! We had a "seminar" today which basically just involved an doctor bringing us free lunch so we would think about sending some of our clients his way for treatment. Score. There were individually bagged lunches each with a sandwich, salad/chips, cookie & soda/water. They were neatly labeled on the outside. I chose a ham sandwich with a caesar salad, water and a cookie. Not bad right?? Wrong. The salad and water were good - but the sandwich was on some ridiculous tree-hugger bread. It wasn't really bread at all it was birdseed with some dough holding it together and giving it a bread-like shape. I picked at it for about 20 minutes - tried to take a few bites and gave up. I figured I would cut my losses and move on to the cookie. How bad can a cookie be? It was oatmeal which I like, it had raisins which I'm ok with, it also had Craisins which I don't like. Again with all the fruits and nuts?!?! Can't I just get a G.D. cookie?? I ate maybe 1/4 of it and gave up. Ugh. I polled the rest of the office and everyone else enjoyed there's - I only found one other loser that was stuck with the bird seed bread, she was equally depressed.

6. To end this post on a happy note: My husband just turned on Food Network and Emeril is making Banana's Foster Bread Pudding! Seriously, how much do you want to taste that?

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The Amazing Bento

What was your favorite subject in grade school? Most kids would say recess, which is nothing if not honest. But what about lunch?

Lunch was the shit people.

Each August, the day my sister and I went to the store to pick out our new lunch boxes was simultaneously the most exciting and most stressful day of my life (yes, my anxiety disorder started at a young age - but I digress) The lunch box had to be super cool, but not the most popular thing because then every other kid would have it too. It had to be original. And it could not be too babyish - I mean as eight year olds we all still watched The Smurfs but we weren't going to admit it to each other and walking through the class with a public announcement that you did was social suicide. I can still remember the purple Mickey & Minnie Mouse gem that was the shining star of my third grade existence. But imagine if your parents sent you off with one of these boxes -> I mean the colors are cute enough but seriously ... L-A-M-E. But these little boxes hold a secret; a secret that would instantly make you the King or Queen of the lunch room and the envy of the entire student body. These are Bento boxes. Have you heard of Bento? If not, wiki defines it as "a single-portion takeout or home-packed meal common in Japanese cuisine. [...] Although bento is readily available in many places throughout Japan [...],it is still common for Japanese homemakers to spend considerable time and energy producing an appealing boxed lunch." But even from this definition you cannot appreciate the magic that is - Bento. Imagine now, that you opened that innocent looking box to reveal this ...

I discovered Bento several months ago on 'adventures in bento making'. I was instantly amazed. She makes one of these almost everyday. Sometimes for herself and sometimes for her husband but often for her children. Some of my favorites are the ones which were inspired by the tv show LOST. I have posted a few below but you must go visit her site and check out the gallery for yourself.

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On the down side, as an eight year old I would probably rather die than eat the amount of broccoli that she includes in these things but at least I would die as the kid with the coolest lunch.

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M&M Wars

I found this on the web while on my "lunch break" at work today ....


"Whenever I get a package of plain M&Ms, I make it my duty to continue the strength and robustness of the candy as a species. To this end, I hold M&M duels.

Taking two candies between my thumb and forefinger, I apply pressure, squeezing them together until one of them cracks and splinters. That is the "loser," and I eat the inferior one immediately. The winner gets to go another round.

I have found that, in general, the brown and red M&Ms are tougher, and the newer blue ones are genetically inferior. I have hypothesized that the blue M&Ms as a race cannot survive long in the intense theater of competition that is the modern candy and snack-food world.

Occasionally I will get a mutation, a candy that is misshapen, or pointier, or flatter than the rest. Almost invariably this proves to be a weakness, but on very rare occasions it gives the candy extra strength. In this way, the species continues to adapt to its environment.

When I reach the end of the pack, I am left with one M&M, the strongest of the herd. Since it would make no sense to eat this one as well, I pack it neatly in an envelope and send it to M&M Mars, A Division of Mars, Inc., Hackettstown, NJ 17840-1503 U.S.A., along with a 3x5 card reading, "Please use this M&M for breeding purposes."

This week they wrote back to thank me, and send me a coupon for a free 1/2 pound bag of plain M&Ms. I consider this "grant money." I have set aside the weekend for a grand tournament. From a field of hundreds, we will discover the True Champion.

There can be only one."



Gotta Love it :)

Click here for the original posting.

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