It's hard to tell because everything is in boxes but I have been a busy bee. I won't know what to do with myself after all of this. I hope everyone has a great rest of their weekend, and I'll see some of you very very soon!
Sunday, October 23, 2011
6 Days and Counting
Today's post will be short and sweet; this is the last full day I have to be productive, so I'm trying my best to make the most of it. The good news is that the end of my to-do list is finally in sight! After a few quick errands, some last minute arts-and-craftsing, packing, and cleaning, we will be almost 100% wedding ready. I just have to make it through 3 more painful days of work and then the fun can begin. Here's a look at the wall that has been dedicated to all the wedding goodies:
It's hard to tell because everything is in boxes but I have been a busy bee. I won't know what to do with myself after all of this. I hope everyone has a great rest of their weekend, and I'll see some of you very very soon!
It's hard to tell because everything is in boxes but I have been a busy bee. I won't know what to do with myself after all of this. I hope everyone has a great rest of their weekend, and I'll see some of you very very soon!
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Recipe Thursday: Ceviche with Chef Carl
This is what a dedicated fiance I am: Not only did I take the time to prep, cook, and blog about this recipe, but I also had to dedicate an entire morning to fishing. Talk about dedication!
This is a super easy recipe. There is no actual 'cooking' involved! All you have to do is gather the ingredients, chop em up, then let it all soak in the fridge for 1 to 3 hours.
The first step to making a delicious ceviche is to go and find one of these:
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| A Carl holding a Redfish. |
I used redfish (aka spot tail, red drum, puppy drum), but you can also use shrimp or any fresh or salt water fish with firm white meat. If you can get ahold of it, I hear wahoo, tuna, or mahi are the tastiest. If you are as sloppy at cleaning fish as I am, here's what you're left with:
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| The filets |
Several salt and fresh water fish have a line of red muscle that runs through the center. Get rid of it. It's not bad for you or anything, but it does have an overpowering fishy flavor. After that, make 1/2 inch cubes out of the filets.
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| Scraps on the left. I can't overstate how much Riley and Melman love fish scraps. |
Here are most of the ingredients:
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| And your stomach begins to growl... |
Ingredients List:
1 - 1 1/2 lbs. fish or shrimp
3/4 cup lime juice
1/4 cup lemon juice
1 small red onion, chopped fine
1 large tomato, chopped
1 jalapeno pepper, seeds and stems removed, chopped fine
1/2 bunch of fresh cilantro, chopped
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
olive oil to taste
3/4 cup lime juice
1/4 cup lemon juice
1 small red onion, chopped fine
1 large tomato, chopped
1 jalapeno pepper, seeds and stems removed, chopped fine
1/2 bunch of fresh cilantro, chopped
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
olive oil to taste
Other optional Ingredients:
Juice from 1/2 an orange (for added sweetness)
1 yellow or green bell pepper, chopped
1/2 cucumber, chopped (for extra crunch)
One thing that makes this recipe so great is that it doesn't require any spices. The flavor of all the fresh ingredients combined is phenomenal. When I was checking out at the grocery store, the cashier looked at me and said, "mmmm, I can just smell all this coming together!" I'm pretty sure you could combine any or all of these ingredients in any way, shape, or form and whatever comes out would be delicious.
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| Everything but the fish. |
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| The fruit of your labor, still missing the fish. |
Question: True or False: Parasites could potentially give you super powers.
This one is tricky. The answer is actually False. For this reason, I let the fish soak in the ceviche at least an hour. The acid of the fruit juice denatures the protein in the fish, which kills all of the cells, parasites, bacteria, etc. If the dish is refrigerated, it can last a day or two, but after marinating for 4 or 5 hours the ingredients start to lose their individual flavors. It's still delectable, but definitely best served fresh! Serve with chips or crackers.
For the record, I got this specific recipe off of the 'cooking your catch' forum on charlestonfishing.com. Try it out!
Monday, October 17, 2011
The Wedding Craziness Has Officially Started (if it hadn't already)
Hello, hello!
Today I embarked on my last full week of work before the wedding! I woke up on time and was even ready early- very uncharacteristic of a Monday morning. I headed to work and was in the car no more than 5 minutes before rear-ending someone. AHHHHHHH!!!! Let me rewind a second to say that the sun in the morning coming down Highway 17 has been absolutely blinding recently. My window was still slightly fogged over and my mind was in another world. Sure enough, you cannot plow through traffic to make it move. I must have done something nice for someone recently because Karma was really on my side today. No damage was done, and the guy didn't even want to take down my information- sweet relief!
I promised that I'd write a wedding advice post, and today seemed like a good day for it. I've been reminiscing over the events of the past year, trying to figure out where all the time has gone. I'm torn between overwhelming excitement for the big day and knowing that it's going to come and go faster than I'd like. How many times in your life do you get to have all your closest family and friends come to the same place at the same time to celebrate you? Not many! I've been trying to savor all the little moments- things that happen that are both firsts and lasts at the same time- that I know I'll look back on someday and smile. That said, here are some little pearls of wisdom that I've gleaned from the whole experience. Everybody's different, so in the end there is no formula for a perfect wedding, but advice never hurt.
*Try to do as much in advance as you possibly can. This is one thing that I've been especially appreciative of these last couple of weeks. I can't really take credit for this one, though- everybody knows I am the queen of procrastination. I have my mom to thank, as well as the crazy wedding scene that is Charleston. We realized early on that things book up far in advance, and so we had to pounce on our vendors while they were still available and make some quick decisions in a few instances. Having the groundwork laid out is key to managing stress levels later on.
*Whenever you make a decision or book a vendor, write it down in the same place (that part is really crucial) as all of your other decisions, etc. Make lists, and make lists for your lists. Also, take note of when payments are due. Normally I'm pretty good at keeping all my information stored and readily available in my various brain compartments, but don't rely on memory! I spent probably an hour the other day weeding through emails and trying to figure out when we needed to pay everybody by- something I could have avoided completely if I'd had taken note of it in the first place. Organization is a must.
*Don't think you need to have every minute detail figured out early on. For instance, the bridal books will tell you to decide on your color scheme in the beginning but this was something that took me months to finally settle on. It's not the end of the world if you change your mind 9000 times about flowers, or soup for the cocktail hour, or what favors to give, or how many tiers to put in your cake. You may start to irritate your vendors, but ultimately they know that it's all about making the bride happy :)
*Never hesitate to ask for advice. A secret: most of my wedding ideas were stolen from other people. It was so nice to let other people do the legwork for me; whether it was a customer at the bank, a friend bored at work, or a vendor with tons of experience, I've been happy to rely on word-of-mouth recommendations, and so far they've all panned out.
*Finally, don't forget yourself in the whole process. I've been really lucky to have family and a fiancee who, for the most part, have let me call the shots and dictate how the whole day will be. I can see how it would be easy to fall into the old people-pleasing trap, but it's not worth it to stress over what everybody else thinks. If people don't like it, they can go have their own wedding.
Anyways, wish me luck as I try to survive this next week without being too much of a threat to the world around me. And stay tuned for Recipe Thursday with a guest post from Chef Carl!
Today I embarked on my last full week of work before the wedding! I woke up on time and was even ready early- very uncharacteristic of a Monday morning. I headed to work and was in the car no more than 5 minutes before rear-ending someone. AHHHHHHH!!!! Let me rewind a second to say that the sun in the morning coming down Highway 17 has been absolutely blinding recently. My window was still slightly fogged over and my mind was in another world. Sure enough, you cannot plow through traffic to make it move. I must have done something nice for someone recently because Karma was really on my side today. No damage was done, and the guy didn't even want to take down my information- sweet relief!
I promised that I'd write a wedding advice post, and today seemed like a good day for it. I've been reminiscing over the events of the past year, trying to figure out where all the time has gone. I'm torn between overwhelming excitement for the big day and knowing that it's going to come and go faster than I'd like. How many times in your life do you get to have all your closest family and friends come to the same place at the same time to celebrate you? Not many! I've been trying to savor all the little moments- things that happen that are both firsts and lasts at the same time- that I know I'll look back on someday and smile. That said, here are some little pearls of wisdom that I've gleaned from the whole experience. Everybody's different, so in the end there is no formula for a perfect wedding, but advice never hurt.
*Try to do as much in advance as you possibly can. This is one thing that I've been especially appreciative of these last couple of weeks. I can't really take credit for this one, though- everybody knows I am the queen of procrastination. I have my mom to thank, as well as the crazy wedding scene that is Charleston. We realized early on that things book up far in advance, and so we had to pounce on our vendors while they were still available and make some quick decisions in a few instances. Having the groundwork laid out is key to managing stress levels later on.
*Whenever you make a decision or book a vendor, write it down in the same place (that part is really crucial) as all of your other decisions, etc. Make lists, and make lists for your lists. Also, take note of when payments are due. Normally I'm pretty good at keeping all my information stored and readily available in my various brain compartments, but don't rely on memory! I spent probably an hour the other day weeding through emails and trying to figure out when we needed to pay everybody by- something I could have avoided completely if I'd had taken note of it in the first place. Organization is a must.
*Don't think you need to have every minute detail figured out early on. For instance, the bridal books will tell you to decide on your color scheme in the beginning but this was something that took me months to finally settle on. It's not the end of the world if you change your mind 9000 times about flowers, or soup for the cocktail hour, or what favors to give, or how many tiers to put in your cake. You may start to irritate your vendors, but ultimately they know that it's all about making the bride happy :)
*Never hesitate to ask for advice. A secret: most of my wedding ideas were stolen from other people. It was so nice to let other people do the legwork for me; whether it was a customer at the bank, a friend bored at work, or a vendor with tons of experience, I've been happy to rely on word-of-mouth recommendations, and so far they've all panned out.
*Finally, don't forget yourself in the whole process. I've been really lucky to have family and a fiancee who, for the most part, have let me call the shots and dictate how the whole day will be. I can see how it would be easy to fall into the old people-pleasing trap, but it's not worth it to stress over what everybody else thinks. If people don't like it, they can go have their own wedding.
Anyways, wish me luck as I try to survive this next week without being too much of a threat to the world around me. And stay tuned for Recipe Thursday with a guest post from Chef Carl!
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Puppy Chow Pictures
Here they are! The best part about puppy chow is that this whole process took about 10 minutes.
This afternoon I'm off to do the trial run for my wedding hair. I can't wait to see how it turns out! Then Carl and I are headed to a cookout that my manager is throwing- hence the puppy chow. I also made a pasta salad. I just sort of winged it, not really knowing what to expect, but I think it turned out okay. I used cheesy tortellini and bow-tie pasta, sauteed yellow squash and zucchini, chopped tomatoes, italian dressing, and parmesan cheese. Hopefully everyone enjoys it.
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| The naked cereal. I bought the Harris Teeter brand and got a kick out of the name: Crisp 6. I always wonder whose job it is to come up with store-brand names that are different from the name brands, but close enough to be able to distinguish what product it's replacing. Whoever came up with Crisp 6 is a genius and deserves a promotion. |
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| Peanut butter, butter, and chocolate chips, all ready to be melted |
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| Coating the cereal. The hardest part is trying not to crush the cereal as you mix it. |
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| Shaken with powdered sugar and ready to go! |
Happy Saturday!
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Recipe Thursday
Tomorrow night I'll be putting together one of my favorite crowd-pleasing snacks: Puppy Chow (aka Muddy Buddies). There's something about Puppy Chow that takes me back to simpler childhood days of yore and makes me want to play dodge ball or Chinese freeze tag for 5 hours straight. Or dress up as a crayon:
Not to mention, I don't think I've come across a single person who doesn't like it. It's very easy: first you melt together butter, peanut butter, vanilla, and chocolate chips. Add this to Chex Mix or Crispix and then toss in a plastic bag with powdered sugar until the cereal is coated. Pour into a big bowl and serve to your salivating friends and family. I'll post pictures as soon as I make it!
We've been collecting childhood pictures for the wedding and this was one I came across. Great costume.
Not to mention, I don't think I've come across a single person who doesn't like it. It's very easy: first you melt together butter, peanut butter, vanilla, and chocolate chips. Add this to Chex Mix or Crispix and then toss in a plastic bag with powdered sugar until the cereal is coated. Pour into a big bowl and serve to your salivating friends and family. I'll post pictures as soon as I make it!
Monday, October 10, 2011
Fooducate
Happy Monday! This has turned out to be probably the single-most productive weekend of my adult life. My stress levels about the wedding have really gone down, so I'm just going to take a moment and pat myself on the back for conquering my to-do list. If we had any cookies in the house I would also reward myself with one... but alas, no cookies. I'm planning on dedicating a post to talk about all of the wedding preparations and what they've entailed for me. For as many wedding planning guides and magazines as I've read, I can't claim to have stuck to any particular timeline so I thought it might be useful for my friends who have weddings in their not-so distant futures to hear some suggestions and learn from my mistakes. Stay tuned for that!
In the meantime, I wanted to tell everyone about Fooducate. Carl and I have gotten hooked using this really cool iPhone app (it may be available for all smart phones, I don't know for sure). What it does is scan the bar code on your food item and gives it a grade (A, A-, B, etc) based on its ingredients and nutritional value. It will also give you information on "mystery" ingredients that are commonly found on food labels. We spent about a half an hour yesterday scanning every product in our cupboard and refrigerator. Sadly, most of our foods fell somewhere in the B and C range, many of which were labelled as healthy or natural products. For example, I bought a Kashi lunch meal that got a C+. Kashi is expensive but I'm willing to pay for it, given that it's providing me with a nutritious, well-rounded meal. I was disappointed when it only got a C, and probably won't continue to buy their lunch entrees. The app has made us a lot more aware of what we're eating (and it's made us wonder how our bodies are still functioning with all the junk we put in them), and I know it will motivate us to eat a little better. I highly recommend it, and would love to hear about the good food that people have found using it- or foods that we all assumed were good for us but turned out not to be.
In the meantime, I wanted to tell everyone about Fooducate. Carl and I have gotten hooked using this really cool iPhone app (it may be available for all smart phones, I don't know for sure). What it does is scan the bar code on your food item and gives it a grade (A, A-, B, etc) based on its ingredients and nutritional value. It will also give you information on "mystery" ingredients that are commonly found on food labels. We spent about a half an hour yesterday scanning every product in our cupboard and refrigerator. Sadly, most of our foods fell somewhere in the B and C range, many of which were labelled as healthy or natural products. For example, I bought a Kashi lunch meal that got a C+. Kashi is expensive but I'm willing to pay for it, given that it's providing me with a nutritious, well-rounded meal. I was disappointed when it only got a C, and probably won't continue to buy their lunch entrees. The app has made us a lot more aware of what we're eating (and it's made us wonder how our bodies are still functioning with all the junk we put in them), and I know it will motivate us to eat a little better. I highly recommend it, and would love to hear about the good food that people have found using it- or foods that we all assumed were good for us but turned out not to be.
Today I am working on cleaning the house from top to bottom one last time before the wedding. We'll see how far I get before I lose my gusto. As early wedding gifts arrive, our house has become filled with boxes and tissue paper, not to mention the arts and crafts explosion that has taken over the entire kitchen. I've really got my work cut out for me, but coming home to a clean house always helps me to stay unstressed.
And look- we got pumpkins!
We haven't carved them quite yet... I wasn't sure of the shelf life of a carved pumpkin and didn't want them to rot before Halloween. That cute little bench they're sitting on was handmade by Carl's dad, Ernie. There are two pipes coming out of the siding that were really an eyesore (you can just see the bottoms of them here), so this was the perfect solution.
Hope everyone has a great Columbus Day, and my condolences if you did not get the day off. I'm off to continue my cleaning frenzy!
Saturday, October 8, 2011
Cheesecake Factory
Wednesday night a group of us from my training class went to the Cheesecake Factory in Charlotte. I have sort of a love affair going on with CF and am confused as to why there isn't one in Charleston. In my spare time I will write them a letter. I was the weirdo taking pictures of my meal the whole time so that I could share them on here and one day use them to persuade friends and loved ones to eat there with me.
This little beauty was delicious. The Georgia Peach was its name, I believe. Because we all know that every 3000 calorie meal needs a frou-frou drink to go with it.
Keeping with the fall theme, I decided on the carrot cake cheesecake. A digression: is carrot cake actually a fall dessert? I guess the spices in it are similar to other members of the fall dessert family (i.e. pumpkin pie) and so I've always thought of it as one. Anyways, this was quite possibly the hardest decision I've ever had to make. I think that they should offer a cheesecake sampler for indecisive dessert-loving customers like me.
I'm salivating a little as I revisit these... Apparently I neglected to take pictures of the meal itself- you can really tell what I value most in a meal! I ordered the mozzarella and tomato pizzette and a spicy shrimp appetizer, both delicious.
Does anybody have any big plans for the 3 day weekend? My goal is to finish assembling our wedding favors, which is going to be no small feat. I only got 30 done last weekend. Carl was sweet and attempted to help, but arts and crafts doesn't exactly fall into his skill set. I've decided not to post pictures yet and keep everybody in suspense in an effort to maximize the 'ooh' and 'ahh' factor once the wedding comes. Not to toot my own horn or anything but they are 200 times cuter than I imagined them being. On that note, I'm off to be productive. Expect some pumpkin pictures soon!
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