long over due

Sorry to our loyal reader, Jill, our blogging performance has been lagging. Anyways, i am going to make an attempt to keep the tradition alive. MOC MOC has been here in Cali and we've been too busy eating and shopping to keep up with the blog. She is in SF this week so I have some time to blog.

Anyways, for my graduation, my cousin gave me a whole cooler full of cheese since it's one of my favorite foods in the world. So I made a cheese and meat plate for my roomies. Included in this cheese plate were the following:
- Havarti with herbs and spices from Denmark
- Brie with herbs from the US
- Blarney Castle from Ireland
- Red Dragon (mature cheddar with whole grain mustard and ale) from the UK
- and mini babybel

For meats we had salami, pepperoni, and chicken pate. We also had multi grain crackers, french bread and pepper crackers. As well as dried nectarines, raisins and apples. Of course we had wine with it. Yum YUM!

kitchen sink salad

For lunch today I had Jack in the box because I was getting sick of subway, noah's and gelson's at work. So feeling guilty, I had a salad for dinner. Except I put everything but the kitchen sink into the salad. It had romaine lettuce, tomatoes, beets, olives, chicken, corn, avocado, basil, parsley, goat cheese and shredded mexican blend cheese. I pretty much was trying to use up everything I had. I topped it off with some ranch dressing.
Tomorrow MM and MrM come into town for a few days. Let the eating fest begin!

--RD

Chicken

My 2nd to last night of cleaning out the fridge...can't wait til we leave! In a roasing pan, I threw in chicken breast with red potatoes, haricots verts, sliced fennel, a tiny bit of celery, shallots, garlic, rosemary and thyme and roasted til the veggies were soft and the chicken was done but tender. Served with some rice (for Mr. Moc, no rice for me) and sweet corn. --MM

MocMoc

OMG! There's a band called MocMoc. Who'd have thought?! Check it out. MocMoc

--MM

spanglish ISH

Today I made a sandwich and sort of copied MocMoc's idea. I put a sunny side up egg on top. It was goood. It was my typical sandwich, sun dried tomato turkey, spinach, tomato, cheese, avocado. I think i might try one with actual sun dried tomato instead of tomatos and put it in a tortilla...maybe... ha ha

--RD

Spaghetti

Still in the process of cleaning out the fridge so this spaghetti sauce was made with a bunch of different veggies...garlic, onions, fennel, carrots, celery, banana peppers and a handful of fresh herbs (rosemary, thyme, basil). All that served over some healthy whole wheat spaghetti. --MM

oatmeal chocolate chip walnut cookies

i didn't really have anything exciting to eat today so i didn't take any pictures. for lunch I had some tortilla soup from gelson's wolf gang puck express. I couldn't finish all of it and it made me naseous. For dinner I had leftover pasta. so, i thought i would post a picture of my cookies that I made this weekend. And here is the recipe too. Silly me, I thought I had a vat of lard, but i couldn't find it hiding behind all those spices. so I bought another one. Now I have TWO vats of lard (aka crisco)...what to do..what to do... anyways, MM what kind of cookies do you want me to make for you when you come?

1/2 cup solid vegetable shortening
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
2 eggs
1 3.4-ounce package vanilla instant pudding mix
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon water
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup old-fashioned oats
2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 12-ounce package semisweet chocolate chips
1 1/2 cups chopped walnuts (about 6 ounces)

Preheat oven to 375°F. Butter heavy large cookie sheets. Beat vegetable shortening and unsalted butter in large bowl until light. Gradually add white and brown sugars and beat mixture until fluffy. Add eggs 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla pudding mix, vanilla extract, baking soda, water, ground cinnamon, ground nutmeg and salt and mix until well blended. Mix in oats, then flour. Stir in chocolate chips and walnuts.

Drop cookie dough by large rounded spoonfuls (about 3 tablespoons each) onto prepared cookie sheets, spacing 2 inches apart. Bake until cookies appear dry and tops are lightly cracked and soft when pressed, about 12 minutes (do not overbake). Cool cookies 5 minutes on cookie sheets. Transfer cookies to racks and cool. (Store cookies in airtight container.)

Makes about 30.

--RD

Brownies

I was craving a brownie last week so I whipped up a quick batch of double chocolate chunk brownies. Yummy - moist & chewy. I had a piece and then tried to send the rest off with Mr. Moc to work so I wouldn't eat them all!

I promise to take pictures tonight and upload "fresh" pictures. --MM

eat steak eat steak eat steak

Roomie made steak today. It was good. She cooked it with butter and pan grilled it. mmm.. buttah! We also had it with spinach and green beans. A low carb diet. i think.

For lunch today I met up with some classmates and ate at the argentinian cafe down the street. I had empenadas - ricotta and spinch, and a chicken one. They were delicious! I plan on going back there someday. Sorry I dont have pictures.

-RD

Onion Rings

Ok, I lied. I do have a picture from Bahama Breeze. Here's a big plate of artery-cloggers (also known as onion rings). Had one while I was waiting for my paella and couldn't eat another one. I felt all greasy after just eating one of those giant artery-cloggers. --MM

i heart artichoke

For dinner tonight I made pasta. It was fusilli pasta with chicken sausage, artichoke hearts, sun dried tomatoes, garlic, chicken stock, white wine, basil, italian parsley, parmesan cheese, and mozarella. Yum yum! It was so good! And then for dessert I made chocolate covered strawberries.

This morning I had a group meeting at my place and so we worked all day. All I had to eat was airborne and oatmeal walnut chocolate chip cookies and two cups of coffee. Sad.

Cinqo de Mayo!

Last night, Mr. Moc and I went out to celebrate Cinqo de Mayo with Social Butterfly, Shaggy and Island Girl. We headed over to the local mexican restaurant...only to find the wait for a table to be at least 1 hour. Not wanting to wait an hour for average food and crappy service in an extremely crowded restaurant to celebrate an national holiday that applies to none of us, we left. Shaggy wanted "cheesy" so we ended up at Bahama Breeze. For those of you who do not know Bahama Breeze, it is equivalent to Red Lobster, Olive Garden, etc. It's also the kind of restaurant I pictured to be in Cleveland when we first decided to move to Cleveland. Apparently a lot of natives like that place because it was very crowded - even for a Friday night. The natives like to dress up in their Hawaiian shirts and faded denim shorts for a night out on the town at Bahama Breeze. This had to be the absolute worst dinner we have had since moving to Cleveland. Seriously. So needless to say, I do not have any pictures from our Cinqo de Mayo dinner.

I do, however, have a picture of the korean kalbi (short ribs) Mr. Moc and I had for dinner two nights ago. We were both dying for some korean food so we headed over to our favorite korean restaurant in Cleveland (there are only 2 in town) called Seoul Hot Pot. We still miss the korean restaurants of LA though. --MM

Happy Cinco De Mayo

For dinner tonight Roomie and I worked together. She made a fish and asparagus dish with sweet chili sauce. It was supposed to be angler (sp?) fish but she used catfish, still tasted pretty good to me! So to go with it, sort of, I just made some whole wheat cous cous with roasted red pepper, kalamata olives and feta. It really didn't match because it was like asian food and mediterranean, but it worked!




Anyways, to celebrate Cinco De Mayo I had a corona. Just one. This has been a weak cinco de mayo celebration this year. Maybe I'll make up for it tomorrow. But look at this picture of my beer bottle..those lines on the neck? a whole row of bubbles! funny.


--RD

Kimchee Fried Rice

Using leftover rice from curry night, I made a korean-style fried rice with lite spam (yes, they make a "light" spam these days), kimchee, corn, scrambled eggs and some green onions for Mr. Moc. Since I'm trying to lose some weight, I made my version with spaghetti squash instead of rice. I know, sounds weird and disgusting, right? But it actually turned out quite yummy. There's just something about the combination of spam, corn and kimchee - nothing else matters. ;)

And Jill, I guess you don't know rocketDOG and me well enough, huh?! We could NEVER stop eating or talking about FOOD!!! :D --MM

sandwich take II

Don't Fret Jill, we were just taking a break, well, not really a break, more like we were adding to the food.
For lunch today I had one of my usual sandwiches - sun dried tomato turkey, cheddar cheese, lettuce, tomato, avocado, grey poupon on whole wheat. And some doritos on the side. (which is what this picture is.)

However, I didn't get a picture of this but I thought I would share. After the Dodger game I went to tonight, a bunch of us (my professor included) stopped at Tommy Burger. We drove all over looking for it too. This was my first time EVER having one. I had a cheeseburger all the way (chili included). Oh boy it was good, messy, greasy, and inhaled in about 3 minutes. Let me just say 6 people in a car with all of us having just had Tommy Burger, not a good idea. Plus I was crammed in the "third row" bouncing up and down. I wish I had taken a picture of it though, it was a one of a kind.

-RD

I'm German!

I'm a Porsche 911!

You have a classic style, but you're up-to-date with the latest technology. You're ambitious, competitive, and you love to win. Performance, precision, and prestige - you're one of the elite,and you know it.

Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.

--Mocmoc

vrooom vroom

I took this test my friend forwarded to me I'm a Mustang!

I'm a Ford Mustang!

You're an American classic -- fast, strong, and bold. You're not snobby or pretentious, but you have what it takes to give anyone a run for their money.

"Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.

--RD

Sandwich

I'm not usually a sandwich person but I really wanted to use up what we had in the fridge. I actually really liked this sandwich concoction...made with lightly-toasted whole grain bread, fried egg (using non-fat cooking spray), proscuitto, romaine lettuce, tomatoes, fresh mozzarella and basil leaves. Sure beats Rocketdog's Subway kick! --MM

gelsons to the rescue

At my work there is NOTHING to eat around there. It's in a residential area that takes practically 10 minutes just to get out of. Well, I've been frequenting Subway more than I would like simply because there really isn't much else as an option. Well, today I decided to spice things up and I headed over to Gelson's the local supermarket where I purchased some sushi from the ready-to-go section. I got spicy tuna rolls with brown rice. Yup.. this posh neighorhood has Gelson's as the local market and they sell sushi with BROWN rice. Well, it was good, relatively cheap, and healthy. Subway, who?

-RD

Chicken Curry

Not the prettiest of pictures but it sure tasted yummy. Again, I made dinner with the idea that I had to use up what we had in the fridge. Chicken curry with potatoes, carrots, mushrooms and corn atop brown rice. I learned from Pigpen to add seasoned vinegar to the mix which gives it an extra kick. --MM

CORN DOG!

I had a small lunch today because I was busy and not very hungry. So I cooked up a frozen tofu corn dog. Yup..good ol TJ's was selling them. It wasn't bad, but I heard that they have big ones at disneyland! Can't wait!

-RD

Chicken Soup

Chicken soup with a tomato base and random vegetables. Random because I'm trying to use up whatever is in our fridge before our trip next week. --MM

eatsa pizza

For dinner I had pizza today. Mr Clean and Mr Clean's brother wanted to go to the bar to watch the pistons game. Well, roomie and I were already in our fat pants and ready to pass out. If it wasn't for the red sox/yanks game (GO SOX!!) i woulda been napping. Anyways, since we didn't go out they decided to order pizza from Papa John's. Oh and we had chicken tenders. They're good but tiny. Now I feel so sick and queesy. =P


--RD

What The Duck??

In honor of my favorite tee, "What the duck"...roast duck with mushroom risotto and sauteed baby spinach. I think it would have made a much better picture if I had only cut the duck in half - there's too much duck on the plate! --MM

trivia

Tonight Roomie and mr clean and I went to the neighborhood pub for dinner. More important we went there for trivia night. Going in as team Michigan we were losing the entire game. Well, we were a pathetic last and being competitive my hopes were down. However, the last question you could get up to 20 points, based on what you bid, or lose those points. Well, the last question was "what color or category star is considered to have the highest temperature?" (you have to guess the answer). And we got it right and we bid 20 points cause we didn't have anything to lose, and we ended up going from 6th to 3rd in the end, winning Team Michigan $10!! That's going into our trivial pool. Anyways, while I was there I had fish and chips.



--RD