Merry And Bright

by Emily

Highlights from a very festive Christmas weekend…

Peppermint pour-over coffee with egg nog cold foam.

Dalgona iced coffee with eggnog.

Red and green yogurt bowl. Trader Joe’s eggnog Greek yogurt with kiwi, raspberries, and vanilla granola.

Holiday special scoops from Odd Fellows Ice Cream. Buddi’s Spaghetti Sundae – maple ice cream, chocoalte cookie crumbs, mini marshmallows, m&m’s, sno caps, and corn nuts / Moose Nog – egg nog ice cream with fudge swirls and peanut butter cups.

Seasonal brews from Ardent Brewing. The gingerbread was perfect, not too spicy at all, and the Fog Nog is truly my all-time favorite beer/alcoholic beverage/beverage in general. 15/10.

A very close 2nd all-time-favorite is Leyenda’s Candy Striper – a frozen delight with cachaca, coconut, vanilla, lemon, peppermint, maple, and cardamom.

We went to their Sleyenda holiday pop-up for seasonal drinks and a wonderful dinner (it was too dark for photos but my shrimp arepas were amazing). I also had a Reindeer Games with tequilla, cachaca, banana, honey, maple, lemon, pine, and bitters.

Chinese take-out from Blue Wave. I got fantastic veggie stir-fried udon. Also the best scallion pancakes I’ve ever eaten.

Red and green salads. Red leaf lettuce with homemade ranch, red bell pepper, fresh mint, a soft-boiled egg, and a garlic and herb lobster cake (frozen, from Luke’s via Whole Foods).

Red and green rice bowls. Brown rice / sauted bok choy / sourkraut sauted with gojuchang and sugar / soy marinated eggs.

P.S. I am off of work most of this week, which is just lovely! I sipped a fancy coffee while I wrote this post!

19Dec2022

Sour Cream Or Applesauce?

by Emily

Vacation is over and I’m heading back to work today. By the time you read this I’ll be drinking eggnog with an extra-strong coffee!

It was a low-key weekend and I cooked dinner x2. My snacks definitely outshown my main meals though. Highlights include…

Trader Joe’s eggnog Greek yogurt with Satsuma mandarins and vanilla granola.

Surprisingly good sushi from Whole Foods. A California roll topped with fried shallots.

Should I be embarassed that the best thing I ate all weekend was a plate of microwave nachos? Really good microwave nachos? Spud Love potato chips with gouda, gojuchang, and maple.

Veggie noodles. Ramen / sauted frozen veggies (stir-fry mix and chopped spinach) / peanut butter gojuchang sauce / soft-boiled egg / Sriracha on top.

A delicious but non-traditional first night of Hanukkah. Trader Joe’s frozen latkes (potato and cauliflower) with sauted dinosaur kale and a fried egg. I pair my latkes with sour cream instead of applesauce.

17Dec2022

Hawaii 2022

by Emily

Adam and I just returned from six fantastically glorious days in Oahu! Best vacation we have taken yet.

Everything was beautiful (of course!), we got incredibly lucky with the weather, we loved our hotel (Hotel La Croix – amazing staff, beautiful views, and perfectly walkable to the beach and downtown), and we swooned over every activity and meal! And we saw a seal!! I did not pack a camera but couldn’t stop myself from Instagramming incessantly.

Some of our favorite activities – – –

Hiking. We went on four hikes this visit. Makapu’u Light House Trail / Kuliouou Ridge Trail / Diamond Head / Ka’ena Point State Park.

We went to Green World Coffee Farm and walked through the coffee plants. We also got a fantastic tour (with tastes) of the Old Sugar Mill Brand Waialua Coffee where they grow coffee and cacao.

Some of our favorite bites – – –

Flavor themes of the week – ahi, malasada, mochi, musubi, passionfruit, poke, taro, and yuzu. I lost my photo but we had a wonderful traditional meal at Helena’s – my first time trying poi!

We walked over to Kona Coffee Purveyors several times. Also to the Starbucks Reserve for this delicious americano con crema with demura sugar and cinnamon.

Guava malasada from Leonards. Also my favorite thing I ate all trip was a taro mochi malasada from a convenience store.

There was a great Japanese store near our hotel and between that and the well-stocked 7-11 I tried some very exciting things.

Passionfruit mochi bar.

Salted cod roe and cheese musubi.

Halo halo.

Local fruits from a roadside stand. Starfruit, passionfruit, and coconut.

Shave Ice! We went to Waiola Shave Ice and Matsumoto Shave Ice. The boring looking one was actually white cake and yuzu (!!!) with vanilla ice cream and sweetened condensed milk.

Poke! So much fresh tuna. We went to Maguro Brothers and Ono Seafood.

Dinner at O’Kims. Fried chicken and purple rice with the best kimchi I’ve ever eaten.

Lunch at Piggy Smalls was our favorite meal of the trip! And dinner at Pig and the Lady was a close second. Twice fried brussel sprouts, tea leaf salad, brisket with pancakes and eggs, great cocktails (Adam had a POG slushie!), and an egg coffee.

A perfect trip!

28Nov2022

Thankful For Family

by Emily

This year I worked Thanksgiving Day but then had Friday off for a long weekend — so my parents came to visit! They loved getting to experience the cold (not many 45 degree days in St. Thomas!) and spend time with their granddog and we did a bunch of great New York exploring. Our travels included Time Square, Bryant Park, Chelsea Market, Industry City, Bushwick, Greenpoint, and Hudson!

I did not take a single dinner photo – we went to the oldest steakhouse in New York and also had outstanding meals at Kitty’s in Hudson and Glasserie in Brooklyn! – but here are a few highlights from the past week…

I managed to eat many on-theme things on Thanksgiving.

My parents and I stuck with tradition and ate Thanksgiving nachos – Trader Joe’s stuffing chips with smoked turkey, sauteed shishitos, swiss and gruyere, and cranberry sauce. Plus sauteed green beans with butter and lemon.

Plus Loryn Powell said that Fireball and banana cream rum tastes like a Cinnabon so my mom and I tried it with a maple pecan cream liquer and were quite impressed!

We were also pleased with these Tip Top mini canned cocktails.

We tried – and loved – one of the Zaro’s specialty black and white cookies – mint chocolate.

We found the Oishii omakase strawberries on sale! Fun to try but no one really preferred them to standard strawberries.

Everyone thought that Fortunes Ice Cream in Trivoli makes the best ice cream we’ve ever tried. I got persimmon and the sour cherry labne.

Broad rice noodles with tofu from Bangkok Bar in Industry City – I’ve wanted to go there for forever and now I want to go back immediately.

Great iced latte from Wycoff Starr.

Festive yogurt bowl with plain skry, frozen banana bread, brown sugar syrup, cinnamon, and sumatra mandarin.

21Nov2022

It’s Starting To Taste Like Winter

by Emily

Highlights from this week…

Wonderful yogurt bowl – plain skyr with granola and persimmon.

Milk Bar birthday cake iced latte.

Great horchatta with espresso at For All Things Good.

I pulled pumpkin chocolate chip cookies out of the freezer and they were even more amazing than I remembered.

I’m not ready for eggnog yet (make that – I am always ready for nog but I am not releasing the eggnog floodgate yet) but I have fully embraced peppermint! Like the limited release Wendy’s peppermint frosty.

Or Minter Wonderland ice cream.

Brooklyn Cupcake! Cojito, tiramisu, and guava cheese.

Best iteration yet of the butternut squash we make every year. This year we served it as a warm salad. Roasted butternut squash and shredded brussel sprouts, Trader Joe’s sweet and spicy pecans, dried cherries, and homemade dressing (3 T lemon juice, 3 T maple syrup, 2 T stone ground mustard, 1 T Kewpie, 1 T crystal hot sauce.

A meta dinner win – cobb salad egg salad in endive lettuce cups. Eggs with mayo and mustard, chives, avocado, turkey bacon, and blue cheese.

Buffalo chicken salad (shredded chicken with mayo, Franks, vinegar, blue cheese, and chives) with roasted broccoli and Japanese sweet potato.

11Nov2022

Kjun + 53

by Emily

This was a weirdly busy and stressfull week and I did not adult very well. I mostly ate take-out and candy and nary a picture was taken. I am also very overdue on laundry!

That said — Adam and I had an impromptu Manhattan date night that was so fantastic I just have to blog about it, photo-free post be damned.

I was supposed to have a doctor’s appointment on the Upper East Side that got cancelled at the last minute leaving us time to try two new-to-us spots that we want to return to immediately!

Kjun NYC – a newish Korean Cajun spot. We had fantastic fried chicken (marinated in buttermilk and gojuchang) that came with pickles, potato salad, and a gojuchang honey sauce. My favorite dish was a take on deviled eggs with soy-marinated eggs, wasabi aioli, and fried chicken skin.

53 – a restaurant with a stunningly gorgeous cocktail bar. Also the most amazing bartender, he was knowledgeable and innovative and when he saw how much we loved our drinks he even gave us a sample of their newest cocktail. We head over heels loved our two drinks. Electric Feels; mezcal with guava, sichuan pepper, calmansi, and Himalayan salt. Coke de Blanc; clarified milk rum and coke punch, rum, champagne, and vanilla.

This upcoming weekend I am scheduled to work but we also have some exciting dinner reservations – I’ll bring my camera!

4Nov2022

Squash The Competition

by Emily

Can you beleive we’re in November?! Highlights from the first week…

I ended October with a homemade Frankenstein tea latte. Matcha with ube.

And I started November with cookie butter cold brew from Dunkin’. <– swoon, by the way

Two bougie snacks, one win. We really loved the Blue Stripes Cacao chocolate covered cacao beans (we’ve liked everything we’ve tried from this company so far, actually; Adam is in love with their cacao waters). I expected to love the cookie butter because this company makes my favorite peanut butter but it had an overwhelming coconut flavor that I did not care for.

The cookie butter was not terrible in a yogurt bowl.

But I much preferred this yogurt bowl with chocolate sunflower seed butter (plus plain skyr, blueberries, and vanilla granola).

We both 10/10 love these honey mustard pretzels.

An easy but delicious Trader Joe’s frozen items dinner – chicken goyza potstickers with gojuchang vegetable stir fry.

Homemade meatballs – a blend of chicken and turkey with tons of garlic and parmesan – with roasted kobucha squash. Plus a maple Sriracha dipping sauce. It turns out that kobucha squash is my favorite thing and I want to eat more immediately.

Roasted delicata squash (this recipe) with egg salad. The egg salad was loaded up with dill pickles, smoked paprika, horseradish, yellow mustard, and mayo (Kewpie + boring).