Weekly Wrap-Up; Chocolate And Coffee

by Emily

Forget Friday, TGIS! {thank god it’s Saturday} This felt like the week that would never end – I had an allergic reaction to an allergy medicine, Adam and the dog both got food poisoning, and we had plumbing issue that flooded the entire apartment. Yuck, yuck, and yuck.

I would have more pictures to share – we might have drowned our sorrows in melted cheese – but we hadn’t done any dishes for a solid week and a half so I’ve been buying lunch at work and we have been eating lots of take-out off of paper plates. In bed. <– we’re disgusting.

We are getting it together (finally) though. Friday night, just before I wrote this post, Adam did a big load of dishes while I cooked us a tasty, healthy dinner. And with any luck, by the time this scheduled post goes live I will have made it to the gym. Cross your sneakers for me?

breakfast/snacks

An apple and a coffee on the way to work, both fabulous. Sonya apple.

Bananas Foster cappuccino from 7-11.

The banana coffee was surprisingly delicious. But the Dream caramel almond milk latte I had the next day was even better.

This Extra cinnamon roll gum is so tasty. I’ve enjoyed the other Dessert Delights but tire of them quickly, but this flavor is enjoyable to the end.

Peppermint candy my parents sent me from STT’s food fair for Carnival. It is basically sugar and peppermint oil smashed together – eating one is like chomping your teeth together during a cleaning at the dentist – and it’s one of my favorite things.

Venti iced non-fat latte with my rewards freebie. 4 shots of espresso / 2 shots of white mocha / one very judgy look shot my way when the barista repeated back my order.

Cheese and chocolate. A mix of what you’ll see below.

Adam and I checked out the gorgeous Whole Foods on 3rd Ave in Brooklyn and came away with a couple of treats to share. Iced coffee.

And a honey nougat chocolate bar.

I’m not sure you can really call something a “turtle” without caramel, but this new Uber Larabar was good.

What is this?

Iced coffee + lavender simple syrup + chocolate milk

= lavender iced mocha {for the win}.

lunch

Last Sunday, a girlfriend and I went to Smorgasburg in DUMBO.

It was even better than Saturday’s in Williamsburg. It is right on the water and there is a wonderful walking path.

My friend and I were food twins all day and we both quite enjoyed everything we chose. Coffee, obvs.

A duck bun that had the most succulent meat I’ve ever tasted.

And bubble tea. Honey and lavender tea with boba and lychee jelly.

Cheese plate. Pear / apple / Chocolove Dark Chocolate Coffee Crunch / Kerrygold Dubliner Cheese.

The only lunch I managed to pack for work.

Passion fruit Chobani.

Plus a Blueberry Oat Almond Thin and a few dates.

Supplemented with a guava cheese empanada from the truck near my work.

Oh. My. God. The empanada was too fabulous. I grew up loving guava paste, but I’ve never had it paired with cheese before. The sweet and savory combo was insane.

I ended up buying an empanada for my train-ride home the next two days in a row.

dinner

From the sea.

I made fish salad out of leftover baked tilapia; shredded fish, Miracle Whip, relish, fresh dill, and Old Bay. On a pretzel roll, topped with roasted spring onions.

Plus roasted green beans with Old Bay on the side.

And a Southern Tier milk stout for sipping.

Adam had the day off on Monday so he picked me up at work and we walked over to Fletcher’s BBQ for an awesome dinner.

They had Genesse Cream Ale.

And this tray was the best bbq I’ve ever had, including what we’ve tried in the south.

We split mac and cheese,

and fridge pickles,

and each got a chopped chicken sandwich with slaw on top.

We smothered our sandwiches in bbq sauce and were absolutely swooning. And one of the men behind the counter saw how thrilled we were and sent us home with a container of sauce to go!

We topped off our night by moseying next door for pie.

A rosemary shoefly slice that was interesting but not quite sweet enough for our tastes.

My healthy/easy/tasty Friday dinner.

Roasted broccoli.

And ridiculous melts.

A maple French toast bagel topped with sweet and spicy pepper jam, smoked turkey, sliced Brie, and Hickory and Sage Smoked Seitan Bacon.

The “bacon” was part of a sample I received from Sweet Earth. This vegan, non-gmo, no nitrate bacon has 10 grams of protein, 90 calories, and 0.5 grams of saturated fat per serving. The ingredients were all things I could recognize, like buckwheat groats, coconut, and maple. We were big fans.

Hope everyone’s having a great weekend!

18May2014

Long Week Wrap-Up; The Perfect Date? I’d Have To Say April 25th.

by Emily

Woah! It’s been almost two weeks; this is going to be a loooooong post, and that’s after I cut out a whole bunch of stuff. I left in lots of coffee, dinners in bowls, and tasty medjool dates. I’ve had a bad case of the Blogging Blahs recently and I just can’t get myself to sit down and write. Even though I’m not talking about it much, we have been eating fancy meals and doing fun things. Like spending last Saturday in Manhattan…

On our way to the theatre!

We saw Bullets Over Broadway and loved it. Zach Braff – one of my idols – played the lead and the show was super funny.

Here is some of what’s gone on {my plate} since I last posted – –

breakfasts and lunches

Amazing hot chocolate and a vanilla almond KIND bar.

Smoothie = frozen banana, dates, vanilla almond milk, vanilla almond butter, cinnamon-maple sugar, and vanilla bean paste.

Yogurt bowl. 2% Fage topped with cooked strawberries, chopped date, and pecans.

Yogurt lunch.

Dannon coffee Greek yogurt,

plus dates with sweet and spicy pecans, and an apple.

Super salad. I packed spring mix topped with blue cheese, sweet and spicy pecans, and chopped apple, then added some Italian dressing from the salad bar at work. P.S. The cafeteria was on point this week; I bought several cheesy slices of pizza and had creamy lobster bisque with giant pieces of meat.

Lunch with Au Bon Pain. They sent me some coupons to try out their new late spring menu.

We tried the Sriracha Chicken Sandwich—all-natural chicken with Sriracha sauce, pickled banana peppers, arugula, tomatoes and lemon aioli on a baguette. Interesting, but not too spicy for the husband.

A Lemon and Sweet Cheese CroisBun – flaky croissant blended with butter bun, filled with sweet cheese and lemon curd.

And an Arnold Palmer with their black currant iced tea.

Everything was really yummy, but we were pretty annoyed because the location we chose was out of the new salads, both of which sounded amazing.

[BBQ Chicken Salad—all-natural chicken marinated in barbecue sauce, romaine, roasted corn, tomatoes, cucumbers, three-cheddar blend and light ranch dressing. Fresh Fruit & Baby Kale Salad—fresh watermelon, strawberries, mandarin oranges, feta and sliced almonds on a bed of baby kale and balsamic vinaigrette.]

I will not be going back to that location, but I will be heading to ABP for a salad asap.

drinks and desserts

Many iced lattes with my magic milk straws.

Also the cookie dough iced coffee from Dunkin is still great.

And this double espresso over ice – with skim milk and sugar – from Café Dada that filled me with joy.

We are officially giving two thumbs up to Rice Dream’s Horchata.

Adam actually liked it even more than I did.

Still working my way through Buzzfeed’s Frozen Treat’s list; #33 was cholado from Las Americas Bakery.

We got Raspado, shaved ice with homemade fruit syrup and sweetened condensed milk.

Caramel date shake – sea salt caramel gelato blended with dates and skim milk.

Frozen hot chocolate from Tim Horton’s. Please note – they sent me a free coupon so I could sample this new product.

It wasn’t as good as the frozen hot chocolate, but it was definitely delicious. We would plan on purchasing them again this summer. The fudge on top was out of control.

This cookie dough candy was as good as you’d expect it to be. <– i.e. if that sort of thing sounds good to you then you’ll probably like it but if you thought“dear god, why would you dip cookie dough in chocolate” then you’ll probably think it’s too sweet. I thoroughly enjoyed half and then was happy to throw the rest away.

Brooklyn Farmacy is officially our new favorite place.

A family restored the 1920’s pharmacy and turned it into a soda fountain heaven. The music, fixtures, and staff wardrobe are all throw-backs to the ’20s but in a way that is touching and kitschy rather than cheesy (think classy, not Johnny Rockets).

We shared a hibiscus float and a maple egg cream that were both indescribably good.

We practically ordered a second round!

dinners

Farro bowls. Leftover farro tossed with soy sauce and rice vinegar / sautéed shiitake mushrooms and shredded carrots / sauerkraut sautéed with Sriracha and sugar / sliced cucumber / and a fried egg.

Here it is before the egg went down.

Pasta bowls.

Whole wheat linguine / spinach and roasted broccoli / sauce made of a raw egg cracked into the hot pasta plus a splash of milk and huge handful of shredded swiss cheese / topped with panko fried with evoo, smoked paprika, and truffle salt.

Burrito bowl at Calexico. Rice / black beans / guacamole / cojita cheese / avocado sauce / and jalopeños.

Old-school burger and fries at Bareburger. Turkey burger – on a bun! – with pickle chips, tomato, lettuce, mayo, and ketchup. Just like a McDonald’s burger from when I was a kid.

Cheese plate! Assembled entirely of items from Trader Joe’s.

Dates, salmon jerky,

orange slices, pear,

rosemary crackers,

and Italian truffle cheese.

The cheese was an early appetizer for our sushi night.

I got a pickle veggie roll and a non-authentic fried stuff roll. Both were only ok. We had sushi a couple of times over the past weeks and none of it has been very good.

A fancy dinner, after our date at the theatre, at Stone Park Café.

We started with a salad of baby arugula, toasted pecans, artichoke hearts, and blue cheese vinaigrette.

And the scallop and marrow tacos. Uggggh. These were insane.

I had seared Catham cod with Odessa eggplant, baby bok choy, and lemon gremolata. Apparently this was the first time I tasted cod outside of fish and chips?! SPC is one of our favorite restaurants in the city so I know this was good, but I wasn’t a big fan.

Adam’s dinner blew mine out of the water. Butternut squash and thyme ravioli with brown butter, pine nuts, and mixed mushrooms.

Thankfully he was very generous with shared bites.

Are you sick of this post yet? That’s all she wrote!

3May2014

Weekly Wrap-Up; Recipes, Redone

by Emily

Hey there! I’m a few days late with this post because the dog had a vet appointment late Thursday night. He had to get about a million shots – we did all of his blood draws and vaccinations in one fell swoop – but was such a little trooper. He is so freaking cute!

Things were good with the human members of the house as well. I remade two of my old recipes this week with great success. It was a busy but satisfying week at work. And now my brother-in-law is here to play! I’m saving our Friday night fun for Monday’s weekend post, but here is the last week…

breakfast

Tropical smoothie.

Crushed pineapple, frozen banana, toasted coconut, and vanilla almond milk. I should have added nutmeg to this because that’s what I put on my piña coladas.

Fancy fruit salad.

This salad was insane and I need to make it again immediately. Blackberries, minneola, lime juice/zest, maple syrup, toasted coconut, and hemp hearts.

Plus a Blueberry Oat Almond THINaddictive.

The thin was part of a sweet box of samples that Nonni’s sent me.

Their sweet and crunchy biscotti almond thins – which have only 100 calories per package and less than 2 grams of saturated fat – are out in two new flavors: blueberry oat and banana dark chocolate. I was a fan of both.

lunch

Asian and apples.

My Pad See Ew leftovers were still great cold.

With Brown Sugar Sea Salt Seaweed Snacks and a Lady Alice apple.

I made my own to-go oatmeal bowls this week! 1/3 cup of rolled oats and 1 Tbsp of malted milk powder, plus toppings. I took them to work in glass Tupperware and then put enough hot water (for the tea in the cafeteria) in the bowl to just cover the oats. By the time I got back up to my department they were perfect! I will probably still buy the packaged ones as well, but this was a very exciting development.

Berries and cream oatmeal = white chocolate chips and freeze-dried strawberries.

The rest of my fruit salad was wonderful at lunch.

Crushed pineapple,

fruit salad,

and a peach Fage,

were all stirred together into a tasty bowl.

Homemade oatmeal part deux.

Crushed pecans, dark chocolate chips, and toasted coconut.

Plus an apple.

snack

Afternoon espresso when I really wanted candy.

I compromised by putting an obscene amount of sugar into my coffee.

Honestly, I had terrible bedtime habits all week and my afternoons took a lot of coffees. Made even more exciting by the Cookies and Cream Magic Straws from my Easter basket.

A Banana Dark Chocolate Almond THINaddictive.

I was expecting to like this flavor the most but ended up preferring the blueberry; this was good but the banana was a tiny bit fake tasting.

Pink Lady. I have been loving apples recently.

We made milkshakes.

Café Latte Frozen Greek Yogurt, chocolate milk, malted milk powder, and ice.

And speaking of milk, I ate about a million cookies this week.

Don’t forget, you have until Monday to enter my giveaway.

dinner

My first recipe redo.

Shallotta Salmon Burgers. They aren’t orange fyi, that’s just bad lighting.

Shredded Brussels sprouts cooked with coconut oil, crushed pecans, chopped celery, and swiss/gruyere cheese.

I added too much oil to my veggies and they were good but a little ridiculous.

My other recipe redo was my Healthy Spinach Pesto.

A total success, stirred into pasta with broccoli and tons and turkey bacon.

I’m off for family fun time! xoxo

28Apr2014

Weekend Wrap-Up; Oh, Sugar, Sugar

by Emily

I don’t have a ton to share from this weekend but every thing I do have a photo of was super tasty. My sweet tooth was certainly satisfied by the past three days!

Greek yogurt, strawberry, and chia from The Epic Seed.

The packaging here was very neat. The flavors were tasty, and I plan on buying this again, but I think I would have preferred this with regular, thinner yogurt because it was very thick and a bit difficult to eat.

Strawberry milk slush from Kung Fu Tea.

Adam took one sip and declared “this is the best drink I’ve ever had!” We both loved it and want another immediately. The texture was perfection; a great replacement for the granitas we used to adore in Park Slope.

Easy dinner at home.

A sandwich – smoked trout mashed with miracle whip and smoked paprika, on rye pumpernickel swirl with swiss cheese, cooked in butter – with baby carrots on the side.

A trip to Momofuku Milk Bar‘s Williamsburg location.

We shared a cereal milk shake that was fine but not too exciting. Corn flakes don’t exactly do it for me, I want the bottom of a bowl of Lucky Charms.

And a slice of crack pie.

This was teeth-achingly sweet, aka fantastic.

And next-door to Milk we discovered a tiny, hole-in-the-wall Thai spot that is our new favorite.

My tofu Pad See Eiw was chewy and wonderful. The tofu was perfectly seasoned.

While we were in Manhattan for the Green Fest (<– more to come on that tomorrow) we discovered H Bake Shop.

We got the Lilac, a berry cupcake with lavender frosting.

This was fabulous, the first cupcake ever to rival the greatness coming out of Sugar, Sweet, Sunshine. The price was a teensy bit higher than SSS, but this was also the prettiest dessert I’ve ever had.

What’s missing from this post? Another migraine (boo!), grocery shopping with giant coffees, a burger for Adam and fried pickles for me from SmashBurger, lunch at the Green Fest, and a trip to the movies for the newest “Captain America” (we liked it!).

What was sweet about your weekend?

25Apr2014

Weekly Wrap-Up; Eggs And Easter Candy

by Emily

I’m bouncing back from a bad migraine this afternoon so this post might be lacking my usual witty prose (<– just go with it). I don’t want to think that too much sugar may have been a potential trigger for the migraine, but it will probably be hard to convince you otherwise once you finish the post 🙂 Also, upon completion I am forced to note that 90% of these pictures are pretty god-awful. The food was yummy though, I swear!

lunch

Oatmeal Monday.

Apple on the side.

Quaker Summer Berry Oatmeal,

topped with Reese’s eggs.

I read the egg carton further that night and discovered that they contain trans fat, dun dun dun! – so I had to throw the rest out. My only hard and fast nutrition rule is never eat trans fats.

Spicy Sandwich Tuesday. A whole wheat Sandwich Thin with Applegate Farms Herbed Turkey, Fontina cheese, strawberry jam, and pickled jalopeños that seemed to have retained a lot of their heat.

I cooled down with cinnamon applesauce.

And crunched through kale chips.

Worst. Photo. Ever.

Egg Salad Wednesday.

This batch of egg salad was made with tons of caramelized onions, miracle whip, smoked paprika, and raisins. It was fabulous stuffed inside a Pocket Thin.

With the rest of the kale chips and an apple.

Leftovers Thursday.

See more of this casserole down in dinners.

With a wonderfully crisp Lady Alice apple and Haribo colas.

Last of the Egg Salad Friday, aka today.

This time with a slice of Fontina.

dinner

Stir fry night.

Served on top of packaged Kung Pao noodles.

My ‘fry contained edamame, bamboo shoots, straw mushrooms, and pineapples, cooked in pineapple juice and green curry paste.

I usually try to put too much into my stir fries and I end up hating them; this simple version was fantastic.

Stir fry leftovers.

My veggies, plus steamed sweet potato chunks, and fish sauce and soy sauce, cooked in evoo, with an egg at the end.

A winning new recipe.

Turkey Reuben Casserole.

Click here for the recipe.

Plus spinach and baby kale sautéed with evoo and dried blueberries.

Let’s be real, I pretty much choked down those greens.

Chipotle post-migraine.

Brown rice with peppers, chicken, lettuce, cheese, and lots of mild salsa.

snacks, aka Easter candy

I made a Cadbury Cream Egg Cream. What?!

It actually didn’t work all that well, I felt like my eggs got burnt in the microwave, but I salvaged it with a bit of chocolate milk. Adam and I were both pretty pleased with the final result.

Speaking of candy eggs, these Ferrero ones from my basket were sure gone in a hurry.

Just like a Rocher but without the nut in the center.

Grape Crush licorice.

When I veered away from the Easter goodies my snacks went horribly awry. I got an email from Dunkin that a Coolatta would earn me 25 bonus points and, sucker for loyalty rewards that I am, I had to get one.

Disgusting. It wasn’t homogenous at all; the coffee, milk, and sweetener separated into terrible layers.

That was a bad note to end on, but overall it was a tasty week.

16Apr2014

Our Weekend Trip To Buffalo

by Emily

We moved from Buffalo to Long Island almost 10 months ago now and we felt overdue for a visit! Adam is on Spring Break this week so I took a personal day on Friday and we made the 8 hour drive back “home.”

It was a great weekend. I’m still pretty sick so we kept things low-key and it ended up being a wonderfully relaxing trip. And we still had time to cross off all of the must-do’s on our list. We ate all of the food we were missing, walked down Elmwood, visited my old job to get all nostalgic and purchase some terrific toys, attended a baby shower for two dear friends, went out drinking with the whole crowd, and took a long walk around the park to look at the buffalo.

Here were the food highlights…

Bubble tea from Gin Gin.

I got vanilla-almond milk tea with tapioca and popping boba.

Thai Orchid for the best Thai food ever.

My tofu Pad See Ew did not disappoint. So chewy!

SPoT for breakfast.

Iced coffee and a Mike’s sandwich on an everything bagel.

Juice at Ashker’s. A blend of kale, spinach, cucumber, and carrot.

We split a duck feast at Blue Monk. Duck Reuben and Duck Poutine.

And on the way out-of-town Danielle took us to Aroma for a brunch that would have been a weekly tradition had we known about it while we still lived in Buffalo.

That Buffalo Bloody Mary had gorgonzola and Frank’s in it! And my salad came topped with artichoke hearts, calamata olives, fried leeks, tomatoes, shaved parmigiano-reggiano, balsamic vinaigrette and a poached Oles Farm free-range egg.

It was a fantastic, delicious visit.

The long car rides weren’t even that bad – honestly they were sort of fabulous – thanks to the audiobook I was sent to review. Doing Harm by Kelly Parsons is an exciting debut novel about medicine and moral dilemmas in which a surgeon must confront, outwit, and overcome deadly threats to his patients and himself. The audiobook is voiced by Robert Petkoff, who has voiced countless thrillers, including those of Michael Palmer.

This was our first time listening to an audiobook and I think we are officially hooked. It made the time fly by. Time for a book review…

cons –

Some of the medical terms were mispronounced – fascia, parenteral nutrition, rhabdomyolysis – and it was distracting.
The author was weirdly obsessed with hairdos; there was only one lone character, out of every single other character both big or small, whose hair we didn’t get a description of.

pros –

The story completely sucked us in, we would sit in the car for at least five additional minutes whenever we reached a destination!
The experience of being a surgical resident was very accurately captured, Adam couldn’t believe how spot-on the author managed to be.
Most of the medical plot was fairly accurate as well.

Overall I’d recommend reading, or listening to, Doing Harm.

Do you ever listen to audiobooks?

6Apr2014

Weeklong Wrap-Up; The Top Five

by Emily

It took a week longer than I’d hoped, but I’m back to feeling 100%! The alternative title for this post was “Cough Drop Chronicles.”

In the interim between this post and the last, I ate a ton of food but didn’t have it in me to capture most of it. Adam and I made amazing, ridiculous nachos – maple bacon kettle chips baked with a blend of eight cheeses – but I shoveled them into my mouth before there was time to let them cool, let alone be photographed. On Saturday I went to a wedding shower that served lunch – awesome lobster ravioli with big shrimp on top – but the only person I knew beforehand was the bride-to-be so I was too embarrassed to get out my camera.

Instead of a full post, here are my “top five” from the past week.

1. Liquid breakfast. I was feeling my sickest on Monday and these three beverages were all consumed over the course of the same morning.

Green smoothie. Frozen spinach, mango, and coconut water.

Lavender GT Kombucha. I shared this with Adam and he actually liked it even more than I did.

“Mocha.” Hospital coffee with a chocolate soy milk.

2. Sweet stuff. These three desserts were the very best of the week but only the tip of the iceberg in terms of consumption. I made it through by having a cough drop or hard candy in my mouth pretty much all waking 12 hours a day.

Nunu caramel dark chocolate bar. <– made in Brooklyn

Whole Foods peanut butter sandwich cookie. This was basically a giant, soft peanut butter cup.

Haagen-Dazs Caramelized Banana Chip Gelato.

3. Another beverage/sweet.

Arizona Fudge Float Sparkling Soda. This was practically a can of egg cream!

4. Salmon and salad.

Coho salmon that I (over)baked with smoked brown sugar, soy sauce, and green onions.

Plus a cucumber salad of thinly sliced cucs, sesame seeds, rice vinegar, soy sauce, salt, and sugar.

5. Dinner at Pizza Loves Emily.

This Brooklyn spot was seriously adorable inside.

We got a lavender lemonade.

Crispy Sprouts.

apples, chilis, black sesame, fish sauce

And the Emily white pizza.

mozzarella, pistachios, truffle sottocenere, honey

31Mar2014

Weekend Wrap-Up; I’ve Got Recipes To Share

by Emily

Like the title says – “I’ve got recipes to share!” I managed to whip up some really great meals this weekend. That accomplishment is even more impressive when you consider the cold I’m working through. <– let’s consider my horn fully tooted, huh? I was talking to my dad on Saturday morning about how glad I was to have missed Adam’s recent bout of illness and by that night I felt terrible. Unfortunately I’ve felt progressively worse since. Hopefully tomorrow will put me on the upswing.

breakfasts and snacks

Recipe #1 – Almond Joy Baked Oatmeal.

This stuff was yummy. Click the link above for the recipe.

Green apple slices dipped in melty peanut butter.

We tried a new type of citrus from Whole Foods, pixie tangerines. They were great; nice and sweet with no seeds.

Healthy or sick, I’m all about the coffee. Iced brown sugar cinnamon latte from Dunkin.

Tall iced vanilla macchiato from Starbucks just a few hours later. I asked for regular drizzle but sugar-free syrup and it was a definite improvement.