Time for some reflection.

It’s been a little over a year since I began this blog and a little longer since I began my journey into ‘domestic’ skills. I was looking back at my old posts and was seriously shocked at how bad some of my food was…not saying it’s super awesome now but I think I’ve come a long way. And sometimes I look at all the things I’m doing and I feel very much like a “Jack of all trades but master of none” because I love to explore but sometimes I don’t have the time, skill, or patience to hone some of these skills. I’d really like to make more pastries but we honestly don’t eat many sweets so we end up tossing a lot of it away. I’ve been trying to make smaller batches to prevent this but even still it’s likely that we won’t eat all of the pie, pastries, cupcakes, etc that I make. Maybe once I start making my mini tarts I’ll be able to make smaller batches.

But another problem that I run into is the vegan aspect. I’ve read so many random ways to sub for eggs or other agents but it’s really hit and miss depending on the item I make. I haven’t really found concrete sources that really help with subbing. Applesauce is good for more condensed items that don’t spread, flax is good for earthy foods, bananas can be hit or miss because sometimes it overpowers other flavors, the list goes on. I made some Persimmon cookies and I didn’t have any flax meal on hand because I keep forgetting to buy it. Didn’t have any bananas, applesauce was out of the question because of the spreading issue….so it left me with a few options…use cornstarch, a weird baking powder/oil mix that I use occasionally or leave out the egg altogether. But eggs are so great for baking that I really didn’t know what would happen if I left the egg out and I couldn’t find good vegan recipes so I used a Tb. of cornstarch…maybe 2…can’t remember. I also cut the recipe in half which meant only using one Persimmon for the pulp but I doubled it since it seemed a bit too dry (probably the lack of wetness since I used the cornstarch instead of a wet ingredient) and the other Persimmon was almost going bad so I figured it would just make it more Persimmony. I found the recipe on either recipezaar or allrecipes…but changed it to include more pulp and vanilla extract. I’ve never baked these before but they were really soft when they came out and I was worried that they’d be gummy and lacking consistency but they firmed up once I let them cool. Personally, I couldn’t taste the Persimmon but maybe it’s just subtle but Nathan said he could taste it. It seemed like a sweet Oatmeal cookie to me.

The batter was really orange but they came out more brown which was kind of disappointing. They’re super yummy and Nathan even stole one after they came out of the oven which seems promising since he never usually likes to eat sweets. Did I mention in my last post that I made some roasted pumpkin seeds. Mmmm…I remember making these as a kid with ‘Cajun’ spice but simply used olive oil, coarse sea salt, and some cayenne pepper. Omg, so good. I had so many I was super regular all week lol. I was planning on making potato-leek soup with my goat-cheese/tomato tarts tonight but I didn’t want to chance that it would suck so I’m going to wait a until sunday to make it. I did make my vegan cheese which I’ll have to post later. The recipe is on Veg. Times website and it’s ‘Pepper-Crusted Cashew Goat Cheese’…I ended up baking it for about 50 min instead of 35 since I forgot to turn it since I was knitting. It looks promising but I haven’t tried it yet to know if it’s good or not.

Anyway, this post is all over the place tonight. So many thoughts going through my mind. I bought some more dahlias and Nathan seemed to like the ones that looked black…not sure if they’re actually black dahlias but they look awesome.

Crappy pic I wanted to post them since I’m not sure if there will be more of them next week. Thinking about the kitchen…I feel really awesome because I replaced most of the cabinet door handles all by myself and it wasn’t easy. I don’t know who installed half the shit in this complex before we moved in but it was done so horribly I seriously think they did shit work and kept the rest of the money. One of the handles I have to replace wasn’t even screwed in…it was glued on. And one of our drawers has a cheap plastic runner so the wheel is now square…I want to replace it but they glued the runner instead of screwing it into the wood…so now I have to figure out how to get the glue off and then buy a new runner and install it…ya I’m so hardcore…no wonder my nails are always splitting with all the housework I do. I wish I lived in the 1950s and just cleaned and baked…haha But back to the cabinets…they look better than the cheap ass plastic handles that were so worn and falling apart but I really need to paint the wood since they used crap paint…they couldn’t even be bothered to take off the hinges before painting the wood…they seriously just painted over them…but I should quit complaining because we live a lot better than many people in the world so bitching about cabinets is sort of mundane.

I’m still knitting my sock which seems so slow but with all the cleaning, home improvements, and cooking I haven’t had much time this week. I decided to watch movies today instead of the radio which didn’t help me speed up my knitting but it was nice to take a break from listening to the radio. Watched ‘How to marry a millionaire’ and ‘The big sleep’. I really love Humphrey Bogart now and I just think our society is becoming so square in certain ways. I know that women have better opportunities now, in general and not taking into account race and socioeconomic status and all the other factors, so I know it’s not like many women/men in these movies are a good portrayal of how they lived. But The Big Sleep was so great and it makes me wonder why we’re pushing so hard to make 1st Wld. citizens live to be over a hundred. Sure, I’m a huge advocate of living healthy and ethically but I also don’t understand why certain activities are condemned for medical reasons. It’s like our society is mandating a ‘healthy religion’. Doing drugs, drinking, swearing, or not having a certain type of lifestyle is accused as being excessive, life-threatening, or wrong…and I’m not saying that people should do these things just for the hell of it but I think back to my history in Protestant Orange County and wonder why so many of my peers were so against exploring. I seriously am confused when Nathan tells me how he knew so many white Catholics (and Catholics in general) in St. Louis because I never knew any in Orange…only latino/as were Catholic. But anyway, I’m not advocating that we do a bunch of socially wrong activities but I think we need to loosen up a bit. Like the smoking ban in Santa Cruz….I personally hated when people smoked in diners or in airplanes but I don’t think we should police these things in such a way…both legally or culturally.

Why is it that we’re so focused on abortions, drug/alcohol consumption, and our work status when people are committing mass murder by exposing people to horrible working conditions that affect entire communities? Sweatshops exploit people, create worse shanty towns/environmental conditions, are usually abusive in regards to women, and create little or no job security for the workers. We have people like Bernie Madoff who fucks over people for money, other CEOs who can’t be bothered to take a coach class airplane seat instead of private planes, our government which has historically abused people, created coups, enacted embargoes for lame political reasons, and generally dicked over a lot of citizens by sending them off to wars that shouldn’t have been started and has taken away food support instead of trying to get communities out of poverty. And we, as a collective society, are concerned about if someone wants to smoke weed or a cigarette?

I mean, honestly, where are our priorities? It feels like we’re tying to make everyone live a long time so that we get max production out of people to feed taxes while keeping us ignorant to bigger issues. We don’t even have full health care which is just criminal…sometimes I feel like I’m becoming a Libertarian which I hope doesn’t happen haha. But honestly, I feel like the 1st Wld. needs a wake up…we should be more concerned about where our electronic parts are coming from in terms of raw materials than if someone wants a random smoke. We should be more concerned about the working conditions of outsourced industries that affect millions of people rather than if one woman decides she doesn’t want to carry a fetus for her own reasons.

And that is another thing, I got crap sex ed. To be honest, I’m grateful that I had friends in high school that talked about sex even if they weren’t practicing themselves…and I had a great Environmental Studies teacher who talked to me and my class partner about contraception when we asked her what our text book meant when they listed all sorts of contraception because we had no clue what anything other than a condom was. I read recently that abortions are on the decline in countries that have a wide variety of birth control which seems to me as a good sign…why does the U.S. feel that the best form of protection is not having sex. It’s unrealistic…I mean some venereal diseases have been around for centuries…sex is what makes life possible and genetics make things possible or impossible. We pump women full of hormones for their eggs or surrogacy and let couples pay thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of dollars to create children but if a woman doesn’t want to have a child then they might as well have sold their souls to the goddamn devil.  Seriously, people all over the world are living in horrible conditions, get no help with substantial political stability from their former colonial powers, are subjugated to slavery/trade/migration because the 1st Wld. is so xenophobic and apathetic.

This post is so all over the place, but I just don’t understand why the U.S. pushes certain agendas. Well, I suppose our society pushes them to make us forget about bigger issues…at least that is how it seems to me. And I write this because I feel if I type about it then maybe others might think more on these issues. It comes down to what does it mean to be political. I’ve done more marching and protesting than most people in my lifetime because of my parents. Just because I’m not ‘actively’ protesting doesn’t mean I’m not doing anything. We live in a very consumer driven society and I am always thinking about what I consume…mainly food because I do believe that ‘we are what we eat’. I’m blessed that I can eat so well. I might not be a professor or employed by an activist organization but that doesn’t mean I’m not doing my part. I think one of our biggest obligations as a world citizen is to read and think critically and then to talk or write about it. Also, not everyone can a ‘full-time’ activist because we need people to work in certain occupations to make our society function…we can’t all be full time activists because we need people to sell, market, clean, etc. It’s just a reality. But at the same time I think we ought to strive to encourage more people to think globally. Everything we do effects the world, especially in regards to 1st. Wld. citizens.

Anyway, the last thing I’ll bitch about, I think people with peanut allergies should all die…ok ok I don’t mean that. But I’m so tired of trying to find peanuts at my local markets because people have peanut allergies. First they take away my airplane peanuts and give me some horrid pretzels. Then they slowly take away peanuts from everywhere…and I mean everywhere! I finally got some peanuts at Wholefoods but then they took most of the varieties away and now there is the lone vacuum-packed bag that sits in a corner away from all the real nuts. Personally, I don’t understand why they didn’t just offer two types of snacks on airplanes and really…is it the peanut’s fault that people are allergic to it? I say no, leave the peanut alone…it’s a mofo’ing legume!

Vive le legume!

I can’t believe it’s Nov. already.

Where does time go? It seems like yesterday that I was in HS waiting to turn 18, then 21….and it felt so slow. Now I feel like the years go by so quickly but maybe I’m just getting nostalgic in my old age. Halloween was pretty uneventful which is a good thing since there are usually a handful of deaths each year. Celebrated our 4th anniversary since our commitment which was nice…I like to look up the wedding gifts for fun especially since the modern ones are so unromantic. This year was Appliances for the modern day. Appliances? ok sure, I actually did ask Nathan to get me the Le Creuset Skillet and we’re going to get him this awesome bag specially made for him so we weren’t planning on romantic…and ya so my gift would kind of be an appliance but really? Who thought up appliances as a wedding anniversary gift?

“Here you go honey, a new food processor to make me food!” or….wait…what kinds of manly appliances do guys use? Irons? Haha I usually iron….oh wait I got one…”Oh Nathan, here’s a Fry Daddy so you can make your deep-fried tofu”

I think the traditional one for this year was linen which is so much more abstract and imaginative than…appliances. Bah, stupid modern crap….I think they should come up with a post-modern list that would include: kindle, iphones, ipods, basically anything mac related, and something labeled as ‘green’ even if we don’t know for sure if it is actually sustainable, eco-friendly, or/and fair trade.

So we didn’t do much but we had a lot of fun thinking up a design for our pumpkin and doing our costumes. I’m proud that Nathan carved the pumpkin so well since I suck at it. He’s randomly more logical than me in certain areas and apparently pumpkin carving is one of them. We brainstormed what our pumpkin would look like and drew out some ideas. He set to work while I made the pizza since I wasn’t going to mess with our year long tradition of Pizza Saturdays. I seriously think the only time we’ve missed out on Pizza Saturdays is when on vacation which is pretty awesome if you ask me….which you didn’t.

We totally got compliments on our pumpkin but it sucks that our candles kept running out. Then I started freaking out because the candles we had were super old so I have no clue if they’re vegan since I’ve had them since before I became one. Now, of course, I’m looking into making vegan candles since it seems easy and relatively cheap and good for emergencies…especially since we have quite a few power outages up here. Anyway, I’ll post our pumpkin.

Can anyone guess who it’s modeled after? Or is it whom? I really need to look that up but I think ‘whom’ sounds really lame. Anyway, for those who didn’t guess it’s supposed to be Paul Stanley. So awesome…really the mouth totally makes it. It’s super tiny just like his mouth in most pictures. Nathan was really upset because we didn’t have all the fancy tools to make really crazy designs especially since he thought it was totally cheating. He kept bitching that it’s not fair to use all these random tools to get some great looking pumpkin and then also using patterns because it makes our pumpkin look not so creative but I reassured him that ours was way more original so screw the pumpkin tools. I think the compliments helped with his mood since our neighbors seemed to get the reference.

So since we usually love Halloween but don’t usually plan we felt pretty good with our face make-up. We didn’t actually dress up but just did KISS faces. I was Peter Criss and Nathan was Paul Stanley. We’re on a KISS theme this year…and I mean the entire year we’ve been loving them. I was kind of annoyed since the Cat Man had way more make up then the stupid Star Child. Took me twice as long. We had lots of fun listening to KISS and random bands while getting ready. Really, I think it’s one of the best Halloween ideas that I’ve/we’ve thought up.

We used pink ‘drum sticks’ for a lot of our pics which was really fun. Re was the drum for Nathan’s picture haha. Also, I wore my red boots which look way cooler than the picture I posted. Nathan calls them ‘Fuck me’ boots which I thought was too funny. I just thought they looked like quirky red boots.

I know that my make-up wasn’t totally original since I wanted to make it a bit more fem. since I looked really weird with the black make-up going to my forehead so I washed it off and just made them reach to my eyebrows. I also didn’t have any green eyeshadow so I used blue instead. And I have a ton of red-eye fotos of myself which is so irritating. I guess it has to do with certain pigments and random biological crap that I’m not going to write about since it’s easy to just Yahoo it…that’s right…not Google….Yahoo! I hate stupid google…::grumbles::

Unfortunately, I’ve pretty much decided to remove my lip ring since it’s so hard to find the right size and gauge. I’m really sad about it…but even when I found the right ring I ended up eating the balls so quickly that it was stupid and then it’s kind of hard kissing sometimes because it moves around or if the ball is missing it pokes me or Nathan. Maybe that is too much info, but I’m really sad about it. I need to find another place to pierce now…especially since I got that piercing as a bet against Nathan. It has so many great memories.

Have I mentioned I started composting? I’m so proud of that and it’s really fun to dump my food clippings but someone hid the shovel this week so no one has been able to turn over the compost lately. I also am waiting for our Sigg water bottles which should help cut down our plastic water bottle consumption. Um…let’s see what else…oh! I bought some small tart pans with removable bottoms so I can’t wait to make some vegan goat cheese-tomato tarts and maybe some vegan dessert tarts! so exciting….and I should be making some Persimmon  cookies this week.

The only thing left really is knitting now. Not to spoil Christmas but I’ve pretty much given up on making big items for my family this year for Christmas since I still am waiting on my big order of yarn. So, everyone who is family…I think I’m going to make socks since they are so awesome. I really hate Christmas since 1. Nathan and I are only children and really hate opening presents in front of people because it feels so weird and 2. I never know what to get people even if it’s Nathan and 3. it makes everyone go into ’shopping spree’ mode. Even Nathan…omg I’m still mad at him for buying me this huge computer screen since we originally agreed to only spend a certain amount on each other. He justified it by saying that I never get anything since I hate spending money on myself so he wanted me to have something really nice…haha so post-modern…instead of jewels he buys me a huge computer screen. We’re so weird. But anyway, Christmas is so hectic but I hope my knit gifts will be nice and awesome because the designs that I have are so beautiful.

My sock is coming a long nicely and almost done. I finished the decreases for the gusset and am working on the foot but I haven’t worked on it this weekend since it was our anniversary so I’m a bit behind. I can’t wait to finish these socks and try the patterns out of my new book. To be honest, I made a swatch (to check the gauge of the yarn/needles) and it was actually smaller than the pattern stated and it’s still a bit larger than my foot. It’s not super loose but I really like my socks to be tight fitting. One of the reasons why I like this new sock book is that she gives tips on how to make a sock fit better for each pattern and gives the standard size for the pattern which is nice since I generally have smaller feet than these patterns and Nathan has bigger feet than these patterns. Anyway, here is my progress.

So technically, my swatch was smaller than the pattern and yet the sock is still a bit bigger than I had expected. It might have to do with the yarn since I’m not using the silk/alt fiber that the author recommended but I can’t believe it’s as loose as it is. But I think most patterns are for ‘average’ sizes which probably means it’s meant for a size Woman 8 and I’m a 7 so that might make a difference. Damn, that picture makes my foot and calf look fat…Anyway, I ought to log since this post is so random. Take care and eat healthy food!

And if you don’t blast this clip and watch it…well…something is wrong with you

I love Woody Harrelson.

He’s super sexy and really into talking about smoking weed which is kind of awesome. That and we just saw Zombieland and he was super fun in that and apparently he’s a vegan and does a lot of activism. Brangelina was so 2005….plus I totally have never liked A.Jolie. Ok, in Lara Croft she was kind of awesome at the time but we watched the movies a few months ago and god was it awful. Anyway, back to Woody…he’s just really unique in that he can do and wear stuff in movies and pull it off.

The movie was pretty good except it was pretty scary for me. I actually screamed which was totally embarrassing but I don’t think it was too loud but still…humiliating. I don’t know why I’m so afraid of movies since I know logically there weren’t velociraptor in my Grandparent’s house, or that creepy Japanese horror undead weren’t in the bathroom as I took a shower, and logically I should have known that there wasn’t an axe-murder in the bathroom or zombies. But it didn’t stop me from practically running out of the movie bathroom since right before I walked in there was this scary poster for The Fourth Kind or whatever. The bathroom was totally deserted and I kept thinking ‘what if someone is in the stall next to me and I’m going to die while peeing?’…Pee Faster! Pee Faster! was my mantra and then I kept turning around while washing my hands because I didn’t trust the mirrors with my reaction time…but I still took the time to open the door with a paper towel since I didn’t want germs.

Then I had to go and watch Zombieland and well…no spoilers…but I was scared the rest of the night. Good movie though. Just wish I wasn’t so afraid of scary movies.

We also went to the bookstore and picked up some things and I got a new knitting book that looks really awesome and helps with sock/knitting design. I’m excited. Anyway, my sock is coming together nicely…I’ve turned the heel and really pretty close to being done…hopefully.

Looks more like a sock now I suppose.

Went to the Farmer’s Market and it definitely had a different feel from the earlier months since the wind has been picking up lately and the tourism has really died out. I feel kind of bad because I didn’t pick up any squash because I really didn’t want to walk half a mile with a bunch of heavy squash. I already get sore feet and achy shoulders from carrying it all back to the laundry mat that I figured I’d just buy some at the grocery. I did see some lovely squash flowers and picked up more of my Dahlia’s.

I don’t think we’re going to eat the Spaghetti squash but instead might do some carving since I only bought one big pumpkin since they weigh a ton. I’m planning on roasting the Acorn Squash and then filling it with a wild rice pilaf which I’m excited about since I have some chestnuts that I’m going to throw in. I also got a sweet pumpkin for my pie that I make. Still gotta try and find some evaporated soy milk online but I keep forgetting.

Anyway, I didn’t want the flowers to go bad so I thought I’d make Butternut Squash ravioli with a Sage-Butter sauce with a side of Bean Stuffed Squash flowers. Many of the stuffed squash flower recipes were either with cheese or some weird vegan nut cheese recipe that I just didn’t have the energy to make. Instead, I pureed a can of Great Northern beans with some garlic, thyme, and some sea salt. Removed the stems and the stamen since I read that most flowers are the males since they let the females develop and whatnot. I did find a little caterpillar nestled in one of the flowers so I helped him outside into the green grass. Washed and shook dry and made a slice on one side of the flower for easier stuffing action. I must say, I’m proud of my little bean dip and I really want to make some more for dipping veggies and bread in. I made about 20 stuffed flowers and ended up using all of the bean spread (with a little bit for me to eat off the spatula). I pan fried them although I think a lot of people deep fry them. Set them on a paper toweled plate in the oven at 250 to keep warm while I finished off the pasta and sauce.

I really need to remember to buy a pasta roller/machine thing because making pasta dough is easy but I never can roll it out as nicely as I want to since it dries out, won’t roll, and generally is a bitch. I managed to make 9 raviolis and they were pretty dough heavy but I did stuff them to the brim. I got the recipe off the food network…basically roast the squash and get a cup of insides and puree it…slice up some shallots, cook in some oil, add puree and let cool. Then stuff. For the sauce…just melted butter with some sage that I left cook while the pasta was boiling. Topped it off with some minced flat-leaf parsley. I think it’s an Emeril recipe and I just omitted the dairy for those who want to look it up.

These blossoms really reminded me of tamales since the bean puree was thick and the petals wrapped nicely around the filling. I must say these were delicious and I still have more that only need to be fried up so it will be a good snack. I really was motivated to make the filling with beans since I wanted to get a fair amount of complete protein even though I know that some vegans don’t think it’s necessary for each meal but we really hadn’t gotten much protein today. Unfortunately, Nathan was totally weirded out by them. Well, partially my fault since I told him about the caterpillar I found in one of the flowers so he was freaked out that there were bugs in them. And he knows, logically, that we eat bugs all the time and that a little bug here and there isn’t a big deal…but he can’t get around that phobia which is ok. Plus, I kind of have to force him to eat flowers in salads since for some reason it freaks him out. Oh well, I loved them and it just means more for me!

Those little flowers barely had any room on that plate! Well, I have to admit it wasn’t my favorite dish and I probably won’t try it again. I think I may just not have a tolerance for Butternut Squash right now…it was just a bit too overwhelming. I only ate 3 of my 4 and it was hard because it was just too much squash. Even if I made them smaller I would have to make another dish to fill me up which just seems insane since I spent about 3 hours making dinner (including roasting time so it wasn’t always active time). I was surprised that I ate the sage since I’ve always hated the smell because it’s always so pungent that it gives me a headache. But it was mellow in this dish and I did like that. Overall, a very beautiful dish but I think next time I’ll stick to my tofu ricotta ravioli. And not tell Nathan about the one bug I found in the flowers haha.

Some of my flowers were burgered so I had to cut off the stems but I filled a small bowl with water and placed it in the bathroom for a bit of a Central American representation in two rooms.

I love these flowers..have I mentioned that yet? They’re like my fall Daffodil…so bright and lovely and I just want to lay in a field of them…but who knows…I think they grow like bushes but still….maybe a field with tall grasses and Dahlia bushes. I remember my childhood when I see these flowers. In Santa Barbara I explored so much; the lagoons with their succulent plants that always seemed to be in bloom, the tall grasses of my elementary school where a bunch of kids would tunnel through the grasses like rodents making our paths, and the Family Student Housing gardens that always had fields of poppies that I used to lie down in while watching the sun set. I love playing online games and I really hate having to defend them from those who think that players give up on life and only enter the ‘world’ through a certain virtual reality. But I think that so much of our memories and realities are self-conditioned and our society shapes our realities much more which can be devastating for some. Dealing with racism, physical hardships, socioeconomic gaps, the list goes on…but all those realities can be hard to deal with and I’m not saying that we should advocate for complete escapism or lack of activism but sometimes certain activities can be freeing. I have a lot of good memories from online games but I realize that I can’t always use it as an extension of my reality because Santa Cruz (and the world) has so much beauty in both traditional senses and non-traditional senses. And with my last post, I think of how these games can actually create communities and to a certain extent friendships as well…there is so much developing in virtual worlds that it still hasn’t set up as many boundaries even after a decade or more of their existence. I suppose that we question virtual realities so much that it irritates me since no one ever really questioned television for so long even though I think it can be really unhealthy and promote a certain level of complacency towards knowledge and news. I’m not as well learned as I should be and I really have to search for a lot of cross references half the time because I hate feeling ignorant. I think part of that is having such an academically geared family that I feel like I need to know so much and I don’t let myself off the hook for much. That and the fact that Trivial Pursuit always makes me feel dumb since we always play the older version so of course I don’t know half the things that my elders do. Plus, I’m really not competitive, although I am with Nathan maybe because I feel like we’re on a similar playing ground so I don’t feel so dumb.

I’ve been really into thinking about different learning processes lately because I feel like part of the reason why I can’t understand or learn certain things has to do with the way I learn. I was always really good at learning music….I taught myself at least 4 different instruments and I’ve always been really visual. Like I was telling my mom the other day…I didn’t roll my eyes as much as she thought but I actually try to visualize things when people talk to me so I roll my eyes up to imagine. It wasn’t until Nathan asked me why I was rolling my eyes at him years ago that I realized that it was off putting. What? Rolling my eyes? Well I did roll my eyes a lot and when my mom would get mad I would roll my eyes because I was thinking ‘here she goes again’ but for the most part I was just thinking. Even when I write I stare at the wall a lot forming my ideas and figuring out what I want to write…it’s annoying. Nathan has learned to adapt to this though but he still randomly asks ‘ what are you staring at?’ to which I have to explain that I’m trying to imagine the scenario in which he’s talking about. Like with knitting….well part of the reason why it was hard to learn was because a lot of it was the English way which I think is knitting with the right hand…but also because they would write out how to do things and I couldn’t picture it. I really have to look up videos or pictures of how to do certain stitches, methods, etc to learn knitting. Same with sewing…my mom taught me during Thanksgiving years ago and I picked it up rather quickly because it was hands-on and I could visualize what I needed to do.

Or another thing…when people tell me their phone numbers or how to spell something I need them to go really slow…like one letter…pause…another letter…pause…I had to ask Nathan some number the other day and he had to start over 2 times because it was too fast for me…because I try to imagine the numbers first before typing them…but when someone spews off a bunch of numbers or letters I just can’t grasp it….

Who knows…maybe I’m just dumb. haha. But I wonder why I picked up on music so quickly…It’s weird because Nathan (I refer to him too much) can memorize lyrics so easily but I never remember lyrics to the point that I continue to sing wrong ones even though I know the correct ones. But we were talking about it and I think part of the reason is because I listen more to the music rather than the lyrics, the lyrics are an afterthought. I’m working on that but maybe my years in band and being around music makes me prone to picking up the little details of the music. I really should look up studies on the left-handed brain or on other learning issues because I feel like people learn in so many different ways. It’s amazing…not only the brain but also our bodies in relation to our organs…our culture…our society…or global community. Nuts. And I don’t feel particularly artistic…never have…even when I excelling at music at so much. It just flowed…

It’s been hard learning to knit though especially now that I’m reading up on the math and dimensions of design…it’s new so I hope that my current confusion will dissipate with more reading and studying. I really am kind of excited about calling myself an ‘artist’ once I get more experienced. And I can’t wait until people ask me ‘what I do’…because I’ll say…’well, my first job is taking care of my home with my partner and making good food and living as eco/ethically as we can and my second job is being an artist’. How cool is that? Working two things that I love…well mostly love…gotta hate the cleaning and the knitting mistakes. Anyway, take care all and eat yummy food.

Why won’t it rain more?

I’m sick of it being gloomy and rainy and then sunny and way too warm for 4 days straight. Bah, I want my rain. But I can’t do much about it except wait for evening when the fog usually rolls in and it’s beautiful.

I’ve been doing a lot of knitting on my corn socks. Yes, corn yarn. It feels super soft although I’ve been warned never to iron them unless I went a hot, sticky, sugary mess….but I rarely iron my clothing unless it’s something that really gets wrinkly. I’m not sure if this book sort of sucks in terms of the editor or publisher because I know that one pattern has some serious issues and I even emailed the publishing house for the correct pattern and they totally copped out and sent me a link to a site that was basically a woman’s blog and she happened to notice some of the errors and made a corrected chart. Unfortunately, I didn’t want the chart since I had already been to that site but I wanted to check and see if there were more corrections. Bah, anyway, I’m not going to even bother with that pattern.

I’m really wondering if knitters have to play with patterns a lot or if this book just didn’t get as much attention to detail as it should have because this sock pattern is a wee bit off. And I’m totally following directions and rereading them, looking up the types of stitches to double check that I did learn the correct way to do it…and still it’s a bit off. It’s really the heel, the rib pattern wasn’t layering quite right so I adjusted it but the rib moved over a few stitches. I haven’t had difficulty with other patterns from online, magazine, or other book sources before so I’m really wondering if these designers had other people make them to make sure the patterns worked. Who knows but I really don’t want to give up on this book because it has some really interesting patterns and deals with a lot of interesting yarns instead of the regular animal fibers.

So, back to my point, my socks are coming out nicely and except for a minor flaw they look pretty good. I still have about 5 more rounds to do before I turn the heel and I’m pretty excited to be making socks for the first time. It sounds boring but if I want to start doing designs and such I need hands-on experience and besides…I love socks. I’m using Crystal Palace Yarns “Maizy” which has 18% elastic nylon which should be good for stretching and shaping….and I got it in Stormy Purple.

Small pic, and hard to see, but the cuff has 5 cables which was rather annoying and I’m glad to be done with them. I don’t mind cables but the yarn is quite fine and doing  about 12 of them in a row gets annoying. I’m not usually a fan of multi-colored yarn but I think for some projects it really makes them more interesting. I’ll try to keep updating my progress and hopefully I won’t do something wrong and have to unravel…

In between my knitting I have made some new food although the salad was pretty basic but oh so yummy. I’ve been really scared of trying heirloom tomatoes because they look like aliens and I’m still overcoming my fear of tomatoes. Sure I eat them all the time but certain things just scare me for some reason…fried green tomatoes? I feel like there are worms in there but I’m not sure if that was from the book that I read when I was younger or if I just made it up in my head…or sun dried tomatoes…my mom used to try and force me to eat them and I would literally gag…it was like my throat would close up and I was getting sucked down a tube and my life was fading from me and then…I would spit it onto the plate rather than sacrifice my life for a stupid, nasty tomato. So I have issues…but I told myself that I need to woman up and buy them before I regretted it. So here they are…my lovely tomatoes from the farmer’s market.

I really loved the peach looking tomato and it was rather sweet in comparison to the green one which was definitely tart and less juicy. The red one tasted a bit like a regular tomato but perhaps I haven’t developed my heirloom tomato palate. Peachy, since I didn’t look at their official names, had a beautiful marbled interior that was amazing to look at and I kept the slices large so that we could enjoy the colors as well and experience different tastes and sizes as they filled our mouth. I know, that sounds a bit pervy but I stick to my claim that most food is super sexy and we might as well enjoy it. Tried out a pretty basic recipe from one of my cook books but I only had sourdough in the fridge which made it look a bit less impressive than italian country bread that I think the recipe recommended. Basically toasted the bread in the oven and spooned the nut,garlic, olive oil mix onto it and let it toast for an extra minute. I probably didn’t need to let it toast more since the recipe used cheese which would have melted it but oh well. Totally great side dish to our dinner and I kept eating the left overs out of the bowl the rest of the night.

I’ve been really into hand mixing lately which I know is good for the food since we can better gauge, season, and handle the dish and plus it does give an organic feeling to cooking. I still use spoons to mix up the liquids initially since I don’t want my hand covered in dough but I really do love feeling doughs and foods in my hands. So, I hand mixed the seasonings and liquids of this salad especially since I didn’t want to break any of my Maters. It’s kind of silly how basic this recipe is and Nathan thought it tasted a lot like Bruschetta which it did after he said it. So basically I made a larger version of it and I can’t believe I fell for that cook’s recipe! He should have named it ‘Fancy Bruschetta’ but I’m not really all that mad but it does feel weird when we think certain foods are new and exciting and then we realize that we’ve had similar dishes before and it’s not as exotic as it initially seemed.  But maybe that’s the anthropology background I grew up around…always exotizing cultures and people…but now I’ve shifted it over to food. Omg, I’m a horrible person…

So let’s shift gears because I don’t want to dwell on my new discovery. I made some more turnovers which came out better than the originals but I still have a bit of a hard time getting them to seal. I let it defrost in the fridge for about 4 hours and made the filling…peeled two ripe pears, mixed in some cornstarch, turbinado sugar, cinnamon, and a dash of nutmeg. Hand mixed again since the pears were really ripe and I thought that a spoon would break them apart.

I actually remembered to sugar the tops before I baked them! I’m proud of myself for that since they came out a bit salty since the vegan butter I have access to has salt mixed in so I can’t control that aspect of the dough. I did omit the salt that was in the recipe but it still was a bit salty since I had forgotten to add sugar to the tops and it really did offset the salt. I’m thinking of buying another measuring tape since I use this one for baking all the time. I’m really bad with measurements…I always think an inch is way smaller which is why I keep my soft measuring tape near me when I knit because I have no concept of length. I’m still having trouble with the seal and I used rice milk which didn’t seem all that great. I usually use flax seed but I ran out and I keep forgetting to buy more so I’ll have to try that next time. Another issue which I’m sure is probably partially my fault are the layers…the foto isn’t as great but when they came out of the oven I could really see the layers but I still feel like I could have gotten more puffiness and flakiness. I may not be an official pastry student but I’ve read a lot of different sources, looked at tutorials, and watched a lot of videos on how to prepare the dough all the way to baking it…so I feel like I have a rather good grasp as to handling the dough and I chilled it a lot between the steps because it was getting a bit warm that day. Anyway, my point is that I wonder if animal fats/veggie shortening work differently than vegan butter in the mechanics of dough. Maybe I’m just expecting a ton of puffiness from my first puff pastry dough and that probably isn’t realistic. They tasted great and I would say that about half of them sealed up and the over half burst open the second I put them on the baking stone…but it was really amazing to see them puff up rather quickly. I could have over filled them too since I’m fairly new to pastries but over all it was really satisfying

To sum up the last two paragraphs…Lots of work, I’m a noob so the pastries probably didn’t come out as well but I decided to blame everything else since theoretically I knew what I was doing. Haha, now I need to make more to prove that I can make fantastic looking pastries.

Let’s see, I wonder if I have any new rants to go on about. Well, Santa Cruz has officially banned smoking downtown, west cliff, and by our area which really makes my blood boil. We’re seriously going to fine people who smoke to generate income for the county which is the 4th most expensive place to live in the U.S. When we went to Monterey I noticed they had ashtrays attached to the trash cans which was really great because people don’t have to litter. But Santa Cruz has the brilliant idea of not putting many recycling bins downtown and no ashtrays and then they decide to bitch about cleaning up. When we went up to Natural bridges the roads were all being repaved but they weren’t even horrible to begin with but lower downtown, beach hill, beach flats, and numerous other parts of SC are in major need of repair but they decide to repave the roads where there are million dollar houses. And it’s conflicting to me because I rant and rave about this but I don’t feel like I have much of a right to say anything because I don’t consider myself a local and I don’t intend on living in this city for the rest of my life. I suppose I feel like it’s appropriation if I start looking for ways to improve the city since it’s not my city.

SC has major housing, homeless, and general city issues but they never focus on these problems but instead decide to pull stupid bans that only serve to bring in money. Everyone likes to think of SC as so liberal and it is in some ways…culturally I suppose, but I feel like our civil liberties are being violated when things like this happen. They argue that it’s better for children…well I think walking by a person smoking for 30 sec is going to do a lot less damage than the fact that we’ve taken P.E. out of many schools, many children (and adults) are eating hormone-pumped, genetically modified, trans-fat, etc food, are inhaling exhaust/smog and I could probably think of a million more things.

Really, drinking coffee is probably worse than that…and to be honest I don’t think smoking downtown is that big of a problem…maybe one person for every two blocks? And seriously, how many drug deals go on that aren’t dealt with and I think that is more dangerous than this new ban.

I really hate what the U.S. is becoming…or is. And I know, before anyone posts, that we’ve been eating genetically modified foods for a long time…like corn…but that also took a lot longer and the way First world countries have forced the world to obliterate so many strains of food is horrible and dangerous when a new pest or disease worms it way into our perfect, bland food.

I really want to move away from this country but it’s going to take a lot of work and even then I know it’s not a solution and I remember criticizing my peers for wanting to do the same thing. But in a way I think I justify my desire because both Nathan and I come from families of immigrants and in a lot of ways we had very migratory lives. When people ask where I’m from I honestly don’t know what to say…I usually say ‘down south’ since it’s somewhat true but what is my hometown? I don’t know…is it where I was born but didn’t live? or The place I was at longest…well technically I suppose SC is the longest but I divide my time here by my mental well being…the first few years were really hard and I didn’t venture out or even really realize my surroundings.

And if I move I know there is that criticism of wanting to move to a European country…as if I’m falling into that colonial state of mind in that I want to become like them and be the white colonial power. But I think it’s wrong to think in that old frame of mind because we’re neglecting to see the millions of post-colonial subjects that live in the EU and who have voices and communities and are very much trying to claim their right to be there. And to be honest, certain countries seem easier to move to…like not learning another language is a plus but this is still a dream of mine that I’m attempting to research so as to make it a reality. But it’s problematic because I know there are conflicts wherever I go but perhaps I want to choose which fights I can join instead of feeling tired of having to justify why I don’t want a huge house or why want to part of the traditional working sector.

I think I realize as I grow older how hard it is for people who have moved a lot to claim an identity. If I move to another country I’ll finally have a more solid identity…as a foreigner…an ex-pat, and American. And I’m not saying I want to become some huge nationalist to a new country and go on about how much better it is than the U.S. (although I think most countries have many and different aspects that are better) or that the U.S. is a horrible place but instead I just would like to live somewhere else. If someone moves cities it’s not a big political deal but saying I don’t want to live in the country has so many ramifications on both the nationalist and post-colonial sides. I’m screwed either way. I also don’t want to erase my history or identity but sometimes I feel like I can’t relate to most people because I’ve had such a mixed history. I had to learn how people acted in different parts of the state and then in C.A. and to adjust to that and then to figure out my own cultural identity which is at times insane. I’m not latina enough and I’m not white enough which is fine but I don’t want to justify myself by knowing big fancy spanish words.

I remember when I was at a conference in Honduras and it was discussion on Women’s rights and many of the ‘liberal/intellectual’ women were using very academic language that I couldn’t understand but of course I knew my spanish wasn’t as great as a native speaker. And yet at one point some women interrupted and they said they couldn’t understand and basically accusing them of patronizing them (or perhaps matronizing?) with these huge terms because they were indigenous and relatively poor in comparison yet they still wanted to organize. I felt really good after that because I may not have great skills but it’s very much apart of me and even though I do want to learn more I still know more than most people think. I have dreams in spanish and I think about my experiences all the time and that won’t ever change. But at the same time I have to recognize that I can’t really share the same experiences with other Salvadorans/Latino(a)s/Indigenous people because many of them have a collective memory or experience. Many lived in poor areas, or at least in the same community where they faced racisim together or perhaps had to leave their home country because of war but I feel like there is always something that binds them even if they still have their individual differences. And I know collective organizations/communities are problematic because one way or another select ideas/agendas/experiences get promoted over others so I know just because someone grew up in South Central L.A. doesn’t mean they feel connected to their community for that sole geographic/cultural reason but I think most times it does.

So where does that leave people like me or that minority of minorities that doesn’t feel connected? I don’t think it’s wrong to want to live a life that a person chooses, especially if we keep thinking about why we make those sorts of choices. I like to believe that I think more about what I do and don’t do than many of the world’s citizens but again…I’m privileged enough to get to questions and make choices and for that I’m grateful but it doesn’t mean that I owe this country my loyalty when it’s oppressed, murdered, enslaved, and generally stomped on my ancestors and others without a second thought. Where was the reflection and questioning of our governments? It still continues with us blindly agreeing that going to Iraq was important because somehow the attacks of 9/11 were directly linked to Iraq…

It’s really hard writing and hoping that people can read through my sarcasm, my exaggerations, my moods, and my political bull. Half the time I write without realizing that people will indeed read this but I try to be careful not to turn this into some sort of diary. I’ve never been very good at diaries actually so maybe this blog is really lame and meaningless. But I suppose in the grand scheme of things our lives are pretty mundane when we think of the plants and stars and the evolution of life…I think I’m becoming too self-reflective. I think being a libra amplifies this tendency because I try to be fair even though I’m far from it.

Anyway, I’ll sign off before I start questioning why I’m not going to continue to write. I’m posting this show that is super funny that I found on netflix and I can’t wait for the 4th season. The IT Crowd…just a clip but super funny. Just for context…Jen gets a bit of an ego after getting ‘employee of the month’ and she doesn’t really know anything about computers…

Update: Embedding disabled but hopefully those who want to view it can still be viewed by clicking through to Youtube. Sorry ’bout that >.<

Fall is finally settling in.

Ah, how I love fall/autumn. Everything always feels so crisp and I love the cool wind on my face as I bundle up. I’m so excited because it always seems so quiet during Fall and maybe pensive as well.

I’m getting anxious about my knitting projects since I still haven’t received my yarn and Nathan probably won’t get his vegan shoes until Nov. >.< Sometimes it is rather annoying to be vegan….He ordered his shoes in august and since the shoes come from the UK it will take longer and my yarn is from Canada so I’m sure it’s moving slowly. I’m seriously considering ordering more yarn in hopes that I might get it by the time I finish the project that I have yet to start. In the meantime I’m knitting a kittie bed and maybe will do some dishtowels out of boredom until my yarn arrives.

In other news, I have some pics of my beautiful Dahlias…well not mine but in my home. One of them was actually two toned: part solid color and part mixed. Totally bizarre when I first saw it but kind of neat.

We went to Natural Bridges this week which is about a mile from where we live. We hadn’t been for years so I figured we ought to head up especially since I hadn’t seen the tide pools. We first headed to the Falafel House and picked up…Falafel and then sat at the picnic tables over at Natural Bridges. We had a friend who was probably more interested in our food than us but he was really cute.

Posting some pics nothing too interesting or in need of explanation.

Well maybe a little. First one is pretty awesome to be near because all these pelicans, seagulls, and other birds hang out on top. This is the only reason that I can guess why it’s called Natural Bridges but I should look it up. Second one is where the tide pools are at and I love that time of day when the ocean looks part silver. The fourth one is a sea anemone or at least it looked like one. Actually it looks like a monster to me.

We had lots of fun walking around and relaxing. The climb back up the hill was our second workout for the day since it was pretty steep and sandy…my poor buns! Zomg, I’m super excited because we got our Stepper on Friday and put it together on Sunday. I swear, every time we buy something there is always something missing or wrong. Like our Stepper, we were getting ready to put the screen on and connect the wires when we realized that the ground wires didn’t have the male piece. We looked everywhere to see if maybe it was in a small bag but nothing. So I figured I’d go get the stupid piece of metal and get showered but then Nathan figured out we could just use foil as a substitute. Because I’m awesome, we had electrical tape handy to make sure the wires didn’t disconnect. Oh, and I’m also super awesome because I bought a wrench a few months back and we actually needed one. I think all those times at Costco with my dad is slowly becoming beneficial…He and my great grandfather both loved tools so maybe that’s why every time I’m at the hardware store I have to pick up something that I don’t immediately need. Ah, I love going. I’m hoping to sand down our windows and repaint them and also get new handles on the cabinets since ours are crap. Our complex could actually be pretty decent if they spent more than the bare minimum on repairs and paint. I mean really, isn’t that why all those home decorating shows are so popular? It seriously doesn’t take much effort or money to make places look better. Anyway, I’ll focus…

So yes, we got our stepper in our tiny apt. but it’s super awesome. Unfortunately we didn’t have curtains in the kitchen since our pets like to look out the windows and it’s nice to let the light in. But now I so don’t want our neighbors to randomly see my sweaty tomato face as they walk by since that would be awkward. So for now we’re really ghetto and are using a sheet until I can find some curtains that we like. Which is actually kind of hard…I’ve been looking online for awhile and most don’t really suit our tastes or aren’t cotton/hemp/plant based. The ones that are plant based are always white or brown or some other color that I really don’t want on our walls. Anyway, I present, our sort of crappy window curtain.

Not that we can really sit on our sofa anymore unless we shove it over but oh well. We don’t really sit on it much anyway. It mainly is our grocery bag holder and cat bed.

I got Nathan to put up our cross yesterday, it still needs a candle but at least it’s up. Also my sun mirror for my mom since I’m not sure she’s seen it.

Sort of a boring blog but I wanted the familia to see my awesome new wall hanging. Anyway, take care and eat lots of yummy food

Happy Birthday to me!

I am resigned to aging gracefully and admitting that I am no longer anywhere near my teenage years. Didn’t do anything eventful except decorate cupcakes and make pizza and hang out with Nathan. I’m going to keep this post relatively brief since I’m in the middle of cleaning but my floors are still wet so I have a bit of time.

First, cupcake pics. Ripped off the decorating from the Vegan cupcake book so it’s not remotely original.

Super cute though. And super sweet. If I remade these I wouldn’t have put the fruit spread on b/c it was a bit overwhelming. Good thing we only ate one a piece. I assume the spread was to anchor the berries down but I’m sure the icing would have done the job by itself. Will have to try again when I eat the rest of the batch haha.

Next up, Tamales! Finally got around to making them a few weeks ago and it was super crazy. I had Nathan help me with the assembly and our tamales came out good but some didn’t have enough masa to hold them together. I was trying to go off the recipe and it seems that they skimped on the masa but we learned and most of them came out nicely. They’re pretty small and remind me of little poops. Gross, I know, but it was super funny at the time and they were super duper tasty.

Apparently there are many ways to make tamales and I guess using corn husks is the Mexican version. I didn’t even know that Salvies use Banana leaves but it makes sense. Not only can you use different wraps but even how they are tied/wrapped/rolled/etc varies. In retrospect I should have youtubed how to make them so that A. I would have made them bigger and B. seen the different ways to steam them. We tied the ends which makes them look cute and then steamed them for about 40min. I used my veggie steamer which didn’t hold all of the tamales and the ones on top seemed to be a bit less firm than the bottom ones. Next time I’ll cut the recipe in half and maybe make them bigger. Overall, I suppose they could have been steamed longer but they were great. The masa was delicious and the filling was really spicy since I used almost an entire can of chipotles. Omg, these look so good I might make them again tonight.

There are some new items on my cooking list that I want to make: Nectarine-blueberry turnovers, vegan puff pastry (I know it’s going to be a nightmare), fritters, still need to make my vegan cheese, and some pies. I don’t really want to make puff pastry since it gets so warm in our kitchen but I can’t find any at our local grocers and I’m not sure if regular brands at Safeway contain non-hydrogenated veggie butter. Since I have access to non-hydrogenated vegan butter I probably will have to make it myself. I’m kind of in love with nectarines right now and watermelon….so many melons at the Farmer’s Market it’s funny to see all the heirloom melons that I didn’t even know about. Makes sense but I feel like I learn something every time I go. Lots of Dahlias are still around so I’ve been picking them up. Apparently they grow in Central America so I think it’s kind of fun to keep that in mind. Another thing I really need to keep in mind is to stop burning myself on the oven. I think I’m up to my 3rd burn and it’s always when taking the pizza stone out. I think it’s because I don’t always pull the rack out far enough and since I’m always trying to do it sort of fast because I’m paranoid our cats will want to run into the oven.

Anyway, Nathan’s mom came to visit last week which was nice since we hadn’t seen her in over a year. We went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium which we’ve hadn’t been to in awhile. It didn’t seem much different except for the new Seahorse area which was amazing. I don’t think people are capable of hating these little guys because they’re just so magical. I was most fascinated with the Leafy Sea Dragon. Leafy Sea Dragon hope that works.

I was really annoyed because I don’t think my battery charger was plugged in because my camera died after two pics and I had left it in the charger for at least 8hours. I don’t think the Wests like pictures anyway but I made them take one haha. They weren’t expecting the flash but it’s cute anyway.

Well, I’ll post more soon but I’m not really that exciting. It’s been a busy few weeks and hopefully I won’t be posting anymore butt rock music but it’s so tempting! I swear we’re way too silly because we love playing some of those songs all the time. I’m not sure which is worse though butt rock or our pop fascination. I am getting us back into listening to EBM in between because I think we might overdose on our hair bands. haha. Well, anyway, back to cleaning for me. Yay.

How anyone got through the mid-20th century is beyond me.

So, I’ve been knitting up a storm trying to get my act together in hopes of making more stuff. Unfortunately, my cooking might take a bit of a back burner but I’ll try to keep it up. Really, I’m trying to consolidate most of my ‘outside’ time into one day so that I have at least 30hours a week while Nathan is working to work on my knitting. I just can’t seem to focus on my knitting when I have other things to do since I tend to make mistakes or not make much progress when I’m only sitting down for 20min and then having to cook, clean, or run errands.

Anyway, I did pretty well this week and I tend to listen to the radio while I knit since I don’t have to watch anything. Unfortunately, our local radio website went down for a good few hours so I decided I’d watch movies instead. I eventually picked Casablanca since I’ve never seen it. Wow, that movie was fun. I don’t know if it’s considered a great movie in terms of the story but it’s pretty iconic and a lot of older movies can be crap just like modern movies are mostly crap. So it was really fun to watch and I was so impressed by their outfits and their drinks….and H.Bogart was totally sexy. Jeez, I wish he was right here so he could tell me, “Here’s looking to you kid” wow!! it’s not just the phrase but the voice…::swoons::

But I was totally fascinated with their white tuxedos and their Champagne Martini’s. It was like a light bulb went off in my head…Champagne? in a martini? Hmmm…..so I mentioned it to Nathan and we agreed it had to be the classiest thing we’ve ever heard. Just like investing, we’ve been trying to diversify our palate. We’ve been trying out wines which has been so fun and flavorful, we’ve been actually tasting different beers for a year which can be exciting…but we don’t really try mixed drinks because we generally know that certain things don’t sit well with us. Anyway, we looked up a recipe for this martini and most were Vodka, Champagne, and some sort of fruit liqueur. Headed to one of our local markets and picked up some sparkling wine since we didn’t feel like throwing down 40US on champagne and picked up some of Cointreau.

Mixed it up and boy did we feel classy. Too bad we don’t have any martini glasses.

I read on one website that these drinks were ‘lethal’ and I just sort of laughed thinking maybe they were weenies. But I can now say from experience that these things will land with an unexpected punch and an amazing headache the next day. How in the world people in the 40s and 50s drank so much is beyond me. Seriously, three martini lunches just seems scary. Anyway, being that it was the weekend it wasn’t horrible that we got a bit too drunk without meaning to. It tasted nice and it did feel super neat to act like we were in casablanca but next time I really gotta count these things.

Champagne Martini:1 Us:0 Totally Brutal.

Anyway, I finally got around to making some Vegan Enchiladas. I actually busted out my shredder attachment which I haven’t ever used because…well I never shred things. I shredded up a zucchini and about a pound of seitan….give or take. The seitan came out really fine and soft which was to be expected considering it’s not as dense as chicken. And I must say my seitan is softer than the store variety. I dumped the seitan in a bowl with a can (15oz) of black beans, strained. I sauteed half a large onion, garlic, 4 chipotle chilies, and zucchini. Plus a bit of spice. I’ve never tried cooking with chipotle peppers since I didn’t think they were all that special but I bought a 4oz can of them a while back on a whim. Damn were those things hot. And we like our food spicy. I only added 4 but I might up it to 6 next time since the veggies, seitan, and beans diluted the heat a bit. Mixed it all together and prepped the tortillas and pan with sauce. It’s a sign that I’m trying to cut down on my cooking time since I actually bought pre-made enchilada sauce but oh well. I poured about a fourth of it into the pan and laid the torillas in the sauce while I spooned the mix onto the tortillas. This allows tortillas to coat a bit more evenly. I also picked up a bag of shredded Rice cheese that was flavored as mozzarella since I’m trying to find a good cheese substitute since we still eat cheese on our pizza. It actually tasted really good which made me so happy that I just wanted to eat the whole bag. The texture was a bit stiff but once my saliva started breaking it down a bit it had a better texture. Nathan was a bit skeptical since he’s always had bad experiences with fake cheeses and I’ve tried it once before with horrible gagging as a result. It claimed ‘gourmet’ melting but we made half cheese enchiladas and half non-cheese just in case.

Baked them at 350 for about 15min. In my experience, a lot of vegan proteins never turn out well if cooked at the same length as meat since it dries out too quickly. We even got these Lemon-herb kabobs at the market last week and they said to grill them for 15 min but I knew they were going to dry out (which the did) and we really ought to have grilled them at the same time with the veggies since they cook up in under 10.

Anyway, the enchiladas came out really great despite the lack of spiciness. The cheese melted decently and it was so great tasting until…..

I found out they’re not vegan. Omg….I wanted to strangle the company. I was so excited that it was a great product I looked up their website and was looking at the other cheeses they offer. I randomly decided to look at the ingredients because some vegan products have the most random things in them. Turns out that it has casien listed and I was shocked and disappointed that this great rice cheese was in fact non-vegan. ::Sigh:: I suppose I really ought to either A. research some vegan cheeses and see if they’re carried locally and B. get around to making my vegan cheese which I attempted once but I wrapped it up too much so it didn’t firm up as much as it should have.

I actually need to check my other cheeses now that I think about it since I picked up a bleu cheese and feta cheese that was in the vegan area of…Wholefoods. I can’t believe we’re shopping there now. They recently opened up two stores in the santa cruz area and I’ve been pretty adamant about not shopping their since I like to support more local stores and the farmer’s market. We have so many organic, fair trade, and local options that I felt like the Wholefoods would just take away from our stores. But I gave in because Nathan wanted to see it and to be honest I was a bit curious. But it’s easier to blame Nathan for my horrible treason.

I’m not sure how other Wholefoods markets are but I felt like they were really pushing for a local feel because there were signs hanging from the ceiling that had pictures of local farmers stating where they came from and basically persuading us that they did indeed buy locally. Hmm…although I’m not too sure about how true it is and what proportion of their stuff is local and really…we live in Central California. We have oodles of food in this state that it’s not much of a stretch to say they’re buying locally. But they did have some great produce that I can’t find anywhere else….Mushrooms galore (our local farmer’s market only sells Shiitake and Oyster) they even had Chanterelle mushrooms at 30US per pound. God, this is why I don’t take Nathan shopping usually because he totally is willing to buy so much food and I spend a lot of money on food when I’m alone. Imagine with him….’go ahead and get some mushrooms who cares about price….let’s get some fancy champagne vinegar for our salads..’ seriously I think he’s more of a food freak than I am sometimes.

But they have a good variety of chile peppers which Santa Cruz seems to lack and they have fresh loaves and a really great vegan section. They had Vegan Gyros! I’ve been thinking about inventing my own recipe for awhile and it turns out someone has made them already which could be nice if they don’t taste horribly. Anyway, I can’t really justify spending money there but I do it anyway…guilty pleasure…and they seem to kiss our asses since I think they’re trying to win over customers. Anyway, I’m sure this hasn’t been all that exciting for people since I’m sure they have Wholefoods near them and I’m just weird about my food. Oh well.

Let’s see….I made Thai Fried Rice the other day which turned out yummy but not as fried as I had hoped. I’ve never made a fried rice dish even though I love them and Veg. Times had a big bowl of it on it’s cover that I decided it was time to buckle down and try it. I actually refrigerated the rice for a few days which was annoying since it was a bit clumpy when I dumped it into the wok. I just used a fork to mash it down and separate it…for those wondering if they have problems. I actually pretty much used my Sesame stir-fry recipe but substituted rice for noodles. I fried up 7.5oz of tofu, then stir-fried the onion, garlic, serrano, 1/2 bell pepper, and broccoli and added some sauce. Added the rice and let it fry up but I think the sauce didn’t allow for as much frying as I had intended. I really should have cooked it longer and added more oil if I wanted a crisper finish but I wasn’t sure how it was going to turn out in general so I fried it up until I couldn’t see much oil in the wok. Added the snap peas towards the end and then the tofu. Yummy but not as hot as I’d like it to be. I really need to make it again since it’s just so tasty for lunch.

I need to work on my photography but really, when I’m super hungry I barely even remember to take pictures.

Next up….I know…everyone is probably hoping I’ll just end this stupid post…

Anyway, I made lavender seitan chops which I’ve been dying to make forever. Apparently, the lavender season is pretty short up here and is actually around during June mostly. Somehow I missed it during the early months but I was lucky to stumble upon it at the Felton Farmer’s Market a couple of weeks ago. I saw this recipe about a year ago and I thought it sounded so lovely. I usually just make rosemary chops which are tasty but lavender just seemed so unusual. The pictures are kind of crappy and I didn’t add as much lavender as I should have because I wasn’t sure we’d even like it. It’s too bad that I missed the season since it was a great lunch dish. For those who would like to know…I take about 1/4-1/3 cup of all-purpose flour, about 1tsp. of course sea salt, and chop up as much rosemary or lavender as I like and then dredge the seitan. I tend to use a good deal of olive oil in hopes of giving it a better texture.

>.< I really should have added more lavender but oh well. A nice light lunch with steamed broccoli. It seems my cast iron pan is always making a cameo since I have to move it around a lot since our stove is a bit small.

I bought a Jicama ages ago and never used it for some reason. I think most of us do that right? Buy food that we like and then let it rot? I am trying to lessen my waste but sometimes it can’t be helped. Anyway, it began sprouting a while back and now has at least 2ft. worth of stem which Re is blocking but you can see a bit. Nathan wants to plant it since it seems like a waste to throw away but I need to check how big the plants get first.

Well, that’s all I have to write although I’m going to post some random pictures from New Mexico and around the house.

Taken in Santa Fe, it was a huge Mexican Restaurant that I wasn’t too thrilled about going to since I was on a romantic kick. Well, I did have to sleep with paper in my hair as curlers and have men staring down the front of my dress all day so I wasn’t too pleased but after a Vodka Daiquiri everything was fine. I’m not a snob since I’ve roughed it in Central America and the U.S. but we were on vacation and I just wanted a more romantic day while in Santa Fe. I totally recommend the Georgia O’Keeffe museum cafe because it was super cute and had a great lunch date feel. We had a hard time in New Mexico in terms of food because not that many places had many Vegan/Vegetarian options and sometimes I feel like a broken record but just because I can eat beans and rice for a long time doesn’t mean I want to while on vacation and wanting to have one nice dinner with my guy. The Persian place we went to was really great but most of the food was really geared for appetizers, but again, I’m not so much complaining as explaining how hard it can be to find places to eat while being on vacation as a vegan. My mom did find a really great Asian place which blew my mind but I still wished there had been more Vegan friendly places that served New Mexican food.

I curse my round face. So not fair. It’s hard to tell since these pictures are small but all three have me with devil eyes. I’ve had this problem since I was a kid and even though most cameras (including mine) have the anti-red eye flash I still manage it anyway, I think it’s because my eyes are a bit of a lighter brown…not hazel but a reddish medium brown that might reflect strangely. I don’t know, I’ve never looked into it but I’ve had devil eyes for as long as I can remember. These were taken at the Asian restaurant and the name is kind of unoriginal (Asian Noodle Bar I think) but it was kind of hipster and really good food. My drum instructor used to tell me that I looked so much like my grandma and I can see it now that I’m older. Broader/round faces and I think our faces when we smile are similar but I’m such a mix of my dad and mom it’s weird. Nathan’s the same way…we’re mutts.

My cousins from my Tia Marielos look like miniatures of her and her ex-husband that it’s scary. But as I’ve grown older I can tell that a lot of people look more like one parent than the other. But Nathan and I are super cool and take a lot of random features/genes from all over our family. I have a really bad farmer’s tan too now that I look at these pictures…thankfully I’ve been smart enough to roll my sleeves up when we go on our exercise to even it out since it’s really really embarrassing.::Sigh:: I wish I were darker like my dad since I think it’s so beautiful to have darker skin.

Random cat pictures. Fe loved the box that my grandparents sent the chile in and she just looks so cute. Re tried to one up her later by hanging out in our paper recycling bag and it’s really annoying that she keeps doing it because she kicks out all the paper eventually and I have to clean it up every time.

Well, I suppose that is it for this super long blog. Hope it wasn’t too boring. I’m going to finish this off with a great song and I couldn’t find an actual video for it and the live ones weren’t as good.

Eat good food and be the strutter.

I was stemming the peppers to put them in the freezer and all I could think of was how great these tops look. Too bad I’m not into claymation because I thought these tops looked so magical. Ah, how I wish I could explore this forest as a miniature.

And I should probably mention that this is gunna be image heavy since I had so much fun and haven’t updated as much as I’ve needed to.

I’m not sure if I’m going to fit everything I want into this post since I’m hoping to grill up some tacos soon and I’m getting hungry. We finally bought a grill, well I actually got it and lugged the thing to the car since Nathan was working. Just a little Weber one since we don’t do much grilling but now that we have one I keep thinking up so many dinners. I was really motivated to get one now since I got my box of New Mexican Chile (Thanks to the grandparents!) and I felt like they needed a real smokey flavor which I didn’t think my oven would give them. Lame excuse but I also figured it would be nice to sit outside with Nathan and just relax with the grill.

Washed them up and Nathan set up the grill…I’ve never grilled anything and Nathan hadn’t done it in years so we were having fun adding lighter fluid.

We also grilled up some corn and we made Kabobs with my marinaded Seitan Asado recipe, onions, peppers, and tomatoes. The coals died down a bit and we really ought to have put more in since it took a bit longer to cook but it turned out super yummy…

I let the peppers steam for a couple hours in a pot and then plunked down in front of my computer and watched netflix shows to pass the time.

Yup, still got our handy little plastic chair. He’s super useful now that we have the grill too b/c we can alternate grilling and sitting between the two of us. Oh and my infamous purple running shorts also make a cameo. I’m sure Nathan is also excited that his running outfit is on display….

Anyway, more pictures of peppers

I didn’t really know what to do with the chiles in terms of freezing so I used my typical wonton way in which I laid out sheets of foil and froze them individually for about an hour before taking them out and wrapping and folding them up. Then I wrapped a bunch of plastic wrap just in case since I didn’t want my precious peppers getting freezerburn. I ended up having about 6oz. of pepper juice which I saved and I’m thinking of putting it into a salsa or maybe using it for a marinade. I only wish I had more peppers since I’m afraid I’ll eat them all up in a week…Oh, and I read that most people seed their peppers but I left them in. I doubt I’ll ever seed them since I personally like as much spicyness but I wonder if there is a notable difference. Well, we’ll see.

I have some more food stuff to write about I suppose. First off, I’m super excited about making tempeh tuna salad. Omg! sounds soo good. Ever since I made those spicy tempeh rolls I’ve been amazed at the texture of mashed tempeh. Plus, I’ve been using some seaweeds in cooking and it really brings out a seafoody taste and smell which works well for substituting and mimicking fish…It’s strange though since I’ve always hated tuna salad but tempeh tuna salad? totally different story. I also really need to try out some enchilada and tamale recipes but they seem so time consuming but I really need to work on some yummy vegan versions.

Anyway, ever since I got back from New Mexico I’ve been recreating this Chinese dish that I had which was basically a stir-fry but with a sesame oil base. My mother asked my we only eat pasta once a week and I had to think about it…well it turns out I think it’s because I suck at making pastas/noodles. Not that they turn out horribly…in fact I think my pesto pasta is uber…but I’ve never really explored pasta since I’m kind of on this whole complete protein kick…eating a veggie pasta just doesn’t seem good enough since I wonder if I should have added beans or tofu….But I’m trying and I have to say this dish is super.

Personally, I like using udon noodles because a lot of the noodles at our market have egg in them and I love that they carry round udon. I cook the noodles and then rinse them in cold water to stop the cooking process. I cut the tofu up and coat them with cornstarch and then fry them up…kind of deep fried but not overly so. Set them on a platter with paper towels to soak up the excess oil. Then I stir-fry some garlic, sliced onion, broccoli, mushrooms, and carrot. The Julienne tool my mom gave me totally works and is really nice for stir-fries and salads…oh how I love these weird cooking tools. Anyway, I soften up the veggies and then add the noodles and sauce.

Oh the sauce is about .25cup soy sauce (I use the reduced sodium tamari), about 1-2 Tbs. toasted sesame oil, and a crap load of chili oil….mix and taste to your liking…then I add about 1-2 tsp. of cornstarch to thicken the sauce and then add it into the stir-fry with the noodles. I add the tofu at the end but it seems to get a bit mushy since it absorbs some of the sauce so ideally I’d like to lightly reheat it again in a separate pan before spooning out the dish. Anyway, it comes out so nicely and I’ve made this a few times since I got back. Gotta love stir-fry.

Mmmm…

The only other thing I’m going to post are my crappy danishes. I used to love my Martha baking book but the more I research the more I feel like her recipes don’t follow through. I’ve used her danish dough recipe twice and I’ve had to use a egg replacer (flaxseed and water) and the dough never comes out nicely and is really hard to work with. After reading other recipes and watching a Julia Child PBS show from years ago featuring a French pastry chef, I now feel like I need to try other dough recipes. The show I saw didn’t use egg at all in the recipe and actually used pastry flour which might help with the overall feel of the dough. Anyway, the ones I made were ‘apricot bowties’ and the show I watched also used apricots but they were basically termed as egg like pastries because when cooked, the apricots look like sunny side-up eggs. I thought I was the only one who thought this until I saw J.Child’s show and now I want to make them again because it’s so funny how eggy they look. Of course mine look like mini burritos whereas hers were more like a platter with eggs on top but the imagery is still the same.

So it took me a few days to make the dough because I didn’t start it early and it needs a bit of resting time. I looked up a vegan pastry cream recipe which I hope to modify since it seemed a bit more like a glaze than a cream. Cut out my dough and wrapped everything up and sprinkled some sugar on top. The end results were not nearly as beautiful as I had hoped but they tasted great which is kind of the most important thing to consider when I make a new dish. Lots of photos….

Not my best in terms of cooking or photography but I think the ‘bowties’ give some indication of how the fruits could be confused with eggs. Also, my crappy pinwheel….but after seeing that PBS show I really want to try pastries again since I really ought to learn how to make them better. At least I now know that I like apricots but I still don’t like apricot marmalade.

Oh I suppose I should post my spicy tempeh rolls that I remade with regular rice and made them with the nori on the outside. Personally, I think if I make them inside-out again the white rice will totally hold together better than the green rice I used before but I thought I ought to take pictures for those who want to see what it might look like.

I actually didn’t make as much rice as I should have and the ends of the rolls were a bit swishy because of the lack of rice. Well, at least folks now have an idea of how the rolls look with each style.

Well, I ought to sign off now…I’ve already eaten my tasty tacos and now I’m super tired. I’ll try to post the rest of my photos and experiences later this week. Until then, eat good food and be happy

I’m so depressed I don’t know what to do.

::Cry:: I just got back from the new Harry Potter film and I am now in the wallowing stage of my emotional roller coaster. Started up irritated, then mad, then exasperated, and now just down right in the blues. Of course I tried looking up reviews to fuel my anger again but all these critics are saying the film is great. Nathan pointed out they’re film critics rather than fans of the books but I snarled that it didn’t matter.

I suppose I should acknowledge the fact that I’m kind of a Harry Potter fan; I’ve read the books a million times, forced Nathan to watch the 5th movie at least 6 times while in the theatre, and maybe read stupid fan fiction….a lot. Ok so I’m a nerd and not even in the cool Hipster sense in which everyone thinks playing the original nintendo or being good at electronics is cool. I’m the kind of nerd that plays online games and gobbles up every crappy fantasy/sci-fi movie simply because they are so few and far between. Plus I grew up with Disney which puts my tolerance for lame movies pretty high. Seriously, we watched the previews and I was super excited that the Frog Prince and Princess movie is being made and I got totally freaked out by that Apocalyptic John Cusack movie and was telling Nathan how I didn’t understand how that is considered entertainment.

I don’t know, I’ve always been a softie and really imaginative. Instead of counting sheep as a kid I would imagine I was this elf from one of my super awesome comics and I had the posters on my wall. I’m just a fantasy freak although I’ve never dressed up to a release. But that also has to do with the fact that I don’t like going to opening nights because I hate hearing everone’s annoying laughs and comments through the movie which is why I didn’t go to see this Potter movie until 3 weeks after the release because I love a nice quiet theatre.

Anyway, I’ve waited almost a year since they pushed back the original release date and really expected it to be better since they wanted more time to work on the stupid film. Seriously, I hate filler chapters in books and I seriously don’t want a filler movie for 2.5 hours. It’s hard to figure out if Nathan would have been lost in the movie since I’ve talked so much about the stupid books that he knows most of the plots through me. But either way he still had questions and thought certain points were totally unresolved. Omg, and the stupid love interests just seemed all wrong. Ginny just acts like a ho since it’s never clear if she broke up with Dean before moving onto Harry.

Bah, it just upsets me that A. the series has never kept a director on for more than one movie (except for Yates who did 6th and will finish off the series) but somehow they all seemed somewhat consistent with the books and engaging, B. the dialogue sucked balls in this one, C. if they’re going to axe like 60% of the damn book at least make the plots they do include explanatory and somewhat linear with the books. Nathan has more faith than me and keeps telling me that they’ll include all the crap they excluded in the 6th movie into the last two movies but I really don’t get how they’re going to pull it out of their asses. Maybe they’ll turn out alright.

I have to admit some parts were good…the flashbacks of Riddle’s life were creepy…I love Maggie Smith, the entire Weasley cast (especially: Rupert Grint, Julie Walters, and Mark Williams), gotta love Robbie Coltrane, and even Michael Gambon. And gosh I just fall to pieces when I see my Ricky on screen, Alan Rickman, he’s just so dreamy. Thankfully he’s a bit too old for me otherwise Nathan might be a bit worried. But even seeing a lot of the charcters on screen didn’t help since much of their dialogue was cut from the book or just added as some random scene.

Anyway, I’ll stop babbling about how lame this movie was and I’ll have to mull over it. Maybe I’ll go see it again from a less critical perspective but I doubt it. I just have been so excited to have a series that is under the fantasy genre without it totally sucking. It’s probably why I used to watch so much anime before Santa Cruz stopped carrying it so much and we don’t go to San Jose much anymore to buy it. Seriously, rent Dungeons and Dragons and you’ll totally see how much fantasy sucks but after awhile it doesn’t seem so bad.

Willow? Classic. Old Star Wars? Epic but only without the extra scenes. I still curse the day I believed Nathan when he said the verison we picked out didn’t have the added scense. Bah stupid CGI in pre-CGI movies that used model spaceships that looked way better than the CGI in the newer movies.

Well, I’ll probably post more later this week since I have oodles of things to write about and pictures but I think I’m going to reread the 6th Potter book to make up for such a crap movie.