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Sunday, June 16, 2013

Furry 5K 2013, aka the Best Day of my Dog's Lives

Yesterday morning my sister Alli and I ran a Furry 5K with Oscar and Ninja, and we had SO MUCH fun!

I'm cheap, and I rarely sign up for races-why pay $25-$30 to run 3.1 miles?  (Like I said, cheap)  Alli thought this would be fun and I am so glad she suggested we sign up.  The puppies got these cute little bandanas to wear, and Alli registered to run with Ninja and I ran with Oscar.  I have a double leash where I can run with both of them but their combined pulling power is too much on 1 leash.  Ninja was READY to run:


The race had a great turnout, they doubled last year's numbers.  Here's me and Alli + Oscar and Ninja taking off:


It was HOT you guys, and I was coming off a 2-day migraine and I was worried that the heat was too much for my dogs.  Per my usual, I was just being neurotic and they did just fine, though they were tired after the race.


The running puppies got free puppy frozen yogurt, which was VERY popular:


Oscar and Ninja got to meet lots of other dogs, eat 2 frozen yogurts a piece, go for a run and get loved on by the other runners, and Alli and I had a blast.  This race is definitely on my calendar from here on out!


Have you done any fun races lately?

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

A Day in the Life: Tuesday, June 11, 2013

This might be mind-numbingly boring for you, but I LOVE reading these when other's do them-so I thought I'd take a crack at it!  This is a completely normal, typical Tuesday with the exception of my dental appointment.

5:32 a.m.:  Wake up.  Ryan's alarm goes off, and he quietly gets ready to leave for an early morning workout.  I lay in bed trying to fall back to sleep but no dice.  I check Instagram and finally roll out of bed 20 minutes later.  I change into workout clothes and my sweet puppies comes trotting up to me, tails wagging, wanting their morning hello.  I pet them and let them out into the backyard while I fill up a water bottle and get Netflix rolling in the office/work out room.

6:12 a.m.  I'm on the elliptical, watching Randy Knows Best on Netflix. I wish I knew why I love the Say Yes to the Dress franchise as much as I do, but I just don't.

6:44 a.m.  Off the elliptical and headed to the shower.  Ryan's still gone.

6:45 - 7:20 a.m.  I get ready and try not to change my outfit an obnoxious number of times.  I hate that.  I dress business casual for work, but if I don't have any big meetings that day I'll tend to the more casual side of business.  Today we're doing a training session for our tour guides/volunteers who help greet visitors at riverboat dockings, and I know we'll be on and off a bus a lot so I make sure to wear comfy wedges.  I get my baked oatmeal ready and throw it in the oven.  While it bakes I walk the dogs.  I read my book (Dark Places by Gillian Flynn) while I blow day my hair.



7:35 a.m.  My baked oatmeal is ready, today it has blueberries in it, yum!  I make a smoothie to take to work for my 10 a.m. snack.- I make Ryan one too and stash it in the fridge.  Ryan calls me, he's on his way home.

7:40 a.m.  Ryan's home.  He's hot and sweaty from his workout so he's not upset about the smoothie in the fridge.  I throw together my gym bag, grab my snacks for the day (smoothie + apple/peanut butter), take out the trash and get ready to leave.

7:52 a.m.  Kiss Ryan goodbye and head to work.  It's a short drive and since the local college is out for the summer there's hardly any traffic.

8:00 a.m.  Get to work.  Head inside and get the coffee started; our volunteers are already arriving for the morning's training session.

8:30 a.m.  Paddlewheel (we call our riverboat greeting volunteers "paddlewheelers") training is underway!  I think I'm getting more out of this than they are, it's all great info.  We really hash out the boat dockings, who will be at the table at the riverfront welcoming passengers, who will be giving what tour on what bus.



9:00 a.m.  A city "bus" (more like a small trolley) has arrived and we all board.  Each volunteer gives a 15 minutes speel; I learn things about my hometown I didn't know before, and take lots of notes on the practicalities of giving tours-our volunteers are aging, and we had 2 step down this summer, so we're short staffed and I'll be manning some of the tours for this year's dockings.

10:30 a.m. Done with the tour and back to the office for more hashing out.  Jimmie John's arrives with our lunch around 11.

11:30 a.m.  Volunteers are headed out the door.  I sit down and start on e-mails, which I haven't managed to check yet today with the training going on.

12:15 p.m.  I text Ryan that there's lots of leftover food; I know he most likely will not make it home for lunch today.  He stops by and we talk for about 5 minutes while he eats, then he's out the door and on the way to his next meeting.

12:20 p.m.  Staff meeting to go over everyone's calendars.  We normally do this on Monday mornings but 2 of our 5 staff members were out yesterday so we buzz through schedules now.

1:00 p.m.  I walk down the street to the printers to pick up a poster...bring it back, immediately determine it's wrong, so back down the street I go.  It's HOT-heat index of 102!  The temp is only 94 but Southeast Missouri has wicked humidity, which makes it always feel hotter.  Before I even get back to the office the printer has called to say their laminator is broken and it'll be at least two weeks.  Boo.

Doesn't it just LOOK hot?
1:00-3:00 p.m.  I try to bust through as much of my to do list as I can.  We have 10 riverboat dockings this summer with 2 different companies, and it's a lot of logistics and wrangling on my end.  The Great Race is also coming through on the 25th, and we have all of the last minute details involved with that.  I had two work conferences in last few weeks, and we're having a family travel blogger visit on the 21st so I need to get that organized.  I also register for another conference and book my hotel while Facebook chatting with one of my tourism buddies who's town is getting that event.  I get my desk and my to-do list organized for tomorrow morning-100% clear calendar, I see a catch up day ahead!-and leave for the dentist right at 3.  I hate leaving while I still have so much to do but knowing there's nothing on my calendar tomorrow makes me feel better.

3:05 p.m.  Arrive at the dentist.  I hoped I could get in earlier than my 3:20 appointment, as neither Ryan nor I got home to let our puppies out at lunch like they're used to, but they're backed up.  I get my teeth cleaned and a good report card.

4:10 p.m. I get to Ryan's office, which houses the track teams weight room.  Ryan has encouraged me to lift this summer, as I complain about being soft.  He says my problem isn't weight, but that I'd be happier with myself if I worked on my body composition.  I hate lifting SO MUCH but I want to stick it out through the summer to try to see a difference.  I'm finally feeling a little more confident in the weight room and I get done with my workout in under an hour.



5:00 p.m.  Home!  I let Oscar and Ninja out of their crate.  I sit outside on the porch swing with my book while they run around in the yard.  Drag the trash can in, start hanging up a load of wash that Ryan put in this morning.

5:20 p.m. Ryan's home.  We both get started on dinner-we have a bunch of tomatoes from the farmer's market to use up, so he's making one of my absolute favorites, his homemade tomato sauce!  I slice up zucchini and squash on the mandolin for zucchini noodles.

5:40 p.m.  Sauce is simmering.  I touch up the polish on my toes and start working on this post and have a snack of chips/salsa since dinner is an hour away.

6:45 p.m. Dinnertime, and it's SO GOOD!  I have been loving zucchini noodles lately, I can eat a ton and not feel overly stuffed.  Now that Ryan isn't in season he cooks about half the time and I cook the other half.

7:00 p.m.  We clean up from dinner and Ryan turns on Borderlands while I read some more.  Oscar gets his favorite chin scratch.


7:40 p.m.  My mom calls, she and my sisters are headed to get Fro Yo and do we want to come?  Not being one to turn down Fro Yo no matter how full I still am for dinner, we crate the dogs and hop in the car. At the fro yo place, I assemble the following masterpiece of honey vanilla greek yogurt fro you with fresh strawberries, mini chocolate chips and crushed oreos on top.  Honestly a perfect creation, there's nothing I could have done to make it better.

8:30 p.m.  We get home, let the dogs back out.  Ryan plays more Borderlands and I read.

9:30 p.m.  I kiss Ryan goodnight and head to bed and turn on an old episode of Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations on Youtube, I'm out in less than 5.

What does a Tuesday look like for you?

Monday, June 10, 2013

Monday

Kind of crazy how a cute new outfit will make your day better, isn't it?  The week before last, my family went to Gulf Shores while I dog sat (Ryan and I are taking a long vacation to Colorado next month so I didn't have enough days off to go with).  My sisters and my mom naturally hit up the outlet mall and brought me back all kinds of cute stuff!


My dogs you guys....they're ridiculous.....


A new spring tradition for us is this free concert series on Friday nights called Tunes at Twilight.  We enjoyed the gorgeous weather there Friday night, and chowed down on homemade steak sandwiches, Shiner Ruby Red beer with strawberries for dessert.   The week before when we had went, Ryan made up his mind that we had to have the most enviable snacks there.  I feel like we accomplished this.


Our CSA is in full swing so I've been getting creative to use up that yummy produce.  This garlic scape pesto has a KICK to it but I'm a garlic fiend and I love this on toasted bread or zucchini noodles.  These corn and kale fritters kind of rocked my world (Full disclosure:  I added white cheddar cheese, and I am NOT sorry). Lucky for me Ryan wasn't sold on them so the leftovers are all mine!  Who doesn't love a good fritter?  Zucchini fritters are a staple in our house.

What have you been up to lately?  Do you have any veggie-heavy recipes to share?


Wednesday, June 5, 2013

All over the State


Whew, I feel like I've been all over Missouri these past few days!  We traveled to a Missouri Association of Convention and Visitors Bureau's conference in Joplin, MO this past week, leaving Cape Girardeau on Saturday at 3 and arriving in Joplin Saturday night at 9:30.  So yeah, ALL over the state!  We just got back last night, it was a great trip but I am very glad to be home as I was in Memphis the week before last for another work conference too.

On the way, we had dinner at this insane diner called Uncle Rooster's.  It was a phenomenal find, and if you're ever on Highway 60 in Seymour, MO, go to this place with an appetite.  When I ordered a side of corn on the cob I was reminded that it came deep fried.  And soaked in garlic butter.  YES.  1st timer's sign their names on the floor....


Dessert was homemade blueberry pie, warmed up with a scoop of ice cream.  It was this good:


We got to Joplin a day before the conference started to help out with a community service project that involved de-seeding fescue, a non-native Missouri grass, to help return this land to it's natural wetland state.  Take that, fescue!


The Joplin CVB director took the group on a really powerful tour of Joplin's tornado recovery efforts.  Seeing how far they've come in 2 years was beyond words.  Here's our group at a memorial to the miracle of the human spirit, located in the park they used for all of the press conferences during the disaster:


Here's what the park looked liked in the days after the disaster:


How quickly and how well they've rebuilt makes you all misty eyed.  They've taken it as an opportunity to completely review lots of infrastructure and are truly making Joplin even better.

My co-worker Alyssa's friend Lenny from the Joplin CVB was kind enough to take us around and show us the town.  I had to stick my head in their public library, which had this really cozy and unique Art Reference Reading Room built on...doesn't this look like a beautiful place to cuddle up with a book?


We also stood in 3 states at once, Oklahoma, Missouri and Kansas!


I was ready to get home to my husband, my family and these sweet guys:


Do you have to travel much for work?  What have you been up to lately?  I need to get caught up on my blog buddies, I'm out of the loop!

Saturday, May 25, 2013

Thrifting Score

I scored big time thrifting today!  My mom and my sister Alli and I hit up 2 of our favorite local thrift stores-Goodwill and Teen Challenge.  Teen Challenge is a religious based rehab program for men who have nowhere left to go (they have the thrift store, a strawberry farm and a lawn mowing service that are all well known around town), and you know all about Goodwill.  The black eyelet tank is from J Crew, the blue gingham short sleeved button down is H&M, the hot pink lace skirt is brand new from Target and I didn't recognize the brands on the chambray shirt of the blue tank top.


They're in the wash right now....and I'm already planning how to wear it all!  Thrift stores are SO hit or miss, but then you have days like this where the time you spend makes it all worth while.  The percentage of thrifted clothes vs. new clothes in my closet has been shifting more and more towards thrifted...it's just so affordable, and it's much better for the earth.  I've gotten to be really selective-just because it's only $4 doesn't mean it's a good deal if you never end up wearing it! This does make it easier to give trends you're not sure about a try. I bought a maxi skirt from Goodwill last year; if I didn't wear it, not a big loss, but it was a trend I wanted to try.

Have you had any luck at the thrift stores lately?

Thursday, May 16, 2013

Smitten...with this cookbook

I swung by our amazing library on Monday during my lunch break to pick up a book I had on hold that had come in (Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan, which was very good) and did a quick peruse of the "what's new" shelves.  I've been a Smitten Kitchen follower for years, and being in quite the meal rut lately, I of course snagged the Smitten Kitchen Cookbook.

Later that night I kicked back on the porch swing while Oscar and Ninja played in the backyard and started tabbing recipes....2 pads of post-its later....



I basically tabbed every other recipe.  It all just looked SO good, and her obsessive recipe testing guarantees it's not going to be a flop.  So far, I've made the zucchini ribbons with almond pesto (very tasty, though I sliced the zucchini too thick and need to try this one again; user error on my part as I can do like 1 setting on our mandolin grater) and the shaved asparagus pizza with her rushed pizza dough.  Oh. My. Goodness.


Never in a million years would it have occurred to me to thinly shave asparagus (which sounded really hard, but was a piece of cake with a potato peeler) and put it on top of a pizza.  I'm also a huge tomato sauce fan, so a sauceless pizza.....but I took one bite and fell in LOVE, this was out of this world.  Full disclosure:  Ryan got his own pizza with tomato sauce, cheese and mushrooms.  The asparagus was too "weird" for him.  

I will say, the next time I have this on the menu, I'll make the dough on a Sunday, freeze it then grab it out of the freezer the day I want to make it. Even with it being a "rushed" pizza dough recipe, it still took 45 minutes just for the dough, and that's too long for a weeknight dinner.

I haven't been this fired up about cooking in I don't know how long...maybe never?  There's a killer veggie ratoutille that WILL be made when our CSA ramps up at the beginning on June, popcorn cookies (with actual popcorn kernels in them, the anticipation is killing me on this one), lemon bars (for Ryan), a fruit breakfast crisp, shells with peas and a light alfredo....I could go on and on, and probably will as I start to cook my way through this!

I am a big library user, and really only buy books at garage sales or thrift stores.  But this book might be what I spend my $25 Barnes and Noble gift card on, that's how amazing it is.  I have stuff to make for dinner for weeks now!

Have you made anything particularly tasty lately? I know some of you are doing the Whole30 Cleanse, (Jessi I am super sorry about that Tiramisu recipe from earlier this week!),  I'd love to hear about some of the recipes you're using for that! 


Monday, May 13, 2013

Tiramisu


I worked at Bella Italia, this cute Italian place downtown, all through high school and college.  A pastry chef named Pat worked there too and made all of our desserts in house; whenever she leveled off the layer cakes, she'd leave a huge platter of cake shards and whip up 3 or 4 flavors of frosting for us to dip it in.  She was amazing!  Before I left, Pat graciously wrote out her recipe for my mom's favorite dessert, a Tiramisu layer cake.  I make it every year for Mother's Day and again for my mom's birthday in July.  It's not at all a traditional Tiramisu, with the ladyfingers soaked in espresso; but I really like the traditional Tiramisu flavors in a layer cake format (I think the ladyfingers get soggy!).  

This cake is a process, a labor of love!  My favorite way to cook it is to assemble each component separately the week before I'm serving the cake, that way you're just left to whip the whipped cream and assemble the cake.
Components all ready to go!
Ingredients:
  • 2 boxes Duncan Hines white cake mix
  • 1 pint heavy cream
  • Powdered sugar
  • 2-4 tablespoons Kahlua (depending of course upon how "spiked" you like your cake)
  • 1 tablespoon corn syrup
  • 1/2 cup leftover coffee
  • Vanilla
  • 1/2 cup chocolate chips (or 1 cup if you really dig ganache)
  • 8 oz. cream cheese

Step 1:  The cake layers.
You'll be making 4 round cake layers total.  I only have 2 9" round cake pans so these get made in 2 batches.  I grease the pans really well with Crisco and then flour them thoroughly; that combined with Calphalon coated pans makes my cake layers slide right out (for the most part).  

Once your 4 cake layers are baked and cooled, flip them over so they're right side up.  Even off the layer; shave it down so the top of the cake is a relatively even, flat surface.  At this point, I wrap them in plastic wrap and freeze them;  they're sturdier to handle when frozen.

Step 2:  Ganache
I make 1/2 the ganache Pat's original recipe called for, as the cake is so rich as is.  If you are a big chocolate fan, then make the ganache using the full cup of chocolate chips.  Melt 1/2 cup chocolate chips (I use 1/4 cup milk chocolate and 1/4 cup dark chocolate, Ghiradelli chocolate chips) with a splash of heavy cream; 45 seconds in my microwave does it.  I make this and then keep it in the fridge until Cake Day.

Step 3:  Cream Cheese
Mix 8 oz. cream cheese (this goes easier if it's softened) with a couple of teaspoons of powdered sugar (or to taste).  Package and keep in the fridge until Cake Day.

Step 4:  Coffee Mixture
Mix 1 tablespoon corn syrup with 1/2 cup coffee and 1-2 tablespoons of Kahlua.  If you do this with hot coffee it all blends together nicely.  Package and keep in fridge until Cake Day.  (You can make all of the different components on one day if you really wanted to; I've done it before, but you will end up with a crippling amount of dishes.)

Cake Day:  Assembly Time
First you're going to whip the whipped cream.  Dump your pint of whipped cream (minus that splash you used for the ganache) into a stand mixer; add a couple of tablespoons of powdered sugar, 2 teaspoons of vanilla and 1 tablespoon of Kahlua.  Mix on medium until you get whipped cream(4-6 minutes in my mixer). Also heat up your cream cheese mixture (until it's softened and easy to spread) and your ganache (until is liquidy). 

Get out whatever plate you want to serve the cake on; or you can get real fancy and use one of those stiff cardboard rounds, whatever floats your boat.  For Mother's Day yesterday I used a milk glass dish we used at our wedding.  

Get your cake layers out of the freezer and place one on the bottom of the plate.  Drizzle a few spoonfuls of the coffee mixture onto the cake layer, letting it soak into the cake.  Spread a thin, even layer of cream cheese onto the cake.  Add about 2 tablespoons of the whipped cream and spread it thinly and evenly onto the cake.  Now drizzle some ganache, like so:  

Now add your next 2 cake layers, drizzling on coffee, then cream cheese, then whipped cream, then ganache on each layer.  For your final cake layer, crizzle on the coffee and cream cheese.  Then add a big "plop" of whipped cream to the top and start icing that bad boy!  I ice the top, then do a thin layer on the sides, then I go back and add to the sides as whipped cream allows. 


Don't go for perfection with the icing, you've made a gorgeous, delicious homemade cake!  After you get the whipped cream situated, drizzle ganache on the top.  Here's yesterday's finished product:  


Whew!  Now eat a piece, you've earned it :)

What are some of your traditional family desserts that got associated with you or a certain holiday over the years?