penn

Having fun with food

Matt and I have been cooking some recently. Tonight, we tried a modified form of April's cornbread. I had some jiffy corn mix, and we sauteed onions and green chiles to add into the dough before cooking. Quite delicious. To accompany this, we also made salsa chicken and red beans and rice. The salsa chicken is simple but good -- simply brown the outside of the chicken in a pan on medium heat then turn the heat to med-low/low, smother the chicken breast in salsa, and cover. The red beans and rice were from the delicious New Orleans style by Vigo.

This week, Matt also made me spaghetti with homemade sauce, and last night we had salad with Walla Walla sweet onion dressing (my favorite) and chicken breasts cooked in a sweet onion marinade.

Somehow, I always cook better stuff when someone else is eating with me. For myself, I don't worry so much about what I'm eating; my main goal is to not be hungry any more. But when I know that someone else will be eating the meal -- or when I have someone to cook with me -- I become much more concerned with putting something flavorful, healthy, and tasty on the table. As a side benefit, I also get good lunches for work; leftover spaghetti is much tastier than my typical PBJ or canned soup.

This holiday season, I'm definitely counting my blessings of good relationships and good food. I also enjoyed quite a number of great meals while at home (highlights: my mom's roast beef, finally satiating my sushi cravings, and custard). I'm lucky to have good friends who share recipes, a boyfriend who helps me try those recipes, and a family that has always valued the sit-down meal.

Welcome

Welcome to my blog, stumbleupon readers! I just now checked my stats and realized that I've been seeing a huge jump in traffic from stumbleupon. Apparently, someone linked my dating ideas, and it's become somewhat popular.

As an aside, thank you so much to the people who have been giving more ideas for dates. Perhaps I'll have to show the post to my boyfriend and see if he can stretch his boundaries a little! Sadly, in my own life, I've only had the chance to try out a few of the ideas listed there. I've played with sidewalk chalk during a date, and I've pulled out cribbage boards all over the place. Interestingly, in the small town in which I live, not one person gives us a strange look when we start playing cribbage in a restaurant. I'm not sure if that means card games are commonplace or that no one really pays attention to other people anymore.

Other posts you might like include a description of a camping date (complete with my boyfriend's first geocaching find), a description of how to find a geocache (for those of you that would like to try it for a date), and my travel archives from visits to Europe, New Zealand, Chicago, Detroit, Tangier, Pittsburgh, DC, Seattle, and moving across the US (more than once!).

I hope a few of you decide to stick around. Feel free to leave comments, and welcome to the site.

Florida 2008

Now that I'm essentially snowed into the house in Portland, I'm looking back on the sunny Florida weather with longing. I certainly appreciated it while I was there, but I'm now adding the feeling of longing.

My family spent a lot of time at the Kennedy Space Center learning about NASA, the space program, and astronauts. Interesting how something which never previously interested me became quite fascinating once I began to explore the huge space center complex.

I've been super busy with everything so that I can get away for Christmas. I finally processed the Florida photos and will post them soon. In the meantime, here's the pie I made for my boyfriend for his birthday. It's from April's dark chocolate raspberry cream pie with her graham cracker crust. Pretty darn awesome.

I also made steak with sauteed mushrooms and a wine reduction sauce, and we split a bottle of merlot. Between work, the gym, and the boyfriend, I stay busy.

Keepin' up the mojo

I've never really been a fan of group fitness classes. Something about sweating it out while staring at the jiggling butt in front of me just reminds me of traumatic gym classes from junior high. Plus, I really dislike it when fitness instructors subtly nag you about not quite doing a move with enough gusto. Just about the only upside to fitness classes is getting feedback about posture.

Typically, I work out by myself. I check my figure in the mirror as I lift free weights, and I run on the treadmill, track, or outdoors depending on my mood (and the weather). But I've noticed that I sometimes get bored with my workouts, and I'm hoping that maintaining variety will help me continue my workouts past my own dreaded three month mark. I work out three months, I lose something like 5 pounds or so, and then I get bored and discouraged.

To that end, I decided to look for new options. One day a week, I'm doing the exercises from physical therapy. On two other days, I run and lift weights. But on two days a week, I'm participating in a group fitness class. Yes, I've sucked it up, dealt with my gym issue, and found a group class I actually like. Thankfully, I get to do this without having to stare at any jiggling; I'm a deep-water aerobics class.

I go Monday and Wednesday. It's the most tolerable class I've joined; that's about what I can say about it. I like the fact that people can't really watch me work out, and I can push myself as hard as I want during the pool time. I've also figured out a way to do the pool workout without getting my hair wet, so this improves my view of the class.

I don't think I'm a class convert. I like going, but I still prefer working out alone. But I think this will keep enough variety in my schedule that I'll be able to keep working out at the gym until nicer spring weather allows me to head back outdoors.

What to do with old jewelry?

For years now, I've had a ring from an old boyfriend. Received as a Christmas present, it looks suspiciously like an engagement ring (white gold, tiny diamond, quite sparkly), so I never wear it. I've always wanted to do something with it, but I think I'd feel dirty about selling it. Somehow, I want the ring to go to someone who needs it and will use it.

Therefore, I was really excited to learn about a Seattle group that takes donated jewelry and gives it away to women's shelters, as read about in the Seattle Times. Members of the Seattle Metals Guild clean and fix the jewelry before passing it along to women in need. Several of my pieces will probably find their way there, as I've got lots of jewelry I no longer wear.

However, the group does not take any engagement- or wedding-style bands; they take received bands and donate them to Goodwill. And I'd really like my ring to go to someone for free. I just have no idea how to do this. Any thoughts, readers? Surely, there must be some good use for my unneeded ring.