Yay! Summer!

So... my family and I are going to the Outer Banks again this year. We've been going there with a big group of family friends for many years now and we always rent this big ol' house and it's lots of fun. (The house we've been renting these past 3 years has an elevator. Crazy, right?)

We go to the beach, eat a lot, hang out, and normally have a Harry Potter marathon. <3

This year, I've promised myself to (finally) watch more Doctor Who, because all my nerdy, Britophile friends won't shut up about it. (I'm on S1E5 right now.)

A big part about our annual OBX trips is the food.
omg, the food.
We have an auntie that cooks really, really good and one of the families we go with owns a Coldstone ice cream franchise.
... We get to eat a lot of ice cream on this trip.

My mother has promised that, in addition to cookies, we will make one dessert everyday. And by "we" she means ME.

It's okay though.
I'm in total vacation planning mode, where I'm super distracted at work (sorry!) and I have outlined everything that I'm we're going to make, and what we need to bring or buy there.
I created a GoogleDoc of all the baking related things to do and the list (which includes prep days) is over a page long.
Whoops.

I just hope I won't be too lazy when I get to the beach house and I'll actually MAKE everything that's on the list. lol

Looking at the list made me think that another thing I should do is read more of that book and do more research on the baking business thing. We shall see.

I'll definitely try to remember to take lots of pictures.

Hope you all are enjoying/will enjoy your summer!

And by "today"...

... I mean today.
Whoops.

Here is a link to my baking portfolio!
I tried to pick the prettiest pictures and tried not to do too many shots of the same item.

Some of them (e.g., the chocolate cake) are really ugly, so I just might have to bake them again sometime soon to replace the picture. lol!

I plan to use this album as a reference for my future menu offerings... whenever that happens.

Next up, FINISH THAT STUPID CHEESECAKE ENTRY figuring out how much to price things!

Warm, fuzzy feelings/Scared, worry feelings

Still working on that cheesecake post... I think I over think things and that long post (and the unpublished ones) is evidence of that.

However! Progress:
Last weekend, I made some cookies as a present for a friend. I saved a couple extra for a few (select) people at work. One of them was for a lady who works in our division's IT team, who, ever since she tried my banana bread several years ago, has been saying that I really need to have my own business. (A couple times she was like, I will help front some money for you. And I was like, eeeep! Um... um... thanks?)

I bring a lot of treats to the office and as a result, lots of people have told me that I need to open up a bakery. Most of the time they're like, what are you doing HERE instead of baking full time‽ (That interobang was for my friend, Ashes.) A couple people in our Communications team have even said they would help set up a webpage for it. I feel like I'm bragging. Sorry...

It's so nice to know that people have so much confidence in my abilities... but the thing is that sometimes I don't get it. It doesn't sink in.
Sometimes I don't have confidence in myself and I get those sabotaging feelings of "well, they're just being nice; I'm not all that great."
I have this feeling for a lot of things though and I'm trying to work through it.

One of the pieces of advice that a couple people gave me is to create a portfolio, so I'm going start with working on that.
A week ago, I went through all my photos (there are A LOT of them) and pulled out the ones that are of things that I've baked. They include final products, but also prep shots.
Just yesterday, I finished uploading all of them up onto my Google+ photo albums, separated by recipe. (They're un-shared right now.)
I was mostly doing that so that I could have them on hand and be able to easily insert them into blog posts (that I will write. Eventually.).*

So today I'm going to pull out the best pics of the final products of each recipe and put into a separate portfolio album which I will make public.

One step at a time.


*Hmm... I wasn't sure how to work out the periods there. I just looked up a bunch of websites and there doesn't seem to be a consensus. It looks weird. OH WELL.

*writing*

Just wanted to give a little update that yes, I have not forgotten you.

My sister got married (!) a little less than a month ago. (They got married on 6/9/12... they chose it because they're all multiples of 3. NERRRDS)
We They had a desert table and gave out wine glasses with cookies in them as favors.

I'm going to make a couple posts on the things we baked (with a recipes!)

I'm currently writing up a post on mini cheesecakes.
It's getting kind of long...

Back

I'm really bad at blogging.
It's literally been over a year since the last post.
I think that my attention span isn't long enough to sit down and write posts. I actually have placeholder drafts for a couple topics that I wanted to write about from this past year, but they were never completed.
I think I'm a lot better at micro-blogging and just fangirling about stuff...

A couple weeks ago, I took this training at work on "Speaking with Authority". For an ice breaker, we were to introduce ourselves, say one thing we wanted to accomplish this year, and to accept applause for it. (The accepting applause part was really hard! A lot of us wanted to slink back into our seats when we finished talking.)
The goal I shared with the group was that I wanted to start up my blog again. So here I am.
To help myself, I changed the author settings so that I can submit posts from my main gmail account. (I think this was one of the things holding me back -- the laziness to log out of my main account just to write a blog post. Sad.)

Anyway. Things I want to write about:

• Cooking classes... It seems a bit silly, as I took them over a year ago. But I did take a lot of pictures and they were a lot of fun (sans getting up really early on the weekend to take them).
• New recipes... In this past year, I've tried out several new recipes that I want to share with you.
• The "business"... I've been bringing lots of treats to work (and now I have some what of a reputation in my division) and so many people have been asking 'Why haven't you opened up a bakery yet?'. I usually shrink away awkwardly when that happens because I don't know how I feel about that at all. I want to do some more thinking-out-loud posts about it. My bff Amy bought me this book for my birthday (last year). I plan on going through it and writing down my answers to some of the thinking questions. (That is, if I can make myself read it on the metro ride home instead of playing Plants v. Zombies* or Where's My Water? or reading Sherlock Holmes...)

So... progress?


*Man, I wish my PvZ money was real. I have over $320,000 and all the plants... :(

SAMMICH!

Okay.
It's one of those late in the night posts.
But hey! It's still 4/10/11 like I promised, so it's all good!

Here we go:

For those of you who know me, you probably know that I love sandwiches.
Love. Them.

The other day, I had a sandwich.
So tasty!

Actually, it's kind of rare when I don't have a sandwich at least once in a week.


Fortunately, to support my love for sandwiches, the building I work in is nicely sandwiched between two great restaurants that excel in the sandwich department.
(Pun intended; I am so clever.)
And by no accident, they are my two favorite restaurants in DC.
(This is coupled by the fact that, while I would like to and should explore more of the city, I have this crippling fear of going out and trying new places - especially by myself. Lately, it's gotten better, but it is still there.)

My most favorite place is G Street Food.
I go there at least once a week. (Though I try not to, because then my sister makes fun of me.)

A while back, I was cruising the Washington Post's restaurant guide. And, being a sandwich lover, I immediately checked out the "Best Sandwich Places in DC". I only noted the ones that were near my office (see note on fear)

I had this place in the back of my mind, mostly forgotten for a long, long time.

Then, one day, starving, coming back to the office from a doctor's appointment, I was like, "You know what? I'm going to try that place. ... Uh... where was it again?"
Sadly, it was so close to my building that I felt bad that I hadn't gone the extra half-block to get there before.
But man, oh, man. All bad feelings were gone soon thereafter.

I got the Grilled Chicken Chermula and it was awesome.
Just.
Awesome.

Just thinking about it makes me happy. :)
(And sometimes hungry.)

I plan on trying their whole menu eventually, but I nearly always have my go-to sandwiches - the Grilled Chicken Chermula and the Cubano.

The Grilled Chicken Chermula is has, obviously, grilled chicken and chermoula. (I had to look up what it was when I got back to my office and started munching on it.)
It's also got bacon. (BACON!)
Like all their hot sandwiches, they grill the bread a bit to get this lovely crunch and some extra flavor.

Grilled Chicken Chermula <3

I tried the Cubano after a strong recomendation from my friends Tom and Arina. They're super smart. :)
Apparently that's all they get when they go there.
It's got like a normal Cuban sandwich, it's got the pork, but switches in prosciutto for ham, jalapeño for pickle, and it isn't pressed.
But either way, it tastes good.

Nom! And check-out the grilled bread action. :D

I think I am going to make a separate post with all the things I've tried and my reactions.

But that would be nerdy.

... We'll see.


My second favorite restaurant is Breadline (mostly because I haven't gone there a lot... yet).
Their bread is pretty awesome.

... But I wish their website looked prettier.

Right now, I'm really digging their new turkey sandwich with sweet potato and cranberry sauce.
It's like Thanksgiving in a sandwich!

Sweet potato, turkey AND cranberry sauce.

So yes.
I like sandwiches and I like these restaurants and I'll make a more substantive post about my cooking classes soon.

(Please excuse my excessive use of parenthesis in this entry.)

Bedtimez!

(Crud. Adding the pictures officially made it midnight... Oh well.)

[Recipe] Maple Pecan Granola (+ Kashi puffs)

SO.
Apparently I am a really bad blogger.

Sorry about that.

BUT. Going to do TWO posts today.
I actually had an entry already written, but I wanted to put pictures in it, so I had to search for them in my hard drive first. And that's hard. :P

I'll do that later tonight, after the gym (and taxes).

As for this post, I'm going to talk about granola!

Yum :D

One thing that I didn't know about granola is that it's basically toasted, sugared oats. With stuff in it.

The funny thing is that granola is is RIDICULOUSLY easy to make. And cheap!
It's just a little time consuming.


For my recipe, I've altered AB's granola recipe.
His recipe has coconut (ew), raisins (meh), and lots of nuts (... too much).

Working with the ingredients I always have in our kitchen, I've created a Maple Pecan Granola (+ Kashi puffs).

Here is my recipe:

Ingredients
3 cups rolled oats
1/4 cup + 2 TBSP brown sugar
1/4 cup + 2 TBSP maple syrup
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup chopped pecans
1 cup Kashi Whole Grain Puffs (YES! Product placement!)  (I don't always have this on hand, though.)

Instructions
Preheat oven to 250 degrees fahrenheit.
Mix the sugar, syrup, vegetable oil, and salt in a small container. (I usually do it in a one-cup measuring cup.)
Mix the oats and pecans together in a big bowl.
Mix the "wet" ingredients into the oats and pecans.
After this mixture is coated well, add in the Kashi puffs. (I do this because I think that it'll prevent the cereal from getting too wet. Not sure if it makes a difference.)
Spread it out on a baking sheet and bake for a total of 1 hour and 15 minutes. Every 15 minutes, stir the granola so it doesn't burn.

ENJOY!

I like to eat it with a cup of yogurt. :)

(without puffs)

Of course, you can always tweak the add-ins (pecans, puffs) to your liking - as you can see through my alterations of AB's recipe.

I usually make a 1/2 recipe. After the jump:

so sad...

I took another cooking class (on tarts) this weekend and I will detail more about it later.

We got to take home some pastry dough.
One of the things we made was Pâte Brisée. The instructor was telling us about the self life and she said that this dough can stay in the fridge for two days so I decided to made a tart shell with the dough.

What is sad is that I rolled out the dough...
... and now, today, my upper arms hurt.
From that "exercise".
Sad.

Anyway. Bed time; hope to write up that entry soon, with a lot of pics. :)

Nice to see you again!

Wow! It's been SUPER long since I made a post! Sorry, guys!

Been busy...
I started my MBA class! Juggling work, school, and other stuff that I need to do is really hard.
Akk! Too many things to do.

Anyway. While I was "away", a few big things happened!

1) My birthday
2) Cooking class
3) New Year's Party

Jump jump!

omg!

Google finally made an official blogger app!
This is to test it out.
I am actually drafting up a real post right now.
Later!


ETA: Hmm... The app does not recognize html...