Showing posts with label Pinterest. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pinterest. Show all posts

Saturday, December 15, 2012

Friday, August 10, 2012

Okonomiyaki and the Return of the King...

For the last three weeks, Brianna and I have gotten together and watched one extended version of The Lord of the Rings on our afternoon off from work. This evening was the final installment of our adventure through Middle Earth, and we celebrated with kettle corn (we both may be little, but we sure can pack away a lot of popcorn) and dinner. Which was amazing. And easy. And from Pinterest (love). And foreign, too. To borrow words from Samwise Gamgee, "I don't usually hold with foreign food, but this Elvish stuff -- it's not bad!"

Or, you know. Japanese stuff.

Okonomiyaki, a savory Japanese pancake, literally means "as you like it." It's simple to make, quick to cook, fun to eat (because it's a pancake, but it's got sauce on it), and delicious to taste. Here's what you need:
1 cup flour
1 egg
1 – 2 cups fresh spinach/kale/nappa cabbage/ or your green of choice [minced]
3/4 cup rice milk or water
1/4 tsp salt
Okonomi sauce (or in our case Sweet & Sour sauce and Teriyaki sauce -- I have a major sweet tooth and liked the Sweet & Sour better, but they were both great)
This is your base recipe. Because this is an "as you like it" pancake, you can add whatever you want to the batter! Brianna and I added green onions and ham. Other stuff like garlic, potatoes, shrimp, fish, shallots, ginger, anything you want can be added in. After you've put in your tasties, do this:
1. Preheat pan with oil on medium heat (or do it after the batter is ready like I did)
2. Place all the batter ingredients into a bowl and stir until just combined- do not over mix (I don't know how you'd over mix it, but that's what the directions said to not do so I figured I'd leave it in for you -- in case it's important, you know)
3. Pour a large pancake sized serving out onto your pan -- about half of the batter will make one good sized pancake
4. Add any additional toppings (or stir them into the batter before pouring into the pan -- then it all gets mixed together evenly)
5. Allow to cook thoroughly on both sides (3-5 minutes, depending on toppings), add sauce of choice and serve while hot
Such a great meal. Pinterest wins again. 
And The Return of the King is just a fabulous film. It's so well done, and the feeling that you get from it is rather incredible. I'll admit it, I was moved to tears by the loyalty and love that the characters feel for each other, and that the actors portrayed so marvelously.
Fantastic evening, I must say. The whole day was great -- productive and fun. And now it's raining. Very perfect.

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

order of the day (but not particular)...


first. OW. But not as bad as usual. Yay pain killer.

second. Fettucini alfredo is delicious, even if the noodles are a little too hard and the sauce isn't quite creamy enough.

third. I voted today. Go me.

fourth. The King of Attolia is just as good the second time as it is the first time.

fifth. Also, Hawksmaid is really good, too.

sixth. I want to watch Real Steel. Never seen it. Want to. I don't have it. Shoot.

seventh. Sleeping after 8:30 is starting to become impossible.

eighth. Sometimes, I would like a hug. Then when someone hugs me (even when I want one), I feel uncomfortable and wish he/she hadn't. Weird.

ninth. The only place in my house that isn't hot (even with the air conditioning on) is my bedroom. WIN.

tenth. On Sunday I wrote letters for four hours. FOUR.

eleventh. I called three people a mean name in my head today and felt horribly guilty for it -- but only for about two seconds because my coworker told me that she'd used the same word in her head, too. Some people's children*!

*because every grown-up is somebody's child

twelfth. I miss Parker. A LOT. A LOT, a lot. And I miss Brianna. A LOT. BUT I get to see Brianna tomorrow, and Matt and Ann. So that will be very good.

thirteenth. Do you ever have days where your bra just does not fit right? One of those days.

fourteenth. Craving sugar like crazy. Boo.

fifteenth. Rent for the month = $70. That was a relief, considering my textbooks for the upcoming semester cost $135 (and I still need to buy about 8 more).

sixteenth. I've had six tutorials this week at the writing center so far. I get so many personal essays for pre-professional applications, it's insane. Maybe I'll be a part-time essay consultant. Oh, wait...

seventeenth. Seventeenth is a very strange looking word.

eighteenth. Poor little Makay broke his elbow and had to have surgery on it last week. His mom told me when I visited him that he hadn't smiled as much that whole week as he did when I was with him. That made me feel really good, and it made me happy that I could help Makay feel better. I took him a small gift bag full of fun toys from work, and tied a "mini" bouquet of balloons onto the bag. I'll make another one and take a picture of it to share, because it is so stinkin' cute. It could be on Pinterest (but it was my idea, so -- I'm just awesome).

nineteenth. Do you have any idea how freakin' happy I am being single? I will post more about it once I force myself to sit still for half an hour and write it.

and now, my favorite:

twentieth. I have been asked three times today if I am a Democrat or a Republican and who I voted for. For the longest time I couldn't figure out why. Then I remembered -- Captain America t-shirt on voting day. Right.

Saturday, March 10, 2012

squirrel...

A lot of things are driving me nuts lately. I should get over it.

However, I'm not over it yet. So I'm going to write it down to at least get it out of my head (haha) and be able to sleep for a couple of hours tonight instead of being awake thinking until my alarm clock goes off. Actually a minute before it goes off, because I always wake up at least one minute before the beeper starts. I hate waking up to that sound...it's a subconscious mechanism to avoid the grating ME-MEEP-MEEP-MEEP every a.m.

1. Sometimes I do really stupid things, and because they were so stupid I keep replaying them in my head and feeling my face turn red for a long time afterward. Like tonight at work. Tracy, my manager, had just gone to grab something, so I was at the front counter by myself. I was playing with a pen that we have. It's got a Santa on the top (yes, I know it's March...but the Christmas stuff is still on clearance [75% off, mind you] so the pen is there too) hooked to an elastic string, and a trigger that you push and it shoots Santa out until he hits the end of his rope. Then he bounces back and you do it again. And again. And in my case, again, for whole minutes of a shift.

Anyway, Santa tangent aside, there I was playing with the Santa Shooter, by myself. All of the sudden I whipped the pen around and did this weird ninja kick thing. At the same time I pulled the trigger on the pen and let loose a loud "HeeeeeeYAH!" while punching outward with the pen. And then I realized...I was at WORK, with customers IN the store, so I really WASN'T by myself. I spun back around feeling absolutely mortified, making sure nobody had seen it.

Thankfully, they hadn't. Phew. That could have been as awkward as I felt.

2. English paper. Oh, and the oral presentation that has to go with it. Ima go find a cliff and drive off of it in my car, k? Buh.

3. My Pinterest pin boards have stupid names. When I go to change them, though, I just can't make myself write something like "Valentine's Day" or "My Style". Every body (most-body) does that. I just can't do it.

4. I overgeneralize a lot. It's bad.

5. While I was upstairs in the kitchen studying for the exam I have to take tomorrow (number 6 on the "What's Bothering Georgie" list), I couldn't help but hear what my mom was watching in the other room. Henry V, with the guy who plays Gilderoy Lockhart (I can spell that, but not the actor's name) in the Harry Potter movies. All I did was hear what was going on, and I had to leave. Not wanted to leave, had to leave. And then I cried and felt like throwing up for half an hour. It was awful. It's still bothering me. Hence number 5 on the list.

We've already done number 6.

7. I can't sleep anymore. Even when I'm asleep I'm not sleeping. That doesn't make sense, but it does at the same time.

8. I complain a lot.

Something that isn't bothering me is the SUNSHINE(!!!) we've had all week and it's AWESOME.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

lately...

In the past week I have

...purchased and tested five different shades of lipstick
...hit 5,500 pins (and counting)
...not tripped once
...de-occupied Facebook
...cleaned started cleaning the bedroom
...written an 11 page paper in two days
...worn boots four days out of five
...almost cut my hair
...mopped the entire PartyLand floor -- twice
...eaten too much
...felt nothing and everything

I'm very much looking forward to finals. St. George trip, baby. I'm out of here.

Friday, October 21, 2011

pin it...

Yep. I did it. I followed the rising trend and got a Pinterest account. Do I love it? Why, yes. Yes I do! And am I actually learning things from it? Why, yes. Surprisingly...I am! See, look what I found: a recipe for Baked Pumpkin Spice Donut Holes (or more like itty bitty muffins)! I decided to make them when I got home from work, and I DID! See?!


Now the reason why I'm so excited about this (and Pinterest as well) is because I have always been a rather non-talented maker of food, whether baking or cooking or even just opening a bag of cereal. I kind of struggle. Seeing all of this stuff on Pinterest has kind of inspired me to try my hand at learning how to do some of this stuff, especially when it comes to cooking. So far I've tried two recipes, and they both turned out really well! And there are other things to "pin" to a "board" as well, like quotes and sayings, photographs, places to travel to, clothes (a particular favorite of mine), and lots of other stuff. It's so much fun! I have so many ideas for things now, I don't even know what to do with them but PIN! Because after that, I can always come back to it later.

So, the donut holes that are really more like mini muffins. These are super easy to make, and they're actually really good. I'll share the recipe with you (I've doctored it up a bit because the first batch had a bit too much cinnamon when it was rolled, so I changed it for the second go around) and you can try it, too!

Baked Pumpkin Spice Donut Holes (yes, baked--it's healthier!)
For donuts:
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoons nutmeg
1/2 teaspoons allspice
1/8 teaspoons ground cloves
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup canned plain pumpkin (not pie filling)
1/2 cup low fat milk (not that it matters, it's just healthier that way)
For coating:
1/2 stick unsalted butter, melted
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Generously grease a 24-cup mini muffin tin (you don't have to have a 24-cup one, I used two 12-cup tins and greased them with shortening to keep the muffin bites from sticking).

In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, and cloves.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the oil, brown sugar, egg, vannilla, pumpkin, and milk until smooth (I used an electric beater because I can, haha).

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir until combined. Be careful not to overmix the batter (I don't know what that means, so just mix it until it looks right to you! My batter didn't have any clumps or streaks of the dry ingredients. If that's overmixed, well, they still turned out fine!)

Divide the batter evenly among the muffin cups (about 1/2-2/3 of the way full). Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until the muffins pass a toothpick test.

While those are cooking:
Make the coating! Melt the stick of butter in a smallish bowl, depending on what you have. In a separate bowl, stir together the sugar and cinnamon.

Now that the muffins are done:
Remove the muffins from the oven and allow to cool until they can be easily handled. Dip only the top of each muffin into the butter, then dip into the cinnamon sugar to coat.


Presto! You're done! Just as a heads up, these are good with milk, hot chocolate, and apple cider. So...yeah! Happy baking! (And pinning. ;) )