Fancy Seeing You Here

Happy Friday y'all! I feel like I blinked and POOF February and March just disappeared. They certainly didn't show up here on this blog.


Where have we been? Living life I guess!


Like I mentioned in our New Years post, last year was rough. But 2013 has been a surprisingly happy and joyous time. I've been M.I.A. from blogging about it because I did work tax season (thank Bob that's over!) and when I wasn't working we were busy with our California bucket list! But I will have a little more time to spend around here now.


Here's what you probably didn't miss...
January

We went to my first NBA game and instantly became Clippers fans. (I know everyone is a Lakers fan but we have too much purple and gold in our lives!) I know nothing about basketball except that it was created by James Naismith and I only know that because I went to a middle school that believed in grading you in P.E. including the history of sports. Despite my lack of knowledge we had a BLAST!!!

We hiked to the top of the Hollywood sign. Man does that make you feel small! It was such a great, moderate hike and only took 1.5 hours up and back. Plus it was dog friendly... we can't leave our darling Juju at home!

February

We celebrated Valentines day even though we aren't big fans since we act lovey dovey all year long much to the chagrin of those around us. Husband never sends flowers, mostly because I'm not a big flower fan since they die so fast and cost so much. But he sent TULIPS! They are my absolute favorite and remind me of my Grandma. Don't worry there weren't any chocolates. just a heart shaped veggie pizza ;)

We FINALLY got our California licenses. Thankfully we both passed the tests the first time because it was rough! 

I turned 28! We spend the day in Pasadena. It was delightful and perfect. Such a great birthday.

March

We went on a "whale" watching cruise. It was three hours of cold, windy sailing and not one whale. But we did see dolphins and I am now obsessed with sea lions which I lovingly call seals with puppy faces.

On St. Patty's we finally tried Sprinkles Cupcakes and yes, it is everything you dream for a cupcake to be. (My favorite is the black and white!)


For Easter we went to San Diego and spent the day at the beautiful San Diego Zoo. I am a huge animal lover and could not have had a better time. I'd never been to a zoo that took an entire day to truly experience.

April

In April we worked almost every day until my cousins, Jennifer and Emily, came to visit. We basically crammed all the Los Angeles highlights into one 5 day trip. I am still exhausted just thinking about everything we did. 

Word to the wise: if you ever need to find a needle in a haystack you can call my cousin because she spotted celebrities EVERYWHERE! 








WHAT CAN YOU LOOK FORWARD TO?
I've got some posts in the works and I'll give you a little low-cal taste of what is to come:

• Sharing our challenges and surprising thoughts on going "Pescatarian" for 40 days. I would say vegetarian, but to be truthful we did eat seafood.
• Los Angeles hits and misses (you know in case you want to come visit us: hint hint!)
• Workout reviews for arms and an at-home barre circuit (both legit!)
• Recipes & reviews for a homemade frappuchinos & jack-o-lantern muffins

So I guess I'll have a little more time to spend around here and I'm really excited. I missed blogging about being healthy and working out. It certainly kept me on the straight and narrow. I hope you're excited too!

An Ode to My Dear Friends: Chips & Salsa

It's about 10:30 PM here on the west coast and I am desperately searching for one last recipe before I hit the stores tomorrow. Just one recipe between me and my beautiful inexpensive IKEA bed. 

I'm going to tell you a little story about how this is all my fault. 

I remember with longing a time in the not so distant past where I ate dinner for one. Hummus and pita. Chips and salsa. Both pretty common dinners for a single gal throwing her paycheck to rent and the outfits and alcohol that make for top nights out with the girls. It was a beautiful time and I realize now the beauty in the simplicity of a life where grilled chicken breasts in a George Foreman was an elaborate dinner. 


I didn't learn how to cook when I got married because I am a sometimes genius who selected a marriage partner who is an outstanding cook. Not only is he good at cooking, but he likes cooking AND likes experimenting with new recipes. It was a wonderful arrangement. He did almost all of the cooking and when he didn't feel like cooking I urbanspoon-ed us a nice restaurant. Also, a beautiful time. 

So simple. For me at least. Fast forward to California. 

We arrived and husband had a job that started right away. I on the other hand spent most of my time applying for jobs and starting this blog about working out and eating healthy.

Naturally I had more time on my hands than husband. In between looking at gifs on tumblr and rolling out the yoga mat I had a thought, like sometimes morons do, that I would learn how to cook. 

What. An. Idiot.

Now I do almost all of the cooking. Yep, a kitchen novice is feeding two people on a nightly basis. 

I may or may not have mentioned that my mother, while a great cook, really served a majority of pasta dishes. To the point where I thought we WERE Italian. We aren't. So that was pretty much the only thing I knew how to make. 

I learned to boil water. (Who knew salt was so important?)
How to brown meat. (That sounds disgusting.)
And other various simple kitchen tasks. (Let's not discuss the litany of questions involving my first go at the rice cooker)

Then I realized that by cooking I had control over our grocery budget.
I was so excited that I started making 2 week-at-a-time meal plans. I used that as my template for trying out new things. The learning curve though has been rough. Like eating the same rotation every two weeks. Husband went from cooking every night to never cooking because he wasn't going shopping. 

Knowledge is a funny thing.
You think I'd be happy now that I know how to properly scramble eggs and substitute Greek yogurt for sour cream, and I am.
But right now, as I distract myself from searching for one last easy recipe to finish off a two week plan, I can only think how happy I was to eat chips and salsa for dinner. 

I wonder what husband would say if I put that on the table tomorrow?

Everything has its time...

To be honest I thought that my first post back after my vacation home to Louisiana would be exhaustingly chipper and optimistic. Turns out that wasn't quite going to happen but I hate to go into too much detail, especially when the wound is so fresh. I want to get back to blogging about things that now seem so unimportant like eating healthy and working out, but I don't think I can do that until I acknowledge one thing.

Last week my grandmother passed away. 

She was really more than a grandmother. She was my Maw-Maw and an important fixture in my childhood, adolescence, and certainly my adulthood. At different points in my life she was also my roommate, my confidant, and a willing participant in my comedic ventures.

I've come to terms that I was wrong about a lot of things.

I thought I had said goodbye. It wasn't enough.

I thought that the comfort of having almost 28 years of memories and the knowledge that she was ready would carry me through this. It hasn't. 

It's only been a week but looking into the near future I can only see how difficult this holiday season will be and how every step of the rest of the life I hope to lead will be missing an important piece. 

Hopefully I will find some way to carry on. At the moment I really don't know how that will happen but I'm trusting that it will because loss is a part of life and my family is certainly not unique. I do know for certain that you cannot continue about your life while sobbing every time you're left alone with your thoughts.

I'm sure this blog will return to it's intended purpose someday, but for now I guess the radio silence is necessary as I try to navigate the change that has taken place. I'm in good company as my Maw-Maw left many wonderful people to mourn her passing and they are a great comfort to me now.

If there is a lesson to be learned here I guess it's this: there is no corner of the world that holds anything more valuable to me than my family. 

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

The Cajun Trinity for the Geographically Challenged

Today we are on the road to Las Vegas for one night only (insert Beyonce and J.Hud from Dream Girls because it's that level of spectacular!)

My sister, Allison and her husband Joey are in Vegas right now with friends Traci and Dean.  She planned this trip before we moved and I have to believe in my heart that if she knew we'd be in L.A. by now she would have come here. Right sister? RIGHT?!!? Just kidding...



But let me take you back to a real nice story:

Monday I was taking Julia our dog out to the bark park in our building for a little mid-morning tinkle and ran into our newest neighbor as he moved into the building. He was carrying a very large, framed portrait of Princess Leia in her slave costume from Star Wars.

I accept that I am an awkward person and that said awkwardness usually appears right on my face. I can only imagine what my face looked like as I said good morning to this complete stranger with whom I now share a bedroom wall. If you don't know what she looks like let me give you an idea:

Princess Leia as she greeted me that morning. (via Fanpop.com)

Yeah. 

I'm certainly not judging his nerdiness. I live with a nerd and have nerd like tendencies myself and calling people "nerds" is one of my favorite endearing compliments you can get from me. HOWEVER, a scantily clad Carrie Fisher greeting you in the hallway on a Monday morning is a cat of a different breed. 

I went back to my apartment, laughed, tweeted about it and then realized that he's no more of a nerd than a woman who writes a blog about kitchen disasters and bacon shaped art in the gym. So props to you neighbor guy! Let's hope you aren't rebuilding the set of "The 40 Year Old Virgin" in there!



But onto today's mini mission at hand: recreating the Cajun holy trinity here in California.

For those of you who are unaware of how this works, there is a not-so-secret trio of ingredients that amplify ALMOST every great Cajun/Creole/Louisiana dish.

Onions, Celery and Bell Peppers

Living in Louisiana I was spoiled. Never once did I have to cut these myself. Never. I always just hopped down to the store and bought a plastic container with pre-cut, pre-measured trinity ready to roll.

Oh what a rude awakening California has been.

When I first got here I bought all three and chopped them myself. Every night. I put trinity mix in everything. I even throw it in with canned spaghetti sauce. It makes everything better (unless you don't like onions, celery OR bell peppers).

Finally I got sick of cutting every night and realized I could just pre-cut and freeze them in bulk and only have to worry about sobbing my eyes out over a dang onion once a month.

Even this was too complicated for a lazy bones like myself. I searched high and low to find frozen trinity mix and this is as close as I got:

Admittedly it is cheaper to chop the fresh vegetables yourself, but I hate chopping onions. Bell peppers and celery don't really bother me.

The trick is to measure out equal parts of all three chopped and then stir so when you get a scoop of your pre-made mix it's not all onions, etc. 

How beautiful is this? I love green food!

So there you go Louisiana ex-pats. An even lazier way to make the holy trinity. Shortest explanation but boy does it make everything better! Maybe I'll bring some to the new neighbor. After all he just rolled out his doormat. Guess what's on it? I'll give you a hint: it's dragons.

XO, Andrea

Karate Kids! A karate themed rainbow cake

This is going to be a semi-long and moderately detailed post on how to make a less involved rainbow cake with a karate theme. Specific enough?

Last Sunday two of my nieces earned their black belts in karate. They worked so very hard, so we wanted to help with the celebration. Admittedly my knowledge of martial arts comes directly from the movie 3 Ninjas. I feel no shame about this. 

Since I knew this would be a big project, I enlisted their younger sister as my baker's assistant and we set out to make an over-the-top, black belt worthy cake. 

Originally I thought it would be a good idea to learn how to use fondant effectively, but then I changed my mind. It seemed really, really involved and the last thing I wanted was to be making an already complicated cake any more complicated. So I found an already complicated cake and made it easier. That's how I like to handle things.

Also just ignore all of the nutritional information for this cake. It's horrible. It's reaaaaaaaaly bad. What can I say, it's cake! But just so you know this was a TALL cake and it took a 3-4 days to eat by 10 people. I think that makes me feel better and you should feel better about that too. Ignorance is bliss and also apparently thousands of calories.

I'm not going to do like the other recipes because it's more of a "building project" than a recipe. 

But the materials I used were: 

Two boxes of white cake mix + eggs and oil

3.5 cans of vanilla frosting

Crisco

Random Sprinkles

Odense Marzipan almond candy dough

Food coloring

Icing pens for decoration

Black licorice

Wilton food coloring spray

Non-food Equiptment

Two 9 in. round baking pans

Karate shaped cookie cutters

Rolling pin

Mixer

A RIDICULOUS amount of mixing bowls

Parchment Paper

And then I will explain the "phases" of this "building project." Sorry I'm in love with quotation marks today.

PHASE ONE: Planning

PHASE TWO: Caaaaaake

PHASE THREE: Decorating

PHASE FOUR: What is phase four?

PHASE ONE: Planning
FIRST I knew I wanted to do a cake with all the belt colors inside. I found this cake online and read the instructions and watched a video of her on Martha Stewart. 

Then I thought, "that seems like a lot of work to make a cake and icing from scratch." It's really not that much more work but I didn't feel like doing it. So there. 

Then I picked up my niece who told me that I and the internet are both morons. There are EIGHT belt colors not six. Thankfully she takes karate too and was able to be the brains behind the operation.

We knew we were doing a rainbow cake and would use the ninjabread men cookie cutters I found over the summer at Target to put the girls on the top of the cake. We would make a black belt for the cake around the bottom made out of black licorice that we knew no one would ever want to eat. 

PHASE TWO: Caaaaaake

We mixed the ingredients for the first box of cake and then separated it evenly into four small mixing bowls. It doesn't seem like a lot because it's not. Don't be alarmed. 

The layers of cake ready to be fully frosted.

I only had two round pans so we did each layer 2 at a time. I put crisco on EVERY pan every time so the cakes popped right out. I highly suggest this.

We baked them at 350 and my oven took about 12 minutes but we checked every few minutes on the first batch to make sure they would come out okay.

When two cakes were done we moved them to a cooling area and let the pans cool down before we cleaned, re-greased and started another batch. While the cakes and pans cooled we cleaned out bowls and started mixing the second box of cake. Definitely a two lady job!

We started with the bottom colors so once they were cooled we could just start layering and frosting. 

Layers Baked Together

White (no color added) & Orange

Yellow & Green

Blue & Brown (One drop of red, yellow and blue until desired shade)

Red & Black (we used black food coloring)

We used about 2/3 a cup of frosting between each layer of cake but use as much as you need.

When we were done we put a thin layer of icing around the cake and put it in the refrigerator for about an hour while we ate lunch. When it was done cooling we put the final layer which was really complicated and looked a hot mess. But more on that later...

PHASE THREE: Decorating

While I iced the cakes, my niece decorated the karate girls for the top of the cake.

 

Niece #3 decorating her almond flavored mini-sisters!

We used almond flavored marzipan because I didn't want to play with fondant and we only need a little bit anyway. Also, it was on the same aisle at the store and was less money. Of course it was the winner. 

Basically you break off a piece, roll it with a rolling pin in between two pieces of parchment paper and then use cookie cutters for your desired design.

It was so easy I can't believe I've never heard of it before. I'll definitely be using it in the future.

We used white and black icing pens for the design and used some extra flower shaped sprinkles I had to put in their hair so you could tell it they had ponytails etc. Then we just wrote what we had room for with the same icing pens. Pretty easy!

Then came the hard part. As you'll see we couldn't get the icing consistency right to be smooth (I guess that's what I get for not making it from scratch. Whatever!) 

Since it looked ridiculous we went to my baking box to find a solution. Our solution was to use spray food coloring by Wilton to color the sides of the cake and hopefully camouflage the imperfections. Since gradient is sooooo cool I just lightly sprayed, just like spray paint, while I turned the cake. As I kept turning I moved downward until the bottom of the cake was really red and the top of the side was just a light pinky-red color. It worked like a charm.

Then we surrounded the cake with its very own black belt made of disgusting black licorice which no one ate. :)

The finished product!

We stored the cake overnight in the fridge because my cake cover wouldn't fit over it. It was too tall! 

PHASE FOUR: What is phase four?

Then final phase of this very long post is the celebration!

Was the cake perfect? no. 

I strongly believe that anyone else who attempts this will make it a MILLION times better and way more attractive and I hope you send me pictures. 

When we were layering I thought, "what dull colors." Even Husband thought that the colors looked bland. When we cut into it the colors were so vibrant I almost shed a tear of relief! It was BEAUTIFULLY colorful!

Karate Kids!

Did the girls love it? Absolutely. 

Especially because their little sister helped make them a tasty treat to celebrate a huge accomplishment. While eating this cake they were already brainstorming what they'll make for her black belt test next year. So sweet!

I'm not saying my nieces have inspired me to take up karate, but I could totally go for a kickboxing class. How's that for gymspiration? These are strong, athletic little girls and they are now officially the most dangerous people I am related too. You go girls!

XO, Andrea