Posts filed under 'Foodstuffs'
Since we are going to be spending buckets of money on our house in the next few months (see category: Remodel Hell), we decide to pack Brian’s birthday (7/18), our 5th wedding anniversary (7/26) and my birthday (9/10-I’m going to be out of the country, so why not live it up now?) into one day of celebrating. No gifts, which makes life so much easier, just dinner and a movie.
I started this celebration off with a 5 mile run in the morning, which felt less like celebrating and more like drilling a hole in my head with a dull pencil. A truly miserable run, I’m hoping it was just the muggy weather.
After that, I assumed we would just hang out with Ashok until Brian’s mom arrived to babysit, but no, there was one more home improvement task to be tackled. We are planning to put a few large trees in pots out in the backyard, since we have nowhere to plant (swimming pool=concrete) but have been struggling to find the perrrrfect large pots to put them.
Immediately after we took him out he said, “again!” even though he appeared to be completely confused as to why he was in there to begin with. Anyway, that pot isn’t the one we bought but without providing too many boring details, we did finally settle on something.
Our real celebration began at 3:00 when we high-tailed it to a showing of The Dark Knight. I liked the movie, it was definitely entertaining and intense but I have to say, the amount of violence was a little over the top. It was particularly disturbing considering that the lady one row in front of us brought her young kids with her, they looked like they were about 10 and 7. Nice.
Then, the part I was really excited about: dinner at Osteria Mozza. We came here for my sister’s 40th and had an incredible meal, so I was thrilled to go back. This time around was no disappointment, we had an incredible meal and a fantastic server who recommended great wines. (If food talk bores you, you may want to stop reading here as I am about to give a grueling play by play of our whole meal, mostly so I can relive it and drool.)
Beverages: one thing I really enjoyed about their wine list was being able to order 250ml. servings of some of the wines, so we were able to try 3 different ones. My favorite was the Sangiovese we had last-of course I was drunk by then, so who really knows. Because I was a drunken idiot, I didn’t take note of any the names of the wines, so I can’t recount them here.
From the antipasti menu we had the Little Gem Lettuces with green beans, noci & pecorino. The noci were actually just walnuts, but they were probably the most perfect walnuts I have ever seen. And salty, which maked them even more perfect. Then we ordered a few small plates from the Mozzarella Bar. They were:
Bufala mozzarella with pesto, salsa romesco, tapenade & caperberry relish - a nice, big dollop of cheese with four spreads to choose from with crostini. I don’t know what a caperberry is but that relish was incredible.
Sheep’s milk ricotta, radicchio, spiced walnuts, honey & fried rosemary - probably my favorite part of the whole evening, the honey was unbelievably fresh and the combination of that with the spicy walnuts (more perfect walnuts!) was incredible.
Burrata with leeks vinaigrette & mustard breadcrumbs - Burrata is a super-soft mozzarella made with cream. The cheese was amazing, but the leeks were only ok. Probably our least favorite thing of the night.
We are both great lovers of cheese, as you can tell. But really, what’s not to like?
After that, I had the Maltagliati (a pappardelle type pasta) with wild boar ragu and Brian had the fresh gnocchi with tomato and basil. They were both fantastic, the gnocchi were of the melt-in-your-mouth variety. For dessert, we shared the Torta del Nonna with honey and pine nuts-more fresh honey and this time on cheescake!!- and a strawberry extravaganza that involved a berry sauce, crepes, gelato and sorbet, but honestly who knows? I was pretty much delirious by this point.
Today, I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck (probably a truck carrying cheese). It was worth it, but I think I may just look at pictures of food for lunch today. Oh, who am I kidding? I need a sandwich.
July 28th, 2008
No, not a baby, or another dog….
Brian’s car was on its last legs (wheels?) so we traded it in for something that sucks down a little less gas. Brian is totally in love, I think I’ve dropped to #3 on his list.
Speaking of gas, we’ve been trying to offset the cost of gas by walking as much as we can these days. It’s a tough thing to do in a city like L.A. where things are so spread out and public transportation isn’t terribly efficient. We took a nice 30 minute walk with Ashok in the stroller and Lucy pulling away on the leash to our favorite breakfast spot the other morning-I don’t feel nearly as guilty about inhaling sausage, eggs and cheese when I know I’m going to be walking a mile and a half home right afterwards. Tonight, we walked a slightly shorter distance with the same gang to a little Italian place, but the food pretty much sucked. Oh well, we tried.
I’m trying to get back into a regular running schedule this week. I’ve been in a pretty serious slump over the last few months and I need to shake myself out of it somehow. I also decided to do the One Hundred Push Ups program. I started last week, but don’t think I was doing my push-ups quite as well as I could, so I’m going to repeat week 1 this week and Brian’s going to start it as well. It will be much easier to stay on the schedule if we’re both doing it. We just have to stop laughing at each other while we’re doing them.
July 14th, 2008
This whole 4th of July on a Friday thing is a really fine idea, I recommend we do this every year. Having a couple of days to recover from the 4th is great-we still get a whole weekend of lazing about after yesterday’s festivities.
I have been on a bit of a cooking spree lately. This may have been spurred on by the fact that our remodel plans were finally approved by the city last week (it took 4 months!) which means we could finally start construction soon. This of course means we won’t have a kitchen for several months which may be why I’m cooking like a madwoman this week. Having time off definitely contributes to this habit as well, and I did just have a blissful week off from work after our week up at Sequoia. So, for the 4th I actually planned a menu. Pretty fancy, eh? For starters we had…
Caprese-on-a-stick: mozzarella ball, cherry tomato and basil on a toothpick, drizzled with olive oil and topped with a little fleur de sel.
Garlicky White Bean Dip and Pita Chips: I wasn’t so sure about this dip right after I made it, but after it sat in the fridge for a couple of hours and soaked up some of that garlic flavor and I added the fresh oregano, it was really, really tasty. At this point I started drinking and completely forgot to take any more pictures of food, but here was the rest of the menu:
Indian Grilled Chicken, my own recipe
These potatoes-so good!
Herb-tossed Corn
Greek salad, courtesy of my mother-in-law, the Salad Queen
White chocolate chip Heath bar brownies, courtesy of my sister the Queen of all Baking
It was goooood. If only I had the time to cook like this the rest of the year.
Ashok’s cousin was over for dinner so they had all sorts of fun. Swimming…
…wagon rides…
…and bubbles.
Or, maybe just bubble.
Today, there was some more excitement around here, but I haven’t uploaded the appropriate pictures yet, so all three of you reading will have to wait for my next post. I promise it won’t be two weeks from now.
July 5th, 2008
I ran my first 10 miler ever today. It sucked. I felt like I was dragging ass the whole way and nothing helped, not water, not clif blocks, not nothing. I won’t post my splits because I was so unbelievably slow and I don’t want to look at them again.
Of course, the big problem today was the heat. I didn’t get out early enough, and by the time I was heading back it was about 75 degrees. That doesn’t sound so bad, but I’m just not used to running in warmer weather right now. Also, I am brown. That’s not a problem, mind you, but I’ve always felt like my skin and my black hair soak up the sun like a sponge. Maybe I’m just making excuses….I do have a good hat. I went through all my water today which I never do, which makes me think that I probably wasn’t drinking enough water in the last 24 hours to get ready for this run, and I ended up walking a quarter mile stretch just after the 8 mile mark. There was a point around 9 where I even considered calling Brian to come get me, but I was so close at that point that I just sucked it up and got myself home.
Next week’s long run is back down to 8 and then 2 weeks from today I do 12, which is my longest long run before the half on April 5th. I really hope that run goes better than today’s and obviously, I need to plan a little better and make sure I get my ass out the door before it gets too warm. The race, thankfully, starts at 7:00 am.
I have so much stuff to do today, mostly practicing, but I feel like just sitting around and sulking. I have an important recording coming up in about a week and I need to do some serious work to get ready for that, but I’m having trouble finding the motivation. It’s a piece I performed many times, so I know it well, but recording is a whole different ball game. I have to be able to play really clean and precise since I know the folks putting this album together have limited time for editing. It is a great opportunity and I’m excited somewhere deep inside, but right now I just don’t feel like dealing with it.
On the bright side, we’re going out tonight to celebrate my mom’s birthday. Dinner will be at one of our favorites, Pizzeria Mozza. If you live in the LA area and haven’t been there, get to it! It is easier to get a reservation than the Osteria and the food is fantastic and although not as fancy, slightly cheaper. I can’t wait. Hopefully, a Butterscotch Budino will help pull me out of this funk.
March 9th, 2008
Congratulations, Brian! My husband had a great race this weekend coming in at 4:16:23. Ashok, my mom and I went out so see him at mile 19, which was right in front of Staples Center where a Laker game was about to start, and he looked great. Unfortunately, my hands were a bit too full to take any pictures of him running by, but I did get some shots of the spectators:
On the (not so) mean streets of L.A….
My Dad is My Hero
It was a beautiful day, highs in the low 70’s, although, according to Brian, a bit too warm and sunny for running 26+ miles. After mile 19, we walked down Flower Street in downtown and I was once again confounded by street closures and barricades and unable to get to the finish line. We managed to find him afterwards, but I wish we could have seen him cross. Maybe if the LA Marathon website wasn’t such a useless piece of crap, they could actually have some helpful information for spectators? Regardless, it was a great day and inspiring as usual too see all the runners and the thousands of people who came out to cheer them on. The marathon always makes me excited to live in L.A.
After coming home, where some people showered and other smaller people napped, we went out for dinner at The York. The York used to be The Wild Hare, which was one of our favorite bars when we lived in Highland Park. We celebrated many different occasions over there, including Brian’s first marathon in 2006. The Wild Hare was a bit of a dive, which I loved, don’t get me wrong, and we were sad to see it go but The York is pretty nice. Excellent beers, a full wine list, great food, and so far none of the hipsters have sneered at the baby in the high chair. I had a fantastic pan-seared tilapia with lentils, swiss chard and bacon and a Crafstman Hefeweizen-I’m drooling just thinking about it. After all that eating, we gave Ashok a bath and both boys were in bed by 8:00. It was a good day.
Now that Brian’s big race is over, I’m realizing that my half marathon is only a month away. I am on track with my training schedule but I looked at the elevation chart for the race today and….crap! What was I thinking?? Am I going to be able to make it through those first 8 miles? Oh well, too late now. If anyone has any recommendations for hill training, I’ll take all the help I can get.
March 3rd, 2008
This last week was brutal. Between the crazy, hectic work week and the non-stop rain (not complaining, we need it!) there was hardly any time for running or anything else. I only got two runs in but at least they were both good. Today I did 7.2 on the same course as last weekend’s seven. Total time was 1:11:12 and here are the splits:
1 - 10:41
2 - 9:56
3 - 9:39
4 - 9:59
5 - 9:51
6 - 9:37
7 - 9:29
.2 - 1:57
In general, today felt much better than last week. My overall pace was about 25 seconds faster which probably had a lot to do with finally getting a few good nights of sleep this past week. Ashok has taken to sleeping in until 7:15 again, god bless him! Even though we usually don’t take Lucy on long runs, she came with me today which probably helped too. She was so excited; after a rainy week of no running and only a few short walks here and there, she was still bouncing around the house like crazy even after a 7 mile run.
I still haven’t posted my food pictures yet-I’m hoping to figure it out this week when I get some much needed time off. Unfortunately, this break won’t last long. February had been looking nice and mellow for a while, but a bunch of work has come in and looks like it will be a crazy month.
But, before that all gets started I have something to look forward to: on Wednesday of this week, my sister turns 40 and we are going out to Osteria Mozza to celebrate. This restaurant is pretty new and has been the source of much buzz in L.A. so I am excited to check it out. If I can manage to take pictures of my meal without making a total ass of myself, I’ll post them here after. Those food pictures will probably be much more interesting than all that cereal and pasta I ate last week.
January 27th, 2008
I have decided to take on a task for this week. Inspired by Runner Susan, I am going to attempt to photograph everything I eat starting this morning and ending Sunday night. Although for me this doesn’t involve any sort of diet, I think it will help me get an idea of how well, or not well, I am eating. This week will be a tough one too, since I have several late night opera rehearsals that will get me home around midnight at which point I usually have a secret pig out party in my office with the cat as my only witness. Perhaps the possibility of photographic evidence of my late night binges will slow me down a bit? I sort of doubt it.
So far my goals are going pretty well. I got 5 workouts in last week (4 runs, 1 ab/yoga). For my long run this week I did 6.5 miles and although they were pretty slow at least I got them done. I am trying not to focus too much on speed in the long runs-since April will be my first half marathon ever, I just want to finish more than anything else.
Shopping….well, I did buy a couple of things on clearance at Target for Ashok (a $3 shirt and a $6 raincoat, come on!) but I didn’t buy any more shoes for myself-I will survive with just the adorable red sneakers and not invite any of their relatives to come and live with me. Curbing the shopping is hard, it is a bad habit that has developed over years and will probably take just as long to get under control.
In a very busy weekend we managed to get in some time at the park on an absolutely beautiful day.
We had a picnic lunch that included quiche for Ashok which he ate with his little finger sticking out after asking around for Grey Poupon. He is fancy like that.
And just to clarify something I mentioned in my last post, Ashok: The Sequel is not yet in production and due to the WGA strike is likely to be delayed for some time. In other words, I am NOT pregnant. Thank you.
January 14th, 2008
Decent run today-5 miles on trail and paths around the Rose Bowl. I also did manage to do 3 miles on Friday with Ashok in the stroller-he was quite cooperative. I’m still not feeling 100% but at least we’re all finally on the mend over here. Ashok no longer has pink eye, in fact it never got that bad, but now he has a tooth coming in and it is obviously driving him nuts. Poor kid, he has really been miserable these last few days. I’m hoping that sucker pokes its way through soon so he can go back to being his happy-go-lucky little self.
My sister and I had an important discussion today wherein we finalized our list of treats to purchase and bring up to my mom’s house for Christmas. So far, we have:
- peppermint bark that I ordered today from one of my favorite bakeries
- backup peppermint bark from Trader Joe’s
- chocolate covered salted caramels, also from TJ’s
- the ubiquitous Candy Cane Joe-Joe’s
I’m sure we will come up with more before we head up north at the end of the week. After all, one of our favorite activities over the holidays is gorging ourselves to the point of revulsion. Merry Christmas!
This will be a slightly different holiday for us this year. This will be our last trip up to Davis, the town I grew up in, as my mom is getting ready to move down here! It’s no surprise really, both her daughters live in the Los Angeles area and now that her two grandsons are on the scene, it’s kind of a no-brainer. She was very lucky to find a great position teaching part-time so I think it’s going to be great for her. Plus, Ashok will get to grow up with his Ammumma so close-by, I’m really thrilled. My sister and I grew up so far from our grandparents that we never got the opportunity to have them be a part of our everyday lives so it will be nice to see Ashok and Rohan get to experience that. Surely, there will be some adjustments for us all along the way, but we’ll deal with that when we get there.
My goals for this week before heading out of town are to get some speedwork, a hill run, and one good long run in. Oh, and to raid Trader Joe’s of every last piece of holiday candy they have.
December 16th, 2007
Here is how things are going around our household tonight:
- Everyone is sick. Brian has the cold that Ashok is getting over and I am still fighting it off. On top of all of that, Ashok now has pink eye. Joy.
- We were supposed to go to a tree-trimming party tonight but due to the crusty condition of Ashok’s eyes, opted to stay home lest we spread our maladies to the general public.
- Not going to the party meant not passing off that bag of truffles that was sent to me in the mail.
- I am now eating the truffles and can’t believe I ever considered sending them to live with another family.
I am supposed to run with my violinist friend tomorrow morning and am hoping I will be feeling well enough to go. The plan is to take Ashok in the jogging stroller and just go for three miles so, of course he will have to cooperate as well. And, of course, this is all assuming that I don’t wake up with pink eye tomorrow. So many variables, never a good sign.
December 13th, 2007
I did 3.1 miles yesterday and finally felt somewhat normal after a week of truly sucky running. On Sunday, I did 6 miles and dragged my ass through every last one of them. I’m not really sure what’s going on but hopefully it will pass. I have a serious amount of holiday eating to work off and it is still another two weeks until Christmas. Here are yesterday’s splits.
1 - 8:55
2 - 9:07
3 - 8:10
.1 - 0:45
I inspired myself to push a little harder in that last mile by thinking about all those Candy-Cane Joe-Joe’s I ate.
Last night, a good friend of mine took me out for Korean BBQ in Koreatown here in L.A. It was excellent except for the fact that I smelled of cooked meats when I got home. Next week I’m going to take her out and teach her a bit about South Indian food which will surely result in another feeding frenzy. Have I mentioned that I love food?
December 12th, 2007
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