tree transformation

before...


...after


(don't forget the hot buttered rum)

need a little christmas, right this very minute

There's leftover Halloween candy in the kitchen, and we're barely into double-digit dates in November...but I'm already jonesing for Christmas.

My spirits are in need of a major boost, and I'm throwing myself into the holidays this year. As a child I loved Christmas, but in 1990 everything went seriously downhill...and soon thereafter obligation replaced simplicity, with joy pretty much nowhere to be found. In recent years I've been lucky enough to be around people who really love Christmas, enough so to help me finally dig myself out of that hole.

It's cliche, but you could say it's like I'm experiencing it for the first time. We went to Target tonight, where I turned into a child again, in awe of the lights, sparkly tinsel trees, and baubles of all sizes. And yeah, half of it's crap, but an explosion of Christmas nonetheless. I had to keep myself from buying everything I saw.

Surprisingly Thanksgiving never fell victim to my holiday disdain, which makes it doubly enjoyable this year -- and the perfect start to a (hopefully) rediscovered holiday season.

tonight's dinner

• Roasted sweet potatoes in a honey-lemon glaze (slight reworking of this recipe, with the addition of fresh ground cinnamon and grey salt)
• Baby lambchops with Loveless Cafe dry rub
• Green beans for color

The cure for my Sunday delirium? Cooking. Added bonus: the house smells like Thanksgiving, lulling me to much-needed sleep.

And after a whirlwind weekend I'm ready for the week ahead.

self-diagnosis of the day

I have a blepharospasm. For two days now. And if you look really really close, you might see it too.

I think I need sleep.

And red meat.

Or some combination of the two, like a big steak and a nap. That would be awesome.

on cities

I've surrounded myself with upstaters. My husband, my friends-- all from way north of White Plains, formerly my line of demarcation dividing "the city" from "upstate" -- a New York state Mason-Dixon line of sorts. Back then I thought Mahopac was upstate, Newburgh certainly, but in reality they're just glorified Westchester.

Real upstate towns -- Cohoes, Syracuse-- have far more interesting pasts, built on industries long vanished...cities now mere shells of their former selves. While my own hometown is closer in concept to those Westchester bedroom communities I grew up dismissing, it's experienced its share of degeneration, though just a sliver of a borough of the city we know as New York.

This weekend I re-stumbled upon Old Kew Gardens, a site that documents -- extensively -- the history of this tiny section of Queens. It's the sort of site you spend hours on, both for lack of usability and the massive collection of current and archival photos.

For example, take the local movie theater--

Austin Theater, 1948. A nice neighborhood establishment, showing Key Largo and Wallflower.

Fast forward to 1977. Featuring Bite and the ever-popular Teenage Massage Parlor. (Picture wee Edie playing in a small park around the corner.)

On the positive side, the Austin has come full circle, now once again a proper theater (and yes it was gutted -- no, ahem, sticky floors). Too bad it lost the original marquee:

And maybe those upstate towns can reinvent themselves as well. Hopefully.

Photos courtesy OldKewGardens.com

all the small things

I'm relatively easy to please. Small things make me happy. Remembering my birthday, finding a cookie on my desk, waking up to bacon, that sort of thing. And boring practical things too, like coming home to a (somewhat) clean apartment. Anything that simplifies my existance is good.

My shower is a disaster. The showerhead specifically has been causing grief, a sputtering clogged mess that sprays water horizontally out over the top of the shower door and onto the floor below, as opposed to down onto the shower-taker. Exiting the shower involves wading through a puddle and inevitably tracking water throughout the house.

So Saturday we stopped at the subterranean Home Depot on 3rd Ave and 59th Street and bought a new showerhead. Which sat in the bag until this morning when I remembered to install it.

Very easy small thing, HUGE difference. No more puddle. Water pressure back to normal. Ah. Morning stress levels reduced.

Now to tackle the faucets...

darkness

It's getting dark earlier. By the time I left work today the sun had already set, and I walked uptown through the twilight, which gave in to darkness by the time I reached 32nd Street.

Summer is over

on music

I'm over an hour into struggling with consolidating my music libraries, spread over two computers, multiple folders, and a mess of mp3, m4p, wma, protected wma, and recently (ahem) liberated wma. The wma's don't play on the Shuffle, the m4p's won't run on the Clix, and the protected files are completely useless when untethered from Rhapsody (but still clutter My Music). Argh. It really should not be this hard.

I want to get rid of my CDs but the prospect of digitizing the library is overwhelming. And what format to digitize to? A standard codec like mp3 is the best bet but at a max bitrate of 320 kbps (importing via iTunes) you lose clarity. I guess I could do flac or some other lossless format but we're talking huge file sizes...external drives...

Argh.

Stark contrast to Friday night, when for the first time in months I listened to some music the old fashioned way. On my stereo. In the dark. Insert and press play.

No shuffle, no cherry-picked tracks, no recommendation engine, no algorithms, no playlists, no editors picks, no free download of the week, no scrobbling, no nonsense. Just sit and listen. Loudly.

Will we ever find the happy medium between these two experiences?

nothing a chili dog can't fix

Tonight ended up being the "going out" night, but with me coughing up a storm I headed out early, leaving Michele at 18th Street Lounge with the cute vendor and neverending free drinks. Left to my own devices I decided to brave Ben's Chili Bowl solo, perhaps not the wisest of decisions but there I was nonetheless, ordering up a chilidog to go, and hoping I would catch a cab back, which I did. I had briefly considered walking back but between the heat and the distance it wasn't quite feasible, so cab it was, and I enjoyed my fourth meal in the comfort of the Kimpton, and now off to sleep...

one the road II

Conferences are hard work. Especially one that kicks off at 7:55am (I arrived shortly before 9, partly because I skipped the breakfast and partly because the Hilton is so incredibly vast I got lost making my way from the lobby to the ballroom.)

I'm finding this one on the vendor-heavy side, and the panels not particularly enlightening, but I'm a guest of the conference and I've made some new contacts, so not a total loss. I think I was spoiled by Promo Magazine's Interactive Promotion Summit, a quality event with great speakers and a low vendor to brand ratio.

So now I'm back at the bordello, enjoying a glass of wine complements of Kimpton, and catching up on work-work before I head out into the sauna once again for more schmoozing.

Exhausting.

Oh...and another cool hotel feature I noticed today -- the elevators have hardwood floors. Neat.

on the road

I'm traveling on business, attending a conference with a coworker but I'm basically alone, as I opted not to stay at the bland conference hotel (though it does have a pool) but rather a boutique hotel across town. The Hotel Rouge is pretty awesome, and not only is the room *huge* but they take the name quite literally -- everything is red, from the leather headboard to the velvet drapes to the red shaded lamps. I'm surrounded by red, which gives it a sort of bordello-y feel, a nice change from my usual color palate.

The leopard print bathrobe rocks, too.

Tonight I took advantage of Restaurant Week (perfect timing) and checked out Dupont Grille, a neighborhood place with great food and a friendly bartender, and walking distance from the hotel. Tomorrow is all work, but good to have some time away from the office to actually think about your job, and tomorrow night we're invited to a dinner at Marrakesh Palace, which should be interesting.

Time to sleep...

cooking solo

Eric worked late tonight, so I came home to an empty apartment. My stomach being equally empty, and our fridge full from Saturday's Stop & Shop excursion, I whipped up some dinner -- roasted plum tomatoes, guacamole (more like a chunky avacado salad), and yellow rice with peas. Yum.

mmm roasty

don't be fooled by the takeout container -- i made this

I don't mind cooking for one, and welcomed the opportunity tonight.

But good thing I'm not left to finish the homemade ice cream all on my own. Though it would be a good excuse to throw an old-fashioned ice cream social. Hmmm...

how I spent my vacation

Fireworks
Rain
Snorkeling
Boating (and more boating)
Beer
Ruins
Views
Nostalgia

twitter

I'm now on twitter
@psedie

oh oh domino

Rain and a previous engagement kept us from the Waterfront Preservation Alliance's "Don't Demo Domino" event this past Sunday, held in support of efforts to preserve the former Domino Sugar Refinery in Williamsburg.

A relic of NYC's industrial past, the plant closed in 2004. Its fate remains unknown -- will it be torn down, landmarked, or repurposed as condos (like the Pennsylvania Railroad Power Station in Long Island City -- hey remember when LIC looked like this??)

In the meantime, the site lies abandoned -- a magnet for urban exploration. Check out these interior shots of the plant. (via Curbed)

photo: Forgotten NY

caught

My photo blog is somewhat photojournalistic, moments captured during my travels near and far. Mostly inanimate objects, and never people.

But sometimes people don't appreciate my documenting.

Take last night for example. I was sitting at a bar, some random mid-town place where we stopped to catch some of the baseball games before dinner. Sitting on the bar was a gallon sized jug that formerly held mayonnaise, but currently half-filled with some strange brown liquid. But the liquid wasn't what caught my attention. It was the label:

MAYONNAISE
Extra Heavy-Duty!

Extra Heavy-Duty? As if it were not intended for consumption but some other, um, use. So of course I had to capture that.

Unfortunately the light was low and the first shot came out too dark. Before I could re-adjust and try again the bartender flew over, grabbed the jar and stuck it somewhere under the bar, shot me a dirty look and said "What, are you with the Department Of Health!?" She was not happy.

I tried to explain but the hilarity of the label was completely lost on her. Clearly I was there to shut the place down.

The brown liquid remains a mystery.

nerd alert

This is pretty freakin' cool

excerpts from my day off

I set the alarm clock for 7am, figuring it was technically a work day and I'd better get used to not sleeping in, besides I had slept plenty over the holiday weekend, including all of Sunday afternoon. I snoozed for another 2 hours. OK so not work day early but pretty good, with lots of day left to fill.

But what to fill it with? I had thought of trekking into town, maybe head up to the Cloisters, but I couldn't convince anyone to play hooky with me so over breakfast I nixed my grander plans in favor of some local me time.

Like taking my bike out for the first time in...what? Two years? I dusted the thing off, filled the tires and headed out, sans helmet no less, weaving between scary conversion vans, fleets of Access-A-Rides and the occasional old lady. Typical Forest Hills.

Also typical Forest Hills are Manhattan-priced nail salons, though on a snoozy late Tuesday morning my go-to place was gloriously empty, and I enjoyed a leisurely mani-pedi. Awesome.

My travels intentionally extended no further than Kew Gardens, where I had lunch with my Mom, who is great in small doses and was surprisingly not insane (today), probably because I bought lunch and she had someone to yap to about her equally insane friends. Though I had sworn off chores for the day I did the good daughter thing and stopped by the house to lift some heavy stuff and scold her for leaving several lit candles precariously around the apartment. Sigh. And one wonders why I have no children.

The rest of the day I enjoyed alone on the couch, occasionally eyeing work email but resisting the urge to respond, with thankfully nothing too alarming coming in to require immediate response.

I need more days like today.

clean

I'm spending Memorial Day cleaning my apartment. (This seems to be a trend for me.) Fortunately, I had the foresight to take off Tuesday as well. Plans TBD.

But they won't involve cleaning.

food for thought

Tonight I tested the chocolate meets bacon theory. It holds.

not the bees knees?

My trainer, Ray, is sort of a crazy anarchist. He's training me to be physically prepared for the revolution (or Armageddon, whichever comes first.) I know this because he has actually said this to me. Yes. And while I've become somewhat grr over the past couple of years, prepared for guerrilla warfare I am not. So he has his work cut out for him.

While a little eccentric, Ray is very well read, and enjoys sharing his finds with me, particularly those having to do with modern society falling into chaos. Tonight's tale was particularly interesting, so I looked it up when I got home.

If you've not heard of "colony collapse disorder" go Google it now. Apparently, the world's honeybee population is mysteriously disappearing. Honeybees, in addition to producing a delicious English muffin topping, are also responsible for pollinating pretty much every food crop in the US. In fact many bees are bred solely for this purpose, and beekeepers drive around the country with truckfulls of bees looking for pollination work.

Theories abound regarding the causes of this troubling bee decline, and include pesticides, mites, "bee stress", immune deficiency (bee AIDS), and the explosion of wireless technology (bees may be getting "confused" by cell signals and can't find their way back to the hives.)

Whatever the cause, this is not so good. Now, the world may not be coming to an immediate end, and perhaps bee decline is not quite at the level of concern as say, global warming (or at least not as well publicized), but I will close with this quote (courtesy of Wikipedia) and you can decide for yourself:

If the bee disappears from the surface of the earth, man would have no more than four years to live. No more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals...no more man...

food network awards

I was looking forward to watching the Food Network Awards this past Sunday night. I even DVR'd the Amazing Race All-Stars to watch.

Wow, what a mistake.

I really wanted the show to be better. But it was just BAD. Bad bad bad bad bad.

Now, the concept of an awards show on the Food Network is a little far-fetched to begin with, and I didn't really know what to expect, but I figured, "It's a Scripps production, how bad could it be?"

BAD.

Don't get me wrong. I LOVE the Food Network. I love pretty much anything on Scripps. But every once in a while they try too hard. This was so bad I would have rather sat through a Paula's Party marathon.

Lame categories included "The Professional Grade Kitchen Appliance You Can't Live Without" and others like "Favorite Classic Read" clearly stretched the limits of being remotely food-related (the winner: Green Eggs & Ham).

Oh I get it! Books with food in the title! LAME!

Half the categories seemed repurposed from far more entertaining programs like Unwrapped or The Secret Life Of. Nominees seemed randomly chosen (see "Better Burger"), as did the winners. Their usually entertaining hosts came across as wooden, and the whole thing seemed forced.

Dear Food Network: please stick with real competitions, like Food Network Challenge, and stay far, FAR away from disasters like this.

The only thing that saved the night was the pilot airing of Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives. Now that's good watching.

If you care to sit through the train-wreck, Food Network Awards repeats April 19th at 9pm EST.

slainte

I'm nowhere near Irish, half English in fact, so St. Patrick's Day doesn't hold much meaning for me, outside of the fact I grew up in New York City, attended a very Irish Catholic college and have been to Ireland. OK so maybe a little Irish has rubbed off on me.

I do also have a strong interest in culinary culture, so to kick off the weekend we attended a cheese class at Artisanal Cheese Center entitled Erin Go Braugh: Irish Cheese for St Patrick's, which featured a delicious selection of cheese paired with the spirits of Ireland. Think Cashel Blue meets Magners Cider.

My favorite of the bunch was definitely the Ardrahan, a washed-rind cow's milk cheese hailing from County Cork. It was fantastically pungent with a nice earthy, mushroomy flavor (flavor, not texture). Delicious.

As for the 17th proper, we had very un-Irish plans to meet up with some friends for an evening of BBQ and bowling, which we kicked off with a stop in what we thought would be the equally un-Irish St. Andrews, a Scottish pub on 44th St, only to find it packed with people oblivious to this fact. Nevertheless we ordered our Belhavens and Innis & Gunns and then headed to dinner.

Now, I had my doubts about Spanky's, mostly because I tend to doubt the quality of any restaurant in the Times Square vicinity, let alone barbecue (see Virgil's). I was pleasantly surprised. We started with the appetizer sampler, the highlight being the Southern Fried Dill Pickle Spears. Like the menu says, once you taste 'em you'll be a true believer.

I followed that with the Country Style Beef Rib. Yes, single "rib". The thing, no joke, was the size of my forearm. This photo does not do it justice. Think GIANT shortrib, meat falling off the bone, served with basmati rice and a corn salsa. Delicious.

Overall a good weekend. We managed to avoid most of the green-clad drunken masses, sample a little Irish culture, and generally have a great time. In midtown. On St Patrick's Day. Who knew?

my ticketmaster purchase history

03/08/07 28-22747/NY1 Mew Irving Plaza,New York,NY 03/22/07
10/27/06 47-56602/NY5 Justin Timberlake Madison Square Garden,New York,NY 02/07/07
08/23/06 8-19656/NY1 Placebo, She Wants Revenge Nokia Theatre Times Square,New York,NY 11/07/06
04/29/06 31-39990/NY1 Taking Back Sunday and Angels & Airwaves Six Flags Great Adventure,Jackson,NJ 06/22/06
04/10/06 9-33361/NY5 Madonna Madison Square Garden,New York,NY 07/03/06
03/06/06 9-14587/NY5 Freestyle Extravaganza: Lisa Lisa, the Cover Girls, Tka, Stevie Madison Square Garden,New York,NY
10/10/05 2-40515/NY5 Depeche Mode Madison Square Garden,New York,NY N/A
08/12/05 17-15014/NY1 Bauhaus Nokia Theatre Times Square,New York,NY N/A
08/12/05 17-14925/NY1 Black Rebel Motorcycle Club Irving Plaza,New York,NY N/A
08/12/05 27-57738/NY1 Across the Narrows:Pixies, Gang of Four, Built To Spill, Rilo Kiley Keyspan Park,Brooklyn,NY N/A
07/16/05 24-46926/NY5 Nine Inch Nails Madison Square Garden,New York,NY N/A
03/31/05 18-26600/NY1 New Order Hammerstein Ballroom,New York,NY N/A
03/31/05 18-26587/NY1 New Order Hammerstein Ballroom,New York,NY N/A
03/11/05 27-57718/NY1 Gang of Four Irving Plaza,New York,NY N/A
01/14/05 25-40997/NY1 Erasure Irving Plaza,New York,NY N/A
08/25/04 7-22679/NY1 The Killers Irving Plaza,New York,NY N/A
08/13/04 8-35890/NY1 The Pixies Hammerstein Ballroom,New York,NY N/A
06/11/04 22-15113/NY1 The Streets Irving Plaza,New York,NY N/A
06/09/04 12-20353/NY1 Curiosa Festival: the Cure, Interpol, the Rapture, Mogwai Randalls Island,New York,NY N/A
05/17/04 30-15305/NY1 Lollapalooza-2 Day Pass Randalls Island,New York,NY 06/23/04
02/17/04 23-52874/NY5 David Bowie Tommy Hilfiger at Jones Beach Theater,Wantagh,NY N/A
09/15/03 6-35703/NY5 David Bowie W/Special Guest Macy Gray Madison Square Garden,New York,NY N/A
07/19/03 10-22110/FLO Miami Dolphins vs. New York Jets Dolphin Stadium Miami Dolphins,Miami,FL N/A

(found perusing my account archives..)

dink

We spent an unseasonably balmy Saturday afternoon at the tax office, a depressing appointment concluding with the realization that we are basically penalized for our lifestyle choices. Married, no kids, no property -- in the eyes of the government, living "high on the hog" with no responsibilities. Nice to know paying off my car loan doesn't count, nor the fact that we're still paying off student loans and other personal debt, or that I help out my family. No I guess I have to justify my income by incurring even more debt in the form of a mortgage, or putting further drain on the city's infrastructure by spitting out some kids. In the meantime we owe State and Federal.

Angry and disgusted, we met Tim and Michele for lunch, where I ordered a beer to wash down my salad, breaking detox, and at the time not really caring. After lunch we met up with Vic for coffee at Cocoa Bar, and while I resisted ordering any chocolate myself, enjoyed a bite of peanut butter cluster. It was delicious.

Feeling better and worse at the same time, and in no rush to leave Park Slope, we left Cocoa Bar to find Alchemy, a newly opened gastropub. And so we did, 45 minutes later, walking the wrong way up 5th Ave before looking up the address.

Alchemy looks exactly how you would expect it to, complete with dark wood, antique fixtures and lit by the requisite Edison bulbs. I found it aesthetically pleasing, reminding me somewhat of a scaled-down version of The Alembic in San Francisco. With only two beers on tap, neither of which appealed to me, I ordered a red wine and snacked on toasted chickpeas. The menu featured elevated versions of pub fare like fish and chips, but we didn't order anything and soon left.

We concluded the day with dinner at Sette, drove home and immediately went to bed. Overall it was a good day, and I don't feel too badly about breaking detox, though I did wake up in the middle of the night in a slight panic, partly from the tax experience, and partly from guilt.

I'm back on today, and I'll get through the week again, and next Saturday we'll see what the day brings.

eighty gigs, baby

(A day late, but I couldn't resist..)

Check out young Steve, all lean and handsome, with that full thick head of dark hair, and those deep soulful almond-shaped eyes, those sexy bare feet, that cup of coffee and loaf of bread, that bottle of wine and those flowers: this is how I want you to imagine me. This was way back, back in the old days, the innocent days. Now just print this one out, ladies, and tape it up on your refrigerator, or bring it to bed with you, or better yet, I'll tell you what. Call up a florist and order yourself a dozen long-stem red roses. When the flowers arrive, clip this photo to them, along with a note saying they're from me. Hold those sexy flowers to your nose and drink in their fragrance and remember how special and sexy you are to me.

-from "A Valentine From Steve Jobs"

Read the whole hilarious post here.

blogger mobile, take two

the fancy phone is back from the wilds of Bloomington, IN, where after some shock treatment is in newish working condition

adventures posted (somewhat) daily:

http://psedie.blogspot.com

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steel dust

Steel dust was everywhere.

It covered the walls, the handrails, the tiled ledges. The soles of my shoes. My hands.

And inevitably, my face.

Trains rumbled through every few minutes, emitting earsplitting wails from steel wheels grinding on unusually curved steel tracks. That's where the dust comes from. The MTA cleaned it up back in 2004, for the centennial, but it's back.

I half expected to look up and see a Low-V rumbling through, passengers in bowlers or carrying parasols. But instead brightly lit shiny new cars rolled by, empty save for the occasional sleeper who forgot to detrain at Brooklyn Bridge, or the daring who hid in the last car to catch a glimpse. The juxtaposition of the recently introduced R142A's against the backdrop of the ancient station was both strange and compelling.

Click image below for slideshow:

...more on our tour here.

tonight's experiment

Orange-Vanilla Sherbet. Think the grapefruit sorbet, except this time using fresh orange juice, 2% milk, some lemon juice, some vanilla extract, some Equal.

The ice-cream maker is on full tilt, practically overflowing. This thing basically doubles the volume when there's milk involved. Its been running for 25 minutes, 5 left on the timer. So far so good...initial sampling reveals a nice fluffiness, though a little on the vanilla-y side and a lack of creamy finish due to the 2% milk (unlike if I were using heavy cream, but that's for another night.)

Do I write too much about food? Yes? Hmm.

beer and pizza

We were supposed to meet our friends at Sutton Place -- the sort of bar that plays the Fray and Nickelback, and everyone's doing shots. I was transported to 1996, and not in a good way. Luckily our friends had relocated so we immediately exited to meet up with them at yet another midtown bar, Corner 51, which was empty and like most bars in the area, offered a disappointing beer selection. I opted for Guinness, which is technically good for you, and surprisingly not as caloric as one might suspect. And a favorite of mine. Not quite what I had in mind for my first night gently stepping off the wagon, but it sufficed.

The highlight of the evening was still to come.

Walking towards the subway, and feeling slightly hungry (and DYING for pizza) I spied a glowing sign and was immediately drawn to it. We were on 2nd Ave and 52nd Street, and the sign was for Krunch Pizza Bar, where they serve crisp square thin crust pizza with a variety of toppings. We shared the Salsiccia and the Margherita, and finished with the Pizza Fagioli -- tomato, Tuscan beans, tiny cubes of pancetta and a sprinkle of gorgonzola. Yum. They were light and fresh and the three small pieces added up to about one slice of regular pizza so not too bad.

twenty years

20 years ago I was halfway through my freshman year of high school.

Lots of great records -- and some not so great, but yet still defining records for me -- were released in 1987. While not necessarily the best works of these artists, they shaped my musical taste for years to come (and still do).

Here's a sampling of what was on my Walkman in 1987:

The Joshua Tree -- U2

Strangeways Here We Come -- The Smiths

Appetite For Destruction -- Guns 'n' Roses

Music For The Masses -- Depeche Mode

Hysteria -- Def Leppard

In My Tribe -- 10,000 Maniacs

Faith -- George Michael

Substance -- New Order

The Lion And The Cobra -- Sinead O'Connor

The Lost Boys OST -- Various Artists

Never Let Me Down -- David Bowie

Plus a plethora of Freestyle.

And I'm definitely leaving a bunch out.

What were you listening to in 1987?

seven days

the first five were difficult, really difficult. the past two much easier for some reason.

maybe its because my body has become accustomed to the absence of sugar and alcohol

maybe its because I've cleared my calendar of all socializing

maybe its because the weather has returned to normal, filling my head with dreams of snow (and snowball fights)

maybe its being 4lbs lighter

whatever it is, I'm feeling pretty good. and kind of wary of reintroducing the things I've eliminated. we'll see how the week goes.

cooking up a storm

One of the benefits of this whole detox low-carb thing is it forces us to prepare more meals ourselves.  So eating out is down, and trips to the supermarket are up -- this weekend we hit both the Amish Market at the new Atlas Park shopping complex, and our beloved Stop&Shop (both located in lovely Glendale, Queens).

 

The weekend's dishes included strip steak with roasted plum tomatoes and sauteed green beans; a spinach mozzarella omelet with smoked salmon; tuna salad (no mayo) with fresh spinach, hummus and kalamata olives; pan-seared boneless spareribs dry rubbed with The Squeal and served with roasted mixed veggies (yellow squash, zucchini, green pepper and onion).

 

Oh and a 3-bean chicken and chorizo chili.  Not eaten, but prepared to bring for lunch this week.

 

Another of our resolutions for 2007 is to use the appliances we registered for, which for the past two+ years have done little more than take up shelf space.  Today I put the ice-cream maker to good use, preparing a sugar-free and surprisingly tasty pink grapefruit sorbet, and last weekend I whipped up some sweet potato samosas in the food processor.

 

Of course now that we're actually using the appliances we decided to add to the collection this weekend, pooling our Macy*s gift cards and walking out of the Manhasset location with one shiny new Kitchen Aid Artisan Mixer -- in pistachio.  It cost us $16.27.

 

I think the crock pot is starting to feel neglected.  Any suggestions?