Category Archives: frozen yogurt

by Becki | September 15, 2010 · 9:57 am

Eating Rats on a Hobo-Train!

Yesterday’s recap: Hike…

Pretty!

Even more pretty!

…Kitchen Sink Salad:

Healthy!

…and work.

My thought exactly, young grasshopper.

Today, I had an audition in LA, so I drove out a little earlier and met up with some handsome dudes for fooding.

Malachi and Dan! I’m so lucky! Le sigh 🙂

We went to an old abandoned train, prepared to eat whatever creatures we may find: rats, mice, praying mantuses (mantii?), all roasted over a hobo-fire.

Alas, our abandoned train had been taken over by chefs and customers! AAAAAAAH!

Turns out, this train that was abandoned on Ventura Blvd. was transformed into some ridiculously famous restaurant called Carney’s. Don’t worry though, they still serve hot dogs, which I’m pretty sure contain rats, mice and praying mantuses/mantii.

DELICIOUS rats, mice and praying mantuses/mantii!

I was a little too frightened to have a hot dog, so I stuck with the safe choice – cheeseburger with everything on it and a small side of fries. Yesssss!

These fries are healthily fried! Is there such a thing? I think so!

Carney’s has EIGHT trained food handlers to make sure that your rat meat is fully cooked!

Malachi didn’t believe that they served rat meat. He was quite certain that the hot dogs contained “sweet crumb cakes and peppered snake’s wang!” He reenacts that here.

After a delicious meal of grilled something-or-other, we headed over to BevMo! so I could show the guys some examples of good craft brews, since Dan is partial to PBR and Corona, and Malachi has learned about beer from Dan’s choices (c’mon, Dan!). We’ve decided that on Saturday I’ll be bringing a pack of the best craft brews I know over to their place where we’ll have a tasting and make some homemade pizza. Any of my beer-genius readers have any beer suggestions for me to share with them?

Malachi…

Dan doing a “Shake your Face”. Sorry Dan, I had to post it 🙂

William Shatner. No words needed.

Billy, I’m not looking forward to your show. Sorry.

I went to my audition over in Los Feliz. It took me thirty minutes to find the building and room, and two minutes to get through the audition. I got to smash lots of things and get angry. It was awesome. It’s also fun to scan down the sign-in sheet and see who’s already been in to audition that I know – apparently one of the guys who was also in the pilot of “Left at the Altar” (same pilot, not the same segment as me) had been in a few hours earlier. HI, GIB!

I fought some crazy traffic to get over to my parental unit’s home, just in time to head to pottery class! Of course my mom and I had to get a little snack first to get our blood sugars up!

I got 5 ounces of red velvet, cupcake and cookies and cream topped with cookie dough, peanut butter cups and a piece of brownie. Oof.

Yes, this is pottery class. It’s a good way to get the creative juices flowing! I had a small mug of prosecco. Yum!

Today, I was kind of off. I blame my exhaustion from driving and eating rats/mice/praying mantii.

I think my rats/mice/praying mantii may have been undercooked… That is the only explanation for this monstrosity.

Now I’m relaxing while sipping a pumpkin ale and watching reruns of “The Office”. I needed it to help cure my sorrows from the bowl above.

OH HEY! Who wants this bowl when I’m done???

😀

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Filed under Carney's, cheeseburger, Dan, frozen yogurt, hot dogs, Malachi, Pottery class, prosecco

by Becki | July 9, 2010 · 10:28 am

Weight Watchers?!

Ahhh, I love my Friday! That’s right, I am DONE with work for two whole days! My dad’s birthday is tomorrow, so I’ll be spending the next two days with the parental unit, spoiling him like crazy. Wait, I also get to have indian food and beer when I take him out for his birthday lunch? I didn’t know that! What an unexpected surprise!

As always, I started my day with a Monsta!

2 cups of spinach, 3/4 a cup of unsweetened soymilk, 1/3 a banana, 1/4 a cup of frozen cherries, and the juice of 1/2 a lemon.

I woke up ridiculously perky, and ready to get back on the trails! We did the same trail as yesterday, and I brought my camera to document.

The marine layer was thick, and the air was very chilly and lovely. We hiked 2.86 miles in about an hour, and took our time to enjoy the views.

After the hike, I had a mini-lunch of protein pasta:

This was some Barilla Plus with marinara sauce and a little goat cheese.

This mini-lunch was followed by… ANOTHER mini-lunch!

THIS was whole wheat pasta with bell pepper, spinach, zucchini, marinara sauce and more goat cheese. The first pasta was protein, this was whole wheat. Total balance :).

A little fro-yo seemed necessary after the sweaty hike up the hill, and the double serving of hot pasta!

A small chocolate, peanut butter and cake batter yogurt, topped with strawberries, brownie bits and cookie dough.

Today was…. wait for it…. FARMERS’ MARKET DAY!!! Prepare yourselves: picture overload ahead:

ORANGE and YELLOW raspberries?? Why were they not offering samples? I’m dying to try them!

Carrot overload and fresh corn. I love summer!

So many flowers!

Local and organic: My favorite way to buy!

We picked up a bunch of different veggies, fruits and fresh eggs for upcoming recipes:

Spinach, mixed baby greens, potatoes, parsley and oregano, broccoli, corn, a massive onion, strawberries, fresh eggs and honey.

I’m very confused… the last time I made my chimichurri sauce, I requested oregano, but I think they gave me marjoram, because today the vendor gave me something I didn’t recognize. Any input? Can you tell if this is oregano or marjoram (14th picture down – I couldn’t link the specific picture) ? HELP!

For dinner I made Summer Corn, Bacon and Potato Chowder with all the fresh farmers’ market ingredients. Yes, this is a Weight Watchers recipe that I stumbled across, but it’s a good one!

Some adjustments I made to the recipe: I used unsweetened soymilk instead of regular milk, used 6 small potatoes instead of 1 yukon, added a little more celery and red bell pepper than recommended, and DRENCHED it with TJ’s Jalapeno Pepper Hot Sauce. This recipe took a total of 20 minutes to make, including husking the corn!

All of the ingredients were fresh from the market, and made the soup taste like it was JUST picked, which it probably was :).

I had to scarf down a bowl of this soup in 5 minutes in order to get to work on time. I still wound up a few minutes late. Whoops. I figured a small gelato would help me get over my tardiness-guilt.

This had rocky road, mint chocolate chip, and amaretto chocolate chip. It filled all the air-holes in my stomach from eating the chowder so fast. Yes, I had two frozen desserts today! Yes, it was so worth it!

Work consisted of packing boxes, unpacking even more boxes, and a friend stopped by to hang out and help me pass the time without going completely crazy. Before I knew it, I was headed home. At home, I was welcomed by something that I NEVER have… WINE!

This is Brochelle Rose. It’s a known fact that I do not like wine. That is, I didn’t like it until I met this wine!

Me gusta mucho! I find that red wines are too heavy, white wines are too vinegary, but this is a perfect blend of soft and sweet, and almost feels like it has a little carbonation!

I had two glasses of the wine, watched two episodes of Glee, and am now ready to spend the next two days spending some quality time with the parental unit, enjoying their lovely company. Have I mentioned yet that I have the best parents? It’s just a fact. Yeah.

Any big plans for your weekends? If you need ideas, I recommend painful hikes and bike rides!

🙂

10 Comments

Filed under chowder, farmers' market, frozen yogurt, green monster, tutti frutti, weight watchers

by Becki | June 1, 2010 · 2:11 am

Quinoa, finally!

Happy Memorial Day to all my fellow Americans! Today is traditionally a day to remember those who fell in honor and defense of our country, and also a day that Americans use as an excuse to sit on their butts, drink lots of beer, and eat massive amounts of food – not that there’s ANYTHING wrong with that once in a while.

I decided to start the holiday off in a different way. After a leisurely morning at home with yet another spicy breakfast scramble, I headed back to the park for hiking. The heat was ridiculous today and the flies were out in full force. When I say flies, I don’t mean the pesky little ones that buzz around your ears, I mean the ones that thirst for blood and attack! I endured an hour of biting, buzzing, sweating, crowd-fighting misery before getting back into the blissfully air-conditioned car.

Up next were errands that had to be dealt with: picking up cat food from the pet store. Could there be anything more thrilling? The dog joined us on the trip, and since we were out and there just happened to be a new self-serve frozen yogurt place nearby, we had to enjoy a lunch of cake batter fro-yo outside in the blissful summer air.

Back home, a big stomach ache ensued. I may have forgotten to mention, but I seem to be lactose intolerant… I’m really good at sticking to soy substitutes, except when it comes to ice cream/gelato/frozen yogurt and cheese. Goat cheese has become my new favorite for those times I just can’t go without a cheesy, spinach omelette in the mornings. I decided to make some sun-dried tomato hummus from scratch to help ease my tummy.

Sun-dried Tomato Hummus: Makes 2 cups (Recipe from allrecipes.com)

2 cloves garlic

1/2 tsp salt (I normally leave this out. I don’t want anymore sodium added to my diet than I take in already)

1.5 tbsp tahini paste (Also known as sesame seed paste, can be found in Albertson’s in the asian food or kosher aisle)

2 tbsp fresh lemon juice

1 (15.5 oz) can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed

1/4 cup olive oil (Again, I use a bit less than this and add water to thin out my hummus)

2 tbsp finely shredded fresh basil (or 1-2 tsp of the dried stuff)

1. Place garlic, salt, tahini and lemon juice into a food processor; process until smooth. Pour in the garbanzo beans and 1/4 cup of olive oil; process until smooth, scraping sides as needed. Once smooth, add the sun-dried tomatoes and process until they’ve been chopped to very small pieces and have made the hummus a pink color. Finally, add the basil and pulse a few times until mixed in.

2. Pack hummus into airtight container and refrigerate for at least one hour. When serving, I like to add a little lemon zest to the top to give it even more color and zing 🙂

(It tastes much better than it looks)

Of course, I wasn’t able to eat this right away since it needs to refrigerate, so I decided to finally get working on the quinoa that I meant to start a few days ago. We ran out of zucchini and onions, but I found some shallots bought for a recipe I meant to make last week, so I thought that I would take a risotto recipe I learned from the amazing Giada De Laurentiis when I was obsessed with the Food Network and substitute quinoa instead. (Original recipe here) I also removed all traces of cheese and butter, but feel free to add some into yours! I might try some soy cream cheese substitute in mine next time.

Lemony Quinoa:

1 tbsp olive oil

2 large shallots, diced

1 cup quinoa, rinsed and drained

1/4-1/2 cup good white wine (something you would like to drink)

1.5 cups of reduced-sodium vegetable broth

Zest of 1 lemon

Juice of 1/2 lemon

1. In a saucepan, heat olive oil, add diced shallots and saute until translucent.

2. Add rinsed quinoa and mix with shallots and olive oil to toast.

3. Pour in white wine and stir until absorbed.

4. Slowly add the vegetable broth, 1/2 cup at a time until absorbed by quinoa.

5. Once quinoa is cooked (the little tail-looking thingy appears and the quinoa is tender but still has a little pop to the bite – very scientific, eh?) stir in the lemon zest and juice, and fluff with a fork.

Quinoa before

Quinoa After

For 1/4 cup of quinoa there are 160 calories, 3 grams of fiber and 6 grams of protein. These little grains pack a punch, plus, in the lemony quinoa recipe, you’re also getting healthy fats from the olive oil. I think when I reheat this for lunch tomorrow, I’ll get some zucchini and butternut squash to saute and add in for some veggie-power.

And now, while everyone else relaxes and enjoys their barbeques with friends and family, I’m off to a pointless 3 hour shift at work where I’ll spend my time holding up a counter and watching the dust bunnies roll across the tile while the minutes drag by. Who wants to sit at home eating bratwurst and drinking good beer when you can work a night at retail?

Oh wait… I do.

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Filed under barbeque, basil, beer, frozen yogurt, hike, hummus, Memorial Day, Quinoa, shallots, wine