Bits & Pieces Around the House

Life has been pretty calm around here, and I am not complaining. We had such a busy summer, with lots of traveling and socializing around Chicago, so I've welcomed the slower pace that came with the changing of seasons. Also, starting a new position at work a couple weeks ago has me working more "retail hours", which means fewer free weekends for hanging out with friends. I've been embracing this cozy time around the house, since i know in a few weeks it will officially be holiday season, with all the craziness that that entails. 

The condo is looking slightly festive these days.

I finally found an R at Anthropologie (they're always sold out!),
and I added it to our slowly growing gallery wall.

On a recent Sunday when we were both off work,
this guy worked some serious magic in the kitchen.
I LOVE sitting back and letting him take over!

Joe chose a french menu for the dinner, and made these pork and sage
stuffed veal rolls. So fancy, and delicious, too!

Cozy fall dinner.

I've been busy in the kitchen, too!
Just playing with my mini blowtorch, no biggie.

Nutella Creme Brulee.
(Need I say more?)

I hope your fall has been cozy and calm. Here's to a little more quiet time before the busy holiday season begins!

Healthy Eating Challenge

Two times a year, my coworkers are all invited to take part in a 28 day healthy eating challenge, commonly referred to as "The Challenge". The last one was right as I started working there, so I heard other people talking about it, but didn't participate myself. Joe and I both think of ourselves as pretty healthy eaters most of the time, but we're always up for a challenge in terms of making our diet healthier. So this year we're both on board, and as of Friday we started The Challenge for ourselves. 

Everyone has different plans for exactly how they're going to do the Challenge, ranging from eliminating cheese or sugar to all out strict vegan diets. We decided to make our challenge focus on a few of our usual vices, and to eat a mostly vegan diet for the next 28 days. Here's the specifics of our challenge:

- no coffee (drinking tea for now, hoping to cut out caffeine completely by the end)

- no drinking during the week, limited drinking on the weekends

- vegan diet, with the occasional exception of eggs

- limiting oil and salt

- reducing sugar intake

Last night, I was looking at vegetarian cookbooks and references I usually use, and I had a hard time finding many recipes that didn't include some kind of dairy product. One of the things I'm really trying to limit is cheese, because I really really really love cheese, and know how unhealthy it can be. I'm sure I'll be eating cheese again once the challenge is over, but I think it's good to try to cut back. I ended up getting online, and finding tons of great sounding options on vegan blogs. Last night we made these fantastic delicata squash with quinoa and cranberry stuffing, inspired by a recipe from the Vegan Yum Yum cookbook. This was one of the more delicious dishes I've made recently, vegan or not!

We've also made lentil chili from the Whole Foods Market website, and have a bunch of recipes from online picked out for this week. I think Vegan Dad will be one of my favorite sources of inspiration, starting with his Indian Style Potatoes and Greens. I'll keep you guys posted on recipes I really enjoy!

Lentil Chili. Not pretty, but tasty and filling!

So far missing coffee is probably the biggest challenge! I have a feeling it'll get easier as this process goes on, and maybe by the end I'll stop drinking it quite so much. Expect a progress report in a week or two :)

Fall is in the Air!

I was reluctant to get overly excited about fall while it was still warm outside... I am seriously a lover of summer! I think being born in California made me that way, no matter where else i have lived. And summer in Chicago is SO FUN, which makes me want to savor every minute of it.

The past few days have been different, though, and have reminded me that fall isn't too bad a time of year. My plants have been sending me a strong message for the last couple days, as they react to the sudden change of temperature.

 

These plants were lush and so alive just a couple weeks ago! I actually got a decent number of tomatoes and peppers from my "garden", plus lots of herbs. The hanging plants were great this year, too. Instead of being sad they're dying, I'm going to look ahead to what I can attempt to grow indoors during the colder months :)

Other signs of fall...

Brewing pumpkin ale a couple weeks ago.
It's happily fermenting now, and we'll be enjoying it in a few more weeks!

Pumpkin beer in the fridge, canned pumpkin in the pantry. Can't fight it.

Chili for dinner. It was this spicy vegetarian recipe... healthy and delish!

This weekend we're headed to a wine tasting event down at Buckingham Fountain, and to the Wells Street Fall Festival. It's supposed to warm up a bit, too, so we can enjoy some more time outside. I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

Things that are making me happy!

I feel like I haven't blogged in forever, and today is going to be a short one. Last week my shifts at work were scheduled so that each day I worked a little earlier than the next day, which meant each day I only had about 10-12 hours between shifts. When you include eating, commuting, and sleeping into that amount of time, you don't have a lot of extra time to spare. But tomorrow I am off, and will catch you up more!

Life is busy but good, and here are some of the things making me happy...

Fresh basil from my 'garden'!

Grilled Greek pizza

New infinity scarf my mom knitted for my birthday. I can't wait to wear it!

Birthday gifts to myself, thanks to a fantastic sale at Anthropologie.

My little garden is growing really well lately!

Most exciting part: little tomatoes starting to grow.

Urban Gardening-- year two

As of today I have officially started my second season of back porch gardening. I love living in the city and have zero desire to have a house with a big yard to tend to... but I do really love the idea of growing some of my own food. With our limited space, thing means growing my own herbs in the summer, and attempting to grow a couple simple fruits or veggies.

The rosemary plant is the same one from last year, which survived the winter living inside. I've also planted two tomato plants... they were both supposed to be Juliet tomatoes, but carelessly picking up the wrong plant lead to one Juliet plant and one Red Beefsteak. I've never grown big tomatoes like the beefsteaks before, so we'll see how that grows.  I'm also trying out a yellow mini bell pepper plant, and have a bunch of basil in the works.

The empty spot in the middle is for thyme, and I might also plant a little oregeno. It's so fun to just go out back and cut the fresh herbs that I need for my favorite summer recipes!  Also, so you see my little gnome watching over the plants?

I also got a couple hanging planters, and put one on each side of the door. I can't wait to see how these grow as the weather warms up. Speaking of weather, it's been obnoxiously cold here for the last couple days. Can we get to summer already?  Or at least a nice type of spring weather??? I'm not ok with 50 degree temps in mid-May!

Soon enough we'll be sitting outside, doing some of our favorite summer things:

Random Thoughts...

Last night Joe and I were discussing how much we love pasta salad. It's one of those "empty the fridge" types of dishes, and there are so many good variations of it. Last night I made a Greek-inspired version. They were out of orzo at my store, so I used fusilli. I mixed in kalmata olives, red pepper, tomatoes, shredded carrots, red onion, and feta cheese, then dressed it with some olive oil, salt and pepper, a splash of white wine vinegar, and some dried oregano. We both went back for seconds.

Yesterday I was having a very grumpy day, so I had a glass of wine after work, then went shopping at Forever 21. It's cheap quality, but sometimes I have to get my clothing fix on a budget. I got a couple cute tops, and some cheap (but nice fitting) skinny jeans. I am officially on the skinny jeans bandwagon. I also got these socks, which pretty much instantly improved my day...

My favorite cookbook for the last few months has been Moosewood's Cooking for Health. Every recipe we've tried has been excellent, and the recipes make healthy vegetarian eating pretty simple. These veggie burgers were made with quinoa, tempeh, and sweet potatoes, and they were incredibly flavorful!  I ate the last one for lunch today, nestled in a pita pocket with avocado and pickled peppers that my friend Paul made. A fantastic little lunch, if I do say so myself! Best eaten while indulging in some mindless tv, such as the newest season of Real Housewives of New York. I just can't help it.

We're Kansas City bound in the morning. Looking forward to a fun weekend catching up with family and friends!

Gotta Stay Hydrated

Drinking is a necessary part of daily life; we all know we'll die if our bodies go too long without water and other important beverages. My beloved pink Nalagene bottle went MIA recently, so I decided it was time for an upgrade. If I have to drink water, it's much more interesting in a cute bottle like this one, don't you think? 

I went all trendy here, with a non-plastic bottle that's been made so popular by the yoga-practicing, Whole Foods shopping crowd. I love it, though! This style has a 2-part lid-- smaller top for drinking, and a wider bottom lid for easy cleaning. Well worth the $20 I threw down for this one! Joe has one, too, but his is more manly looking, I promise.

Then there's the other beverage I find necessary for my survival. Even the simplest beer can be elevated by pouring it into a fancy glass. Now, Dasiy Cutter, our favorite local beer, is far from simple. But isn't it more fun in this rockin Duvel glass my friend Steph got me? She works at The Publican, and has all sorts of connections in the beer world at this point. Joe and I have a whole collection of beer glasses, thanks to my dad, and Steph was awesome enough to give this one to me when she ran across it!



And since I can't drink beer all the time (especially during Lent*), and water gets kinda boring, I've been trying to branch out. I've been into iced tea lately, as a nice alternative. The most important thing about iced tea is that you must drink it out of a bendy straw. I'm less picky about the glass for this one, but the bendy straw is a necessity. It makes cold drinks taste better, I swear!

What's your drink of choice these days? In addition to the above mentioned drinks, I'm totally obsessed with vanilla almond milk. Sooooo delish!

*Lenten fasting and giving up of things does not count when you get stitches in your finger and are feeling very grumpy. There were a couple weak moments last week when we did drink at home, but I choose to believe God still loves me and forgives me for this weak moment :)

What did you do today?

I had quite a lazy day... it started with about 2 hours on the couch. Breakfast. Coffee. Blogs. Today Show. It was pretty nice. But I was actually being more productive than it looked, as the kitchen was filling with the aromatic smell of homemade chicken stock. It was simmering away on the stove top, and had only taken about 3 minutes to get started.

The inspiration came from The Sweet Beet, a blog my sister introduced me to. The first post I read was about boiling your garbage, and while I thought her advice was a little extreme (egg shells! apple cores! GROSS!), I liked the idea of saving my veggie scraps in the freezer. It seems silly to me to buy fresh carrots, celery, and onions just so that I can boil them to death. So I tried to remember to save scraps, plus wilted veggies I didn't cook in time... and today I tossed the bag of frozen bits into a big stock pot, with a frozen chicken carcass left over from a roast chicken last week. I filled the pot with water, placed it on the stove, and went to enjoy my bagel* while it came to a boil. Seriously, so little effort. The biggest challenge was remembering it was in the kitchen, and to check it and turn down to a simmer once it started boiling. Otherwise, I just tossed in some peppercorns, and let it simmer for a couple hours. I guess straining and putting into containers took a bit more work, but at that point I was more awake and willing to put forth the effort! The result: about 18 cups of homemade chicken stock, now patiently waiting in my freezer.



*While on the subject of breakfast... Aren't bagels the best thing ever? I think my dad's New York roots get credit for my addiction, and it takes every ounce of my health-conscious eating mentality to not eat a bagel every morning. Salt bagels are my all time favorite, but since they're pretty hard to find outside of NYC, my usual go-to is the everything variety. Delicious!

Intentional Happiness

Life has been a little frustrating around our house lately. Mostly, it's jobs. I can't even get a call or email about any of the teaching jobs I'm applying for, no matter how many times I update my applications. I'm not unhappy with my current jobs-- babysitting and The Chopping Block-- but in terms of schedule and pay, they are jobs I can't sustain on forever. We've been living pretty comfortably regardless of my minimal income, but after doing so for over a year, things are starting to get tighter. I won't bore you with all the details, my point is just that I'm frustrated. I want a real, "grown up" job again, and I want it to be in a school setting. Joe is also feeling a bit stuck at his job, with frustrating management and not any obvious place to get to. So between the two of us, there have been some crabby evenings around our house!

That's where intentional happiness comes in. I first saw the idea of it on my friend The Kitchen Witch's blog, and I commented on how I've been trying to pick out the positive aspects of my life recently. She sent me a !!! card to keep in my wallet, and I've been trying to actually pick out and document some of the !!! moments in my life. Here are just a few things that have made me stop and appreciate my life this week.

This year I have been growing some herbs and tomatoes on our back porch. Not only have I not killed the plants, but they're actually edible! These tomatoes were the first on the plant to turn red, and Joe and I were so excited to eat them. That's major !!!. I also had enough home grown basil to make a batch of pesto, which is now in cute little containers in my freezer, waiting to be eaten.

A great !!! for us is homebrewing. Making beer is a hobby that I am happy to share with Joe. We have so much fun working together to see the process from beginning to end. This is bottling day, which is always fun.

I've been cooking a lot of farm-fresh produce lately, from our CSA share and from farmer's markets. Cooking always brings some !!! into my life. No matter how broke we get, I have a hard time compromising on food. We're mostly eating vegetarian at the moment-- cheaper AND healthier for us and the earth. This was an amazing recipe I made up for grilled polenta squares with collard greens and spring onions, topped with zucchini and white bean tomato sauce.

My jobs have random hours and are low paying, but they allow me !!! like this. 3:00 pm, on the back porch... Get Up Kids on my ipod, homebrewed beer standing by, and a book to enjoy. Ok, so I didn't really enjoy the book (The Sun Also Rises), but I get to feel !!! for relaxing out back in the middle of the day :)

I'm sure I'll document some intentional happiness again. It's a good exercise in counting my blessings, which are many! What made you appreciate life this week?

Recent brewing experiments

I don't remember exactly when we brewed our first batch of beer, but it was sometime after Joe's birthday last summer. His birthday is towards the end of August, so we're still more than a month off from a year's worth of brewing. In the last eleven months, we've brewed 8 batches of beer. I'm proud of that fact, because it shows that we found a hobby we enjoy, and are really working on getting better at it. I've helped Joe with just about every batch, not only because it's easier with two people, but also because I really enjoy the process. It's so similar to cooking and baking, and I savor the end result with a sense of accomplishment. Within the next few months I would like to take the lead on a batch of beer, and to see it all the way from recipe selection to sanitation and bottling. Don't worry, I'll blog all about that experience!

We have gotten a little more bold with our beer making with recent batches, now that we're more comfortable with how the process works. We just tasted our "doctored up" IPA, which was a pale ale kit with our own hops added. I saw this as being similar to taking a boxed cake mix and adding ingredients to make it more gourmet, and I think this beer turned out a lot like that. It wasn't the best beer we've made, but it was not bad at all. When we went to bottle it, the fermented beer was very murky, which we attributed to the dry hop pellets. Next time, we'll use whole leaf hops or somehow contain the pellets before dropping them in. We attempted to filter the beer, which was a long and somewhat successful process. We were really cautious about avoiding contamination, but this was still a risky experiment. Thankfully, the first couple bottles we've tasted have been good. It's a very strong IPA, almost more than I can handle. But as a slow sipping beer, it's not bad. Nothing like the Dogfish Head IPA recipe from our Extreme Brewing recipe book, but not a bad attempt at adding our own touch to a recipe.

We also recently made a Belgian double that called for two pounds of honey along with the malt extract. We haven't tasted the final product yet, but the dark brown color and smell of honey and malt was pleasant and enticing when we were bottling it. I can't wait to taste this one!

Attempts at Urban Gardening

For the last few years I've been talking about attempting to grow some herbs on our back porch, but for one reason or another we've bailed on the plans each summer. This time we were out of excuses and decided to bite the bullet and give urban gardening a try! I love cooking with fresh herbs, and was excited at the idea of having them available to me right outside the door. Also, to know that I've grown a part of the food I'm eating is an exciting concept that I wanted to try.

We decided to get our garden started on Memorial Day, when Joe and I were both home from work. Unfortunately, this ended up being a relatively rainy day, but I refused to wait any longer! So we got soaked while wondering around Gethsemane Garden Center, and them embraced the rain while planting at home.

This is a Czech Bush heirloom tomato plant. They recommended it for our small space, because it grows like a bush and doesn't need the typical steaks for a tomato plant that grows up. I also couldn't resist the cute little gnome to watch over our plants!

We bought two kinds of basil. Typical sweet Italian basil, and also lemon basil. It has already been growing a ton, and I used some of the basil in a pasta sauce I made last week. We also are growing French thyme, which I added to the quinoa loaf that I blogged about. The herbs taste fresh, and it's wonderful to just cut them straight off the plan while I'm in the midst of my cooking. Below is the final product. The tomato plant is already sprouting some small green tomatoes, which we've been checking in on every day. I can't wait to taste them!

Fireplace be gone!

When we bought our condo almost two years ago, we were charmed by the fireplace in the living room. Against the brick wall, the fireplace looked cozy and inviting, and we loved it! However... soon after we moved in, we realized what a pain in the neck the fireplace really was. First of all, it took up so much room! It was about 3 feet out from the wall, and the spots on either side of it were totally dead space. It looked nice, but made the room seem so much smaller once we put furniture in the room.

I also didn't like that the fireplace really only left us with one way to set up furniture in the room. This was more of a problem for our table, which had to be pushed against the windows. The fourth seat was pushed into the corner, and we'd never actually had more than 3 people sit at the table at one time. Seems silly, right? And the final nail in the coffin? The fireplace didn't actually burn properly, and shot up bright blue flames that didn't look realistic at all! So, after a lot of debate and planning, we decided it was time to tear it out.

Joe's dad is really handy, and has done a ton of home renovation projects over the years. He loves doing these types of things, and was really eager to help Joe with his first big project. It was a dusty, busy few hours, but by the end of the day the project was complete!

We had to sand the marks from the edge of the fireplace, and now you can barely see where the drywall used to be. Joe enjoyed this excuse to play with power tools!

At this point we were almost done! Can you see the exhaustion and relief in their eyes?

After we sanded and varnished the wood, we discovered the color was a little different. We're planning to refinish all the wood floors before we sell the condo anyway, so it's not too big a deal. Plus, we're going to have the sofa covering it until then, so you can't really tell unless you look closely. The picture below is our finished living room. We love it and are marveling at the way it opens up the room! The table now has 4 chairs around it, and the couches are much more open and welcoming. I'm dreaming of new curtains in the near future, but otherwise I think the room is pretty much perfect!

If you're a Chicago friend, get ready for a party some time in the near future! We can't wait to do some socializing in this new space. Otherwise, come visit and see it for yourself! What do you guys think?