Is it only Thursday?!

It's been a long week in my house. A has a stomach bug again. She's been home all week. My new best friend has become the washing machine. A is in a much better mood today which I am so thankful for.

Some things that happened before the stomach bug hit my house.  Made french toast from ATK book. They were ok. The flavor was good, but the bread didn't soak up the liquid enough. Possibly because of the flour the recipe called for? Guess they weren't too bad since they disappeared before I could take a picture of the final product.

Had a little Korean bbq while my sister was in town on my older sister's new dining table.

That's my girl holding up the flag for the school's Friday morning pledge.

I hit the library and got me some books.

Drinking this coffee at the moment.  Thanks GP!

Caramels...yummmm...thanks AC

these days

I made this Strawberry cake from Saveur magazine. It only got 3 stars, but several blogs claimed it was really good. Let me say...it ended up in the trash. E said it was the worst thing I've made and I had to agree. I would give it 1 star.

So I made a lemon cake to make up for it.

chocolate coffee muffins

Received this clip/coffee spoon for my bday last year and I love it!

making strawberry jam today

this week

 I'm missing

In my kitchen this week

(links to recipes in green)

We ate so much last week in SF that I decided this week we would eat a little healthier. I know minus the apple fritters, but they had real apples in them!

lemon dressing (recipe link is below)

apples for apple fritters

spring salad...barley, asparagus, peas and arugula from Heidi Swanson (except she used bulgar)

fried rice from DALS (it was a little bland so we threw some furikake on it)

fennel, zucchini, yellow beet, & arugula salad ( i used leftover dressing from the spring salad above)

Is it over already?!

Today is the last day of spring break. I'm thankful that A and I recovered from the flu before then. Our friends were here from DC (visiting their family) for their spring break the week before ours. We were able to squeeze in some time together. Miss them already!

For our spring break we headed up to SF to visit my sister.

we went for a little hike

waffles at blue bottle.

their wings were so good!

Checked out some bakeries Craftsman & Wolves and B Patisserie

white chocolate sesame coffee cake

B Patisserieis was a little pricey, but good. If you go try the kouign amann. Great with a cup of coffee.

almond biscotti

It's been one of those tough weeks.  A is sick with a stomach bug again and she's been out of school for almost a week. 

Red and orange beets fresh from the backyard...thinking about making a nice beet salad. The first beet salad I had was at The Campanile many moons ago when my sister took me there for my graduation dinner. So sad that it's closed now.

almond biscotti

ready for their second bake

I lost my appetite since I've been cleaning up after A. I made these and have been eating them for lunch and dinner with a cup of coffee or tea.

spring

Something I regret...not planting more daffodil bulbs last season. I only planted 10 bulbs I should have planted 30 more.

lettuce anyone?

I made orange chocolate biscotti late last night which made the house smell delicious!

breakfast

gardening and baking

My younger sister is also an avid gardener and before she moved up to sf I promised to check up on her raised box plus I had to check up on my parent's lawn.  I think my parents are one of the few people in their neighborhood who are without a garderner. They had my sister who mowed the lawn, trimmed the bushes and the trees. The lawn mower broke right before she left so the other day I had to mow the lawn with clippers...it was quite a sight.

veggies growing out of control!

please excuse my old phone....the spinach and the chard were almost the same size!

I had some frozen cranberries leftovers from the holidays that I used up for this loaf.

sprinkling a little raw sugar on top before baking it gave it a nice crunch

Have you heard of PappaRich otherwise known as PappaRoti in Asia? There is one shop in Pasadena which is a little too far to swing by. I searched the internet and found a recipe. They were pretty good, but not as light as the real stuff. 

what would I do without my kitchen aid.