The weekend.. or most of it anyway

 

Our weekend was pretty darn awesome and rather productive if I do say so myself. Eric had a big paper to write so instead he tackled a home improvement project! (I can't complain on that one) He turned our loft space into my "book nook." Its a pretty great place for a cozy indoor picnic. 

Chelsea and Ben came over for a cozy indoor picnic in the book nook! 

We also got more lovely veggies in the lastest CSA box. If you are in Austin and haven't checked out Johnson's Backyard, I highly highly recommend it. 

I gave a talk on Sunday. Scary but had so much fun researching. 

I also finally planted our strawberries. I love austin. Planting strawberries in November. Awesome. 

We watched lots of Battlestar Galactica. Or "The BG" as we now call it. 

And what weekend is complete without french toast....?  

Yes, I ate cookies for Lunch AND Dinner Yesterday

 

I couldn't help it. They are so good. AND the worst part is, they taste (and are) just healthy enough that I can convince myself that eating them for not 1, but 2 meals in a row, is perfectly within recommend daily nutrition. (if only I had a side of pizza....) Just in case you are also looking for a way to round out your hips and thighs, look no further... homemade thin mints! 

Homemade and All-natural Thin Mint Recipe

Taken from 101 Cookbooks

Chocolate Wafers:
8 ounces organic butter, room temperature
1 cup organic powdered sugar, 1 teaspoon natural vanilla extract
1 cup cocoa powder
3/4 teaspoon fine grain sea salt
1 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour

Chocolate Peppermint Coating:
1 pound good quality semi-sweet chocolate, chopped
natural peppermint oil to taste

Preheat your oven to 350. Racks in the middle zone.

Make the cookie dough: In a mixer cream the butter until it is light and fluffy. Add the powdered sugar and cream some more, scraping the sides of the bowl a couple times if necessary. Stir in the vanilla extract and then the salt and cocoa powder. Mix until the cocoa powder is integrated and the batter is smooth and creamy, sort of like a thick frosting. Add the whole wheat pastry flour and mix just until the batter is no longer dusty looking, it might still be a bit crumbly, and that's o.k. You don't want to over mix and end up with tough cookies.
Turn the dough out onto a counter, gather it into a ball, and kneed it just once or twice to bring it together into once nice, smooth mass. Place the ball of dough into a large plastic bag and flatten it into a disk roughly 3/4-inch thick. Place the dough in the freezer for 20 minutes to chill.

Rollout and bake: Remove the dough from the freezer and roll it out really thin, remember how thin Thin Mints are? That's how thin you need your dough, about 1/8-inch. You can either roll it out between two sheets of plastic, or dust your counter and rolling pin with a bit of flour and do it that way. Stamp out cookies using a 1 1/2-inch cutter (this time I used one with a fluted edge, I've done hearts and other shapes in the past). Place cookies on a parchment-lined baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes. Remove the cookies from the oven and allow them to cool completely on a baking rack if you've got one.

Make the peppermint coating:
While the cookies are in the oven you can get the coating ready. I use a makeshift double boiler to melt chocolate (a metal pan over a saucepan of gently simmering water), but I know many people who swear by melting chocolate in the microwave. Slowly melt the chocolate, stirring occasionally until it is glossy and smooth. Stir in the peppermint extract. If you think the chocolate needs a bit more peppermint kick, add more extract a drop or two at a time - but don't go overboard.

Finishing the cookies: You are going to coat the cookies one at a time and then gently set them on a parchment-lined baking sheet to set. Drop one cookie into the chocolate and (using a fork) carefully make sure it gets fully coated. Lift the cookie out of the chocolate with the fork and bang the fork on the side of the pan to drain any extra chocolate off the cookie. You are after a thin, even coating of chocolate. Place on the aforementioned prepared baking sheet, and repeat for the rest of the cookies. Place the cookies in the refrigerator or freezer to set. They will set at room temperature, it just takes much longer, and I prefer them straight out of the freezer anyways

Make 3 or 4 dozen cookies.

Gypsy Picnic

This weekend was the Gypsy Picnic - a trailer food festival. Austin is pretty serious about it's food trucks. And unlike NYC, there are designated food truck areas so you don't have to follow trucks around with your twitter in order to find them! But this festival was even better because all of our favorites were all in the same lot!







We always start with dessert! Frozen hot chocolate and frozen banana!



Beautiful sunset



pretty great music

Food Truck Friday

Last weekend we went out with our trusty buddies - Chelsea and Ben - for some foodtruck lovin'. We started with some taco/cones from The Mighty Cone. They were pretty darn tasty. I loved that hot-n-crunchy sauce but we were all still hungry afterward!

Never fear - Gourdoughs was down the street and around the corner with their monstrous donuts! All in all a successful friday night.

Big Apple BBQ

This past weekend was Big Apple BBQ. We thought that since it was super foggy and wet there wouldn't be any big crowds. YEAH RIGHT! it was crazy town.



Those colored flags marked the end of the lines for different BBQ booths. We just picked a color and went with it. Having to figure out what food went with which color was just too difficult.



And then, on the other end of the block were even more flags!



Look familiar? That's right, a fountain of bbq sauce! But not for anyone, just for the people that paid for the day pass. Alllllll you can eat bbq and a bbq fountain - how did we miss that?!

And then we ate our ribs on the side of the road and then got the heck out of there.

Warm Food for Cold Days

Veggie Chili
(adapted from the awesome Honest Fare)

You need:

• 2 cans of chopped tomatoes
  
• 2 cans of beans (I used 1 kidney and 1 white)
  
• 1 cup chopped zucchini
• 1 cup chopped butternut squash
  
• 1 ½ cup chopped yellow+red peppers
• 1 cup chopped carrot
• ¾ cup chopped white onion
• Olive oil

• 1 large clove diced garlic
• Handful of fresh oregano diced
• Salt
• black pepper
  
• Cayenne pepper to taste
• ½ teaspoon cinnamon powder
• ¼ teaspoon ground clove
• 1 Tablespoon paprika
• 1½ Tablespoon chili powder
• 2 tablespoons maple syrup
• Fresh Parsley

Directions

1. Chop veggies. Sauté garlic, onion, peppers, squash and zuc in a large pot with about 3 tablespoons of olive oil on med high heat for a couple minutes. Add a teaspoon of salt, the beans, the paprika, chili powder, clove, cinnamon, oregano and some black pepper. Saute uncovered (mixing occasionally) until veggies become tender but not soft.
2. Add tomatoes, carrots and maple syrup. Bring to a simmer and reduce heat to low. Stir in about 1/6 teaspoon of cayenne pepper and another dash of salt. Cover and continue cooking on low until carrots are soft. Taste and add more salt and/or cayenne pepper if needed.
3. Partially uncover and continue cooking until chili thickens. The longer you cook it the better it’ll be. Serve topped with sour cream, cheddar cheese and chives.

Red Iguana

In thinking about leaving Utah there are a few things I will miss dearly. Of course there are PEOPLE i will miss. But we're talking THINGS here. One of those things is Red Iguana. I thought for so long that it was over-hyped. That was until I had their mango enchiladas. MANGO enchiladas! They were so good. I was sad there wasn't tons or I wasn't so gosh darn hungry because I ate them all so fast.
My parents refuse to eat here because from the outside it looks so sketchy. I give them that. But its worth it. And it's not THAT sketchy. Come on, you're five minutes from the Salt Lake Temple.
Final Word: It will be dearly missed