Tag Archives: breakfast

So, I’m 40! I’m not too surprised that I’m embracing it with love, I have been working towards this acceptance after all. I wanted to ring in this next decade in a BIG way, so off to Northern Cali I went. My first three days were spent alone in the Redwoods between Carmel and Big Sur California, one of my favorite places. Landing in San Francisco around 12:30 my first stop was Baja Fresh for lunch. I can’t help it, ever since PFMan and I lived in Vegas, years ago, I have loved BF and don’t miss a chance to eat the veggie burrito. Then down the coast I go. HWY 17 is spectacular, a curvy, tree-lined drive, just breathtaking. I arrive in Carmel to do some shopping for my stay. I’m determined to go veggie while I’m here so I stock my cart with organic produce, strawberries, asparagus, & pistachios. I’ve brought my herbal teas from home as well, oh and chocolate with sea salt:-). I turn down Palo Colorado Rd. to head to Don Loui’s. This image above is the point where Palo Colorado Rd. meets the Pacific Coast Hwy. Turning off down Palo Colorado was magical. See I’m a dreamer in the sense that I love environments that transport me, and when you turn onto this road you are placed immediately into towering redwoods, like a land of fairies. You twist and wind amongst the quiet giants, houses placed into the sides of the mountains like they’ve been there forever, all blending in with the trees, completely part of the forest.

Here I have my bag of goodies, camera & backpack (which was packed in my luggage and now used to haul only the few items I’d need for this portion of my trip), and up the mountain I go. Not too bad, about five steep switchbacks, with little treasures at every corner. Then the Dragon House appears, unbelievable! I’m through the Dragon house tunnel and onto the Rainbow House where I’m staying. Don, the innkeeper, is an eccentric. He’s been on this property since 1983. Then it was him, the land and a tent. The Rainbow house he built first. Yes, him and his son. Previously he was a contractor and landscaper by trade and it shows. Today there are 4 buildings, The Rainbow & Dragon House (rentals), his own home and an octagon above the rest with windows looking out over the mountain and Pacific Ocean, used for yoga and/or meditation. Beautiful, peaceful! He’s created many trails all around the property as well.

Though I highly recommend staying here alone, as a couple or small family, this is not for everyone. Forget a warm shower and none at all in the Rainbow House. Luckily I like going rough and dirty, ha. There is no oven and only a propane burner for stove top, and it’s QUIET (aside from the very loud frogs and owls at night:-). I like to think of the house like a tree house on crack, seriously! And since I like being transported, it was perfect for me, like a kid again.

So what’s a girl to do all alone in the mountains? Hike, hike, eat at her favorite restaurant in Big Sur, play words with friends, ha, take lots of pictures and hike some more. To my chagrin there was no big AHA moment or anything, just time with myself which in itself is a BIG deal for me. In my past being along has been very difficult. A good friend of mine text-ed me while there questioning how I was doing alone. He said he talks to himself a lot when alone, lol. Me too:-). And I did, much of it in my head, some out loud. But I was comfortable with it, the oneness, and that’s a BIG deal!

Please enjoy some of the many photos I took while on this part of my trip and look for a post on me joining the girls in Wine Country soon:-)!

Peace!

Previous trip to Big Sur with my honey:-)!

Eggs Benedict with Meyer lemon dressing.

One of my goals for 2012 is to cook more at home, with fresh ingredients, using what’s on hand with less waste. I love to cook, I love cookbooks, so this year I’m making it more of a priority. This past weekend our close family friend, Britt, spent the night on New Year’s Day. We had made Grilled Salmon and a Fennel salad with Meyer Lemon Dressing from my new X-mas gift cookbook, Big Sur Bakery Cookbook, (I highly recommend by the way). I was so excited to make this at home. PFMan and I spent a few days in Big Sur in July and fell in love with the Bakery. Though all the food we had in our 9-day trip to Northern California, my absolute favorite meal was the simple salad of fennel, greens, herbs and Meyer lemon dressing at the Bakery! So I’ve been itching to get the cookbook and PFMan didn’t let me down for the holiday!

Anyway, we had plenty of dressing leftover, as well as a French Baguette, some greens and a hunk of ham in the freezer so I whipped up a beautiful new recipe for Eggs Benedict on Monday morning.

Believe it or not, I’d never poached an egg before. So I got on-line, of course, and had that figured out in under five minutes.  I have to say I was very pleased with my first try at poaching.  Anyway, the Benedict went like this. Cut baguette into slices, lay on cookie sheet, brush with olive oil, toast in oven.  We plated four slices per plate as the base of our Benedict. Then we placed the ham, which had been previously cut into thick slices and heated in a skillet, on top of baguette slices and then a dollop of salad greens. Next came the poached egg, a drizzle of Meyer lemon dressing and some chopped fennel tops to garnish.  It was a crowd pleaser.

On a cookbook note, I’m also really enjoying Jamie Oliver’s At Home Cookbook.  It’s about his garden and the recipes inspired from the beautiful bounty that grows there.  Very inspiring to eat healthy, fresh and sustainably.

Salute!

Galway City

The Luck of the Irish that is.  We just returned home from our family trip to Ireland, kinda piggy-backed on PFMan’s yearly trek out there to broadcast live for St. Patty’s Day.  This would have been his third year in a row and I was not letting him go without us this time!

We flew out several days prior to the broadcast, finding our way by car to Galway City where we called home for our first four nights.  We stayed at the Kilcullen House B&B which is about a 10 minute walk outside of the City Centre, close enough to enjoy the city, but a distance from the noise.  Many times while walking in Galway I felt as if I were a character in a Dickens novel or a miniature in a Christmas Village scene.  I love that, the old worldliness of it. 

Our favorite food in Galway was hands down found at Ard Bia in the Spanish Arch.  It’s located in the Arch which is very medieval in style, but once you walk inside, it’s the small, cozy and very eclectic eatery.  It was love at first site.  The menu is so creative, using local and sustainable produce and meat sources, which I love!  My favorite entree was the St. Tola goats cheese & pistachio cracked wheat cake with wilted greens, garlic yogurt & muhumara.  I will crave this until I return! Honestly we couldn’t decide what to order so we had them bring us the two most popular starters and mains.  We were NOT disappointed.

Other places we enjoyed eating: McDonagh’s, O’Grady’s on the Pier (actually in Barna on the coast near Galway), and Griffin’s Bakery! McDonagh’s is THE place to go for your required Fish n’ Chips, with many different fish types to choose from you can’t go wrong here. O’Grady’s was recommended to us by Emer and Russel, the Inn keepers at Kilcullen House. It’s located in the tiny coastal village named Barna, just outside of Galway. Located on the pier, great views and the BEST chowder I’ve ever had in my life, no kidding! Griffin’s Bakery, originally founded in 1876 also recommended by Emer & Russell. OMG, we each picked a pastry and thank goodness we got four, they were all DELICIOUS. Again, the BEST scone ever. I could have died happy.

I have to stop here, with the food, I haven’t yet mentioned the PUBS, or the Irish Countryside or our time in Dublin or…. So, you’ll have to stay tuned and for now, enjoy the pictures.

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Eating Clean lunch

Wondering if we’re still Eating Clean, me too!! So, truth be told we’ve been struggling with it lately. No big surprise, it’s March 4th and most of us have fallen back into our old routines statistically speaking. I have a ton of excuses of course, we travel a lot, life’s too busy, etc. You know them. However, since I’m not one to simmer over the negatives, let’s discuss what amazing new habits have been formed from our time taking Eating Clean seriously.

1) I’m off coffee completely. Not because I ever had too many cups, I was a one cupper. I just couldn’t drink, wouldn’t drink it without lots of cream and sugar, so I’m an Herbal tea drinker now, sweetener free, hard core! And you know what, my kids like a nice cup of nicely flavored decaffeinated herbal tea with me now in the evening too:-) – Bonus!

2) We use hardly an salt. Eating Clean calls for mostly NO salt. So we had completely cut it out of our diet for a while, got used to food without it which has allowed us, mostly me, to add it back in very small amounts.

3) I love Steel Cut Oats now and eat breakfast every day! I was NOT a breakfast eater and I know it was terrible for my metabolism, but now every morning I fit it into my routine.

4) Bye-Bye sour cream, hello Plain Greek Yogurt! Even the kids!

5) Well adjusted to Whole Wheat Pasta, Yay!

6) Ezekiel Bread products are the only bread products we buy now! They are made with Living Sprouts, they are incredibly yummy & so much better than regular bread. We love their English Muffins!

There are more I’m sure, but these are the biggies, so there is always a positive and we haven’t given up completely, it just isn’t happening at every meal. Things I really need to work on: Well, exercise is at the top of that list:-)!

Most Sunday mornings PFMan makes the family blueberry pancakes.  This has been going on for some time now.  Several months ago, in the process to use more natural and organic ingredients, I started buying unbleached flour.  I didn’t understand using a product that used chemicals to bleach something simply for aesthetics. I mostly think things look better in their natural form anyway.  Well, the pancakes were different.  The taste was there, but the consistency was denser and it seemed as though they weren’t cooking all the way through.  He started changing up the amounts of ingredients, cooking them longer, went back to the recipe to make sure he wasn’t messing something up.  So I finally delved into the differences between bleached and unbleached flour, seeing as how this is the only thing that had changed.

Here’s what I’ve learned:

Both bleached and unbleached flour goes through a bleaching process.  Bleached flour has bleaching agents such as benzoyl peroxide or chlorine gas added to aid the process along more quickly, where as unbleached flour will, over a period of weeks, undergo a natural chemical process in much the same way in which a sliced apple turns brown.

The agents which are used in bleached flour also alter the protein content, making it less than that in unbleached flour making bleached flour best for baking cookies, pancakes (aha), pie crusts and waffles.  Unbleached is better for yeast breads, Yorkshire puddings, cream puffs, Danish pastries, and popovers.

So I guess I’ll give into bleached flour for some things now and use unbleached on others:-)

There is a lot more information to be found about different flours at this link by Cooks Illustrated.  And another good reference here!

Mangia!

Michael (PFMan) and I have wanted to visit Colorado for years now.  It’s also a place we’ve thought might be nice to live sometime.  We brought our kids out here this past Saturday and I’m sooooo incredibly happy that we still have four days before returning home.  It is even more stunning then I could have ever imagined, the terrain, the landscapes, the weather, the people.  I’m soaking ever bit of this in to carry with me until we can get out here again and again.  My family is sitting behind me contemplating how much food to bring on our hike to Mohawk Lake today.  Seems we may be out there longer then we thought.  We just ate a yummy breakfast at Blue Moose.  I so love a good pancake.

Anywho, PFMan is now at the grocery store getting some grub for our hike and I’ve just completed enhancing an image that I took with my I-phone from our balcony.  Nice view huh?  Wouldn’t mind waking to this every morning at some point.  Oh my, and to see this with a blanket of white snow, (Big Sigh here, then smile).

I have a lot more to say about this trip, but I have to git for now:-)  Be back soon with lots more details and photos too!

Sundays have become a day we can count on. Sleep in, hubby makes his now infamous blueberry pancakes, we all play in the pool. Mostly a lazy day, just the four of us. You can usually count on some talk about our future travel plans or past vacations or both. We love to talk about places we’ve been and want to go. It doesn’t matter if it rains all day, we find something to do together. It might be running out after dinner for a walk on the beach or to get ice cream. Ultimately it’s just family time, something we all should make time for.

A couple of Sunday’s ago my daughter Addy and I made Blueberry compote to spoon over home-made biscuits, topped with home-made whipped cream. Mmmmmmm, dessert for the next three evenings. Just a little something I’m trying to do more often… HOME-MADE with fresh and/or organic ingredients. The kids like it and it makes me feel good too.

Our Blueberry Shortcake

The recipe for Blueberry Shortcake