Evergreen State Fair

During the sunny part of the day, Lee, Susan, Celia, Cypress and I went to the fair. The scary clown just came up to us when we were enjoying our onion burgers and elephant ears and corn dogs--I don't know about clowns and neither does Cypress. We had the best time and Susan put it in better words than I could have, so here's her blog entry. www.suzqueue.com -- check it out. Thanks Sus!

During the buckets of rain part of the day, Lee took me to an outdoor festival of food, the Incredible Feast. We still enjoyed ourselves just like true Seattlites even though we got soaked to the bone, and had some excellent food. I think I liked the sliders, bacon and cheese toasted sammie, beet salad with pistachios, peach gelato and goat on corn cakes the best. I got to see all the locally famous chefs in person, instead of just on paper, and see them in action. I'll definitely be going again next year, it was well worth it, and maybe the weather will even be warm. You never know here in Seattle.

It's been too long!

I just have to blog. It's been forever since I last did so and I'm starting to feel a bit depressed about it. I still don't really have time to do this, it's late and I've got to get up early, but I figured I could give you all a quick update as to what's been happening around here. Lee and I have had a busy and stressful week, it seems that it just isn't a good week for most people I've spoken to. I like to think it's the waning moon. Both of our jobs are particularly awful this week, our friends and family seem to have tragedies happening and we are as usual, very busy just doing our normal stuff. Tonight we went out for a drink and dinner at the Pig N Whistle, then met up with Dannie and Rob for some beer. Already I feel better, and I'm looking forward to a couple of days off. We are taking my nieces to the Evergreen State Fair, then going to this big chef food function at the Phinney Market. On Monday I am going to play Bingo with my Mom and Lee's Mom up at Tulalip--I think we are going to win!

We did the Gumshoe Walk last week, it's a mystery type of scavenger hunt throughout Greenwood and Phinney. It took us hours and hours to finish, it was really hard and I don't think we won the prize of restaurant gift certificates. I'm so not doing this again next year and if it weren't for Lee and Susan, I probably wouldn't have gotten the answers to the clues. We did, however, see a wonderful sunset due to the large amount of pollution in the air that day, and a couple of cute houses and streets. I know this is strange, but I love those beautiful smoggy sunsets--it reminds me that I am in the city, the best city in the world. Not the country, where I was at for way too long. I'm such an urban girl.

We had a salad with the few ripe cherry tomatoes I got from my garden last night. The rest of them are green, but plentiful, and I've narrowed down what I want to grow in my garden for years to come. Definitely tomatoes, even though they don't really ripen until September, and onions, herbs and peppers. Look at my beautiful, really hot, pepper I have grown!

Lee was working even later than I was this Saturday and sometimes when that happens I eat the things I crave that Lee just doesn't like. So I either eat eggs or spicy food. Sometimes I dream of eggs, they are the perfect food. So here's picture of the best omelet I've had in some time. Fresh eggs, gruyere, arugula and wild mushrooms sauteed in white wine. I broke the top of my lovely eggs, but it was still amazing.

Golden Gardens Vagabond

Last night we went to Golden Gardens for a special Vagabond dinner with friends. There were a ton of people I haven't seen in a while and it turned out to be a pretty mellow night. Chef Katie demonstrated her shag dance, Lee and I walked along the beach during the sunset and we had plenty of good food. A crab and shrimp boil, pulled pork, slaw, mac n cheese and peach cobbler--a very southern bbq.

Lee's kickball team, the Sofa King's (ya, I know), needed another girl team member, so I'll be playing kickball on Wednesdays now. We practiced this evening and apparently I'm not a good runner, although I knew that. I'm just not built for running. We shall see how it goes tomorrow.

Also, I'm without a car. I got in my first car accident last week (yay?, cause it took me so long to get in one and I'm alive!), but our new car that I previously blogged about is about to be in the shop for 3 weeks. This is why I live in the city, near a bus line, 2 blocks from the grocery store and restaurants and coffee shops. When things like this happen, it really isn't so bad if you can walk everywhere, or at least take the bus. So I'm kinda enjoying it, this life without a car. Lee drives me if I need to go far and even takes me to work most of the time. It's kind of a pain in the butt to get in an accident due to the fact that I've had to run around trying to get estimates and insurance claims made, but that's really the worst part. And remember, I'm alive. That's the best part of this first accident of mine.

Cruefest!

We (Dannie, Lee, Tammi and I) all headed down south to Auburn to the Motley Crue concert at the White River Amphitheatre. All in all, it was pretty cool. Not as many mullets as I would have liked to see, but plenty of Tommy Lee and his boobie camera. Definitely not a child friendly show. And I have to say there is a completely different crowd in Auburn, which the Crue referred to as Seattle one too many times. I was kinda like, ummm, we are definitely not in Seattle anymore. Dannie and I actually saw a Ted Nugent look-alike and when we told him about his likeness he acted like he was gonna cry he was so happy. He was just beaming and saying how this was the best part of his week. Then Dannie said something about Anthony Bourdain, and he thought we were saying he looks like a cross between Anthony Bourdain and Ted Nugent and oh my god, he was in heaven. He was also drunk. And don't ever go to the beer garden at a butt rock concert and order a glass of wine--I almost threw up, really. Still, it was a good experience and something we all have to do at least once in life. Rock on.

Cruefest!

We (Dannie, Lee, Tammi and I) all headed down south to Auburn to the Motley Crue concert at the White River Amphitheatre. All in all, it was pretty cool. Not as many mullets as I would have liked to see, but plenty of Tommy Lee and his boobie camera. Definitely not a child friendly show. And I have to say there is a completely different crowd in Auburn, which the Crue referred to as Seattle one too many times. I was kinda like, ummm, we are definitely not in Seattle anymore. Dannie and I actually saw a Ted Nugent look-alike and when we told him about his likeness he acted like he was gonna cry he was so happy. He was just beaming and saying how this was the best part of his week. Then Dannie said something about Anthony Bourdain, and he thought we were saying he looks like a cross between Anthony Bourdain and Ted Nugent and oh my god, he was in heaven. He was also drunk. And don't ever go to the beer garden at a butt rock concert and order a glass of wine--I almost threw up, really. Still, it was a good experience and something we all have to do at least once in life. Rock on.

Lazy Sunday

I can't tell you the last time I did not much of anything on a Sunday. It's sooo nice. I had a good friend from college visit me this weekend and so I blocked out some time for her, which actually ended being some time for me as well. We had our own little Ballard pub crawl on Friday night and a BBQ with lots of Guitar Hero on Saturday night. I found out the drinks at Matador are really strong and that Lee can host a fairly big party without my help. He's incredible and sometimes I don't know how I got so lucky. But I just did, and it's pretty awesome, dude. We had some incredible grilled shrimp last night and I also made some blueberry sausages in puff pastry that were really good. Today we went to the Ballard Farmers Market, Senor Moose for chiliquiles (so yummy!) and then to Golden Gardens to stroll along the beach for a bit. I'm going to get some actual house stuff done today and celebrate with a bottle of beer, considering we had so much left over from last night. Thanks for visiting me, Maya!

Caprese Salad

Last night we went out with a few friends to Il Capretto D'Oro, the Golden Goat, in Woodinville. I never make it over to the Eastside--seems like yuppy country to me--but of course I'll get over there for good food, or possibly a shopping spree at Bellevue Square. I was raised mostly on Mercer Island and lived in Bellevue and Redmond at points in my life, but I definitely prefer the city and living in Seattle to being on the Eastside. I'm such an urban girl at heart. The restaurant was very authentic and wonderful and I told Lee we needed to go back just to take a tour of all the little wineries around there, so I guess I will be back to the place I never go. I had no idea we had our own Napa just half hour from our house!

One of the many things I've already done today was make yet another version of caprese salad. It's on every menu in America and has become so mainstream- it can be terrible and it can be the best tasting thing summer has to offer. I'm always experimenting with different ways to do it since I like it so much and recently found a way to have it in the winter months (AKA : October through June if you live up here in the Northwest). Lee got me the Molto Mario cookbook by Mario Batali and it's got a great way to fix this salad so that it still tastes good despite the main ingredients being out of season. It basically roasts the tomatoes for a couple of hours so their sweetness comes out and uses pesto that was made and frozen in the summer, so all is fresh and yummy. The version I made today was with red and yellow organic grape tomatoes, basil from the Phinney Market and buffalo mozzerella. The difference this time was that I marinated and salted the tomatoes for a few hours before adding the rest of the ingredients in order to get some of the moisture out of the tomatoes--I let it sit in a colander in the sink and they drained. Then right before serving I tossed the drained tomatoes with the basil, mozzerella, olive oil, balsamic and pepper (no extra salt needed) and it was a much better salad to bring to a party or BBQ (which I did). It still had a dressing of sorts due to the olive oil and vinegar, but it was much less 'soupy' overall and tasted great. It was also good for all those people that don't like tomato innards--that juicy, seedy stuff that sometimes makes people not like the wonderful tomato.

Lee and I are headed for a long evening of crazy with drinking and the Nine Inch Nails concert, should be a good time.

Chicken with Wild Mushroom and Herb Pasta

I writing to say that today I have done nothing but been a complete homebody. This kind of day is extremely rare and I can't tell you the last time I got to spend my day like this. I made myself iced Victrola coffee this morning, went for a long walk down Phinney Ave, walked to the store to pick up items for dinner, surfed the net, trimmed all my hedges outside, weeded, made homemade yogurt, harvested my veggies from the garden, washed them and stored them, read a book and made dinner for Lee and I that had lots of stuff from my garden.

At this point I'm normally still out with Lee and friends, dining out or doing something with them all, and I come home later and get a few things done and pass out. It's 8:30 and I don't know what to do! I guess I could watch a movie. Or take a bath. You know what?? I'm going to do something totally self indulgent and unnecessary and make myself a Facebook profile while drinking a glass of wine. I do have to get up way too early tomorrow morning to bring the car in for an oil change, so maybe I'll get to bed before midnight as well. I'll let you know when I get my new Facebook profile and then I'll have yet one more place to display my life for everyone to see. This is what happens when people are bored. They spend too much time online and get a Facebook profile. Geez, I can't believe this is happening to me. I'm becoming one of 'those' people. Hehe.

Dinner tonight was my first that had many garden ingredients--my onions, thyme, parsley. Morels and lobster mushrooms from the market. Local free range chicken and summer squash. I've worked out a sweet deal with my friend and neighbor, April, to trade a pedicure for her wonderful bounty coming from her garden, which is significantly larger than mine. She's even got chickens!

I'm enjoying this quietness and time to do the things I rarely get to do. This weekend will be packed full of dinner with friends out in Woodinville at Il Capretto D'Oro, my godchild's 2nd birthday bbq, Nine Inch Nails concert at Key Arena and working extra hours on Sunday. Monday I've got a cooking class focused on duck and peaches, yummmm.

Changing My Perspective

You may have noticed I took the subtitle of my blog off that I had initially intended on writing about....'making Greenwood the other Cap Hill of Seattle'. Yea, that's just not going to happen. I still love Capital Hill and all of it quirks and it will never be Greenwood. That being said, I really like it here, I really love our home and my life is one that I could never complain about. In fact, I don't know how I got so damn lucky. So I'm continuing to blog about my food related activities and all the wine I currently drink ( I think it's a summer thing), but I also write about my life and the love of my life, Lee, and our family and friends. I'm back to the beginning of this outlet being a journal, sometimes personal and sometimes not, but something that gives me a way to tell people what's going on around here and talk about who I am.

So what exactly has been happening? Well, turns out summer is even busier than winter was, but in a more 'sure, I'll have a margarita with lunch'!, kind of way. It's hot and sticky and I need to stay hydrated, and my mind needs to be a little more laid back on these kinds of days. So we started our vacation to Michigan with this in mind and have been enjoying our summer to the fullest. All of my siblings and my Dad and Step-Mom were in Michigan and we don't get together all at once very often, so we had a really good time. We laid in the hammock, picked cherries, lit fireworks, had a bonfire, ate Moose Tracks ice cream every day, went to Chef Charles every other day, went pirate mini golfing, swam in Lake Michigan and read a bunch. Chef Charles has the best pizza on earth and I have to fly across the country to get there, therefore I go as much as possible when I'm there. Also, we don't have Moose Tracks ice cream here. It's vanilla with little peanut butter cups and Macinac Island Fudge all throughout the whole thing. It's the best! I think Lee's highlight was finding that you could buy fireworks, alcohol and junk food all at one grocery store. You just don't find that in Seattle.

Since we've been home, we have been going out almost every night and enjoying summer while we can. My old friend from high school came to visit and we caught up on all the things I forgot about, apparently my memory isn't so good, but we had fun and I hope we can visit her in Sonoma, California soon. We also went to Molly Moon's again, the new ice cream place with funky flavors--still think that caramel salt is the best. We had dinner at Palace Kitchen and went to see 'The Dark Knight' last weekend, I recommend you go out and see it. There were many other things that went on, but most recent in my memory since I just ate the leftovers, is the fabulous dinner that Lee cooked for us last night. And Katie, our own personal CIA chef, helped out as well. I just like to say that cause it makes me feel like Oprah. Well, not really just like Oprah. Anyway, we went to the Ballard Market twice yesterday to fill up on the things we missed the last few weeks (Seattle dogs, Veraci Pizza, Buckwheat Crepes), and also picked up some dinner items for an impromptu party.

Here's our menu for our Sunday dinner, much of which includes herbs from our garden:
Caprese salad on a stick with balsamic jelly
Green beans with shallots and pinenuts
Broccoli
BBQed shrimp with garlic and herbs
Gnocchi with morel sauce
Chocolate cherry malts (honoring our trip to Michigan)

I love morels. They are heaven in my mouth. I'm out.

Back Home Again

We've been on vacation in Michigan for about two weeks, which is why I haven't blogged. All is well and more to come tomorrow....Stay tuned.