Cozy Sunday

Vanilla cinnamon black tea and a fresh cider apple donut. My kind of Sunday.

Sweet Holiday

My husband and I went down to New Jersey this holiday weekend to visit friends. Not only did we get to meet their sweet, baby boy, but we indulged in some seriously good local sweets. We really took advantage of what La Rosa's had to offer. The red velvet cupcake (above) was divine. The frosting was cream or cream cheese based and not-too-sweet, and the cake was fluffy and most.

But the other big star was the ice cream cannoli. I did not think it was possible, but I liked them better than regular cannoli. I can't even describe the deliciousness that was the ice cream filling. You'll have to make the trip yourself. It is well worth it, even if you live hours away. It is probably a good thing I have 4 hours separating me from the La Rosa's.

Friday Find: Whoopie!

I have Halloween treats on the brain, and these Halloween Whoopie Pies look divine. You can find them in SinnersSaintsSweets's shop. Everything in the shop looks so good - being sinful can't really be that bad, right?

Yum

A seriously delicious sandwich. Peanut butter, celery and raisins. It was in Real Simple recently and I couldn't believe I had never thought of it before. So good.

Sweet Treat

I came home to a lovely surprise today and found that a friend sent me a box of macarons from Little Oven for my upcoming birthday. So beautiful and so good! The Caramel Fleur de Sel are divine. Thanks L!

Yes, More Tea

Before you call me obsessed when it comes to afternoon tea, you should know I am not alone. I found this great resource for sampling tea services around Boston, The Boston Teacup. After reading their review, a friend and I celebrated her birthday in style at the swanky Taj Lounge.

After settling into our decidedly posh surroundings, we enjoyed a wonderful afternoon sipping, chatting and snacking. We were not in the gorgeous sunlit windowed room at the front, but our corner was cozy, and time flew by. They were very accommodating to vegetarians, I gave them a heads up when making reservations.

If you are celebrating a special occasion, be sure to let them know when making reservations. Because it was my friend's birthday, we were treated to complimentary Champagne and a candle lit plate of chocolate desserts along with a mini serenade by the violinist.

Afternoon Tea

Today we had some friends over for afternoon tea. I have been dying to make it since I enjoyed the full spread with a friend at our nearby tea house. And of course, who could forget the Four Seasons back in March?

I would like to say I made everything from scratch, but I am no Martha Stewart. I made the sandwiches and bought the baked goods. It was a great way to spend the afternoon, snacking, sipping tea and talking. I highly recommend it. It is such a fun excuse for gathering and trying new things. I'm hooked.

Season of Donuts

In my absence I have been very busy. Eating donuts. We went to Wilson Farms for fresh cider donuts, not once, not twice, but weekly for about 6 weeks. Lucky for me, the craving has largely passed (or at least I can occasionally say no when we are there for produce). Here are a few photos of the glorious donuts and other fall ephemera there. Mmmm, donuts...

Apple Picking Heaven

Saturday was the most gorgeous day for our annual trip to the orchard. There were so many apples! I have never seen such an amazing crop. It even looked like some trees/branches broke under the weight of the apples. We also came across two beautiful plum trees.

My husband and I roamed around the grounds and I took a lot of pinhole photos. I ended up taking 6 rolls this weekend and you will see some of them in the next week or so.

Anyway, here are some regular photos from the day. I wish every day could be like Saturday - sunny, breezy, and rounded out with giant homemade peanut butter cookies...

Seattle: Food

Fair food, market food, street food - call it what you will, I love it all. I am a sucker for food from a stand or a stall. Which is part of the reason 90% of my meals were had near Pike Place Market, which had a nice mix of stalls and restaurants. But also, if like me you are short on time and short on cash it is a good place to be. Here is my "best of" food list at or near the market, in no particular order:

1. The "world's best" mac and cheese at Beecher's. While I don't know if it is the world's best, it was really, really good and had a little red pepper or something to give it a lift out of the ordinary.

2. One of the lightest, fluffiest, airiest croissants I have had in a long while from Le Panier.


3. A maple butter smothered crumpet and good Irish tea from The Crumpet Shop. A perfect way to start a cool, grey morning!

4. Piroshky Piroshky! This was probably my favorite. The potato, cheese and onion filled piroshky was completely divine. Potato filled bread. How can you go wrong?

5. Gelato from Bottega Italiana. I loved mixing Pannacotta with anything citrusy. It was like a rich, fancy creamsicle. I am pretty sure I had gelato every day, and twice on at least one day. It is a good thing I was walking a lot.

6. Veggie Combo at Pan Africa Market. A delicious arrangement of cabbage and potato stew, red lentil stew, curried split peas, greens, carrots & green beans served with injera. I really wanted to try the curried corm but knew I couldn't eat that and my combo. The food was good and the price was great. The same dish would have cost me almost twice as much at home.

As you can see, I ate very well in Seattle. If I go again I hope to spend more time in the neighborhoods surrounding the downtown. This time I had limited time and a limited ability to get around. That leaves me something to look forward to (aside from another piroshky!).

Treats from the Yucatan

Lorena of Hungry Gringos has finally returned from Mexico. And she came home bearing gifts! I was so happy to get a package last week that contained a number of treats from Yucatan. This embroidered panel was one lovely gift, and then there were the edible gifts.

I already ate the Língua de gato and I think the packaging might have been the best part about them anyway. But last night I cooked up my fresh from the field gift of squash seeds.

I tossed the seeds with olive oil, salt and pepper and then baked in the oven. They were warm, delicious, and addictive when they came out of the oven and they made noises like Rice Krispies as they cooled. My husband and I ate about a million before looking up the nutritional value. At least I got 150% of my protein at the same time as 150% of my fat!

The other charming and old world treat in my care package was an adorable package of table chocolate. I haven't tried it yet, I'll have to wait for a cool night to curl up with a cup of hot cocoa.

Thanks so much for all the great gifts Lorena! I am glad you are home, happy and healthy! I am about to brew the hibiscus tea to enjoy iced today...

The big plans this weekend include checking out paint colors and floors at Home Depot, and hopefully taking some pinhole photos of the flowering trees before they are gone for another year.

Day Tripping - Salem

While the rest of the country celebrated St. Patrick's Day today, here in Boston we observed Evacuation Day which meant no work for me! my husband, his mom and I went up to Salem, Mass to poke around and enjoy the bright (yet brisk) day.

I took this photo in Derby Square Bookstore. Stacks and stacks of books filled every inch of space, with just a trail through the piles. We walked away with 4 half priced books and a 5th free book. There is just a little crack between the books to make your purchase. A must-visit for any bibliophile visiting Salem.

In addition to shopping, we did a little historic site seeing. We went to the burying point and saw some very old graves. The skull and wings was a very popular motif. That and vases with willow branches.

We has some lunch (I got a great sweet potato and caramelized onion soup) and popped into the gift shop at the Peabody Essex Museum, but were too out of steam for a full visit. Next time. You can see some more salem photos in my photostream.

Back to work tomorrow. I love evacuation day. Funny how it happens to fall on St. Patty's day in a city where 20% of the population claims Irish heritage (the most in any city in the country). What a coincidence! ;)

Afternoon Cuppa

Just for fun, me, my husband and his mom went to have the afternoon tea at the Four Seasons in Boston since she was visiting. We all love tea, and I am crazy for tiny sandwiches. It was super fancy and extravagant, but so much fun.

There were scones and banana bread on the top plate, which I meant to photograph as well, but I was flustered because right before the food came, Dwyane Wade walked in and sat down at a table near us. Now, obviously I am a Celtics fan (even though I don't watch a ton of basketball) but Dwyane Wade is one of my favorite non-Celtic players and I stared at him with my jaw on the table as he walked by, completely star struck and bright red. I guess if you are going to bump into a celebrity it would be at the Four Seasons.

Anyway, after deciding not to bother him while he ate I refocused my attention on the amazing tea treats. There are some more photos of the tea sandwiches and amazing desserts below. If you have a birthday or special occasion coming up, I highly recommend finding a fancy pants hotel that serves afternoon tea to celebrate. It feels like a real treat!

Bread Pudding

I mentioned yesterday that my husband and I were going day-tripping up to York, Maine and Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Well, we didn't make it to York because we were short on time, but we did cross over the border into Kittery to visit When Pigs Fly Bakery.

Even though there is a location just up the road from us in Davis Square, it always feels like a treat going to the Kittery location. We got some delicious olive bread, seeded multigrain, and a special treat - blueberry lemon bread pudding.

The bread pudding tastes as good as it looks. It is dense and moist and not too sweet. This morning I took it to the next level and whipped up some whipping cream with a little sugar and vanilla. Oh, sweet, sweet bread pudding. It is a good thing you are so small in size or else I would be in trouble. Plus I have to save room for Super Bowl junk food tonight. I am making vegetarian cilli nachos. I will be rolling out of this weekend into the coming week.

President Obama!

No, I am not in DC getting ready for an inaugural ball. But today made me wistfully remember April of 07 when I saw Obama speak in Boston and got to shake his hand. Twice. I am really tall and so is he so we shook hands over a mass of crushed undergrads. I caught him at the beginning of the line and then one more time for good luck at the end of the line. This is a photo I took during my encounter.

Today was amazing. At work I helped organize a pizza/viewing party. The internet was overloaded and so we ended up listening 1930's style around a radio. I made some truly patriotic cupcakes for the occasion.

I have never been so proud of this country or so hopeful for the future. Hearing the national anthem was more meaningful today than ever before. Now let's get to work!

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PS- Be sure to read Skinny laMinx's post about Shine-Shine's commemorative Obama cloth. I followed a link from that post to another commemorative cloth posting of hers and learned a lot about the tradition of African commemorative cloths in politics. Very cool and very interesting. Thanks Skinny laMinx!

Red Lentil Sunday

I didn't quite get as much done this weekend as I would have liked, but I did make an important discovery. I have been craving the red lentil soup with lime that Lorena turned me on to (and which is in the amazing vegetarian cookbook she also gave me). As I cruised around the insanely busy Stop and Shop with everything I needed in my cart except the lentils, I remembered that split red lentils aren't easy to find in regular grocery stores.

Not that finding Indian specialty stores in Somerville is a challenge, it's just that all the ones I know about are in Union Square and, since I hadn't eaten for 3 hours and had already spent over an hour running errands, I did not want to deal with the traffic and parking situation in the square.

I had essentially given up hope and was on my way home thinking I might get lentils tomorrow. But my street is full of little shops, and while they are almost all Brazilian, Italian, or bakeries, I decided to try one on my way up the hill. And that is when I made my big discovery. A small Indian grocery store 3 blocks from my apartment! Seriously, how long have I lived here and never noticed?

I got a giant bag of red lentils and some fun frozen Tandoori breads. They had a ton of spices - so I plan on evaluating my spice supply at home and then restocking. Needless to say I am very excited and love Somerville that much more. Where else can you find a martial arts studio, a Brazilian bakery, an Italian sub shop, and Sir Hare's Salon, and an Indian grocer living in such close quarters?

I made the soup for dinner and it was exactly what I needed. Yum.

Holiday Cards on Parade

I spent part of yesterday and most of today working on my holiday card designs. I think I finally have them figured out. Tomorrow I will start printing and then I will try and get them up in my Etsy shop as soon as possible since the time to buy and send holiday cards is limited. Today I also realized there are a couple cards I never posted to my shop! I am a bit behind I guess. It has been super-crazy-nuts this fall.

These are the 3 designs I will be printing. I decided to do all flat cards this time around instead of folded, but 2 of the 3 are the bigger A6 size instead of the A2 size I usually print in.

I am still hooked on the bird silhouette with a pattered background as you can see. I think this is my last variation of this card. This is the smaller A2 sized one out of the 3.


I loved these brocade/swirly designs and thought they would be good snowflake/holiday starbursts.


You can't go wrong with a pine tree and pinecones. This is the most Christmassy of the three but I think it is a different enough perspective that it doesn’t scream out Christmas tree. This is also the most “manly” of the three. I have had a couple of male customers on Etsy, but mostly women.

I will try to post some photos of the printing process. Oh, and tomorrow I will be making some carrot cake cupcakes for Monday’s craft night. I’ll let you know how that goes if I am not in a cream cheese frosting stupor by the end of the day!

stART on the Street

I am resurfacing after a busy week with some photos and news about how last week's craft fair went. It was a great day. There was a huge crowd as you can see. It was a really big fair with about 250 vendors. I sold a good amount of cards, but got the sense from some of the vendors around me that overall it was a slow sales day. You know, the massive economic crisis and all. But it was a good experience and I gave out a bunch of business cards and met some very nice people.

This is my little set up. Yes, that is a car. No, it is not ours. And yes, it is awfully close to my table. I ended up with car dirt on my shirt from constantly bumping up against it. My husband spent the day with me and a friend and her super cute dog, Belle, visited for a long time. I think I owe Belle a commission for all the people she drew over to my table.

My husband and I left our house at about 7:30 that morning and got back at about 7 that night, it was a long day. I was in bed by 8:30. These are the top 5 things I learned over the course of the day:

1. Bring a beach umbrella if you aren't under a tent. We would have fried without ours.

2. No matter how nice a day it is, the wind will blow. Be prepared. If I do another outdoor fair I will change my set-up.

3. Bring a cushion to sit on. Seven and a half hours is a long time to sit in one place. My back was sore for 2 days.

4. Bring a calculator. Doing math in your head in front of strangers is hard/stressful.

5. Bring lots of water and food, unless you are willing to spend your profits on fair food. We did take advantage of the vegetarian Chinese food at the fair, and it was worth every penny. Veggie teriyaki on a stick can't be beat! Not to mention there were frozen chocolate covered bananas, which I also could not pass up.