Berry Cherry Limeade

(did this about a week ago and forgot to publish it so I figured I'd just stick it in)

I defrosted a handful of TJ's Frozen Berries and cherries mix - it's got cherries, blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries. Pureed and strained the defrosted fruit and mixed with the juice of one lime in a glass, a squeeze of blue agave syrup (also from TJ's) and filled the glass with water and floated some more berries - oh yummyyyyyyyyy what a perfect refreshing summer afternoon drink!

Embarking on a new "Diet"

Let me preface with: I HATE diets. I hate diets because they mean deprivation. But what I am in favor of, especially more recently, is changing some of the things I eat in order to not only be a little healthier but just plain stop putting crap in my body. It's so scary how people just grab stuff that tastes good with no regard to the ingredient panel on the side. Forget the nutrition information, what about the ingredients? I maintain, if I can't pronounce it, why should I be eating it? Additionally, if it contains stuff I studied in high school chemistry, why should I be eating it?

It's like, someone asked me the other day why I refuse to eat yellow cheddar cheese.... and my response was, UH, BECAUSE MILK IS NOT ORANGE? How do they get it that color? They put food coloring in it LOL. Even if it's made from natural ingredients or vegetable extract or something, it's still completely unnecessary and purely cosmetic.

So with all this in mind, I purchased a used copy of Michel Montignac's "Eat Yourself Slim" - to make a long story short he focuses on good carbs and good fats and not calories or even really fat or portion control. Interesting idea, even if I am a bit skeptical since I almost eat that way anyway. But I thought, while I am working and making enough to afford this stuff, I might as well give it all a try, no? So I went to town in Fresh and Easy and Trader Joe's and bought all kinds of good stuff (not pictured, raw turbinado sugar):



Of course, I don't even know what I'm going to do with the flour. All that stuff in addition to the brown jasmine rice and Barilla's 51% whole grain spaghetti (which unlike other kinds actually tastes good, and as the whole point of this blog points out, I am picky ;)), drinking freshly-squeezed grapefruit juice, and a few other changes here and there, we will see what happens. If all a good attempt requires is a few little changes here and there, mainly to breakfast, how can I not try, right?!

The next step will be ridding my apartment of the crap I already have, mostly snack foods and white breads............... and potatoes....... i don't think i can give up potatoes :( I'm gonna go out with a bang tonight (post on that forthcoming), and start it all up tomorrow. We'll see what happens! If nothing else it'll give me interesting material to blog about I suppose :) Wish me luck!

Chocolate Espresso Shortbreads

In my new addiction to Stumble, a great Firefox add-on that shows you sites that match you're interests, I've been brought to a lot of cooking sites. One in particular has some really amazing-looking stuff, and i signed up for the email list, so when I got this delivered to my inbox, i knew I was gonna break down and make it - and probably sooner rather than later ;)

So, of course, mine did not come out as pretty, but what I did was halve the recipe to control the fatty unhealthy goodness I was about to concoct (in other words, if I only made half as many shortbreads, I could only eat half as many shortbreads ;)), and I think it worked out pretty well. I don't have instant espresso so I used about a tablespoon and a half of regular pre-made mokka pot espresso. I didn't really taste the coffee in the finished product unfortunately, but I didn't want to add more than that in case it'd throw off the recipe with too much liquid.

Of course, I am too lazy to get all measuring and stuff, probably to the cookies' detriment. But oh well. They taste good and are very delicate and tender, they almost melt in your mouth because of the powdered sugar and very little mixing the recipe calls for. Baking is more fun now that i've figured out my oven runs a good 50 degrees too hot - no more burned cookie bottoms with raw middles, hooray!

It's California Cherry Season!

We're full-swing into the California cherry season. The first couple weeks, the cherries looked light and didn't taste too sweet, but now, they are deep red and just delicious. Picked up a little cup for $2 at the downtown LA Friday farmers market - these pictures are of those - and bought another little bag of them this past weekend at the LA Farmers Market. mmmmmmmmmmmmm yummyyyyy

As a note, I don't 'do' anything to fruit - I don't cook it or cut it or put anything on it or what. I wash it, and I eat it. And that's what I will do with these cherries :D

Castelvetrano Olives

I had these amazing olives in Italy from Florence's Mercato Centrale. They were called "Dolce" (sweet) and from Sicily. So mild and crisp and tasty and a kind of strange color of bright green, I knew I had to find out what they were! Last week or so I discovered that they are Castelvetrano olives... and it seemed like the only place to find them was to order from an Italian deli in NYC or something.

But today I decided to check out the LA Farmers Market because there's a crazy expensive, but cool, market in the back called Monsieur Marcel that has a ton of olives in tubs of brine, etc. I had filled up a little cup of various olives - picholine, gaeta, etc. and saw peeking through a label, bright green olives. Then I saw the price....... then I looked at the label and saw they were imported from a city named..... Castelvetrano...... so I bought them...... I took the plastic labeling off so you can see what they look like



They are wonderful but let's just say they'll stay in the fridge and come out for special occasions or when I really need a mood-lifter ;)