I mentioned a few weeks ago about Monday night dinners with my wonderful friends. Well week before last there was a discussion about my love of cooking but parallel intimidation of it. They decided this week I would be the cook! Here is a little documentation thanks to the photographer of the group Caroline:

Pre-feast prepping


Chicken with prosciutto and spinach


Tomato and Cucumber Salad with Balsamic Dressing

And don't worry we ate just about all of the dark chocolate mentioned in the previous post.
It was a successful Monday night dinner!

All my life my mom has had some artistic form of escape forget her day or stresses for the time being. I've always wanted to be crafty enough to use painting or jewelry making as my escape, but I think I figure mine out (for this season at least)

Lately Nothing calms me/makes me happier/makes me forget any stress other than cooking or baking.
Lately I have been super pensive about anything and everything. Its been nice to use the kitchen as a safe haven and stress free zone.
Here is a little taste of how blissful this evening was.

Quick and Easy Dark Chocolate Hazelnut Bark. Basically nutella deconstructed. I'm going to cheat and use the professional ones because mine don't compare but this is so good and its off a healthy food website so if that's your thing there that too.

Dark chocolate (1lb)
Hazelnuts
Cinnamon (1 tsp)
Vanilla (1 tsp)
(i didn't use the rice cereal but I'm sure thats good too)

I love:

If you know me, you know that I love all things wedding. I love a reception with long rectangle tables. It is quaint and elegant at the same time. I am obsessed with the lighting in both pictures.

Personally, I think chandeliers rock-- put 15 at a wedding and you can't go wrong. (Anyone want to donate to my fund?) Much wedding blogging to come. This came far to easily.

I love Spring.

There is nothing like dining alfresco with great friends in great weather.

Christmas in March!

Douglas and I like to pretend that we are foodies. We watch the iron chef every Sunday night and try to guess what they are cooking before Alton announces the dish or ingredients. We try to be adventurous in our cooking and eating as much as possible. So for Christmas my parents paid for us to go to a cooking class where ever, when ever, whatever style.
This past Wednesday we cashed it in for a Tapas class at Sur La Table. (Can I add an aside that this was the week after I had gotten my wisdom teeth out and up to this point I had eaten soup and ice cream) The class was a huge success!! We had so much fun learning little knife tricks and the science of why certain things work where. AND I could eat! We made 7 different tapas (Salt Cod Fritters with Allioli and Meatballs in Saffron Tomato Sauce were my favs!) and I left completely satisfied. These are dishes we would make again for any party or gathering.
I highly recommend something like this to anyone who has any interest in cooking!

namaste

Lately I feel like I've been going 90 to nothing physically and mentally. Tonight was the first night I have been home in the evening in about a week and I was really excited to just have a good home cooked meal. Well that didn't go as planned because my parents had a meeting and I had zero energy or will power to cook a real meal so Mr. Wok sounded just fine as long as I could eat it on my couch and watch Parenthood.
The greatest remedy that I have found to this crazyhecticness has been yoga.... on demand. I'm telling you don't knock it till you've tried it. Yes, of course I would rather be in a class with humans to do this or be rich like ellen and have my own yogi come teach me every morning when I wake up. These are not luxuries I have. My luxury is that I can practice the are of yoga in my living room whenever I want.
Also I think It should be mentioned that hollywood lies. I do not feel a Jennifer Anniston body developing in any kind of future.

Pot Luck

Man I've been slacking on posts. I'm not even going to try to catch up... nor will I say it won't happen again. Things have been wonderful in the past few months, that can serve as a catch up.
One thing that has been great are my Monday nights. I'm blessed to have moved have to the same city as my friends and roommates from school. As crazy as our schedules are, we mark our calendars to get together once a week and catch up on life, eat lots of calories together (I'm sure they don't count because we are just laughing the whole time), pray for each other, talk about the bachelor... you know all the necessaries. It is one of my favorite nights of the week. It is the kind of thing I really hope we are still doing 60 years from now.