angry chicken

"fish" tacos & fish tacos

Tres “Fish” Tacos  9.95
Crispy “fish”, green cabbage, original Baja sauce, cilantro,
fresh limes, with mashed avocado + tomato salad

This "fish" taco is from Veggie Grill. It's a vegan restaurant and the idea of having a fake fish taco was too awesome to pass up. This was not a destination-fish-taco event, but more of a fish-taco-opportunity. It found me. In general, I try to avoid fake meat products. There is quite a bit of delicious food here that features no fake meat, but for research, I had to order these. They were good! I also was starving. I did go back and ordered them again about a month later when I wasn't as hungry and they were not as impressive. The salsa was great. That was my overall take-away. That, and just being delighted I could add "fish" tacos to this category.


Grilled Fish Taco-
seasonal fresh fish, flour tortilla, shaved cabbage, jack cheese, pico de gallo, lime crema 6.50/9.95/14.95

This very sad photo of fish tacos from Chez Jose. The low light really hurts here. You can order these ala cart or with sides. The sides make the whole entree filling, but sort of punishing. Pete and I used to eat here a ton in high school and just remembered it this year. It's still there! These fish are good, but I have to be in the right mood (better for fall/winter eating) and have to NOT eat the chips for 15 minutes straight before the food comes.

a cyclops snowman cookie

For a couple years now we have had friends over to decorate Christmas cookies during the day. Hooray for homeschool flexible scheduling! Otherwise, I don't know how this would happen this time of year. I make a double batch of sugar cookies a few weeks before and freeze them and take them out the night before. I seem to use a different recipe each time. These were yummy, but got very puffy. Then the kids go to town with icing and sprinkles. We had these eyes on hand from when we were making Twinkie minions last spring, and they were such a hit decorating these cookies! They took a fabulous comedic turn. I love seeing a stocking with eyes. Delia added broken candy canes pieces to the mix, which was a great addition, too.

Unrelated:

I am reading Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She's Learned and am almost done. Lena Dunham is much younger than me. I find her writing interesting, smart, funny and sad. Mostly I feel grateful I'm not in my 20s anymore. I read an interesting discussion about this book on Man Repeller. In keeping with the theme of female comedic writers, next up— Yes Please by Amy Poehler.

solstice gifts

I put together these 3 little jars for the girls for solstice. They don't read my blog which is why I am showing them early. I like to give them handmade, or partially handmade, gifts for solstice and I had so much fun making these. The bottles came from Cargo, here in Portland. They are small, only about 3 inches high, and the goodies inside came from Collage, also in Portland. These shops are very dangerous places for me, I try not to go in them very often. Collage carries quite a few miniatures now, which I find delightful.

Unrelated:

• I had a cooking fail today—caramel sauce. I am doubly bummed about it because I have made caramel sauce so many times with no issues, but this time I tried it in the microwave (why!?) and not only did it boil over, but them got too hard, and then separated. It was sad. I made Pete throw out all the evidence, so now I am pretending it didn't happen.

• I can't stop watching the Hobbit Office skit on SNL.

• I'm excited to start this clayoquot toque pattern (free!) from Tin Can Knits after the holidays.

small needlework gifts

I stitched these little gifts last weekend. They are framed in 3" hoops. I didn't stitch them in this size hoop though, it's too small to work with. To finish them, I glue a felt circle on the back. Then I sign and date them. Sometimes I accidentally write the wrong year on one of them, like "2004".

The designs are heavily inspired by the book Mariko got me from Japan, which I have blogged about already. I just can't get enough of the combination of wool and silk in the same piece. And working on 3 or more is so fun for me. I work so much better when I am doing multiples of things, then each decision I make doesn't have to be the only one. I was sad when these left my wall.

gift factory 2014

Last weekend pete bought whole spices in bulk, toasted them, and ground them up to make garam masala. We found the little spice jars at Cost Plus, and magically, quadrupling the recipe filled all 9 of them perfectly. The recipe calls for rose buds, which we left out. I really like to give a non-sweet gift item every year, along with all the sugar stuff. Having said that, I think I'm going to use this today to make these garam masala oatmeal-raisin cookies. This spice blend is also great on popcorn and hashbrowns.

We use this blend at home for the red lentil soup we have made almost weekly for a few years now. 3 out of 5 of us love it, and the 10 year old eats it for breakfast. It's so easy I always feel like I'm forgetting something. The recipe is from a friend, and I'm not sure where it came from originally. I've probably made some changes along the way, but here it is:

Red Lentil Soup—super easy and delicious!

• 1 chopped onion
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 1/2 teaspoon garam masala
• 1/2 teaspoon turmeric
• 1 cup red lentils
• 2 cans (16oz) diced tomatoes
• 1 can coconut milk
• 2 1/2 cup broth or water
• cilantro, chopped (optional)
•  juice of 1/2 lemon (not really optional)

Saute the onions and garlic and then add the spices and cook for about 2 minutes, add the lentils, coconut milk, water, and tomatoes and bring to a boil. Turn down to a simmer (give it a good stir now, the lentils like to stick to the bottom of the pot), cover and simmer for 30 minutes. Add the lemon juice and chopped cilantro. I love this soup.

Unrelated:

This hysterical piece in the Oregonian by Jamie Hale is the most Portland-y Portland story I have read this week. A brief summary—

"This is not just a story about drunken Santas roaming Portland bars. This is a story about a secretive society, riot police, fake protests, legal battles, Chuck Palahniuk and, incredibly, a rivalry with people dressed as bananas."

the low-pressure cookie party

The low-pressure cookie party was a huge success, like always. There were many yummy cookies to eat, and it really was low-pressure—one guest came with two bags of oreos, and another with a purchased bag of delicious shortbread after a baking fail. It's all good. There was much swearing, eating, a little smack talking about high-pressure cookie parties, and delight taken in the host's heated toilet seat. For real. It also had a light.

The little brown guys there on the left with sprinkles are pretzel shortbread cookies and were a favorite. I need to try making them, I love cookies with salt. They were perfect for breakfast this morning with coffee.

 

a christmas gift for the girls (really, for me.)

 Anne of Green Gables

I stopped in my tracks when I saw this copy of Anne of Green Gables and had to buy it immediately. We already have a copy, and are almost done reading it, but this one, in hardback, with the cover illustration by Rifle Paper Co.'s Anna Bond, was just too lovely to not own. There a Little Women and a Heidi, also with her cover design, that I will need to pick up. The end papers are really sweet. I might pick up a copy for my niece.

Unrelated, but still about books:

I'm almost done reading the Tenth of December, by George Saunders, and it, coincidentally, is the 10th of December right now! This was not planned and is exciting to me. This book of short stories comes with very high praise. I have been so curious about it. I have been trying to read from only our bookshelves, and not check-out/buy more books until I get through some of the ones I have waiting to be read.

I have never read anything by this author and this book is nothing like I thought it would be. Each story is a complete surprise. I have mixed feelings about it so far. It has me riveted in that, what the heck is going on in this story? way—which I like, although I know some people find this very frustrating. Sometimes all I can say about a book is I am reading it. Or, I have read it. There is so much to say about most books it's hard to start writing about them. This makes me miss my book group.

I was once in a great book group in my mid-twenties in Seattle and we had this rule, that you couldn't actually say "I didn't like this book" or "I loved this book" until the very end of the meeting. It was brilliant and it made our discussions so much better. We realized that it was so hard to have a good discussion about a book when people felt defensive that everyone "hated" a book they liked or vice versa. The meetings would spiral into defending why the book was good or bad while trying not to offend poeple—and someone was always offended.

The interesting thing was at the end of the discussion, we would go around and say whether or not we liked the book and it was always a surprise who liked it and who didn't because the observations and critiques weren't burdened by arguments defending a "like" or "didn't like" stance. This rule really changed the vibe of the whole group.

I was in another book group later and when I joined I noticed the the first thing people would say when the discussion started was "I loved this book!" or "I hated this book!" and then things could get weird and uncomfortable not in a good way. I think I brought up this rule of my old book group, but now I don't remember if we adopted it, it was between babies and I don't remember much from that time.

apricot ginger shortbread

I bake these cookies every year for the Low-Stress Cookie Party I attend. it's a win-win, you just come and eat cookies. You can bring some you have made, or not, all you have to do it show up. Then, if there's some left, we split them up and take them home. It's genius and we have been doing it for many years now.

I always think I will branch out, but then I don't, because these are so good and I only make them once a year. They use 2 sticks of butter for a 8" square pan, so you know. I know I have blogged about these before, but since I am repetitive, so is my blog.

Real Simple calls them Apricot Crumbles, but I have renamed them because they have ginger and they are a shortbread.

I'm trying to make sure I take the time to do fun holiday stuff right now—bake, make little gifts, wrap stuff, use too many stickers, that kind of thing. There's been a whole lot of driving and errand running with the 3 girls all in the nutcracker this year, so our days have been spent in a minivan suck hole, which is not my favorite. My brain is working over the whole— what do I have to do, vs. what do I want to do, and then deciding I should do what I want to do so I don't resent what I have to do, thing.

pompoms

I snatched up quite a bit of free/very low priced yarn this summer and have a big bag staring at me in the sewing room. Mittens and other items have been made from this stash, but I have had the most fun making pompoms. The girls have made them, too. We used cardboard forms we made ourselves, pinterest is full of ideas, and we used a really nice tutorial on mr. printables.

I discovered I can get a little weird with the trimming. It's hard to stop, and when I think I am done, I find more fluff to trim. So I have started timing myself, working only for a few minutes and then moving on. I have enjoyed making these much more since I have set a trimming time rule for myself. It's the little things.

We plan to tie them to gifts and make key chains to clip to bags and zipper pulls. I bought a pack of these Metal Swivel Clasps on a whim and have used them for so many projects. They will be perfect to attach the pompoms to—making them easily clip-able.

Unrelated:

• we have been watching the 16 Holiday Life Hacks over on mental floss, and laugh every time. We adore all the life hack videos over there and use uncooked spaghetti to light candles all the time.

• I love these delicately illustrated free prinatble holiday gift tags by Kelli Murray

 

thanksgiving trifle & learning geography

I made this for Thanskgiving—it was the first time I have used this amazing trifle dish Grammie gave me for my birthday. It was a raspberry, gingersnap, mascarpone trifle. It looked amazing, and in theory, was amazing, but in reality, was a fail. But I have not given up hope. The big mistake was using gingersnap cookies instead of gingerbread. There wasn't enough body in the cookies. They got mealy and grainy in the liquid, so instead of being a trifle, it was more like a sauce. A delicious sauce with a very grainy texture. It's like it should have been on top of another dessert, and for a bit I thought about serving it on top of pie, but I didn't.

Unrelated:

The girls have been really enjoying these geography quizes. This first link is fun with some sense of geography already, but for learning from scratch, this site is better, because they can learn little bits at a time. This second site also has the US state capitals. I like to follow up with a blank print out they have to fill by hand periodically in so they can practice spelling. Then I can use all the stickers I have stashed.

winter needlework

I stitched this for Grammie for christmas. I gave it to her early so she could hang it up now and enjoy it all winter. It is stitched with wool yarn and silk thread. I was so thrilled to get this book, Wool Stitch, from Mariko. She got it for me in Japan and it's been an endless source of inspiration. I love the combination of wool yarn with the silk or cotton thread in the same color. This was also thrilling because it all came from my stash, no purchases needed, even the frame. I have all kinds of ideas and sketches to stitch and what's so great about this, with the yarn, is it's pretty fast as needlework projects go, making it reasonable for gifts.

Unrelated:

• I find myself spending a lot of time looking at pencil blogs. Blogs about pencils. There are so many! And then all the ones about pens, which are different. There are a few blogs about both, which is handy.

• And also knitting blogs. I'm very excited by Yokes, a new book by Kate Davies. Wow, the sweaters are amazing. I love her color combinations.

• I got a burst of energy last night and cleaned off my desk in anticipation of the arrival of this adorable Moleskine 2015 Volant Color-a-Month daily planner box set. It's a box with 12 little planners tucked inside, a different color for each month. I can't wait for January to start! I might have to get some new pencils. And pens. Because I don't like to play favorites.