Category Archives: restaurants

CAKE FOR EVERYONE!!

  By breakfasttobed | January 7, 2012 - 10:49 AM | , , ,
5 Comments

My Peanut is home. She is acting like herself and playing with her big brother and sitting in her beloved exersaucer. She lost 4 oz of weight while she was sick, so we are now on “Operation Calories”. Last night’s dinner consisted of liquid vitamins whirred up in a chocolate ovaltine, Justin’s chocolate almond butter, Trader Joe’s ultra premium chocolate ice cream, and organic half and half milkshake. Funnily enough, she didn’t hate it! She actually thought it was pretty stellar. She tried to eat the straw and spoon.

It’s kind of a dream, isn’t it? To need to GAIN weight in a hurry? I think I would be drinking a lot of wine, eating a lot of potato chip and pimento cheese sandwiches, (I told you, I come from hillbilly stock. IT’S DELICIOUS!!) and eating a LOT of pie. A LOT of pie. I don’t like soda, but I love skim lattes, I’d have 3 a day. I don’t think the Peanut is quite ready for a Starbucks Latte in her sippy cup.

By the way, if you ever wonder why Americans are so fat, look at what is available in hospital cafeterias. NOTHING other than salad was healthy, and even that was wrought with nutritional landmines. Sugary craisins, glazed nuts, giant croutons, mayonnaise based dressings, fried chicken breast. Doctors, nurses, techs, and patients were all eating this crap. There is nothing good I can say about it. I suppose it does keep their beds full, though. It seriously looked like the Klumps from “Nutty Professor” designed the menu.

I was happy to note that the surgeon who botched my gastric bypass has been axed. I have oft worried that he was just botching more and more surgeries after mine, but apparently, he was sent back to Poland. Sorry, Poland. Maybe just use him as the basis of the jokes from here on out. “So there was this gastroenterologist, a priest, and blonde on an island…” You can see where this is going.

The ONLY people that should be eating like that are the ones needing to gain weight, so skinny people and professional boxers, I’ve got a good dining room for you.

In the spirit of celebration and of putting weight on the peanut, I baked the peanut a cake!!! I decided against hospital food.

Chocolate Raspberry Bundt Cake

 

Chocolate raspberry bundt cake

by Cat Tan

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 1 hour

Keywords: dessert cake

Ingredients (one cake)

  • 7 oz dark chocolate
  • 3/4 cup softened butter
  • 4 eggs
  • 1 1/2 cups sugar
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 tbsp vanilla
  • 1 1/2 cup buttermilk
  • 2 1/2 cup flour

for the frosting

  • 3/4 cup raspberry preserves
  • 1/2 cup butter, softened
  • 1 cup powdered sugar

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350F

melt together the chocolate and the butter in the microwave on high

stir in the sugar while the mixture is still hot

let cool slightly.

In a mixer on high, beat the eggs and salt until light and frothy

slowly pour in the chocolate mixture

slowly pour in the buttermilk

sift in the dry ingredients slowly.

pour into a buttered. floured, bundt pan and bake for approx 45 minutes or until skewer inserted comes out clean.

cool completely

For the buttercream

whip together ingredients until well combined

spread on a well-cooled cake

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Now we have a big day of doing a whole lot of playing, feeding the peanut, and fun stuff like laundry. Happy Saturday!!

Being A Badass Manatee.

  By breakfasttobed | January 2, 2012 - 8:48 PM | , , , , , , , , ,
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I admire people who take time to do their jobs well. Whether it’s a doorperson, or cop, or red mango raspberry placer. The last one is really the most important. If you are a fro-yo fan you know just how wiley those bitches can be. They’ll fall right the hell off of your yogurt. Not my berries. Oh no, I had the artistic berry placer and they all stayed.

Can I get an amen?

Why can’t EVERYONE give a damn about their jobs? Like my bodega coffee guy who always spills my coffee, or my gym front desk lady who always calls me “Mrs Tam”??

A: It’s TAN! With an N!!

B: Have Mercy, I’ve told you 16k times to call me “Cat” or just “Mega Awesome” but you seem to LOVE seeing me flinch at “mrs tam”. Two can play at that game, Hally.

My salad guy today was an artist, but seemed to lack the necessary equipment. Namely, a salad plate big enough.

A gentle breeze and this was taking a tumble.

After I got some worky work done, we headed to the outlet mall, because we’re nuts, and we figured it’d be far less crowded if it is below freezing. We were right! We were the Kings of Tanger. It’s like being the Kings of Leon, only far less more lame.

Don’t worry, the kids were EXTRA toasty.

Hey Mom! Look at me! I can vandalize plants!!

(to be fair, he’s wearing his Darth Vader hat, and feels the need to up the badass quotient. Give them the tools, people.)

Can I just tell you that gray skinny jeans do NOT look so skinny in the mirror when the stabbing ladybeast is afoot? I looked like whatever whale is gray-or a manatee, but not so gentle; because as I said, the stabbing ladybeast is afoot.

Either way, we all got some exercise in cold enough weather that I could convince myself I was burning more calories just for being outside. It’s totally untrue, but I once convinced myself for a whole decade that smoking was totally NOT gross. It’s an art, much like making salads, but with well fitting plates.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go write, cook, and shoot a recipe for you people!! Ok, fine, Imma gonna eat it, but I am only doing it for you. I promise.

Do you like outlet shopping in the cold? It’s kinda my fave.

Score any good post-Christmas deals?

-holla! Got a puffer coat for practically a puff of air!

My Own Obesity Epidemic

  By breakfasttobed | December 28, 2011 - 11:31 AM | , ,
6 Comments

Sorry for the mucho late post, but I met up with my family at a local breakfast place. In typical midwestern style, they served each of us enough food to feed a small, inpoverished nation, thereby making me feel both guilty and sick. There may be starving people in foreign countries, but we’re going to eat enough to fall into our own personal obesity epidemic.

It was tasty, though! (nothing tastes as good as fat feels…oh wait, that might be wrong) I ordered the pancakes with eggs, bacon, home fries, and toast. The home fries weren’t touched, one half of one pancake was eaten, the eggs were split between me and the Captain, and the bacon was all his. I didn’t eat HALF of the meal and right now, I am considering the best way to to end my pain. Did I mention the Captain also downed a bowl of oatmeal at such a rapid fire pace I thought he may puke? Oh yes, he did.

Why is it that kids on vacation won’t eat for DAYS and then all of a sudden it’s like a soldier coming home from war and landing smack dab in a boobie bar? They go crazy.  They don’t care if the boobs have gonorrhea or the oatmeal is 175F, they’re diving in.

Now, I have really important things to attend to. I have to watch “Long Island Medium” and possibly go to Target. As you can see, I live a very exciting life and I have run out of swedish fish and dunkin donuts coffee. That just isn’t right. Red fish made of car wax, sugar, and speed are necessary to my being. Just like wine. And spanx.

 

 

Drunk and Blindfolded at Breakfast.

  By breakfasttobed | December 14, 2011 - 2:45 PM | , , ,
7 Comments

Reminder. If you haven’t entered my drawing yet, DO EEEET!!

Welcome to the latest edition of What I Ate Wednesday, EVER. I told myself I would just lay my head down for a minute longer because the kids were asleep. This of course, meant I would sleep for another 1.5 hours in complete and total bliss. So thank you, Peas and Crayons, once again, your blog is the place to party.

I don’t know if you’ve ever figured this out, but I am stuck as far as breakfasts go. It’s the winter-I’m eating oatmeal. It’s warm and yummy, and I could make it drunk and blindfolded. (I am not often drunk and blindfolded at breakfast-I generally wait till lunch.)

As a snack, I had a few of these toffee bits. They’re soo good.

For lunch, the Captain wanted noodles. I did NOT want Chinese lo mein or spaghetti, so I looked in my fridge to see what I had on hand. I got lucky.

I made a greek pasta for me, and alio olio for the Captain. Both had feta, carrots, snap peas and garlic. Mine was tossed in a Greek Vinaigrette his was not. I’ll let you guess whose strawberry banana applesauce that was.

Print
Greek Vinaigrette

Yield: 4 servings

Ingredients

  • 4 T EVOO
  • 1 T + 1 t lemon juice
  • 2 mashed cloves of roasted garlic
  • 1 t dijon mustard
  • 1/2 t dried oregano
  • salt and pepper

Instructions

  1. mash garlic with salt, pepper, oregano, and mustard in a bowl with a fork.
  2. Add in all other ingredients and whisk.
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Dinner was fast and furious. Sushi at Bay Sushi in Bay Ridge. We had some things to do last evening, and the boys were getting hangry. The Captain declared “I WANT SUSHI” good. Healthy and quick.

Dinner started with a yuzu saketini. I don’t think there was actually any alcohol in it, but it was still tasty.

I had the BEST salad. Ok, the salad itself was “ok” but the dressing was perfect. I did like that the broccoli was steamed lightly and chilled before being placed on the salad. That was pretty boss.Dinner was full of maki. Salmon avocado, spicy salmon, something called a “Christmas Roll” (if your family is Japanese-and also Christian) and a crapton of pickled ginger. I wanted to take a photo of it uneaten, but the Captain swooped in before it even hit the table.

Possibly the worst food picture ever. Oh well. I came home to finish my chocolate covered, chocolate drizzled, sprinkle sprinkled candy canes. The Captain absconded with one. My little future felon.

All wrapped in cellophane and ready to be hung from my wrapped Christmas gifts.

By the end of the day, I was so tired, I wanted to wrap myself in cellophane until I passed out. Instead, I had some green tea and headed to bed in my fuzzy socks. Just as good, really.

 

Anyone else beyond exhausted this time of year?
Ever had a saketini?

Amazon One-Click Was Designed for Winos.

  By breakfasttobed | November 10, 2011 - 2:57 AM | , , , , ,
8 Comments

Today-was a whirlwind. So after much working and running around, I was friggen spent. How on G-d’s green earth people manage to work a gajillion hours a day, come home, cook, clean, and take care of the kids is beyond me. My many, many family trips to Meldrum’s restaurant in my hometown make sooooo much sense to me now.

Fortunately, we went to a cute restaurant near to where we were erranding (I just made that word up) called “Peppercorns“. Cute, American, AND the food was good. Thank the Lord they had availability at the senior citizen happy hour (who eats dinner at 5?!??!), because it was restaurant week and the cop was starving. We were inches from eating meatballs at Ikea. –They don’t serve cocktails. They should–I’d buy that smorgaaaslaandik tree branch dog bowl or whatevs. Drinking while shopping=odd purchases. I have purchased more than one really weird book with Amazon one click after a party. And a slow cooker, but that turned out for the best. (leftover beer? SHORTRIBS!!) That Kardashian book though? They really are that terrifically awful and vapid.

I had the filet mignon sandwich, which came with fries and cole slaw. Most of the fries were left behind, and I ended up taking half of the sandwich home. Each half of that sandwich was probably 5″ long.

Why are  portions SO HUGE? Seriously-charge me half and give me half. I won’t be half as happy, I promise. I’ll be double happy. Just like when Kris Jenner had a daughter get a divorce a few minutes after getting married, just as her book was coming out. DOUBLE HAPPY.

He devised a straw holder that held his straw at the perfect height.

The food, though delicious, was so rich and now I am feeling just “bleh” I knew, KNEW I should have ordered the salad, but I really wanted that blue cheese. I need a really long run. All of this pent up energy from running errands, and working, and eating rich food needs to come out. I can’t take it. I am going bananas. A nice 15mi in the morning sounds just perfect. I guess I should fill my water bottles and chill them now!!

What is your favorite sandwich?

-if i am being honest, pb and honey

what is your favorite way to relax?

-run like I’m being chased by Michael Myers.